All about Etsy!

I did it, I opened an Etsy store. I have heard talk about Etsy, a store entirely for handmade work, for a while now. I went there, tried to surf around and quickly got frustrated. I just didn’t understand it at all. Then I was reading a thread on LE, about successful sellers. So I went and looked again.

I actually signed up and all the sudden I found out how to search things properly. I am still unsure if I needed to be signed up to do that, or if I just finally found the right button. Listing are only 20 cents for three months. wow cheap! Cheaper than ebay or Justbeads thats for sure. Then there is the fact that is is just a store, not an auction, which I think is appealing. I am one of those that if they find something they like, they would rather just buy it rather than bidding. I know bidding can be exciting and can be a way to get a great deal, but you also miss out on stuff you really want if someone snipes you. Frustrating for sure.

I also really like the ease of Etsy. It looks nice and they host your pictures for you. Really it doesn’t matter much to me as we have picture hosting with our website, but it makes it nice for those who don’t. Free picture hosting and 20 cents a listing. Sounds like a great deal to me. Check it out. Check me out. I promise to stock my shelves on etsy daily, just like ebay and justbeads. Give me a try and if you like what you see, heart me too.

A Ghost Dog?

About once every month, our Golden Retriever has a night where she just can’t sleep and appears to be stressed out.  Usually what happens is we go to bed, then a few hours later, she is scratching at our door urgently. We take her out, tell her to go to sleep and see what happens.  Usually she wonders around the house making a bunch of noise on the hardwood floors, wondering from each door to our bedroom.  We have two, so she paces back and forth.  Then she urgently scratches on our door again.

Usually by now we are both awake, and I take her out and walk her for what seems like an hour, but is probably more like 10 minutes.   Then she seems to be calmer, but it never fails, 5 or 10 minutes go by, then another urgent scratch scratch.  By now we have no choice but to bring her into the room with us.  She is loud sleeper, so this is our last resort.

This whole pattern happened again last night.  We don’t know what it is that freaks her out, but apparently she just needed to be near us.  We are left wondering if there is a ghost dog terrorizing her in the middle of the night.   She is a 10 year old dog, who has never slept in our room, so it’s not like we are breaking a habit.

A novel in a month?

This morning as I was waking up, drinking my tea, I was browsing the various blogs I like to read. I haven’t visited Lori Greenburg for a while. A while, is about a week. I came across her post about National Novel Writing Month. Write a novel, 50,000 words in the month of November.

At first I thought, is she crazy? How would anyone find the time? Then I looked at the website, read a bit, and started to feel that twinge of excitement. It started small and is slowly growing. Could I do this? Do I have enough in me to do it? How would I start? What would I write? I still don’t know the answer, but I signed up. I added my name. I am thinking of plots and ideas. I made the step, I have a commitment, I am going to try.

I have always been an avid reader. When I was a kid, teenager, I always thought it would be cool to wrote novels. I read a lot of everything, including chick lit, fantasy, romance, historical romance, sci fi, or whatever catches my eye. Some of my favorites are JK Rowling (of course), Janet Evanovich, Diana Gabaldon, Anne Rice, and Jennifer Cruise. There are many more, but you get the idea.

Do I think I could ever live up to the reputations of these great writers. Absolutely not. However, one will never know until one tries. The idea behind a novel in a month, is to just do it. Get the words out, expecting them to be drivel. I am good with that. I will help me to know if I am really meant to write or not.

After all, I really enjoy my blog. I love to write here, about just any old thing, so we’ll see what happens in November.

Well, the heater works.

A few nights ago while I was torching, the breeze from the door and the window actually made me cold.  So I closed the door and kept right on working.  When I was finished at about 9 pm at night, I wondered into the living room to tell Greg it was actually cold outside.  He looked at me with his “You amaze me” look and then laughed.  He gets up wonders over to the thermostat and say, yep you are right it is 74 degrees in here.

Okay, I didn’t say it was cold inside, I said it was cold outside.  So me being me…I put him on ignore.  The next morning, he tells me it’s cold this morning, then turns the heater on.  Yep, we ran it for all of 5 minutes.  Good to know it works for when we might actually need it.  Although some would debate the heater is needed when it is 60 degrees.  Hey, I am use to 90 degree weather, give me a break.

Clickables!

 

 

When did I become such a snob?

