Beading Challenge Results!

Okay this is what everyone has been waiting for. A big thanks again to SantiamDesigns for providing the beads for this challenge and shipping them to all of us for free. I have heard from more than one person who did this challenge that is was a bit difficult to decide what to do with these beads. They are as small as they look ha ha! A lot of the designers had never or very rarely used beads this small. We were able to use our own findings as long as the beads that were sent were the main part of the design. I did my design on paper the day I got the picture of the beads because I didn't want to see what anyone else had done. I wanted to go into it without everyone else's ideas in my head. I am going to list them in the order that I received the pictures and I will be putting a link to each persons shop with their name. I had a lot of fun with this and I think everyone else did to.

StonesandStarlings







EarthlyCreations







Studiohart









melaniehazen








DesignedbyLucinda








byrobinlynne






virtuallori








SilverRiverJewelry







blackcoral








sleepingcatbeads









beadymonkey






TeaguesBeads







Okay so I really tried to get these to line up side by side so people wouldn't have to scroll down the page too far but I am not that good at hotmail so this is as good as it gets. I find this whole thing fascinating as there are some that are very similar and some that are very different. And nobody had any idea what any one else was doing so there was no way they could have copied or not copied any designs. I would love to have comments on this contest and maybe people will realize that for the most part if you see a design that is similar or even almost exactly the same as yours, chances are good that they didn't copy they just think like you do.

And as Cindy said " the challenge is a great way to make us designers maybe have to think outside of the box and stretch ourselves..."

I also got lots of comments that this was just a fun thing to do and I think sometimes we get so caught up in selling (which isn't a bad thing, let's face it, we would all love to make a decent living at this) that we forget why we started doing this in the first place. At least for me, get a huge amount of satisfaction and joy out of a piece but sometimes in between the picture taking, the constant promoting, listing and just regular life I can sometimes lose that sense of satisfaction. And while this is a type of promotion it was a lot of fun to do and there was that anticipation of the beads arriving and now the fun of seeing what everyone has come up with.

Featured Etsy Artist

Battlemaiden

I have to confess that I have always loved science fiction/fantasy. Mostly the fantasy to be truthful. I think it started as a small child and the addition of fairy tales to the bedtime routine. I am an avid (I can read a paperback in two hours) reader and have read just about everything I can get my hands on. The Dragonriders of Pern, and all the rest of Ann McCaffrey's books, David Eddings, Wies and Hickman, Terry Goodkin and Marion Zimmer Bradley to name a few. The wonderful places that these books have taken me to are wonderfully exotic and different from my day to day life. They allow me to be, for the time that I am reading, the heroine, or the dragon rider that saves the day, or the elf, dwarf or human that helps save the world from evil. The featured artist I have chosen for today from Etsy has taken the characters that I see in my head when I read and put them on paper. She is well worth a look if you are remotely interested in fantasy art. Valorie has managed to capture the feel of the fantasy world perfectly in her work and every time I come across her shop I want to go pick up a book and escape for a short period of time back into that wonderful world of fantasy where I can be anything and conquer evil in 350 pages or less. (Give or take a hundred pages).

Beading Challenge Update

Just a real quick update to let everyone know that the beads have started to arrive and people are getting started on their earrings. We already have one set of earrings that are finished! I am not going to spoil the surprise and post the picture and I really don't want anyone to see anyone else's design because that would kind of defeat the purpose of the whole thing. Don't worry I already have my design worked out so I won't be influenced. Remember they need to be done by the 24th of March. Happy designing everyone and I am hoping mine will be here tomorrow!

Beading Challenge Part 2

Well we posted out challenge on the Etsy forums in the Business and Marketing section (Thanks Rob for the go ahead on this). It took less than 7 minutes to fill the remaining eight spots. We are doing twelve total with the idea of trying to get a Treasury when we are done. I will be listing the 12 people who are participating with links to their shops and also the judges with links to their shops at the end of this post. The beads are going out by Monday from SantiamDesigns
(thanks again Kira). Contestants have until the 24th of March to finish their designs and list them on Etsy for all of us to see (and hopefully they will sell also lol!). I will of course do a blog post with the finished products for everyone to browse also. Keep in mind that there is no prize so the speak just the fun of the challenge. Here are the beads that are in the challenge. What would YOU make?

