week 24 - weekend excursion to geneva, il

do you believe it is labor day weekend? how did that happen? what did you do? mesh is also enjoying a monday night off due to labor day. my husband and I took an excursion to the suburbs all day saturday and visited geneva, illinois.

if you haven’t been to geneva you should definitely put it on your list to go! it’s easy to drive and is also on the metra line. one of my best friends used to live in geneva, so it brings back good memories every time i’m there. (but i always wish she was with me when i’m there.)

third street is my favorite. there are tons of shops that have found their place in old homes along this wide boulevard. you just go house to house, store to store…

i went to all my typical stops on third street; cocoon, paper merchant, little traveler to name a few. the houses are filled with home accessories, holiday decorations, gourmet foods and any other trinket you could think of. i did happen to find a new ‘must –go’ called grahams. it is the local handmade chocolate shop…and a door or two down is grahams coffee and ice cream restaurant. i would recommend the espresso con panna.

another change on third street (well, it was new to me) was the restaurant called fiona’s. it’s in a beautiful old home that used to be a shabby chic type of furniture shop….but now is a restaurant. the home sits at an angle on a corner lot. it just beckons you in. we went in there for a relaxing lunch and each had really great sandwiches. i recommend the mediterranean chicken with olive tapenade. it also happened to be voted best new restaurant in 2010 (west suburban living magazine). it was a good find.

hope everyone had a great holiday weekend! mesh is looking forward to our thursday show at kimball.

-sherry

on the table | beads of all fall colors

week 23 - botox show!

this post comes to you on tuesday morning, as i suppose most posts do by the time you see them after our busy monday night production sessions. last night we were knee deep in creating pieces to fit into the inventory of a few new boutiques that sherry will be visiting this week. we love setting a style and design goal for ourselves, to make sure we get as creative as possible with the beads, stones, and trinkets that we think will be a sensation for a new group of mesh fashionistas.

speaking of mesh fashionistas, tonight is our long awaited botox show! salon rhapsody in frankfort, il and owner heather fox will be hosting a botox party and has invited mesh to join in on the excitement. while both sherry and i are afraid of the botox injection process, let alone the word botox, we thought this would be the perfect way to spend a mesh tuesday with the our friends in frankfort!

please come out to see what this party is all about. we will be one of two vendors showcased at this event, and there are all kinds of perks for those of you who can make it! check out salon rhapsody's facebook page for all of the event details!

-melissa

on the table kelly's bag of spectacularness! thank you kelly!!!

week 22 - end of summer flea market finds

it happens every summer. august comes…and then goes way too fast. wait, summer is over? why did it go so fast? well, it happened this year again to me. even though we did tons of fun outings and events, there were still many things that we didn’t cross off our list.

flea markets. that is always on my list. although they are 'hit and miss,’ i love them. It’s the adventure of the hunt for the perfect piece of furniture or mesh trinket. this past saturday my husband and I went to the highwood street market on the north shore.

it was great. we even had a coupon to ensure a reasonable $2 entry fee. this offset my $4 hot dog. the festival was in a beautiful park area…so plenty of trees for shade on a hot day. it was just the right size also, only taking a few hours to see all the vendors.

one booth particularly held my attention. (no, not the one where the vendor’s dog was apparently biting other dogs). this woman had buckets and buckets of trinkets…watch parts, game pieces, old door hardware, vintage earrings….all things mesh! I was able to find some really neat hardware pieces and metal trinkets that you will soon see on our fall collection.

i’m convinced that these types of festivals and finds we discover at them make mesh the unique product that it is.

-sherry

on the table | acceptance letter to the oak park art fair on november 7th!!!

week 21 - monday night home | show

tonight was an extraordinary mesh monday night, as we were surrounded by an home full of mesh-worthy models.

we were invited to transform kathy's sky-high place downtown into a full-on boutique for the evening...and the event was a pure success! as always, kathy and kelly put together a wonderful evening of food, friends, skyline views, and mesh :) thanks so much to both of you for your wonderful hospitality and your sensational taste in necklaces and people!

it was so much fun to watch as the accessories added up on everyones' ensembles throughout the evening. we love when someone spots a piece they have to have as soon as they walk in the door. it is amazing to watch the process we all go through when debating on what we can rationalize adding to our wardrobe. there is no doubt that everyone needs a new bauble for an average tuesday at work...so why not start the week out right with a monday night homeshow?!?!

