Check this out! http://www.artofcraft.net

I signed up for this after a fellow Etsyan (qbranchltd) offered free advertising. It's a brand new site, so it's basically an experiment to see how much new traffic is generated by having my Etsy banner and an item (my Raspberry Wave bracelet) featured.

It sure would be nice if Etsy had the capability to add counters so we could all see the traffic to our shops and see where the traffic originated!

Little cards and envelopes are all over my house. I love making these things, and I have a bazillion ideas for them.

These newest ones were created from my warped sense of humor (that would be the fly, which I just thought would be funny on a card) and from my love of fonts.

These Fly in the Grass cards and envelopes are in my Etsy shop:

And so are these... fun little Thank You cards. This set is all in pink, with Thank You written in a different font on each of the 20 cards. They're also offered in blue, green, yellow, and lavendar. Cool, eh?

The yard's looking better. It should, with all the work that's been done out there over the past couple of days. My husband's uncle, who doesn't have a house of his own any more, said that he missed doing yardwork and volunteered to help with ours. Little did he know...

Thinking that we might be able to get some mulch down to help keep the weeds to a more manageable level, 15 cubic yards of the stuff were dumped in our driveway. Sadly, we spent so much time pruning bushes and trees and eliminating even more of them, that we never managed to get around to spreading any of the mulch.

Two full days of work in the yard... that equals at least 20 bushes eliminated (which also included digging out the roots), 25 trees and/or shrubs pruned, a big pile of perennials dug up for future transplantation, and a lot of weeds pulled.

The result so far? Take a look at that pile of debris. For reference, the fence is 8' tall...

Whew!

I bought a PIF on Etsy from FooberryIncense (http://FooberryIncense.etsy.com), and it's great!

Okay, what's a PIF? PIF stands for 'Pay It Forward,' and on Etsy it means that the item being bought is free to the purchaser. Some people ask to be paid for the cost of shipping, but most of the items are free. The buyer of a PIF is expected to do something nice -- in other words, pay it forward -- in return for the freebie. Kind of like what went on in the Hayley Joel Osment movie of the same name... Instant karma.

So I bought this PIF, which was listed with this title: PIF - Full-Color Promotional Brochure Pamphlet Ad Space - YOUR ETSY BANNER AD DISPLAYED - Brochures will be Distributed WORLDWIDE. And a couple of days later I received an email from Julie (Fooberry herself) with copies of the brochure. Awesome!

By the way, I know from past experience that FooberryIncense's incense smells wonderful, so if you're browsing around on Etsy and decide you need something to make your house or office smell really nice, check her out!

I'm enthralled with Enthral. I haven't previously featured other Etsy artists on this blog, although I have a list of favorites on Etsy that's over 30 pages long (I have very varied tastes and like a lot of stuff!).

But today I saw this necklace that Enthral had made from an old earring. It's the coolest use of something that might have otherwise wound up in the trash! I love being able to recycle and reuse things, and I'm always astounded at the creativity of people who come up with ideas that give something old a new life.

So you wanna see the necklace? Check it out, along with the process used to make it, here: http://enthral-enthral.blogspot.com/2007/05/buy-recycled-jewelry.html

I'm featured on another blog!

Well, at least something I made is featured. There was a post in the Etsy forums (the Street Teams section) about reusing, recycling, etc., and I posted there. After I posted, Bombus (http://bombus.etsy.com) added my little Lotsa Alphabets envelopes, created from a recycled graphics catalog, to the blog: http://re-craft.blogspot.com Go check it out! It's a great blog showing off all kinds of things made from repurposed items.

And then someone bought the set of envelopes that was featured!

Never fear. I have more.

:-)

Our garage is a sight, a pitiful mess.
What are we gonna do?
We have to pack and put it away.
It's a big job for just us two.

But we made the mess, so it's only right
that we be the ones to clear.
I don't know exactly, but I'll hazard a guess
that this might take us a year.

There are tools out there, all kinds of them,
for building and yardwork and such.
There are way more tools than anyone needs,
and some have never been touched.

My husband located a box full of things
he'd purchased many years ago.
He thought he'd use them for something or other,
but did he? Well, no.

There's a drum full of rakes and brooms and shovels,
and there are boxes full of screws and nails.
And in one corner there's a great big pile
of containers, buckets, bags, and pails.

So why are we trying to clean out this mess?
Why don't we just leave it be?
Because, you see, we want to move soon
to the state of Tennessee.

And we need to clean up the house and garage,
not to mention the plants in the yard.
We just never thought it would take this long
or be this dadgoned hard!

We're packrats, you see, and what that means
is that we never throw anything out.
We always think we can use it some day,
but I'm beginning to have my doubts.

I think we need one of those TV shows
like 'Clean Sweep' or 'Mission Organization'
to come and help us get rid of this stuff
so we can take a vacation!

But no, we'll just do it all by ourselves.
We'll be strong, and we won't delay.
We'll toss out the stuff that's broken and bent,
and the rest we'll sell on eBay.

Wish us luck.

Lime Green and Lavendar Plaid. I love the way this bracelet turned out, although creating the plaid with no pre-planned pattern (that's pretty alliterative!) was a pain. hee hee. Several rows had to be removed and rewoven because I realized too late that I had forgotten to change a color.

I'm pretty happy with it. The colors are soooooooooo cool.

:-)

Custer Art Fair... It's looming. June 16 and 17. I hear the sound of the music from 'Jaws' in my head as the date gets closer and closer.

So I'm making lots of things to take to the art fair. Chicagoland envelopes with notecards. Magnet sets. Artwork. Jewelry. All kinds of fun things!

In addition to getting things ready to sell there, I have to figure out how I'm going to display them all! That's a project unto itself, as I don't have readymade jewelry displays, shelves, or much of anything. I'll have to scrounge around in the garage to come up with some creative ways of showing off everything I'm spending all this time making.

It's really nice that I'm going to be at the art fair with someone else. At least I'll have someone to talk to all day, although I hope we're both so busy selling our artwork that we don't have time for chatting! Laura's a hoot to talk to (that's Laura, who sells under the moniker 'artonthehoof'), so I'm really looking forward to the weekend.

tick tock tick tock tick tock...