Thank you all for following my blog! It has been a grand adventure so far, and I really appreciate all your support. As a thank you, I am having this giveaway!
The items being given away are the necklace shown in the top image, and an 8x10 print of the bottom. The necklace is made of taupe acylic faceted drop beads on an antiqued copper chain with some dusty pink glass pearl accents. The photo is printed William Turner paper and shrink wrapped on foam core. Both items were made by myself :) I hope you like them!
To enter, you must be a follower of this blog, but being a follower doesn't give you an automatic entry! To enter, simply leave a comment about which edition of my blog posts (Treasury Tuesday, Feature Friday or Shop News Saturday) you enjoy most!
Extra entries will be given for connecting with me on Twitter or Facebook. Just let me know you did so in a comment on this post. If you already follow or like me, you get the extra entry too, but please let me know you already follow in the comments. I have a hard time keeping track of everyone sometimes!
You get one extra entry for each site you connect with. You may also receive extra entries for sharing this giveaway (on your blog, facebook or twitter.). Again, just let me know you did so in the comments of this post. This means you can enter up to 6 times!
If you are having trouble posting comments or have any questions, you can e-mail me at virtuosotrainer@gmail.com.
As you may or may not know, there have been some serious concerns raised about buyer privacy on Etsy. Some of these concerns were far fetched, but some were, in fact, quite accurate. It was true that it was possible to see what buyers were purchasing on the site, but the problem is not fixed. Here is the article from Etsy CEO Rob if you are interested in reading about how they fixed the problem:
Yesterday and today there have been several articles reporting that purchases on Etsy are public. The articles have led to concerns by members of our community.
We want to apologize. We also want to set the record straight about how our product works and about changes we made today in response to your feedback.
Are my purchases on Etsy public?
No. As of right now, all your purchases on Etsy are private.
Were there changes to Etsy that made my purchases public?
No. The issue here is our Feedback system, which has not changed in six years. We do not directly publish your purchases on Etsy. However, when a seller leaves feedback for an item you bought, or you leave feedback for an item you purchased, we would link to the item. Our Feedback system has always worked this way; our original thinking was that it's important to know more about the transaction, to better establish trust in the marketplace.
We added the option to enter your real name when registering. Right next to this text field, it says: "Your full name will appear on your public profile. This is optional." Some people enter their name, some don't. As of right now, 25% of people (including us) have entered their real name.
It is the confluence of these two things that led us to this position: if you enter your real name, purchase an item, and the seller leaves feedback for this item, this purchase will be publicly visible via our Feedback system. Search engines index our site, which means this data can turn up there, too. It's been this way since October.
If nothing has recently changed, what's going on?
There is a lot of misinformation being spread right now. One blog post even has the outlandish title "Etsy Makes All Of Its Users' Activity Public." This is simply untrue. On Etsy, private conversations, financial information, billing data — all are now and have always been strictly private.
There was an article published on ArsTechnica that made clear how direct the connection was between using your real name on Etsy, buying an item and receiving public feedback for that item. The reaction to this article has made us realize that we need to change the way our Feedback system works, and this is what we’ve already done today.
Why make any changes to the Feedback system?
The article and response highlighted for us how we've outgrown our current Feedback system. It dates back to a time when payment for items was sent after completing the checkout process on Etsy. This meant that sellers needed to know how trustworthy their buyer was. We now require payment prior to completing checkout, so this issue has basically gone away.
We believe that markets are conversations. We want people to discuss what they purchase, although this will often mean discussing it in private. As such, we have removed the link from a piece of feedback (which is public) to the item that was purchased (which is now private).
What is Etsy’s view on privacy?
We take privacy very seriously. We work with TRUSTe and audit our privacy policies regularly, notifying all members via email any time a substantive change is made.
In the future, we may provide an option to share individual purchases publicly at the time of purchase. This will be completely opt-in and on a purchase-by-purchase basis.
We are deeply sorry for any confusion and will work hard to regain your trust.
What’s next?
We have been working quickly to make changes based on your input and opinions. We will continue to work on this, for what’s really needed is a rethinking of our entire Feedback system. In the meantime, all purchases are private, and feedback doesn’t link to items.
