Ahhh Friday

Where does the time go? I swear I just moved to Minnesota the other day, but low and behold... I have been here for 4 months already! Time has flown but that doesn't lessen the fact that I am extremely tired and burnt out from the late nights and other stress. I really put a lot of time into my shop in the last couple months and it has really paid off. I am more determined to make this dream a reality and in the next month I will be taking a nice break from production to design and create wonderful items that will make you 'ooo and ahhh' in 2008!

Picture: Limited Edition Sketchbook.

No Coast Craft O Rama Update

No Coast has come and gone. Almost with the blink of an eye. I spent many a late night working feverishly for this show printing, cutting out, scoring, and folding, and clipping, and on and on! The show began Friday afternoon and into the night and then all day Saturday. Friday brought out quite a bit of traffic which was great. Saturday, was not so great. There was a wicked snow storm that started right as the show did and did not let up all day! Barely anyone was left during the last few hours! I am seriously mad at all the weathermen who told all the watchers not to leave their house!!

I came out rather short of my goal. But honestly, who expects to bring home $900 after their first craft show! Maybe if it wasn't a blizzard I would have. Maybe not. Now on to the next show!

Pictures above are of my display. I had a bit of trouble with the shelves at first but my fiance found a wonderful solution. And since I was too lazy to go and have a sign professionally done I made a collage of a design I made! Not too shabby :)

ps- That is my mom creepin around the corner in the second photo! What a great helper!!!

The Recycled Collection!

I just introduced the recycled collection to my etsy shop! I have been using old magazines and brochures to create envelopes and recycled papers for my sketchbooks! I am happy to be reusing materials that would have otherwise be thrown away. And all while doing this, I get to showcase wonderful Minnesota! The sketchbook features pictures I took around Minneapolis and many of my envelopes feature magazines from around MN!

Let me know what you all think!

The aftermath...

Well, since so many of you just see pictures of my nice clean studio, I thought now would be a perfect time to show you what it usually looks like... especially after a craft show!

Excelsior & Grand Art Show Update

Well, the show has come and gone.... and boy am I tired. I am so glad that I did this show before No Coast Craft-O-Rama. I think this prepared me to work my butt off for the next few weeks! I stayed up late every night this week to print out and cut and package my stationery products for the show. I knew that if I had leftovers I could just bring them to No Coast, so it wasn't that big of a deal. Although this show was free I had set a sales goal and luckily I did meet it plus some! Now since I have done my first show I have some tips/lessons I have learned for the next show.

1. Show up on time/early! (I was half an hour late for the show set up time and there was literally NO SPACE FOR ME TO SET UP! This is mostly the fault of those who came early took large amounts of space and left none for the people who came later, hopefully next year there will be equal space for everyone! I nicely asked a lady who had tons of space to move over a bit so I could set up my table. I think a few artists who came in after me ended up leaving because there was no place to go.)

2. Bring food and water. (I talked so much my mouth was dry! Bring lots of water!)

3. Bring a helper. (My fiance was wonderful enough to help me package all my stationery so I let him off the hook and he didn't have to sit with me. But luckily one of my friends decided to hang out and ended up being a great promoter for me!)

4. Price each piece. (Although I had 3 sheets of paper on the table specifying how much each thing was, people rarely looked at it and looked on the package for it instead. So now, I am going to get little stickers that allow me to write quantity and price on each thing. It may be tedious but it will save me the trouble of having to explain it each time someone comes to my booth!)

5. Bring chairs! (Since I was running late, I completely forgot to bring chairs!!! Wow would I have been tired if the spot I got didn't have a few club chairs against the wall!!!!)

6. Load up your car the night before! (Again, always running short on time, it would have helped if I figured out how to fit my gigantic easel in my car earlier...)

7. Use vertical displays. (I have two white box/shelves to use for my display to create some hierarchy between my products but I forgot it. I didn't mind my display in the pictures at all, I thought it looked fine, but I would have liked to get rid of some of the clutter with the extra boxes.

Hopefully a few of my mistakes will be your gain!

The 2008 Calendar is here!

YAY! Lots of hard work, many, may hours my calendar is here!

