Run up to Christmas....

I really meant to blog last week....LOL!  Ok, well it's the run-up to Christmas and I still haven't sold anything.  I'm not too upset of course, because I know it takes a while to get established anywhere, including a website like Etsy.  I do love Etsy though, I just love the layout and all the support there.


Anyway, I have listed pretty much everything I have made so far, with the exception of a couple of things here and there.  I know it's hard to price your stuff - whatever you're selling - and I am starting to wonder if I might be over-pricing my jewellery.  At one point I thought might have been UNDER pricing, but my brother recently told me that his colleagues reckon that my prices are too high.

Would you pay £35 for this necklace?

The thing is, I would be happy paying the prices I have put everything at.  There is no correct way of pricing jewellery, which is what makes it so difficult.  The basic formula which I have come across is to add everything you have spent on the item, and multiply it by 2 to get a wholesale price (if you're selling to a store or a company).  Now this is realistic because if you sell anything wholesale, you will be expected to sell your goods at around half the retail price.  This is perfectly normal - and this is why you need to do this equation to make sure you're not losing out on any profit, even if it might be a little bit.  The retail price is usually 1.5 or 2 x the wholesale price. Now, I have actually done both equations and taken into consideration what I personally would pay for each piece if I were buying it.  The other thing, is that I do have to cover costs and make sure I pay myself for the time I have taken to make a piece of jewellery.  It really does take me about half an hour to string a necklace of beads together from figuring out the design to calculating the price.  How many people out there actually know how much I have paid for some of these gemstones?  £10 for a string of 50 pearls is quite a lot.  Garnet, Onyx and Amethyst are all pretty expensive at the moment, you'd be lucky to find a 30cm string of any of these beads at a good size of 8mm for less than £5.  And don't get me started on the price of silver LOL!!  Some people might be surprised to learn that I might actually end up paying around £10 for the materials to create a necklace, double that to £20 for the wholesale price, double it again for a retail price of £40 which I think is too much so I take it down to £30 or even £25 because that is what I would personally pay.

I'd pay £30 for this necklace - would you?

I don't know....perhaps I'm rubbish at marketing or perhaps it's just that nobody has noticed or is waiting to buy things at the last minute.  All I know is that half the people I ask about the pricing tell me it's too much, and other people tell me it's about right.  So I'm not sure what to do there!  The other thing is that I know there are quite a few people looking at my Etsy store, yet nobody is buying.  There must be a reason - again, I think it's probably either price, waiting for payday / beginning of December, or perhaps my niche isn't attractive to many people.

Anyway, as I said, I'm not too upset about it - as I only started this thing in September / October, and I read recently in an Etsy blog that it can take around 6 months to get noticed on Etsy.  In the meantime, I LOVE creating treasuries, I'm a member of a jewellery making forum, I love creating jewellery and even though I have had a few down moments, this is a journey which I am taking in order to find out if it will work or not LOL!  If this doesn't work out for me, then at least I can say I tried it out and I won't be wondering "what if" for the rest of my life.

How much did I pay for the silver and gemstones here?

course I will continue to be creative if this doesn't work out, and I will even continue to market and try to sell my jewellery on Etsy, and next year I might do a few craft fairs and it might help spread the word.  Who knows, perhaps this will work out in a couple of years' time?  Besides, Russell Grant (A British astrologer) told me that it will take off, but it will take time.....so yes, I called into Radio 2 and got to be on air and find out what the Universe had in store for me - where's the harm in that?  The Universe can always change it's mind I guess ;)

Anyway, if ANYONE would like to take a a look at the prices in my Etsy store and tell me what you think of my prices, I would be very grateful for the feedback.  Tell me if you think my jewellery is over-priced, under-priced, and tell me what you would pay for which pieces!  Please, be honest! :)

Siobhan xx

Long time, no blog!

Wow...how long has it been since I last posted on here?

Well, to start off with, I have been away for the first two weeks of October.  I was in Wales for the first week, and I was travelling around the UK following Josh Groban on tour, who was amazing!  I managed to get my t-shirt signed along with a CD lyric book and picture.  I'm happy!! :)

So, I am back on Etsy - last week I re-opened my Etsy store and decided to gradually re-list each item one by one.  It's so cheap to do it, 20 cents is practically nothing in UK £ sterling!  Last week I was re-listing the Prehistoric items, this week it's Egypt and Middle East.

I am also in the middle of catching up with Etsy Holiday Bootcamp tasks - I'm a little concerned actually because I have had SO many views in my store yet nobody is buying anything.  Yesterday I had 40 views, and right now I'm on 20.

I'm trying to do everything I can to increase views - relisting definitely works, as does tweeting.  I may have said this before, but even though they advise you not to tweet too often about your own stuff you'll be considered as being "spammy" but so far, every time I tweet somebody looks at my Etsy store....

