Weekly update. . .busy week

In this week's update I admit to being too busy. 😏 I had big plans for learning all the new things and making lots of Christmas ornaments and pumpkins and earrings. However, that didn't quite work out, instead someone bought the rainbow box chain before I even had it finished. 😧 So I had to finish it and get it in the mail quickly and start it all over again. (I took the listing down this time) 

I did get it shipped on time and the latest re-make is going quick so hopefully soon I can get back to doing all the other things, which would be good because I have a lot planned.  I need to make the Celtic star earrings in several colors with matching pendants. I did figure out chainmaille pumpkins and I can do 2 sizes with the rings I have on hand, but I do need to practice with the wire stems. 😏

Even though the pumpkins are cute I have no idea what to do with them. I'm not sure I trust the wire stems for earrings or pendants, maybe my wire is too soft or I'm just crazy, but I am concerned that it will wear badly and not last. 😟 I have always been way paranoid about people being disappointed. 

In a rare move for me I bought "kits" from another mailler. 

I have not purchased an actual kit since I first started over a decade ago. 

Thanks go to Metal Designz

I have never been able to figure out scale flowers, I have tried and they just don't work, I think it's because my standard ring sizes are the wrong sizes for the pattern. I also really wanted to learn those Japanese ball ornaments because they look amazing but again I didn't have the right rings sizes to make them. Now I get to test myself and see if I can follow directions, lol.

😅 I'm not sure the odds are in my favor. 😂😅

 

It's July and I'm late. . .

I have been trying to post weekly lately but after the craft fair and recovery and the July Fourth holiday I've been busy planning for the next big thing. 😅 I have been making things, learning new chain patterns, and I applied for 2 more events. 😉 I'm not sure I'll get into both, one of them is a "juried" thing which I've never done before, the other is a fall version of the craft fair at the fairgrounds like I did last month.  

Both events have a fall/winter/holiday theme, so I am working on more Christmas ornament designs and autumnal wire trees. I'm also going to add some orange and black chainmaille and attempt some pumpkins. 😎 I have several ideas for booth decorations including a small Christmas tree to display the ornaments. 

There are some star designs that I think will make great ornaments if I upsize the rings. My current ring sizes are a bit limited, but they do make nice earrings. 😇

And also pendants, especially if I can find the right sized crystals to capture in the center. 

I have so many ideas for things to make, it's a good thing that the shows aren't until September and November. 😅

It was fun but I'm tired. . .

I've had a few days to unpack, reorganize and recover from the craft show. Looking back, I think I over did it for the venue. Looking at my booth set up compared to those around me, I think I got carried away. 😅

 My tower of art was almost the tallest thing in the hall. 😁 While it was part of my plan to have the tall thing to attract attention and mark my space as different, I didn't expect it to stick out quite so much. 😅

 I mean most of the other booths were just flat tables and/or small stands. I also noticed that most of them didn't have much if anything for the "beach themed" booth decorating contest, where I had extra decor all over the place. 😐 

Literally, beach towels, sea shells, sand toys, beach balls on every display, racks and tables 😎 plus the whole front of ocean waves art. I mean come on, I "beached" my whole booth, but no word on who won the contest, so I doubt it was me. 😐

Kind of a shame really, I put a lot of thought into this, a lot of extra effort and planning that now kind of feels like it was a bit of a waste. I mean I was happy with my display, I was proud even of what I had come up with. I mean did you even see the shark about to swallow the toy boat?!!? 😆

The 3-sided art display worked pretty great, I'll probably do that again.

It created a good amount of hanging space and I was able to display quite a few paintings showing off different styles. 

The second rack was absolutely necessary to split the jewelry up and keep it from overwhelming the tables.  

I still think I have too much stuff and I need a better plan for the leather bracelets because they take up too much surface. Overall, I had fun (which was greatly aided by inviting a friend) and I would do it again, although I will probably reign myself in a bit next time. 😅

Tick tock. . .

No not the social media app, the countdown clock to my event. The first event in my new "home" area, the first event in over a year. The first event since the move has taken a lot of preparation, digging thru the garages searching for tables, racks, and shelves, cleaning said tables and shelves; 😉 building out inventory, making more little trees, filling jewelry displays. I didn't get quite as much done as I had planned but that's life sometimes. 

I have spent a lot of time thinking about the booth set-up, partly because I haven't done a lot of indoor events and partly because of the booth decorating contest which I've never done before. Normally I set up outdoors and have the canopy/tent overhead that I use to hang things like the wire trees and paintings. So, setting up indoors without it presents a bit of a challenge for displaying certain things. 😐 I have a monster wire display tree, but I have no place to hang it, so I am leaving it home.

I had decided on the 6 foot rack because without the canopy I feel I needed some vertical attention grabber. I also decided to use it a bit differently instead of "cornering" it I am flat facing it so people can walk around and I can use all 3 sides. 😁 The "front" is the beach theme with all the ocean waves paintings and some decor stuffs, there is more I just didn't get it all out for yesterday's test. 😉

Side 2 is the wall of flags, with all the embellished abstract flags. The third side is just a sampling of abstracts and rainbows. 

While I do find the tower of art pretty and kind of impressive it is just art leaving me with mountains of jewelry. 😏 I had planned for two 6 foot tables but when I set them up and started loading the stands and displays and the book of little trees, I realized I have too much stuff and not enough surface. 

