Happy Birthday to Me!!!

Well, I'm still 53 minutes away from November 27 - but I can celebrate a tad bit early... right? Etsy has already wished me happy day in both of my shops and many a Facebook friend has sent me nice, warm wishes... and what's this I spy on my porch? A package from my bestest sending me goodies from James Avery?How did she know I just got the new catalog yesterday and was aching for some new James Avery?

My plans for my birthday include Thanksgiving dinner with the family, a few glasses of white wine, and hopefully a good handful of sales on Etsy since I'm having a sale... but we'll see.

I hope everyone in the States has a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Nudge, Nudge

Just a very friendly reminder that I will be participating in the Etsy HolidayFest November 27 - December 1. Both of my shops, IdyllHands and WoolyHands will have free first class shipping - worldwide - during that time and maybe some other special sales over the course of the 4 days.

By Wednesday night, I'll have all of my new items listed so you'll have plenty to shop from.

I'm not the only participate in this sale, there are a plethora of shops joining in and Heather over at HeatherKnitz has organized quite the website for this sale. The website is here: Holiday EtsyFest
You can browse through the different catagories and stock up on handmade items right from home while sitting in your PJs this weekend. No need to get dressed up to go out.

Now, get on over to Etsy (starting tomorrow) and do some shopping!

Ta-Dah!

Some new items showed up in my shop tonight - as promised (maybe just a bit late). I'll be adding even more tomorrow night, and the rest of my new items on Wednesday. IF you're lucky, I might even have a new knit bracelet up before the weekend.

All of this is in preparation for the Holiday Etsy Fest that I am taking place in starting Thursday. Yeah, yeah - I still haven't come up with my sale, but at least I'm making headway on the shop inventory. I have some bracelets and many more necklace laying around, so please check back - they make GREAT Christmas gifts for your friends, loved ones and even yourself!

I've been extremely tired lately and yesterday I woke up with a bit of a pain in my throat. It never fails, come Thanksgiving each year I catch a cold. I'm really hoping this doesn't pan out and it goes away. I swabbed some nasty gel stuff up my nose today (courtesy of Dianna) and supposedly that is miracle gel and I won't get sick. Let's hope not, I've got movies to watch and yarn to spin during my long weekend coming up.

I hope everyone has had a great weekend and great Monday.

Must they tease me?

Over the past year I have collected a handful of prints on Etsy. This one is my favorite:
It is from Lineanongrata.etsy.com. Julia, the artist, also has a wonderful blog here. Well, I was happy and content with my knitting print until I saw this little gem in her shop this morning:Do I really need to buy new prints? I'll wait until Christmas comes and goes. If my family doesn't snatch it up for me, I'll buy it then.

Hello, my name is Erin...

and I'm a Christmas addict.

Those who know me, and know me well, know that I am a sucker for all things Christmas. Oh yes, I'm all for the true meaning of Christmas, being with family, sharing the love, etc - but man, oh man, the things that come in the Christmas package are great too. There are greeting cards, wrapping paper, pretty decorations, stockings, ribbons, music, iconic images (snow, cute main street scenes, etc), and so much more.

Yes, I admit, I fall into the commercialism of it all.

To feed it, I search out wonderful Christmas promotions and deals that all start happening this time of year. I think I've hit the jackpot today. The EtsyGreetings street team is having a huge greeting card giveaway. Go to their blog here and read all about it. Rest assured, I'm signing up for all of them!

Two times a charm?

This little gem sold twice today pushing my sales up to 160 on Etsy (7 for the Orbital design alone). I did a happy dance, but not too much of one. It's late and my body can only handle so much dancing when it's late.

I've been doing a lot of knitting this weekend. My crafting room is still in shambles, but the new floor in that room is down and I should be able to move stuff back in tomorrow night. Then I'll be able to package all of the orders and special gifties (all purchases in November get a free gift) and get those in the mail on Tuesday morning.

I think that is all I have to say tonight. I had plans to update my street team blog too, but I'm not feeling as talkative as I thought I was. Perhaps I'll have more to say tomorrow.

Holiday EtsyFest

The Holiday EtsyFest is an Etsy wide sale on November 27 (my birthday and Thanksgiving) - December 1. There are a TON of Etsy shops participating and I am one of them. I'm still thinking hard about what my sale will be - but rest assured it will be worth your time to come do some shopping then.

And just in time for some promotions for this sale both of my shops were included in the same treasury for the Holiday EtsyFest! I'm flattered. In fact - it included two of my favorite items. It included my Green Goddess Yarn from Woolyhands and my Green Oribtal necklace from Idyllhands. Hoorah!Psst - if you want to be a part of this sale, and you do, go here to read about it: http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5903305
and go here to sign up: http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5903349

Put On Your Red Shoes...

I had to dress up tonight for the Theatre Squared Gala. "Having" to dress up can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. Some people rummage through their closet until they find something, some people wear the same thing they wore to work earlier in the day, I take it as an opportunity for an afternoon of shopping. I shopped at Gap, at NY&CO, at JCPenny (not in the Mommy Jeans section for you old SNL fans) and at... and I'm ashamed to type this... Forever 21. Oh, did I say shopped? I meant that I spent money at those places. I got some stuff here, some stuff there, some shoes at that place, some jewelry at another place.

