Crochet Project #2- The Blanket

I now find myself hopelessly addicted to crochet. I can work on it a little here and there, when I have a minute or when I have an hour to unwind. It's therapeutic for my fidgety hands, although I do have to keep an eye on the carpal tunnel in my right wrist. As long as I crochet in shorter bursts and do my wrist stretches, I don't have serious issues with it. For my next project, I started a blanket for my bed. Our bedroom walls are painted a slate blue, and our comforter is gray with black trim. So, my blanket I'm making solid black. I am using this pattern: http://home.att.net/~susanbinkc/patterns.html?avshell2.html but mine is turning out looser and has larger wholes, which I think will look good over the light gray comforter. Here's a photo of what I have so far...right now it looks like it would be a pretty scarf!

Etsy Twitter Team: Shop of the week: PunkyJane 2/15-2/21

Etsy Twitter Team: Shop of the week: PunkyJane 2/15-2/21

Shop of the week: PunkyJane 2/15-2/21

I love stepping into Sandy Simpson's shop, PunkyJane. She has amazing hand stamped and personalized sterling silver jewelry and gifts, but also works a bit in copper and fine silver. PunkyJane has been selling on Etsy since October 2008, and she does ship internationally. With over 500 sales on Etsy, Sandy feels that the most important thing for people to know about PunkyJane is "is that I truly enjoy working with customers to help create their vision. It's not all about MY design. Hopefully my work will be something they treasure for a very long time. I love a good challenge!"
As all of our team members here get the SOTW questions (our basic questions) Sandy has turned one of our questions into a fun twist. Here is how our conversation went...
Jen: "What are your Twitter tricks of the trade? "Sandy: "Say that 10 times fast!! I think being a part of the Etsy Twitter team has really taught me how to be a good tweeter. It's all about community. Sure, tweet when you list a new product or have a special sale, but I truly believe you'll have more success if people get a feeling for WHO you are, not just WHAT you do. And the nice thing is that it doesn't have to be too deep...it's only 140 characters after all!"(to tell you the truth Sandy and fellow readers I did say it 1oX fast-it was not pretty;)

PunkyJane's favorite thing about her craft is: "As a graphic designer, I always had my undo button. It saved me all the time! With stamping, there's a finality to it. I've had to completely change my thinking about how to create. It's taught me that perfection isn't possible, and for me, that's a great lesson to have learned."

Sandy's business resolutions for 2010 for her shop are as follows: "I resolve to become more efficient at the paperwork and communication parts of the business so I can focus on what keeps me going...being creative."

This week Sandy is offering the following sale to our readers:
Free standard shipping on everything in my shop now through February 25, 2010. Use 'TwitterSOTW' in the message to seller box at checkout and your shipping will be refunded via PayPal.
To learn more about Sandy's shop (aka PunkyJane)
please use these links and check out the other blogs here on our blog (ETT).
http://twitter.com/punkyjane
W E B ~~~> http://www.punkyjane.com/
B L O G ~~~> http://punkyjane.blogspot.com/
F A C E B O O K : Become a fan! ~~~> http://facebook.com/PunkyJaneJewlery

Etsy Twitter Team: Shop of the week: Glizy Events

Etsy Twitter Team: Shop of the week: Glizy Events
With the wedding season coming up, the Etsy Twitter Team’s Shop of the Week GlitzyEvents has the invitations and the customer service attitude to make the experience perfect for the bride-to-be! The shop proprietor says, “I just want brides to be able to get exactly what they want. Often times with mass production companies there is no personal interaction, so you can’t just say I love this part about this invite, but can you change this. I want my clients to be 100% happy with the product that they receive, so almost all requests can be accommodated.” Since she ships internationally to Canada, UK, Australia, and Ireland, that’s a lot of happy brides!

Kimberley Williams is the talent behind GlitzyEvents. She specializes in custom invitations; the process from start to finish is entirely for the client. They choose all paper colors, fonts, & text, and can also mix and match invitation styles. Coordinating pieces to complete the look and feel of the wedding are also available, i.e. menus, programs, placecards, unity candles, seating charts, & more!

Kimberley’s is inspired by her dedication to quality goods and customer service. And she loves all the options available for paper goods. “There are always tons of new papers in production so I can continually evolve my line.” And with her high quality paper goods, hardware, and machinery, “everything from samples to full invitation orders come beautifully professionally packaged, and with useful freebies for the modern bride.”

Facebook and Twitter are key tools for Kimberley’s business, but most importantly, she enjoys them as a means of building relationships. In addition, she says she has ‘met’ and been able to cross promote with many great wedding professionals. When tweeting about a new product or promo, “the retweets from these ‘tweeps’ have been really priceless.”



Her 2010 New Year’s resolutions is to “reach a larger audience. The start of 2010 has been fantastic. I have literally tripled my business from this time one year ago. It really has been an awesome start to the year.”



From February 8-14, GlitzyEvents is offer
Free shipping on all invitation samples
Just mention EtsyTwitter @ check-out for a refund on shipping,
or convo me ahead of time for an updated listing.
To learn more about Kim and her amazing shop please use these links:
twitter is http://twitter.com/glitzyevents
blog is http://blog.glitzyevents.com/

First Crochet Scarf Phase Two

Phase Two: Where I almost pull the entire thing out and start over. Then come to my senses in the nick of time. I learned something else new about crochet, and that is "tension". I was apparently very inconsistent with the tension of my yarn as I stitch and my edges are a little on the wavy side. You can see in this top photo the interesting little in and out pattern going on as my single crochets were looser then tighter. I asked my son to look at it, and he didn't even notice the edges. He mentioned the inconsistent "wholes". Which, I'm thinking is also the tension issue. I don't care so much about the wholes...with this textured yarn I don't think that's going to be so noticeable as I wear it. To normal people. And since he said he didn't even notice the uneven edges, it's staying as is. As you can see in the other photo, I finally got into my groove holding the yarn and developed a consistent tension toward the end of what I have finished so far. I'm loving this color, and the softness of the yarn, so I hope it ends up wearable. :)