Website Update – New Platform

Last year I decided to try again with running a website in addition to my Etsy shops. I committed to a six month plan with Weebly, and my bare minimum goal was to make enough sales to cover the fees. It took me almost the full six months, and only one of those sales came from someone I didn’t already coordinate with elsewhere, but it happened (and I appreciate every single order). 

So I’m going to continue running my website, but with a different platform. Weebly was easy to use, reasonably affordable, and had most of the features I wanted. But for a few dollars more (or less, depending on the timeframe) Shopify will give me a couple things that were missing from my site, as well as the ability to sell directly on Facebook and Pinterest.

It’s taken some work to get set up again, and to keep a website going in general, but I’m excited about having even more possibilities for my business. Customers will have more ways to shop, and I hope to be able to focus on doing my best work instead of competing with what’s trendy in a certain marketplace or trying to keep up with constant updates (I’m referring to Etsy, of course, but I will still be taking advantage of their built-in traffic). 

I’m starting with a monthly plan but would love to commit to a year as soon as I can afford it. This would save me a little money, but mostly it would motivate me to make it work. I think most of my failed attempts to branch out in the past were not so much about the platform but the fact that I wasn’t ready and didn’t realize how long it would take to see results. 

This year has gotten off to a rough start but I think things are going in a good direction and I hope I’m right. So if you would like to support my work, please check out The New Shop, share with some friends, or give some feedback here. If you’re a fan of My Facebook Page, you can use the discount coupon at the top of the page for your first purchase! 

Vote to Decide What I Paint Next!

I mentioned that one of my goals for the year is to finish one painting a month. This will be a bit of a challenge with my main focus being on selling jewelry, so I’m going to go ahead and say it counts when I finish a long-time work-in-progress or do a commission. Either way, painting is really important to me and I want to spend more time on it.

I also take A LOT of nature photos. Between those, my product photos, and photos of my cats, I constantly have a storage problem on my phone. But more to the point, I’ll probably never paint all of them and it’s hard to choose between them. 

So I started a photo album on my Facebook Business Page where you can vote on what I’ll paint next. No obligation to buy, of course, but you get to be involved in the creative process, and I get some help deciding what to do next. If you happen to be interested in buying, I can also do custom work.

If that sounds like fun, head over to my Reference Photo Album and start liking & commenting on your favorite photos, or share the album with your friends! 

New for Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is once again around the corner and this year, in an effort to narrow down my jewelry collection to items that showcase my best and most unique skills, I am offering all new items. These ones happen to feature a technique called caning. Please check out my Mountain Scene Cane post if you’re curious about the process.

These three sets are all made in the same heart shapes, each one with a different image. The glittery repeating hearts design is a classic Valentine’s Day pattern done in darker, more sophisticated colors. The iconic reflecting cityscape, my personal favorite, is great for couples remembering a special location such as where they met. And the mosaic/stained glass set, done in translucent pastels, symbolizes the idea that your heart doesn’t have to be unbroken to be beautiful. 

I think they are all subtle enough to wear throughout the year, and I also have a lot of floral sets available, which are perfect for the occasion and for Spring. And finally, for those hard-to-shop-for men in your life, I have a selection of cufflinks and tie/lapel pins featuring animals and landscape designs.

Shopping for romantic gifts can get a bit cliche at times – not that that’s the worst thing, I’d say love is allowed to be a little cheesy – but buying handmade is a great way to find something different. 

Please visit NoelleLewisArt.com or Pastiche Accessories on Etsy for more details on each item, and feel free to use coupon code “BETTER2GETHER” for $5 off any matching set. Have a lovely Valentine’s Day! 

New Year Goals

So I’ll be honest, I’ve never been much of a New Year’s resolution person. It seems like they’re usually unrealistic, and I don’t think the date on the calendar makes everything suddenly change (sorry if I’m stepping on any toes). But I do think it’s a great time for evaluating your life and setting goals. 

My husband and I have been spending some time discussing those goals. Joe decided to share his by going live on Facebook, whereas I’m more of a writer than a speaker. Either way, making a record of your goals can make them more effective. Sharing them does the same and can also encourage others.

So I’m going to briefly share some of my goals for the year here, starting with my business goals. 

1. Making $5000 in sales. I’m somewhere in between those who just started selling their crafts and those who actually make a living, so this number might sound like a lot or not much at all. For me, it’s a good balance of ambitious and attainable, and that motivates me. 

2. Finishing one painting every month (and hopefully selling one a month too). My focus has been on jewelry because it’s easier for me to make and sell. I love it, but I also love painting too much to keep neglecting it, however unrealistic it may be. There is something sort of tragic about seeing beauty all around you and not doing anything with it, or doing something and not being able to share it.

3. Speaking of jewelry, I want to narrow down my products to things I enjoy making and my fans enjoy buying. Because really, what’s the point of making a bunch of stuff that’s just one or the other?  I’ve always had a hard time with making up my mind, but I plan to work on getting more feedback, too. 

And now for the personal stuff (but not too personal at the moment).

