Bring me sand, bring me surf!

The sun sets on the Atlantic!

What's a girl to do when life feels overwhelming?  She goes on vacation.  While it wasn't actually that simple, that's just what I did. My mom has worked for the same company for nearly all my life, and she is sent to fun locations nearly every summer for their national conventions.  This year's conference was in Ft. Lauderdale, FL.  My mom's husband didn't want to frolic in the Florida humidity, so she asked me to join her.  I'll admit, I almost turned down the invitation - I can't sit in one position on a cross-country flight, and I don't do well in extreme humidity....but I figured what the hell. A luxury hotel would be paid for by my mom's company, she offered to buy my ticket since hers was already paid for, and I'd never been to Florida.  The more I thought about it, how could I say no?!  I brought along one of my girlfriends from Arizona (sorry husband!), got my spray-tan on, and we were good to go. 

Boy, am I glad we did.

Jody posing with her tasty beach cocktail.

It was amazing.  Absolutely amazing.  We spent five glorious nights at the Harbor Beach Marriott - a luxury resort sitting on its own private beach.  While it was Florida's rainy season, we were lucky enough to get in some good beach time in the warm Atlantic ocean.  We played on the water taxi, we shopped, we walked miles down the beach picking up neat shells, we enjoyed yummy cocktails in our lounge chairs. I definitely needed the time to relax and worry about nothing except my tan and what I wanted to eat that night for dinner.  I'd been doing a lot of reflection lately, thinking about where I want to go with my professional life.  I had been looking for a different job that could still give me enough PinkyCrafts time, while trying to balance my personal and professional life.  Whew!  That's enough to exhaust anybody.  Just before we left, I had interviewed for a job that sounded fantastic on paper, but I ended up turning it down, and felt a bit re-committed to my current job.  I was able to go on vacation with a much clearer mind, although that doesn't mean I was excited to come back!  That's the funny thing about problems - they're always waiting for you when you get back.

An afternoon storm kicked us off the beach.

However, there is something to possibly look forward to.  I brought one of my scrapbook magazines on the airplane with me, and I flipped by this one advertisement twice before I realized what it was trying to sell me on: a Royal Caribbean Scrapbooking Cruise.  Yes, that's right.  There are CRUISES for SCRAPBOOKERS.  It's like a crop on steroids. How did I not know about this?!  It's true - just check out all of the options on Cruise & Crop.  As if a plain ole' cruise isn't enough amazingness, throw in unlimited scrapbooking, classes and goodie bags?  Count me in! Unfortunately, most of them leave from the east coast, but with enough advance notice, I could definitely see myself saving for one of these and having a fabulous time.  There are even a few that depart from Ft. Lauderdale, and I'd love to go back.



It sounds too good to be true, but I think a scrapbook cruise is definitely in my future!  Perhaps not my near future, but my future nonetheless!  Just thinking about it relaxes me...maybe I should think nothing of it until I make it happen :)

Giveaway Alert: If its free, its for me!

One of my many Halloween page creations!

Before I get to business, I have something very important to announce.  I think the Swiffer 360 Duster is amazing.  There, I said it.  I've never felt the need to spend money on those cleaning products that I thought were just invented to make money for cleaning product companies, but this is one that is *completely* worth it!  It doesn't just move the dust around, it really gives you instant gratification - a clean surface with little effort.  I'm in love.

Ok, now its down to business!  I wanted to let everybody know about this fantastic giveaway that I'm participating in over at Domesticated Delight.  I'm giving away a custom designed Halloween scrapbook page to one lucky winner - it could be YOU!  Before you dismiss this giveaway, consider this: scrapbook pages aren't just for scrapbookers.  You can pick up a very inexpensive scrapbook page frame at your local craft store, and you'll have instant personalized art.  Do you have family members who can't make it to see your little ones trick-or-treat this year?  Stick your snapshots onto the custom page for them, and it will be their favorite gift this year. 