Now, since my last post I decided right away to not sit on my duff and sulk that sales had been slow. So I went and did some networking and what do you know... I AM ON DECOR8'S BLOG!!!!! I am in her amazing calendar feature! If you don't know much about Decor8, you should check it out. It is one of my favorite blogs to read every day and I have some links (to the right) of some other amazing bloggers I like to keep up on. Since she posted about my calendar my sales and traffic to my blog have been amazing. So lesson learned, it really takes some big promoting and networking to have some success. Word of mouth is fabulous!

Have a HAPPY NEW YEAR! :D

Another front page!

I got back from lunch today, and there were my poppy cards chillin on the front page again! Unfortunately out of my 2 front pages this week, I did not make any sales. I seem to be stuck at 105 sales. So after all the extra exposure and still nothing, I clearly need to start trying some new tactics. I have started listing/relisting more than once a day and I am designing like crazy coming up with new designs to fill my shop. I will also be promoting my designs harder than before and with a new consignment deal and a few art shows coming up, hopefully my slow streak will end!

Etsy Front Page

I was on the front page this evening! My poppy cards made it on for the second time now! Unfortunately it didn't create any sales but I did get tons of new hearts. So hopefully they will buy in the future!

500 Hearts

Around the same day I hit 100 sales, I also hit 500 hearts! It is such and uplift when people heart you. It is kind of childish but it always reminds me that just the littlest things in life can put a smile on your face!

On a side note, a took a nice long week off of creating and designing. I think I just got a bit burnt out. But today I designed in full force and have a few new things to keep the shop updated with! Be sure to check back with my latest and greatest!

100 sales!

I am so thrilled to say that I made it to my goal of 100 sales in my etsy shop! I am really ecstatic! I want to thank all my buyers and etsians for making my experience such a positive one! I, now, hope to make my next goal of 150 sales by my 1 year 'etsyversary' at the end of January!

Thanks for being supportive!

Etsy Critique

The hard workers of Etsy finally put up my critique in their online newsletter the storque! They had some great comments and I followed them all! I brightened up my pictures and think they look much better! I hope you like my new and improved shop!

Enjoy!

Sick of woodgrain yet?

Here are my latest cards for the holiday season! Just like my tags you can personalize the message on the front! They are currently in my Etsy shop!

Woodgrain Treasury!

A while back I was in an amazing treasury full of great items that had a woodgrain pattern. It was definately front page material, but it never made it to the front before it expired. Still all great stuff though!

If you are around and bored tomorrow at 1 p.m. EST time (noon for us midwesterners) I am being critiqued by the etsy labs online!!! Here is the link, you have to be signed in on etsy to enter. It should be pretty cool!


http://www.etsy.com/workshop.php?room_id=77

Enjoy!

Just a little humor

When life gets too serious, I add a little humor. So, I thought I would make some seemingly cute tags. These adorable little guys are innocent at first glance, but when you flip over the tag the Gingerbread Man has a little something to say to you....

I even have some cards I will be making in this Gingerbread Man style. So be sure to check back to my shop later this week!

Enjoy!

More Tags!

Here is another set of awesome tags. These ones are bigger and have a wood grain texture for the background and they come with a variety of messages! You can even personalize your message on these tags.

This year, make sure all your presents are prettied up by these tags!

Enjoy!

A doe a deer, a female deer!

I just created these awesome holiday tags with a small doe on them! I am also creating some cards that will feature the same polka dots and deer, AND I am currently having some 1" buttons made in the same theme!

But for now, you can check out the tags in my Etsy shop.

Enjoy!

Holiday cards have arrived!

I just listed my first set of holiday cards in my Etsy shop! Expect more to come over the next two weeks! I have come up with a few sets of cards and cute tags for the upcoming season! My cards will come in sets of 4,8,16, and 24. Please see my listing for pricing!

No Coast Craft-O-Rama!

I just received offical word that I made it into the juried craft/art show! woohoo! I am really thrilled! I was nervous about entering since I had found out about it a day before the deadline, but I am sooo glad I did! The show will be on the evening of Friday, Nov. 30th and all day December 1st. Apparently last year they had about 9,000 people come to the event! It looks like I am going to be working my butt off to get enough inventory for the big show!

Anyone have any advice/tips for me!?

My Studio!

