Amanda’s Musings

Before I show you what I’ve been doing in between general every day life and bouts of sickness I want to mention again the SIM project for these two months. Perhaps you’ve noticed a bit of Christmassy stuff in our stores already, well its never too early to start gift buying!

A reminder that the money from my sales for September and October go to the work of Deborah House Shelter for Street Girls (92704) in Addis Abbaba in Ethiopia. I’ve already had three sales but the more I can sent to help these girls the better so feel frr to browse my shops here;

Polyclarific on Etsy
Polyclarific on Made It
Polyclarific on Wahmania

Now to some of the newest items, I had fun making the polymer clay beads over the last year, its great to see them finally made into jewellery;

Necklace

Bracelet

Necklace

There’s a lot more but this is a picture heavy post already!

Thank you to everyone who gave such generous comments about my last post, what you have said makes a lot of sense. There were a few stand out comments that have helped me to sort out a bit more of my thinking. Firstly, what Miss Dot said was a great summary:

“You have to decide if you are doing your work……force yourself to make enough of the “selling” stuff and when that is complete you allow yourself to have some fun things.”

What Pam said was good:

“Maybe if you continue experimenting with all the different styles, then abandon the ones you don’t enjoy so much to spend more time on the ones that you do enjoy, you may find that your “style” finds you!”

but I think Sarah managed to summarise it the best:

“I reckon 50-50. Obviously you want to enjoy what you make and if bright colours are your trademark then I say go for it. But on the other hand, I do see your dilemma as well…you don’t want to end up with stacks of stuff that hasn’t sold especially as you putting money towards such good causes. I say make a few things that appeal to you personally and even if they don’t sell, you’re still left with something you like. If the big sellers aren’t your fave, I reckon still make a few anyway cos if people buy them then at least the money is helping SIM projects.”

One of the reasons I give my profits to SIM projects is that I have a ‘heavenly’ focus (I am in no way commenting on any one else’s focus, everyone can focus on whatever they choose). I find it very difficult to be creative if what I’m making or designing does not contribute to the physical or spiritual assistance of someone else. I don’t know why this is but I find that my creative process is completely inhibited when I am designing something just to put it in a drawer or keep for myself.

I like the idea of making things that I can always keep if they don’t sell (or use as gifts). So, what am I concluding that I should do? I think I will decide on what are the best sellers and then, once I’ve made enough of those as stock I’ll focus on creativity. If things go well then I should find that the ‘cash-cow’ items will also be the ones I enjoy creating! In many ways this is no different to those artists who paint lovely aesthetic images for their bread and butter and then have another line of work for exhibiting.

Thanks for all your input everyone, and I’m glad you all liked my experimental pendant, it needs a lot more experimenting and work but it will give me something to play with! For those who wanted to see the whole thing, here it is:

I’m very impatient and easily bored when it comes to designing. Instead of coming up with a ‘line’ of jewellery or the like I find myself trying every style I can think of and ending up with quite a range of items that are not really related. I’m torn as to whether I should sit down and come up with a set style and try to figure of what makes my work look like me or if I should just keep on playing. Here’s a few examples…

This is an experimental pendant that I did last week. I cut a cane along the edges to see what it would look like and it turned out very organic. Should I do a few of these in different colours or not?

This is a cuff bracelet that I did a few weeks ago using a symmetrical cane that I made with scrap clay. Very different to my other work. I won’t be selling this one however.

What about this one? I could easily make a series of these using different colours and shapes but should I?

Or these thumbtacks. Very kitch and funky but should I go down the miniature food line just because its popular?

Should I put my hand painting skills to work and do more like this one? I did this a while ago now and it hasn’t sold.

Or maybe more wire wrapping, these seem to be popular.

Perhaps I should do more brightly coloured beads? Not everyone’s forte so they don’t always sell well but I love doing them and I’d love to be known for my brightly coloured work.

These sold very fast and I could pump out these and sell them fast but are they my style?

