Yellow tulips

The people who lived in our place before us had planted some kinds of flowers in our front patch. For the last couple of years the only thing that showed up were big green floppy leaves. This year the conditions were just right and for the first time, we have gorgeous yellow tulips growing there. What a nice way to start the summer!

I must be getting better at sewing because I don't have to rip things out or redo them much anymore. It takes a lot less time to make something if I don't have to sew each seam at least twice :) It has taken a long, long time to get to this point and there are certain things that I can almost guarantee that I'll have trouble with - like collars. But I'm getting better at those, too, and over time I hope to improve even more.

I know that I've been obsessed with sewing and dresses (50s dresses..... sigh) but believe it or not, I have had a few ideas for some jewelry. Yes, really :) I haven't been making much of that lately, as I think you know. I'm hoping to get back to that, a bit, because I'd like to get the designs out of my head and constructed. Not that I've photographed or listed the last couple of pairs I made, of course, but that doesn't matter. The point is to get stuff made. :)

That's a lot of sales!

I mailed out the bracelet I made and another pair of earrings that someone bought today. I've had a few sales since the beginning of January - enough that I now have 96 sales since I first started listing things at the end of February. That's pretty good for a hobby :) Seriously, I never expected to sell that many pieces when I first started making things. Thank you all for helping me get to this point.

I'm hoping to get to 100 sales by the end of February.... I expect that I'll be having a sale in a few weeks :)

Nothing much, I'm afraid

You know how some people have nothing to say, really, and write blogs anyways? I'm feeling like that today :)

Seriously - I'm still working on the dress and vacillating back and forth between contrast fabric banding for the sleeves and neck. I've cut out several different possibilities and I still can't make up my mind. I've left samples in the sewing room so that the next time I go in there I can be surprised by all of them again. Hopefully one will jump out as the best option.

And I'm still taking photos. I'm about to try and edit about 40 of them: 10 different earring pairs on 4 different backgrounds (well, 3 - one of them developed a moire effect at this close-up range). I'm using a wide range of earring styles and components to really get an idea of how things will look if I use them.

Robin, you might be the winner - the backgrounds I'm looking at are different shades of cream and brown :) The darkest brown is handmade paper and it has sort of a reddish cast so it's quite warm. We'll see - I still have a lot of photos to edit :)

More and more photos

I'm still working on the photos for the items in my etsy shop. The light source over the jewelry brightens it considerably. I'm also photographing the items with the camera almost resting on the table on which backgrounds are sitting. This gives the photos depth and interest.

I'm still figuring out which scrapbook paper will make the best backgrounds. I have a great cream colour with some very faint swirls and stuff on it that works for a LOT of the earrings. I'm also looking at some other brown or tan papers and an aqua paper (all with faint patterns) that might work as well.

All of this photography is pretty tiring, that's for sure. I haven't edited any of the latest photos but I'll do that tomorrow and post them somewhere. After I do whatever sewing I'm going to do tomorrow, of course :)

Thanks! (and more about my etsy photos)

Thanks for your comments, everyone. I like the crispness of the photos and I do like the darker backgrounds. I've managed to add an additional Ott-lite to the front of my lightbox that brightens up the ambient light and item to be photographed. This definitely is making a difference in my test photos.

I don't think that the dark backgrounds are going to work for all of my stuff, though, as much as I'd like it to. It's really hard to get the right aperture and shutter speed for pictures on the really dark backgrounds - I'm finding that the background colours aren't staying true but are being washed out.

Michael's has a sale on most of their scrapbook paper so I bought a bunch today in different colours and patterns. The one we like the best so far looks sort of like sand. It's tan with some different shading in it and that's probably why it works for different colours. Plus the fact that natural colours or backgrounds tend to look good with a lot of things. It seems to work for some colours. The lightest-coloured earrings do need a darker background, though (they're still not popping off of the sand colour) so we'll go back tomorrow and see if I can find some darker browns.

Thanks again for all of your opinions on this: I really appreciate your help. When I have a few more test photos I'll put them up for you to see.

