Letters to Ann

Dear Ann,

It was the last Sunday in the month, which was Wickham market. Earlier this year Charley had taken clothing, knick knacks & all she wanted to get rid of to sell. Because it was bric-a-brac she did better selling her used clothing & ‘stuff’ for very minimal amounts like a dollar or three items for $5.

I was amazed as she almost did better than the relish. So with this experience behind her she decided to go again in February. Naturally, I said I would tag along with some relish, that maybe we would sell or not sell, but at least I could be beside her to give some support.

We arranged to meet at a certain spot to be together when we drove into the site. This was our normal practice for Wickham. The organizers only charge $10 for the site so we had little to lose.

However, when we met she got out of her car, came to me in my car saying she didn’t think she could stand all the rejections that the folk attending this market had to offer, so why don’t we to take a look at a Farmers Market?

“Good thought,” said I, as we are trying to get into these markets & they are very up market markets. You can’t just pop along & drop in! Charley is familiar with the one we were going to whereas I had never been to one, only heard about them for years.

Two years ago I applied to get into one, but when I received all the paper work to be done I reneged as I was in this market thing as a hobby, not as a business.

However, Charley is now in charge of getting into some more really good markets like these, so the interest has come to the surface again. As I said, you can’t just drive in like we do with all the others. You almost have to pass exams to get into these markets.

Over the years, far back when Philip was married to Jenni, I have heard about these markets because Jenni used to shop there. So when Charley mentioned going to the Entertainment Centre in Newcastle to witness what it was like, I was all for it.

We got in her car, leaving mine parked in the suburb of Hamilton where I was parked & she took me to see the Farmers Market.

Well I don’t know what I expected, but to put it mildly I was ‘gob smacked,’ which means amazed. We drove into the Entertainment Centre where it was held & there were traffic people guiding the cars in at $2 entry fee!

It is a huge place as you can imagine. I Was thinking the market would be held in one small part. No sir, not the case! You would be forgiven if you thought ‘Disney On Ice’ was being performed.

It was a complete sea of parked cars & when we saw a spot to park Charley’s car we stepped out to a sea of stalls. It is one of the biggest eye openers I have ever had!

And when they call it a Farmers Market it was truly that & more. I was like a country bumpkin on her first trip to a big city, even though I have travelled a fair way around the world!

The stalls were amazing. The fruit & veges were amazing: straight from farm to you. Everything was amazing.

One of the first stalls we came to had fresh strawberries – picked yesterday – set out on small plastic platters & wrapped in glad wrap. I vowed months ago that i would never buy strawberries again as they look good in the super market & taste like plastic.

At this market they had strawberries cut up for tastings. I have not tasted a strawberry like that since Max & I called at a strawberry farm once on the way to Queensland many years ago. The flavour was unbelievable, real, true, home grown fresh strawberries. I chalked that one up to collect at on our way out.

I could not believe what Charley had brought me to. The whole place was simply buzzing. It wasn’t even 8 a.m. & the place was packed.

People were sitting in the provided places having breakfast. Whole families & all bought from the stall holders. We wended our way in & out arriving at the stalls under cover.

I was blown away at the hub-bub & the butchers shops with their sausages on display making my mouth water. I am still berating myself for not buying them as I could feed on sausages like that for a fortnight!

Charley had been saying how her  step sister, Georgia comes all the way from Medowie every week just to shop at the Farmers market. I can now understand why.

Charley knew her way around very well, telling me I just had to see the eclair stall. Well we did & they even have gold eclairs. Plus  strawberry ones; mango ones & orange ones, but only the strawberry had a filling of fresh cream. All the others had had a mousse filling applicable to their name.

I just had to buy one, so I chose Mango. Charley chose the Strawberry one. Charley got me a coffee & we sat at a little round glass table with a couple of stools & had coffee & eclairs for breakfast!

Jiiminy Cricket it was all mind boggling. As I sat there nibbling at an eclair, feeling guilty at what i was having for breakfast, but appreciating my coffee very much, my mind was doing big calculations!

Charley has already applied for the application forms & doing photographs of our produce etc. This is where we want my little hobby & what is to be Charley’s future business. For once I was out of my depth & have told Charley it scares me to death.