This week I am attempting to tweet about my own stuff, other things which might be interesting to people who follow me, and generally being a little more human rather than robotic.  The other thing is tags and descriptions of each item - I'm thinking I might go tweak them a little just to see if something happens!

In the meantime I still have some knitting and crochet to do in time for Christmas.  Speaking of which, I am going to promote some craft fairs which I have recently discovered, all in the Midlands - I thought it was worth blogging about!

1. Crafts for Christmas (www.ichf.co.uk) 3rd - 6th November at Birmingham NEC
2. Festive Gift Fair (www.festivegiftfair.co.uk) 17th-20th November at Birmingham NEC
3. Nottingham Bead and Craft Show (www.ukbeadfairs.co.uk) 20th November at Nottingham Gateway Hotel
4. The Guildhall Christmas Craft Fair (www.leicester.gov.uk/craftfair) in Leicester

I will NOT be exhibiting at any of these - I am nowhere near that kind of stage yet, although it is something I am thinking of doing at some point.  But I will be going along to have a look at the Festive Gift Fair at the NEC to do some Christmas shopping!  And also I will pop along to the one in Leicester as it's closest to me, easy to get to and....well, I want to see if I might want to exhibit there next week :)

Hey people - it's NOT too early to do your Christmas shopping!  I like to try and get everything done by November 30th or at the latest, the first weekend in December.  I usually end up buying many things throughout the year - if I see something which would suit somebody, but their Birthday has passed, I still buy it and save it up for Christmas.  I also buy the odd little thing here and there if I like the look of it but can't think of who to give it to - I buy a couple of cute things and put them away, think about who to give it to later.  Too many people hate Christmas because they avoid it until the last minute and rich around getting stressed about everything and don't put much thought into what they're buying for people.  Think about it NOW and at least you will have a little time to think about what you're giving as gifts :)

And of course....there is always my Etsy store if you're after some nice handmade jewellery ;)

Siobhan xx

Week 4 of being on Etsy!

Well here I am again....!!  I guess I should actually post some photos actually.  One thing which is not right with this blog is the recent absence of photos....!

Okay, first thing's first, I made some more Prehistoric jewellery last week because I realised I didn't have a great deal of it.  But I ended up making a few really nice and simple pieces.  My favourite is the Obsidian necklace - the stones are really tactile and organic.  They're just lovely to hold in your hand!  It's very dramatic but I love it.  I made matching earrings too :)

Now, this week I have decided to try and get used to Twitter and Facebook and figure out the best way of marketing my stuff.  I know this is probably a steep learning curve as I have never done this before, but I am keeping an eye on the stats both in Etsy and with Google Analytics.  They both come up with differing numbers but roughly the same outcome with regards to what time people look at my Etsy store.

Of course, when I first uploaded items I had no end of visits, and the week after that had some good visitor numbers too.  These last couple of weeks haven't been very high with visitor numbers though.  Obviously I don't do any at the weekend....but perhaps I should do the odd onw or two tweets and messages about my Etsy store at the weekend perhaps?

Anyway, the other thing I have been looking at is how often I should send messages out and what impact it has on my visitor stats.  I read that if you tweet a LOT then people are more likely to "unfollow" and "unlike" you, and you're more likely to get more people following you if you tweet facts, hints and tips.  Today I tried historic facts - one an hour - and I had NO hits from 8am till 12noon.  Then I tweeted about an item in my store and it went up to 4 hits as soon as I tweeted the first one at 12noon....!  So I just carried on tweeting something in my store every hour or thereabouts and it's been fairly even for the rest of the day.

Tomorrow I think I will tweet about something in my store, perhaps combine a fact with a product, and do it once every 30 minutes.  Yesterday I went a little crazy and did one tweet every 15 minutes and it wasn't that exciting LOL!!  I tried once an hour and it was very slow so perhaps once every 30 minutes might just be okay.  Between 8:00am and 5:00pm is when I usually tweet and message.


Currently my stats say I get most visits weekdays between 10am - 2pm, 4pm - 6pm, Saturdays 12noon - 4pm and Sundays 10am - 12noon and 3pm - 5pm.  Might just try focusing on these times for the rest of the week.  I know 12noon - 2pm falls in many people's lunch hours when they would be more likely to look on Etsy.  I usually end up missing a tweet at 1:30pm and 2:00pm so perhaps I should try to tweet at those times a little more.  I'll try it tomorrow and see what happens.

So far I have had ZERO sales too.  I know it's early days and I have only just started my 4th week promoting my Etsy stuff, but I'm wondering if it's a combination of that and not actually being known much.  I haven't sent many business cards around, although I keep giving them to friends and family to distribute.  I'm wondering if I should create some postcards or leaflets, pop into town or perhaps make a trip to Birmingham and Nottingham to distribute them in the right places, as my cards are really quite small.  I'll think about it, because it means designing more things and spending more money.

