Crafty ADD Weeks 21 - 30

I've had so much fun doing my Crafty ADD posts! And one of my favorite posts of all is when I get to the end of a 10 week (approx) stretch and look back with a slide show on all I've done. It's a lot of fun to revisit my projects, frustrations, and triumphs. I hope you have fun looking at the slide show as well :)

Crafty ADD #30

I know - I went two weeks with out an update, but life's been such that I wasn't getting too much done so it's not too much of a loss :P

Crocheting

I'm never doing this blanket again! I figured it out, the squares are so small that I'm having to tie in twice as many ends as I did when I did the first baby blanket. I do NOT like tying in ends! LOL Oh well. It's going to be pretty - so that's something at least :)

Cross Stitch

Book mark's finished! Well, ok, so in that photo it hasn't be cut out and backed yet, but Mom does that part for me (interfacing hates me) so I took a snap shot before I sent it her way :)

I'm making something for me this time! Can you tell what that is in the center? I'll give you a hint, it's an animal :P
I finished my "no thought" necklace - but not my butterfly! Hoping to finish that tonight :) I've got a lot of projects I need to get going on - so I really need to finish it up!

Here's a snap shot of my first paper beads! This is after they've been rolled, and coated with one coat of glue. They still need to have a finishing spray put on them, but it's been raining and I need to have the hubby do that outside. Once their completely done I'll start listing them online and do a post all about how I made them!

Pro and Cons

Whenever you have a big decision to make it's a good idea to look at the Pro's vs the Con's. Right now, my big decision is what I'm going to do with my Artfire account. Will I keep my pro account? Or will I go basic?

The reason I'm even asking this question is that I haven't made very many sales on Artfire. It's been great when I have a commission from a friend, but other than that, there have been very few sales. Here are my thoughts...

Pros: (for staying Pro)

- No additional costs for listing or check out fees

- I'm locked in at a certain monthly fee. That won't change as long as I'm pro.

- I can issue gift certs and coupons

- I have studio categories

- My work is in more than one on-line venue

- Teams (I'll write more about that later)

- No extraneous advertising

Cons: (for staying Pro)

- A monthly fee that I'm often not earning enough to cover (from this site at least) IE - the site isn't really paying for itself as of right now.

Pros: (for going Basic)

- I'll still have no additional costs for listing or check out fees

- No monthly fee to worry about paying

- I'll still have my work in more than one online venue

Cons: (for going Basic)

- If I ever want to go Pro again I'll have to pay more per month

- No gift certs or coupons available

- No studio categories

- No teams (negligible)

- Advertising in my shop that I didn't place there.

Can you see why I'm having a hard time deciding what I want to do? There are some pretty important factors on each Pros list and each Cons list! My biggest concern is the monthly fee. Since I've signed up there have been some months I've more than covered the monthly fee with my sales, but there have been many more where the monthly fee is coming out of my sales from other locations.

However - I'm headed into the busy season with a full summer of Saturday Markets (I'm signed up for 12 weeks), so I can probably afford to keep paying the fee for awhile to give me more time to work on the shop.

I'm also concerned about losing the studio categories if I go basic. I know as a shopper I like being able to click on a category to narrow my search and I'd hate to take that away from my shop. I also don't know how I feel about them placing advertising in my shop if it's a basic account. If you have a basic Artfire account I'd love to know how that part of it is working out for you!

Teams...I listed it on the pros and cons but it's not a very big factor. I really don't like the way Artfire has the communication set up for teams and there's only one team I'd really miss....and I think I'd manage to still be a part of them any way if I wanted to :P

Right now I'm leaning towards staying Pro - but if sales don't pick up in that store soon (by the end of summer maybe?) I'll go Basic.

Thoughts?

Markets, Paper, and Parrots....oh my!

Do you see this lovely space with a small park and great retail shops? That's where I'm going to be doing a Saturday Market this summer! I'm VERY excited! We had a meeting this morning to talk over details and it went very well. We voted on making a couple changes that make me really happy, and we got to pick our booth spaces. I've got a primo space and I'm very happy about that!

I'm also happy that it's SUNNY out today and I think I may even have gotten a wee bit of color as we sat outside and talked. Which, after two years of being sick, is nice.

Paper...I stopped at a Garage sale on the way home today and picked up four pieces of scrapping paper for a good price. I'm going to use them in making paper beads - and the money was going to charity! Oh, and the promised post about the paper making bead process should come along some time next week... I still have to buy the stuff for the very final step. It's been a busy week!

And yes, my blog title does say "Parrots!" It would be more accurate to say Parrot. As I was driving through town today I saw a man walking on the side of the road with a full sized macaw parrot. It was gorgeous and it was VERY distracting.

Necklace Discoveries

Spring Bubbles Necklace

One of the current Blog Fire Carnival Themes is "Wow Necklaces" and that tickles me because I was planning on writing a post about necklaces today anyway! I chose to show of my recent creation "Spring Bubbles" because I got a TON of positive feedback, and that makes me say Wow!

The reason I'm thinking about Necklaces today is that I'm in the process of going through my inventory and getting prepared for the summer bazaar season. One step in getting ready was to reorganize how I kept my necklaces. I had been keeping them in a clear plastic box separated by layers of construction paper. I would put two or three necklaces per sheet of paper and at first that worked. Eventually, though, my inventory just grew too large. It was awkward, things began to get tangled, and it was frustrating looking through it for a specific necklace.

Today I finally pulled out some snack bags and put all my necklaces in those. This will make it much easier to find the necklaces, and no tangling! I didn't have enough of the little baggies in my drawer, so I took a walk down the hill to the little grocery store to pick up more. It's a beautiful day out today!

I was rather surprised at what I found when I counted up my necklaces after they were in bags. After all, counting was a cumbersome process before! I have 40 necklaces in my inventory between my two stores. I think that's a good start for the summer bazaar season - how about you?

Oh yes - and for anybody who read yesterday's post, this means I have one thing crossed off the list :D

I Shouldn't Complain....

Stars Chain Link Necklace

I've had a lot of things on my mind that I want to work on for my store(s), especially with Saturday Market season coming up! Only problem has been that they've all been in my mind, and I haven't written anything down. This produces a irrational panic and feeling of being completely overwhelmed because I don't really know what needs to get done! So this evening I finally sat down and made a list.

I'm still a little overwhelmed.

Right now there are 7 things on that list, several of which are going to take me a good amount of time. I used the sticky notes feature on my desktop to create my list so it's easy to find, easy to add to, and easy to delete from. I think that's one reason I hadn't written things down before, it's going to take a least a couple of weeks to get through it all (with the way my health goes) and that's a long time for me to keep a piece of paper without losing it!

So here I am, a little overwhelmed, but feeling focused and ready to get started on my projects :) And I really shouldn't complain - because this is what it means to be building a small business!

Catching Up Once Again :)

Well everything has been a little sporadic from me lately do to the medication withdrawals and the migraines from 'em...but here are my latest listings from etsy and artfire! Tell me which one is your fav and I'll give you an extra entry into my top commentators contest!