November 27, 2011: National Diabetes Month

I haven't paid any attention to November being the National Diabetes Month. Until now,I didn't realize how much of my life revolved around maintaining blood sugar, blood pressure, and my weight. I started gathering the paraphernalia I use every day...to simply manage "myself". It sounds scary but it really isn't. It's lots of things though. The numbers aspect of every function I monitor can get to have it's own life. Like, the weight game of numbers was the worst. I would jump on the scales every morning and often it influenced how I felt about myself. I've worked my way out of that game by, first, putting the bathroom scale in the trunk of my car, knowing I would be too lazy, too tired, or too cold to go to the car just to have bad news. It has worked really, really well. I don't own a bathroom scale now and the doctor lets me know every six months how I'm doing. Good news each time, even if it is only a pound, it's going in the right direction!

I manage my blood sugar best by making better decisions on what I eat. The diabetes itself helps me maintain a little bit. If I'm "listening" to my body, the diabetes itself lets me know rather quickly what I need. I keep orange juice in the fridge and sucrose tablets in my purse, the drawer by my bedside and in my desk. I only need them once every few weeks. I'm not insulin dependent but I am on two oral medications to help me maintain. Being diagnosed with diabetes in 1994 has been a journey. I've developed a better relationship with food sans dieting that has allowed me to lose 67 pounds since. I have achieved a weight loss without the numbers problem. The numbers for my blood sugar and even my blood pressure are all about little decisions that add up to little life style changes that add up always. If I get too hard on myself I tend to become anxious, frustrated and angry at myself. Totally the opposite of where I need to be and how I need to feel about myself. I read Diabetes Forecast, www.forecast.diabetes.org,published by the American Diabetes Association and Diabetic Living, www.DiabeticLivingOnline.com, a Better Homes & Garden Special Interest publication, front to back a little bit at a time. A couple of stories everyday. I skip a year once in awhile, just to catch up on the reading. I just realized, I have accepted diabetes and it teaches me how to adapt to my body. Most importantly, it has been because I have been blessed to live long enough to make it my life style, in my own time. Change is always difficult, "myself" is so interested in what makes itself feel good that I either need to distract "myself", pray for the strength or just simply talk to myself, no, yell at myself. LOL But because I gave in to myself often as a younger woman you can see the monitors and medicines I use every day, some twice. The bag is full with today's prescriptions, five more than shown. Yep, that's ten, and five or six are twice daily. I'm not sure I could have done things differently. It takes what it takes.

November 22, 2011: Black Friday Sales

I'm on the fly this evening. I learned how to add a treasury widget. To your right. I love making treasuries. It definitely satisfies the gallery director in me. The following quote is from Etsy's Help section. It describes the treasury process.

"Treasury is an ever-changing, member-curated shopping gallery comprised of lists of items. Lists contain 16 items. Members can feature their favorite items, items selected on a theme or whatever they like. Any Etsy member can create a Treasury list, and there is no limit to the number of lists you can create. You can edit your lists as often as you desire, and post comments to other members' lists. The number of views your list receives as well as the number of clicks the items featured in your list receive are displayed in the list's Stats section. Treasury is not intended for self-promotion, but instead to acknowledge and share the many cool things for sale on Etsy."

This treasury, at the top of the right sidebar above has been made by another Etsy seller and an item from my shop was put in the treasury. I want to add treasuries that I have made as well as those that have selected one of my pieces to be featured. This is my learning post. LOL

I make several treasuries a week and often concentrate on a team and it's members. It helps me get familiar with the team and it gives me the time to search out the fine crafts and fine arts. I suppose I will learn more about vintage and supplies when I begin the big destash. After understanding what it's like for all this to stop...y'know, breathing, beating heart stuff...I want to destash. I'll be using the treasury tool to learn about that, too.