Oh - I've left the Jewelry on Etsy Team. I've been thinking of doing that for a while and since they left my name off the roster recently, this seemed like a good time to actually leave. Honestly, I've felt consistently ignored by the leaders and that the team wasn't doing much for me. Also, the organizer behaves badly in the etsy forums and has been muted at least twice from the forums for poor behaviour. Hopefully I'll find a team that is more suited to me.

Etsy shop photos

I'm still trying to think of ways of re-do the photos on my etsy shop. Not that my sales are suffering; I'm actually getting sales from people I don't know. But I think that my photos could be better. Someone has suggested using quilt batting but I'm worried that they would come out too grey - although it might work.

There was also a thread about this on etsy, and there are some tips there: http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5419864

I've been looking at etsy and trunkt sites that I like. Here are a few:
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5472288
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5043503
http://www.trunkt.org/client.listing_more.cfm/id/1452
http://www.trunkt.org/client.listing_more.cfm/id/2940
http://www.trunkt.org/client.listing_detail.cfm/id/1482
http://www.trunkt.org/client.listing_detail.cfm/id/718

Looking at these, they all have solid-coloured, muted backgrounds. Some are grey to black as well. The lighting in these is very similar in that they each appear to be using at three or four lights and at least one is a direct light. Right now, I'm using indirect lights only.

So what do you think? Any ideas as to how I could make my jewelry pop in photos?

Etsy shop things

Members of the Jewelry on Etsy Team are setting up a couple of buys for the team at different suppliers. Going together on a purchase means that we're able to get the deepest discount on the products which is quite nice :) I'm in need of sterling silver chain in certain sizes and I've been trying to figure out where I can get it the cheapest. I think that I've found a supplier from which I can get relatively inexpensive chain. It's not cheap, really, what with sterling silver trading at $15/oz.

I'm also looking at possibly changing my photos for my etsy shop. Not all of the current ones are good; I'm not happy with the pink or purple backgrounds, for example. I'd like the pictures to feel warm, with warm-coloured backgrounds. I need at least three different colours: a light one for non-light earrings, a dark one for non-dark earrings, and a medium one for everything in-between. I'm not sure what the best colour would be - any ideas?

I'm thinking of going with fabric backgrounds, but my first tries didn't work - the fabric weave created a moire effect in the thumbnails and I wasn't happy with that. I do have some microfiber fabrics and some velvets that might work better. What do you all think?

Almost normal

For the first time in a long while, I got up before my alarm like a normal person! I was awake at 9:30am and I didn't even have a nap today :) Not that I did much with my day, of course - mostly, I tidied things up in my jewelry area. I had a couple of sales that came in while I was in Edmonton and I got those shipped out today as well.

It looks like different people are planning some group buys from different places. This might b good for me as I need sterling silver chain. I don't have that much right now and I really need more of it. Before I order, I have to figure out which vendor will have the cheapest rates for what I want (or which ones have what I want at all). I'd like to start doing more necklaces, and those need chain. Hopefully I'll be able to get the chain I need at a reasonable price.

Finding suppliers

I need to buy some sterling silver clasps for a necklace I'm making. It turns out that the price of silver has jumped about $3USD/troy oz in the last month or so and my usual supplier has raised all of their silver prices by a ridiculous amount more than that. So I'm going back through old etsy forum threads, trying to find a supplier that carries these things.

Finding suppliers for stuff is tricky. For example, I ordered some swivel hooks from one place and rings from another place for the bag that I'll be making, and I haven't heard from either business. It's like my money has dropped into a black hole - the places looked reputable, so I hope they'll deliver, but every time I order from someplace new I worry that things won't go smoothly. Not receiving order confirmations doesn't inspire me with confidence, I'm afraid.

Not that things necessarily go smoothly with etsy sellers, either - about one third of the sellers from whom I've purchased have reminded me to pay after I've already done so. Then again, I guess it's better that they acknowledge me that way than not at all. In my ideal fantasy world sellers would always acknowledge that I've bought something from them and wouldn't mess up invoices or payment... but this world is far from ideal in more than one way.

Cleaning up

My sale is still on! I've even added new stock and expect to add a few more pieces over the next few days. Happy shopping!

