Fave store contest: Cherie's Eklectica

Linnea Barone's entry

I believe one of the best, intriguing gift shops around the Tampa Bay area
is CHERIE's EKLECTIKA, located on Beach Drive. This gift shop sells various
items that you do not find in your ordinary gift shop. I was able to pick up
some Christmas gifts that were great and out of the ordinary. You can spend
hours looking around and reading all the great cards they have. Also i
cannot forget that the staff is great and makes you feel very comfortable!

GO CHERIE's.

Open call: Good ideas for Valentine's Day, anyone?

So I walk into CVS the other morning to get a few toiletries. It was 6 a.m.; the only crazy person out shopping was me. An occupational hazard of being a night crawler.
As I made my way to the register, I happened to walk through the 75 percent off Christmas aisle. Kind of maudlin, really, the way the leftover holiday bits of this and that sat unbought and unwanted, shoved into a corner of the aisle. And right next to that, a garish pink and red display for Valentine's Day. Big stuffed animals holding cards and heart-shaped boxes of chocolates and the like. I found the juxtaposition of these two polar opposite holidays interesting. But are they really so different? Both days of celebration have become overblown, bloated and commercial.
And as I stood looking from the tinsel to the silk roses, I understood that I am just as guilty of contributing. Each year I too get sucked into the whole obligatory candy-coated lacy Valentine's Day thing. Not that I don't relish the chance to remind my husband that he's still the hottest guy on earth. Not that I mind the chance to try and finds words to express how huge my love is for him a la Hallmark.
It's just that maybe all the commercialized stuff takes away from the real thing a bit. What is there about a red heart-shaped box of Whitman's screams eternity? Or roses for that matter? If you only give them once a year to the one you love there's no point.
This year, I am on a mission to be different. But where exactly do I start? This is where you guys come in! I just know you romantics can help me come up with something unique for the ol' February 14 deadline that's barreling down on us all. Comment here, or drop me an email at editingdiva911@yahoo.com. I'll post your ideas.

In memory of Daddy

When I was seven years old, the nation was embroiled in the Iran Hostage Crisis. And for the first time, I was interested in world news. I wrote letters and spoke out in class and became a tad obsessed.
My father, bless his heart, urged me to be the controversial little person that he saw emerging. "Challenge everything," he told me. And he bought me a 'Khomeini is Crazy' tee shirt. I wore it to school, and they sent me home, of course.
Daddy had crust and sass, and an offbeat sense of humor that offended some, but made me laugh. I inherited all these things from him, and no price can ever be put on them.
He was also the ultimate independent shopper (I think I learned this from him, too) ... he boycotted Walmart and the like, and preferred to trade at little places where they knew him by his first name. He worked at a small lumber company in Providence, RI that right up until his death fought Home Depot and Lowe's to stay afloat. The names he called those two giants I can't even put in print.
Six years ago today, I got the worst phone call anyone could receive. They had found my father dead in his apartment at 56. He'd never been sick a day in his life. I never got to say goodbye. I flew home, and had the awful task of going through Daddy's things to square away his affairs.
Through that, I got to re-learn the man that he was. He wasn't a sinner, and he wasn't a saint, but he was everything in between. Everything that I am today at 36. I see more of my father in me as each year passes, and I am grateful for that.
So good night, Daddy. And thank you for everything.

Great local find - and new life for your broken china!

A Dunedin woman with a passion for homemade jewelry found a great way to showcase broken china and glassware - and a hobby went haywire with beautiful results!

Cracked Up Jewelry, the creation of local jewelry artist Lori Rosenberger, is truly where broken china comes to life. Lori takes all kinds of broken glassware - from Limoges to 1940s dinnerware and everything in between - and handcrafts it into unique, lovely pieces. Her online collection boasts bracelets, earrings and necklaces from Depression glass, Hobnail, milk glass, art deco, Flow Blue, Mulberry and even broken pop bottles. Fantastic vintage-inspired creations!

Lori specializes in custom work, and can even take antique photographs and transform them into romantic wearable treasures. What a unique gift! And a great way to breathe new life into a broken heirloom.

Cracked Up Jewelry's work is displayed at local consignment shops from time to time, but you can view her current collection at http://www.crackedupjewelry.com/

Marketing tip: Think through Big, Scary Ideas

Small Business Achievement Thinking Through Big Scary Ideas
by Mark Mikelat,
www.BuildingAspirations.com


Mark Mikelat is a consultant for small businesses. He is on faculty at Long Beach City College and is the founder and owner of www.BuildingAspirations.com.

