Reader of the Week at Wickedly Chic!

I've been chosen as Reader of the Week over at Wickedly Chic, one of the best websites out there for Indie shopping. As reader of the week, they asked me to suggest some of my favorite Indie merchants. This gave me a great opportunity to plug the merchants in my Reclaimed to Fame Market. Unfortunately I was limited and couldn't choose them all but put in as many as I could. I wrote glowing reviews for each of the merchants. Though each review was only a sentence long, Wickedly Chic apparently decided not to include them and just added the links to the shops. It must have been too long for their page. But it's still very nice to see our Reclaimed to Fame merchants given front page on that site!

http://www.wickedlychic.com/

The worms will love it!

Pretty, isn't it?? OK, well maybe not. But the worms will love it. And so will my garden. I'm determined to master composting this year. I have a lot of dead leaves, plants and flowers from my garden that I know would make good compost that can be used to enrich the soil of my garden. Plus all those vegetables peels, coffee grinds, tea bags and egg shells from my kitchen. This type of recycling may not produce beautiful products like those found in the Reclaimed to Fame market on 1000 Markets but it's a very helpful way of recycling all those nutrients that are thrown away from our kitchens and yards each day.



Last year I started throwing my coffee grinds into the garden. But this year I wanted to do it right. But when I went to check out compost bins, I found that they are between $100 to $250 and even more. That wasn't what I had in mind.

So here's my homemade effort. I've punched in at least 200 holes all over the garbage can, bigger ones on the top and bottom. I hope that's going to be enough to give it good ventilation. I've done some research on composting and there are three main things needed to have a good compost bin - air, water and food.



To give the compost heap air, I'll need to make sure the pile doesn't get too wet so it all mashes down. I'll have to roll the garbage can around to break it all up so it will have enough air. And make sure that it's a little wet, but not too wet. It it gets too wet, I'll have to add more dry materials to it. There are two types of "food" for the compost bin - brown and green. Brown is all those dead leaves, dead plants, straw and sawdust. Green is green weeds, coffee grinds, tea bags and all those vegetable and fruit scraps from the kitchen. It has to be a pretty even combination of the two.



So hopefully in a couple of months, I'll have some rich, black compost full of nutrients for my garden. I've added some photos of a few of the flowers that have already appeared here in New Jersey - daffodils and crocus. Next year they should be even more beautiful from all the good soil they'll have from my compost bin!

New Reclaimed to Fame Market!

I'm very pleased and proud to announce the newly formed Reclaimed to Fame Market on 1000 Markets. I joined 1000 Markets a couple of months ago and set up a shop there. I loved the look and concept of this new online marketplace. The idea behind 1000 Markets is to create a marketplace that is more than just a collection of products. They want to connect the artisan merchants with the people who love their products.



To visit 1000 Markets is like strolling through your favorite marketplace, only you don't need to leave your home to do it. In each shop, there is a place where you can post comments to the merchants. Some of the merchants also have blogs in their shops where you can read about them and their work and get to know them better. The shops are organized into different markets specializing in unique products.

I approached the owner of 1000 Markets, Matt Trifiro, with the idea of creating a market exclusively for recycled products. He told me what he needed to put it all together and I've been working with him on setting up the criteria for admission, finding appropriate merchants and working up a slogan and market policies. Christine Epstein of Oceano Sea Glass designed our beautiful banner. And yesterday it all went live!

At this time, we have 16 merchants in the market. We have outside art such as fire pits and birdhouses, clothing, jewelry, greeting cards and some fabulously inventive artwork. Each of the merchants was hand picked by me to ensure that shoppers in our market will find only unique, handcrafted recycled arts and crafts. If you're a shopper looking for something special that you won't find at your local mall, I know you'll be pleased with the assortment of products our market offers. Not only will you be buying something unique, but you'll be helping to contribute to the health of our world by buying recycled. If you're a merchant at 1000 Markets and sell only recycled products and would liked to be included in our market, please contact me.



Happy shopping, everyone!

Reclaimed to Fame Market