Frills and Fancy Feature Story Alice McElhiney

I owe my start in miniatures to my daughter Heather, now 26 years old, more than 15 years ago who needed to do a special project for Girl Scouts. I found myself inside the most wonderful place in Stockton, CA., called Bearly Big Enough which was and still is owned and operated by one of the loveliest people I've ever known, Susie Lim. I picked out a couple of 1" scaled furniture pieces that my daughter could use for her interior decorating project, but more importantly, I picked out my first dollhouse kit. I learned the basics of assembling, wiring, wallpaper, flooring and trimming a dollhouse. Susie saw my desire to widen my horizons, and introducted me to a very talented lady, Jeannie Kennedy living in Modesto at that time, who had mentioned the need to find someone that could help her in her home based business "Jeannie's Minis" making mini accessories and food items. Jeannie taught all the basics of working with Fimo to me and gave me even a deeper love for making minis. Not to long after that, I started working in Susie's wonderful miniature shop and helping Susie with miniature shows. Susie never had to pay me a penny for all those long hours because I always was finding a miniature to barter my time for. After moving to the St Louis, MO area in 1992, I decided to try my hand at my own business which was named Mini Blessings. I found myself very busy filling orders for Deb at DragonFly International and Carole with Carole's Creations. I've since furnished a handfull of shops with my hand made minis, but find myself very busy with my 2 distributors. I did open a miniature shop for a couple of years in Troy, MO. I found it much easier to sell on E-Bay as well as dealing with Carole and Deb. I passed my miniature shop torch over to my best friend Nova who now has Tiny Treasures in historic Kimmiswick, MO very close to the St Louis, MO area. I am now settling into my new home in Milan, IL. Here I'll be selling on E-bay, filling orders, and helping a handfull of people with special orders. I have truly found my place in life, right in the middle of creating lots of "Mini Blessings" to share.