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

A new listing on Etsy!

Ok, first I have to say that it has NOT been almost two weeks since my last post.  I went through a time warp, I swear!  :\  I'll have to get to making beads and posting pictures from my last palette tomorrow.  Right now, though, I wanted to announce that I've listed a new item, a cute little pair of beads you can use for earrings, in my Etsy shop!  Yay for finally getting something accomplished! :)

Monday Madness Sale!

I've decided to start a weekly sale one particular item at my Etsy store and post about it everywhere, including blogging, tweeting, pinning, and facebooking, hence the name "Monday Madness Sale"!  Don't forget to check back weekly for a new sale every Monday!

This week's Monday Madness item is a playful matched set of beads that are perfect to make earrings, or just use as colorful spacers in a larger piece.  Just for today, from the time I wake up until the time I go to bed (about 10pm Hawaii time), this bead set is 25% off.  Click here to take you directly to the sale page! :)

Thanks for visiting, and I hope you have a great Monday!

TGIF Treasury for 7/6/2012

Here's this week's Treasury featuring items that are currently for sale on Etsy that include lampwork beads.  There are some incredible jewelry designers on Etsy, and the lampwork beads are just exquisite. Aren't these pieces beautiful?

Please give a little bloggy love to these talented jewelry artists and click the pictures to visit their Etsy shops.  (Sadly, the picture on the bottom left isn't showing up for some reason, so please click on the square and it will take you directly to an absolutely gorgeous kumihimo necklace that just has to be seen to believed!)

TGIF Treasury for 6/29/2012

Here's this week's treasury featuring items that are currently for sale on Etsy that include lampwork beads.  There are some incredible jewelry designers on Etsy, and the lampwork beads are just exquisite. Aren't these pieces beautiful?

Please give a little bloggy love to these talented jewelry artists and click the pictures to visit their Etsy shops.

Lampwork Beads Are Treasures! Etsy Treasury

One of my beads was included in a gorgeous treasury today!



Also, I'd like to point out that I missed yesterday's self-imposed deadline for revealing the beads I made with the palette I posted on Tuesday.  My only excuse is that I just didn't feel I had enough beads made on Tuesday night, so I made more on Wednesday night, and now I have a whole lotta beads to share.  I will do that in the next blog post going up later this afternoon.

Monday Madness Sale

I've decided to start a weekly sale one particular item at my Etsy store and post about it everywhere, including blogging, tweeting, pinning, and facebooking, hence the name "Monday Madness Sale"!  Don't forget to check back weekly for a new sale every Monday!

This week's Monday Madness item is my Cornflower Blue and Green bead set. Just for today, from the time I wake up (usually about 6:00 am Hawaii time, which is noon for you East Coasters) until the time I go to bed (about 10pm), this bead set is 50% off.  Click here to take you directly to the sale page! :)

(How do I pin this anyhow?)

New listings on my Etsy...

I couple new items listed in my Etsy shop. Come take a look!

Thanks! :)

You get two! Two! Two treasuries in one! :)

Ms.B on Etsy was kind enough to feature one of my favorite beads in a treasury today so I thought I'd share it along with the one I posted earlier today! :)



I find the composition of that particular treasury ironically amusing. The most common theme for a treasury is items with similar colors (see here) where another bead set of mine was featured. All the items featured are or have blue in them. But the only theme Ms.B's Etsy treasury has is just to reciprocate and thank the people who have featured her items in a treasury. The ironic part? That treasury is gorgeous, like all the items were picked out because they enhance the beauty of the whole. They match!!! is what I'm trying to say, and badly. I must be tired from looking at all the beautiful treasuries over on Etsy.

TGIF Treasury, for June 22, 2012

Last week I had (what I hope is) a great idea to start a weekly post featuring items sold on Etsy that include lampwork beads.  Here's this week's treasury.  There are some incredible jewelry designers on Etsy, and the lampwork beads are just exquisite. Aren't these pieces beautiful?