I could go on because I’ve done so many different styles but I won’t because I’m sure you get the idea. Perhaps I should choose a seasonal palette and go with that for a few months or something like that or maybe I should just keep doing what I’m doing. What do you think?

As promised I have had a look at the available SIM (Serving In Mission) projects to which I can donate my coming sales and have settled on a project choice.

Before I share with you my choice I had better give a summary of the July and August sales. The project for the last two months was Malawi Church Leaders HIV & AIDS Training (96352). $US40 was needed to train one Pastor. The total in sales was $US82.50, a lot less than the past few months but enough to train two Pastors.

Thank you to those who purchased from my shops these last two months, the money will be forwarded this week.

Now, on to the project for the next two months. I have decided on a very interesting work to send the sales money to this time, the work of Deborah House Shelter for Street Girls (92704) in Addis Abbaba in Ethiopia. Quoting the SIM website, the project is described as:

“Deborah House is a shelter house that offers these girls a safe place to sleep, Christian love, food, and care—by paying school fees, offering medical care, teaching about HIV and AIDS, and most importantly, teaching them about the love of Christ through Bible studies and compassionate care.

In order to bring more girls off the streets, the Deborah House staff is working towards reintegrating some of the girls into the community. This will be done by reuniting some of the girls with their families, by placing others in foster families, and by other methods.”

If you go to this page (click there) you can view a short video of the girls that have lived at Deborah House.

If someone can tell me how to put a google video on my wordpress blog I can add it here, otherwise you’ll need to go to the site to view it.

I’ve entered the September Challenge for the polymer clay artists guild of Etsy (PCAGOE) and one of our wonderful guild members (Pam) has put together a great slide show of the entries. You can see it here and vote for the entries here. Voting starts on September 1st (USA time) so pop over and take a look. The theme was ‘texture’ so here’s my entry called ’smooth is a texture too’:

This is a faux wood cuff bracelet.

Most Saturdays my wonderful in-laws take Kezi for the day and we get a lot of things done that are easier without a toddler tagging along. She loves her days at Granny and Poppa’s place and always comes home happy. This morning Michael dropped her off and took Luci so I had the house to myself for a couple of hours. That’s a pretty rare thing so I took advantage and spread myself out on the floor with all my jewellery findings and handmade beads.

In November I’m taking part in two market events. The first is the Melville Baptist Church (our church) Fair at which I’ll be selling my polymer clay items. The money from all sales at the event go to local chaplaincy so keep November 1st aside if you are in Perth. The second event is November 15th, the next Made On The Left market at the Hyde Park Hotel in North Perth (this time my sales will go to the work of SIM around the world). This will be my first really big event. The only other event I’ve participated in where I’ve sold my wares live is at a Curves market night last year.

I have exactly 9 weeks before the first of these events so I’ve been trying to do as much time snatching as possible and create stock. If I don’t have to empty my Etsy, Wahmania and MadeIt online stores I won’t. 9 weeks seems like a good amount of time but not when I have to balance family life, SIM work, events, travel and a myriad of other things in between.

So, back to today. I think I spent about 4 hours or so in total making things and then taking photos (this time for my own records, not for listing in my stores) and then more time editing the pics and putting them on my flickr page.

I had a really great time today and in total put together 7 necklaces, 1 necklace and bracelet set, 1 bracelet, 7 pairs of earrings, 2 phone charms and 7 bookmarks. I also got to go through my current stock and separate what I think I can sell at the markets in November. Now, if I don’t get to do any more time snatching this week then I won’t be so stressed!

Here’s some shots of today’s results:

Bracelet

Dragonfly Earrings

Purple Pansy Dragonfly Earrings

Inspired by India Earrings

A hoard of Bookmarks

Oceanic Necklace and Bracelet Set

Seashore Necklace

Keyrings (made these the other day)

Anyway, I’m not planning on listing any of these in my stores BUT if you see anything here or on my flickr (where the rest of today’s work is displayed) then contact me and I’ll let you know my planned prices.

