This morning I received a convo from one of the Etsy admins which said my Fleurs de Mai bracelet had been selected as one of 48 (!) in Kaboodle's Pop 10 Etsy Floral Jewelry - in which one lucky voter would get a $100 Paypal gift certificate. Well, of course the item with the most votes would also get some promotional publicity. How very clever of them.


Anyways *whispers* I am, sadly, a realist who thinks it's highly unlikely that I would even make the top 10 (especially not when they chose a not-so-striking photo for the display), but for what it's worth, do help out, hop over and bump up my vote count a little, eh? You'd need to be a Kaboodle member to vote, but I think you can skip all that and sign in with Facebook if you're on there too.



This bracelet was one of only two pieces made, featuring vintage pale pink acrylic roses and vintage cream-ivory 3-petal glass flowers, combined with the juiciest grapefruit pink rhodochrosite rondelles. All on deeply oxidised sterling silver. Oh and there are matching earrings in store too.

Haven't done a giveaway for some time, so when I was asked to join the December giveaway on Or so she says..., I agreed immediately.

My contribution is the pearl solitaire Macrocosm necklace, one of my favourites for its nature-inspired simplicity:


To participate, simply leave a comment on the blog. For additional chances to win, you can post updates on your own blog, Facebook, or Tweet about this giveaway AND/OR become a follower of Or so she says... on Google or Twitter.

Giveaway closes Saturday, Dec 12th at midnight (US time) and winners will be announced the following day. Good luck :)

So apparently a treasury my (recently rephotographed) Princesse Bracelet in (I think?) made it to Etsy's front page last night when I was already dead to the world. I went to look for it today but couldn't find it. What I did find was a couple of other gorgeous ones! I am SO chuffed that I will now spam this post with the aforementioned treasuries. Thank you lunadog and noblegnome!

So I thought I'd share a few things featuring some of my new jewellery. Two new treasuries popped up yesterday, curated by lovely fellow jewellery artists in the UK - visit them quickly, as they'll be expiring on Thursday :)

This Next please! is by Jo of gemheaven. If you are shockingly unaware of her existence, please check out her shop for gorgeous organic pieces. And I'm so coveting her lampwork bracelets at her other Etsy shop!



Nature Inspired is by Hannah of Kutuu Jewellery. Hannah is really a multi-talented crafter and her own jewellery is impeccable! I love her new textured Blossom collection, and she is one of the few who makes stuff for guys :)



There are also a few blog mentions:
- Etsy Collection: Labradorite at What Fresh Hell
- Etsy French Noir at Jacqleen Bleu
- The Moon's Clear Light at Moods and Appetites

A big shoutout to Sydnei from Simply Sentimental, who has kindly featured our lampwork Rosette earrings on her Thursday Treasures! She's also included loads of other pink handmade Etsy finds in honour of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so do check out her blog which also happens to be chock full of artist spotlights and great giveaways :)

I was contacted by Liz at Wickedly Chic in May (!!) for a feature. Well, it's finally up now and you can find it in the Fresh and Chic section. I am pretty amused that she also found my earlier rant hilarious enough to want to publish it in the Guest Quarters. Oh dear :P I wonder if everyone will now think I'm a misanthropic bitch LOL.

PS. And don't forget, free registered shipping for everything in the Etsy shop is still on, till 20th September!

Trunkt. "The Premier Directory of Creative Entrepreneurs"... basically an online portfolio site where it seems jewellery is the hardest category to get accepted into. There's always so much talk on Etsy forums about rejection, it just makes me curious to know what the big deal is.

Since launching my new shop, I've been determined to be more thick-skinned about self-promotion. I want exposure! No publicity is bad publicity! Who cares if I get rejected, I'll just give it a try and see what happens... so I did that yesterday and received an email this morning saying I got in. It's quite surprising because there are already so many great jewellery artists there with kinda similar styles, as well as rejected applicants whose work is just as gorgeous. I feel a large part of it has to do with photography and presentation... but of course I won't nom teh hand that feez me :P

Right now, I'm not very sure what it all means and am still figuring my way around in there so I have only 3 items up. The premium portfolio fees are steep as a one-time cost but compared to a few months of banner ads, are still pretty reasonable.

Stay tuned.

Before I forget, this morning I received a convo from a fellow Etsian informing me that she'd featured me on her blog. Meet Carnival, "the Craver's Candy Company"! Tammy's shop is not only a gourmet's delight, it's literally a feast for the eyes.

Anyway, back to the Carnival blog. Tammy's latest post is a fashion feature, where she's put together 6 different consisting of clothes, shoes and accessories from Etsy sellers. Here are my Nightsky Earrings in her "Brunch in the City" outfit:


But don't stop there. Her blog may be relatively new, but you can already see the thought and effort that has gone into making it varied and interesting. Stay tuned :)

OK, this comes a day late because I was too tired to blog yesterday but my Pleiades earrings, one of my all-time favourites, have been selected to be on Capitola Girl's blog Saturday Sparkle feature this week :)


Check out the rest of the article here.