Please give a little bloggy love to these talented jewelry artists and click the pictures to visit their Etsy shops.

Round and round you go...

I'm starting to add larger holed beads to my line, beads that will fit all those European Charm Bracelets, like Pandora, Troll, or Biagi. Today I'm listing a few on my Etsy site, starting with this one.  I'll be listing a couple more as well, keep an eye on my Etsy shop for exciting developments! :)

And since this post is a little short on images, here's a picture of my adorable little girl.

Find out how you too can double your Etsy listings in a week!

It's easy! Only have five listings to start with. ;)

One of my recent listings.

But seriously. I've taken practically every free moment I've had in the last week to take and edit pictures, make listings, perfect titles and keywords, and I've managed to get five more listings up on Etsy. Mind you, I have a full-time job, an almost-three-year-old, and have been participating more heavily in our local SCA group, so there havn't been a lot of "free moments" to be had, but I feel really good, I feel like I have purpose.

I feel like I have momentum!

TGIF Treasury!

Sometimes I wonder what anyone could possibly want to make with any of my beads, so I went searching around Etsy for examples of things you can make with these little balls of once-molten silica and soda lime.  Here's an Etsy treasury I put together featuring cool stuff other jewelry artists have created with lampwork beads.

Aren't these pieces gorgeous?  Please give a little bloggy love to these talented jewelry artists and click the links to visit their Etsy shops.

I'm thinking of making this a regular weekly feature on my blog, hope you like it! :)

New Beads on Etsy and Planning for Vacation

New Listings on Etsy:

I put up a couple more items on my Etsy store.

Pink Beads with Pink Flowers and Pink Scrollwork

Blue Beads with Blue Flowers and Blue Scrollwork

And the companion set to a listing I already had up on Etsy:

Red and Blue Beads with Flowers and Scrollwork

So that brings us up to a total of 8 items up on Etsy, and my goal is to maintain over 50 items. I'm almost a fifth of the way there!

The thing I like the most about listing on Etsy is that you can copy previous listings, and once you do that it's just a matter of changing a few key words, and then changing a few keywords. I hope whatever shopping cart software I eventually get for my own website is as easy to work as Etsy is.

And since I've said what I like most, I will now share what I like least! Taking the $^#&!! pictures! I know that is something I will always have to do, whether I'm using Etsy or not, but it is such a chore, and sadly, mostly because I feel like I could be getting better pictures out of my camera if I just knew *the trick* to it. Right now, my pictures are coming out all grainy, and I have no idea what I'm doing wrong. ISO is low, I'm shining two 40 watt bulbs directly on my subject, I have stabilization turned off, I'm using a tripod, I set the 2 second timer to reduce shaking, and I'm using macro and only zooming in so far as the auto-focus will allow.

The only thing I know is that the light might still be the issue, so I'm going to try taking pictures outside in direct sunlight today at lunch to see if I can get any photos without the graininess. If anyone has any recommendations, I would love to hear them. I just hope the solution isn't, "Get a new camera!" LOL

Planning for Vacation:
In 4 and a half weeks Jon, Emma and I will be winging our way to Portland for two whole weeks of fun in the cold, cloudy gloominess. I'm really looking forward to it, both for the chance to see Emma's Grandpa and family again, AND for the chance to spend 2 weeks in COLD WEATHER. Hawaii's great! Really it is. But 90% humidity and 85 degrees, with no tradewinds is ... sweaty. And I really don't like sweating.

We have all sorts of cool activities on the list of "Things to Do": science museum, zoo, drives up mountains, visits with little cousins, shopping, and, last but not least, and most related to this blog: Driving up to Belleview, Washington on Saturday the 28th to attend the (open to the public) Bead Bazaar at the International Society of Glass Beadmakers annual Gathering.

I just hope I can fit all the stuff I want to buy into my suitcase for the trip home!

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!