Anyway, next week will be the last week before I go on holiday.  My shop will be closed for 2 weeks - until the middle of October, and then I shall open the shop agan and promote everything from scratch - I have an action plan ready and I'll blog about it when the time comes :)

Happy Wednesday! :)

I have to say I have been quite productive lately - this week I started listing my Prehistoric jewellery online, and I realised that I didn't have a great deal of it....so I made more! LOL!  Actually the thing which irritates me the most about all this is taking photos.  It so annoying when I take lots of photos of one necklace only to find out that they are ALL blurred and I have to take them all over again....!! I think it was too dark though, I did that last night, late afternoon after the sun had made its way around the garden :)

Anyhoo, I now have 21 followers, and of course I would LOVE some more!  I have sent messages to LIKE my Facebook Page to pretty much ALL of my friends on Facebook and I know only a handful have done so.  I'm not sure when to send them out again....I don't want to spam everyone!  Of course, there may be the odd chance that nobody can be bothered.

But hey, it's early days yet, I've only been going for 2 weeks, and the other thing I have been doing is looking at statistics of how often I have visitors and when.  Quite useful - at the moment I have discovered that Thursday and weekends are fairly quiet days.  Weekends - possibly because I don't list anything then, but I have no idea about Thursdays.  Ialso found it interesting that as I promoted my jewellery online I was still getting quite a few visits.

Last weekend I wasn't able to do much as I was in Cambridgeshire watching my brother take his vintage biplane flight (woohoo!) and on Saturday I was in London at Proms in the Park (again - woohoo!) and didn't get back until Sunday late afternoon.  It was still useful to find out how visits drop during the time when I am not listing or promoting!

Also, my website has finally corrected itself! It is www.wix.com/gemstone_orchid/portfolio
I have added my Twitter feed on the right hand side twitter.com/GemstoneOrchid
But unfortunately I can't find a widget for my Facebook Page so I'll put it here:
Gemstone Orchid Facebook Page

See you later! :)
Siobhan xx

Here we go!

Hi everyone :)

So my store is up and running, and I have added a little Etsy widget on thi sblog here, it should be on the right hand side there.  on September 1st and 2nd I uploaded several items of jewellery, and I have continued this since Monday 5th September.

I have been tweeting and posting messages on my Facebook page.  I only have 11 followers at the moment, yet I have sent requests to many more than that....but I won't be deterred!  I will continue selling.

I haven't had any sales yet, but it really is early days.  I went on a few forums on Etsy and asked someone in the States to tell me if they thought my jewellery is too pricey, and she thought it was just a little too pricey.  I have brough down prices of earrings and bracelets, but not the necklaces yet.  I'm asking a couple of other people I know in the States to get their opinion.  Its really hard when you start thinking about prices which are reasonable in the UK, but when you convert them to US, Canadian or even Australian $$, it's hard to know whether it's a reasonable price for them too, or too much.  Perhaps I shouldn't be thinking this way?  Perhaps I should be pricing things at what I think is a decent UK price, and not think about how an American would see it?  I have no idea, I'm still very new to this!

Anyway, I need to find a widget or something to put on this blog, which connects to my Facebook and / or Twitter page.  I shall investigate this later on, so watch out for it!

In the meantime I have made absolutely NO more jewellery LOL!  I have been concentrating on listing my items, and so far all the Egyptian / Middle Eastern pieces are up.  Today I decided to plug seperate pieces on Facebook and Twitter every 30 mins.  I didn't think this was too invasive of me, and I have kept an eye on my Etsy shop stats and Google Analytics, which both come up with similar numbers but different useful and sometimes random information.  For example, most people who have visited my Etsy store in the UK are in Liverpool, and most in the US from California!

I will be looking into joining a forum or two soon, and I will be uploading prehistoric inspired jewellery next I think.  I'm putting up my best pieces of jewellery - which I think are the Roman, Greek, Tudor and Victorian pieces - last and nearer to Christmas.  I really like a lot of my jewellery and I really hope it starts selling soon.  I think I just have to work on my networking, and perhaps when Etsy have another live critique session, I might join in to find out several opinions.

The website it up, but there is a problem with the url which appears in Google searches.  It turns out that Google crawled my website before I even uploaded it, but why it's got a different name I have no idea.  The good thing is that the link works, as does the url, wierdly, as well as the real url which also appears at the top of the web browser either way.

Did I mention my business cards?  They are BRILLIANT!  And because I reported to MOO that there were 22 cards which were mis printed, they are sending me 100 more business cards for FREE!!  How cool is that?!