I was thinking tonight that it was eight years ago this weekend that I moved here to Waterloo. I have such vivid memories of that time. I remember being so excited about school; I was really looking forward to starting over. Not that things were that bad before.... but the person I was before I went to UW is very, very different from the person I am now. In many ways I did start over by going to school, and while it was very hard, it was definitely a good choice.

I spent most of today organizing things. I finally re-organized all of my beads and put all of my purchases away. Finally. We also bought some small shelving units on sale for $5 (regular $15) and I'm able to keep my beads there when I'm not using them. My beads, craft show, and shipping paraphernalia take up much, much less space than they did before. The living room is quite a bit tidier :)

Making jewelry again!

For the first time in a very long time, I made earrings today. Before the last craft show in June I'd gone kind of overboard by creating lots and lots and lots of earrings. I'd hoped to sell a lot at that show but I was sick :( Anyways, since I'd worked so hard on jewelry before that I couldn't really make myself make more.

Until today, anyways. I was able to make six relatively simple pairs of earrings. I even listed three pairs so that I'd have some new stock for my sale. Tomorrow I'm going to work on the bag (the parts I can do, anyways) and when I take breaks I'll organize my beads. While I haven't made anything, I've certainly been buying beads :) I haven't put anything away and I have a ton of re-organizing to do. I hope that I'll be able to do that over the weekend and then work on the custom necklace and some more complicated pieces.

I'm very much looking forward to getting everything in its place and getting my work area set up again. I'm itching to do some more jewelry work for the holiday season. I'm glad that my jewelry dry spell is finally over.

Sale still on!

I sold some earrings - thanks! I have finally finished listing all of my stock so if you haven't checked out my store yet, now is a good time to do it :) There is a lot of variety in the earring colours and styles so there is something for everyone. For those of you that like the Waves of the ocean earrings, you might like these Green waves of grass earrings. They both have similar beads in different colours and evoke a similar impression in me.

I also have some lovely earrings using millefiori beads - these are glass beads that have flowers embedded in them. They are gorgeous when the light shines through them. I have these simple green ones, these other simple green ones, these yellow ones, these orange ones, these bigger green ones, and these aqua ones. As well, if you like interesting, fun earrings, have a look at these Flourite cube earrings. And of course I have quite a few simple glass earrings with two or three beads; these are about $10-20 each, depending on the number of beads.

Don't forget to look at my older stock as well; there are some beautiful earrings there. There are also a few necklaces that you might like. I like them, myself :) As I've said before, there is something for almost everyone in my store. Please note that all the jewelry in my store is arranged by dominant colour of the item. Now go and shop :)

The sternum pain is flaring up a bit and the skin is definitely red. There's a red rectangle in the center of my chest; it looks strange. I hope it goes away soon. I'm definitely keeping it out of sight so that the sun doesn't get at it. I'm also more tired than usual, but I'm managing to get by. I hope tomorrow is better.

A long treatment day

The ultrasound went well. The technician definitely got the tender spot, so we'll see if anything shows or whether I just have aches and pains from getting old. I'm thinking it's just aches and pains :) The results should be at the doctor's in five business days, or by Monday, July 9. I'm not worried.

It turns out that I'll only have one radiation treatment, and that was today! The pain might flare up over the weekend but should subside and get even better within 10-20 days. I can hardly wait :) Funny, the radiation technician treated me up in Thunder Bay back when I had my first cancer. This is a small, small world. They did say that I might feel tired, which I do. I hope that this goes away.

I have listed over half of my new stock. My goodness, I have a lot of it!!! Anyways, check out my store - there are lots of new and exciting pieces; I'm pretty sure there's something for everyone :) I will add the rest tomorrow. I hope you all enjoy the sale - don't forget the secret blog sale mentioned below as well!

Sale has started!

My etsy store sale has begun!! Buy any one item in the store and get another item of equal or lesser value for half price! Just put JET in the notes to seller box and wait until I send you an updated invoice before paying. The sale lasts until 6pm July 2, 2007.