By the way, today was the last day for the money from my sales going towards the work of SIM with Pastors in Malawi, I’ll be putting up the project for September and October sometime this week and letting you know the results of the last two months. Thanks for reading my blog and for those who comment, I get a little buzz out of it every time so thank you! : )

A little while ago I bought a great matching t-shirt and romper set (from this shop) for the girls. The t-shirt says ‘I’m Lucinda’s big sister’ and the romper says (you guessed it!) ‘I’m Keziah’s little sister’. Today was the first chance I had to put them on them and take them out. We actually got to church today after missing a few weeks due to sickness or being away (second time I’ve taken Luci) and I wanted to keep the outfits for a ‘good’ occasion (as in one that doesn’t involve food or mess!).

I managed to find (by accident) a matching pair of courderoy jeans in both size ‘000′ and ‘2′ when I was at Big W the other week so they look so cute dressed the same at this age. I’m not sure that I’ll dress them the same too often but I was just glad to be able to do it this once (something to bring out at their 21st!). Anyway, here’s the end result:

My Mum reckons that little Lucinda looks like Kezi’s doll in that photo. Cute!

I was also able to put Luci’s new Bitty Booties on her and they only just fit!! I think she’s going to be tall like her sister.

Yesterday morning a group of us Western Aussie Etsy sellers met up at the art gallery cafe for coffee before going in to see the Art In Bloom exhibition. One of our group, the very talented Liza from Lillybuds had some work in the exhibition and we all went to support her. I find it very important to support and encourage people, even if you don’t know them well. I’ve been at the receiving end of this many times and believe in the principle that its better to ‘give than receive’ (Acts 20:35).

The meet up was really great, I got to meet a few more sellers that I’ve only spoken to online and a lot more that I’ve met before. Liza’s work was beautiful too!

So, here’s the ladies who were there, missing only from below is Princesslotta.

Part group shot (me in green)

AliJ, TinyLittleGirl and Ramsdendesigns

EmeliaRose (Soop Design), GetSilvered ad Lillybuds

J2aney and Osier

Sinipuu and OddGirlOut

TeaforBini and DaraArt

Well, what a weekend this has been. I have had very little sleep although last night was a lot better than the previous two nights. This was related more to Keziah than Lucinda. She has had bronchitis for the last week and then on Friday night around 1.30am she started throwing up! We think that she has a virus on top of the bronchitis and the health line people think that her system would be down a bit due to antibiotics hence making her more vulnerable to viruses. Poor little girl.

Usually I do all the night feeds and shifts and Michael will get up with Kezi (and now Luci) around 6-6.30am and let me sleep for a bit longer but on Friday night/Sat morn he had to take care of Lucinda and her feeds while I took care of a chucking up Kezi!! We were both wrecked by Saturday morning. It was all looking on the up until just after bedtime for Kezi last night when she was sick again so we did what we had done the night before and set her up in the lounge room so I could sleep next to her. Michael would have done that shift except that he was preaching this morning so really did need sleep! It all turned out ok because Keziah slept most of the night, wasn’t sick again and I actually got sleep between feeds.

I feel fully initiated into double parenthood now. Looks like I survived. : )

In between all of this I have managed a tiny bit of time snatching and creativity. I think it keeps me sane. Here’s the results from the last three or four days:

Some bitty booties for Lucinda, she only just fits them though!

Various pendants, beads etc… that I’ve made this week and varnished

Varnished a large group of pendants and beads (ready for an upcoming show - stay tuned!)

I have realised that I have a lot on my plate for the rest of the year. Between my SIM responsibilities (newsletter coming out soon, emails, admin and working on our display for upcoming events), Creativity and my shops (I have 2-3 actual physical market stalls before Christmas), Home life (the usual cleaning, kids stuff, feeding Luci etc etc…, buying presents, arranging Kezi’s birthday party for next month etc…) and church life (I’m yet to get as involved as I’d like, I was either away or pregnant for most of our first year at our new church!), I need to be organised. I’m happy though to be no longer pregnant and able to have a reasonably clear brain again, its good to be busy!