You can find my jewelry where?

Back in January when I opened my artfire account, I signed up for the pro account, which costs $10 a month. I told myself that I would give it a year, but I've just about decided to throw in the towel early. Granted I haven't devoted as much time and effort into it as I have over at etsy, but I have at least had 10 sales since Feb on my etsy store, but I have had 0 at artfire - where I'm spending more money every month! Sorry artfire, I guess my product isn't really compatible with the shoppers.  

Meanwhile, I was told yesterday that someone working in a local, privately owned pharmacy spotted a pair of earrings on a friend of mine and inquired about them, and after looking at it closely, they asked her to bring me, my cards, and a few pairs in so they could sell them. With Reflections salon interested too, I'm beginning to wonder if there is a market for these here in town. I really need to figure out my pricing point on them and make sure its fair to me while including whatever their markup will be, probaby at least 25%.  I have not had to mark anything up yet since I sell everything myself or on my online store, so all of my prices have been wholesale, nothing more than a dollar above it at most, so if I begin selling these in retail shops, I will also have to mark them up on my site and at shows, because I can't undermine the retail shops promoting my jewelry. Point is...if you want some butterfly earrings, get them now because the prices are probably going up by about 25% here very soon! I have already begun accepting Christmas orders. In fact I have a custom necklace to design and execute and at least 6 pairs of butterfly earrings, and its only September! If you place your orders now, you will get the prices that are in effect now as well...food for thought! : )

Busy and Blessed

Vintaj Blog Designer Highlight

I am the featured designer today over at the vintaj blog, visit the above link to check out my very first interview/article and share in my excitement!!  I'm so thrilled. This has truly been an amazing week. In addition to having my first feature article, I also received word that one of my submissions (also a vintaj design) is going to be in the Feb 2012 edition of Bead Trends magazine. It was my first attempt at submitting a design, so its pretty amazing and awesome that it was picked! Hopefully I can make a habit of that and get things submitted every month and maybe have a few items in throughout the course of next year.  My first downtown arts market event went great as well. There was no advertising, but I still managed to make a few bucks, and everyone told me later that my booth was a hit and received a lot of traffic. I didn't realize...I guess I was too busy with customers. ; )     Here's the booth set up, which is still a work in progress:

In addition to having all of this going on, we tiled the kitchen floor this weekend. Everything went great and it looks beautiful...but we forgot to account for the added height it added to the floor, and our refrigerator now doesn't fit under the cabinet where it is supposed to go...so we are going to have to rethink our layout and design. Right now its in a completely different spot, and its actually growing on me, it seems like it really opens up the feel of the space as well as the views into the other rooms. You can see in this photo where it is now as well as the pretty new floor - tiles are 17 inch tiles that we got from Knox rail salvage for $1.99 each, wow!  We love how it looks so much like slate, but its ceramic tile. Anyway, the refrigerator originally was on the left, and it would stick out so far that it made it seem very narrow, and it blocked the view into the living room area, which is now opened up. The den also now has a view of the refrigerator and pantry, so if the boys are trying to sneak sweets or something, its easier to stop that now.

Now, today I have a lot on my plate. I have to get my necklace ready to send to Bead Trends for photography, set up a home inspection for some buyers I'm working with who are buying an amaing house (another blessing in my life that could not have happened at a better time, otherwise I would have had to retire my license this year due to not being able to afford my dues/fees) and do about 3 bpo reports, fun stuff! Once all that is off my plate though, I just got some new Vintaj products from beadaholique that I'm dying to try out, and I plan on doing my first "how to" series, so stay tuned!