Infatuation October 29, 2007

I just posted a brand new yarn in my Etsy shop – Infatuated!

I just looove this yarn. It’s all different shades of pink, from some roving I dyed ages ago, plied with sparkly silver thread! This was my first time plying with metallic thread, and I love the way it came out. I have some gold thread too, so I’ll have to find a way to use that soon. This picture shows the sparkliness of the yarn a little bit better.

Love it.

In other news, I’ve actually made some progress on the Saturday Market Bag, following these modifications.

I really like how it’s working up. It’s a fast knit – don’t be fooled by how long it’s taking me to complete this, I’m a pretty slow knitter and I don’t spend very much time doing it. The body of the bag is done, so all I need to finish is the top edging and the straps. Hopefully I’ll be able to get it done in the next week or so – I’m so excited to go shopping with it and whip it out when the clerk asks if I need a bag!

This week is going to be fairly awful, since it’s the second-worst time in a college student’s life – midterms. Blech. I’ll try to keep crafting to relieve the stress, and I might even have some new things to post in the next day or so.

Enjoy your week!

Fall is Here! October 17, 2007

And in the spirit of fall, a few friends and I went apple-picking the other day. And then…we baked a pie! From scratch! I was super-proud of it, considering that an apple pie is by far the most complex thing I’ve ever attempted to cook. Luckily my friend Beth is a good baker, so with her guidance we were able to make a successful pie.

Before baking – can you see the little apple we stenciled on top?

Just out of the oven.

Ready to eat! Yummy.

While I was home for Fall Break, I dyed up the rest of my merino roving! I’m so excited to spin this stuff.

Green, pink, and purple – looks kind of like a flower garden, huh? I really love the purple dye, I need to use it more.

Shades of blue – you can’t tell, but it actually gets a lot darker than this picture shows. It has parts where it’s a really deep bluish-purple. I’m really excited to see how this spins up as a two-ply, I’d kind of like to do a series of 2-ply yarns with varying shades of one color.

I’ve been obsessed with this tutorial on making paper boxes for the past few days. It’s the coolest thing ever – it really works! Go check it out.

Playing Catch-Up! October 10, 2007

I’ve been so busy the past few days that I haven’t been keeping up with 30 Days to a Better Shop over at christinaperdue.com/blog! I did Day 1 (from October 1st), but since then I’ve been falling behind. Today has been my catch-up day.

*Day 2 – Update your shop announcement – done!
*Day 3 – Revise the categories in your shop – I’m pretty happy with what I already had (Handspun Yarn, Recycled Yarn, and Paper Beads), so I decided to just leave them. Done!
*Day 4 – Update your profile – I didn’t completely follow the recommendations, but I did change it and add a bunch more information, so I think it’s a lot better. Soo…done!
*Day 5 – Update your banner/avatar – I already have a banner and avatar that I absolutely loooove, thanks to the wonderful laurasue on Etsy. Done!
*Days 6 & 7 – Update your listings/item titles – This one I’m not so sure about. I’m pretty sure I like the way my listings are written, since I spent a lot of time writing them not too long ago. The only thing I’m not sure about is whether it’s better to include specific numbers in the item’s titles. For example, would the item “Sunny Delight – Handspun Yarn” be better as “Sunny Delight – Handspun Yarn – 90 Yards”? Or maybe “Sunny Delight – 90 Yards of Handspun Yarn”? I really can’t decide if that makes the item title too long or if being more descriptive is better. So…any thoughts? I guess I’ll have to mark this one as not done for now.
*Day 8 – Update message to buyers – done!
*Day 9 – Join a Street Team – I have to admit that I really didn’t know what Street Teams were before I read this post. I looked into them, and it seems interesting, so I’ve applied to be a member of the Etsy Fiber Arts Street Team (EtsyFAST for short). So I’m going to consider this one…done!

Wow, 8 days of work accomplished in one! I’m pretty proud of myself! In other exciting Etsy news, my yarn Sand and Sky was recently featured in a treasury! It was my first time being in a treasury, so I was pretty excited about it. I’m not sure it really did a whole lot for my views, but it was really cool to know that someone liked my yarn enough to put it in their treasury!

Gosh, these past few posts have just been Etsy, Etsy, Etsy, haven’t they? I promise I’ll have some interesting fiber-related content for you soon…tomorrow hopefully!

Happy October! October 1, 2007

Fall is in the air! Brrr. I’ve decided to use the fact that it’s the beginning of the month to set some goals for October. There’s another Etsy seller, ChristinaPurdue, who has organized a “30 Days to a Better Shop” series on her blog. Basically every day she’s going to give a tip on how to improve your Etsy shop, so that by the end of the month your shop is well, better. Today’s assignment was to set both monthly and long term goals. So here goes!

October Goals
*List 20 items.
*Create 4 new yarns
*Sell at least one yarn.
*Sell at least 4 items total.
*Blog at least 8 times.
*Write a bio/shop announcement.
*Keep up with 30 Days to a Better Shop

Long Term Goals
Hmm….I guess I don’t really have any long term goals. I don’t aspire to make a living doing this or anything like that. I guess my long term goals are to just have fun, be creative, and send some of my stuff out into the world!

In other news, I finally cast on for the Saturday Market Bag that I bought the yarn for so long ago. I’ll try to get pictures of that and the two yarns that I still haven’t posted about tomorrow.

Hope your October is wonderful!