2007 Year In Review (Yes, another one!)

After seeing so many year's in review on TV,  in magazines, newspapers, etc., you were probably thinking, "Not Another One" when you saw the heading.  I know I was when I typed it, but I thought I would be remiss if I didn't take an opportunity to recap the year and it's highlights from an artistic/business perspective.  So, please, bear with me.

Here at Burning Scentsations, 2007 has been quite a year, and I hardly know where to begin.  

Diverse Year Of Beads

I've made a lot of different kinds of beads and jewelry throughout this year.  I've done raised florals, grape beads, encased beads, dot designs, frogs, stone-like organics--the list goes on and on.  I like the challenges that glass affords me and gives me lots of room for more improvement and experimentation.

Attending Custer's Last Stand Art Fair

In the beginning of the year, I started researching art fairs and found, that while I missed deadlines for a few of the shows, I was able to enter the Custer's Last Stand art fair in Evanston, IL.  It fell on two of the hottest days of the year, but we persevered in our tent and met lots of great people including our friend Richard who was also selling at the fair.

Bead and Button

In 2007, I took classes at Bead and Button and stayed in Milwaukee for several days and got really enjoy being in a very artistic and creative atmosphere.  The classes helped me add new techniques to my repertoire and interact with beadmakers and jewelry designers from around the world.  It was a fantastic time, and I cannot wait to go again this year.

New Etsy Shop

I opened my new shop on Etsy in July of 2007 after talking with several people about Etsy during Bead and Button.  It's been a terrific experience, and I've met several nice people and made some new customers through this site.

Art Of Beadwork Show

My most successful show came in early November when The Bead Society Of Greater Chicago had their annual Art of Beadwork show.  Although it was only 5 hours long, I met a number of great people and sold quite a bit of jewelry at the same time.  I cannot believe how well it worked out, and I'm looking forward to next years show.

Additional Shows

After that success, I followed it quickly with shows at work after being urged by coworkers to have an event there.  It was also wildly successful in just a short two-hour time span.  

I also had a couple of showings at the O'Reilly's Stained Glass, in Crystal Lake, IL that also helped boost sales for the year.

Lamp Of Luxury Blog

In late November, as you well know, I started this blog to help keep you up-to-date on upcoming events, new store items, and generally discuss topics that I think will be of use or interest to everyone who loves beads and jewelry.  Whether I've been successful or not in that task is up to you, my readers, but I will continue it into the New Year and see where it leads.

My New Mac

Burning Scentsations was able to purchase a new computer at the end of the year in order to help maintenance of the web site, reduce the time associated with taking pictures and getting them up onto the Internet for viewing.  It has already been a great help in getting my pictures loaded and organized much better and will continue as I work toward a re-design of my web site in the coming weeks.

Review Wrap-Up

This has turned out to be a much longer post than I had intended, but I'm very thankful that there has been so much to review.  As you can probably tell, it's been a great year here, and I hope it has been for you as well.  I couldn't do any of this without the support and patronage of my customers, and I am very grateful for each and everyone of you.  Thank you so much, and I hope to continue our relationship into the New Year.

Happy New Year!

Another Christmas Gone - New Store Item

I can hardly believe another Christmas has come and gone, but it has.  It's been a wonderful holiday for us here, and I hope it has been for you too.

The post holiday events, like playing with Christmas presents, shopping with new gift cards, took up a good portion of yesterday, but I did get one new set listed into the shop.

While I do hope to get the sets listed here in my blog first, it just does not always seem to be happening that way, and for that I apologize. 

Tribal Summer was added to my shop yesterday morning, and it is a rich set of 6 lentil beads in bright orange with turquoise blue designs.  It just reminds me of a fun in the sun, and I hope you like them too.  You can view the new set in my shop HERE.

I've got a couple more lentil sets coming later along with several new focal beads that I need to get cleaned and photographed before they can go into the shop.

At any rate, hope your holidays are going nicely and that you have a great rest of the week!  

If you  have any questions or would like to suggest topics, please let me know either through this blog or at the following links:

www.LampOfLuxury.com

www.BurningScentsations.Etsy.com

Have a great day!

Big MAC Attack Ahead Of Schedule!

Happy Holidays Everyone!  

Welcome to my first blog entry created on my new Mac!  

This year is wrapping up nicely here at Burning Scentsations. I was able to purchase my new computer a bit ahead of schedule, so I have more time to get it setup before I go back to my full-time job.

For those of you who may not be aware, I've recently converted over to Apple from being a die-hard Windows user.  I'm now the proud owner of a new iMac.  It's a breeze to work with and is really going to help me get some new features into my web site.

One of the main reasons for purchasing the new computer is to make the Internet portions of my business be less of a struggle.  For those who may not be aware, keeping up a web site can be a full-time job all by itself, which left me with little time for making beads and jewelry.

So when I have a choice between spending a few hours taking pictures, cropping and sizing them, uploading them, entering descriptions for each into the database and then reviewing the web site or just plain making more shiny, pretty things, I always make more shiny, pretty things.  It's just much for satisfying.

The tools available for making creative tasks simpler and faster on the Mac are just amazing.  I will be able to shoot and edit my own videos for demos on various techniques and let you all get a front-row seat to how beads are created.  I might even just video blog every now and then so you can see that I am an actual person and not a corporate puppet.

I should also be able to keep pictures galleries updated much more simply too thanks to iPhoto all while improving features for my readers and customers.

A complete overhaul of the web site www.LampOfLuxury.com will also be in the works in the coming weeks once I've found the web software that I'll be using.

If you'd like more information on my new computer (don't call it a PC or the Apple police will get you), check out this link HERE.

Tomorrow morning, I'll be back at the torch before heading off to work at the retail job in the afternoon for a few hours. I'll probably focus on doing some focal beads and bead sets, which I will be very happy to show you in the upcoming days.

As always, if you have any questions or want to suggest topics, please do not hesitate to contact me either through this blog or on my web site or Etsy store at:

www.LampOfLuxury.com

www.BurningScentsations.Etsy.com

Have a great night!

Holiday Crunch Time - Finding Inspiration

December is a busy month for us all, but for an artist who is also working two jobs (not including my glass business), it's especially problematic.

I haven't had any torch time in the last few weeks which is why I haven't been able to add anything new shop lately since I'm working a full-time day job and a retail job in the evenings and weekends. While I've been re-listing items, I really want to create some new beads and get back onto the torch.

How did this drought occur? Well, I had a couple of shows in November where I was able to sell some of the jewelry stock I have made over the past few months which is great. Getting ready for and doing the shows ate up my torch time for most of that month. Now that December is here, it is time to switch gears a bit and start getting ready for spring since jewelry designers need to make their items now in order to get their stock ready for the upcoming art and craft fairs.

Invariably, when I know a show is coming my inspiration disappears as the pressure rises. Likewise when the seasonal change for lampworking comes before the actual season itself. However, now that I've had my break from lampworking, I'm looking forward to getting back onto my torch tomorrow morning!

I've got a couple of custom orders that I will extend into bead sets for my shop, and I should have more hollow bead sets in bright spring colors also in the next week or so. I haven't made hollow beads since early October, so now it's time for new spring colors.

Anyway, send me happy thoughts tomorrow and hopefully there will be lots of new beads in the coming week!

If you have any questions or would like to suggest topics, I can be reached through this blog or through my web site or shop at:

http://LampOfLuxury.com/
http://burningscentsations.etsy.com/

Have great Day!