Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Etsy Front Page!

Well I was told that I was featured on the front page on etsy (thanks Littleputbooks for telling me!) and by the time I was able to log on to look... poof it was gone. Being the sleuth that I am I hunted on the Treasury and found the treasury list that had featured me and landed on the front page (list chosen by candywilliams) . Here it is:
There I am in the middle of the second row down! I love making those earrings and have written about them several times in other posts on this blog.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

My Sister the Poet


My sister Melissa is very talented in many ways and has a thirst for the literary arts. I am always amazed by her knowledge of literature and her enjoyment of it is contagious. I asked her to share with me some of her personal poetry. She is very shy about sharing it but she obliged. I have never enjoyed reading poetry this much before and below you can find a few of her poems she shared with me:

Manzanita Canvas
(Composed of jealousy towards painters on Thanksgiving weekend November 2007, Manzanita Oregon)

When to twist and blot together,
How to see the steps combine,
Those with orbs which spot the pattern,
Blessed are they with natural eyes.

Always looking, always buying,
Never coming from within,
Some are blessed and some are laking,
Can we change our talents spin?
....................................................................................

Erudition
(Poem written in the Botanical gardens Oxford University, Oxfordshire UK July 2004)

Cackling punters round the gardens crawl,
Chattering birds and chipmunks all
Must pause to absorb legacy
Of cinereal tracery-
Knowledge!
Awe!
....................................................................................

Life Leaves
(Composed November 2003 - Binfield, Berkshire, UK)

Warm sun and cool breezes freeze their being.
Green vibrant life into frozen colours slumber
Red, orange, brown.

Cold wind gusts, throwing dead lifeless Corpses
Into wet moist rot.

Bruises- caused by compress of wheel, crush of foot,
Mashed, no longer any life.

Thin weak frames covering the earth,
In a screen of skeletons.

Sadness in death, mourning in ends, life of itself
So rushed, short, timed, Yet-

Brilliance of colour, glory in existence, magnificence in life,
Worth every end.
.......................................................................................


My personal favorite is Manzanita Canvas. What's yours?

Monday, April 21, 2008

Which One Do You Like?

Alright... I came across a store "Leanimal" on etsy today. She has mad designs. I wanted everything she makes or has made. She is also from right here in PDX. I am window shopping for a new jacket and these two "sold" items are the most amazing jackets ever. I may have to contact her and ask for a custom order! Which one should I get (if I can of course)?

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Strong Like Bull!


Ok... so the theme for etsybloggers street team blog carnival is…BULL! Anything to do with bull. So I wanted to find a way to showcase something cool with a bull theme so I took to the Etsy search. I found this really cool recycled aluminum pendant by julep115. I love many things in her store but this Bull pendant is definitely one of the coolest and the Vegan Chicken is too cool as well.

A little about the seller julep115: "I've worked as a bench jeweler, a diamond grader, at present I am doing what I love best, I have a "storefront" studio as part of my loft where I live in downtown Dallas with my husband, Kyle and our corgi mix Julep (etsy store namesake), and tabby cat Miro. Besides my love of jewelry I can be found cooking vegan meals for friends and family and enjoy traveling to eco friendly places!"

Saturday, April 12, 2008

User Review: gDiapers!

Well having a new baby gets you thinking about all sorts of things especially diapers. Ones that work well and ones that don't.

So we came home from the hospital with Pampers Swaddlers diapers and stuck with those for quite some time, not because they were working great but mainly because a friend of mine had tried Huggies and had said that they were horrible for her son. Well we had blowout after blowout with the Swaddlers. So finally I ventured out and bought a bag of the Huggies Snug&Dry LeakLock. This is always difficult to venture into new territory. You could end up with a diaper you hate and a whole bag you have to use before buying another type. So the Huggies were better for us than the pampers. What does this tell me? Not all baby butts are alike!

Well the story does not end there. I have issues with diapers and the environmental issues they produce. If you use cloth ones then you are using a lot of water and electricity to clean them. If you do disposable then you are dumping a ton of plastic into landfills that will never biodegrade in our lifetime. What to do?

Well I came across these gDiapers. They have a biodegradable inner disposable diaper refill that completely degrades in 50 -150 days. You can compost them, toss them or flush them. So I checked out some of their videos online and thought I would try them out so I bought the starter pack.

The arrived yesterday!!!!