1. Connecting with and supporting my husband. Our transition to civilian life has been challenging, financially and otherwise, but I’m finally starting to feel like our life is our own, and we’re in it together. I love that our passion for our businesses, however different, is something we can share. So it’s a great time to reconnect and figure out how best to help each other. 

2. Exploring the local area and/or meeting people. I am honestly pretty okay with spending most of my time at home, alone, working or relaxing. Especially having spent the last several years in a place that was very limited in terms of things I wanted to experience or get involved in, and people I could actually connect with. But having relocated, I might be ready to make an effort.

3. Adjusting my schedule. I kind of hate talking about this one. I love my (extreme) night owl life for getting creative work done in those silent, magical midnight hours, but things like errands and plans would be a lot easier if I had just a little bit more daylight.

So I guess that’s it for now. I may not be expecting a miracle year, but I hope I can make the most of it and work toward what’s important to me, and I wish the same for you! 

Do you have some professional or personal goals to work on this year? Leave a comment! 

A Quiet Christmas for Two

I figured I should go ahead and write about last Christmas before this Christmas gets here – my final “late holiday post.”

The holidays can be magical but they can also be stressful. I think as adults, most of us have fond memories of childhood holidays, but we can also feel a lot of pressure in celebrating them now, whether it’s due to our own expectations or those of others.

In the eight years Joe and I have known each other, six of them married, we’ve spent a lot of special occasions either separated or traveling, due to military life and wanting to spend time with our families.

December is also an extra busy month for us, as I’ve probably mentioned. I get a lot of orders, especially custom work, and we also have a birthday, anniversary, and of course Christmas.

So last year, as weird as it might sound, we decided to spend Christmas at home, just the two of us. I made a simple but festive meal for two, and we decorated gingerbread houses, exchanged modest gifts, and took pictures with our little tree and our big cat.

It may not have been exciting but it was relaxing, and I think it was good for us. I used to think we’d start building our own traditions once we had kids, but I want that for us too, because two is still a family.

So I don’t have any recipes or projects to share this time, but I wanted to share anyway, and I hope everyone can find their own way to enjoy the holidays. 

Wilson Living Holiday Expo & Giveaway Winner

We’ve lived in Tennessee for a few months now and, like most relocations, it has been a challenge for me. 

Our quiet house in the woods is actually surrounded by annoying roosters and loud dogs, I basically have no friends, and despite my efforts, I’ve found no successful opportunities to grow my business. Partly I am too tired and stressed out to try harder, but still. 

In addition, for whatever reason, my online sales have been weirdly slow, so I was having some doubts about my business when I stumbled upon a Facebook post about a local vendor event, the Wilson Living Holiday Expo. 

I immediately emailed and found that they still had a couple spots left. I wasn’t sure if I could afford it, but it was really well promoted and seemed too good to pass up. 

Once I’d committed, I had a busy week of event prep ahead of me, but luckily I’d already done a lot of the work for a previous event. 

I was also stressed about running my booth by myself for a day and a half. Most of all I really hoped it would be worth it.

But I got everything done in time, my husband helped out so I could take breaks, and I practically didn’t notice twelve hours pass on Saturday as I ran my booth on two hours of sleep, because everyone was wonderful. 

I made some money on top of my booth fee, I got email signups and potential custom orders, and I met all kinds of people who talked to me about their lives and told me that my work is amazing and that I am awesome.

It’s not that I never hear those things (though sometimes I doubt them when things get hard) but it’s nice to know I live in a place where more than a couple people actually care about what I’m doing, and that I can take a risk and not fall on my face. 

So I just wanted to share my experience and thank you guys for showing your support. 

And now for the giveaway results! If you visited my booth and signed up for email updates via my blog, please head over to YouTube to watch this video and see if you won a custom ornament! 

While you’re there, feel free to subscribe for future giveaways, craft tutorials, and more. Thanks for reading! 

Thanksgiving Dessert Recipes

As promised, here is part two of my late holiday post series, where I will share some Thanksgiving dessert recipes. It’s so late it’s just in time for this Thanksgiving! Can I pretend I did that on purpose? 

Last year, much like the year before, we invited some friends over for a sort of potluck style meal. I’m not all that social but I do like to be hostessy from time to time and I really enjoyed it. Living in a military town with most of our families miles away, it’s nice to come together to create a nice holiday experience for each other.

Everyone brought stuff, so I think we just made the turkey and a couple other things. I love baking and really wanted to try this Pumpkin Cheesecake Pie. I ended up looking up a couple other recipes and modifying it cause I like to mess with things, but this one is nice and simple. 

My other dessert is a little more extravagant and actually from Halloween, but it works for Thanksgiving too. I’d been watching Eugenie Kitchen on YouTube. She makes a lot of slice and bake cookies. They’re kind of like polymer clay canes, so of course I was intrigued. 

I was inspired to create my own design and, at the same time, decided to try a No Spread Cookie recipe from Pinterest. It didn’t work that well for this technique. They turned out okay but next time I would probably use a regular sugar cookie recipe or these amazing Pumpkin Sugar Cookies.

I get that making art out of food is probably not everyone’s thing, but if you like that sort of challenge, it can be fun. 
So there’s a few recipes and ideas; try one or all and let me know how it goes! I’d like to do some more experimenting myself but wanted to get these posts done at least before this year’s holidays! 