Really, I ask you: When did I become such a snob? Greg and I have had a running joke for a few years now that we are food snobs, wine snobs, beer snobs, tequila snobs and now it appears art snobs. I am sure I can find more snobbiness if I try, but I will leave it at that for now.

It’s no secret among friends about our food and drink snobbiness. Last month I was visiting a friend. Before I got there she went shopping for beer for pizza night. She did not know what kind of beer to get, so she went to the store with the most options and stared at the beer. A few moments later a man in his thirties comes along and joins her staring at the choices. My friend turns to him and explains she has a beer snob coming to visit, does he have any recommendations. He appears to think for a moment, then reaches down grabs a six pack of Bud and says “Nope.” and walks off. LOL. She did okay though. I don’t remember what she got, but it was good enough to drink.

As far as wine goes, maybe it is because we grew up close to the Napa Valley. I don’t know, but I just can’t do a cheap bottle of wine. I know people who drink that wine in a box stuff, and say they LIKE it. Really? You are kidding me right? What about Boones wine? I remember drinking that at high school parties. (Sorry mom and dad). It wasn’t good then either. Now, I know you are thinking, those are terrible wines. Yes they are. You are right. Still anything less that about a $10 bottle of wine and I am not interested. See told you, I am a snob. It’s not about the price, don’t get me wrong, it’s just I haven’t found one under $10 I’d happily drink.

Tequila? Well, lets just say Jose is not in my vocabulary and if we invite you over for margaritas, there is no blender involved and likely the name on the bottle is one you cannot pronounce. 100% agave baby or nothing.

Then there is food. I am such a major food snob. I like fresh fresh fresh food. I cannot eat fast food, bleck. Don’t even ask me to stop at any of those places. Subway is about as fast food as I get, even then that is a last resort. I like delis, with all the fresh trimmings and fancy cheeses. I don’t even eat deli meat much, maybe a bit of turkey. I will only eat seafood if it is fresh. Usually that means I need to be near the coast to eat it. I use to really like Red Lobster, but since traveling around the US and having opportunities to eat really fresh seafood, Red Lobster is now only an “if I have to” kind of place. Good thing we live near the Gulf Coast. I love fresh seafood.

We recently just learned what art snobs we really are. As many of you know we recently moved into a house here in Louisiana. We literally had no furniture and nothing to decorated it with, after living in the rv for so long. So we are slowing buying furniture and we really need something for these walls. 12 foot ceilings, with nothing on the walls looks pretty barren. So we have been art shopping. I would love to have some original art of the walls. So we went looking, in New Orleans of course. To be honest, the prices are not terrible in some of the galleries down there, but still way out of our price range. We makes beads and marbles for a living, it’s not like we are rolling in extra dough.

So our next thought was, we will just get some prints for the walls. So we started looking. Nicely framed prints run anywhere from $100 to $300. I just cannot bring myself to spend that kind of money on what is essentially just a poster, when I can get the real thing for $300 to $500. So we didn’t get anything and realized we are snobs. No prints or poster for this girl, she wants the real McCoy.

So what am I to do? Well, shop ebay of course. Have you ever really looked at the self representing artists on ebay? I hadn’t, until now. I can see the appeal for artists selling there. No gallery charges. Just straight to the public. The artist gets to find out right away what sells well, no waiting months for a piece to sell and then waiting for a commission check. But best of all, I found I might actually be able to afford some original paintings. We just bought one on ebay and I am stalking a few others. Here is the one we got. It looks fantastic in my living room.

Perfecting my craft

The topic for Flaming Hot! today is: How do you perfect your craft? Quite simply my answer is practice, practice, practice. Then I have to let it sit and stew for awhile, then I practice, practice, practice some more. It takes me a very long time to process new techniques. I can watch someone do something, then it will sit in my brain, stewing, processing, and working itself out for a good six months before I ever get the will to try it. It’s not that I don’t want to try it, it’s just that my brain has not worked out how best to go about it. I need to wait for the ah ha! moment. Then I have to practice, practice, and practice some more. I think it is safe to say I have never been fast at catching on to new things in glass. Once I get it, I get it, but catching on takes me forever.

It was the same way when I was heavy into sports. I was uncoordinated and clutzy at best. It’s a good thing I am 6 feet tall or else I fear I would not have made my volleyball and basketball teams. Turns out I was pretty good at both, eventually. I am still uncoordinated and clutzy, but can you imagine how bad it would have been if I had not participated in sports?

