Treasures...Recycled Fun

It's time for another week of trash to treasures! We went digging through our pile of saved materials (I will have to make another post on what to save from your rubbish bin!) and got straight to work this past week. Out of our milk jug, we made a basket to hold our money. We were playing store during our math lesson and we decided to use the over-sized money that does not fit in the cash register, so we needed to make up something different! This ended up being so perfect we made 3 more to hold the 'produce' in the store! A pipe cleaner makes an awesome handle doesn't it?!

When challenged to make something on her own, while the boys were occupied with a numbers lesson, my daughter made up this fantastic  paper clip holder out of the bottom of a water bottle! I had just gotten some new catalogues in the mail and she saw me pinning pages with clips from a plastic bag and told me that this would work much better! How creative! I love it!! Some of the best artwork will come when you give your kids the materials with no direction what so ever! Each of them have a work table in their rooms that has a small bit of art supplies set up on it, this way they can create in private if they want! Yes, it does get messy, but this is a home, not a museum :)

<a href=”http://www.michellescharmworld.blogspot.com/” style=”border: none;”><img alt=”MichellesCharmWorld” src=”http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v456/WDWwedding2004/001.jpg” style=”width: 129px; height: 129px;”/></a>Join my blog hop! Snag the button and link up below!! You can even grab the code and embed it into your post for more people to link up! Let's spread the word the recycling can be fun!!

Fun in the Sand!

The weather was outrageous today, so we headed off to the sand park! We have this fabulous park that has walking trails and a man made waterway for fishing and the like. It at one point also had a carved out area for a beach, but after only a few truckloads of sand, they abandoned the idea and left it as is. This small area is awesome for beach play on a day not hot enough to go in the water and it's quite the hidden gem, that there is never anyone over there! PERFECTION!

 I snagged one of the mesh bags from the 5 pack I got at the Dollar store and filled it with all kinds of recycled goodies that would be perfect for sand play. As you know, I LOVE using recycled items for the kids playtime and the best part? If they break or get lost, no big deal!!!

 Kids cups from restaurants are so easy to wash out and toss aside to keep for the kids to play with! Crystal Light containers, yogurt cups, plastic spoons and other goodies can go such a long way!

 I threw in a ziploc baggie of coffee stirrer straws and scrap paper triangles and the kids made flags with them too!! It was such a blast to see them put 2 and 2 together!!

 I also added in scoops and pitchers picked up at tag sales! I never spend more than .25 for each item, so that they can have more and it's no biggie if it gets lost!

All recyclables and so much fun! These items mostly were free and some as much as .05 and yet they equaled hours of fun and play!!

What's your thrifty secret?

Craft in a Minute!

Need a craft for antsy kids that doesn't take long? Grab those eggs (you know you have HUNDREDS lying around!!) and a paper plate with some glue and scissors too! Cut out the center of the plate and glue on the eggs!!! We gave these out to Nana and Grandpa and have one on our door too! Super cute and super fun! Best of all? Super fast and inexpensive! Yay!

Caps Caps Caps!

I have been saving caps for quite some time (If you can see the bucket, we started around Halloween time!!)! We keep this small bucket on the kitchen counter (Does wonders for the decor!) and then empty it out regularly to our box the holds the real collection, hey how did that Box Top get in here?? We first started saving caps when we made a space ship and used the caps as buttons and dials and knobs and even a steering wheel with the largest one! It was so much fun we decided to keep on saving!!

One of our first and favorite creations with the caps was an alphabet memory game! We put stickers in matching white bottle caps (yikes, you can tell how much bottled water we drink!!) and then we turn them upside down and get matching!! We plan on putting colored garage sale dots on the one side of these eventually, because if we play outside, you can see through a little bit with the bright sun!!

Pictured here is only 1 set, just so you could see the letters closely!!

Linked Up Here:

Just a Stay At Home Mom...