Plus, if both tables are just covered in jewelry I have no place for crates of other art. 😕 So I went back to the drawing board and double checked measurements and decided I will need a second rack. If I put a 4 foot in the back corner, I can move some of the larger jewelry things over and have enough table space for 2 crates of art.  

One of the major reasons I decided to use a second rack is because I realized I had no place to put the necklace board without it, it zip ties in the top normally. 😐 So if I can use the second rack I can move over the barrettes, rings, earrings, giant triple bar, and it gives me more space for hanging wire trees. 

It seemed like a great solution until I went back to searching the garages for more shelves and realized I don't have enough. 😖 Normally I use either the 6 foot or the pair of 4 foot, so I have not had this come up before, but I only have 6 shelves. The 6 foot configuration I tested had 5 shelves all by itself, but the 4 foot rack requires at least 2 shelves just for stability and ideal 3 for display purposes. After about half an hour of semi-panic searching, realizing there were no more shelves to be found and that this would not work without them I jumped online and order more. 😏 Now I am fingers-crossed just hoping they arrive in time.

Sad but Accepted. . .

Well, it finally happened, after 8 years of selling on etsy I finally got a less than 5-star review. 😞 I am a little sad but I accept it. 😐 It is still 4 stars so it could be worse, like a 2 or something. 

The overall rating is still 5-stars at the top of the shop, at least for now. I could have messaged them and tried to offer a discount or additional things for them to change the review but it's not really a bad review it says they are happy with it and likely to purchase again, it's just that barrette clip has a loose center. 😑 They said my chainmaille is beautiful they recognize the clip itself is a supply, so instead of trying to get them to change the review I simply apologized recognized the clips can be an issue and in the future I will test them more carefully.   

I am a bit disappointed because there is a good chance that at some point my shop will show as 4 stars instead of 5, because of the way etsy calculates the average on a 1 year rolling period, combined with the infrequent nature of reviews in my shop complicated by being closed for several months for the move making a period of no new reviews.  It's just one of those things, I see it coming but as there is nothing to be done about it, I have to just let it go. 𝅘𝅥𝅮𝅘𝅥𝅰𝅘𝅥𝅮𝅘𝅥𝅝 let it go 

Over the years I have seen many, many sellers freaking out in the forums over a "bad" review and often I have thought to myself "ok but that is not that bad" 4 stars is actually technically not bad at all, it is not negative it's just not perfect. For many years on etsy you couldn't even publicly respond to a 4 star review it had to be 3 or less. They have recently changed that and now sellers can respond to any review even 5 stars which seems weird to me because what would you say other than "thank you". 😅  

With a Father's day trip this weekend and my craft fair next weekend I just don't have the time or energy to be overly-upset about one less than perfect review. I do care, I care a great deal about my customers being happy, but if you read it they are not really un-happy so I am going to choose to not obsess over this.  There are so many other things for me to obsess over right now. 😅😆

Only 2 more weeks. . .

There are only 2 more weeks before the Summer Craft Fair. 😲

I am not ready. I'm still making things. I haven't decided on racks and table set-up. 😕 I haven't figured out decorations for the contest yet. I have lists and lots of ideas but I'm not ready. 😨 

Seriously, it's not even 2 weeks it's really more like 10 days because today is a Sunday and the event is a Saturday and Father's Day is in between. 😏 

I have found my racks and tables and am cleaning them all, but I still haven't decided between the 4' and 6' racks, just 1 corner unit or 2. I am considering ordering a new flat wall in a 6' that folds so it fits in my car and takes up less floor space standing in the booth. But if I use both corner units it gives me the lower shelves to stick beach balls and decorations. 😅 

I have so much inventory I have no idea how I'm going to display it all. I have a lot of bracelet bars and jewelry stands but I need to sort the chainmaille patterns so that I can price things easier. I also still need to come up with the right metal panel for the magnets. 😒 

I have gone from nervous to excited and back to nervous. 

More etsy oddities. . .

Today on my etsy shop dashboard I have a huge banner of sorts. 

I'm not sure what to think about this. 😐

I'm not sure why it's there all of a sudden. 😕 

My shop is not new, my "first sale" was years ago, like 8 years ago. Seriously, I literally just shipped 2 orders on Tuesday, I'm actually getting close to 300 sales on the etsy shop front. 😎 

So yeah, I admit I am a bit confused by the "quick guide to getting your first sale". 😅 Although, sales have been slow and there is always room for improvement, right?  

So, I clicked the links to check out the info, first the "how to create great listings that sell" opens a pop-up window (which I hate) and it's a youtube of an old etsy-up (she mentions the 2021 trend guide). Not sure how that's helpful or even current. Next the tips for photos and keywords links go to articles in the Seller Handbook, cool but the photo article is almost a year old, I already read that. The keywords article is recently dated at least, March of this year, but much of what is in it is standard and a bit repetitive if you watched the recent etsy-up event or previously read almost any of the etsy handbook articles over the years.  After that is just a push to get the new app and add more listings, so nothing really helpful for my shop, but maybe it will help others.  😇

Personally, I don't really plan to add more listings on etsy, I moved all the art to goimagine.com and the new app won't download on my phone so until I cave in and upgrade my phone no new app for me. 😅 I do miss the cha-ching.