So here is the list of participants making the earrings.

DesignedbyLucinda

SilverRiverJewelry

EarthlyCreations

BlackCoral (yes she does jewelry too)

byrobinlynne

virtuallori

DesignedbyLara

TeaguesBeads

SleepingCatBeads

melaniehazen

stonesandstarling

studiohart

And here is a list of the judges

YadaYadaYada

marelle

theHouseOfWorn

EmmaRoseJewelry

Beading Challenge

Well I was browsing through the Etsy forums ( which is extremely addicting, if you haven 't checked it out I highly recommend it, it is open to both sellers and buyers) the other day and there it was, another thread about "someone copied my stuff." Which of course started a debate on people coming up with the same design independently. Which happens all over the world all the time no matter what category of product you are hand producing. I am not saying that people don't copy, plenty of them do. I am also not saying that no one ever has an original idea because they do. However there are really only so many ways to make a circle out of metal, put bead on a string and make a tote. It's all in what you do with it as far as color, materials and that little something that is you and no one else. So I ran into a friend of mine on Etsy who happened to be chatting in the same thread (http://DesignedByLucinda.etsy.com) and I after some friendly banter I said something like "wouldn't it be neat if a group of us got together and using the same beads each came up with a design so that we could see how similar or different each persons design would be?!" Cindy said yes that would be so cool and then Kira (http://SantiamDesigns.etsy.com) said "Hey I would be willing to provide the beads and ship them to everyone". (Like anyone is going to turn down free beads to play with haha!). A couple of other people chimed in and said that they would be interested in joining us so the three of us decided that we would go ahead and give it a try. Not only would it be an interesting and fun thing to do but it would also be a good way to promote our shops. (We are really hoping for a storque article out of this). So Kira is providing the beads, Cindy is organizing and in touch with Rob from Etsy on the appropriate way to do this, and I am going to be updating our progress as we go. I will also post pictures of the finished products. I believe we will have a couple of judges although there is no prize in this challenge other than the satisfaction of seeing the outcome. (And free beads to play with). If this is successful we may decide to do it two or three times a year with a different person contributing the beads each time. So we will be posting our challenge in the Business and Marketing portion of the forums with Rob's permission and I will keep you updated on what happens next.

Expanding My Horizons

Also known as not putting all of my eggs in one basket. Please don't get me wrong, I am a die hard etsy fan, I love the community, I have no issues with the way they run things and really believe that they do listen to their sellers and implement many of the things that we have asked for. Etsy will most likely remain my main squeeze so to speak. Having said all of that I have to say that selling jewelry on Etsy is a bit like drowning. There are sooooo many jewelry sellers there. And many of them are very under priced. (I know, now everyone is off to etsy to find great, under priced jewelry lol). And the numbers just continue to grow. I don't mind competition and I love a challenge but I have come to learn some things since I started this whole venture in July. In order to be successful you have to be seen as often as possible. And not just in one venue. I am coming to realize that I need to be seen all over the net as often as possible. Silver River Jewelry needs to come up often in the search engines from a variety of places. (I know this is not a new thought by any means but some of us are slow learners or are just intimidated by the whole thing). So with that in mind I have branched out just a bit.

I have just opened up shop on a beta site called Icraftca.com.

http://www.icraft.ca/silver_river_jewelry

If you open up shop there before March 31st you can list unlimited items free for 1 year. Here are their terms that applies after March 31st.

