County City Mouse Blog

I have met so many great and kind people through etsy!! It really is the site I prefer for my shop. There are tons of Canadians on this site too (shout out to all my Canadian friends on etsy)!! Recently another Canadian asked if she could feature my shop on her blog. Of course I am thrilled!!! I love the way she does it. She picks a shop she likes, she actually does an interview ( i think it's a great idea) and then we decide what to feature for a giveaway! It's a much more personal way to feature someone. I don't like to copy people's ideas but this is just a very personal and nice way to feature a shop and help promote someone. I haven't started

featuring other people yet but this is the way I want to try it out.

Please check out her blog - countrycitymouse-pam.blogspot.com. She has a really great blog with lots of friendly followers!!

Be sure to enter the draw for my pumpkin softie!! Here's the link for that:

http://citycountrymouse-pam.blogspot.com/2009/08/mostly-sundays-giveaway.html

Here's a picture of my Pumpkin Pam softie:

Choumie7 from Paris, France

I just had to write about how excited I am to be part of a blog from Paris, France.

I was notified a few days ago that Choumie wanted to put my cute little cupcake softie

on her blog. I'm not sure what time it is in Paris right now but my softie is featured

on her blog. She is a wonderful artist that everyone should check out. She found

me on etsy and she has a shop on etsy!! Check out her shop as well - awesome art!!

Just going to post a pic of my cupcake softie!!!

Thanks again Choumie!!!!

Merci Choumie!!!

Addicted to Forums

Is it just me or is anyone else addicted to the forums on etsy?
I originally went on to see what it was all about on the advice of another etsian.
Before I knew it I was reading and reading and learning a lot about what I had
yet to do on etsy to promote my shop.
At first, I felt it was shameless promotion of my etsy shop but then I realized
that a lot of shop owners were on there and sometimes not saying much.
Other times, they had a lot to say!!
Within no time I came to realize that I could learn a lot from these generous
people. I learned where to advertise outside etsy, which ones were the best and
even my ever favourite, how to advertise on a limited budget.
The other great thing on the forums is positive reinforcement. Whenever I felt
discouraged all I had to do was log onto a forum and I'd find a positive thread to
follow.
At first I was afraid to post a comment. Then I just had to speak up (how odd considering I have a blog). It is fun and informative!!! I've even been so brave as to start a thread myself. I've just started with questions about how etsy works but someday soon I'm going to bust out with a thread that asks for everyone's opinion. Can't wait to come up with something.
How addicted to the forums have you become?

Crafter's Block

We've all heard of writer's block but what about Crafter's Block? For those of us who love to craft, do you ever find you have too many new ideas and only a short block of time?
Thats' when I usually get blocked and just stop doing everything I love.
Do you ever just get overwhelmed with new ideas and can't sort them all out?
For those of us who have online shops I really think that's the time we spend doing our
advertising, chatting with others who enjoy the same activites and generally just avoiding our studios.
Then we have the organizers. I am truly one of those. I wll spend countless hours organizing my supplies, idea folders (not that it helps at the time), invoices, paper work, kid's paper work. I'll do anything but sit down at my desk to start a new project.
I also have an addiction to magazines. I've been told I need some serious help (there is not a support group for this). This is one of the places I get overwhelmed. I'll see a new color scheme that I love or a new technique. This will sidetrack me for days. Magazines offer so many inspiring ideas for crafters - some of them come complete with how to's. How dangerous!!
If anyone else has some of these symptoms or others - please feel free to comment on this blog and let me know your best method of avoiding getting the work done.

I've been doing some redecorating lately. Thought I'd put some vintage looking things on my favourite display cabinet. See the little house - that's my favorite thing. My son made it when he was just a little guy. Now he's in university in Montreal. He'd be so embarassed if he saw I posted it on my blog. But I love it!!! It's my dream home - it just needs to be on a beach at the ocean!!

Happy Canada Day!!!

New tags to sell

Just thought I'd share some photos of some new tags that I've made for etsy and icraft.

I also updated photos and I really like how they turned out. Let me know what you think.