Anyhoo, I must have a look at widgets so I can add things to my blog so everything is linked up.  Sorry for the rambling! :)  I have a busy weekend ahead too, I'm seeing Lee Evans in Nottingham tomorrow night, going to see my brother take his vintage bi-plane flight on Friday (weather permitting) then gatecrashing my boyfriend's parents house for tea and cake afterwards.  On Saturday I'm going to Hyde Park for the Last Night of the Proms on Saturday, and coming home on Sunday.  Perhaps I will wear a noticeable necklace in the hope of getting comments so I can distribute business cards...... ! :)

Siobhan xx

Gemstone Orchid is on Etsy!

Yesterday I finally went LIVE with my launch of my Etsy store here at www.orchids.etsy.com!  Hooray!  I have been making quite good progress listing my items up gradually throughout the day, and I also managed to make one treasury which has great comments and as a result I have been starting on a little Etsy network!  How exciting!

I have been Tweeting and posting messages on my Facebook page, and this afternoon I will be letting more people know about the Facebook Page.  I have a few followers on Twitter but I hope to increase that number soon.  I think it all has something to do with hashtags and trends, I have been looking to see who I can follow.  The main thing to know about folowing people on Twitter is that you can lose your account if you follow people aggressively - if you follow 50 people in one go.  Not good!  Yesterday I think I followed around 8 people and 4 of them followed back which I think is about average.

I'll be adding a widget to my blog if I can too.....and the Website is ready but there is a problem.  Well, it's Google's problem....basically, when I searched for my website on Google, it came up and worked but the URL was totally wrong and I need that to change to what it actually is before I make the website live.  I don't really want people getting confused with the URL, so I might have to wait another month before Google updates it.  I'm not too fussed about that as Etsy is my main concern :)

There are still lots of things to do of course, tweaks here and there, but I think everything is going as I want it to.  I have even had my mini cards delivered which I love, from www.moo.com and 22 out of 200 of the cards had been misprinted - the image was crokked on the card - so I let MOO know and you know what they did?  They're sending me 100 more cards for FREE!!!  I love MOO!! :D  They are brilliant!

Ok, gotta run, I have jewellery to list in my online store!

Siobhan xx

Almost ready!

Again, no photos so sorry about that......

But things are going quite well.  Fortunately I haven't got a great deal to do.  I say fortunately because of this cat saga which is happening at the moment - this last weekend, everything jewellery related totally stopped so we could take care of this cat.  I just could not do anything jewellery rtelated for 2 days last week because of it, I had no concentration, I couldn't sleep.  It's fine now, but hopefully she won't be in the cattery for too long.  We'd gladly have her here but I am allergic.  Every time I go to see her or take her to the vets I have to take my meds.  Hopefully it will al be sorted out soon.

Anyway, back to the jewellery!  I have completed my website and I have actually published it, but with hiding pages and a big message saying "UNDER CONSTRUCTION". This is because I wanted to make sure of the web address so I could put it on my business cards - which I have ordered now.  And they will be fine because I haven't put the address on, I have put my etsy store, website and email.

This weekend I'm going to Oxford with my boyfriend from Friday - Monday and after that I will have 2 days to prepare myself to go live with selling jewellery on September 1st!  It's quite exciting and daunting at the same time.  But as I have said all along, I am not expecting loads of sales right away.  I have plans to manage my time each day so I am promoting on Facebook and Twitter (hopefully I have this "selective tweets" business sussed), whilst making 1 or 2 pieces of ne jewellery per week.  In the meantime I will be putting one new item up every 2 hours in my Etsy store, and after the first couple of days I will actually tell people about my Facebook Page, Twitter, and website.  The reason for the delay is purely because I don't like the idea of telling people about it all before I've put much up for sale, otherwise I get the feeling people will go there, see about 4 items of jewellery, and leave.  I need to have at least 10 items up before I make everything official to everybody I know :)

Also there is a possibility that I might be going back to archaeology - temporarily!! There is a site coming up (they think) which they are willing to take me on as paid staff because of my specialist skills which would be very welcome on this site.  I said yes of course...although it will mean making selling my jewellery alot more difficult, and I won't be able to make much except at weekends.  I could still market it via Twitter on my mobile, or I could get one of those little laptops...those mini ones.  I love them!  But I have never needed one.  I probably wouldn't want to bring it onto site actually, it would most likely get scratched or dirty.  Anyway, I guess that will probably be another challenge, but it will get me a bit of money coming in too.  Perhaps that could mean spending longer concentrating on selling jewellery after it's finished? :)

What I have to try and to this afternoon is to try and give my jewellery names - it's proving to be quite difficult.  How many times can I say "Step back in time", "Step into the past", and call things "Egyptian Gems", "Egyptian Sunrise", "Sumerian Sands"......I'm trying not to be repetitive but I am sure there will be some repetition at least....!

