Open See and Look What I Found!

Today was the Open See, I drove to nyc yesterday after about 5 hours sleep getting everything I needed to do done before I left. I had a wonderful night with my sister Gillian and her friends and then awoke this morning at 5am...that would make about 4 hours sleep...and was on line by 6am with my very amazing sister by my side. I was located directly under the Harry Winston sign and stayed there until 9am. The line went very quickly at that moment and by 9:45 I had gone in and showed my jewelry and was on my way back uptown. I pretty much feel that today was a complete waste of my time. I reflected on this as I drove home like a zombie this morning, and then after I awoke from my vegetative state of napping all afternoon.

The two buyers that I showed to liked my jewelry and said they were very interested in my rings in particular, but that they already had some similar stuff in the store. They asked a few questions...did I have wholesale accounts, how much did I sell on my own web site, and what were the most popular items that I sold? That was it, no real feedback that I could use, and nothing to really take with me. Well, at least I have done it...one more thing I can say I have accomplished.

OK, so that is enough energy that I have spent on this one store, its been a long and stressful month freaking out about something that would never really have done much anyway, and now I just feel a bit silly about it all. Even if they loved my stuff, the most I would have received was a trunk show in the store...not something that would make or break me.

Well tonight I went to the grocery store and blockbuster...while hungry...you should see all the food I bought, I can tell spring is here...veggies and healthy food seemed to gravitate to my cart. At blockbuster I bought two movies I have been dying to see...Margot at The Wedding and Martian Child. I am watching the latter right now, so no opinion yet....but I liked Margot at The Wedding..especially the last scene. Nicole Kidman removes her cardigan and the rest of the letters of her shirt come into view...it looks vaguely familiar and as I watch more and more of the shirt, it dawns on me...its a Millbrook School, Trevor Zoo shirt!



I was checking out some stuff on Noah Baumbach, the director and writer of Margot at the Wedding and in an interview he actually mentions the shirt! Sub note...Baumbach also wrote The Squid and Teh Whale and Steve Zizou, two awesome movies hat I adore.

Is that your Midwood T-shirt Nicole Kidman wears in the final scene? I don’t think it’s Midwood; it’s Millbrook. It’s something Ann Roth, the costume designer, brought in. I actually had a different T-shirt in mind when I scripted it but we couldn’t find one that worked and Ann had this old Millbrook T-shirt which, when Nicole put it on, just felt like something she had her whole life.

OK, I am obsessed with this all of a sudden...but Ann Roth was the costume designer for Regarding Henry which was filmed at the Millbrook School the year before I was a freshman there...ah the connection is made, I feel better now.

Allergies and Easter Candy

That is what my week has consisted of. Although it took me until Wednesday to realize that it was already allergy season for me. As my birthday was the day before Easter this year, my mom presented me with a mountain of my beloved Cadbury creme eggs...this happened once in prep too, as a result one of my friends called me cadbury for years! Anyway, I have been slowly eating my way through them all week, perfect timing to be all fashionable on Monday, although with my allergies I have hardly been eating, so I guess it all evens out.

Other then that I have just been prepping my tush off for the Bendels Open See. I have line sheets all ready and I think samples that well represent my work...now I just have to go.

One long weekend is upon me...a meeting at 4 and then work until most likely 1:30 tonight. Saturday my good friend Jono has a show that I cannot make, but will at least be able to pop into before work...Sunday I have to go the restaurant in the morning to do the dreaded end of the month inventory...then get my car inspected and washed before I leave for nyc. I will meet up with Gilly...and hopefully my long day will have made me tired enough to go to sleep, as I am then getting up at sparrow fart to go stand in line all morning. Then the 5 minutes will happen that could change my life. I will then lounge around nyc for a while until dinner at 6:30 with my friend Bryan, who is one of my favorite people in the world. Then finally I will get home around 11 Monday night.

I also have a show next Saturday! Woo Hoo, I bet if you come you can score a Cadbury Creme Egg! Speaking of Saturday April 5th...If you are in the Chicago area, please tune in to CBS 2 Chicago at 8 am to catch Manic Trout Necklaces on TV in a segment about eco friendly jewelry!

What would life be like, without stress?