After trying everything on - again - at home, I decided on a dress I already owned and a new pair of shoes. Amazing how a new pair of shoes is all you need sometimes. Especially when the new pair of shoes are bright red, patent leather. Mmmmm. Delicious.

I'm sure I was the hit of the gala and all the ladies, and some of the men, wished they were me. All because of the shoes. It's okay to be jealous. :)

In all seriousness. I'm a bit disgusted that I bought as much as I did not because of what it cost, but because of how long it's going to take on Sunday to return all that I didn't wear... oh, I'm keeping the wool purse from Gap and the 2nd pair of red shoes. They are darker than the pair in the picture and different enough to make them count as a necessity.

But everything else is going back.

I promise.

Personality

When I first started selling on Etsy I wanted to be very professional and that meant that I thought people needed to take me seriously to accept that I make nice things, good things. Over the past year I've found shops on Etsy that have personalities. Beyond the pictures, beyond the items, heck, beyond the description of the items. There is a personality there. That often comes from the profile.

Before yesterday, my profile was informative and described me as a professional and as an artist or crafter or whatever I am. However, thanks to some BSing that took place with my sister yesterday afternoon, I changed my profile. It's all the truth but not the usual "I'm just a knitting living here doing this, graduating from that, working here...". I tweaked it, gave it personality, gave it some attitude.

I'm quite happy wtih my new profile - you can read it here: READ IT - YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO!

Comfort

Comfort can be a lot of things to a lot of different people. Right now, to me, comfort is knowing that my mom is getting better. Cancer is a long, ugly road, but for now, she's doing well and she's getting stronger. I find a lot of comfort in that.

For the first 7 weeks of this brain cancer ordeal, I found myself eating out a lot. I was constantly exhausted just from thinking about it. It's done the number on my health and energy. This week I decided to change that. I've cooked at home almost every evening since my return from Little Rock. I love cooking, I'm pretty sure I've said that a few times, but for some reason, I had let it go away from me for all of September and most of October. It's back now and with cooking at home I hope comes better health, better nights of sleep, less yawns during the day at work, and better cognitive reasoning (for those who have known me for the past couple of months, you know I've been left staring at you like a deer in the headlights when you ask me something that requires thought).

Tonight I cooked beans... okay, I started them this morning... and cornbread. Yum, comfort food for a comfortable week.

I also made a lot of new items for the upcoming holiday trunk show this week. It's amazing how I've had time to do these things for weeks but thought I didn't have time at all. What a change the surgery in Little Rock has made.

Holiday Trunk Show

I've been busy preparing for a Holiday Trunk Show that I'm participating in on Saturday. A fellow AREtsian, NightSkyProducts, told the street team about the event and I jumped on board. I will be joining a few local artists/crafters for this show. There will be soap, paper goods, jewelry, scarves, massages, food and of course, wine! We'll also have door prizes and I'm offering a free gift to anyone I invite who brings a friend with them.

This will be the perfect opportunity to shop locally for Christmas and support the local economy and some local artists/crafters. If you're around here and want to come, leave a comment here and I'll send you more information.

The items pictured here are some of the new things you'll see at this show. Other items I'll have there are my knit bracelets, necklaces, knit scarves and handspun yarn for those who are crafters.

By the way - THIS rocks my face off.

Happy Election Day

In honor of this very important day, I'm having an Election Day Special in both of my Etsy shops. If you voted in this election - you can get free domestic (US) shipping on all of your purchases today only.

Shop here:
IdyllHands

WoolyHands

Just put "I voted" in the notes to seller and pay as usual. I will refund the amount of shipping.

Knock Knock

Hello? Anyone out there?

Sales have been a bit slow for me on Etsy this week - but then again, I've been a bit MIA from my regular life. I did keep up with things the best I could from Little Rock, but there was no time for crafting there. Perhaps when I'm back to being creative here the good karma will reward me on Etsy.

I did list some new things in my shop today. Oh, and I finished a scarf and started a new one. I'm madly getting ready for a sale on Saturday, November 8. It's a few local artists/crafters and I cannot wait. I'll post more information soon.

I took some time away from everything last night to sit with the Sweet Boy on the couch and watch a scary movie. We watched The Strangers. I'm not sure how much I liked it. It did startle me a few times and it wasn't a bad movie, but I want to know about the killers. I've always been interested in what makes the mean people be, well, mean. I'm not creepy with interest, just normal with interest. The movie ended allowing room for more movies, but still, I just want to know what the bad people were bad. Ah well.

Besides scary movie watching, we decorated the porch and had a big bowl full of candy ready to pass out. However, we got ZERO trick-or-treaters. I don't blame them - with kids getting shot and kidnapped last night, I would not let my kids out of the house either - that is, if I had kids. Is it really that bad out there?

I suppose I should call it a night and head up to bed to snuggle in with a good book.