Category: Jewelry

Jewelry creations I have made…

Modest Sales! Exciting Developments?

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Very excited to hear my items have been selling locally in the shop! They are hosting an event tonight, and it appears that what I brought with me yesterday is on trend as it were. Some of it will even be featured as “exclusive early access.” ::grins::  Definitely excited to hear how that goes.

Seems I will have to keep an eye on what sells, and what sells quickly. The “monster” earrings were fun, and so were the mermaid scales, although let my stupidity be a lesson. Always wear the correct protective equipment for the job. I thought I was working in a well ventilated area and… nope. I’ve got the ventilator and forget safety glasses, I should buy goggles. Ouch, my eyes smart long after the fact. Rather worrisome, actually. Dragonet caught pink eye; wondered for a while if it was going to develop into that but instead it remains sore and gritty, and no other telltale signs. Perhaps time to be a grown up, yes? (But who likes going to a walk-in?)

Mostly excited that I may have “regular” items to make and keep in stock.

In other great news, the prints I mentioned last entry have been printed and mailed ::grins again:: My stickers for labels as well as… ::drumroll:: corrected business cards! MOO is so awesome and fixed them for me! I cannot say enough good things about them; they are fantastic!

I’m also thinking I should have bought… more stickers than I did :P Probably going to do that once they arrive, too.  See if I can get a few more drawings done before the end of March to make it worth ordering again.

Lastly, some of my supplies arrived earlier than expected in the mail, so I am back to designing packaging for it. Fingers crossed my file didn’t get eaten with the random virus I caught on my computer… I can’t seem to find it. Sigh.

Life happens.

Hope you’re having a great weekend :)

It’s Hard to Turn Over a New Leaf

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…when electric cars don’t have gas engines ;)

Signed my life away for a 2017 Nissan Leaf. According to the dealership, this is probably the first 2017 model sold in Canada. Pretty cool factoid, if you ask me!

The weather has become ridiculously warm. At 2°C for the past couple of days, the snow has been melting and to add insult to injury, it rained for the latter part of the day. Rather than complain, I reminded the girls it made for perfect snowball weather, with heavy, sticky snow. Snowballs also meant snowmen, and ‘Phee decided snowdragons were more impressive creations within the realm of possibility ::grins::

I’ve been feeling kind of scattered lately.

I cranked out more earrings for Strange Things Emporium. I think she said she has a venue this weekend, so fingers crossed for both of us! I should have kept a few pairs to photograph for Etsy, but I rushed them to the store while I had time to. Malachite with silver, steampunk gears… carnelian that looks like dripping  blood. All kinds of stuff.

They also need traditional painters/artists, so I spoke to the fellow running that part of the store. I’m hopeful. I just need to focus and draw.

But I’m also knitting… just seems the easiest thing to pick up and manage at the moment. I am also… obsessive sometimes. I started a project and I want to see it done, so while I might have a larger chunk of time to draw, now my mind is on knitting. There are dragons in the background too, hehe. They need to come to the forefront, as I probably have another craft sale lined up in March.

Lastly, I’ve been wrestling with taming my crafting space. There’s no way to work on some of these things (save the knitting) because I have no space to work! I bought a million shelves on clearance from Chapters, (hey, I’m surprised too!) They are floating shelves, so trying to find the right sort of things to put on them have been a challenge in the art room. They made a great spice rack in the kitchen, and cleaned up the clutter in both bathrooms very nicely! I just… have a lot of large things :P

 

Maybe some photos next update. I have lots and lots of goodies arriving in the mail ::smiles::

Small steps in the right direction

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Firstly, new earrings available at Strange Things Emporium!

Not my usual style, but they fit in with the theme of the shop. I believe they are reasonably priced, so even better if they sell ;)

Next up, incorporating upcycling into my business model. I’ve become an avid tea drinker since discovering Earl’s Valentine (a seasonal black tea blend from  David’s Tea), and winter has bestowed upon me several of these beautiful display tins. I am thinking I can re-purpose them for earring containers, or possibly art. I used to have an interest in tiny dioramas, but stopped because I had no way to seal them away from dust. (I wonder if these will work, aesthetically speaking. Hrm… )

For kicks, I started priming the cases a few of them came in. They will either make great display cases… or they won’t. Either way I’ll have learned something, and the cases are still good for storage.