Big scary ideas can grow your business, Mikelat says. "If you want big results sometimes you need to make big decisions. The challenge is that this idea is contrarian to our human nature. We work to maintain safety, comfort, and familiarity in our lives. ... Big scary ideas will bring accelerate growth your small business."

He gives an example: A client of his had opportunity to be on a TV show; in her application, she submitted just one line. No spark, no personality. Of course, she wasn't selected. Producers probably assumed she wouldn't make for an interesting show.

"This was her time to shine through, demonstrate her expertise to get on the show," Mikelat writes. "Why did not my client pursue this opportunity with greater enthusiasm? The reason is simple: it was a big scary idea. She had never been on television and the idea was intimidating. I understand that. Of course it is intimidating. That is why it represents such a great marketing opportunity. You can print out flyers and put them on cars in a mall parking lot. That will provide poor results because the idea is safe. Being on TV is not safe. Yet, this unsafe opportunity could have provided her the opportunity to sell 10,000 books by an enthused and engaged audience."

Mikelat isn't saying to just try everything at random. You need to check the risk, and weight it against possible rewards. In his client's case, he says, there was risk, of course, maybe perhaps stage fright. But no significant expense ... and the reward, that potentially would have reached thousands of viewers, and brought his client much new business.

Words that need to go out with 2008

Out with old, in with the new.
Ringing in the New Year is a bit like starting over. The slate may not be completely clean, but it is a good time to steel your resolve and attack anew some things you wanted to square away in 2008 but did not get the opportunity. Hey, we're all there on that one. My list is a mile long.
Along with bidding farewell to 2008, there are a few other things I'd like to kiss goodbye as well: words that I never want to hear used again. Ever.

In no particular order:

• "Bling." Enough, for pete's sake! Especially now, in these lean times.
• "BFF." As in "Best Friend Forever." A throw-back from our texting-happy nation.
• "Bail-out." Over it. Should now and forever only refer to a relative in jail in need of assistance.
• "Hot Spot." I never really figured this one out, anyway.
• "Embedded journalist." They're on assignment, O.K.? Can't we just call it that?
• "Insurgents." Don't get me started.
• "Forecast cone." Weather people could just say they have no idea where the storm's going...
• "Prequel." I want Hollywood to come up with some new ideas.
• "Rehab." Sorry, Dr. Drew. Take it off my T.V.
• "uber" anything. Ultra more than covers it.

And I'd like to add to this list any texting abbreviation that I can't understand. You know the script. All the OMG and such. (My 16-year old stepdaughter speaks in some sort of cryptic texting lingo that is unidentifiable. I wonder sometimes if she isn't working for Central Intelligence. Perhaps I'm just getting old.)

It would be nice to return to proper English again in 2009, whatever that may be. Somewhere between Elizabethan Shakespeare and things that are suitable for public consumption. Slang aficionados may want to hang me, but I still bid farewell to these words and all the images they bring with them. Anyone that uses them gets charged a quarter.

Happy New Year, everyone! May it healthy, safe and prosperous for all.

Life on Saltines and Jell-O

I had a recent bout with some bad gastrointestinal mojo, which landed me in the hospital for a few days. Not a fun place for a paramedic to be. Us medical people don't make very good patients.
Turns out I have ulcerative colitis AND bleeding peptic ulcers AND ulcers in my duodenum, thrown in for good measure. I'm pretty much full of holes. Why? Stress, spicy food, H-pylori, who the heck knows. Can't get a straight answer of any of the doctors that I now have to see.
What they DID tell me is not to eat anything heavy, greasy, fried, spicy, creamy, acidic, alcohol-based, vinegar-y, and caffeine-laden. This is pretty much everything out there. The good stuff. Like coffee. Or a cocktail with dinner. Or dinner at all.
And hot wings. You guys have followed my mission to find the best wings in Tampa Bay; alas, I'll never know. They just don't make enough Mylanta for me to chance it.
So I have been living the last few weeks on saltine crackers and different flavors of gelatin. If I am feeling brave, I sneak down a little chicken soup. This is not fun. I LOVE food. Lots of food. And having to go around watching people eat it all up is, at the very least, excruciating.
Right now as we speak, the guy next to me is eating gumbo. And yesterday my husband actually ordered a pizza and wolfed it down while saying to me "You poor thing."
Poor thing indeed. I am usually laid-back about a lot of things, but I now am in a constant state of being on the verge of throwing a tantrum. Especially during the holidays when full platters of heavenly stuff are being passed under my nose. My mother even makes her own holiday candy! It's got chocolate and peanuts and peanut butter all rolled into ...
I can't even talk about it. It's too upsetting. And when did every commercial on T.V. become involved with food?! Does every fast-food restaurant have to launch a new burger at once? And can't people meet for a facial instead of a drink?
And just who does Outback think they are with those steak ads?
O.K., I'll stop. But let me tell you this: Appreciate and love and each little snack you're munching right now. When you go out, order everything on the menu for me. Raise a toast to my ulcers. I'll be the one in the corner having green Jell-O and a side of cardboard.