If we get okayed I have put it all in her lap as it is too big for me. Charley is young & very capable.

If our application finally gets accepted I will give Charley all the support she needs once she has driven in, set up the display, parked the car etc. For once in my life it felt it too big for me to handle. In other words I felt a little old!

I have, over the past two years. made myself walk slower, watch where the feet are going, put things out of the way, so that you don’t have a fall etc, which has worked well, but in doing this going slower makes you feel older.

However, I am not too old as I stopped at the strawberry stall on the way out to purchase a few trays of the juicy sweet strawberries for Charley & I.

I wished later that I had bought more for David & his family, but I truly wasn’t thinking straight it was such an eye opener.

If Charley gets us into these markets with our home made relish, chutneys & particularly Christmas Puddings, we won’t need to win the lottery. We would work hard, but would get a lot of satisfaction in the process & Charley a wonderful future which she is aiming at.

What I couldn’t help noticing is that all the produce there was top quality & not a soul quibbled at the prices asked which appealed to us immensely.

And the strawberries were divine!

Love You Heaps. Dawn X O X O

Dear Ann,

On the last Sunday in the month, a huge market in a delightful tree filled park is held in the suburb of Wickham. When I first went there in October 2016 it was on the advice given to me by another stall holder.

It is a market where no stalls were allocated ahead & it was first in best dressed. I met a lady who goes there with her bric-a-brac & said she gets there at 4 a.m. to get what she termed ‘her spot’.

On my first visit I arrived three hours later than that, took pot luck with the sites left & set up shop with Christmas puddings. I did quite well in the remote spot left, far from the main hub of things.

Through one thing & another I did not go back to Wickham until late last year with Charley. We had both Chutney & Christmas Puddings & the results could almost be termed as zero.

However, I always think of what I learnt from my brother Peter, who said that if you look hard enough through the dark clouds you will find a silver lining.

This could not be more true of the first time Charley & I went there late last year with the Christmas Puddings. I did expect some interest from the volume of people who passed by but we soon became aware that our stall was not bric-a-brac, as ninety percent of them were. However, we did have a ray of sunshine.

A young lady approached our stall & started to talk with us, She stood out from the rest of the crowd as she was so nicely dressed, spoke well & was interested in us. Her name is Catherine. She explained that she had only recently come to live in that area & was associated & employed by the Newcastle High School.

In the course of our conversation she asked if we might be willing to donate a Christmas Pudding for a raffle to benefit the school. I could see she was a go-getter, someone with such a positive attitude & will succeed in whatever she did & to be honest she did remind me of someone I knew very well – me!

I liked her & realised that she was dedicated to her school & come high or low water she would be a success. I made a deal with her saying that I would give her one of each of our four varieties of Christmas Puddings for her raffles (amounting to quite a large sum in value) if she would work at getting sales for us. I just knew she would.

She agreed saying I would not be disappointed with my decision & I knew she would not let me down. Her husband, Grant, works at a school in Toronto, next door to me where Fennels Bay markets are held, so we arranged for him to call at my door & pick up the four promised puddings.

That was in early October. I also gave Grant a container full of tastings for Catherine to use as she saw fit.

Catherine used them very well & took them around to all the teachers at the school; used them at Staff meetings; etc. Every so often from then on she would call me to say Grant would be calling to give me the order for puddings that he had to pick up & pay me for those already collected.

I will never forget the day she called me to give me an order which Grant was to pick up from our Twilight Market being held that night at nearby, Speers Point. She said, “And tonight I am going to make you rich tonight as Grant will give you all the money I have collected for what I have sold recently.”

I was taken by Catherine’s personality when we first met & loved her great enthusiasm. As I said, I knew she would not let me down & she certainly didn’t!

When school resumed this year & Grant was back at work, I came home one day to find he had left me a Certificate of Appreciation for my invaluable & contribution of prizes to Newcastle High School Christmas Raffles. That was so sweet as I have never been given one of those before & the thought meant so much.

So, that is the big ray of sunshine to come from Wickham, which I term as Wicked Wickham. Since then I have spoken on the phone to Caroline who said that everybody has raved about the puddings.

