Tuesday Tech

Some people have asked me in the past how I get my blog to post to Facebook and Twitter. I thought I would take a few minutes to show you.

How to automatically update you Facebook Fan page with your blog.

• From your Facebook fan page admin site, locate your Notes application.
• Click on this application and proceed to your Notes Screen.
• One the right hand side, you will find your Notes settings. There will be a link that says "Import blog." Click this link to proceed.
• A new form will pop up asking for a URL. Simply enter your blog web address into the form and click the button that says "Start Importing." It is that simple!

This feature may also be used to import your Etsy or Artfire RSS feed. However you can only import one feed per page.

How to automatically import your blog or Etsy feed into Twitter.

• Go to Twitterfeed.com and create a new account.
• Create a new feed and login with your twitter ID.
• The next step is to name your feed and input your RSS feed address. Make sure to test the feed so you will know if there are any problems.
• Now click on Advance settings to determine frequency of tweets, tweet tags, ect.
• Click the create feed button. Now you are up and running.

I hope you enjoyed the Tuesday Tech. Have a Great Day and Don't forget to Stop by the Etsy Black Friday/ Cyber Monday Extravaganza. Find me here on Etsy!

Monday Business

This week in the United States we celebrate Thanksgiving. This holiday marks the beginning of the holiday shopping season here. Many people typically spend the Friday after Thanksgiving in one store after another looking for the perfect deal on a day known as Black Friday.

In recent years online merchants have decided to get on board the band wagon. It has been reported that the Monday after Thanksgiving is the largest online shopping day of the year.

So why am I giving you this background? To announce my store's participation in the Black Friday/Cyber Monday Etsy Extravaganza. I will be offering Free Shipping on all of my products during this time.

So how can you shop the Etsy Extravaganza? Simply search for the tags, "ETSYFREESHIPPING" or "ETSYHOLIDAYSALE".

Do you still want to do some Etsy Christmas Shopping, but perfer to keep it local? Have you ever used Etsy's shop local feature?

http://www.etsy.com/shop_local.php?ref=fp_nav_local

Simply type in your town and start shopping. Each shop is listed in the order of their last shop update or listing.

Hope you have a great Monday.

Wishlist Wednesday

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and the day after BLACK FRIDAY. So here are a few thoughts to get you started on your Christmas Shopping.

Looking for earrings for a special someone?

Treasures, teeth, and rocks.

I wanted to let you in on some good news. Today (11-05-09) I found out that I have been featured in 5 treasuries. Some of them may be gone by the time your read this, so I have take pictures for you to see.

On a slightly happy/sour note, I just found out that my 15 month old is cutting two of his molars. Happy because he will have more teeth to eat with, sour because teething sucks for a little one! He does not seem to be in alot of pain, but he has been fighting sleep. I guess that is because he has been in pain with no way to really let me know.

Ok on to the Rocks! In an effort to fight the angst from my show last weekend, I took sometime last night to cut some new stones. Here are some pictures of the stones I cut.

This one I have already wrapped. It will be raffled off as part of a fundraiser to raise funds for a needy family. We adopt a needy family and buy christmas gifts for them to try to brighten their holidays. Last year we created cookbooks and raised alot of money. Since we are trying to top last year's fund raiser, we have decided to hold a raffle with handmade items to be raffled off and this one will be on the prize list.

There are some days, you will just have to fall.

Everyone of use has one of those days. No matter how much we want to have a good craft show, something in the universe prevents it. Be it weather, traffic, or money, sometimes no matter how much you prepare, it will happen.

I had that happen to me this weekend. I had a great setup planned (knowing the preferred setup of this show), yet when I got there, the setup had been changed. This threw all of my setup off. I went from an L-shaped setup that allows for plenty of display, to a front table setup with little display room.

The rain and drizzle also helped to start the morning. I actually checked the radar before we left the house to decide whether to take my sidewalls or not. Since it was a localized shower, I assumed it would be gone by the time I started setting up displays. Wrong again! That drizzle stayed over the show for three hours.

So needless to say, I was in a damp mood by the time the show started. Then came the worst of it! The guy in the tent next to me was selling those annoying yippee dogs you find in toy stores at the mall. The ones the walk and go yip-yip-yip until they are cut off or the batteries die. You know the ones. He had ten of those things going ALL DAY LONG!

So I realize that my body language drove my few customers away. I was extremely annoyed. So much so that I actually called the promoter this morning and left a complaint. I rarely do that, as I am not really the type to complain to those in charge so much as I am the type growl about it and walk away.

The guy beside me was there to make money just like I was. However, I do believe that there was poor planning involved to stick handmade arts and crafts beside commercial junk like that.
I know in the past I have said check out the show before you do it. The sad thing is this was not my first time at this show. Sometimes someone new comes in and re-arranges a show and you don’t find out thing changed, until you get to the show.

So what do you do in this situation? I really wanted to pack up and go home, but I stayed. I did not complain at the show, but I did tell the promoter I will double check there setup plan from now own before I submit an application. (You can ask if the promoter plans to inter-space non arts & crafts with the handmade booths, or if they are separate.) In this case, if they are not in separate areas, I will probably not do this show again.