I think about this every often, and then I also think that realistically I think I am sure that I tend to push to stressful areas in my relationships and work...its the over achiever in me I guess. I did however realize that as it gets increasingly harder to balance being a bar manager and running the ever growing Manic Trout that I tend to accumulate people who have to maintain my life. So far Manic Trout has only had PR wonder woman and accountant added to the list...but in my personal life I am having a crisis over fitting in everyone. I have to fit in the mechanic, vet, (the last two are not for me, but I still have to be there and pay for them) hair stylist, pedicurist, podiatrist and acupuncturist this week I need to get a facial, but I have no idea when that is even possible. I should also see the dentist as I clench my jaw so much when I sleep that I have headaches, so who knows what it is doing to my teeth. oh crap and I just remember my inspection needs to be done on my car.

The mountain of work is also piling higher each day, and I am getting buried under it all. I am prepping at the moment for the next Open See at Bendels, which is next Monday...the stress from that alone is enough to make me burst into tears...I did manage to go running yesterday, which helped, but as I have to go into work at 2 today, its not a possibility.

However, I have heard that stress is one of the best fuels to power a successful entrepreneur, so maybe its all for the best...I'll just keep thinking that...OK deep breaths and power on...

I tried to stop it from arriving...

alas, I can not stop time...so today I turn 31. Wow, its odd to write that. It feels as though I was wearing that crown and boa not that long ago (thats me on the left). I celebrated last night at the end of work and into the early morning hours with a few good friends, so I am not as chipper today as usual, and I have to work tonight, but I am enjoying the day none the less.

Now if only the signs of age would go away and I could turn my head with out pain...I pulled a muscle this week and have not been enjoying limited mobility, but its getting better every day...and last night after doing shots it felt awesome, who knew, alcohol sometimes IS the answer!

I have been quoted!

So Monday I was out running errands and I decided that it was time to buy a new scanner, as the last one I had which was very fancy, high tech and ginormous used scsi and therefore would not work with my computer. Well the main reason was so that I could scan in things from magazine...which is almost enough for me not to miss my camera, but not quite...anyway...the fruits of my labour is that my press page is up to date and actually shows the pages I have stuff on...crazy, I know. The exciting news is that the most recent piece to hit the newsstands includes not only a lovely necklace, but a quote...by me! The hot pink boxes direct you to Manic Trout...



In case you do not have bat vision..."Manic Trout jewelry designer Sierra Bailey says 'A dash of gold makes an outfit look sophisticated and glamorous, yet dramatic'"

So exciting! While I am congratulating myself I will also add that in the past two days Manic Trout has been mentioned in the fashion blogs Trendinista, The Budget Fashionista and Fashion Binge! I was extraordinarily honored to have these blogs notice Manic Trout. I also had to laugh that Fashion Binge said that Manic Trout sounds like a tedious jam band name...ahhh those days of Grateful Dead adoration are permanently stuck in my subconscious I suppose once a deadhead, always a deadhead.

A camera-less existence

Well actually, the camera is fine...the software is not...sadly, when I upgraded I was not prepared for a few software glitches and did not have the upgrades already here. I had to order some new software and until it gets here I cannot upload anything. sad. I had a post about a whole pile of photos I recently bought from Etsy all ready to go on Friday too...all that was left was adding the photos of them displayed...but alas, no dice.

Well, I do have tons of photos from the past...so I will work from those. Did I mention last week that it was Faye's birthday? Yes, my darling dog turned turned 6 on March 11th. In case you have never formally met her, I will share my favorite photo that I call "This is Faye"


Judging from the length of my hair, this was taken a while ago, but she has not changed at all in the year or so since that photo!

27 new items!

Very late, but its done! 27 new items are now available at Manic Trout! Yay!!!!

Wow! An OS upgrade kicked my butt....

So on Monday I had a pile of work to go through...a very large pile...and I was making my way through it...slowly. Then I had the great idea to make it the day to set up my big new external hard drive, back up all of my work and finally update to Leopard. Well...this process alone took the better part of the night...and then. It happened. Everything went wrong.

It took many, many, many hours to straighten it all out...some of them in terminal and much of it spent moving files one at a time from my new favorite thing I own, my LaCie hard drive...which saved Manic Trout's life.

So now, here I am...even more behind then ever, but with a snazzy new OS and the peace of mind of having all of my work backed up!

Catching Up

Slowly, ever so slowly, I am getting caught up...there is so many little bits that just add up to a mountain of tasks if I don't keep on top of them. The end of the month also brings filing, processing and inputting of all sorts of stuff...perhaps I should try to do this at the end of each week, no? Sadly, I still have not sat down to design any thing new in a bout two weeks, how sad is that? Well, after I get all of the new stuff added to the web site, and the newsletter out I can focus on that. I did just update the press page...well kind of...I have the covers up, I am still missing the scans...but I'm getting there one bit at a time.

