New things, Research and development. . .

I found barrette blank bases at the craft store and decided to make some chainmaille hair accessories.  😍  I spent several hours on several days testing different combinations of chain patterns in different sized rings to find ones that fit just so on the clips.  Research and development, it's a process. 😄

I really wanted the chainmaille segments to just fit on the clips so I wouldn't have to use any kind of glue or anything when mounting the chain to the clips just rings.  😏 

I have succeeded for the most part. 😉 I have found several combinations that work really well but I have decided against using certain patterns/combos that don't fit so well.  I know many chain patterns but I will not be making barrettes with all of them because some of them I just don't like the way the chain lays and some of them don't fit the clips and I don't want to use glue all the time. 

So far I have only used glue on 1 and although it worked well and I do like the finished piece, I would prefer not to become reliant on adhesives for the attachment.  I don't know if I trust glue. 😖

This triple flower is the only one with glue, the center just wanted to droop, I just couldn't get it to fit tight enough to stay where I wanted it.  😩  So I used some adhesive to make it stay where I wanted and just put rings on the ends as reinforcement. 😊

All of the styles in this blog post are listed for sale in the shop.

Etsy forums. . .

Etsy has ruined the forums.  😖 Totally ruined, they outsourced it and the layout, functionality, everything is wrecked. 😕

It is butt-ugly. 
It is impossible to sort out and find things.
The pictograph icons for sections just look retarded. 

I could go on but what's the point? I hate it and I will no longer even bother to look at it.  The old format had some issues and it was said that only a small percentage of Etsy users used the forums but I would bet money that that small percent just got a lot smaller. 😒

Re-stocking . . .

While many of the things I sell are in fact "one of a kind" there are a few that I re-make regularly.  Chainmaille is easy to remake, let's face it as long as I can get the same rings I can re-create anything I've made but I don't do it all that often because I like to make things different. 😉 

The wire tree sculptures where meant to be one of a kind things but I have made an exception for the rainbow&stars version because it is so popular and being a bit simple it's easy to re-create, although, even with the same colors and the same number of wires and the same number of stars, no two actually look alike. 

I've sold almost a dozen of these between the 2 sizes in the last 3 years. 😮  After the first set sold so fast at an event I remade them so I could post them online and they sold out again, at that point it became obvious that as much as I like doing "one of a kind" things I need to keep these little babies in stock.  😉  So I try to do just that and I usually make them in sets, making 2-3 at a time.  I keep the 5" inch size made in both silver and gold base hoops. Originally I have only made the 3" inch size in the silver hoop but I am now adding a gold hoop version of it too.  😊  I'll have to shoot new listing photos and update the listing with a the new "variation" tomorrow, but it is laying on my work-bench. 

Happy New Year. . .new listings

Well it's now 2019 and as a new year begins I find myself re-editing and updating a ton of listings. 😏  

I have learned over the years that seasonal tags can be highly effective to improve views and sales but that means that they need to be changed ya' know "seasonally".  As the holiday season expired I have begun changing over my holidays and tags from "Christmas" to Valentine's and Mother's day.  I am simultaneously adjusting my shipping prices because in a couple of weeks the postal rates will go up as they do annually.  😖  

I am also updating some of my listings with new photos, as some of my listings have really old original photos taken on non-standard backgrounds and I'm trying to get them all on white or black and eliminate the wood grain.  I have shot hundreds of photos in the last week and spent hours and hours editing, cropping, and adjusting them.  I have re-made the Japanese Lace Bubbles bracelets that had sold out and even made the gold on gold version and renewed the listing with all new photos.  😇  I shot photos with the rosettes necklace, bracelet, and earrings in a set and made a new listing in sets.  I also edited up some of the rosette photos into a new Valentine's sale banner. 

I made a new bracelet with a variation of the Japanese Lace pattern and I LOVE it, so much that I am still debating on if I'm going to list it or not.  There is a part of me that really wants to keep it. 

It's totally gorgeous and

 It does fit me perfectly, after all 😉

Although it took so many rings that I am practically out of the small 4 mm size and had to order more.  I did a quick count and there are nearly 500 rings in this bracelet, so if I decide to list it for sale it will not be cheap. 😉 

I'm a winner !!

No seriously, I was one of the winners in Etsy's Holiday Free Shipping drawing.  I was totally shocked by the email stating I had won, mainly because I only set up "free shipping" for orders over a set $amount and had very few orders qualify for free shipping. 😏  

In spite of the limit and the few qualifying orders some how I won. 😲  That's the astonished face 😲 as I never "win" anything. ~LOL~

I did not win the $25,000 top prize but I am not complaining about the $250 I did win, that will supply advertising budget for the next year. 😊

Etsy 2018 Year in Review . . .

Ok so Etsy did a "year in review" thing for my shop. 😊 It's a bit like the Facebook "your year on facebook" memories thing. Etsy's version is not a video though it's a really long scrolling page with some cute graphics and shop statistics and other stuff. 

These are just a few screen shots of my "year in review" there was a lot of other stuff in there like total $$$ sales, some info on other things my buyers searched for and bought, general shopping trends, info and articles on new shop tools, SEO, links to see the TV commercials, etc.

Thanks Etsy

Happy Holidays . . .

Wow, holy cow hard to believe it's been a month since I posted on this blog. 😮  I have been a bit busy though, as the shopping season kicked in around Thanksgiving and just slowed down for me on Tuesday.  😏  This is the best, busiest holiday season I've had yet on Etsy.  

I had multiple custom orders and even though a couple of the initial contacts did not go all the way through and complete an order I have had enough sales to feel really good about it.  My husband actually got to hear multiple cha-chings the other day and congratulated and complimented me on the success. 😇  

In the 3+ years I've been working on this, and trust me it has not been easy, there have been many months with no sales at all.  I have worked and worked on completing my shop, improving my listings, re-doing photos, brainstorming tags, re-writing titles and descriptions.  It has been never-ending work on my part, I work on my shop every day in one way or another.  I write this now because I just saw a post in the forums by a person who opened a shop and got pissed off because it was not instantly indexed and complaining did not result in instant action so they quit in 5 days. 😕😞  Seriously, 5 flipping days and they quit, I waited 5 fracking months for my first sale, I don't know if my shop was indexed the first week or not because I didn't know anything about the site or their search indexing. ~LOL~   

Online sales is not easy and there is no such thing as instant, indexing is not instant, payment processing is not instant, delivery is not instant.  I don't know what's wrong with people these days that they think it's ok to act so entitled, spoiled, bratty, it's ridiculous to expect such things and even worse for grown ass adults to have public tantrums and throw their toys when they don't get the instant gratification they seem to expect.  It's like buyers complaining, writing negative reviews, and threatening to open cases because their order was not delivered the day after they placed the order. 😡  

Some days I am just floored by the unrealistic expectations and over-entitlement that seems to run rampant in the forums, but most days I just thank God that my buyers have all been decent people who have not treated me that way.  😇  Heaven's blessings to all this holiday season.

HappyMerryChristmaHanuKwanzakah