My first impressions are as follows

Positives:
  • They have a very soft outer lining and I love the waist band elastic. It is wide and snug without cutting in.
  • They are not too bulky.
  • My little girl is awfully adorable in the diaper (way cuter than the huggies or pampers).
  • The inner plastic snap out liner is easy to wash and dry.
  • The plastic liner was able to thwart a blowout up the back with the design the way it creates a lip at the front and back of the diaper. I will see if this is a consistent finding with more use but considering blowouts up the back have been our main problem (causing more stain removal and laundry than we would like) these diapers are doing well.
Negatives:
  • The disposable diaper insert has no plastic in it and biodegrades easily as I said earlier but it arrives in the cardboard packaging with thick plastic shrinkwrap sealing them within the box. Maybe there is some sterile packaging law that forces this to be the way they are packaged but I did feel like the plastic shrink wrap was not necessary.
  • The inner plastic liner (rubber pant component) is very slick and so when the diaper is wet it bunches and slides into the middle of the liner and no longer extends to the edges of the liner (I feel this may have contributed to the wet leak issue in the next bullet point). This might be improved upon by using a waterproof material that has some sort of cloth material feel to it so that the disposable diaper potion has some surface tension from the liner that would hold it in place. I have purchased some cloth diaper outer shells (Bummis Super Whisper Wrap) that are cloth-like yet waterproof, like I am suggesting (maybe this type of insert liner could be offered as an optional liner). The main problem with this is that it would be slightly more bulky and would have to be washed (currently the way it is it can just be wiped down) between each use and would take longer to dry.
  • The wet diaper leaked out the leg area toward the front top of the diaper near where it fastens. This has only happened once and it was a fairly wet diaper. Once again I feel this may have been due to the fact that the wet diaper bunched towards the middle of the liner leaving no diaper to absorb wetness at the front top edges. I will still take a few wet leaks over the blowouts we have had with pampers and huggies.


Thursday, April 10, 2008

Press Release!


I posted my first press release today. I did a little research and asked a few questions on some forums and typed one up and submitted it just like that. I have no idea how it will affect the hits to my store but it can't hurt. It is always daunting and yet exciting to try something new like this and put yourself out there. Here it is.

I will post at a latter date and update if I think it has improved traffic to my site?

Tuesday, April 8, 2008

April Showers!


I was in the car the other day and a huge rain shower started. It was so amazing because a beautiful rainbow appeared that looked like it ended right on the hood of the car (I looked for the pot of gold and it wasn't there). Even when it is gray and rainy out beautiful things are all around us. We really have to remember that here in the Pacific Northwest because the gray days seem to go on and on this time of year.

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

EcoLoops!

Here is my new EcoLoops line of jewelry.
I have been toying with creating some items in my shop with recycled components for quite some time. I have been stuck in the concept phase for ages and I have worked on prototypes and never been satisfied until now!

I started playing with the lid of a Quaker Oats container this week and found it made a really cool abstract disk I could use for jewelry or earrings in particular. I was so inspired I took old pages from this years calendar and continued with my quest to make recycled earring designs! Here is my first tray of creations below.


This red flowered disc above is created from the desk calendar for 2008 and comes from the March page that sits on my desk at home here. I always save the pages of calendars hoping to find something cool to use it for and then a few years latter I find them and I throw them in recycling. Now I can actually put them to good use.

This earring above is made from the January page of the same calendar.

And yet another calendar page.

These are a smaller disc. I have created 2 sizes do far. A 3/4" disc and a 1 1/2" disc. I am having a lot of fun with this and only hope they sell as fast as i am making them. I plan to add more recycled material jewelry to the EcoLoops line as fast as I can create them as I have many more ideas to play with.

So far I have used junk mail post cards, calendar pages, garment tags from store bought clothes, catalogs, magazine pages, cereal boxes and I'm sure the list will continue.

What do you think? U like?

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Etsy Blogger Team!


Whats the point in joining a team if you don't participate in the team functions right? Well with a gentle nudge (new membership rules) the Etsy Bloggers team is off to a running start this spring. Our first featured artist member is StormyDesigns. Congrats on being FISRT! that is a title that you will always hold Stormy.

There are many reasons StormyDesigns deserves this. She has spent a lot of time co-managing the EtsyBloggers.com team. Dedication and a contagious spirit of participation have earned her this honor. She has great tutorials on her blog, that I know she has spent a lot of time creating and are well done.

She is and Etsy seller with a beautiful shop full of great finds and one of a kind creations of polymer clay sculptures and jewelry. Her attention to detail is inspiring. I have featured my favorite item here. I have not worked with polymer clay but being the adventurous creative spirit that I am Stormy's store is tempting me to try it. Check her store out!

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