So here I am, the stay at home mom to 3. I've been out and about to several soirees recently and I am finding that I am most often thought of as a nobody because I stay at home. I often find people when introducing me saying something along the lines of....This is Michelle, so and so's wife. As they reach out to shake my hand their mouth opens, but then the introducer says something like....Oh, she's JUST a stay at home mom. This has happened more than once, more than twice...many times. It actually has me thinking that not only has it become me, but I have allowed it to become me. I'm an artist, I work hard on my jewelry and yet, I don't speak about it as much as I should. I'm never given the chance. Once they hear SAHM, their eyes glaze over, they seem to want to get out of there as fast as possible. I'm often left wondering if I have puke on my shirt? A dirty diaper in my pocket? A pacifier in between my teeth? What makes me so uninteresting before i've even said a word? The WHAT DO YOU DO question has often times become a question that makes me cringe. Maybe I should just start introducing myself? Just walk right up to people and say hello first! Get that word in, let them know me a bit before they judge me. If only they knew Stay at home mom, pretty much meant never at home mom. I'm far from super mom, but I try hard and I love what I do, I love the mix of work that I do on my shop and with my childrens lives. I may not be the most fascinating person at the party, but I am in fact a person. So hello blogging world, I'm Michelle, Artist and not-so-perfect mom.

FEATURED!!

I hope everyone is having a great weekend! I myself have been busy with my fathers birthday! Parties, Presents, Dinners and Family get-togethers! It's been a lot of fun, but here I sit at 11:30 pm and just getting home exhausted! We did the waterpark resort on top of all that too! Phew, I just need to sleep in until noon tomorrow!! Alright, I got a message from Scribblistic that let me know I was in her treasury today! How cool!It's a SWEET treasury that features my Pizza Ring! I discovered some cute new shops too!

Another Monday....

Purse Charm coming soon to MCW

So it's monday and i'm saddled with an upset stomach and 2 kids with runny noses...blahhh...it's been a lazy weekend and i'm sorry about the lack of blogging going on here lately! It's been busy getting into the height of craft show season coming up! I can't believe how fast Spring is approaching!

I wanted to be sure to remind you to change up your featured items today and select 2 items from your shop that need to be rephotographed! It will be a great way to bring some life into your shop! Have you thought about changing up your backrounds?? I have an idea in head that I will try and work out this week sometime and see if I like how it turns out!

I have also been featured in a treasury today! It's so pretty and bright! Thanks so much to MonarchDancer for the feature! Please stop by and click and comment on the treasury!

Monday Reminder and a Winner....

It's that time of the week again! Time to freshen up our shops and give it a new look! Let's go ahead and change up those featured items!! I hope you all had a great Valentine's Day! I had a lot of fun and the weather was foolishly almost Spring Like! haha! Unfortunately before all the pink and red was out of the stores, the pastels of Spring and Easter bagan to arrive! So my featured Items will be bringing in the pastels too! haha! If you can't beat them, join them!

Now it's time to announce the winner of my contest! BooksByRachel come on down!! Congrats on your 10.00 gift certificate to my shop! Just email me at MichellesCharmWorld@Gmail.com and I will send you back your code for buying up your goodies! Yay! Happy Monday everyone!!

Monday Morning

Monday morning is here! Time to enter your shop and change up those featured items! What theme are you going with? I decided to stick with a simple and elegant black and white theme.

I hope everyone had a fabulous weekend and this week brings everyone much luck and good times along the way!

The weekend weather had us playing outside a lot and the melting snow made for some seriously messy times! hahaha!

The local antique mall had me dying for some new goodies, but I just couldn't make up my mind! These vintage canisters would look GREAT on my kitchen display shelf, I just couldn't bear to use them! So for now they will be at the top of my list if they are still there when we go next week! haha! I figured I would give myself enough time to think about the purchase first and I have to see if anything from my destash shop sells, once I list it! (That's my spending money shop! haha!)
My studio phone is so boring and blah, that I have been dying to spice it up with something totally fabulous and begin adding a little more decor to it. These phones totally caught my eye! I would love one in pink, so I'm checking a huge antique mall this weekend, if it's a no-go then I am going wiht the mint green!

Promoting Yourself....

Dessert Buffet Bracelet by MichellesCharmWorld 25.00

Morning everyone! It's time to make sure you are promoting yourself to the heavens! are you getting that word out everywhere? I always make sure I have a kit with me every single time I leave the house! It's a mini promo kit.

My Promo Kit

I am putting this photo on Flickr too, so that I can point out things in the notes. I keep it pretty compact and switch out the jewelry samples often. I have a code book/idea book so that I can keep track of the codes I give out to people that ask for my business codes. The tacks are for putting up my business cards wherever I go. It's a great way to promo on the go. I was at Potbelly subs last week and I noticed that my cards were gone, so I put up some more that I had and then added others that I had on me. I also noticed that another Etsy sellers cards were gone too (she lives in Rockford too), so I convoed her when I got home and let her know. I basically put them up wherever possible.

