*!

Help Gina:

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 14:38:11 -0700

So you guys have worked miracles for me.

Can you work a miracle for someone else? A long-time reader of *! is running up against hard times- she's in the process of a divorce, she was laid off from her job, her ex isn't helping her support her kids and she is only days away from eviction.

If everyone who reads this blog and *! gave her just five dollars, she wouldn't lose her home.

Just five dollars.

Just a coffee and bagel.

Come on, guys, help her out. It'll earn you some serious karma.

Here's her site explaining her situation:

Help Gina.

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Will Trade Cookies For Traffic.

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 10:25:49 -0700

I may have mentioned this before, but I really need to be selling things. To people other than the people who read this blog.

So I will trade cookies for help. Yes. Big fluffy Mennonite style old fashioned buttermilk cookies with buttercream frosting. Cookies like this:

Gum drop buttons

Only not decorated by a toddler. (Unless you want yours decorated by a toddler.)

How can you get these cookies? Refer my shop to someone who buys something, or give me some sort of prize-winning advice that leads to higher traffic on my site. See, I've done all of the stuff that people generally suggest. I've started taking better photos, I've joined a few teams and done the social networking, I've tweeted and blogged and listed new things every other day and tagged even the colors in the photos and banged my head up against this thing, and in a year and a half of selling on Etsy I've made quite a bit of money... Off of you guys, you wonderful thirty people who actually read this blog.

How many sales have I made to non-blog faithful? Two. How much were they worth? About fifteen dollars. That's less than .5% of the sales I've had.

Gah.

So, I will bake anyone who helps me get more traffic a dozen cookies. All you need to do is verify that you've helped me get a sale (or gotten my store reviewed somewhere that gives me a fabulous bump in traffic) and the cookies are yours.

Once again- I love you fabulous people. You've helped me through a very dark year. I almost feel bad asking you to help any more...

Except, these are cookies we're talking about. The kind of cookies that Grandma makes for Christmas.

MonkeyLand Originals

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Artfully, uh, artful.

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 13:11:08 -0700

IMG_1929

IMG_1937

So ninety five percent of everything I've sold on Etsy has been to blog readers. And the things that haven't been to you lovely folks? Those have never been jewelry.

So I decided that if I want to grow my buying base, I need to make less jewelry. This has led to a lot of fun, like the above two items.

There is so much awesomeness to craft, why restrict myself to things that people can wear?

And, of course, should you want to buy them they are on Etsy.

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Tote! Hurray!

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 12:50:25 -0700

I was going to make a baby blanket, and then I got lazy.

End product?

Img_1813

I think I like this better.

Etsy, of course.

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Last call for bids!

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 20:15:38 -0700

If you want to own a blanket made out of my old shirts (which is either cool, or creepy, or both maybe) then GO BID NOW.

You've got 34 hours from uh, now. (Now as in when I posted this, not when you read it.)

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Jewelry.

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 14:52:28 -0700

Because my mom insists that Jewelry is what I'm best at and wouldn't take no for an answer. I tried to explain to her that I don't have the supplies I need to make what I normally make, and she kept insisting that I have to have enough to make SOMETHING.

So here we go:

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I made the cord using several strands of thread, and tore apart a funky silver necklace for the clasp and silver ring for the drop. The beads were a gift from an angel- not my normal thing, but I think it turned out nicely enough.

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I would never have picked these beads. But I had them (Thank you, angel!) and when I poured them out, they seemed to tell me what they wanted to be. By this point I had no monofilament, they were too heavy for thread, and I wanted to reserve what little coated wire I had left for something else. So what to do, what to do? I found a small roll of silver and just kind of... winged it. I made curlicues like wind in a Winnie the Pooh drawing, and played with the idea of red leaves being blown by a very blue stream. Something like a nursery rhyme illustration, bright but somehow peaceful. I like it.