This was a pleasant surprise! This morning, just an hour or so after I discovered my Neopod earrings in gallerialinda's treasury, the entire treasury list made it to Etsy's front page! It's a pod-themed list. This motif has proved quite popular amongst jewellery crafters and visual artists, and there are many interesting interpretations of it on Etsy. Well, it's been changed this evening to a really cute dachschund treasury - which also caught my eye this morning - but I'm grateful to have had the exposure because I've amassed more than 400 hearts now.

I have been busy creating these past two days, well, yesterday more than today. And, not as productively as I would've liked. This afternoon, I tried oxidising some pieces but to my unspeakable frustration and disappointment, they would not turn a consistent black no matter how many times I washed to rid them of grease and soaked in LoS solution (I've made 3 fresh brews already). I see dark brown patches here and there. Will have to check in a while to see how the latest round fared. Maybe after several openings in this high humidity (I do store it with some moisture absorbers, but no idea whether it helps), my tub of LoS has decomposed or something. The solution, which used to be bright transparent yellow, is now slightly cloudy and the lump of LoS doesn't fully dissolve. BAAAAAH.

Just a short note to say that the latest Crafted With Love newsletter, which I helped with writing, was sent yesterday evening, along with an interview with me on their new blog :) It was strange to write about myself though.

In other news, I have finally managed to reinstate my pierced ears! The right one was OK, but I knew the left needed a bit of work. I'd tried several weeks ago and drew a little blood. I had them done when I was about 6 (obviously, I had no say in the matter) but stopped wearing earrings about 10-12 years ago. I'm pretty paranoid about them snagging on clothes or towels. I was ecstatic that I'd be able to wear all the pretty earrings I've been admiring, but I realised that on most days, I'm either working at home or going to yoga classes. And I hate wearing any kind of jewellery during a yoga practice. Is my euphoria short-lived? O.o

I'm on Indie Quarter today!!! :D

http://www.indiequarter.com/blog/2007/06/29/beakee

My Aqueous earrings made it to Etsy's front page today! Well, the 21st of June that is. All thanks to knots who created a pretty treasury with moody blue goodies! I was about to go out for my yoga class when I discovered it. My first time! Eeeeeeeeeeeeeek! (well if you go and check it now the page is different of course, because the admins change it frequently)

New hearts and views have been phenomenal, and I made a few sales. AND the sparkly Absinthe earrings that were just listed this evening will be travelling to their new home in Lithuania - how cool is that!

I'm going to have to go to the post office tomorrow morning but I'll also have to spend the rest of the day creating new pretties. The shop is relatively depleted and I have a Showcase coming up next week. Thank goodness I have a ton of new beads to play with. My precioussss...

At Crafted With Love, you can find various goodies contributed by indie crafters, with sales proceeds going to (no-kill: very important!) animal shelter groups. And CWL is currently working with Action For Singapore Dogs.

I've contributed 4 items, 2 of which have been created specially for CWL:

Check these out along with other handcrafted accessories at Crafted With Love!

I have so many things to blog about, emails to write, and it's nearly half-past midnight and I'm sitting here with a towel over my wet hair. (Yeah, ignore the original timestamp on this post. That's how long this window has been open with me not doing anything. I went to watch Heroes over dinner, came back, yapped with WG, went to shower, came back, yapped some more, surfed a bit...)

Where do I start... OK I think first I'll admit that the real reason for me not wanting to leave the house of late is the fact that Vesuvius and Etna are having a tea party on my chin. No idea when they'll be done. The sweltering heat is also killing me to the point where I find it futile to shower. What an absurd paradox.

I had a pretty pleasant surprise this morning as I discovered that Jen, the author of Pretty/Modest, has featured me on her blog. It's a very nice writeup and I think I may have blushed while reading it. Her philosophy on colour [...as creatures that are largely visual, we appreciate colour even when we don't want it screaming at us, "Yes! I am green! GREEN in all my glory! Just look at me!"] is precisely what I suppose I subconsciously am doing. I love muted colours; somehow they are closer to those found in nature and are easier on the eye. Maybe it's also because I don't like attracting attention to myself. There are also lots of other indie artist finds on her blog... kudos to her for being able to sniff them out!

I'm also having my Showcase spot today, and as of this moment, I have finally reached the 50-items-sold mark! Yeah, it doesn't sound like much, but to me, it's a big personal milestone.

Received some great new beads as well... apatite, peridot, amethyst and rock crystal. Plenty of sparkly goodness. Can't wait to play with them.

Aaaand I finally managed to collect my bundle of handmade (by Etsy crafters, natch) soaps from Everett's office! They smell so good, I'm torn between wanting to use them and wanting to keep them to cherish the smell... more on this tomorrow. Mmmmm.

OK a few hours, actually.

In my post-Maple stupor last night, I went on to Etsy to see how my latest treasury list was doing. Lo and behold, it had made the homepage!!! And I'd been oblivious all along. Hahahaha...

I'd only created it in the morning, and it's a gloomy-gus page full of grey items to match the leaden afternoon skies.

Made it a point to select artists with wonderful work that truly deserved more exposure, instead of the usual suspects and items that make regular rounds in the treasury. Several items sold quickly, got replaced by the alternates I'd selected, and even some of those sold out (that hoodie belonged to the previous list --->). Someone even got her first sale! I'm so happy for them!

Gawd... I hope I'm not turning into a treasury maniac...

Anyway here's my original list: