Crocheted Hat and My Zazzle Line

Thanksgiving was wonderful but it's time to get back to work. I'm designing more address labels on Zazzle.


make custom gifts at Zazzle
Here is some of what I have for sale there.

On Thanksgiving I showed my boyfriend's mom the hats I was crocheting hoping she'd pick one for her Christmas present. Well, she got pretty excited about the pink one. She wore that a bit and then I continued working on one with a lavender hat band. As I added more colors she kept saying, "I really like those color combinations.' So finally I asked her if she'd rather have that one. So I worked on it while dinner was cooking and then more after dinner, and managed to finish it for her just in time before we had to leave to drive back home.  I hope it will keep her head nice and warm when she goes to watch her grandson's games.

Striped hat.

Joyce enjoying her new hat.

Zazzle Address Labels

I just got off the phone with Zazzle because the balance they emailed me does not equal the balance my account page shows. I've had a discrepancy with them for most of the year. At least I'm making some sales there. The nice man on the phone tried to explain to me that the discrepancy is caused by royalties on foreign sales.

Earlier today I did design some new address labels and put them up for sale. http://www.zazzle.com/rose_labels-106061030023476026 If it weren't the day before Thanksgiving I'd try to design more. For one thing, I need to bake an apple pie and make some mincemeat cookies to take to the Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow down in Southern CA. Cooking happens!

And I have to make a library run. In short, today is going to be full. We'll see if I can squeeze some more designing into Zazzle if possible. What got me motivated was looking for return address labels on Vista Print. After scrolling through hundreds of designs, I thought I'd be more satisfied designing some myself. I'm supposed to be an artist after all.

Acrylic Floral Painting by Fayme Harper ©2011

Knitting and Zazzling

Good morning my lovlies,

I just updated my knitting blog here. I picked up one more shade of green yarn for the Imbolc garland. I wanted to get gold too, but the local market's selection is pitiful. I was going to knit at the laundromat but ended up writing my Zazzle postcards instead. I added new stuff to my Zazzle shop. I really like that they have Bicycle playing cards now that you can customize. Here I am in my Zazzle t-shirt.

Zazzle T-shirt

Today I had a glorious day alone. I did a lot of scribble drawings. You start out with a scribble and turn it into something else. Too fun. I also got to order a t-shirt and some postcards I designed on Zazzle. It's a bit too expensive but I just did it anyway, because I'm tired of pinching pennies all the time.This is the design I made for my t-shirt.

Need an Unusual Business Card?

http://www.zazzle.com/loving_couple-240619411349861345 Designing business cards this morning. I've been meaning to do this for a long time but it kept getting pushed aside by more pressing matters.

Marketing Crafts

It's 7 AM and probably too early for me to be hashing out marketing strategies, but I think I should start putting an hour a day exclusively into marketing. Things like listing new items on Etsy, Zazzle, Cafe Press, Bonanza, and Zibbet. I've really let that fall by the wayside.  I'm like many artists in that I'd rather paint, sew, shop for supplies or research new crafts than I would writing ad copy and trying to steer buyers in my direction. I do market things on Facebook and Twitter, but I don't really see much profit in that. Of the millions of things people could possibly buy why would they buy from me in particular? And hard sell never works. People just get annoyed and annoyed people don't buy things from the person that's annoying them.

Gourds, Needle Punch and Rose Stickers

Today I had a to-do list as long as my arm so I didn't get to work on crafts much. First thing in the morning I dyed 2 gourds with the little felt cubes.  One is Sienna and the other Berry. We got the dyes at the Welburn Gourd Farm. 

With Valentine's Day coming up I've been working on a bunny holding a heart done in needle punch. I got most of it done last night and then had no time to work on it tonight. We went out to dinner for my boyfriend's birthday. Now it's just after midnight and my eyes are way too tired to be working with a sharp needle. You definitely don't want to plunge one of those into your hand.

This weekend I have creative events both days so tomorrow will be about packing and getting organized.

Oh and I just made my second sale ever on Zazzle. I sold some rose stickers!

Dragonfly Needle Punch by Fayme Harper

Year of the Rabbit

The Asian New Year is in February and it's going to be the Year of the Rabbit. I'm so excited I've already started posting rabbit stuff on my Zazzle zazzle.com/Personalizeme*. In fact in the last 3 days I added a lot of new images including a deer tie, a Year of the Rabbit mug, and some beautiful items with pink camellias on them. I hope you will take a look. I love seeing my art on products. I get such a rush from it. I think the deer on the postage stamp is going to look great once it gets through their approval system. Most items get approved right away, but the postage stamps are stricter, for obvious reasons.