For now I'm sticking with what I know. I'm a little bit of a snob because the treasuries I make are handmade by the artist and Etsy sellers as members in a team. At least for now. I still feel very new as an owner of an Etsy shop. Keeps me busy every day all day. I'm thinking about adding a second treasury widget for the treasuries I make. I think they are pretty good, even if I say so myself. :D

Okay, I talked myself into it. In the right side bar below the first treasury is a treasury I curated. It's members of the Top Treasury team. As far as my desktop, it is all business and paper work. I'm photographing, processing and listing new items in my shop.I have included the very newest items before I list these ASAP! Please, enjoy.

www.BillisPaperBatiks.etsy.com From 12:00 am, Thanksgiving Day, until 11:59 pm Monday, Cyber Monday I'm offering FREE SHIPPING on all purchases! There are two coupon codes available for you to use at the time of purchase.You'll be asked to enter one code, your choice, on the PayPal invoice. Remember that's for free shipping! BLACKFRIDAY or CYBERMONDAY

November 18, 2011: Featured Etsy Blogger

I have joined a couple teams on etsy and volunteered to write a post about the monthly featured blogger for the official Etsy Bloggers Team. Selected for November is Pamela Baker from New York. As I perused her shops and blogs, listed below: http://www.MagdaleneJewels.etsy.com http://www.MagdaleneKnits.esty.com http://www.MagdaleneJewelspjk.blogspot.com http://www.MagdaleneJewelsblogs.blogspot.com I discovered she has another love beyond her online presence...theater. She is into costuming, make-up and does a little acting on the side. With that in mind, I visited all her links and became increasingly impressed with all that she is doing.

In her Etsy shop, MagdaleneJewels.etsy.com, I found lots of beaded pieces. I especially liked her use of flowers in the wedding items but I loved the necklaces made with a polymer clay flower as the focal bead.

Next, I visited her other Etsy shop. MagdaleneKnits.etsy.com, and looked in awe as I realized how much time it involves for her to crochet her inventory. Beautifully done sweaters, booties, scarves that made me ooh and ahh all the way through. But my favorite, cause, y'know, it's about me :-D, was this beautiful and cozy looking shawl!

Of course, I had to visit her blogs and found delightful offerings in both blogs. Each one has a personality of its own. The first one I looked at was www.magdalenejewelspjk.blogspot.com. I found a variety of very interesting artist posts, treasuries and best of all, shop/artist reviews. I was mesmerized by the review about these dolls. Haunting, right?

Needless to say, I didn't want to miss the last link to her other blog at www.MagadaleneJewelsblogs.blogspot.com. And I wasn't disappointed in the least! I'm totally bookmarking this blog featuring a "Wordless Wednesday" photographs. I like the "make your own caption" option. This one makes me laugh out loud! I can just hear the excited toddler running towards the toys, "O boy! TOYS!", just before he tumbles. All in all, my trip hopping through cyberspace getting to know Pamela Baker was interesting, educational, telling and, sometimes, downright funny! I recommend taking the time to take this trip yourself.

November 11, 2011: Gallery Ready

This last week I have been getting new work prepared for the Andrea Wilson Gallery, located in the Arts and Crafts Community in Gatlinburg, TN. The economy and foot traffic fluctuates with the seasons and the next 6 weeks are all about Christmas. I was able to put together a nice collection of polymer jewelry to enhance her existing stock.
Next trip will be with Valentines polymer. This a good trip to get done. And, any trip to the mountains is great. I do miss living in Gatlinburg, but I don't miss getting snowed in!
You can see my desktop in full swing of sorting, pricing and taking inventory the night before my trip to the gallery. Enjoy!

Desktop 11/06/2011

I'm happy to say the two galleries that carry my work are well into the season, and both need more new work. So, I pulled the bead necklaces I want to finish and the polymer fan brooches that have been waiting for the right time. Now would be right. I'll be spending my time finishing and prepping for delivery to the brick and mortars this week. Here comes Santy Clause. :-)

Desktop: November 3, 2011

I mentioned earlier I was going to take a break from the Christmas palette. These mini bottles were the most recently cured. They will join my growing collection of polymer covered mini-bottles. I did a mini vase, too. I like greens, purples and magenta together. I indulged. See the stack of canes I made last week. Well, here they are covering a 4 3/4" and two 4" glass mini-bottles. The bottom of the vase is 2" in diameter, the tallest bottle is 1 1/4" square and the wide bottle is 2" wide and 1 1/4" deep. I plan to finish these with a buff finish. Now, that I have cured nine mini bottles I have to commit to setting up my buffing table. Uncovering that is another post! LOL Enjoy.