Let the construction begin.

Well my 27th birthday was yesterday, it was pretty fun. Really one of the most uneventful birthdays in the history of tina. I had to work (at my real job) I work at a little tiny boutique called baby cakes in La Canada. We (me and my invisible boss Shannon) make custom bedding and other random baby related items. I call her invisible because when i am at Baby Cakes she is at her other little shop in Calabasas, so when im there i pretty much run the joint. Its the ideal job for someone like me. Anyways....

The next 6 weeks of my life are going to be INSANE. I need a full time employee. Is that crazy or what? well, let me rephrase that, what i really need is a personal assistant. (one can dream right?) seriously though. in the next few days i will begin construction on an 8 foot tall giant giant giant giant sequoia for the green market installation. This needs to be completed within 3 weeks. Then after i make it through that whole thing, i then need to somehow complete another installation that needs to ship out by the 25th to be installed at the Burrito Gallery in Jacksonville, Fl. on the 4th of november. Somehow i know it will work out, but at this point i have no idea how. there is plenty going on after that, but i dont want to think about it right now, my brain will implode.

So wish me luck!!!! ill be documenting the construction of mr. giant giant giant giant sequoia here on my blog. Should be interesting. I think a good question would be, what does one do with a 8 foot stuffed giant sequoia after the installation? ha, i guess we will find out!

Anyone want to be my personal assistant? :)
Seriously

Keychains!!! YAY!

Alrighty. so i decided we were going to do the giveaway drawing old school style. i wrote everyone's user name on a little piece of paper and folded it up real tiny like and put them all in a hat. (i thought i would be more exciting for hazel this way.)
she was definitely excited, she really didn't want to stop at two, but i had to draw the line somewhere.
the two names she pulled out were.......

1.Jessi
2.Tara

I have emailed our lovely winners, and i have to say i think its karma that hazel pulled Jessi's name out of the hat. I bought a doll from her a few months back for hazel. Her name is Agnes and she has to be the cutest doll ever. Hazel and I love her so much.
Here is a picture of Agnes. You really need to stop by her blog and Etsy shop. so cute.
simplijessi.etsy
simplijessi bloggy blog




I will definitely be doing more giveaways, so check back! who knows what it will be next time. Thanks to everyone who participated :)

A Story.

So. (Giveaway going on below, dont miss it :)
Let me just say, i think i have some really good karma or something. Ive talked about how awesome the featured sellerdom was and how things have just kinda been going my way. bla bla bla
Yesterday morning i finally got caught up on my big rush of orders, i have only a few left to go that were placed after the rush.

Upon realizing that i was almost caught up, i started to think, after i get all this done, whats next? what do i do now? my etsy shop isnt getting any action because my pricing is so high now. wah wah wah, mini freakout, you know what i mean.
About an hour or so later i get a phone call from this lovely lady i met back in may at a festival i was vending at. She had come into my booth a few times and said that she worked with designers in LA and she could help me get started, and that she really loved my stuff. I thought that was cool, but ive learned to never ever ever believe people that say they are going to do this and that for me, bla bla bla.

So i didnt hear from her for quite a few months, when she finally called me last month she invited me to participate in a wholesale green market in downtown LA that cost roughly $4000 a booth. Of course i told her i cant afford that, MAYBE next year. psh.
ANYWAY. she called me yesterday and said that they had decided to give me a booth for free, in exchange for an art installation. WHAT?! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?
So let me get this straight, not only are you giving me a booth, but your putting me in the spotlight!? SWEET.

let me give you a little back round on these so called markets. Markets, particularly in downtown LA, go on for and where from 3 days to a week. basically, retailers from all over the country fly in to come to these markets to shop for their inventory.
This particular market is a"green" market. AWESOME.

The universe continues to love me....... Amazing

Giveaway!!!

Oh heck why not. Every one has given me so much love i should give some back. I will be giving away two hi tree keychains.
You know how it goes, Post a comment (with you email address) in this post and on Saturday i will randomly choose two lovely people to receive these little dudes. Better yet ill have hazel pick, since she cant read and all.

