Another Treasury Honor!

I've been honored again in another etsy treasury for the next 2 days. This time by an inspiring glass artist, Kathleen Krukoff . Visit her wonderful shop at http://www.kathleenkrucoff.etsy.com/ and her blog at http://kathleenkrucoff.blogspot.com/ . She shows incredible photos of how she makes her glass items on her blog. She's making some beautiful bowls right now -very, very interesting to see the process!
Be sure to visit her treasury with many other talented artists at http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=43028
Thank you Kathleen!

My Own Etsy Treasury!

Etsy's Treasury list is a place where seller's and buyer's can publicly post some of their favorite items (not of their own items). I've had the pleasure of being included in 2 treasuries in the past weeks. Tonight, I was determined to figure out how to compile a treasury of items in Etsy's treasury list. I read the instructions and waited and waited and waited... I had to stay up until 3:00am in order to grab a spot when they became available! Here is what I came up with! Enjoy these artists beautiful works!

Sucess!

Yesterday, I mentioned that I had listed a few items on a new website, ShopHandMade.com. Today, I sold 2 pairs of earring on that site! So, I posted a few more items there. Apparantly, the site gets some notice and since there aren't as many sellers on it, my items stay visible. So far, I like this site!
P.S. Thurs, Feb. 26th- As I work with this site, I find it's very, very slow to load pages. If I were a buyer on this site, I think I would get impatient. For now, Etsy will still be my main site. I'll post a few items on ShopHandMade, but problably won't post all of my items there.

Another Treasury Honor

I am pleased and honored today because one of my jewelry items is featured in a treasury on etsy.com! You can see it and the entire treasury here for the next 3 days:
http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=41607

The artist featuring me has some wonderful jewelry on her site as well at:

http://www.lazydayz.etsy.com/

Thank you lazydayz!

Competition and other web site options?

Today I spent some time researching options for other web stores to list my jewelry. I settled on one called ShopHandMade.com and set up a 2nd store there (the link is to the right). I only listsed a few of my items on this site, just to see if it gets any exposure in the market. There are over 40,000 jewelry items listed on etsy.com! It's a popular site with buyers, I have a hard time keeping my items at the front of the pile so they are seen by buyers. I think I've had a fair number of sales for the 2 months I've had items listed on etsy, but I think I'll try other options, too and see if I get any results that way. We shall see.... I've never been a very competitive person and I'd rather make jewelry than spend time maintaining my website on a daily basis.

Frustration solved!

My quest to find a better quality leather has been realized and I've finished the bracelet. It's a far cry from what I had originally planned, but I like this so much better than my orginal design. And, I had fun making it. That's important to me because I have learned that even if what I'm making is for someone else, if I don't enjoy making it, it just isn't worth my time. I enjoyed this, and I think it shows!

Experimentation = Frustration - Part 2

After many more attempts to design the perfect sterling and leather bracelet, I've now come to the conclusion that my leather is of inferior quality and I'll have to replace it before I'll be sucessful in my quest to get this bracelet done. The good news is that the problem was neither my cutting skills or wire wrapping skills (whew!) and I can blame this weeks trouble on a poor quality product. Now if I could only remember where I purchased this leather, so I can go elsewhere to buy a new roll tomorrow!
Unfortunately, this bracelet was supposed to be a gift and now it will be late in getting to the birthday girl. I'm sure she'll accept my apology, but I am dissapointed nonetheless.
Moral of this story: Always know exactly what you're buying.