I also have a special sale for my faithful blog readers: buy the Hand-beaded evening purse and get up to four free pieces of jewelry (maximum value $100)! To get this secret sale, put JET BLOG in the notes to seller box and wait for me to send you an updated invoice before paying.

I am adding new items even now and hope to have everything added by tonight. Happy shopping!!!

Tomorrow is a big day

Thank you to everyone who gave me their preference for sorting the earrings. I'll be sorting them by colour. I really appreciate your input!

I was able to get all of the first pictures and about 2/3 of the black background pictures edited. I still have to edit the ruler pictures, which shouldn't take too long. I hope to get the pictures all edited after the ultrasound tomorrow and before the appointment with the radiologist. I think I'm scheduled to have my first radiation treatment at 1:15pm tomorrow so I'll be able to spend most of the afternoon tomorrow adding new jewelry to my store. I'm pretty excited about that - I have some really great pieces that I think you'll all like :)

My sale will start sometime tomorrow - I'm a part of the JET team on etsy and we're all having a sale over the weekend. I'll post in my blog when the sale begins :) I'm actually glad that I have this sale and the new pieces to focus on because that means that I'm not nervous about either the liver ultrasound or the radiation :)

The retreat is over

I don't know what was wrong with me today, but I was not in the mood for the retreat today. I think I may have been the only person who was more annoyed leaving than I was going in. The days are pretty intense and I was really tired because the days started at 9am. I'm also having wicked pain problems - I was taking Percocet all day long.

I did get stuff out of the day today - in particular, there was one visualization that I found very powerful. Basically, while relaxing, imagine that you are holding a bowl in your lap. Any kind of bowl is fine. Imagine the love and light from inside you filling the bowl so that the bowl is now filled with light and sparkles and good. Then take each of the dark, negative emotions that you're experiencing, one by one, and drop them into the bowl. Let the sparkly light and love surround and overcome the dark negative bits until they're all gone (they said to imagine them swirling together, but I saw the light surrounding the dark bits and making them smaller until there was no more dark). Once that happens and the bowl is filled with sparkly light only again, lift the bowl and pour the light back into you. I really liked the cleansing aspect of this visualization. I felt energized and whole afterwards in a way that I haven't felt in some time.

Other than that visualization, the day pretty well sucked for me. At one point we were talking about our greatest fears.... mine, in case you were interested, is that I will lose the ability to reason or think logically; that I will lose my smarts, as it were. This fear is real because this happened after treatments for my first cancer. Anyways, someone in my group gave me this look when I said this and said "you're afraid you won't be smart anymore?"in this shocked, "I can't believe you just said that out loud" kind of a voice. Like I should be grateful for any smarts I have.

I explained that I'm not all that smart, but that I identify with my intellect, logic, and reasoning abilities. I use them in every aspect of my life, and I'm terrified that they'll go away again because I wasn't me when it happened before. I kind of felt like that when the person made that comment they were thinking that I'm some snob who's better than everyone else. I'm not - wanting to be my smartest is no comment on anyone else or their abilities - but I don't know if that person got that. Sigh.

I was really glad when the day was over. I think Ian got some interesting things out of it - if nothing else, the doctor who facilitated the event validated our view that you have to be your own advocate in this health care system. I don't know that either of us would go to one of these again, though. I've had enough support in that kind of environment to last me a long, long time.

When we got home, we watched 5ive Girls. It was pretty good in a cheesy, low-budget horror movie kind of way. I'd recommend it if you like those sorts of movies. There's not much gore, and the story is kind of interesting.

