It 'Ain't Half Hot Mum!!

It's been a hot one today as I'm sure you know but we seemed to especially feel it in the gallery as we've had a very busy day!

Today we have moved the walls and hung a superb selection of Bob Barker prints and original paintings in readiness for his PAINTING LIVE session on SATURDAY!! That's THIS SATURDAY 4th JULY 2009 between 12-3pm - champagne will be on ice so come on down :-)

Diane and I had a helper today! Our daughter Emily came along to offer a hand. She has now finished school and is awaiting her exam results and so we 'encouraged' her to come along and help get the gallery ready. I have to say she did good but she did moan!!

It really has been too hot today to be having a changeover but needs must. We have therefore swept the floor, dusted everything (you'd never believe the dust that gathers simply from having the door open!!). We've moved the walls and hung nine FANTASTIC pieces!!

The one, single drawback to all of this activity is that there has been absolutely no air circulation at all! We have had the door open, all the windows open and even a fan blowing today to try and get some air moving ... it all failed miserably but we survived!

Emily's payment for her days work was a large waffle cornet with two scoops of mint-choc-chip and caramel ice-cream from The Deli. Bargain price for a days labour I thought!

After putting Emily in a bear hug I managed to get a quick lick before I was shooed away and told by Diane to leave Emily and the ice-cream alone!! According to Emily it was fab!!!

Anyway, moving on ... I can now update you with the top sellers for June. They are as follows:-

1. Govinder Nazran
2. Toni Hargreaves
3. Mike Jackson
4. Caroline Shotton

Posthumous Congratulations go to Govinder and also well done Toni on second!!

We still have lots to do to be ready for Saturday, nibbles to organise, champagne (and ice!) and glasses to collect from Threshers ... I wonder if Bob is a messy painter - perhaps I should have a large plastic sheet on standby :-)

Diane & I look forward to seeing you all on Saturday to see Bob painting live. It's promising to be a lovely afternoon and Bob is a great chap so pop along, enjoy a glass of chilled bubbly (or fresh orange if you prefer) and do some chilling of your own :-)

What A Night!!

Thursday 4th December - Pocklingtons Dickensian Late Night Shopping Event.

I was duly forced into wearing my costume (and I have to say I thought I looked rather good in it!!) See photo below - all comments welcome!!



Considering the number of things that got cancelled on the day, most people I have spoken to since Thursday have said what a great event it was and they thought the snow machines were great... at this point Scrooge will rear his head and say ... I have to disagree as the gallery was covered in fake snow as the machines were blowing it straight in the door and making the floor very wet!! Bah Humbug!!

People also liked the idea of having no fair rides in the town but did comment that more lighting was needed on the stalls... all these comments will be taken into account ready for next year.

Diane and I agree that we had easily over 200 people through the door and we both noticed lots of new faces as well as many regular faces too :-) The gallery was very busy from about 5.30pm and didn't empty until almost 9pm!!

We must apologise to those people who had travelled a distance to be with us and didn't get as much of our time as they deserve. We would have liked to have spent more time with you but with the sheer number of people and a constant demand for bubbly and home made truffles meant that I was busy serving drinks and at one point in the evening I had to dash down to Threshers and ask Neil for yet more glasses!!

Diane was kept busy doing sales and running up and down the stairs for more glasses and her home made truffles. Orders now being taken for Christmas!!

Next year we must arrange for our daughter to help out - this will hopefully free up Diane & I to spend more time with people!!!

For us it was a great evening and we would like to say thankyou to everyone who came in and said hello. We would also like to say a big THANK YOU to Sara at Simply Books whose idea it was for the Dickensian evening and thanks also for her huge contribution to the evenings planning.

We hope this event has shown the people of Pocklington and surrounding villages just what the town has to offer and hopefully they will think local and shop local.

Thanks to everyone for your hard work bringing it together and thanks to everyone who came!

All I can say is 'What a night'