Not the direction I expected to take myself in, but art (ok, and possible sales!) pleases me :D There might be room to sell my traditional artwork at Strange Things Emporium, as well. I need to make inquiries and crank out some drawings if it works for me.

Until later <3
~ElvenAssassin

Scarves and Yarn Stashes

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No pictures of my work, I’m afraid.

I did a lot better at my 2nd craft sale. While I only sold items to one customer, I was in the same boat as other vendors, and traded a lot of items. I now have beautiful shades of purple and magenta mixing bowls from Tupperware, plus other goodies, mwahaha!

Two of my infinity scarves sold, so that was nice as well.  ::smiles:: I am still swamped under scarves and need… well, more. Sort of :P They are excellent samplers, and a nice way to learn new techniques. For example, I got tired of waiting for my cabling needles to arrive from China, and I’m attempting cables for the first time… without any extra special tools! Go me!

::struts:: I’m ridiculously proud of myself, and you know what? It even looks good, if I do say so myself (and I do).

I haven’t figured out how to go about listing them for sale… but I’m sure it’s going to be stiff competition, whether it’s on Facebook or Etsy. Of course, the girls lose scarves almost as quickly as they lose their mittens, so I may not have extras to spare. ::laughs:: Their school will also accept donations, so I have options, one way or another.

As for zee stash, it is filled with practical, and not-so-practical stuff to knit with. I bought yarn that was pretty, with no idea what I’d knit, so I have lots and lots of pairs of skeins, meaning I only have enough of one colour to, well, make a scarf. Heh.

While sorting today, I took this picture (for shopping purposes. Don’t you ever do that?).

I am one of those people who can never leave things well enough alone; I’ve found a sweater pattern I want to tackle and I’m thinking this yarn may be an acceptable substitute. Probably shouldn’t mess with changing the fiber type when size matters, but it will be a learning experience no matter how it turns out.

I am behind on some orders for ornaments for friends (none sold, but family and friends like ’em!). Extra appointments on top of shuttling children to extra-curricular activities. This candle is pretty much burnt out. Blah.

Oh oh oh! Don’t recall if I said some of my jewelry is being sold at Strange Things Emporium? Apparently some of it has already sold ::preens:: I will have to go down in person and see what’s gone and whether I should supply similar items.

That’s all for now,
ElvenAssassin

Business Cards! (and craft sales)

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There I go, disappearing again…

November brings with it an extra year on my driver’s licence.

I was brave, and signed up for two more craft sales. I’ve attended one and broke even, so I should not complain. (I’ll be honest, it’s difficult not to question what I’m doing!) The second is set for the end of the week. Nothing has been unpacked, so set-up should be relatively easy, in theory. I’m nervous to find out there is a larger venue scheduled the same day, but the last one had a great turn out for being in a suburb at the far end of town.  I can only do better, right?

I’ve been knitting to pass the time… it’s been good for me. With my phone broken, (again!) I have something to keep busy while traveling. I actually replaced it with an old one while I wait for the Note 8 to come out, but it has limitations :P I spoke with the office staff at my daughters’ school and if none of my scarves sell this weekend, they are more than happy to accept the donations. So win-win for me in a way. I either recoup my costs, or I help my community. Even better if I can do both ;)

With Black Friday creeping into the Canadian shopping calendar, I scored a deal on business cards from Moo.com <3 What do you think?

elvenassassins_business_card

Granted, I should have had this design sitting and waiting, but I didn’t actually figure out what I wanted in a business card, until a couple of days ago, so… the digital version was flung together in a few hours. I think it’s good for what it is. (although I just realized there’s a typo. Can you see it? Oh dear.) 400 typos being sent off to the printer… nothing to do now but grin and bear it. ::laughs:: 400 typos at a 30% discount at least! I have two weeks to mull over what kind of white-out works best, heh. The nifty thing about Moo is being able to upload up to 50 different designs. I managed 33, so I’ve got quite the variety to hand out. I’m still rather happy.

Lastly, on the general topic of dragons… I made several dragon-be-speckled ornaments to sell. The girls have picked out which ones to decorate for themselves, and the very worst case scenario is keeping them for myself? (Oh, the hardship!)

Fingers crossed I do well this weekend!