I have been trying to write stories about each item too.  Not sure if they will work, but I hope so.  I know I'll be saying pretty much the same thing about them all, such as "made with gemstones adored and worn by ancient Egyptians", but I am assuming that if someone looks at one of my necklaces, they won't look at each and every one of them.....I don't know.

Anyway, things are going well, I'm just working on titles and descriptions so when it comes to posting them onto Etsy I won't have to sit and think too hard about them :)

Next week I think I will blog on Thursday, as it will be September 1st and my shop will be live!  I hope everything works..... :)

Just a quick blog!

Yes, I know I totally missed blogging last week....and I almost missed this week too.  Well this week I have put a reminder in my mobile so it should go off every Wednesday and hopefully I'll get into regular blogging!

So, sorry but this is just a quickie, as I have plenty to do and I have a BIG distraction in the shape of a small black cat trying to get to the US from the UK...!

Anyway the jewellery is going well, I have made quite a lot and I have - for the moment - stopped making, and I have been concentrating my efforts on creating a website which is almost ready, my photos are definitely ready and I will be ordering business cards very soon.  This week I have been REALLY trying to compile some good descriptions for my jewellery for Etsy.  So far so good.  Also planning on re-doing the business plan including a cash flow forecast which I have just got to grips with and re-doing the marketing plan.  I've been quite productive today and I hope to continue being productive up until Friday afternoon, then I'll be taking a break on Saturday to visit my brother in Milton Keynes.

As I said, sorry about the quickie, but I have put a reminder in my phone to blog every Wednesday.  Something is better than nothing, right? :)

Siobhan x

More creativity!

I know its late again, but here is my weekly post! :)  I'll get used to it and post every Wednesday at some point.  I think I might have to put a reminder in my phone or something!

This week I have made quite a few more necklaces, a handful of bracelets and quite a few earrings.  Soon I will need to take proper photos of these for my ETSY store - I hope to get those done either this weekend or at the beginning of next week.  I am starting to run out of supplies too, like specific headpins for example.  I tried using longer headpins for a couple more pairs of earrings, but I discovered that the longer the headpin, the wider the wire, and they don't thread through my freshwater pearls!!  They will have to wait.  I suppose I could try and undo a couple of the other pairs and re-do them with the other headpins....I'll see about that next week!


Also, I managed to cancel my order from www.moo.com just in time - because after the Business Day class last week, we were advised not to put our postal address on business cards.  I managed to get a full refund, and they just told me I will have to start from scratch to re-order.  They are such a good company!  I know I created stuff like a mad woman for a while JUST to get the photos for the business cards, but now it's not so much of a big deal and when I take the photos again I can take a little more time.  Last time my photos on white busts came out dark, possibly because I did those at the end of the day.  Some of my photos came out really well, so I will be going through all the photos I took last time and re-taking others next time, along with the new jewellery I have created.

Another thing I have to do this weekend or next week, is sort out a website.  That's another thing I want to get sorted out before I create the business cards because I want to put either the website address or my facebook page address on the card.  I investigated using CoffeeCup to create my own website, but it turned out that for me, I think it's far too much hassle and expense - paying for a web domain AND the amount of space you can fill online.  So, I went to www.wix.com and I thought it looked pretty good - then I discovered a couple more people who I know have also used this website to create their own websites for free!

I chose a few templates and played around with them, and I have decided that I think this is the way to go for me.  I only need a portfolio website to show off my stuff, with links to my ETSY store, I don't want another shop as well as ETSY, and if people are genuinely interested, they will go to ETSY and check out my stuff.  It means sacrificing the opportunity to have a website which is www.MY STORE NAME.com but with wix.com, I can upgrade for a fee to buy the domain.  Which I might do eventually, I'll just have to see how it goes.  All I know that it's not actually worth me paying £40 - £80 a year to have my own website when I don't even know how much money I will be taking!

Anyhoo, once I have all that sorted out I think I might re-visit my marketing plan and tidy it up somewhat, and perhaps go to the Business Plan - which currently doesn't have a great deal in it at the moment.  It shouldn't take me too long to sort those out because I have the basics there and I just need to update all the complicated and boring stuff! :)

Anyway, I have written far too much already, so....I shall see you next week and in the meantime, Happy Crafting everyone! :)

Siobhan x

London Jewellery School Business Day Class

Ok, so yesterday I went to a Business Day Class at the London Jewellery School!  And the first thing I will say is that I can definately recomment it to anyone who is thinking about starting a Jewellery Business.

For me, I kind of knew half the stuff which we talked about as I have been reading up and researching this for a few months now - things like PR, Advertising and Marketing stuffm Packaging, Pricing jewellery, IT, Websites, Networking and Craft shows.  But there were also very useful nuggets of information which will definately come in use for me, as I feel there are always at least a few things which aren't ALWAYS mentioned in books and other websites which have this sort of information on.