I apologize for being a bad bad blogger. Im still playing catch up with all my orders. im almost done!

Holy Guacamole.

Sorry this isn't a post about my top secret guacamole recipe. that for another day :)
This has been one awesome week. Featured Sellerdom (yeah i know its not a word, but im making it one right now) has been beyond words. I got a lot of love, here on my blog and through etsy convos. I cant even express how wonderful it has been.

Im staying up late every night to get these orders out. AND i finally scored my first wholesale order. woohoo. Its about time!

I just want to say that my top priority was to respond to ever convo i received. I dont think i missed any one, but if i did, i apologize, but certainly read ever single one. I had a lot of really interesting questions and i thought it would be kinda fun to answer them publicly.
like, what kind of sewing machine do you use?

Personally i like this question, because my sewing machine is a total sleeper. You might never have known it was so awesome if i never told you. Her name it betsy, i have had her for 3 years this christmas. I have beat the living daylight out of her. All us craft people know what felt does to a sewing machine. Its just not good, at all.
Are you ready for the shocker......

Betsy came form Target. Yup. Target. ill say it again Target. Forget spending $1000 on a bernina (ok yeah they are great) but not everyone can drop a G on a sewing machine. Betsy cost a mer $300. She is computerized and does 300 stitches including 3 different fonts. yup. So what is she you ask? She is a Euro-Pro Shark Intelli-Sew. Cheeeeeeesy name i know, but she rocks it.

So thats all from me right now, i need to get back to betsy. Lots of sewing to do.
Ill elaborate further on the other interesting questions i got in my next post.
meanwhile, heres betsy. (and my new laptop, my first mac, im in love)

Holllllllla World!

Hello everyone! the hits on my blog today are off the charts! Etsy is having issues uploading my pictures to the featured seller article so i figured ill go ahead and put them here. Ya know, their "working on it".
Thank you every one for all of your kind words and for all the love i am getting. its awesome!!!!!

WOW!!! what a week

So i have a story to tell, these past few weeks have been crazy!
last week i posted the announcement on my etsy page about my price hike taking place on the first. Let me just say WOAH! the response was incredible! I have been flooded with orders and i am still working as fast as i can to get them all out. What an amazing little trip that was.
So anyway monday the 1st rolled around and the time had come. I felt very uneasy about the price hike, as i have been all along, but even more so because i haven't actually had any wholesale orders yet. that was the whole point! But i set that deadline for myself in hopes it would push me to a new level and so i had to stick with it.
So at midnight i went into my shop and reluctantly started changing all my prices..........
Tuesday i went to work and felt a little down, thinking to myself, gee i wonder when ill even open my order book again. A few hours pass and i get this text message from my email service that said "Etsy conversation from adam B" and im thinking gee thats weird there aren't too many dudes on etsy, i wonder if it is someone interested in wholesale. sweet. so i log into etsy and what do i see?.......????????


THIS:

by adam
Hi,

I think your work is fresh, and I would like to make you Featured Seller on Monday, September 8. Please answer the following questions, prepare your store as you see fit, and send me one or two images of you in your workspace by Friday afternoon (September 5).

We will put your interview up around 1:00 pm (NY Time).

Please let me know that you are interested with a quick convo.

Thanks and Congratulations,

Adam

1. Tell us a bit about yourself (name, location, affiliations, personal stuff).
2. Apart from creating things, what do you do?
3. What first made you want to become an artist?
4. Please describe your creative process (how, when, materials, etc).
5. What handmade possession do you most cherish?
6. Name your top five books, movies, songs/musical groups, and websites (besides Etsy).
7. What advice would you give to artists who are new to Etsy?
8. What are your favorite features on Etsy? What new features would you like to see?
9. How do you promote your work?
10. In ten years I'd like to be...


WHAAAATTTTTT!????

END OF STORY.... UNBELIEVABLE