Here it is at last, my studio! I got two table tops and 8 legs from ikea and put them together to make one giant L-shaped desk. It is AWESOME. I love the space! I definately need more containers for things because right now I just have a lot of everything everywhere!

Look what I got!

Last night I received a package in the mail from JonesNotions. I bought some really cool tags that have patterns and wood grain on them. (if you all don't know, I am obsessing over wood grain patterns right now) Not only did I get buy one get one free, I also got a couple of extra flatcards in with my purchase! I personally recommend you all going over to Heather's shop to have a look around!

Finally!

I finally did it. I made the BIG purchase! One 17" MacBookPro is now my baby! It cost so much that I just sit there and look at it and then decide to work on my old PC laptop! Though, I am sure this will change quite soon once I start doing more freelance and Etsy work from home! Also, once I clean up the studio I will post some pics of the whole space!

I hope you all had as fabulous a labor day weekend as I did!

Another Front Page of Etsy!

Etsy sure knows how to cheer up a sick girl! I haven't been feeling the best lately, I have a major cold. No fun. But today when I got to work, I opened up Etsy on a whim and noticed that my Poppy Notecards had been viewed well over 100 more times than the night before, so I went to the front page and there I was! So now, 600+ views, 75+ hearts, 4 sales, and 1 Front page later, I am one happy chick! Though I definately need to head to bed soon because I am exhausted... being sick is no fun.

Oh yeah, I hit 75 sales today too :) woohoo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Front Page of Etsy!

I was on the front page yesterday! Woohoo :) Here are the earrings that made it!

Trunk Show

I did my first trunk show yesterday at a local boutique in St.Paul called Ekcetera . There were a few other designers there and I met a cool girl, AJ who is also on Etsy. Here is her shop. Though there was not too many people who bought from me at the trunk show I did meet some great people and I now have some connections in the Twin Cities area! Above are some pics of my display.

Wild Animals Galore!

I made the big move to Minnesota this weekend! It was a pretty easy move and I am glad it is over! On Sunday, Matt and I cleaned and ran errands and tried to organize our stuff. While we were at our house and driving around the neighborhood we saw tons, and I mean tons of wild animals! I knew that being in a heavily wooded area we would see lots of animals but I was not expecting to see all that we did! So far we have seen 2 young fauns, 2 does, 3 bucks with antlers and all, an ALBINO squirrel (!), and two turkey families with baby turkies hanging out in the sandbox on the side of our house! Now, you must be thinking I am living in northern Minnesota, but no, just in one of the suburbs of the east side of the twin cities. Hopefully we will continue to see animals around... but I hope they don't become a hassle!

I am now on Trunkt!

I have been approved and accepted to join the new online site Trunkt. This site's mission is: "Trunkt is an art and design collective made up of talented painters, graphic designers, fashion accessories, apparel and home accents designers and other creative entrepreneurs that make a living from their artistic skills.

Our mission is to champion independent designers and small retailers to mainstream shoppers and to keep mass-market merchandise and big-box retailers from overwhelming the globe."

Now that makes me seem a billion times better the artist than I really am. So maybe this will give me the little kick in the butt that I have needed!

Here is my shop!

If you have a moment, please log in and sign my guest book and give me a little rating boost!

what to wear?

Seeing as I can't stop buying dresses (yes, I bought 3 more dresses since my last post)I thought I would create these lovely little retro ladies! I wish I owned every one of these dresses I illustrated. Maybe I should go into fashion design?!

Enjoy!

New Design!

I just listed my newest card design in my Etsy shop! I love the whimsical look of these lovely wild flowers. They will be great for fall when you just want to pop off a cute little note to a friend. Snail mail is always a wonderful surprise!

Enjoy!

I'm moving to Minnesota!

It is official, I have put my two weeks notice in at my job and have already started packing... I am moving to Minnesota! I am very excited to start my new job as an associate designer with a publishing company and I am even MORE excited that the new place my fiance, Matt, and I are living has a few spare rooms for me to set up an art studio!!! I am super excited to finally have an entire space dedicated to my art and now I can be more organized for Etsy as well! I have many plans for the new space so I will be posting many pictures of it all in the next few weeks!

The Birds Return

I have just reposted the popular Bird notecards back into my Etsy shop. They are one of my favorite styles.

Bird on Trees, Bird on Wire, Bird on Cage

Enjoy!