What was also very useful for me was the first part where we focused on our strengths and weaknesses, VERY useful information about hallmarking, how to get into galleries and shops and what to expect when you do decide to try, including the legal side of things and how to draw up an order form and a document of "Terms of Trade" which can be used as a legally binding document.  I also found it VERY useful to find out abou legal requirements and insurance stuff - this bit usually fills my head with candy floss and I get very confused....I swear all this legal stuff is purposefully made to be hard to understand to prevent people from wanting to run their own business!  Seriously - some of this stuff is enough to put some people off even starting...!!

Anyway, the best things about this class was that it was small - only 8 other people were in the group, which meant that the entire days' discussions could be focused on what WE wanted to know and learn. Like me, with all the legal stuff, and others who wanted to know more about being at craft shows, selling to galleries and doing commissions.  I also felt that the entire class was quite informal, fun, and it was nice to be with other people who had the same sort of interests and ambitions, and that our ideas were so different from one anothers.  It was a really good place to share ideas, advice and knowledge, and I have to say the teacher was very approachable and experienced in running a business herself - I always find it better for someone experienced to teach something that they know a lot about, rather than having a list of stuff and a random person just talking at you all day.

Sorry there are no photos in this post, but I just wanted to say that I really enjoyed the Jewellery Business Day at the London Jewellery School, I recommend it to anyone who is thinking of starting a jewellery business, and it has got me thinking of several things which I need to look at before I even start selling my jewellery...!!  Hopefully we're all going to keep in contact and share our shops and websites - I'm afraid I only have my blog to offer at the moment as my website is not ready, and neither is my shop!  I will be ready in the middle - end of August which isn't too far away, but I will be blogging when everything is up and running, I promise :)

With the website, I have to re-arrange a few things and put my photos up, and I need to wait for my business cards which - I know I took all those photos in time for the 30% discount but it turns out that there is something which I put on the cards which at the Business Day Class we were advised not to do....!!  I have contacted the company to find out if I can cancel and start over - and that's another thing: I need to amend my business card design!

So there are a few things I need to do before launching this business of mine, but I will get there in the end!

A very productive week!

I know I know...I meant to blog last Wednesday LOL!  Actually last week was pretty busy for me.  Wednesday I went to a book launch, had a vaccination booster jab and I was creating jewellery like crazy!

So here is what happaned - last weekend I checked my email and found one from www.moo.com - this is where I have ordered my stickers from to put on my jewellery boxes topersonalise them and I think moo.com are brilliant!  Anyway, this email said that they were doing a 30% of EVERYTHING they printed until Thursday midnight last week.  When I opened the email, this gave me 4 days to make enough jewellery so I could put photos of my work on the reverse of the business cards I had designed!  Yey!

So, Monday through to Wednesday I was creating goodness knows how many necklaces, and on Thursday I spent the day taking lots and lots of photos of them.  I filled my camera with 480 photos!  Wow.  Anyway, Everything turned out really well apart from a few photos of the necklaces on the busts with turned out darker than I would have liked.  Still, it was the close up photos which I was going to use to put on the business cards, and with a little tewaking of the OTHER side of the business card, I managed to put my order in and sort it all out by 9pm Thursday evening and I got 30% my order of 200 mini cards.  Phew!

So you see, it really has been a busy week but I'm glad it happened.  I had a deadline so I made jewellery like crazy.  This doesn't mean I'm not going to make much jewellery this week - last week sort of threw me into it and I feel like I have a flow going, and I'm ready to play around with more designs.  I am still planning on begining to launch everything mid - late August, but something else may come up before then which may delay it a week.  It's all got to do with a friend in the States and the issue of shipping her cat over to her by September 1st....but I won't go into that LOL!

Anyway, everything is pretty much on schedule, and this Wednesday I am going to the London Jewellery School for a "Business Day" class - I really hope it's going to be helpful and not repeat everything I've already read about!  I'm looking forward to it actually.  I just need to print out a map to find out where everything is and I'll be fine.  Also hoping there might be a Starbucks close by so I can have some lunch there :)  I shall write about it in my next post :)

Sneek Peeks on experimental jewellery making!

Well this week has been quite productive for me, I must say.  Productive in two senses - I have been discovering what I can and can't do, and I have actually made some jewellery!  I have been playing around with beads which I may or may not sell online and perhaps keep them for potential craft fairs.  I'm not sure, we'll see.

