Halloween Pendant Disappointment

OK when I said that I ruined 3 of my pendants, I was wrong. More like I ruined 1/3 of them. I almost don't want to even bother photographing them for the oops section. I guess I should, because at least I'll be getting my card out there.

There is one that I did that I think I may have turned from an oops to something cool, but I'm not sure. I'm calling it bloody frightening. The resin dripped off over the side and I colored it red in hopes that it would look like blood. I think it worked out well, but I'm not sure if it is good enough to not be an oops. I know I should post it on etsy and get there opinion, but I just haven't gotten around to it yet. I also have to post my Halloween pendants for sale, I just haven't. No reason but sheer laziness.

The world is conspiring against me

So I made my Halloween pendants last night. I'll be posting them on Handmade Pendants and Crafts when I've taken pictures of them. I ruined at least three of them by getting water into the resin.

I've been wanting to do more lampworking but have been two distracted as of late. I've had a big test that I've been pretending to study for (I was actually surfing the net in a panicky avoidance of study) so I haven't spent much time in the craft room.

Last night I took the evening to watch TV and make my scrabble tile pendants. I showed my husband how to make them too so he could do some designs of his own. As I was cleaning up afterward, in a moment of epic Danie gracefulness, I took a tumble down the stairs. I feel like I should have a huge bruise on my tush and I torqued my hand something good.

So now I can't do my lampworking. You need to have two hands, one to control the glass and one to control the mandrel, if you want to achieve a good bead. I guess it could be done if I twisted my arm into an unnatural position, but my feeling is I'd just be wasting glass on something not worth my effort.

I think I'm going to focus my attention on tiles and coasters for now. I haven't done them in a long time and they are easy to make, even if you are gimped.

A great find!

I'm trying hard to drive traffic to my etsy. I found a really great site walton.communications. I've been enjoying it as a resource. He has put out a really great ebook that is easy to read and full of good information and he has an awesome forum where he answers questions.

I was flattered to see that he used one of my questions for his blog.

So I'm going to make some Halloween pendants in hopes to sell for the season. The thing is I'm out of bails to glue on them. I used all of mine for the pendants I donated to a friend's garage sell. He was trying to raise money for his son's surgery. I hope he sells a lot, but I digress.

I went to the Hobby Lobby to buy some and I stumbled onto a wondrous sight; fuseworks! Glass ready to fuse and inexpensive enough for me to mess it up a few time. I am totally going to come back when I have money. I have to wait because my husband wouldn't let me hook for it.

Working this SEO thing

So I've started to work the SEO campaign and I have to admit it is very overwhelming. I don't think I'll have the results in two weeks, I don't think I'll have it fully up and running in the two weeks. But I'm giving it the ol' college try.

I've started a new blog on wordpress to highlight my work. That doesn't mean I won't highlight my work here to, but the wordpress site is more like my booth babe. It is tarted up to lure people in to see my wares. Or it will be when I get done with it. Right now it is basic and boring.

I'm still excited to start working on my fused glass. I need to buy glass and kiln liner paper to start. I'm selling my car, and if I get what I'm asking for it, I should be able to buy a metric assload of supplies.

I also asked at a farmers marked how I would get a booth for next year. That didn't go well. I think they are sort of like a private club. The people I asked seemed to give me the runaround and the person who finally had answers for me seemed like he was actively trying to discourage me from applying. I don't know, now I think I want to apply out of spite.

Business card challenge

So the business card campaign was a bust. I couldn't find a place to post them. I did donate a bunch of my pendants for a friend's baby's surgery fund and I put business cards in with them, but I don't know how many of them he sold, or if anybody who bought them checked out my site.

I had a campaign going through stumble and it generated a lot of traffic each day, but I wasn't getting any sales. I'm not sure if I'm going to try another ppc advertisement right now.

My next experiment is going to be SEO advertising. Using key words and the like for "search engine optimization". This one is going to be a lot of work, I'm not sure if I should start now or wait until I have passed my tests for school. I should be dedicating my time to study, not business venture. IDK.

I got my kiln working. I bought a new catalytic thermometer for it and I have tested the temps that it goes to. It will get hot enough for annealing. I haven't seen how hot it gets on high, so I don't know if it will get hot enough for fusing, but it got close, so I think it will. I am excited to by glass and start fusing, if I can. I got a laser printer so I can fuse pictures. I have an idea where people send me their little kids drawings in black and white and I fuse them on a pendant. I don't know if that is a good idea or not, but I think it is cute.