New Website (Again) With Store!

I’ve decided to try again with running my own website. And despite my last attempt’s failure, there are some important differences that give me hope for this one.

I’ve mentioned this before but just wanted to briefly state that while I appreciate Etsy for helping me get my business started, and I will continue to sell there for exposure, it’s feeling less and less like the best fit for my products.

On top of that, I decided a while ago to branch into two shops, which made sense at the time but may or may not have been the best idea. Because I want to keep parts of both shops, it’s difficult to undo at this point.

So I really wanted a place of my own, for potential customers to find all of my listings in one place and not lost in all the not-so-handmade competition.

I’ve tried a lot of other platforms and most were either inconvenient or unsuccessful. My first actual website fell into both categories, especially since it didn’t even have a store. As a “solopreneur,” I really needed something fully functional but easy to update.

So, with the holidays fast approaching, I decided on Weebly and set up my site, which does have a store. I’m still on Etsy and will gladly take orders there, but I hope NoelleLewisArt.com will be a great place for new customers to shop.

I’m also still figuring out how to integrate my blog without giving up WordPress, but for now it’s linked on the blog page and I will be using it to post updates as usual.

To kick-start sales, I’m currently giving away a free greeting card with each first time order (coupon code FREECARD). I have a lot of options that coordinate well with my art and jewelry, so it’s a great way to do some holiday gift shopping.

If you’ve stuck around through all the changes, thank you for your support, and I hope you will continue to find it worthwhile. And if you’ve just found me, welcome and please have a look around!

My New YouTube Craft Channel

Well, I’ve finally taken the plunge – I have officially created and posted my first YouTube craft video. This was no easy task due to my extreme social awkwardness and lack of tech skills, but it probably wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be either.

This upload, a Hobbit Hole Door Necklace Tutorial & Giveaway, was sort of a last minute acknowledgement of Hobbit Day (in case you’re not a “rings nerd,” it’s the birthday of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins, and a day for Tolkien fans to celebrate). But I’ve actually been planning this for some time.

I enjoy and learn from a lot of craft videos myself. I’m also hoping that being on YouTube will get some extra traffic to my shop. And now that I’ve decided to stop selling my fan creations due to potential legal issues, I thought I could at least share the ideas and techniques for you all to use, and send some of the finished pieces to people who will enjoy them. 

So I’m starting with my nerd themed pieces, but I hope to share some of my own designs as well, both to contribute to fellow polymer clay crafters, and for customers to see the process behind my products. Eventually I may also do painting  demonstrations or other arts and crafts. 

I’ve had to accept, at least for now, that my videos are not perfect. There are all different levels of professionalism on YouTube, but I’m sure a lot of people started as amateurs. I am definitely one of them in terms of editing. To be honest, I would rather spend more time creating new projects, but I definitely have room for improvements and suggestions. 

So I hope you’ll check out my video (I’m still taking entries for the giveaway!) and leave some feedback or requests. Do you prefer videos more polished or more casual? What kinds of items would you like to see me make? Let me know in the comment section! 

Moving Again: North Carolina to Tennessee

After about 8 years of service, my husband is getting out of the army. So after almost 6 years of marriage, we finally had the chance to choose where to live.

Of all the places we could have gone, we spent our entire military life at Fort Bragg. And while North Carolina is a beautiful state, Fayetteville was not a good fit for us.

People dislike it for a lot of reasons (and again I mean no offense to those who do like it) but most importantly for me, I found very few things going on that I wanted to get involved in – specifically opportunities for my business – and very few people who shared what I care about. I really did go there with optimism and try to make the best of it, and while I appreciate the people who supported us and will miss the things I did find joy and inspiration in, I spent a lot of time pretty unhappy.

Meanwhile for my husband, Army life was not really what he expected, and the gym he started didn’t exactly go as planned either. He did have a bit of an easier time making friends but overall didn’t enjoy the area much more than I did.

So when another couple presented an opportunity with a new gym in their home state of Tennessee, Joe was interested and I was skeptical. Our discussions went in circles so we finally visited.

I found basically nothing I was looking for in the area we were looking at, but somehow went home with thoughts of creating my own opportunities, something I never felt like I could do before while being so overwhelmed by my surroundings. For Joe, it made sense, with the gym, a National Guard position, and college classes. For me, it would be an adventure, and there’s at least a part of me that doesn’t mind that once in a while.

We were able to find a house through the aforementioned friends and, a few weeks after making a decision, here we are in Watertown. Moving has been a bit of a nightmare (isn’t it always?) and we are certainly still adjusting. I’m not in love with the annoying rooster next door, the limited internet access, or the half hour drive to my favorite craft store. But I don’t mind solitude, the mini horse down the street, lots of trees, and as always, the beautiful sky.

I do have my studio set up again, and will be checking out local possibilities and of course running my shops. I hope to either find new inspiration or finally get bored enough to catch up on all the ideas already in my head!

Thanks for sharing in my creative journey and I hope you will enjoy whatever I come up with next!

P.S. Subscribers, if your email was messed up I apologize, my finger got over-eager while I was still composing!