What I've been doing lately...

I made a goal to increase my Etsy inventory by 1 new item every day, and for the last 4 days I've actually been keeping up with it. Go me! :) The universe decided to reward me for my hard work and dedication and I ALSO actually made a sale. Go me, again!

Here's my newest listing on Etsy:

Besides listing beads, I've been furiously trying to catch up on all the blogs I read. As of a week ago I had 247 unread blog posts, and I had no idea how I was going to get through all of them and keep up. But I've spent every waking minute scanning blogs for interesting stories, pictures of gorgeous beads, and the occasional give-away.  I'm pleased as punch to announce that I am finally caught up. Since I just went through all that, I'm going to share with you a few blog posts I enjoyed reading and thought you might like too:

Mind Melt: Test Results :: Sage Green
Beads by Laura: Hooked
Judith Johnston Lampwork Beads: Red is Best -
Astrid Boyce Beads: A Trip to the Past and Product Branding
~Studio Marcy ~ Marcy Lamberson: Nature's Hats

Etsy and stuff...

So I posted five bead sets on Etsy a couple months ago now, and after a flurry of hits the first couple weeks they haven't had any attention at all since.  As can be expected I'm kind of disappointed, but I'm also giving myself the freedom to change my tactics.  My listed prices might be too high, I will need to spend more time advertising myself, I might need to take better pictures for the listings, and the most important thing I need to do is list more stuff.  Right now I'm just trying to decide which of the hundreds of beads I've made I will turn into a cute piece of jewelry to list.

Last couple weeks I've spent almost all my torch time concentrating on making largess for the incoming Queen of Caid. Largess is just gifts that the Queen will give away to members of the populace, and since the Queen has to give away lots of stuff, she needs lots of hands to make those gifts.  Hence, my local group has been making banners and badges, beads and bangles.  

Also SCA related, I'm now the Deputy Arts & Sciences Minister.  I submitted my warrant to the Kingdom Minister today and hopefully all the paperwork will get filed all nice and official-like.  I'm looking forward to providing some "official" direction to our Canton so far as A&S goes in the form of helping to keep people motivated to do Arts & Sciences. Hmm, I need to get a new calendar to keep notes of what everyone's been working on.  

Last but not least, Mother's Day (yesterday) was just great.  We spent the whole afternoon at the beach with friends swimming, relaxing and playing with Emma.  After a few minutes of panic on Emma's part, we finally convinced her to get in the bath... 'scuse me, I mean the ocean, and by the time we wanted to leave a few hours later, Emma was running around with other kinds in the shallow, calm waters of Anini Beach.  No, we didn't take any pictures, but sometimes you have to just enjoy your experiences instead of spending the whole time recording them.

Happy Mother's Day!

Beads a Go Go!

After years and months and weeks of preparing, I have made, cleaned, matched, photographed, described, and finally listed some beads on Etsy. As I said on my facebook page last night, I feel like I've jumped out of a plane and I don't know if I put my parachute on correctly.

So, now I'm going back to the torch to make more beads!