Registration Fee	$25.00 CAD This is a small, non-refundable one-time fee each seller pays when setting up their "Creator Exhibit". It is required in order to verify the seller's identity, ensure credit card validity and to encourage honest transactions. This preventative measure will give buyers confidence that they are dealing with serious, honest sellers.
Subscription Fee	Three available packages allow you to customize the amount of products your Creator Exhibit displays. You can add, delete or rotate your products any time you want. If your business is seasonal, you can put your subscription on hold and resume it at any time. The subscription fee is not refundable if you choose to un-list a product from your inventory. 1 to 5 Items (interchangeable) – ALWAYS FREE! Starter 5 to 20 Items (interchangeable) - $15.00 CAD/month. Every additional item is $2.50 CAD/month. Professional 5 to 30 Items (interchangeable) - $25.00 CAD/month. Every additional item is $1.50 CAD/month. Elite 5 to 40 Items (interchangeable) - $35.00 CAD/month. Every additional item is $1.00 CAD/month. If you happen to reach the maximum amount of items in your package, iCraft.ca will give you the option of adding an additional item at a set cost, or upgrading to the next available package. The choice will always be yours.
The Details	Limited Time Offer Sellers who submit inventory to their Creator Exhibit by March 31, 2008 will not be charged ANY registration or subscription fees for an entire year. This is a great opportunity to take advantage of all the great iCraft.ca benefits for absolutely NO COST. 5 Free Items When posting your products, the first 5 items are always FREE! And if you sell one, you can replace it with another right away at no extra cost. As long as you keep your listings to 5, you won't be charged. Interchangeable Items When we say that items are "interchangeable", that means you have complete flexibly to change / update what is displayed. For example, say you have 5 "summer" items in your inventory in July. When October arrives, you decide you want to update your 5 items to reflect your "winter" collection. You can do so at no additional charge, as long as you place your "summer" items on hold. "On hold" items are not included in your active inventory, and will not be counted as part of your package - only items which you flag as "live" are. It's About Quality, Not Quantity Unlike most other arts & craft ecommerce sites, iCraft.ca does not charge creators per quantity of a listing. For example, if you have a product page showcasing your knitted scarf, and you have 5 of them available for sale, feel free to list the "Availability" quantity as 5! We will not charge you any additional fees. Pricing Policy was last updated on January 24, 2008 Questions? Please feel free to Contact Us.

This is an opportunity to get in on the ground floor of a new hand crafted site which I find quite intriguing. Also it is a win win situation since it costs nothing to try them for a year. I think this is a superb opportunity for anyone thinking about expanding their horizons. They will be going public sometime in the next several weeks I believe and will begin advertising the site at that point. (It will be nice to have someone helping out with the advertising). So, for those of you who want to try another venue in addition to where you are this is a great place to try with no risk to you or your pocket book.

I will be posting about another site that I am trying sometime it the next couple of weeks.

Etsy Artist of the Week

PENGIES

I ran across this shop in the forums and just couldn't resist. These are little penguins made of fimo clay in an assortment of poses and colors. Her is what Caitlin says in her profile about her "pengies".

Pengies are little model penguins, made of a special clay called fimo. Each little critter has it's own personality, with a name & message to suit. They are bright & colorful, and they all need a loving home, so take a look & maybe take one home...

Now these are also customizable as far as names, colors, personality and sayings go. They come in two sizes. You can also request a holiday themed pengie by using the "convo" feature on Etsy.

What can I say?! These just caught my eye as being really cute and colorful and some of the expressions on their faces are great. Go check out her shop and take some home.

Last Update on the Puppies

I wanted everyone to know that the final two puppies Lizzie (Elizabeth) and Alex have gone to their new homes. I am very glad but also very sad. I am surprised at how much I miss them already and Alex just left yesterday. On the other hand it is really nice to have my house back. No more hopping the gate (and we were to the point where we had to double gate one on top of the other you can imagine what a pain this was since the access to the basement where the laundry and my workbench are is thru the kitchen lol). No more newspaper to clean up and all of the stuff that was temporarily dumped in my dining room to avoid teething puppies is now back in the kitchen where it belongs! Of course we keep walking into the dining room to throw stuff in the trash can and have to turn around and go back into the kitchen.

I got a text from Lizzie's owner that said everyone already loves her even the cats. And by the way she is a bed hog. Haha! I can see that she will be quite spoiled.

Zeke's owners have sent me pictures and he looks really happy (and also spoiled).

Alex went to a couple from my church that are good friends. I will be able to visit him and be regularly updated which is great because he is just such a sweet puppy. And Elna is home all day so he will have company most of the time.