I was part of this business card and flier swap on Etsy once where we all swapped a certain amount of business cards and or fliers, post cards what not and then each person had to go out and paper their city with the fliers they got. Photos were required so that everyone could be sure it was done. I am planning on starting something like this again in hopes of spreading the word out of other awesome artists! So go on, get out there!

Just another Manic Monday....

Mmm..Pie Stud Earrings by MichellesCharmWorld 6.00

Good morning everyone! I hope the weekend was wonderful for everyone! It's monday now and it's time to get back to work! I'm thinking of trying to come up with a blog schedule so it's not so difficult to come up with topics on a daily basis. I'm still thinking of what they will be though! If you have anything you would like me to write about, please let me know! I love helping people as much as I can! This is what I have so far:

Monday--Change up Featured Items Reminder and maybe a weekly challenge of some sort?

Tuesday-- In The Studio-- Organization tips, photos, new supplies that sort of thing.

Wednsday--Promotions

Thursday--Shop Improvements

On a good note, have you loaded your Google analytics for your Etsy Shop yet?!?! Talk about an OMG moment! I just uploaded mine and got the checkmark about 32 hours ago and lo and behold I have in that amount of time already surpassed my views in my Lollishops shop that has been running for over a month now, in fact I have more than doubled the views! haha! I am 100% amazed at how fabulous that is. (the loads of views, not how sad my Lollishops store is! I have to figure out something else for that) I am getting a lot of foot traffic and a lot of convos and even some sales too. It's also great to notice that my traffic is in fact coming from overseas just like I always knew it would. The best part? I'm noticing that I have a couple people from a few cities that seem to spend a lot of time in my shop daily! haha! Brentwood, TN where are you and who are you? How about you Lambeth, England? This is so fun! I know there are other regular visitors, many that visit daily too! It's a fun tool, I check it for both of my shops every morning as I start the day.

The top one is Lollishops and the bottom is Etsy, I had to cut the rest out because it has personal information and codes on it. You can see how my Lolli views keep tanking, nothing to compare yet on the Etsy views, so we will see if it was just a lucky coupd of days. I should also mention that I was barely online in these past days as we went out of town. I was not doing any online promoting or listing of new items. I just relisted some pieces in the evenings before bed.

Back to shop news! Have you changed up your featured items yet? Get to it! Time to get the shop looking fresh! I've been invited to set up at a birthday party for a 16 year odl this weekend. My pieces will be the party favors and i'm really excited! The hostess gives me a price range and those are the pieces I bring. Unless she has a theme. Everyone picks out what they want upon arrival and then during that party, I package up the goodies in cute bags with tags and business cards in little boxes and such and then put them out for the guests! It's an awesome way to make great money for about 2 hours time! THese are my favorite kind of private parties! SO I'm off to work on getting tose pieces together this week too!

Word for the Year...

I was browsing the Lollishops Guild (a private forums for vendors) and I came across a thread by Jill of Bailiwick Designs. It was all about choosing a word to set the tone for the year. I thought this was a great idea and went and thought about it. I chose the word Patience. I am a very impatient person, think 3 year old pouting and demanding. The sad thing is, is that it always works. I was an incredibly spoiled child and only grew up to be a spoiled adult hahha! I would be lying if I said my father didn't still spoil me. I was also lucky enough to marry a man that spoils me a bit too much too. I feel sorry for the man our daughter marries! hahaha! So I have decided to really try and work this out. I found some charms with the word PATIENCE on them and I made them into a Purse charm and a cell charm. When I move to my new studio, I am hoping to put the word on the wall. I not only want to learn patience in business (my lack of views and sales on Lollishops is a big one for me). I also have 3 children and trying to juggle this business and being the perfect stay at home mom is difficult sometimes. I need to be patient and realize that having it all is not always important. So what is your word?

Here is the direct line from the thread:

Every year I choose a word to use as an inspiration
and encouragement to myself. I'll even print it out and put it up all around my studio (and the bathroom
mirror too!) to remind me. Last year my word was
"focus"; this year it's
"grow". For one thing, I want my business to grow.

Valentines Day Is Here....

Conversation Heart Charm Bracelet by MCW 12.00

So it's not really here, but it's time to start thinking like retailers! I am not going to make too much holiday themed stuff since it never seems to sell, but I am going to shuffle around some stuff with candy and hearts on it and put it in my featured items, sticking with pinks and reds.