Anyway, I had lots of teeny tiny seed beads which I thought I would use to try my hand at bead sewing and weaving.  I tried a few things and actually found the process...not difficult as such but incredibly time consuming.  I know people who do this all the time can do it really fast, but the smallest thing took me 40 minutes to make and realistically, I thought perhaps this wasn't such a good idea!  I did make two charms which could be put onto a keychain though!  I decided to keep some beads and pack others into small bags.  I gave them to my boyfriend who took them to work where his colleague's 10 year old daughter apparently squealed with delight upon receiving more beads!  She's obviously better suited to this bead weaving lark than I am!

Other techniques which I tried and decided were not for me included wire crochet and wire knitting.  As great as it looks, I found these really difficult...and painful on the fingers...!  However, I continued making things and trying things out - I tried crocheting cord with the larger seed beads which looked allright, I have to admit.  I also tried macrame, which I remember doing a bit of at school and not too long ago - I just had to remember which cords went where and I was off!  Macrame doesn't take me too long - nowhere near as long as beadweaving anyway - so this might be something I could use with the remaining non-gemstones which I have in my collection.  Something which I was successful with was creating a few necklaces with some wooden beads, some of which a friend had given me before she move to the States (Thankyou Liv!), which included a HUGE pendant which I ended up making an improvised bail for.  No really, it was a case of threading the wire through the hole and thinking "Oh. What now?" - I had not thought it through but it turned out good in the end.  I thought copper worked well with the rest of the necklace.

The next thing I did was a bit of wire-wrapping.  A while ago I had won some large wooden beads in a little magazine competition (I love beads. ANY beads. A competition to win some is something I cannot ignore, regardless of what beads there are...!!!).  They were plain and black, and I had NO idea what to do with them.  Fortunately, I had kept many blog posts from other people online who make jewellery and as I was going through them wondering what on EARTH to do with these plain wooden beads, I came across a tutorial for wire-wrapping sea-glass.  I didn't look at the tutorial at all - I saw the photos.  I tried it with copper wire and the result was very pleasing!!

I have to admit that I have tried wire-wrapping before and I dont' have any luck with non-drilled beads.  I personally find it so much easier to have a drilled bead (like these wooden ones here), so I can create a bail at the top, take the wire through the drilled hole, and wrap it around the bead that way.  Yet another thing discovered. I really enjoyed creating these actually, and I honestly think the copper wire works REALLY well with the black wood.  I think silver would also have worked well but these were meant to be practice pieces which I am now keeping as is.  Trouble is....I want more of these wooden beads to wire wrap and I have NO idea where to get some from LOL!  I'm sure I will find some eventually.

Anyway, this is what I have been up to as of late, and next week I hope to have some photos of some gemstone beaded jewellery which I have been making in order to sell online.  Well, maybe it'll be another "sneek peek" as I'm not putting them up yet - I'm building up stock in preparation to "launch" my shop on Etsy! :)

Green, grey and fuzzy!

Yes, it's another scarf - as I said, I am making rather a few this year for Christmas!  This one is another simple double rib scarf like the last one, but the wool is different.  This is a sage-green wool with blue spots called "Wendy Mistral Chinky", and is a very similar wool to the grey one I knitted AGES ago.  This wool is 29% wool, 68% acrylic and 3% polyester, and I used 6.5mm needles to knit.  I am very pleased with this scarf, it's a little bobbly in texture, but the wool is quite wavy.  I added tassles as I did for the other one - actually I find tassles very therapeutic to do LOL!

Anyway, I would say who this is for but he might be reading this blog so I'll just say it's a gent's scarf....and no, it's not for the model in the photo - my boyfriend!  He's not really a scarf person, but he wanted the grey scarf I mentioned earlier.  Actually, speaking of that grey scarf - I actually knitted a hat for him to match, which was my first time using circular needles, using the same rib stitch as the scarf.  In all honesty I'm not really a huge fan of circular knitting needles, it kind of irritates me having to push the wool around constantly!  But I think I ended up with a nice hat.  I have tried crocheting hats but it doesn't really seem to happen for me!  I'll be posting a few of my crochet results at some point - the successful ones of course!

Lastly, regarding the beads - I have began to play with seed beads and bead stitching and weaving.  It's nice to do, but for me as an inexperienced person at this particular craft, it does take me quite a long time.  I kept imagining how long people take to make those huge necklaces with all that intricate bead weaving!!  Anyway, the point of doing it is part of my voyage of creative discovery, and I think I have to say that bead weaving and stitching is not really for me.  But I tried it - and this is what I'm figuring out!  I'll get on to the gemstone jewellery soon, I know I will! :)

A simple warm scarf

Before I show my scarf off, I'll just provide an update regarding my handmade jewellery!  I have made quite a bit of progress - although it won't seem so to some - I have created a website on which I just need to purchase the URL and upload photos, plus I hav an Etsy widget on there so people can go straight to my store if they like what they see - this widget will make it onto this blog when I start putting new items up for sale.  I have a Twitter acount which is ready to go, a Facebook page which is ready for photos, and I will be working on combining the two to save time on advertising and promoting - I hope I can use Tweetdeck for this and have it sent to my Facebook page!  I have designed business cards too, but I need photos of new jewellery which I plan on putting on the other side of them to give the cards a little bit of interest.  Other than that, I think it might actually be time for me to start experimenting with new techniques!  I can't wait!  In the meantime I have a book about "Web Marketing for Dummies" although I honestly feel I have read enough about that these past 2 weeks that I could probably write my own book about it!