I will be posting my next edition of the Etsy artist of the week in a couple of days, hopefully by
Thursday night. I know I am behind but I am still recovering from pneumonia and still tire easily. And since I can't afford to take off extended time from work I am just sucking it up and going in. And then I come home and pass out lol!

How To Make Sterling Silver Head Pins

Okay I promised to do a picture tutorial of how to make headpins at home. Please be patient as I am recovering from pneumonia.

Obviously the first thing you will need are your supplies and someplace safe to light your torch. I don't recommend your living room. I know you may not like those curtains but trust me there is a better way.

You need your sterling silver wire 18 to 24 guage round either dead soft or half hard.(personal preference and depending on what you are using them for) Something to hold them with as you apply your torch. I am using what is called a third hand. Basically anything that will hold your wire and not catch on fire or melt while near the torch. Your fingers do NOT fall under this category and will most definitely burn. Even if you miss them with the torch the wire itself get hot all the way to to top so be careful. it to cool completely or use tweezers, pliers whatever to remove them from your holder.(Yes I am speaking from experience, take my word for it). You also need a torch. Mine is from Home Depot and was 14 dollars. Please read the directions FIRST. Move anything flammable from around your space you will be working in. (you would be surprised at how far the flame actually goes). Now you will need to cut your wire to the appropriate length ( I am still working on how long to cut for the amount I want to have left but it is just a matter of trial and error to figure out the right length.) Hook up your first piece of wire and light your torch. Apply the flame to the bottom of the head pin and watch for it turn red. This does not take long! As soon as it turns red it balls up and you can remove the torch and turn it off. Either wait for the pin to cool or use a tweezer or plier to remove it from you third hand.( I cannot emphasis this part enough, third degree burns do ugly things to fingerprints!). Continue with this process until you have made the desired amount of heads pins. This is what they should look like at this point. Not very attractive and kind of dirty looking.. At this point they need to go into the pickle pot so that the fire scale will be removed and they will start to look like usable pieces. Again please read all the directions for your pickle if you have never tried this before. After pickling the head pins come out with a whitish coating on them. This is normal, please don't panic, you have not done anything wrong. The next step is to toss them in your tumbler and give them a spin for about two hours. This not only makes them nice and shiny but also makes them stronger. Then you just straighten any that you need to straighten and you have now created your very own headpins to work with. I hope this has been a helpful piece for those of you just starting out. Please follow all safety and handling instructions when you attempt to do this.
Many thanks go to the fine etsians who have been kind enough to share their knowledge in the forums and in tutorials of their own. Not limited to but including

GlitterCritter, LooseWireStudio Stereotte, and WireYourWorld to name a few.

How to Cut Rocks Step Three

Sorry it took so long to get back to this, the holidays were a bit crazy and since we are now short one person at work (with absolutely no plans to replace him for at least a year) I have been working more too. This is tough because even though I like my job I would rather be designing and making jewelry so having less time to spend doing that and promoting my store does not really thrill me. Although the extra money is always a good thing lol!

So we left off at the trim saw. The next step is cabbing the stone. This takes a little more skill and time although there are some tricks to make it easier. This step requires lots of water instead of oil to avoid heat. You do want to make sure all of the oil is off of your stone. We use a bucket of kitty litter and a brush. Then wash well with warm, soapy water. (The large round object in the picture is a vibratory tumbler. We use this for all of the odds and ends left over from the trim saw . After several weeks it gives us highly polished stones that the kids at the gem show go nuts over). So we have our lovely almost oval trim sawed stone and we are going to start grinding it to a 15 degree angle with the machine on the left. This machine does not have removable belts, the grinding wheel has tiny diamond pieces embedded in it. This spins at a high rate of speed. A plastic apron is a good idea with this machine as the water you use to keep it from getting too hot sprays in the direction of your body not the wall. Also eye protection is a must. Here is one of the tricks of the trade. The grinding wheel has a natural 15 degree angle so that you really don't have to do any fancy calculations to get it right. Remember that oval we drew on here with the magnesium stick? This is where you want to grind it to. This is the back of your piece and the angled portion is the front. When you have it to the right size and before you begin to grind your dome you need to put it on a dap stick. I am going to leave off here because I need to take pictures of the dap stick and how it is done before I can continue. (Remembering the camera is always an issue for me. When I head for the rock club I usually have two toolboxes and my purse, and since it is winter my coat, gloves etc. I'm lucky I remember my name on some days much less the camera lol!). This is a good stopping point as I will be able to finish hoe to cut rocks with my next post on this subject in a couple of weeks.