New Featured Items in MCW

I am trying to stay away from getting too theme-y, I want a certain look for my shop and the conversation hearts as cute, so I am sticking to candy and treats and it will still fit in with the rest of my shop!

Dessert Treats Charm Bracelet by MichellesCharmWorld 30.00

Another great way to get into the holiday is with packaging, i'm changing up my packaging and backrounds to suit the holidays. That pink polka-dot is one of the backrounds and I have some hearts too. I am going with pink jewelry containers and I had new earring cards made up! I'm using pink tissue paper and white ribbon.

Since I had earring cards made up for both shops and my labels have Etsy and Lollishops on them, I am transitioning this into both places. I am going to re-do all my Lollishops photos, since there is not that much inventory, but only the new photos will get the new backround on Etsy. So what are you doing for this new holiday?

Pricing Your Items...pay yourself what you are worth!

Cake earrings by MichellesCharmWorld 10.00

Alright...hmmmm that title can't possible be right, there is no way I can pay myself a million dollars! hahahah!!! Okay all kidding aside, when we put our stuff out there, we are looking to make money right? We're looking to make back what we have in supplies and fees and time, but also a profit! It's difficult getting your pricing just right and sometimes it seems as though there are people undercutting you every step of the way, but no worries keep it at what you think and the customer that buys the cheaper item was never going to be your customer to begin with. There are so many threads like this around, that I hate doing a blog post about it, but sometimes people want to hear it from someone they 'know' and I feel like I know you all! Sometimes prices are just too high and that's because the pricing formula may not be right. I've priced some pieces that I knew were overpriced, but was just too lazy to figure it out right then and there. Of course they didn't sell. Remember that if you are interested in Wholesale selling your items, the norm is 50% of your selling price. So be very careful! I price all of my items, so that I can still put them on sale at 50% if they are not selling and make a good profit.

My pricing formula:

Supplies x 2 + 2.00 for overhead (bills and such) + 15.00 an hour + .60 (2 renewals and listing)

I round up to round off the dollar amount as I don't like listings that say 4.75 in my item shop.

Whenever I get a new supply order in, I count every single piece in the batch (even the ones I cannot or will not use) I then divide that by what it cose to purchase and ship or any other fees associated in the cost of the supply (If I went out just for that, I put in some gas money too), this gives me the per-item cost that I then use to calculate supplies pricing. The pieces I do not use head off to a box of my destash stuff and then when I go to sell my destash, it's all pure profit outside of the fees and photography time, since I built that into the cost of the supplies that I do use.

Hope this helps you guys!!

Time To Shop!

Shop Etsy for my Funky and Chunky Line

Come on everyone! Enter the world of online shopping!! Join me in either of my shops today and get a FREE Bow Necklace with your purchase. Use the code 104Bow in the Notes To Seller after you check out! Free necklace will only be given to those that pay with Paypal today.

Shop Lollishops for my Wearable Sweets Line!

Wearable Sweets!

I finally snagged a treasury today!!! It's all about my tagline! Wearable Sweets! Sweet Treats without the calories! Gotta love them! now check it out and be sure to use all 12 of your clicks and make a comment! Thanks!!

The Wonderful World of Flickr

My Flickr Page!

Today, we are jumping into the photographic world of Flickr. This is an AWESOME social networking site! If you love lots of photos when you read a blog, this one is for you! It's all about uploading photos and typing in brief descriptions. When you sign up, be sure to have a great profile, where you mention where you can be found. I list my Etsy Shop, my Lollishops shop and my Blog! Check out my profile here. I like fun profiles, that give a little hint to the personality. I will NOT click on profiles that JUST have FEMALE/MALE and their Shop link on them. That tells me, they are just there to sell things and not really there for the community aspect of it all. A Big no-no in my book AND in Flickrs are photos that are items for sale in your shop WITH descriptions that say FOR SALE ON MY ETSY SHOP check profile for link. That is NOT allowed and can get you shut down.

