What can I say except - Thank You - You're the Greatest !

Update June 2, 2014-  On 8/26/2013 I blogged about a great new website market place for handcrafted arts and crafts items.  The site was called Craftinest.

Unfortunately Craftinest is now no longer online.  No one knows what happened.  Though Craftinest did post on their facebook page that a fire had destroyed much of their sites equipment and they held out a promise to us that they would repair the damage and get the site back up and running . . . that promise is yet to materialize.   As I update this post is has been about 9 months since anyone has heard from Craftinest. Craftinest has not bothered to update their facebook page nor notify any of their many shop owners as to what is going on. All our emails are returned as undeliverable. We have pretty much given up hope that Craftinest will repair the fire damage and reestablish their website. 

Personally I believe that they grew too quickly and the inundation of so many artists and crafters overwhelmed them and their sites capacity to handle such an influx of shops and traffic.  The loss of Craftinest is sad as it held forth so much potential . . .  but sometimes things are simply not meant to be. 

Below is my old blog post of 7/23/2013 -

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A Great Big Thank You to all my wonderful Blogging Buddies for voting for me on Craftinest.
With the help of all my friends, both online and offline, I gathered 154 votes and maintained a 4.4 heart average.

Craftinest has just informed me that I have been approved and that I may start building my Craftinest shop.

I have so many lovely people to thank and I am starting off with thanking all of you. 

 

THANK YOU :)

Photo was taken by me during a trip that my hubby and I took to California, Oregon and the state of Washington.  I saw this lovely spread of yellow and gold daisy-like flowers in the fair state of Oregon and had to take a picture.

Begging For Votes - A New Venue For Selling

 

Update June 2, 2014-  On 8/26/2013 I blogged about a great new website market place for handcrafted arts and crafts items.  The site was called Craftinest.

Unfortunately Craftinest is now no longer online.  No one knows what happened.  Though Craftinest did post on their facebook page that a fire had destroyed much of their sites equipment and they held out a promise to us that they would repair the damage and get the site back up and running . . . that promise is yet to materialize.   As I update this post is has been about 9 months since anyone has heard from Craftinest. Craftinest has not bothered to update their facebook page nor notify any of their many shop owners as to what is going on. All our emails are returned as undeliverable. We have pretty much given up hope that Craftinest will repair the fire damage and reestablish their website. 

Personally I believe that they grew too quickly and the inundation of so many artists and crafters overwhelmed them and their sites capacity to handle such an influx of shops and traffic.  The loss of Craftinest is sad as it held forth so much potential . . .  but sometimes things are simply not meant to be. 

Below is my old blog post of 8/26/2013 -

*********** 

 

I recently ran across a new and upcoming website for artist and crafters called Craftinest .

Yes it is just a baby and has not been discovered and there is always a possibility that it may not make it into the big time the way Etsy or Artfire has.  But the fact that it is new intrigues me and so I took the plunge and filled out my application.

Application?  Why?  Well they say they want to have a website that will be solely for handcrafted items and they wanted it to be innovative, fresh and filled with marvelous artists and crafters . . . well aren't we all marvelous artists and crafters?  Craftinest claims that their site is juried and in order to have a shop there one has to be juried in.  It sounded like this might be a good way to discourage all those bogus handmade shops that are really just resellers in a thin veil of disguise . . . a very thin, almost transparent veil.

Unfortunately Craftinest's jurying process is not done by a devoted, unbiased team of artist and crafters but by the public and I need 100 votes in order just to be considered for their site.  I'm sure you can all see where this is going, right? 

 (Yes, I'm blatantly soliciting your vote - please click here and give me a vote or a heart:
AlmostPrecious - on the chopping block at Craftiness.com

Since Craftinest is so new it is not yet inundated with a barrage of visitors, so those applying for a shop will have to provide their own voters.  I even received an email from Craftinest encouraging me to go on facebook etc. and encourage all my friends and followers to vote for me.  They told me if I can get 200 votes and 4 hearts I'll be automatically juried in. 

That's not exactly how I've had to go about being juried into an art show  -  it was never a popularity contest but was done by a separate panel of unbiased judges that judged on the merit of the artist's art or the crafter's craft, taking into consideration their originality and the quality of their work.

