Project Recap Monday

Hello everyone!👋.  Hope everyone had a great weekend.  Mondays will be my project recap day and/or stuff related to my business.  Today I mailed out the bracelet I sold last Friday.  I always like to throw in a few extra goodies for my customers as a thank you.  Usually some loose charms, stickers, or pretty notecards.  For wholesale orders I like to include an extra item that is not part of the sale.  This gives them an idea of what else I offer and it keeps up good customer relations.

Last week I mentioned starting on the PURL stitch in knitting.  Well I pretty much suck at this!  It is the opposite image of the KNIT stitch so I found myself in utter confusion because I have a bad sense of direction.  I mean I can do it but it is going to take a lot of practice to get the hang of it.  My sense of direction sucks because I was born left handed but my parents didn’t think that was normal so I ended up being ambidextrous and use my right hand to write and my left hand for physical things like brushing my teeth/hair and using a knife.  I will continue to work on the purl stitch this week.

I have come up with a weekly theme to keep me focused:  Tuesdays I can review products, websites, or anything I’d like to share of interest.  I just got a couple of my monthly subscription boxes in the mail today that I can review.  Wednesdays I can talk about magical metaphysical supernatural psychic astrological stuff.  Thursdays I can post a quote or saying and share my thoughts or feelings about it.  Fridays I will leave open for whatever.  I probably won’t always blog every single one of those days but it is a guide I can follow.  Until next time!🧡

A Nice Surprise

I sold a bracelet on Etsy today.  Yay, what a nice surprise because I haven’t listed anything new recently and the last sale I made was back in June.  I take that as a sign that I’m on the right track.  Maybe activating my blog is generating more traffic or maybe it is just pure coincidence but whatever it is I am grateful.  

I think I am going to stick with Blogger instead of starting a new blog elsewhere.  It is better to stay consistent and if I blog enough my tags will eventually show up closer towards the top of the search results on Google and plus Blogger is powered by Google.  I forgot to add that Pinterest could also be another potential source of promotion.  I will be back on Monday or Tuesday.  Have a wonderful weekend!

So What’s Next?

Yesterday I went to the thrift store so that I can buy some extra yarn to practice on & got a bagful of these for only $1.99.  What a nice selection!  I have been practicing on the KNIT stitch all week and feel like I’ve got the hang of it.  One of the hardest things about knitting at least for me is hand coordination.  I still feel a bit clumsy.  This weekend I will be practicing on the PURL stitch.  After I get the hang of that then I will be able to create many things.  According to the experts there are 4 basic techniques that are essential in knitting: 

1.) Cast on: The first initial stitch to get you started 

2.) Knit stitch: One of the 2 major stitch patterns

3.) Purl stitch:  The other major stitch pattern

4.) Bind off: The last stitch to close up your knitting.

I am going to try & blog at least 3 times a week, no weekends.  I want to talk about more than just my projects though.  Maybe one of the days I’ll update on projects, then another day I can write up product reviews, then another day I can share my opinions on a topic.  I can talk about anything and everything!  I wish Blogger was more user friendly.  This platform is so outdated!  Links are not working and missing pics, it’s disturbing.  I’ve been writing mostly from my phone so maybe I’m limited to what I can do.  I wonder if the blog hops still exist?  When I get my Etsy shop running again I will probably open up an Instagram account for my business.  Not anytime soon though.  That is the only major platform I have not tried yet as a marketing tool.  I don’t think it was around back when I started. 

Thank you to everyone who reads my blog.  Have a great weekend!

Reflecting Thoughts

Yesterday I touched up on my business journey through the years.  As with anything in life there will always be highs and lows.  I think when things got busy especially during the bracelet years, it started to feel more like a job and I started to lose interest.  I didn’t feel like I was doing it for me anymore, like the creativity part of it was gone.  But I wouldn’t change a thing about my journey.  I’ve always had it in the back of my mind that I would come back when the time is right.  It was and will continue to be a great experience as I continue to grow & learn.  I am very proud of what I have accomplished and how I used my gut instincts to make most decisions.  It has definitely made me more confident in myself as I discovered many skills/talents I didn’t know I had.  And to this day it still makes me very happy when I make a sale.  It just amazes me that someone would want to wear something I made.  I’m not talking down on myself, it is more like a “thank you so much for liking something that I made!” type of feeling.  I mean there are literally thousands of people out there wearing or have worn something that I’ve made.  It’s like a part of me is with all these people and that’s cool as shit if you think about it.  