Some of my contacts that have recently updated

Ready to start adding friends? Use that search bar at the top right hand side of the page and type in some of your interests! This is a great way to find people that like the same stuff as you do and also you can find more people that like it, by checking out their contacts list too! When I add someone, I am sure to comment on their photos straight away or as soon as they add me too! Always comment on photos of those that add you too! Common courtesy! Post your link in any online forums your frequen, that's a great way to get people adding you too! Another great way is to check out the GROUPS! Click on the top tab that says GROUPS. Type in the FIND GROUPS bar, what you are looking for! Check for things you collect, your favorite color, where you sell, you name it it's there! You will be overwhelmed by the groups, but they are just so fun to be a part of! PLEASE make sure you read all the rules to the groups before posting and putting up your photos. PLEASE don't spam groups with dozens of your photos, just because they don't have upload limits, this is tacky :(

Ready to Start Uploading Photos? Click on the YOU tab at the top of the page and a drop down menu will appear, click on Upload photos and videos. There you go! It will then put you at a page to type in your descoptions and tags. DO NOT DO NOT use for sale lingo, see profile or anything like that. Remember, that if people really want to know this information, they will check out your profile themselves or message you their question. (I have made loads of sales this way!) DO not make your album ALL ABOUT what you sell. This is not a showcase gallery, it's a social site and they want you to be social, they want to see what else you do! supplies shots, family shots, studio shots, that sort of thing!Photograph the weather, your dinner, your starbucks! Anything you can think of! If your photos are ALL about what you sell, you can and will be shut down. If you use for sale, profile jargon, you can and will be shut down. How do I know? 3 of my friends were shut down (1 of them had a PRO account) with no warning at all, and me? Well I got a very stern warning. What made me get a warning and them just get deleted? No clue, talk on the Etsy forums seem to be it's just whatever admin is on duty that day. There seem to be no rhyme or reason. So be safe, before you get shut down! This is a fun site when used correctly! After my warning, I asked what was and was not allowed and those were the items that I was told! I keep many photos of my children private to only friends and or family members. It's safer that way and yet my album is still personal and not just a gallery!

Check in daily on Flickr, sometimes it's hard with the 100 other things to do, but try and work it into your schedule. I always click the CONTACTS button at the top of the page to see who has recently updated and then I choose 10 interesting photos a day to comment on. I usually end up commenting on more, but at minimum 10. I check in on my groups every now and then and many have come through in a pinch for me! I once needed to know a place that I took a picture of in another country and within an hour someone knew where I was standing! hahaha!When used properly, Flickr can get you sales and get you a lot of friends! Be My friend and I will be yours!

Sweet Treats from my Lollishops Shop!

Peeking into Myspace!

Gahhhhh! Yup, that's how I feel with the whole Myspace thing. I am going to keep this one pretty short, because I have nooo clue how to do it. I signed up and added my mini in from Etsy, I will be putting in a Lollishops one too. I posted my link in my public forums and I had people add me then. This is me on Myspace and it's as basic as it gets! haha! I have much younger family members that live on Myspace and the way I make this site work for me is to give them free goodies every now and then in exchange for keeping my mini on their page! I have 2 high schoolers, a college gal and a young 20 something. They keep my mini in a prominant spot on their Myspace page and a discount code EXCLUSIVE to their site, so I can see who brings in the most people. I'm thinking of also running some kind of ad on my Myspace to see if anyone is interested in adding my mini to their page in a prominant place in exhange for a gift certificate to my shop, as an incentive for them to keep my mini up after they have gotten the free treasures, if I get a sale directly from their coded site, I will give them something extra! I'm still thinking of just how to do this the right way :)

I mainly promote my shop by using the BULLETIN feature, this seems to work best, since all of my friends usually don't visit my site daily and everyone gets the bulletins, so this way they can choose to click if they see an interesting title. To post a bulletin just click on POST bulletin, type out the details and then follow the prompts to publish it! Use a catchy title! The key here is NOT NOT NOT to be spammy and throw out more than 1 bulletin in a row and I would say 2 max in 1 day. Make sure it's a catchy title so that people will be inclined to click. Be sure you are keeping track of your codes so you know what is working in your promtional blitz! Now get out there and Myspace to the best of your abilities!

Simple Myspace Don'ts and Do's

DO NOT message people about your shop directly! post bulletins, the other way is spammy and annoying it will get you unfriended (I probably made that word up!)

DO NOT post your mini or link to your shop in other peoples comments, it will get your comment deleted and most likely blocked if you keep it up.

DO NOT post multiple bulletins it's annoying and will keep people away from your shop if you are posting 3 or 4 things saying the same thing!

DO DO DO keepy uour avatar EYE CATCHING! When you post a comment, people will be more inclined to click on your avatar and check out your profile, seeing your mini and if they like that your shop too!

In Shop news, buy today in my Lollishops Shop and get a free bow necklace! (In my choice of colors). Buy a bow necklace for you and get a free one for a friend, buy anything else in the shop and get a free bow necklace for yourself! Check it out and get something fabulously sweet!