Pictured are a couple of pieces that I entered for jurying, if you click on the photos it should take you to my voting page . . . hint, hint.   :)

 

 

Oh and if any of you decide you'd like to join me on Craftinest please let me know so that I can give you my vote .  :)

 

The Whys and the Wherefores

hand embellished Sodalite Pendant necklace

For the past few days I've been trying to figure out the whys and wherefores of Etsy.  Why do some shops find almost instant success while others languish, floundering in a sea of invisibility ?   Why is it that 2 shops selling almost the same items will have such disparity when it comes to views and sales? 
I've been trying to build up my shop inventory as I've heard that the more items you have the better are your chances of being found by search engines and therefore found by potential customers.  But seems that the past week or two, as I've added more items, my views have fallen from 30 or 40 views a day to about 10 or less a day.

 

I made the black nylon cord adjustable so necklace

can go from very short to very long

 

I recently listed this Sodalite stone pendant that I embellished with sterling silver wire work and sterling silver beads.  The cord has my handcrafted  sliding, macramé clasp on it making  it very adjustable. 

 



After listing I tried promoting, yes  used all the old standards that I could think of :   facebook, teams, etc.   Now, a day later, I find it has a total of 5 views and 9 admirers (meaning  that 4 people must have given it a heart without even clicking on its etsy link).

In the past I tried opening a shop that was just for my jewelry and one shop for other items but found it spread my attention too thin and neither shop was profitable.  This time I had some of my soft textiles listed, such as the pair of crochet potholders-trivets-dishrags.

 

Above trivets etc. in hot pink-red and white are about 9 inches across

Below trivets in crisp white on dark apple green and white on tomato red.

 

 

I also listed some of the cute Ruffled Boas that I made.  My daughters loved the ones I gave them at Christmas and said I should put a few on my etsy shop - they thought they would

sell quickly.

 

 

 

 

 

 They got a number of views and hearts for awhile but have dropped down to zero lately.  So much for my daughters' intuitions.  :D

 

I feel like I'm neglecting so much lately trying to crank start my old etsy shop.  Granted etsy has far more shops now and a lot more unscrupulous resellers selling their items way below market value.  Trying to rid etsy of these shops is like a never ending game of "Whack a Mole".  They "conk" one out and a dozen more pop up.

 

Anyway, like so many mornings before, I took my mug of coffee and went to check on my etsy shop.  There were no orders and I noticed that I had garnered all of 1 shop view since I had turned off my computer yesterday.  How, Why, What ?  Just a whole lot of questions and I haven't an answer.

Happy 4th of July

 

 ! HAPPY 4TH OF JULY !

After reading about Hotlinking I am not 100% sure how to "borrow" an online photo and use it on my blog legally . . . so much for using free clip-art of firework displays. :D

The only thing I could think of using that was red - white- and blue,  was  my own photo of our (what used to be new) flag and this necklace that I have on etsy.  The flag won !  :D

Wishing everyone a Safe and Happy 4th of July.  

Nooooooo !!!

Catastrophe has struck and I am still reeling in shock from it.  When I went to attach the fluorite flower that I had worked so hard to enhance, taking it from bland to beautiful,  I could not get the beading needle to go through the drill hole.  Somehow the epoxy resin that I used to coat the back of the stone flower had filled the center of the hole.  I thought I had cleared all the resin out with a toothpick after I had coated it but either I did not do a good enough job or more seeped in afterwards.
All I know is that I had to try to ream the hardened resin out of the drill hole in order to attach the flower to the bail.   I used a small, diamond coated reaming tool and was being gentle but ... well as they say "a picture is worth a thousand words".

Picture below - how it looked before the accident.

 

 

Picture below - how it looks after the accident.

 

I have thought and thought but haven't come up with any solution to the problem.  I can't try to reattach the broken piece as that would just seal up the dill hole again (but I am thinking about maybe doing that and then using the flower later on in a wire work piece - maybe!)  So now I'm in the process of trying to locate another carved fluorite flower.

 

I had also came up with a pattern that I thought would look nice with the center piece of the necklace.

Photo above and below - I like the rich, old world look of the capped  Amazonite and large  (Lab created) Amethyst beads interspersed with smaller, natural Amethyst beads.

Photo below - Got these little clamps at a home improvement store and at the time they were almost 3 for a dollar.  I find I use them all of the time and wish I had bought more of them.

If anyone runs across a site that sells similar fluorite carved flowers (about 40 mm in size) please let me know.   All I can find, so far, are small little 15 mm fluorite flower beads.