Marketplace: Starting Vendor Events for This Year

May 22, 2026 Bernadette

The full display at the HCMT Spaghetti Dinner

This past Sunday was the Homeless Cat Management Team’s annual Spaghetti Dinner and I was there with all the things I have in stock right now. I call this my starter set because I’m designing and developing other new products right now. If they work out, which some have not yet, I’ll be sure to share them here! If you see anything you like here, you can find it all on Portraits of Animals in the Handmade Gift Gallery.

Aside from the merchandise and all, this was an event when my friend Mary would have met me and helped me set up and also helped elsewhere in the dinner if needed; this was my first vendor event when she was not with me since 2022. The spaghetti dinner that year was when she chose to help me set up and I guess she liked it because she kept it up with every event through September 2025. And yes, it took me forever to get it all set up myself! I also intentionally missed the spaghetti dinner last year because all the losses were catching up with me and I decided I just couldn’t face a crowd of people who all know me and heard about my losses. It was good to see everyone again. So now, moving on with changes, and memories.

Below is the wall of tote bags, dishtowels and t-shirts and a few cat signs. My artist friend Chaz Letzkus loaned his metal mesh art panels to me for the day and I plan to buy some of my own for the coming year, years, however that works out. They were so easy to pack into the car, lightweight to carry in, easy to set up and can fit so much of what I have to display better than a table or my old makeshift art screen ever did.

Everybody was attracted to the tote bags but no one bought any. They were more interested in the dishtowels, both designs, but there were a bunch of tortie lovers there for The Goddess and The Roundest Eyes tees!

Below are all the smaller gift items from refrigerator magnets to garden flags with keepsake boxes, tiles, jar lamps and note cards in between. Sometimes this first vendor event gives me a taste for the tastes of my customers for the year. I barely sold any garden flags last year, and it used to be that was most of what I sold each week. Jar lamps were crazy popular in the past few years, but they really slowed down last year. The tiles made a big splash but were slowing down near the end of last year. Keepsakes had been slow in 2024 and started off slow in 2025 but I sold nearly all 18 of them by the end of the summer. You just never know what people are attracted to, and there are always other influences like the economy and even the weather. I keep my prices low—most items are $20.00 or less—and I stay with groups of products so my display is easy to browse. Keeps my cost and time setting up and tearing down to the minimum it can be.

Starting this year I am nearly out of keepsake boxes and couldn’t fit them in before this event, but I’m changing my process a little so I’m glad I didn’t try to get them done, and that I have some time to work with that. But several jar lamps found their homes when I thought I’d be looking at the same ones all year. Several tiles sold, I’m out of the pale yellow tiles so any new ones won’t match the current ones when I find or purchase a new batch of leftover wall tiles. But people usually buy one, maybe two, tiles and when I’ve asked them about it they don’t really notice the base tile color, so I’m not going to stress myself about that. I’ll be happy to make another batch of all these things for this coming year.

I do have a lot of note cards and they sold well, I think because the new display boxes I found to hold and display them and to use as a raised base for the jar lamps and other small gifts. A decade ago any printed cards started gathering dust and I quit taking them with me to any events because a few people might look at them, no one bought any, but I sold several singles and some sets of multiples. I have even more to print and this gives me some direction on that. I’m glad I’ve been spending time printing them, and Morty’s been happy to have company in his room while I’m in there playing games and brushing him, and birdwatching at the feeder on his window that hangs there with suction cups. Got to keep us both amused with the printer is slogging through its thing.

I had my Custom Pet Memorial Gifts there as well, but they were difficult to photograph against the window. I did have a few orders too.

Custom Pet Memorial Gifts at the spaghetti dinner

I love to make these things, and I love to be at these events, but the packing, setting up, tearing down and eventually unpacking, and no one to help me with events, that it almost felt like too much this year. But with this event I’m all in.

When I pack for the first show everything stays in the car for the summer, or has for the past five years. It’s so much wear and tear on me and on the merchandise, and a lot of extra time, to bring it back inside and set it all up in here again, only to pack it up and into the car six days later. Summers have been getting hotter, though, and sometimes the bins in my car get in the way of other things I’d like to do with my car, so I may start storing the bins in the house between events. I have the packing routine down even after one event, and it’s really simple to just carry them outside to the car on Saturday so it’s all ready to go Sunday morning.

So there we are! My event schedule is below, and I’ve applied to a few shows that aren’t on here so there will probably be a few more. You can see my next event when I’ll need ALL the things is June 13, a little over three weeks from now. I’m excited about all the things I’ve designed and been making for the past several years, and about all the new things coming up.

2026 Event Schedule

The Carnegie Farmers market has added SIX new Sundays—three at each end of the season, and it will begin at 11:00 instead of 12! Currently four other events in the schedule too and I’ve applied to others.

MAY

Sunday, May 17: HCMT Spaghetti Dinner, 3-7 p.m. Castle Shannon Volunteer Fire Department

JUNE

Saturday, June 6: Blessing of the Animals, Unity Presbyterian Church Green Tree (RSVP only)

Saturday, June 13: Hearts & Paws 20th Anniversary Pet Fair, 9:30 a.m.-3 p.m., Christ Church, Bethel Park

Sunday, June 14: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, June 21: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, June 28: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

JULY

Sunday, July 5: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, July 12: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, July 19: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, July 26: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

AUGUST

Sunday, August 2: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, August 9: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, August 16: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, August 23: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Friday & Saturday, August 28 & 29: Seasons on the Panhandle Trail during Rock the Quarry

Sunday, August 30: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

SEPTEMBER

Sunday, September 6: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, September 13: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, September 20: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, September 27: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

OCTOBER

Sunday, October 4: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Sunday, October 11: Carnegie Farmers Market, Main Street, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.

Marketplace

Kitties like it when I don’t restock my display because they have new places to sleep!

Take a look at other new merchandise and featured artwork.

Marketplace is a feature on The Creative Cat to share the latest coming out of my studio with my readers. Once a week on Thursday I feature something new in my “shop”.

Read about creating custom items

Find out more about creating custom items for your own home using the images you see here. Visit the “Ordering Custom Art” page to see samples and read bout how to order.

Find out about events and festivals where you can find me and my work.

Sign up for my e-newsletter (below), check the widget on the sidebar on my home page, or sign up to receive posts on Portraits of Animals Marketplace. I plan on plenty of events this coming summer in the Pittsburgh area.

It’s all done under the close and careful supervision of my studio cats!

Copyright

All images and text used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission, although links to your site are more than welcome and are shared. Please ask if you are interested in using and image or story in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of an image or a product including it, check my animal and nature website Portraits of Animals to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.