Within 2 years she was using her garage as a warehouse and shipping
packages daily around the country and the world and found it was time to
expand to a "brick and mortar store" and the Lenth's and 14 month old
son Griffin packed up and moved to the rural town of Welton. They
secured property that contained an old retail store and warehouse for a
feed store and a house and some outbuildings. It was a fixer upper, but
suited their needs. They would have a walk-in store and continue to
ship over 20 packages daily across the world from website orders.
The
store was painted & carpeted and the warehouse set up over the
summer. The grand opening was held on August 21, 1999. Then the first
of 3 festivals honoring the movie's canine hero Toto, was held in May of
2000. Meinhardt Raabe was guest of honor, he played the Munchkin
Coroner in the 1939 movie, proudly pronouncing the Wicked Witch of the
East dead, after Dorothy's house "dropped" on her. Other munchkins in
attendance at the festivals included Margaret Pelligrini who was a
sleepyhead and a townswoman and Clarence Swenson, who was a soldier.
Ann
closed the doors to Annie M's in 2005, to spend time with her growing
family that included 7 year old son Griffin and 4 year old twin girls,
Gretchen and Gillian. It was time to move on, but was very hard to say
good-bye to all of her friends and customers she had met over the years.
The
store was used as storage until it was converted into a craftroom for
Ann in the summer of 2009. Soon Ann knew her new passion needed to be
furthered into a business and once again, the building was turned back
into a retail store which is of course now, Make it Yours Crafts.
Please come back later this week for more information on the business and what is in store for customers!