Black Friday, the Sequel

So Christmas is here, everything's been unwrapped, and we're all laying around fat and happy. But not for long.
Somewhere around ten o'clock tonight, we'll all get that little itch to get back out there with the masses tomorrow and do more shopping. Return stuff. Get more stuff. Use the gift cards that are already burning a hole in your pocket (like they are in mine).
Retailers, David and Goliaths alike, are waiting for this day to potentially save their holiday season. Sales percentages this year represent the worst numbers in decades. The majority of retailers, despite monster deals and promotions, are reporting losses.
Not a good forecast for our already bleak economy. Bad revenue now leads to more layoffs later, which has a ripple effect that touches us all.
So tomorrow is perhaps the second biggest shopping day of the year: Black Friday, the Sequel. And I hate to keep beating this drum, but if our big retail giants are going a little hungry right now, that means our local independent retailers are starving. So if we're going to spend a little post-holiday cash and scratch our shopping itch, let's all try to do it at our favorite mom and pop places that need it a little more than Target and Walmart. So everyone can enjoy the holiday bacchanalia!

Thanks, AJC

Too often mainstream newspapers focus on what the Big Box stores are doing. Pick up any major metropolitan paper on Black Friday, and you'll most likely see a story about what's on sale at Macy's, Sears, Target, Walmart. Story will probably be on the front page. Of course, you can flip through the paper and see their full-page ads, too, touting these very same sales.

As it gets closer to Christmas, you'll probably see a variation of that article again and again. Stocking stuffers, gift guides, last-minute gift ideas. ... all focus on what's available at the chains and franchises.

So we were happy to see a fresh approach at the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Along with their stories on the chains, AJC reporters also went out into their own neighborhoods, checked out what the local businesses were doing.

We hope other papers follow AJC's lead.

Here are excerpts and links to two stories the paper recently published:

Little stores, big hopes
Location counts for local, independent retailers. During dismal season, intown shops with higher foot traffic may fare better than those in suburbs.

By Jamie Gumbrecht
Tuesday, December 23, 2008

During this scrimp-and-save holiday shopping season, the problems hitting major chain retailers are being felt by small, locally owned stores, too.
In fact, it may be even worse for the little guys, such as Peony Lin, owner of Lavender boutique in Alpharetta.
“We have seen an increase in shoppers versus last month, still not as good as it was last year,” Lin said. “They’re cutting down on their purchases, much more cautious. They’re always asking for sales, coupons. They’re always trying to find the best deal.”




Go local for unique gifts

By Nedra Rhone
Sunday, December 07, 2008

The holidays can drive even the hardiest of shoppers batty, and the mall-averse may find themselves particularly vulnerable to the holiday shopping blues. Fortunately, there are more and more options —- local craft markets, neighborhood specialty shops and online shopping —- to satisfy the nonmall shopper who seeks a one-stop experience.

Show charity year-round

I always feel a little bad for the Salvation Army bell-ringers. Lots of people do anything they can to avoid them, like putting their heads down, walking around them quickly or using another entrance and exit from the store.



And still they stand, silently soliciting by their lone kettles. I stopped to talk to one in Ellenton recently on my way into Publix. I only had a couple of dollars, but as always, it was appreciated. And I hated to ask, but since we are living in scary economic times, I wondered how the donations were faring.



Horribly, he told me. No one has any money to spare, which means the less fortunate shall get less help. It's everywhere; every time I turn on the news there's an update on the crisis situation in our food pantries and homeless shelters. Things are dire.



"Maybe things will perk up soon," I told him. "Then next Christmas will be a little better for all."



But he told me something that we all know in our hearts but tend to forget in the minutia of everyday life: "We need to give all year. Not just as Christmas."



How true. People are poor year-round; children don't stop needing clothing and toys because the holiday season has ended. Families don't stop needing food on the table. And I took a look at my life after he said this, and counted how many times I've cleaned out the pantry and tossed away things that the soup kitchens could have used. How many articles of clothing have been gotten rid of with the tags still on them.

We need to show charity as much as we can, not just at this time of the year. So I'm urging all my readers, join with me. Make a pledge for the New Year to give something to those who have nothing.