It’s hard to believe it is over and the Help Me! Help Me! shop is now closed!

I’m missing it: the bell ringing and everyone shouting “Help Me! Help Me!”, the conversations with strangers and friends, and all the tea and cake I could eat daily…

Thank you to everyone who visited and browsed, trawled, rummaged and found. Thanks to all who offered me their help, I am mulling over the things people suggested, and I will post up some of the ideas and advice.

I’ll also add photos of the treasure being taken, and the happy customers, like Irene O’Mara who claimed this tortoise, which I made in primary school but neglected to finish. She has promised to try and complete it…

Well it is nearly here. Only one day to go and the shop must open! After some panic and denial things are taking shape. It wouldn’t have happened without a lot of help! A full list of people I want and have remembered to THANK can be found on the Thank You! Thank You! page of this website – fantastically designed by Victor Terenetiev.

It is fun being in the shop venue now, as people pass by and want to know what is happening. Today I got asked for a job, and someone wanted to sell me her homemade sushi, and lots of people asked if I will take donations of their stuff. Irene O’Mara, the Performance Corporation Production Manager kept things on track brilliantly and designer Catherine Murphy has finished her lovely window display – letters supplied by my mother and photos by me.

We started to count the things in the shop and there are over 600.

It is slightly scary realising how many things I have, and these are just the ones I can do without! I hope it all goes, or almost all. It is hard not to take some things back and the treasure I am finding hardest to part with is labelled High Risk.