Not rain, sleet or power outage...

Nothing keeps crafter's away from a big sale! We had our MYSTERY SALE at the Market St. Crafting Cottage yesterday. What a day! Most of the day we spent in the dark without electrical power. Did that stop our loyal crafter's from coming out for a bargain? No way! They came in groves and saved a whopping 50% off everything in the store.

Cheryl called me at home at 8:45 to say the roads up her way were all ice and that she would have to be a little late. I told her to make sure it was safe before she headed to the store. I arrived on Market St. to find the sad news that Sorge's Restaurant had burned and that our side of the street was without power. Needless to say the day was not how I had imagined. Cheryl arrived a little later and we were going to go have breakfast and wait and see if the power would come back on. To our surprise when we put the sign on the door and headed out for our breakfast we had two excited ladies waiting across the street for our doors to open. They didn't realize that we were without power and that there had been a fire. So... I did what any other manager and crafter would do... I opened the doors and invited them in to shop in the dark!

They came from Elmira and had a great time. With the help of a small flashlight and a candle they devoured every corner of our store. They didn't want to miss anything. Before I knew if the store was filled with crafter's all laughing and having fun enjoying our sale.

Throughout the day we had a couple short periods when the lights would come on. Unfortunately when they came on so would our fire alarm in the store go off. At one time my daughter Erica was shopping and she tried to help by wrapping her coat and scarf around the alarm to muffle the sound. Hey, don't laugh. IT WORKED! And our customers were thrilled. We also had a wonderful husband and wife come into the store to shop while we were without power. He even went back to their car to get his wife a flashlight. He thought it was great that we stayed open for the sale. He even propped our front door open with a chair and a sign to let people know we were up and running. When they checked out their purchases he handed me his flashlight and told me to use it the rest of the day and he would come back next week to pick it up! WOW! How nice was that!

So, the Mystery Sale on Market St. didn't quite go as I had planned. It ended up better than I could have imagined! Family, friends, customers and strangers all came together and laughed, joked and helped each other make the best of a bad situation. What a day!