Its very easy and there are several easy ways to gain entries, so click here to head on over to check out the feature that Johnna, the delight behind Domesticated Delight, wrote about me and the shop.  While you're there, check out her other postings - she's got fantastic recipes and info.  I heart her blog! 

I'm afraid I can't write anything further - I'm too blissed out in my clean house (thanks to my duster magic)  with my pumpkin spice candles and "Gilmore Girls" on TV :)   Have a fantastic Sunday!

New, New, New!

Junior Scrapbook Album for Baby

I've just added a new line of "Junior" scrapbook albums to the shop as an affordable alternative to full-length albums.  Its important to me to have products available at different price points, because everybody deserves to celebrate life regardless of their financial situation, and traditional scrapbooks aren't exactly affordable.  I do make paper scrapbook albums, which are much more affordable, but they're also not true scrapbooks.  The Junior Scrapbook is the answer - an actual scrapbook album containing 10 fully embellished pages! With half the pages of a traditional scrapbook, they also cost half as much. Most of the cost of a handmade scrapbook album comes from the time it takes to create one. I wish I could offer albums at an even lower cost, but then I'd have to compromise quality, and I just can't do that! I'm really excited to bring this new product to my customers in time for the holidays, as they'd make great gifts for aunts, uncles or Grandparents. 

As of this writing, I've only listed the premade album pictured above, but I'm working on more. I can also create a custom Junior Scrapbook album for any celebration or event!  I hope this affordable alternative means more people can bring the joy of scrapbooking into their lives (wow, that was cheesy!).

New item news

Whew! I just spent all weekend in Arizona, cramming a week of seeing friends and family into 48 hours. I'm exhausted. I did hand out a lot of business cards, so that was a positive for the shop. I also used the plane rides to draw up plans for my new line of party supplies, which I am very excited about. I'm trying to think of a better generalization than "party favors" or "party supplies", since I think of noisemakers and themed paper plates when I think of that term, but I nothing has struck me yet. Maybe "paper party goods"? Hmm....I'll have to do more extensive researching with Google's keywords tool.

I will be developing party favor tags, cupcake toppers, and other fun party goodies to go along with my already-offered gift tags and such.

If you haven't stopped by the shop lately, please take a moment to check it out: http://www.pinkycrafts.etsy.com.

Evolution

I'm jealous of my Etsy scrapbooking buyers. Why? Because their scrapbooks will look so much better than my original works! I recently made several wedding-themed pages, like this one, and I found myself thinking back to my own wedding scrapbook. It was the first scrapbook I had ever made - big mistake. I wouldn't recommend choosing your wedding as your very first scrapbook subject. Most of my scrapbook friends were scared to do their wedding books even after they'd had years of experience! Not me; I couldn't wait to get started. Only now can I appreciate the style that comes with practice and experience. My wedding album is a hillarious mish-mash of random pages that didn't go together, is over-stuffed with very cheesy wedding stickers that aren't even my style, and has no journaling or personal sentiments.

Clearly, my style has evolved. There's nothing wrong with my wedding scrapbook, but some pages do make me wince. I've often thought about doing it over again, about taking one of my Etsy pages for myself, but I know I'll never do it. That was my style at the time, and it can always be useful as a "before" example! I'll leave the elegant wedding scrapbooking to my customers, and hope they post pictures of their finished works for me to drool over.

Attention Crafters!

I'm looking for other craft bloggers to network with - trade badges, blog about each other's shops, retweet each other's deals on Twitter, etc. We need to stick together! If you're interested in any type of networking, please send me an email at mishelle.mccall@gmail.com.

I Heart Google Analytics!

I have something new in my life, I hope my husband doesn't mind. It's called Google Analytics, and it's absolutely amazing (but then most of what Google does is amazing). This site has the ability to track how many visitors your page has had, where they're coming from - down to the city, how long they stayed on your site, how many were brand new visitors, which site (if any) they were referred by.....the sheer volume of useful information is mindblowing! If you're interested in which internet brower your customers are using, Google Analytics will tell you that too.

