I Heart Etsy

Etsy is a dangerous place for me. I can spend hours in an Etsy K-Hole before even realizing how much time has passed. I'm always delighted by the awesome things I find - I tend to geek out over photography and vintage stuff (of course) but I can't get enough of beadmakers and metalworkers.  Those are two things that I tell myself that I will "someday" learn.  Randy and I even looked into the start-up expenses for lampworking a few months back, but we don't really have the cash to lay out for the gear.  I would prefer to take some classes in both of these crafts before jumping in and buying a bunch of stuff, but have been to busy/lazy to seek out said classes, so for now, I just go from page to page to page to page until I realize I am supposed to be working!

I "Favorite" a lot of stuff, some of which I do intend to purchase when I have a little extra.  One thing I recently bought myself (and am so glad I did) is the below pendant from New Hope Beading :

I had "convo'd" Caroline about one of her pendants, which was the periodic table symbol for silver and asked her if she could customize the same idea for me, but the element Mercury, because...well, I'm Elemental Mercury!

And look how cool it is!  I had big plans of making a funky cascade with a multi-beaded strand for it, but couldn't wait to wear it so it's on its original leather cord (and yes, that's the geode from the gem/mineral show I'm wearing with it, I think they look cool together).

Caroline makes personalized charms, mother's necklaces and bridesmaids jewelry and has some very cool pendants that she has designed and stamped. She was lovely to work with, as well.

On the selling side, yesterday someone purchased one of my flower hair clips, and I'm almost sad to see it go.  I keep all my hair clips hanging from wide ribbons pinned to my inspiration board so they brighten up the studio while I'm working.

I'm crazy about these earring wires from Blue Moon Beads

I've been known to throw in a free gift with purchase sometimes. If someone purchases vintage sewing notions from me, I'll add a little extra vintage something from my stash, and lately I've been making coordinating earrings for the flowers for my customers.

I think they turned out cute and I hope she likes them.

I don't even know what kind of flower this is
supposed to be, but I'm digging it.

I also made a bunch of new fall flowers for the shop that I still need to photograph and upload.

I happened to find some black roses with black leaves and they cracked me up, so I now have black rose hair clips as well as some cream colored roses and bright orangey-yellow mums.  This purple bad boy is all mine, though, I totally love it.

As much as I wander around Etsy, I know there's something like approximately 800,000 sellers.  Do you have a shop? Do you have a favorite shop? Have you bought something lately that just tickled you hot pink?  If so, hook this Etsyholic up and post a link in the comments, because I can't get enough!