Featured!

Yesterday I was featured on Pretty Deserving. Well, actually my magnolia earrings were featured. See? Look how pretty that is.

It is a lovely review/feature. I especially like the part about "feeling like Angelina". Who wouldn't want to feel like Angelina?!

Check it out. I really don't think I could've asked for better press. Now I'm off to fill orders so everyone gets their stuff before Christmas.

Blog Banners, Selling Online and Marketing Ideas

If you are just starting selling online or are a blogger, then read this post. While it is geared more towards Etsy sellers, others will find some of the tidbits mentioned very enlightening.

First, I have had the honor to work with Nicole from Dust Baby fame. You may also recognize her alter ego Party Boutique from Twitter and from Mom Fuse. Mom Fuse is a great forum/blog site for moms to find other blogs, giveaways, or just converse. Anyway, back to Nicole. Her etsy shop has lots of banners. She has premade ones, and she will also custom make banners to your specification for your blog, etsy shop, buttons, or whatever. Best of all, they're only $5. Yeah. I know. Great price. Definitely check her out if you are wanting to spruce up for the holidays or in the mood for a new look. She is terrific to work with.

This next review is mostly centered towards Etsy sellers, but as I was reading the guide, I realized that several of the ideas could be geared towards anyone who is starting to sell online. So, don't turn me off now. The Guru is a former Etsy seller turned marketer that has come back to help. She has several lovely help guides in her shop such as the Etsy.com Guide, Jewelry Shop Success, and a Complete Etsy Marketing Package. I personally reviewed the Etsy.com Guide and 44 Etsy.com Marketing Ideas. The Guide I would highly recommend to any newbies on Etsy or online selling. Here are some of the topics touched on: 18 ways to drive people to your shop, promoting your shop, writing eye catching titles, and what you need to know about pricing and shipping. The guide is well written with lots of examples so you will not have a problem reading through this. But at the price she sells it for, it wouldn't hurt to have it as a slight refresher especially if you have problems with your tagline or tags or most importantly pricing.

Now the 44 marketing ideas really could be used by bloggers, Etsy shop owners of all statures, and other online sellers. Now the bloggers and other sellers may not use all the tips, but most of them can be used outside of Etsy anywhere on the web. Although there is one in particular I am not so fond of, but this is my personal opinion. I'm not going to give away her secrets, but let's just say there are a few I'm going to try both here and in my shop. Heck for $4.44(cute, huh?) it's worth a shot if you're looking for some low cost ways to market. Oh, and this just happens to come free with the guide.

Okay. That's enough reviewing for today. I'll be back on Monday with a little get to know me post about my family and our wild and wacky ways. Meanwhile don't forget to check out my giveaway.

Free Software

Today is free software day. We could all use a little free something once and a while. And, why spend hundreds of dollars on software when you get something equally nice for nothing?

I discovered this company a couple of years ago. One of their programs came as an extra in a book I purchased. I googled them and found a few other programs they offered. Serif is the company. I find their software easy to use, their directions easy to follow, and the price is right up my alley. You might think at first this software is only for business types, but it's not.

PhotoPlus 6 is a great photo editing program. For business people, you can create those little buttons for advertising, banners, and avatars. It's how I made my banner for this blog. On the personal side, you can rotate, add text, or add effects. There is an upgrade to this program for $10. With the upgrade, you can remove backgrounds, resize your photos easily, add 3d effects. This is a nice substitute to Photoshop if you can't afford it or you don't really need to do everything Photoshop does.

Then there is PagePlus. I love this program. I use it to create my business cards, and I'm working on fliers/postcards now. For businesses, I think this is one of those must have programs if you don't have one like this. The business cards it creates are stunning. There are so many templates you can use and alter, and that goes for everything. For the mom, you can create your own greeting cards, birthday party invitations, birthday banners. You can easily import your own pictures to personalize anything you're working on. And, once again, the directions are easy to follow.

Now here are two programs that you might not readily use, but your kids might. In fact, I'm getting ready to install them on my artist daughter's computer. She will love them. The first is DrawPlus. This free program enables you to make animations, room layouts, family trees. With a $10 upgrade, you can trace your own photos and make them editable drawings to transform into art. Then there is 3dplus, an amazing program to make 3d graphics. Kids would love this to enhance their school projects like science fair projects, book reports, or just about anything. If they are into art, they would love it just to play with.