So next entry I would like to come up with some ideas I would like to focus on.  I’m still enjoying my knitting projects but not quite ready to dig back into jewelry yet but I definitely will eventually.  Until next time!

Years Gone By

Last post I mentioned that I would touch briefly on the 6 years I’ve been away. My 2nd year in business was definitely my most successful year.  By that time I was averaging 2 sales a week on Etsy in addition to participating in local craft fairs with both the local Etsy team & on my own.  I really enjoyed being part of the team and once a year a group of us would participate in a big festival held over here the Hyde Park Street Fair which I have participated in 3 times & always had such a blast.  Unfortunately the team disbanded in 2013 because our group leader opened up her own business and nobody was willing to take her place. We went our separate ways but some of us still keep in touch on FB.  I stopped blogging shortly after I opened up my FB business page because I was getting a lot more exposure over there and didn’t have much time to blog anymore. I had so much fun with my FB page but all the social interaction was a bit overwhelming at times.  I was doing giveaways and contests and meeting other crafters and we were all “liking” each other’s pages. It was a great way to make sales outside of Etsy and connect with potential customers and the added benefit of having the support of your family/friends there as well.  In addition to all of this I was doing wholesale bracelet orders for 3 yoga businesses out east. Chakra bracelets that they give to their students as incentives for joining their class.  By the end of the 2nd year my business practically became like a part time job.  I didn’t have as much motivation to post new items on Etsy anymore.  Instead I was mostly relisting items I’ve sold.  That same year I attended a Christmas party event with the local autism moms group and we had a white elephant gift exchange.  The girl that ended up with my bracelet loved it so much that she shared it with the autism moms FB group page and after that I was flooded with moms requesting to purchase one of my bracelets.  It helps that I was offering it to them for half of what I was selling it for on Etsy.  I never felt so popular in all my life!  The orders were steady for the next few months and I went on to donate some for autism charity events.  By the spring of 2013 I stopped creating new items on Etsy and basically became the bracelet lady because that was all I was ever selling anymore.  I also landed another business deal with an online autism store to sell some of my bracelets.  Nowadays I rarely get any orders on Etsy anymore and still get wholesale orders but also very rarely.  So that is where I am now.  Some closing thoughts in next post then time to move forward!  I didn’t know this published already!  It was supposed to still be in draft!  

I’m Back

Hello everyone!  I’m back on here after a 6 year absence.  I’ve been gone for so long that I don’t think anyone remembers me.  That is okay because I am pretty much starting over.  And honestly I don’t really know what I’m doing but I will figure it out as I head into this next chapter.  So much has happened in 6 years which I will touch on briefly in a future post.  But today I just want to announce that I am back for the time being.  This is a low key platform that I can document my progress at my own pace.  I want to add that my absence from my business has nothing to do with any bad experiences or lack of sales.  Almost everyone I’ve done business with as well as my family & friends have been great & extremely supportive.  It was just a combination of taking on more than I could handle and dealing with personal life challenges.  So the first thing I’ve decided to do is to focus on a project that will hold my interest long enough to get me back into the swing of things.  I chose knitting because I consider myself a beginner since there are still a lot of patterns I have yet to learn.  It also requires a lot of patience which is something that I struggle with a lot when I get frustrated.  Attached is a pic of what I started this past weekend.  It’s funny because none of this was planned, I just decided to buy some knitting stuff at the store last Friday and went along with it.  I am not much of a planner and tend to go with the flow with most things in life.  So that’s it for now.  I am going to finish off these 3 projects & then learn some new stitches.  I also need to clean up this page a bit & update any changes.  I don’t know why a lot of the pictures on my past posts are missing??  Until next time...

One Year Anniversary:)

Wow it's been forever since I posted! Today I just want to document the 1 year anniversary of when I opened up my Etsy shop and to sincerely thank everyone who supported me from my awesome customers to my wonderful family and friends. I also want to thank everyone that gave me great advice, everyone who "liked" me on Facebook, everyone that follows me on Twitter, everyone that participated in one of my giveaways, everyone that trusted in me to do a custom item for them, the 2 wonderful owners of the yoga studio that I did a wholesale order for, the 2 Etsy teams I am on (IIW & IFS team), everyone involved in the craft show/fairs that I participated in, and to everyone that takes the time to read my blogs. I've had a wonderful year and hope you guys will still be a part of my journey as I continue to learn and grow. Your support is what keeps me going, THANK YOU ALL!:)