On a much more positive note, this weekend, the JET members on etsy will be having a sale. Each member picks their own sale; mine will be "Buy one, get one 1/2 off (of equal or lesser value)". I'll be adding a LOT of things to my store this week. So if you were thinking of buying something for yourself or for someone you know, I'd encourage you to buy it next weekend as you'll be getting a fantastic deal!!! :)

Shopping and creating

Oh, how I love shopping! Today we went to this really cool store that has new and used retail fixtures. I think I may have mentioned before that I was looking for a mannequin or something on which I could photograph my necklaces. People say that they want to see necklaces actually on a model, but I'm too short to show necklaces properly. The store had new hanger mannequins to the waist for about $15, but I was able to get a used "regular" fabric-covered bust mannequin (to the hips) for $50. The bust on the hanger mannequins showed more than I was comfortable showing in my photos, and I felt like I got a good deal on the one I bought. It's being shipped via Greyhound to Ontario; I can't wait to use it :)

I saw my sister and her family today. I took all of my beads over and offered to make them things like bracelets and cell phone charms. I also said that they could keep any beads that they liked. I made two bracelets and four cellphone charms (one of each of them) out of the beads that each of them picked. They looked cool; all of them had very good taste. I'd never made anything like that before, so I was kind of making it up as I went along. I was very pleased with the result. I wonder if there's a big enough market for cellphone charms?

In Edmonton!

I managed to make it to Edmonton! I tell you, traveling on WestJet is so much nicer than traveling on Air Canada. On Air Canada, as you may recall, they turn the overhead lights on when they're doing dinner and beverage service during a redeye flight. Westjet didn't! They kept the overhead lights off which was a much more pleasurable experience. I was actually able to sleep uninterrupted for a couple of hours, which I liked.

It's been raining here and I miss the way Edmonton smells in the rain. It's so fresh and clean and green and, well, nice. I don't know how to describe it, except to say that it smells nothing like Southern Ontario in the rain - which has a wormy, pollutiony smell. I'm very much looking forward to my stay here. I don't know what my days will have in store for me yet as I've done virtually no planning, but I'm prepared for almost anything. I certainly brought enough clothes!

I also brought all of my beads. Ummmm, they take up a pretty big suitcase and weigh about 40 pounds altogether. That seems like a lot of beads :) Even though I don't need to make anything because I have so much stock, I still want to be able to make things. And I figured that people here might want to take a look at my stash in case they want custom orders or something :)

Tomorrow's the show

I think I have everything ready for the show tomorrow - I've tested out the display, got all the jewelry categorized and priced, and loaded up the car. It's supposed to be clear and 24C tomorrow so it should be a nice day for an outdoor craft show. I'm a little nervous, of course; between yesterday and the show tomorrow I was snappish all day. I'll let you know how things go tomorrow :)

Bone scan day

So I had the bone scan today. A bone scan, as I'm sure you remember, has two parts: the injection of a radioactive tracer into me, which settles in the bones, and then the scan (much like a geiger counter) three hours later. They had trouble with the injection - I guess she got the needle in and then the vein disappeared, so she had to poke my veins twice. This is not a surprise, as my veins don't like to be poked.

When I came back for the scan, they said that they would do an extra close-up scan of my sternum because that was the area that was hurting. They did do this extra scan in the same orientation as the last time, on the left side of me. The top of the field was around my shoulder and the bottom was around my stomach.

But then they did another close-up on the right side of my chest. The top part of the field was at about underarm level. This means that they weren't just doing a scan of the sternum from the other side, you know? And the scan was completely unexpected; they'd said that they would do a closeup scan of the sternum, but they didn't mention a second scan.

Needless to say, I freaked out and am still freaking out. I'm scared, and I didn't think that that was going to happen since I suspected that I had more mets anyways. Now the idea that there might in fact be something going on scares the crap out of me. I don't get my test results until after I come back from Edmonton, so I have to live with this for just under two weeks. The best thing I can do is to put this out of my head until the night before I get my results back. And I will do that, but today I need to work through the fear. I hope that none of you ever experience this kind of fear - it makes my knees weak, my heart pound, and I feel like I'm moving in slow-motion.

Today we also did bloodwork including the usual complete blood count and my CA 15-3 tumour marker. I'll get those when I'm back from Edmonton, too.

The pain hasn't completely decreased. I hope that it goes away before Monday, but it's not really showing signs of doing that yet. It's still quite painful at times, although I guess it'll take some time to get used to the new dosage. I'm a little light-headed and woozy at times, too, which will be a direct result of the new dose.