Just so you know, I am not getting paid or anything like that to tell you about these programs. I just think these programs are fabulous. I use mine all the time for one thing or another. With Christmas coming, some of these would make lovely inexpensive gifts or create inexpensive gifts straight from the heart. I hope you enjoy them, and if you download them, let me know what you think or contact me if you have any questions.

My Soap Addiction

I love anything to do with baths. No, that's wrong. I'm Addicted to bath products. From soaps to bath pillows, bath bombs and bath fizzies. I think I became so addicted because the only me time I get is bath time when the house is quiet and everyone has gone to bed.

I recently ran across Magic Hands Workshop on Etsy. It's such a lovely shop with her trademark being a hand on her soaps. She has so many wonderful sounding products that it was hard to make a decision, but I decided to try her Queen of the Nile soap and a matching bath bomb.

The wait was excrutiating. Sheer agony, I'm telling you. But, of course, when it arrived, I decided to jump right in the bath after the inmates had gone to bed.

Her bath bombs are huge. Literally, half the size of a baseball. In fact, I decided to cut it in half so I wouldn't have to argue with my daughter who is obsessed with bath bombs. This is a true bath fizzie. You can see it working as soon as you put it in the water. You can feel it working on your skin as well. Plus, it's like aromatherapy. It filled the air and water with a lovely jasmine scent as that's the flavor I chose. And, it didn't leave the tub all slippery. The soap is equally lovely. It lathered nicely and made my skin feel so clean without drying it out. The scent was heavenly without being overpowering.

I want to try some of her body polish, body butter, a sea salt soap, her Isis soap, and a gardenia bath bomb. Maybe not at all one time though. She even carries samples of her body polish and butter if you want to try some scents out or if you just don't have a lot of money to spend.

Jackie is a dream so head on over to her shop and check her out. We all deserve a little luxury and me time once in a while. Let her know I sent you.

Mineral Makeup

Today is all about mineral makeup.

I recently purchased a makeup kit from mineralmakeup on etsy. It's all a part of my plan to make myself feel better about the way I look. I haven't worn makeup since I was pregnant with K. I used to wear it all the time. Plus, I've come to realize that I'm at that age where I can't get away with not wearing makeup. My biggest problem was the colors I needed. My complexion is only good with certain colors and not many at that.

So, I convo'd mineralmakeup to see if she could help me when I made my purchase. I even sent her a pic so she could have a better clue of my coloring. She was very sweet and very kind. I even ordered some of her brushes which are fabulous. She sent me several colors that I love and some samples of other colors that I'm loving just as much.

What's so great about mineralmakeup you ask? Well, I can't give you the rundown of all the benefits of it cause I don't know really. I only really know my experience with it. First, it's supposed to be better for your skin that ordinary makeup. It is super easy to apply. Even after all these years, it only took me about 10 minutes to apply everything from the concealer to the mineral veil. It totally felt like I didn't have any makeup on at all. Not like when you buy store brand, and have that heavy feeling all over your face. The best part was that I only had the slightest hint of wearing makeup. The rest just smoothed out my lines and complexion, and you couldn't tell I had it on.

If you were thinking of trying mineral makeup, I say go for it. Go talk to mineralmakeup over on etsy, and she can get you all set up with what you'll need. Every now and then she does a Saturday Night Special which helps. For those of you not in the know, it's a forum thread on etsy at 5pm EST on Saturdays with lots of shop specials. She also has lots of great samples.

Creative Block

Once again, I am getting absolutely nothing done. I am having severe creative block. I completely blame this on the fact that my wire order just got here. I am in awe of all the possibilities of things I could create, and yet, I can't get those ideas out. This is why I should not do bulk orders.

Check this out: Glass Artists Blog. Isn't that an amazing review?! Dee from Willow Glass did an amazing job writing about both myself and my job. In fact, the earrings pictured are created with some of Dee's glass cabs.

Today is the day they are supposed to announce the winners of the Upcycle Contest on Etsy. I am all nervous and jerky even though I know I have no chance of winning. I want to win, and I wish they would hurry up with the announcement so I can get on with my life.