One of My Treasuries on Etsy

Okay for those of you who don't know what a treasury is I am going to show you one of mine. I love making these, they are highly addictive and there is a great deal of competition among fellow etsians to secure a spot when they become available. This is how it works. When the list drops below 333 (don't know why they picked that particular number but that is what it is.) So if you are lucky enough to get the little title box and get your title name in it before they are all grabbed you then get to make a treasury.
TIP - copy your title from Word so all you have to do is paste. This increases your chances exponentially. You then get to design a theme and go thru all of the lovely shops on etsy to choose your photos for your treasury. It is considered bad form by many to put your own item(s) in a treasury. It is meant to showcase other artists. As you can see from this screen shot I have chosen a theme of Black and Sunset. Of course your theme can be anything you want and does not have to be based on color. To see more treasuries go to www.etsy.com and click on the treasury link on the left side of the page. Have fun! But be careful they are highly addictive.

Do You Need A New Banner? Check out this Etsy Artist

Well I have decided that with all of the talk about branding and making a statement that has been going on in the etsy forums that I would go ahead and give it a try and see if it helped my sales any. I spend a good amount of time browsing the many talented designers on Etsy who make things like banners and avatars, not to mention business cards etc. I finally decided to go with Callista's Design Shop at http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5353905. I convo'd her at about 10:49 pm and she responded immediately. I explained to her what I wanted and said I would check back the next day. Less than 24 hours later I had my new banner and avatar. Did I mention how pleased I am with them?! I have also shown a small sampling of custom banner designs that she has in her shop and she also does blog headers etc. Go check her out!

I will also be finishing my series on how to cut rocks very soon and will do another update on the puppies soon. We are down to three right now so we are making progress lol!

An Etsy Seller and Fellow Blogger

I know that I usually do a post on an etsy seller and link to the blog on the sidebar but I am going to do this one a bit differently. There are lots of sellers on etsy who also have wonderful blogs and it would take years to post everyone of them.

BUTTERFLISLM
This particular etsian has added to her blog a very long list of beautiful shops that you can find on etsy. If you want to check some of them out you can go here http://butterflidesign.blogspot.com/
I am guessing that you can spend several days checking out her list alone. And it is a chance to see some really talented artists. So I was browsing thru her shop and came across this very cute and practical crocheted scrubby. Now my sister's, husband's grandma makes me a couple of crocheted scrubbies every year for Christmas and I love them. They work really well and they wash easily in the washer. However Stacy has gone one step further and has crocheted hemp yarn in the middle of hers. This means MORE POWER to clean my stove and countertops. (My teenagers can leave a horrendous mess and walk away. Three hours later when I come home from work I practically need a flamethrower to get the dried on gook off the stove). So I suggest you check out her blog for lots of cool etsy artists and check out her store for some great crocheted items. (She does more than scrubbies lol!).

Etsy Artists January 3rd 2008

PATEREEVES
This artist on is fairly new on Etsy but I have to tell you I was so impressed with her bead work. I also thing that she is seriously underpricing so if you want to get in on a good deal I would head over to her shop soon as I am sure she will eventually raise her prices to what the work is worth. I don't have the patience to do detailed bead work like this and I admire anyone who can follow a pattern that turns out so beautifully. Her monarch butterfly looks soo real that you just expect it to fly right off the page. Can you believe that this is made out of beads. Just blows me away. I usually only post two pictures but I really couldn't resist putting one more dragonfly up as they are some of my favorite bugs. They are beautiful in nature and I think that this artist has captured that beauty in her wonderful beaded creations. Enjoy!