Anyway, my latest knitting project is a scarf for a friend - this one is for Christmas so it needs to be warm in time for the January and February chill!  I LOVED this wool and I still have a ball of it left to play with.  It's SIRDAR Escape Wool Rich Chunky (51% wool, 49% acrylic) and I knitted this one on 6.5mm needles.  Not too big, not too tiny.  The colour is a really vivid blue from dark to light to dark again.  I want this scarf for myself but I have made it for a friend and it will be given to that friend, come Christmas!

This was just a simple double rib pattern, great to do in front of the TV in the evenings (which is when I usually knit) as there is little room for error, although I probably went wrong a couple of times, but its hard to notice really.  It's soft and of course it has tassels, I love making those!  Very easy to do with a 3 - 4 strands of wool and a crochet hook to pull it through.  Simple, soft and warm :)

Exploring my Creativity

Over the last few weeks I have been researching and reading up on running a small business and marketing, all the ins and outs of it.  I already have a store on www.etsy.com but I haven’t really been able to market it properly or sell a great deal of what I make.  What do I make?  Jewellery.  With silver wire and gemstone beads.  I currently have  a schedule which I plan on keeping to (hopefully...!) and part of my list of things to do is a blog.  Of course, I have this ‘Creativity Blog’ which I will use to post up the Jewellery which I make, but this will happen later.

Before I go ‘full steam ahead’ with my Jewellery, I plan not only to read up on everything I can find which is essential to run a small business, but in the meantime, I plan to blog about what I am creating in the meantime, and about me exploring my own creativity.  The aim of this is not only to make lots of things I can give away as gifts, sell to friends and family, online or at craft shows (the latter of which I have yet to do!), but I want to find out what I can do, what I am natural at, what I am terrible at, what I hate doing, and what I love doing.  I have no idea how long this process may take, but at the moment, the Jewellery business will happen after my exploration of Creativity.

So, let me begin by talking about my current crafting obsession – knitting and crochet!  I learnt to knit before crocheting and I can say I can do both.  But some things do elude me – I have tried crocheting a hat several times and I just cannot get the tension right for the rim!  I either end up with floppy, flat rims and a hat that just kind of sits on the head and easily flops off, or I go to the other extreme and end up with a beret sort of hat with a rim which is simply impossible to fit on anybody’s head.  I have, however, knitted a hat which was successful, although I haven’t knitted one since – this is something I will be pursuing at some point!

In the meantime, as you can see on my blog AGES ago, I knitted a few scarves, and although I have successfully crocheted a couple of flower brooches as gifts, I am mostly knitting – lots of Christmas presents!  But first let me show you my first crochet scarf.  This is a simple straightforward pattern combining three rows of 203 double crochet stitches, and a border of shells all the way around the edge.  I got this pattern from “The Happy Hooker” (Stitch ‘n Bitch Crochet) which is a book I cannot recommend highly enough if you want to learn how to crochet – because I learnt from this book!

In the book it looks a bit larger, wider spacing between stitches, but then again I always come out with something different from patterns because I tend to buy the wool and think about the pattern later!  I thought this scarf looked very pretty in pink and it has a slightly floral feel to it thanks to the shell border and the mottled pink colour.  A spring/summer or summer/autumn scarf I think.

Springing back into action

Wow.  It has been over a year since I last blogged about my creativity.....!  Well, certain things kind of distracted me really.  Stuff at work got to me too much and thinking about that kind of took over......

BUT.....I am ready to blog again, and I am hoping to continue blogging more often.  To cut a long story short, I took redundancy at work at the end of March 2011 and I feel fantastic!  I'm not too sure what I'm going to do but for now, I am enjoying being creative again, and being able to devote the time I want to it as well.  Not only this, but I am planning on creating and selling lots more handmade jewellery online, via my Etsy shop.  I had one set up for a while, but now is the perfect opportunity not only to play with my creativity but to see if it can make me some money!

So basically what I am saying is that I am back, I'm being creative and I am planning on not only sharing my creativity more often on this blog, but I hope to be sharing my experiences, ups and downs, along with some cheeky advertising and links to my Etsy store.  So keep your eyes peeled for more frequent posts.... :)

Siobhan x