In my opinion she worked wonders with the raffles in how she split the puddings up putting them with other things. For instance she mentioned how she put the Traditional Puddings with a plate, saucer, coffee mug, creamer & sugar bowl etc. as a little afternoon tea party gift. I thought how clever that was & we are both looking forward to a continued relationship for the next Christmas season.

God Bless You, I think of you such a lot. Dawn X O X O

Dear Ann,

When Charley & I went to Burbank in December 2015 we were doing quite a bit of window shopping the day after we arrived, so that she could get a feel for the place. We wandered into a delightful, but small boutique.

It had a definite ‘Charley’ dress in the window, which she just had to try on, It looked beautiful on her so I made a quick purchase to go under the Christmas tree. Also on a model just inside the door to the boutique was a little black top sporting a life sized cat on the front & the back. We both thought it rather cute, particularly Charley with her love for cats, so I encouraged her to try it on which became a second gift to go under the Christmas tree!

She has had a lot of wear from both items ever since. I am explaining this for a reason which I will come to shortly.

In February we went along to one of our minor markets at Fennels Bay, which isn’t a very good market. We have found that when there is a large volume of bric-a-brac & used clothing stalls it is not so viable or profitable for those with a better class of produce.

We consider our products are among the better class with more appeal to those who are not so much looking for bargains but good home made products. Charley & I have decided we will still patronise this venue, as it costs little to be there, & we are content in the lower sales. Our attitude being that we would do better than sitting at home doing nothing.

So until we can find our way into more profitable & active markets we are happy to attend as, in recent months, we have booked a permanent space. Anyway on a lovely day it’s not hard to take just sitting in the sun chatting to those who come & try our products. Although Charley, being a redhead, has to be extremely careful not to get sunburnt!

Actually in February our sales there were the best we had had for some months, which was encouraging. Maybe it was because Charley wore her ‘cat top’! She looked great & was admired by many.

I was finding it rather quiet & left Charley to hold the fort while I sussed out the ingredients we needed for the production. We had to do as there are a couple of really good greengrocers who attend this market. Having completed this chore I wandered around a bit which I don’t normally do & I had a great time.

Charley with her cat top and cat cup.

I came across a chap who makes animals & things out of concrete. He had an attractive bird bath made that was lovely & deep, with a kookaburra sitting on the end of the bath. On the pedestal he had a possum at the foot of it peeping out from a tree trunk that even had initials carved into it.

I fell in love with it. As my friend Sandra had given me $50 as a Christmas gift, I decided that this would be what I would spend it on & have something to show.

I am still waiting for my gardener to put it into place in my garden. When it’s in place I will take a photo of it to show you. I am really pleased with it & know that Sandra will be delighted with my choice of the gift that will remind me always of my friend every time I look at it.

As I was wandering around I came across another stall which had mostly bric-a-brac but I did notice a coffee mug with a cat on it which, of course, caught my eye. The lady said it was $2.50 so I decided to snap it up as a gift for Charley.

However, I was even more delighted when there was a set of four cat mugs all different, brand new & in a gift box. It was $2.50 for the lot ! Charley, of course, was delighted when I took them back to our stall & gave them to her.

One of the things I have ascertained in being at markets with Charley is her love of crystal, which really surprised me. The young people today do not favour it greatly, most are very disinterested . Where I bought the coffee mugs the lady had a crystal dressing table set, which brought back memories as I still have mine & can remember when Mum gave it to me for my fifteenth birthday.

As the sweet lady only wanted $10 for it I also snapped that up, but it is a secret as I have wrapped it up to give to her on her next birthday. I think she will be stoked. I am now spending a little bit of time perusing all the markets as what do people say, “One man’s trash is another man’s treasure!”

We had quite a good day in sales, much improved, so we are taking this as a good omen. In any case we also enjoyed the warmth from the sun & the lovely breeze blowing in from the lake. Lake Macquarie is our beautiful lake in Newcastle & very large reputing to be three hundred & sixty five kilometres around it, one for each day of the year.

It certainly is a draw card to our city as it is well known so as we sit at our markets in this area the water has a nice calming & relaxing effect,

Love to you always dear friend. God Bless, Dawn. X O X O