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This one came because of some serious, hardcore inspiration. For months I've been wanting to do something for someone who suffered a loss. And jewelry seems contrived, nothing else seems good enough. So I was thinking about the "Hope" bracelets we'd make in Bible Memory camp (black is sin, red is blood, blue is baptism, white is purity, purple is riches in heaven) and I thought, there's got to be a way to make a prayer bracelet that doesn't look childish, that has real meaning, even if the wearer isn't a Christian.

So I made this bracelet. Here's an explanation of each bead:

Either end is a pearl, to represent the beauty that comes from pain and patience, the wisdom that comes from a full life.

Black is for loss. Some great, some small, but inseparable from life.
Red is for pain
Yellow is for fear and anxiety
Brown represents earth- to bring us back to reality and keep our feet on the ground
Blue is for water, which represents the currents of the ocean and being washed clean
Green is for life itself- but especially the new life of spring which is only born because of the little deaths of fall and winter
And the final bead is a pink rose, for the hope of the seasons still to come.
And of course the bracelet is worn as a circle. One cycle ends, the next begins.

It may not be a comforting thought for all, but I look at it and feel a certain kind of peace. Life is bittersweet, but it is life. And life is good.

Of course, as always, they are on Etsy.

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Buy a piece of history!

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 07:02:44 -0700

So I've decided to sell the t-shirt comforter that I've been working on for, well, half of forever. I pieced the top 7 years ago when I was newly married, and I pieced the back just last month. Finishing it seems like an eternity, even though I know it's really not that long.

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But right now I need to focus on doing everything possible to bring in money. We have a lot of work we want to do on the house, and even doing it on the cheap there's still a lot of fund raising involved. When you live paycheck to paycheck, every little thing counts.

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So I decided to sell the comforter on Ebay. I never know what to charge for these things, and since this particular one is also sentimental, I just couldn't settle on what I thought was a reasonable price. (50? 75? 250? I don't know!)

I thought, since my lovely neighbors always insist they'd be willing to pay more, I'd test that theory.

The starting bid is $15, what I need to recoup the cost of the materials and listing it.

I'm comfortable letting it go for that if it means it goes to someone I like. (Mainly, dear reader, YOU!)

So, admire.

And then go bid, if you'd like!

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Newly Listed on Etsy!

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 11:33:19 -0700

Baby Quilt

Going Around the World

Baby takes a trip "Around the World!" I really love this quilt- it's far from perfect, so I'm not charging much for it, but I hope it finds a home.

And then, there's always Baby Jane.

Baby Jane

Both available from MonkeyLand Originals

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In other news

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 08:48:15 -0700

I've been a little quiet here, because I've been dividing my time between "real" work and trying to actually post on my Wordpress blog.

So, in case you are interested, here's what's been happening on WordPress:

David’s real brilliance was not in his beauty, his grace, or his cleverness. It was in his absolute faith in who God made him to be.- Think as David Thought
If I want to share the depth and wonder of my faith, it means letting people into my past. It means telling stories that are embarrassing, painful, sometimes nothing short of humiliating.- Be More Vulnerable
Thus, the moral of the story is that we shouldn’t rush God’s calling.- Ishmael or Isaac

Allow me to try to explain this a different way. Look at nature. The snowmelt runs down the mountain because it must, it’s a natural directive, there is no other way. But plumbing shows that we can sometimes tweak things to our advantage, we don’t change natural law but we change natural circumstances.- See Your Circumstances as Malleable

So, in case you can't see the theme, it's a series on overcoming obstacles. I know none of the posts are tagged "gay sex", so it's not my most popular work- but I think it's important nonetheless.

Now I'm hungry, and I'll go make myself lunch. :)

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Progress on the Baby Jane

nobody@vox.com(shush now) — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 08:00:49 -0700

It's not nearly done, and this is four days later than I promised- but here's the Baby Jane quilt.

I still have a LOT of beading and embroidery to do, but I think it's a rather charming little thing. :)

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