Today was a good day.

Today was a good day. I made my first real sale on Artfire today.
Tecnhically I have had one already but that buyer never paid so that one doesn't count.

I'm also off done with work for the week. That's great that I have a day off but the downside is that I'm having oral surgery tomorrow so I took a sick day.

I am looking forward to the time that I will have to work on the custom order for my friend Jen. I'm hoping to also finish a few other projects that I've had lying around as well.

Love this new necklace and pair of earrings that I just listed.

So,

Last week when I went out to buy the Bead Unique mag (we all know that story) I found these stunning purple jasper beads. I got these really supurb antique copper and regular bright shiny copper findings as well. Looking at the beads I saw that they had this almost rust colored streak runnign through them. I wanted to pair them with copper so I used both the bright copper and also the antique copper.

Here's the result.

Bead Unique Ad

So, I run out to the bead shop after work to buy the current issue of Bead Unique.

One of my necklaces is in a Shop Handmade ad. The owner of the shop is like where are you in the mag. So I flip through and get to the ad. There are 8 total pieces from different people. One is mine.

GUESS WHAT THEY LEAVE OFF THE LISTING FOR MY NECKLACE????????

MY FULL STORE NAME!!!!!!!!!

Sorry about the yelling but saying that the store is Jewelry by DOES NOTHING FOR PROMOTING MY JEWELRY!

I've emailed the person who contacted me about the ad in the first place voicing my displeasure.

I emailed the editor about it and here is her response:

Apologies. Profuse ones. The ad got made at the last moment, and was delivered on a weekend when we were all off work...But that's no excuse. Mistake is a mistake. I'm going to make up for this as best I can. I'll definitely get the graphic designer to correct it in the next ad that comes out. And I'll feature your products in other promotions...

Please don't be too disappointed. There will be lots more stuff.

I really feel bad, thinking how awful you must have felt when you opened the magazine and saw the glitch. I do apologize again...

Here's the page. I'm on the bottom left.

Here's the link to my flickr as well.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jewelrybydesiree/3215763830/

Bead Unique Update

I don't have a direct link but I WILL scan in the page and post it for all to see.

The Spring Issue of Bead Unique Magazine

On stands today! Look for the Shop Handmade adventorial with my Round Pendant Necklace featured in it! You can find it in my Artfire studio as well!

To craft fair or not to craft fair?

So, I found out yesterday that there's this craft fair happening in May of this year in a town called Griffin, GA called Hatch Market. It's right up the handmade alley, ergo, my alley. Now the big thing is that I'm wondering if I should try to apply. The booth fee is inexpensive ($85), they give you a skirted table, chair and sign with your business, hometown and website on it. Now I'd need to get a credit card merchant account. I can do that for about $40/year so that's not too bad and the fees aren't that bad. Griffin is about 70 miles away from where I'm at. Not sure if I could potentially get ready in time as I haven't ever done a fair before and I'd need to buy some display stuff and make a ton of pieces. That and I'd have to sell about $300 worth of stuff to break even.

I won free advertising!

So the website http://indiesmiles.com was having a free advertising contest. Post a comment and sign up for there newsletter and get a chance to win free advertising. Well guess what? I was picked as a winner. Hopefully this will generate more exposure for my site and also sales!

I'm totally stoked!