The Good The Bad and The Ugly...

The crazy world of Christmas craft fairs has arrived and I have not only attended and survived my first one but to my great relief my jewellery flew off my table and into the wonderful hands of the craft fair attendees.

In my short experience of craft fairs its very quickly become clear that as much as people love a good craft fair, they can be very hit and miss for the sellers, which got me thinking is it a hit for some because they sell items the public really want or because its the right demographic or both??? and is it a miss because the items are totally wrong for the demographic or maybe location.

On Saturday I was in a hotel on the main road in the function room at the front of the hotel and as people walked in I was in their direct line with all that glitters and sparkles and I really do believe that my location was almost perfect and my sales told me pretty much the same thing. On speaking to a friend of mine who was at the same craft fair but in a location where it was off the main road in a building I had never noticed until the day of the fair. I found her day had been very very different to mine and she understandably and quite rightly so was unhappy and her sales reflected her location too.

Going further into the realms of craft fairs I find with my jewellery it is my key way of selling where the customer can pick up touch try on my jewellery to see how it looks but as I meet more and more people I find that the opinion of craft fairs is very split and more than a few feel they are not worth the effort you have to put in.

So I guess Im wondering is the bubble of craft fairs for sellers like myself on the verge of bursting??

Stick twist or leave it alone...

So the realms of reality aka my gruesome twosome children have taken up all my spare time the last week or so ( I'm laughing at "spare time" I'm not even sure I remember what that is) but with a twist of fate I have today off my part time job so making is the name of the game!

In the wee small hours I have been looking at what I have made and how to maybe put a twist on an old favourite.. The spiral bracelet.

It is a beautiful weave very simple yet both eye catching and elegant a piece which is will sparkle on any evening out but still adds that something for everyday wear. Would adding Swarovski or Preciosa crystal enhance or detract from what is one of my favourite pieces ???

Holidays are coming Holidays are coming

Okay so I guess by now you have worked out my blogs aren't going be the same as the others. My titles will be slightly off the cuff there will be jewellery blogs and oh heck what a day I have had and probably more on my learning curves which to be fair are pretty massive :) .

So today I haven't made anything but after collecting my fixed car I took myself and the boys off to St Andrews and ended up in Carnoustie, looking for driftwood to add to my pictures. Being by the sea is the best place for me and we went looking for seaglass ( and found some) and I managed to regroup and get the creative juices flowing and have had a few ideas for what comes next.

 

( Sky over Carnoustie at 6pm )

For now though I was to promote my glasses chain the perfect Christmas gift for the person who is always say " now where are my glasses " and grandmas, grannys aunts mums. Its made with Bright Aluminimum and Anodised Aluminimum, the main weave is Byzantine and that is broken up with Mobius knots which can come in most colours and are the bargin price of £6 and free postage and packaging :) and because its made from aluminimum its very light too.

Perfect Present even if I do say so myself :)

To Blog or not to Blog

So this is something that has been beyond me for well every since I hear about blogging but after spending 2 solid days of getting the jist of social media it is definately to blog!

I have been in business for six months and social media has been the big elephant in the room ( and yes I really mean huge) so two days ago I decided that I really needed to get a grip of it all.
 I had naively thought that my internet sales would just appear once people saw my jewellery but after a few months of changing my pictures networking through just facebook I realised this was not going to be the case. So I tentatively stuck my toe into the what I thought was the murky world of social media and to be quite honest decided it wasn't for me.

Then I discovered Pintrest with a photograph completely unrelated to jewellery but of the beautiful Fairy Pools in Skye. So I asked to join and have slowly got the idea of how you pin and get repinned, so I decided maybe social media needed another chance.
So here I am two days in and first thing is Social media can swallow you up hours can pass without you even noticing the retweets the hashtags the mentions remembering to thank people for the mentions the followes..I could feel myself getting lost then I found tweetdeck and I regained not just hours but my sanity and now I think I can say I finally have the hang of it all.

Or so I thought!

After reading many many pages of advice and information I soon realised I had one more learning curve to tackle.... writing my own Blog and keeping it up. I have done half hearted attempts and now need to get it sorted. So for today its reading blogs as many as I can to get an idea of what it is people want to read I'm hoping this is a good point to start.

Jooles

So here I go

Ok so people keep talking about blogging and so I have delved into its realms and actually  for my interest of chainmail jewellery there are some amazing blogs out there to read.
So I have set mine up with no clue as to where this new path will take me hmmm where to begin?

Well I am a scots lass firstly but don't hold that against me :P and I have 2 gorgeous boys who definately keep me on my toes. I am developing my new passion of chainmail jewellery and so far its been a massive learning curve not just at learning the weaves but on the business side of things too. Safe to say I'm still in the woods (its a little dark) and thinking I have wandered into the land of complete confusion but I will persevere.
A wise person aka my mum gave me a solid piece of advice when I was considering taking the leap into this unknown state of self employed, she said make sure you are doing it for the passion of what you create and not the money.. and she is right!! As much as you need money to put in funny how when you subconsciously ask for things.. things begin to happen.. talking of which these chainmail flowers arent gonna make themselves :) will write more soon xx