Some of My Favorite Blogs Week 4

This is one of my all time favorite Blogs!!!

How fun is this?!?!?!? This would make an awesome patio set!

All Things Thrifty!!!


Brooke is amazing! All of her ideas are awesome! I am especially in LOVE with the glazing technique she does. She has so many awesome projects but today I am only talking about the glazing.  I am saving the others for another day! lol




You must check out her BLOG!!!! 
So the glazing technique is my favorite HERE is a link directly to her glazing 101 page! 
 Or HERE for for her glazing FAQ! 

 All I am waiting for is to find a great deal on some bedroom furniture so I can try this glazing technique!!!
Here is sneak peek at some other stuff Brooke does!  

Some of My Favorite Blogs

Did You Miss Last Week???  

It was all about inspiration featuring The Shine Project and A Place to Bark!

This week it is all about some adorable blogs with cute tutorials! 

First up is Kim over at Oh,Sweet Joy! Her blog is full of awesome fashion finds, awesome tutorials and and totally cute shop!

 This are just a few of the cute items you will find in her shop!

How about these awesome tutorials!!!

Be sure to stop by her blog and check it all out, you wont wanna miss it!!!

 Next up is Oh, So Antsy, I actually discovered Oh, So Antsy from Oh, Sweet Joy. Oh, So Antsy has an unique and adorable shop. She hand makes each piece. Check out below to see what I am talking about!

 I am an Oregon girl! I was born in Southern Oregon and have lived here most of my life.

I spent a few years living with my dad, right by Yosemite National Park. So my heart has a special place for California too!

Now do you see what I am talking about, how cute is her stuff! She does lots and lots more and custom orders. Check out all her work and you will see exactly what I am talking about the possibilities are endless! I totally need of a few of these!


 Hope you enjoyed this weeks favorites, be sure to check back next week for more favorites!

Some of My Favorite Blogs Pt. 2

This week I am going to talk about more of my favorite blogs, but this week it is all about the inspirational blogs I love to read!

The Shine Project!

Ashley over at The Shine Project is amazing!  This is one of my favorite quotes she wrote talking about her life. "If you're in too much of a rush to enjoy the small moments that matter, at the end of the day you're left with a bunch of meaningless events." LOVE IT!  If you are not familiar with The Shine Project, head over there right now and help Ashley make a difference! 
 Here is a small taste of what Ashley does.  The Shine Project is a non-profit organization that raises money for inner city high school students, while getting them involved in service in their community.

                                                    Here is how I found out I could help!


                    The CHANGE4CHANGE campaign.  All money collected will help inner city high school students afford their first year of college. Pledge to throw your leftover change in a jar until you've collected $100, and it will be put directly into The Shine Project Scholarship Fund.If you are interested in having a Change for Change jar, email Ashley at Ashley.TheShineProject@gmail.com

She has a video on her page that really shows you even the smallest act of kindness can make a difference in someone's life!  Watch it HERE! 

How cool would it be to do something like this in your community?!?!? I think it needs to happen!  Please go to her blog and help in anyway you can!

This next blog is about animal rescue. I feel so strongly about supporting Animal Rescues! 

A Place to Bark

A Place to Bark is a private No Kill Shelter. They work with both Animal Control and the Humane Societies. They get animals from high kill shelters, foster them, work with them, rehabilitate them, and then work with the humane society to adopt the animals out. It is a wonderful thing! Be sure to go to there website and read all about it. Hopefully it will inspire you like it has me. 

In our local paper this week, it had an article about the local Animal Control Supervisor getting laid off due to "budget cuts". It talked about how the Shelter was once funded  around $300,000.00 a year to run and then it got cut to $75,000.00. and now this year they say there will be ZERO funding! How sad it is that, to think about the animals that will now suffer because of a humans mistake. 

  I have always had a dream to open my own shelter, I just had no idea where to start. So now thanks to reading this blog. I know exactly where I am going to start. 1 animal at a time! 

 A Place To Bark is a temporary home, a foster facility that provides quarantine, full vet care, rehab & training to help adoptable animals further in the adoption process. All animals rescued are spay/neutered to reduce the future population & by saving existing lives, their program encompasses all vital actions needed to benefit the pets in need.


Check out their facebook page and website.


See what you can do to help. Or Donate to your local shelter. Here is a link to Rogue Valley Humane Society.
Give what you can to help a local dog in need! 

Some of My Favorite Blogs Pt. 1

This last week I FINALLY signed up for a Pinterest account! I am controlling myself so I don't get addicted! I have found many things that are really cool and I would love to try to make. So we will see how that goes! I also started P90x! I think I am going to die! I started it with my husband and now I have decided that I need something more geared for women so I ordered The PINK Method! I will keep you up to date as I go!

                     Anyways why I am really here is because, as I spend sometime looking at friends and other bloggers shops I have totally fallen in love with a few to say the least. Here are some of my favorite items from my favorite shops. . . yes I do own most of the stuff in these pictures but some are still on my wish list! Here we go!

Here is ONE of my MANY favorites of Heather's Just.Lovely.Things

 Now I failed to mention I own at least 20 different beautiful ruffled flower headbands and clips!! I absolutely love them!!!

A friend of mine Alex, over at Alexandra Rose made my boys some super cute matching blankets, and I have a really adorable clutch! 

 BTW I am sponsoring over on her adorable blog! On her blog you will find everything from totally awesome tutorials, to totally adorable pictures of her cute little family, to shop updates! If you haven't checked out her blog you really should!

Now isn't this the cutest little clutch ever!

Check out her store here!

I am also sponsoring over at Sew Chatty   Elizabeth, has an adorable little family and adorable shop! 

Here are some of my favorite things!

Now I love Fallon's blog over at Silly Beautiful Life! She has an adorable shop also. These are my favorite earrings! I also had the pleasure of sharing a booth with her at a little Indies Crafters Market, and I am going to say it. . . she needs to get on it and post more stuff from the market! lol The stuff was so cute!!! Everything from beaded headbands, to anklets, to earrings to necklaces! 

This next shop is one I totally stumbled upon while looking for a make-up bag. Well I found one and it is the prettiest print! LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!!! Check out these and more over at Sew There's an Idea

I fell in love with these!  Be sure to check out her Etsy store and Facebook! Tell her I sent you!!!



These are a few of the MANY things I am in love with! Be sure to follow my blog and check back next week, when I talk about some of the most inspirational blogs!

Holiday Bazaars and Shop Update!

 A Very Interesting Weekend!!!

              This weekend was my First Holiday Bazaar, and well lets say I am chalking it up as a lesson learned. I am not giving up on Holiday bazaars but I am going to be more selective in the bazaars I choose. Lets start at the beginning, so first  when I called the man "in charge" he was very hard to get a hold of and terrible at returning phone calls. (yes I know RED flag). When we finally got in touch he really grilled me and asked a ton of questions about what I was making. I thought okay he really wants to be selective as to who is at the bazaar. He also told me that he asks what each vendor makes so there are not any duplicates. After the long phone call I thought well I have nothing to loose I will set up shop. I was excited, nervous, anxious. I didn't know how much stuff to make, or how I was going to set up my booth display. So Saturday morning came and I went to the bazaar an hour before it started and set up and got all giddy and was ready to greet customers. Slowly other vendors trickled in and were setting up there booths and as I looked around I realized. . . . . wait this is not what I had expected.  There were  4 purse ladies(you know the one who buy knockoffs and then sell them), 2 Mary Kay reps, a lady selling tons of sheets. Now don't get me wrong there is nothing wrong with selling that kind of stuff I just kinda, sorta expected it to be more handmade crafts, since it was called the Holiday CRAFT Bazaar. After seeing that I really kinda thought, man this guy fooled me.  SO with all that negative I decided well I need to make this positive.  I took notes on how I would display things better.