If you have a website, even if you only have an Etsy site, you must sign up! Its under "web analytics" on the left side of your "My Etsy" page. If you're not an Etsy user, but have a webpage, sign up here: http://www.google.com/analytics/

I've told you what it can do, let me tell you what it did for me. For example, I know that yesterday I had 89 unique visitors to my site, up from 67 the day before. I know that the majority of my visitors were from the US, followed by Canada, for a total of 17 countries. I could even see that the leading city my visitors were coming from is Corvallis, which is close to where I live. This tells me that either my mom has handed out my business cards like she said she would, or that marketing myself at the Jamba Juice (as blogged about below) has actually worked. I don't think that those people were just random visitors.

Perhaps one of the most useful stats is knowing how these shoppers found my site. About half of my traffic is direct, meaning they found Etsy on their own, without clicking a link or searchig. I am getting 25-35% of my traffic from Google, which I found interesting. It will even tell you what search terms the shoppers used that ended up clicking on your site. When I enter that information, I don't find myself, at least not in the first several pages. I've spent a TON of time on Search Engine Optimization in the last week, but its too soon for Google to reflect those changes. At least I know I'm still getting some search engine traffic. I can also see when my craigslist.org ads are working - I had four clicks from the ad I posted yesterday. Despite my Twitter addiction, I only had two shoppers that came from Twitter yesterday.

All in all, this information is extremely helpful. I can target my marketing towards certain demographics, I can see which tactics are working. I'm an information-loving gal, so I'm totally in love with Google Analytics. Sign up and you will soon be in love with it too.

Go On Girl - Get Out There!

Working from home, I really enjoy that I don't have to leave the house every single day. Some people might find this strange, but there's something so freeing about waking up and staying in your PJs all day, without having to put makeup on or do your hair. I don't do this everyday, but I do enjoy that I can do it some days.

Today was not one of those days; I was on a mission. I wanted to see if I could find the second book in the "86 Bloomberg Place" series at a local used bookstore, I wanted to see what deals I could score with my 20% off Total Purchase coupon at Michaels, and I wanted to take my first stab at promoting my business off-line. I struck out at the bookstore, which was a bummer. Michaels was also somewhat of a bummer. Nothing was already on sale, making 20% off Total Purchase coupon pretty useless. I did find some new die cuts templates on clearance (not elligible for the coupon) so all was not lost, but my outing was pretty disapointing.

Then the husband and I decided to stop by Jamba Juice, where I noticed a community bulletin board. They had a couple ads for local plays and businesses - I could totally post a business card there! A little disclaimer told me I needed management approval to post anything, so I mustered up my courage and asked to speak to the manager. He came out, I explained who I was and what I sold, and he gave me permission to leave a business card on the board! I was psyched, my first off-line advertising venue. I intend to carry my cards with me now at all times, just waiting to come across another wonderful bulletin board like the one at Jamba Juice.

Here I am...my new Etsy shop!

I always said I wouldn't start blogging again, but here I am! I guess I just can't stay away :)

PinkyCrafts on Etsy (http://www.pinkycrafts.etsy.com/) has been live for nearly a month. Its been a huge learning experience for me. Its a good thing that I'm unemployed (or is it..hmm...) because it's nearly been a full-time job for me. Between making new products, photographing and re-photographing my items, and promoting the heck out of them - whew! I will say that it has been fun! I didn't have huge expectations for this shop, I just wanted to finally do something I loved and try to make a little spending cash out of it. I reason with myself that I can spend so much time doing this right now so that when I'm fully employed again, I won't have to spend my life doing it since I will have done such a good job getting it started.

The sales fairy hasn't visiting me often this month, but at least she has visited, and that's something to be thankful for. All in all, I'm really glad that the products I make, the products that I've already been making and gifting for years, can bring joy to somebody else. I love it!