Update on our Puppies (Finally)

Well it is New Years Day and I finally have a small breather as I am waiting on the turkey to finish cooking so I am going to do my long overdue update on the pups. We have sold four puppies, Zeke our smallest puppy, Hope and Bluto went to the same home, and Mo was the first to go. While I do miss them, being down to four pups is much easier to manage.

Zacharia is our teddy bear, both in looks and in personality. He is a great big ball of four and since he has a naturally bobbed tail when he is running away from you he really does look like a bear cub. Must be all that fuzzy fur. He just loves for you to love on him and is usually the first to greet you.

Lizzie (Elizabeth) is the only female left and is also the smallest. Her fur is more sleek than the rest of her siblings so this also makes her appear smaller (She is not as fluffy lol!). She is a very happy go lucky dog and very active. She has no fear of anything either. I can't decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. And if you are wondering yes she is behind my vegetable garden fence. They are still little enough to squeeze thru the "bars" and seem to take great delight in doing so.

Alexender (the Great) is another sweetie. He looks up at you with big brown eyes and you just melt lol! (Have I told you how spoiled they are?!). Always willing to please he also has an adventursome spirit and is often the first one to get into something new. As you can see in this picture he is trying to figure out what this fountain is and of course he has never seen a fish before.

Last but certainly not least is Boo. He is a blue merle and he has one blue eye and one brown eye. He is our most gently and laid back puppy and he is also the biggest puppy. He has such a sweet personality just kind of waits to see what the rest of the pack is going to do before joining in.

They are all paper trained and have just introduced them to the outdoors. They absolutely love it and went out in their very first snow storm today. They love being outside and don't willingly come in on their own even when it is snowing. We have to train (bribe) them with treats and occasionally chase one down to get them all back into the house. They really needed the exercise, the kitchen is just not enough space anymore. Much easier to do with four than eight though. This also cuts down on the amount of mess I have to clean up which is of course a good thing for me. We are hoping that their new owners show up soon because every day I get a little bit more attached. However we live on a city lot and seven dogs is out of the question lol! Three is really pushing it. I am very glad our back yard is fenced! This will most likely be our last litter also so that makes it a little harder. This is Liberty's third litter and I think she probably doesn't want to do this again either.

The Next Edition of Etsy Artists.

Well I hope that everyone had a fabulous Christmas. I am feeling a bit more relaxed now that things have settled down a bit. I will be doing an update on the puppies very soon as I have sold four and have four left. If your in the mood please pray for good homes to come soon lol! I am getting way too attached.

Here is my newest find on Etsy

CreativeDesignz
She is from Newcastle Australia and does some really beautiful work. I can't decide if I like her jewelry better or her photos. Both are beautiful and eye catching. She is the mother of two and as anyone who has kids knows, it can be tough to be a mom and still find time to be creative, much less creative and then sell online to boot. As you can see by the fine pelican photo, she takes gorgeous pictures. However this is not her only talent as you can see by the photo on the left she also makes beautiful jewelry. I happen to know that she is undertaking a new venture and will be listing some beautiful fused glass pendants in the near future so make sure that you check out her shop on etsy soon!

Featured in Talent Database

I am so excited! I feel like I am truly starting to produce quality jewelry and it is so cool to be recognized! Check out this link

Cast Team Christmas Contest

Okay, so this week I am doing a post on the Cast Teams Christmas contest instead of separate etsy artists because it is close to Christmas and they are having a wonderful Christmas contest you should go and check out. Here are the details.

The words to the carol "Oh Holy Night" will be posted in the CAST Team shop:

http://www.etsy.com/profile.php?user_id=5372642

with 10 words highlighted. The highlighted words can be found in listings in the participating shops. The words will be in listings found on the first page of the shop. Entrants will send a convo to the Cast Team with the links to the listings containing the words. All correct entries will be eligible for one of several Gift Baskets. Each will consist of items from the cool shops in CAST. One correct entry per person.

http://www.etsy.com/favorite_listings_public.php?user_id=5372642

Contest will run from Tuesday, Dec. 4th through Tuesday, Dec. 11th. Winners will be notified via convo on the 12th.

Contest is not open to members of CAST

There are some really beautiful prizes and you may find some neat shops that you have never seen before.

You can see some of the prizes on the right of the screen.