It's the little things...

[merimask]

Oh man, I think this holiday season will be the death of me soon.

In an attempt to avoid staying awake until 5AM working on things, I decided to raid my old stash of little items I made almost a year ago.  They were just sitting in a box that hadn't been opened since the last time I actually, physically attended an event where I sold my stuff in person.  So I found things like this...

...and listed 'em on Etsy.  Yeah, it's all just little stuff, but this is a good time to offer it anyway.  Stocking stuffers, you know?  Way to use your noodle, clever overworked artist-person! 

I'm going to take this opportunity to plug my good friend golden_meliades'  Etsy shop, while I'm at it.   Her hairsticks are absolutely lovely and SO reasonably priced.   I own several sets and every time I wear them, everybody notices them because they are simply gorgeous.  

Just click on the picture to go to her shop.  There's something there for everyone's taste and budget (even a stick that we collaborated on!)...which reminds me that I have to send her some more leather leaves.  Been planning to do that for a while now ...I'm a bad friend.  :-/

Last of the X-mas packages should be heading out today, I hope.  That's the plan anyway.   The plan is always subject to changes.   Weather may become a factor.  We are supposed to get sleet and freezing rain and eventually snow, here.  I can't see how we are going to get sleet or freezing rain, as it is SO COLD here right now (in the teens), but then the weather has been changeable too.  Yesterday it was 52 here...52!!  Day before that, it snowed.  Today, the lawn that was warm and soggy yesterday, and covered with snow the day before, is hard and crunchy-frozen right now.   So, I suppose I should be prepared for anything.

Hope you are all having a decent day.    Scary weather in much of the country, so stay warm!

EDIT:  Hey cool!  I topped over three thousand frontpage views on my DeviantArt gallery.  Not bad eh?  It's been up for less than a month.  ^_^

Comments

[golden-meliades.livejournal.com]

It's getting into the depths of the holiday season again...and again, LJ dies. Ghost town! *echos*

I'm on dial-up right now so it's taking me FOREVER to do anything online...I hope the high speed comes back up before I have to make my Etsy listing today...uploading the pics takes forever on dial-up.

Thanks for the plug. :) With the US economy as it is right now, and with Canada only a couple of steps behind, Etsy is a ghost town as well. I still only get one or two hits each time I put up a new listing or renew an old one. ONE SALE at the very first of December...and nothing since then. November was dead, too. November/December should be the BUSIER months! People are really cracking down on the luxury items/non-essentials. It's not serious for me as I don't rely on my Etsy income for anything (I've only used it to pay for supplies thus far and all the rest is sitting untouched in a separate account...not that hairsticks are very lucrative anyway, being only about 20 bucks average per sale, with about 10 sales a month.)

But hey, working yourself into a knot about it isn't going to help...it's going to give you an ulcer. I mean, I know you have to work hard to keep buyers coming at a time like this but worrying on top of it? Extra work + extra stress = Burnt Out Meri.

Though there are SO few things that worry me (being that I'm an exceptionally sheltered/protected/fortunate kid) that it's easy for me to say 'try not to worry'. I could worry if I made an effort, but I would HAVE to make an effort, at this point. Right now my biggest problem is an increasingly serious winter funk...but I'm getting my brain together on that topic and trying to form some kind of plan to keep it all under control. The lamp does help somewhat but it's only a little...just enough to take the 'edge' off, it seems. The random pointless anxiety has gone away, but it's been replaced by utter sloth/don't-care-about-ANYTHING...'ness'.

I had to change my LJ layout to a sicken heart and flowers one to get a warmer colour that isn't dark. Most of the 'warm colour' layouts for 'Expressive' are dark warm colours...and I dislike dark colours for my LJ...it makes me depressed. So I had to settle for this one with hearts and daisies spilling out of an envelop. Scary!

[merimask.livejournal.com]

LJ is SUPER dead, but not as dead as Etsy. It's not just you; I'm having a hard time getting people to click on my stuff too. I think I do okay because I'm already bookmarked so much, but stuff in there is definitely not getting looked at like it was before. When I do a fresh listing, in the past (just a few months ago) I'd have 10 or 20 hits in the first few seconds. Now I'm lucky to get 1 or 2. Only cross-listing on Twitter and DA brings in the attention I need to make sales. I even ran a Main Showcase spot today & I got maybe five hits from it, & NO sales. Really very scary times, economically speaking.

[zannachan.livejournal.com]

You are just a very busy bee, aren't you?

Thanks for the reminder on golden_meliades hair sticks. They are beautiful. I need to figure out how to use Etsy better because there are a number of venders there that I really, really like--some steam punk venders, the lady with the gorgeous butterfly pendants, your stuff, golden_meliades work, and so forth--but I can never find them again (yours at least I can be confident to find a link in one of your posts).

Unfortunately, neither of us has a working pay pal account, and even if she took checks (and it doesn't look like she does) she's in Canada--so personal checks don't work. But I may end up getting something and sending it to the person, even though at this point there's no way it will arrive in time for Christmas.

I'm so far behind on my Christmas shoppping this year it's crazy.

[golden-meliades.livejournal.com]

Every Etsy shop and listing has links in the sidebar that allow you to keep track of the item and/or the seller. One says 'add this item to favourites' (which will add the specific listing you're looking at to your 'favourites' list. Or you can hit the 'add this seller to favourites' if you like a lot of the same person's stuff and want to keep track of their shop. (The favourites section is divided into two...favourite items and favourite sellers/shops.)

I have about 275 favourite sellers and over 700 favourite items, lol. If you have friends who would check your list when you don't want them to (say if you buy them gifts on Etsy) then you can keep your favourites private.)

[zannachan.livejournal.com]

Shiny! Do you have to be logged in or something to use the favorites? I'm pretty sure I have an account, since I've ordered a few things there, but I'm still a newbie at it and I just haven't had the time to play around with it.

Heck, I don't even have a pay pal account, though I think that will have to change because I love Etsy and it's the only real way to buy things there as most venders don't take other forms of payment.

It's a bit late for Christmas, I know (they'll just have to be late, I guess), but I want to order a couple of hair sticks from you. I feel like an idiot because Meri linked to your site ages ago and I really liked your work--I do beadwork, but not hairsticks--but then didn't know how to get back to it. So you'll be hearing from me hopefully soon. Once the Pay pal thing is figured out.

[zannachan.livejournal.com]

D'oh, I meant to say Thank you for the help. Seriously, it is appreciated, even if I am a bit of a scatterbrain these days.

[golden-meliades.livejournal.com]

You're welcome. :) And yeah, you need to sign in before Etsy can add items or sellers to your favourites section.

Yep, Paypal is pretty necessary for Etsy; personal cheques just take too long, you have to wait for them to arrive, and THEN you have to wait for them to clear, so all in all it takes at least a month after purchase before you can mail the person their item. Money orders would be a little better but most people don't want to get them or don't even know how/where to get them.

[zannachan.livejournal.com]

Money orders have also gotten very expensive. That's what I've done in the past--and you can even get ones good in Canada, which personal checks are not--but they've gotten really pricey.

Thanks again! I now have you and merimask in my favorites. I even remembered my log in and password. Now I just need to hunt down some of the other venders I really liked and add them. Yay!

[merimask.livejournal.com]

Zanna, go to my favorites on my front page in Etsy...you'll find Niele (the butterfly lady)in there among others Her shop is listed pretty early amongst my faves, under favorite sellers. :-)

[zannachan.livejournal.com]

Awesome, thank you!