Cute Christmas Fabric

 I found this great fabric with square vignettes of Christmas symbols.  This is a 2010 fabric from Blank Quilting.  I loved it because it is not the traditional colors.  It has some pinks, cinnamon, and green on a cream background. 

It is easy to cut away individual squares to make little pillow tasseled ornaments. 

 I also have used them as a focus point on some of my Christmas stockings for this year's craft show inventory. This one features great gold and cinnamon tassels with a snowman vignette on a light green snowman fabric.  

This new style was fashioned for the October monthly challenge by my favorite Etsy team, Blogging Business Artisans.  Visit our blog and have a look at what my teamees are up to. Thanks!

Bring it On!

Well, we are down to the last two days in August!  Labor Day weekend:  Where did the summer go?  I drove down a local street earlier this week and for the first time I noticed the tops of the trees are already turning color.  They were slightly tinged purple.  Autumn is sneaking up on us, since at the street level,  all the leaves were still green.

I really love the autumn season; I  am DONE with the heat, and welcome some cooler weather, and some occasional days of rain and I'm ready for the harvest! But the thing that I think I like the most about  autumn is the colors.  I thought I would show you, rather than talking about it.  Enjoy!

(And Autumn color in my handiwork)

Bring on Autumn! 

This post is for the Blogging Business Artisans monthly challenge.  See what the other members are submitting for the challenge Link Party on our blog. 

Etsy Shop Evaluation

The BBA Challenge for this month is to evaluate your Etsy shop in some way--several ways possible.  I have three shops, but I have chosen to evaluate, for this challenge anyway, my Creations shop. I have evaluated my other shops, including closing one of them, but for now, I will talk about the first shop I ever opened on Etsy.

Since it opened in late November of 2008, my sales have been pretty stable each year. Evaluating every year end, and wanting more traffic in 2012 (including more sales!), I have been very diligent this year to list new items, relist items, and tweet items almost daily to get more views.  (I also occasionally list items on Facebook.)

Results have been that the ratio between Etsy views vs. Direct Traffic views this year has changed over  last year's ratio.  Meaning, I am getting a greater portion of Direct Traffic views.  I believe this is due to Twitter and this is good!

In 2013, I would like to increase my views from outside Etsy.  I will be looking for ways to accomplish this. One way, I believe is to advertise with or sponsor blogs that do some promotion of their sponsors.  I have found that tweeting draws views, so this will be my first priority for 2013--more blog sponsorship--blogs that tweet.  Just one of my plans; we will see how it results!

Got any plans for your new year!!????

BBA Secret Santa Reveal

My favorite Etsy team, the Blogging Business Artisans, had a Secret Santa event and look what I got! My secret Santa was Jamie of Poppy Hill Creations!  My gift arrived in this lovely wrapping and I loved the tag.  If you look closely at the picture you will see a glittery snowflake--that's the tag with Jamie's greeting on the back!  Love it!

What was in it?  Paper products!  What a surprise from a fellow Etsian that loves paper!  Yay!

 Even though I am a blogger, I love paper and love writing hand written notes to my friends.  Thanks, Jamie; It will be well used!

Jack (Jill) of all trades!

Hope that title is not politically incorrect!  Seems like everything we say lately has to be considered for fear of offending someone! Oh . . . heck with it!  Anyway . . . .

I'm back!  I have had a wonderful vacation from the riggers of promotion blogging in favor of blogging about my creativity, as I have been doing in my other blog during the month of August.  I know that this sounds a bit on the unfavorable side,  but I have had a time to be honest with motivations and take a frank look at my time availability.

"Promotion blogging" as I have labeled it here, is just that.  A blog that exists for the sake of promoting something.  I originally started this blog to promote my fledgling Etsy shop.  Along the way, I have met quite a few wonderful friends in the blogging world and other Etsy sellers. Blogging has blossomed into a healthy community "thing".

In looking back over my nearly four years of writing this blog, I have made a few observations:

1) I have blogged about my creativeness, but there are so many others who do the same. There are so many great blogs out there! I feel sort of like just one of the ships sailing in a vast albeit crowded sea.

2)  I have blogged about my family, from time to time, which I dearly love. (This is not strictly a family blog.)

3)  I have blogged about and participated with my favorite Etsy team, the Blogging Business Artisans.  I have met an awesome group of ladies (all Etsy sellers) thru my BBA team participation and consider them friends.  I thoroughly enjoy participating with them in this selling journey.  (If you are a serious blogger and are interested in participation with an active group, please visit our team blog.)

4) Blogging puts a bit of pressure on the writer, unless, of course, one lives for writing.  I like to write, but I don't live for it! I am a "jack-of-all-trades" kind of person, but "master of none" as I can hear my dad saying. I like writing, and sewing, and painting, and reading, and creating and . . . um . . well. . . you get it!!! BTW, my BBA team has a September challenge to try something new. . . that's gonna be difficult for me!

5) I can be consistent with something!  Over 530 posts just in this blog!! My gosh, I have been blogging for a long time!

So . . . . I do like the outlet of the blogging medium, if for nothing else than to have a communication outlet with you, my reader, and with my potential customers! This online selling environment can be a lonely world at times, and honestly, we all need to share our triumphs and our failures with an audience of like minded and friendly individuals.  Thus, I will continue blogging after my much needed break!  Hope you will continue to follow along.  I love having you! 

Looking forward to our chats and your comments!

Vacation!

August Vacation!

For the entire month of August I will be on vacation from this blog!  I may put up a couple of blog posts to keep up with my favorite Etsy team, the Blogging Business Artisans (see our BBA blog here) , but for the most part, I will not be posting here.  Please watch for my return in September on this blog. 

In the meantime . . .

I do have another blog, and will be posting to it, as my vacation is actually a change in focus from handcrafting to writing and my other blog is a creative writing blog.  I will be taking this month to work on some writing projects, which I will share in my Abigal's Attic blog.  The new adventure starts here. See you over there!