So back to lampworking. Only once have I ever had an idea that I wanted to try, that I had not done before that turned out really spectacular the first time around. It was from a picture of a dragon on book Eldest. I stared at that picture for a good two weeks, dying to make a bead. For those two weeks the details ran around my head, until finally I just had to make that bead. The next day when I got it out of the kiln is a day I will never forget.

To have kids or not to have kids

No, I am not thinking about having kids. Just wanted to clear that up right away. One of the forums I frequent for lampworkers, recently had a discussion on to have children or not. In particular a woman about my age was asking older women who never had kids what their life ended up to be and if they ever regretted their decision.

It turns out only those people who really wanted kids and ended up not being able to have them, regretted the outcome. Though it wasn’t really their decision to make. What I found interesting about the discussion were the implications made on both sides of the debate.

I have heard many parents say that after having kids they discover this whole new wonderful side of themselves they never knew existed.  That they grow into a much better person and tell all of us with out kids we are missing out on the worlds greatest miracle.

Then there is the other side.  Those of us without children, free to do what we please, go where we want, free of the financial burden of raising a family.   We tend to flaunt our freedom in the face of others, telling them how wonderful our lives are and feel resentful when people tell us we are somehow “missing out”.

The thing is this:  We all make choices.  Life is just life.  The best thing to do is live it to the fullest and not look back and wishing we did things different.  Live for today.

As women I firmly believe we should be supporting each other.  Isn’t it wonderful we have choices in this day and age?  I hope I never make someone feel bad about their choice to have a family.  Family is a wonderful gift.  I feel fortunate that I have a large extended one, with plenty of nieces and nephews to go around.  Just as I hope the women in my life will respect my choice to remain childless.  That doesn’t mean I don’t have love to give.  Quite the contrary.

I hope we someday evolve as a society, so that women with careers are not made to feel bad that they are depriving their family of something, and that women who are stay at home moms are not looked down on for not having the career.  What a double standard we set for ourselves.  The saddest part is that we women do this to each other.

Again it is all about choices.  The choice to not have a family, the choice to have one, and the choice to do it all with a career.  I have the utmost respect for the moms in my life.  I am not sure how they do it all.  I am certain, I wouldn’t handle it nearly as well.

The Princess Bride

What is it about this movie anyway?  This is the one movie that everyone I know likes, accept for me.  I have never liked this movie.  I have tried several times to watch it, searching for whatever I am missing about it, that everyone loves.  Am I missing a humor gene?  Am I not twisted enough?  Maybe I just have a mental block about it.

I remember in high school hearing the title and thinking this movie was a romantic fairy tail, along the lines of Snow White, only not in animation.   I was surprised to find it was a spoof movie.  I keep thinking. maybe it just didn’t meet my expectations the first time around.  I should really try again.

Over the years, I have tried three or four times to watch it.  Greg (my husband) thinks it is hilarious, along with every other person I have ever asked about it.  Unfortunately it just never holds my interest long enough for me to really watch it and give it a full shot.  I feel like there is something seriously wrong with me.   I like twisted movies.  I cracked up watching Napoleon Dynamite,  Strange Brew, American Pie, Austin Powers, and many others.   However, the Princess Bride has eluded me.  Tell me I am not the only person on earth that doesn’t like this movie.

My friends say I’m spolied

Todays topic on Flaming Hot! is preparing your beads for sale.  There is a whole process after a person makes their beads that has to be gone through before a person can sell them.  In my case, they have to be taken off the mandrels, which can be hard on the fingers and hands.  Then they have to be cleaned.  Most bead makers I know clean their beads with a diamond coated bit and a dremel.   This is what we do too.  The next step if it is a set, is to string them up some how.   I string my sets up on craft wire and space them out with seed beads.  Then they have to be photographed, as we sell online pretty much exclusively.

Out of all of those steps, I only string up my beads on the wire.  Greg almost always does the rest of it.   He even dips my mandrels, so they are ready for me when I want to work.  This is quite funny, since he rarely makes beads. He does not need a mandrel to make  a marble.  So if it is a set, I do, do something to prepare it for sale.  If it is a marble or a focal, I wait for Greg to do what he does.

So, I guess what they say is right.  I am spoiled.