If you have any more questions or concerns, please email support@etsy.com or convo us directly on Etsy.
I have been creating all my life. When I was little, I preferred coloring over dolls. When I got a little older, I learned the joy of creating music. Most recently, I have found happiness in creating images through photography as well as creating jewelry. However, I have found something that inhibits my creating.
Worry. During college, I was so worried about playing the violin perfectly, not beautifully, that it wasn't even fun anymore. I would imagine that I wasn't fun to listen to either.
I work at a local violin shop called Whittlesticks, and the luthier there, Luke Heaton, has often said that he doesn't worry about what people think of his instruments. He puts all his knowledge, skill, and enjoyment into the creation process. His products are all totally beautiful. Click here for examples of his work.
I think all of us who create should take on Luke's attitude. Create, enjoy the process, and don't worry. Worry should not be a part of the creation process. To create something truly beautiful, I think one should put their soul into their work and the outcome will be beautiful. Perfect? No, but as the great violin teacher Frona Colquhoun said "Anything can be beautiful without being perfect, and it can grow more beautiful."
For more words on creating, visit this link. If you don't have much time, you can skip to the creating part :)
I have a group of good friends who get together now and then and do fun stuff. This is the second time I have helped them make jewelry, and the stuff they did this time was AMAZING! They all chose to do the same type of necklace, but they all looked very different from one another. They really reflected the girls' personalities.
The girls chose the beads they liked and the overall look they wanted for their pieces. Then I showed them how to make bead links with wire wrapping wire. That was the hardest part. After they finished making their links, I showed them how to attach them to the chain. The last step was to make a charm pendant, which we did by putting beads on an end pin (easy!), attaching them to varying lengths of chain, putting those on a jump ring, and then attaching the jump ring to a necklace. Then ta da! A necklace! They put their closures on the same way they put on their bead links. It was so fun!
This is a lovely little sister (in-law) of one of my friends. She wanted to model her necklace for my blog. I had a hard time getting a good photo with the available lighting, but she is still cute. She made a necklace with mostly purple glass beads with foil embellishment and some larger turquoise seed beads. Her charm pendant had matching beads plus a larger purple bead (which can be seen in this pair of earrings).
The necklace on the left was designed by my closest friend of the bunch. I love the design so much that I want to copy it :) It's so classy and lovely. However, I already had one in mind that has some similar things going on so I will refrain.
On the right is a necklace that is very different. I like it a whole stinking lot too. It is sparkly with a blue and silver color scheme. It looked nice and wintery to me. All in all, I was impressed with their creativity!
In this posting, I will explain how I got started with jewelry making. These techniques are not only great for beginners, but even with more complicated designs.
For this bracelet, I used nylon coated beading wires, glass beads, metal charm beads, 2 crimp beads, needle nosed pliers, and wire cutters. Here are the beads I used:
To start, decide how much wire to use by wrapping it around your wrist and deciding how tight or loose you want it, and then give yourself a couple inches extra so you have room to put on the clasps. Once you know how much you need, use your wire cutters to cut the length you will be using.
Next, you need a crimp bead and one end of your clasp. Put the crimp bead on your wire followed by the clasp, and loop the closest end of the wire back through the crimp bead.
Next, use needle nosed pliers (or a crimp tool) to "smash" the crimp bead and secure the clasp.
Now you can start adding beads to the wire. You can have a very symmetrical pattern, or string them at random. I did a mix between the two for this piece. To make it easier to put the bracelet on, it's best to use small beads on both ends. Be sure to put the beads on both the main strand and the one that was looped through the crimp bead.
Once you have put on the amount of beads you want, which should be enough to create the length you desire, put another crimp bead and the other part of your clasp on the wire. Loop the wire over the clasp and through the crimp bead as you did before, as well as a few beads to make it more secure. Then hold the clasp with one hand and use the needle nosed pliers to tighten the wire.
After you have finished this step, smash the crimp bead as you did before and snip off any extra wire. Then wear and enjoy!
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