I have an open studio going on, but I told so few people that I am jsut enjoying a god reason not to leave my studio all day...and I had to get up early too...imagine that! The weather has also decided not to be kind to me for two months in a row, as its pouring out!

I have overwhelmed paralysis

Sometimes I just get the point where I have so much to do that I get stuck...its like everything starts to move in slow motion around me and I feel like I am in a dream state...or maybe its more like i am stuck in the mud...actually I believe that due to the tightening in the chest that I may be having a bit of a panic attack about having so much to do and having to go the restaurant at 2pm until 11pm...where I will make very little cash as its early March...such a dilemma...not ready to cut the cord on the full time job, yet I do not have 40+ hours a week to devote to said job. Deep breaths...

I have been trying to get any thing on a deadline done as soon as I find out about it....but everything else gets pushed back every time another deadline appears...arghhhhhh!

Ok...I don't even have time to freak out right now...must keep going...

I am so behind...but check out all this press!

OK, so last week left me much more behind then I thought...all the new goodies I have ready to post and the Manic Monday Newsletter are all pushed to next Monday...sorry. Although the good news is that the red Sweetest Thing Earrings are all coming back then too, yay!

The exciting news is that so far today I have found out that Manic Trout is in Seventeen Magazine (April 2008), Venus Zine (Spring 2008), Justine Magazine (February/March 2008) and Figure Magazine (March/April 2008)...how awesome is that?

Simply Stunning...

OK, this is for the blogger readers, so all you myspace blog reads, you'll have to head on over to The real Manic Trout Blog to see what the fuss is all about...

I have been adding to my Etsy Shop again recently...so far its just stuff you can find at Manic Trout, but I tend to shop on Etsy a lot, especially for photos...so I was fooling around with the tool that makes the instant banners from your shop and I clicked on the option to make one up from a selection of my favorites...and needless to say I will have all of these asap...I have one already on its way and in the mail...but the set as a whole made me swoon....I wonder if the set changes if the items are purchased (eta: I have bought all 5 photos...and figured out how to keep them in the banner!)? Well this may be a time sensitive post, but what a beautiful thing it was for those minutes...Hopefully you still see the five flowers in the right hand column...

Random facts about Manic Trout

I was tagged the other day by the fabulous blog Cherry Coloured although I have not finished my post on this, I have however realized how fun random facts are. I have thus decided that I will begin to share random facts with you about Manic Trout, and sometimes about me.

So first off, I thought I would introduce you to some of the fun that I have with the real behind the scenes stuff...naming all of my designs. I once upon a time would just make up a name for each design and then picked a girls name for each color/style randomly...well, I really quickly started to come up with some stupid names, and I exhausted my resources for girls names as well. (some of these early made up names are still existent, I am embarrassed to say...i.e...the very original Bottle Cap Necklace) So I knew I had to look else where...

You must be chomping at the bit in anticipation right now...waiting to find out where I come up with all of these bizarre names! Well all of the designs names are songs, some make obvious sense and some just work in my complicated mind...but they are all song names. The Sweetest Thing Earrings are named for the Lauryn Hill song.

The names of each color/style I get from a web site that has lists and lists of names...so I pick a theme for each piece...the Salt Water Sound Necklaces which are inspired by Japanese fishing balls have Japanese names.


The Sweetest Thing Earrings have Gypsy names...and the meaning of the names usually plays in too...Pesha which is the name of a diminuitive pair of flower earrings, means small...Pattin which is a pair of tiny pink leaf earrings, means leaf. Shimza which are bright orange earrings that look like gummy roses, means joy and happiness and the very pretty Ilona earrings which are shaped like a pink lily means beautiful one.

I also have some silly and fun names...the Button Rings are all named after Super Villianesses! So you can find your inner bad girl and wear her name with pride!



Also fun to note is that the Bling Rings are named named after the women with the largest and best jewelry collections throughout history...Elizabeth Taylor, Jacqueline Onassis, Joan Crawford, Mary Pickford, Ava Gardner and Theda Bara to name a few.

In case you were wondering...the paintings have name themes too...they are named and I am sure influenced in both tiny and huge ways by the titles of books I am reading when I paint them...I will admit that I have bought and read books because I thought the titles were so good to work with.

I hope you enjoyed these random facts about Manic Trout!