THANK YOU LADIES!!!
-mesh

week 20 - it was a bird

carrie: "he couldn’t get out of the car…i got out of the car, i put a bird on my head."

miranda: "is that what that was? i thought it was feathers."

carrie: "it was a bird"

those lines are my favorite part of sex and the city 1. maybe because carrie was simply brave enough to pull off the styles we simply don't dare to attempt. teal birds and feathers on your wedding day? pretty brave move, i'd say. but i love it!

it could simply be my long standing obsession with birds... it started in childhood. both sets of my grandparents were bird watchers and bird figurine collectors…and it has continued on through the generations. many times, we would be summoned to the window to see the newest woodpecker or shushed to hear the cat bird meow in the tree.

this obsession has carried into many areas of my life...bird jewelry, necklaces with feathers, bird vases, dishtowels...even our mesh logo!....

either way, mesh loves this carrie-inspired trend of headbands with feathers for the fall! yes, I said it; mesh has expanded into hair accessories!

what a perfect way to add a little sass to any outfit very inexpensively! wear it with your power suit for the big sales pitch or out on saturday night with the hubby! no rules apply. it's all in the attitude.

check out our wide arrange of headbands at the next mesh show!

-sherry

on the table - feathers galore!

week 19 - gram's gems

the other day i was spending some quality time with gram (my 89 year young grandmother, who happens to be as much of an accessory extraordinaire as i am). as i was playing the role of 'tech services', due to a pesky computer glitch (again, another uncommon commonality between us), gram happened to be rifling through a few small boxes of trinkets she had been collecting for mesh. you see, gram has a lot of collections around the house that she has lived in for 65 years. she happens upon trinkets on a daily basis that she put in a 'safe place' years ago. now, every time she finds these - miscellaneous broaches, clustered clip-on earrings, rhinestone shoe clips, and the like - she collects them all in one place and shares them with me when i visit. we walk through the story behind each piece/pair and she sometimes parts with them, and sometimes decides to hold onto them for safe keeping.

much like gram, we love to tell the story behind each one-of-a-kind necklace we create. whether the beads came from our friend richard in london, or the stones were discovered during sherry's honeymoon in rome, or we tracked down the trinkets in a dark alley 'boutique' of new york city....there is always a story behind every mesh piece.

i have to say that i strive to be like gram...a collector, a woman with a keen eye for quality, a creative soul that just simply 'gets it'. it would also be ideal if i were up for a trip to vegas on my 89th birthday...

-melissa

week 18 – it’s never too hot for style

the oddest thing happened this past week. melissa and i took part an awesome home | show in la grange. not to mention it was held on one of the hottest days of the summer…tipping a sweltering 94 degrees. (i think it was actually still that hot outside when we left at 10:00 pm….that’s how hot it was!)

as mesh was setting up for the show we laughed at ourselves as we set up a display of scarves…thinking “who is going to buy a scarf on the hottest day of the summer?” well, we convinced ourselves...they are ‘summer scarves’…lightweight and airy. and we had just gotten a new batch of large checkered patterns…very transitional for the summer/fall season. let’s try it. so we left them out on the table.

[insert drum-roll here]

we sold so many scarves on thursday night! I think it was our highest scarf sale night to date.

then i got to thinking….what is it about the summer scarf that is so attractive these days. we used to only wear them in the winter to keep warm or as an attempt to add a bright accent color our black wool coats. i personally own about 20…and think i continually need more.

these are the reasons we've decided we love summer scarves...get yours at the next mesh show!

1. you feel a little fancy wearing them.

2. can’t decide which necklace to wear…no worries, use a scarf.

3. cost is no issue! you can get great scarves for under $20.

4. get too warm? take it off and tie it to your purse bohemian style.

5. best defense against the pesky air conditioning vent at your favorite restaurant.

6. easiest way to show your creative personality through texture, color and pattern.

7. there are a gazillion ways to wear a scarf. a woman thursday showed me a pretzel tie. be creative.

8. one-size fits all. (how much do we love this ladies?)

9. all the hollywood stars are wearing them. does jessica look great or what?

10. it's another excuse to buy new winter scarves. you can’t wear summer scarves in the winter!

-sherry

on the table | the brightest chunky necklace i've ever made