My First Doggy Shirt

Today was rough. I had to avoid the chatrooms because everywhere I went someone was yelling Merry Christmas in my face.  So I spent a lot of time on Zazzle posting new items. It took my mind off the insane holiday revelers. http://www.zazzle.com/i_love_my_furkid_dog_shirt-155476578344806500  This is my first item for a dog. I'm slowly getting the hang of Zazzle.  Lots of buttons to push.

I also finished a hat on the knitting loom today. I just hope it fits the kid I made it for as I don't actually know her.  I did it as a favor. If it doesn't fit I'll make her another one though.

On this special night may you have the freedom to follow whatever spiritual path you choose without others hitting you over the head with their beliefs.

1000 ACEO's

I've decided to make 1000 A.C.E.O.'s. It's good to have goals. And I found they are useful for putting on Zazzle on things like greeting cards, stickers, postcards and t-shirts, so even if I never sell one on Etsy it doesn't matter. I've started a Flickr set for my ACEO's, in case anyone wants to see how I'm doing. http://www.flickr.com/photos/almostfamous/sets/72157625493475629/

My friend just sold five paintings on another art site. I need to ask her which one it is, because I didn't think to bookmark it last night. I have one of her paintings. Before she became better known I bought it at a sale she had. Now her paintings go for $300 and up.

That is one advantage in doing fine art, as opposed to selling crocheted washcloths or tie dyed t-shirts.  A painting can one day jump from being worth $50, to $500 to $5000, where a washcloth will only be worth less and less as it wears out.

Crocheting and Zazzle

I just finished a tutorial on how to crochet around a metal circle. And I have the clips already of tomorrow's tutorial on how to make a mobile. I just ran out of time to link them all together.

Once I got that out of the way I worked on my Japanese Cord Braiding. I'm almost done with one I made in the Caidan colors. I just can't remember WHY I made one in the colors of Caid. What was I going to do with it?

I was hoping to work on my new leather quiver today, but wasn't feeling all that great. Leatherwork isn't the most forgiving medium, so it's not something I want to work on when I'm not feeling 100%.

Tonight I got some new items added to my Zazzle shop. And I'd even give you the link if I wasn't so tired. My Zazzle shop is called PersonalizeMe. I added some new postcard and postage stamp designs.

http://www.zazzle.com/striped_rose_postcarfd_postcard-239341760563770490

I'm Amused

 

My new Zazzle icon buttons look like this.

Today I bought some animal crackers. I was in a chatroom and I mentioned to a man who is in China that I was feeding my inner child. Then he asked if I was pregnant. At first I thought he had confused me with my daughter, who is in fact pregnant, but how could he have known that.  Then I realized he didn't realize that 'feeding my inner child' was a metaphor. Something had definitely gotten lost in the translation.

I spent most of the last day and a half making two crochet tutorials. I'm glad to have that out of the way. My old computer isn't helping. It refuses to move things to CD's so I can free up memory to make more videos. It is fighting me tooth and nail. In fact it took over an hour and a half to save my new movie to the computer. Why so long? It used to take 30 minutes. By the time I got my second video in, the editor was long gone for the day. The work week was over.  I won't hear anything now until Monday.

What I really wanted to be doing was playing on Zazzle. Today I figured out how to make categories and add custom icons for each one. That was a lot of fun. I figure if I put in an hour a day on Zazzle, I'll soon have a very nice selection of merchandise.

It's already after midnight. One of my friends is moving back east and tomorrow is a big yard sale at her house. I'm supposed to be there at 7 AM. I don't think I'm going to make it.

Zazzling Up a Storm Here

A lot of chatters on Etsy seem to love my creations but don't want to spend $20 or more. So I'm having a blast putting photos of my crafts on buttons and mugs and other things over on Zazzle this morning. So maybe if they can't afford the sock monkey, they can at least afford the photo of my sock monkey on a keychain, right? Or on a postage stamp or hat. I can't wait to see more of my art up on Zazzle. I feel almost famous.

Zazzle Take Two

make custom gifts at Zazzle
I made a Zazzle shop years ago and never did anything with it. Then someone told me tonight that she makes more on Zazzle than Etsy, so I thought I'd take another stab at it. I used to be on Cafe Press but at the time I didn't know how to handle computer graphics that well.  My friend said she gave up on Cafe Press after some changes in their terms of service took some of  the rights away from the artist.  I'm not sure exactly what she means, but I thought I'd try Zazzle again.

So my first item is a Redheel Sock monkey on a greeting card. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.