No Stone Unstrung is Live at Etsy

I launched my new Etsy store, No Stone Unstrung, on New Year's Eve. The new store will feature my jewelry.



 My old store, Essential Adornment, is now a destash store.  I'll be posting beads, fibers, and fabric from my stash.



I haven't sold anything yet from the new store but I listed 4 sets of yarn in the old store and sold them immediately. Yipee! Guess I'll be taking photos of more of my yarn today.

Canton Marketplace

I have a store on Etsy, Essential Adornment. I don't spend a lot of time on it, so I haven't had a lot of sales. Recently we started an Etsy team made up of people in the northeast region of Texas. This is morphing into Netsy art/craft guild. I'm really excited because we've opened a booth at the Canton Marketplace in Canton Texas.


Martha, of Menagerie Studio, and I will be anchoring the booth and every month during First Monday we will share the booth with two other members. Last weekend (April First Monday) was our first weekend.


Here's the booth just after we put a fresh coat of paint, with some displays that will be living at the booth.




Here's a couple of shots of the booth in action. The right side of the photos was cut off in blogger so click on them to see the full shot. We still have some decorating to do and things to tweak. We need to get a sign. The layout may well change from month to month as our stock changes with different members coming in.






We also are taking items on consignment, three or four or so from various members. April had items from Billye of Silvermoon Studio and Katie of KatherineKouture. Here's some detail shots showing how things were displayed.



Front of the booth. l to r: wire mannequin with pink resin necklace by Billye, rose necklace by Menagerie Studio; large mannequin: yellow necklace by KatherineKouture, cross necklace by Menagerie Studio; tall wire mannequin: necklace by me; front: large cross by Menagerie Studio.



l to r: necklace by me (No Stone Unstrung), Treasure Box earrings by me, necklace by Silvermoon Studio, charms (in tray) by Martha of Menagerie Studio.



Charms by Menagerie Studio and earrings and necklace by KatherineKouture.



l to r: pink necklace by Silvermoon Studio with pendant by Menagerie Studio, bracelets by KatherineKouture, earrings and large coral necklace by me, necklace by KatherineKouture.

We didn't have a lot of sales in April, but we made money. Things should pick up, especially since the Canton Marketplace is improving their signage and a winery is moving into the building in June.

For those who don't know, Canton Texas is like one big market every first Monday weekend of the month. It started with antiques, and now you can get pretty much anything you want. The Canton Market Place is just one of the many, many buildings in operation, and there are also people who set up in outdoor tents and canopies. Unlike the rest of Canton, our building is air conditioned and open until 8 pm. This should be a real advantage come summer and in rainy weather.

Posting at Etsy

Wow, it's been a long time since I posted on this blog.

Lately I've been experimenting with the jewelry showcases on Etsy. In November I bought a showcase spot and did notice more traffic to my store, Essential Adornment. I also made a sale. I did another showcase for December. No sales, but again increased traffic and some more people favorited the store. For the second showcase I managed to get more items posted. I'll try again after the new year.

Here are a few items I've posted recently, plus the dragonfly bracelet above:



blackstone cross




pearl and hilltribe silver earrings

Swarovski crystal earrings

My First Sale at Etsy-Essential Adornment

I had my first sale at my Etsy store Essential Adornment recently! Now I need to get to work and get more listings up.

I sold these earrings:

The North East Texas Team

A little while back I met with Martha of Menagerie Studio and we talked about getting an Etsy team going for our corner of Texas. Our goals for a team include promoting our Etsy stores, and promoting ourselves and Etsy to the local community, and raising awareness of handmade items . Greenville, and this region (outside of Dallas) have few good opportunities for artisans to show their creations.

We got busy and started contacting other Etsy vendors and today our Team was officially recognized by Etsy. So say hello to the NEtexasTeam. I just checked the search link and so far Martha is the only one who has added the Team tag to her listings, but I'm sure everyone else will do so soon. We're just getting started and have a blog N E Texas Team. I'll be adding team blog rolls to both this blog and the team blog.

Remember, shop handmade.

My Etsy Banner

A while back I blogged about tutorials on blog and Etsy banners and headers. Yesterday I finally took a few minutes to work on one. It's not the best in the world, but it didn't take a really long time either. I suspect that it will be like my business cards, which have a photo that changes all the time.

The background is from one of the sunset photos that I took last week. I solarized it so that the colors were more green. You can still see the electrical lines that ran across one side of the page. I guess I could have taken them out but I don't mind them. The rest is the picture from my avatar and basic brushes and text from photoshop elements.

Click to view the banner at Essential Adornment, my Etsy store.

Next up, the blog header.

Pearls and Crystals

Here's a necklace and earrings set that I made that will shortly go up in my Etsy store, Essential Adornment. It features large diamond shaped freshwater cultured pearls, sterling silver, and large Swarovski crystals. This is the only time I've found pearls this color blue. The color is gorgeous, plus there is enough iridescence that the pearls will go with more colors than blue. I'm really happy with the way it turned out.

Tutorial Monday-Etsy and Blog Banners

Today Tutorial Monday is a little different. Instead of a jewelry tutorial I'm sharing the the best of the banner tutorials I've found on the web. I've been kicking around ideas for my blog banner/header and my Etsy shop banner but haven't been sure how to go about creating one. I want a picture or two of my jewelry with the name of my blog. I also want something similar for my Etsy shop.

So far my favorite comes from Etsy Labs: Skill Share: Making A Banner. One of the reasons I like this tutorial is that it uses Photoshop and the directions are applicable to Photoshop Elements. I have Elements. I've taken a couple of courses in Photoshop Elements, but I don't always remember the facets of the program that I don't use often. Danielle goes over the steps and illustrates the process with some screen shots.

Brenda Smith of Serendipity Patchwork and Quilting has a good tutorial How to Create a Blog Banner, and well as one on Blog Buttons. Oh, and be sure to check out her blog.

Carole Casper has a tutorial for Blogger banners as well. Creating a Personal Header in New Blogger is a PDF file that you can download and print out for handy reference. She has other tutorials on creating a favicon, making links, and fabric art related tutorials on her blog A Stitch in Time.

Gabrielle Blair has a tutorial by Guest Mom Amy on Making a Blog Banner.

Paul Stamatiou has tutorial on HOW TO: Make a Blog Header Graphic.

You can get free graphics for your Wordpress header at Ten Free Cutline Header Images on Skitzo. For more on the Cutline Theme for Word Press see Chris Pearson. Captain Hops also has free graphics for Cutline.

More free graphics can be found at Blog Headers For Free Download. There are some very creative graphics here. All of the header graphics in this post came from here. Check it out.






Maybe you don't want to do it yourself. There are a number of people who will do blog and etsy banners, as well as website banners, for very reasonable fees. Here are some I've found:

Etsy Banners and Graphics by Jelene

Many of her banners have a colorful pop art style, but she also does some very close to what I had in mine for my banner. She has lots of examples to view. You can also buy through her Etsy shop Jelene's Pop Shop.

Callista's Graphic Design Studio

I really like the look of her work and she also does website and blog headers.

Update on Tonia Davenport

Since I just reviewed Plexi Class I thought I would post this quick update on the author, Tonia Davenport. She has just opened an etsy store. Check out the cute bracelets. I especially like "dark chocolate."

Also her bracelet project "Save the Trees" from Plexi Class is featured as a free project on MyCraftivity.com.

Essential Adornment at Etsy

I finally opened a store at Etsy, Essential Adornment. I'll be selling my jewelry here, as well as in my other store and at art shows.

I only have one listing, but more will follow.