Like making my display easy to navigate with prices marked

Making a place for me to stand behind my table so I am easy to approach and talk to.

Engaging with people as they walk by and bringing them to my table.

I also took note of  what questions I would ask when looking into a bazaar.

Do they advertised? 

What other kind of booths would be there? Handmade or not?

Asking there return rate (how many booths come back each year?) 

There is much more but that will come in another post.

      The good news is I did break even. So it didn't cost me anything but my time to be there, I even made enough to pay for the items I purchased for my display.  That was awesome.  I also met this totally awesome lady named Brooke she is the face behind SharpCouture. Her stuff is AMAZING! She also has a Facebook page. She sells totally awesome burlesque costumes and masks, totally adorable sock banks, feather earrings (she even dyes the feathers herself). EVERYTHING IS AMAZING!  Be sure to check it out and tell her I sent you!!!!

        Well with lessons learned, breaking even and meeting new people in the handmade world, it wasn't to bad of a weekend!  If you have a good or bad experience that you think the rest of us can learn from! Link up to my blog!!!
     
           Next weekend I will be at the Indie Crafters Market at Gates Home Furnishing in Grants Pass. Be sure to check it out!!



 Oh almost forgot there will be a huge shop update this evening and tomorrow!!!! So excited!!!!

From Acute Designs: Let's talk about pricing!

 This came from Acute Designs and it is an amazingly awesome post! This is a must read for everyone, if you are a handmade business, this is valuable knowledge. If you are a lover and shopper of handmade goods, then this gives you an insight into what we think when we price our items! 

 

 

Let's talk about pricing

{image via here}

Yesterday, I took part in a GroopDealz deal and it didn't go over too well....


I am not sure if it was my product, the cost, or the mood of their customers.  Either way, it was a good experience and I plan on trying it again, but with a different strategy.


The headbands I chose to discount are super cute and the materials are very inexpensive.  The down side is that they take more time to make than some of my other products.


I was asked to go lower than my $9 price but I need to make a profit, so I kept it at $9.  Also, there was a comment made by a potential customer that "they are not worth $9."  


I am not offended by this comment - everyone has their own opinions and people choose to spend their money in different ways.  


What irritates me is that SO many in the handmade community devalue their products.  They price them just to cover their costs + a little more....thinking this is a positive selling strategy.  And in turn, they are breeding the idea that handmade products are not worthy of a higher price tag.

We are addicted to cheap goods and a handmade business owner cannot compete on price.

We all know that you can buy a flower headband at a big-box store for $5 or less.  If you want to spend less than $5 go buy one at a big-box store.  If you want something handmade, it going to cost a little more.


Why does it cost more? 

Because I pay myself a living wage.  

The people that manufacture the items at big-box stores are not always paid a living wage.  Also, these stores are able to keep their prices low because of the sheer volume of products they sell.


When I price my products, I consider materials, shipping materials, website fees, how long it takes me to make the product, how long I spend photographing, editing, and promoting the product, marketing costs, and a profit.


I also sell wholesale, so my wholesale price needs to be about half of my retail price and I still need to cover all of the above + make a profit.

{image via here}

If you own a handmade business and are not doing all of these things, you are selling yourself and your company short.  


If you just want to make a little extra money here and there and don't mind selling your products for far less than they are worth, that's fine, it is your choice.  But those of you who are trying to make a living need to make sure your products are priced to reflect all that went into each design.


People who buy handmade don't buy because it is the cheapest available.  


They buy handmade because they want to support local or small businesses, they like how each item is unique, they like the story of the artisan making the items...and so much more.


Handmade products cannot and never will be able to compete on price with a big-box store.  But they can blow these stores out of the water in almost every other way.

Value yourself and your products.  The right customer will pay what the product is worth.