The best part of today was that we worked on my display for the show on Saturday. So far, I'm liking the way things are being set up. I think I'll have less space than last time, but I think I'm using the space better. I hope that I sell lots :) If you are in the Hamilton-Ancaster area on Saturday between 9:30am and 3pm, please stop by. I have a lot of stock that hasn't been posted on my store :) You may find even more things that you like in person!

Doctor days

You might be wondering why I didn't post last night. Well, around suppertime, my back started to get really woogly and so I took a clonazepam. Bam! I was out like a light. Today I took one by accident and am abut to fall asleep. This entry will be short.

I saw my family doctor and he's increased my Oxycodone from 360 mg/day to 480mg/day. That may not seem like much, but 3 weeks ago I was taking 280mg/day. I can't believe how much the pain has gone up :( My doctor says that if my pain isn't better by Monday I have to go in and see him before I leave.

I have my bone scan tomorrow as well as my bloodwork. I get the results in two weeks.

In preparation for the show on Saturday, we're getting the display together. I decided that I wanted a black background. Originally I wanted velveteen, but after some thought at the fabric store, I decided to get some black linen-look polyester fabric. It drapes really well and has a bit of a sheen to it, making it very attractive. I still have to get all of my things priced and inventoried, too. Guess what I'm doing tomorrow and Friday? :)

If you haven't already, please have a look at my treasury - it's the best I've ever done. Enjoy! I love it so much!

Shopping and wire

I had bought a couple of skirts from H&M recently, as you may recall. Well, I loved them so much that I convinced Ian to go back so that I could buy more. I ended up buying two more black skirts and two black and white skirts. I know it seems unusual to have three identical black skirts, but I love the skirt so much that I've been wearing it every day. A person probably shouldn't wear the same skirt or pants every single day, so this way I can switch it up.

I also bought a bunch of wire today. I was running out and so I managed to get a spool (75 yards) or 24 gauge and a spool (120 yards) of 26 gauge sterling silver. I use a lot of the wire because I wire-wrap the closure on every bead, making the items more secure. It requires a lot of wire for complex projects and sometimes I make a lot of mistakes so I waste wire accidentally. At least now I'm going to have enough wire for a while.

I'd also ordered wire from petitespoon on etsy; I got a mixed bunch of wire from 16 gauge all the way to 24 gauge. The lower the number, the thicker the wire. I'm excited to have these new wires; I've never worked with the lower gauges before and can hardly wait to make some interesting designs.

Creating, creating, creating...

I spent some time today making more jewelry. I now have almost 100 pieces which I think will be almost enough. I want to make a few more necklaces, of course, and maybe a few more earrings. I'm pleased that I'll have enough stock.

I'm also thinking about the displays. I bought some similar things to the display things I used last time; I think what I'll do is string black wire back and forth to make sort of a chicken-wire or sea effect and hang the things off of that. At least, that's my current plan; I hope it works out. I expect to be making jewelry until Wednesday and then spending Thursday and Friday (when I'm not doing scans and stuff) working on the displays. I think that'll be an effective use of my time.

The show on Saturday is in Ancaster, ON and runs from 9:30am - 3pm. I've put a link on the side for you; there's more information on the June 9 part of the events page.

Working on my jewelry

We spent most of the afternoon looking for a card table for me to do my jewelry on in the living room. You wouldn't think that it would be difficult to find a boring thing like a card table, would you? There was this one at Linens 'n Things with 4 folding chairs for $100, and we had a 20% off coupon, so that would have been a good price. Our local Linens 'n Things didn't have them, though :( We ended up buying a folding camp table that's 2 1/2ft square instead. It's got slats, but it works ok. I think I'd love the other one we couldn't find, but, well, that kind of thing happens.

I am also thinking about the upcoming show. Three of us are sharing a 10ft square space. One person will bring a cover thingy for us to stand under, and the tables will be arranged around the front and sides of the space, I guess (unless it rains). I don't expect to get the front table, so I don't think that I'd get more than about 2ft at the front and about four to six feet up the side, which is plenty for me. I definitely want to differentiate my work from everyone else's.

I'm thinking of getting some garden edging things and maybe a wire obelisk for the back to hopefully make a statement. I'll definitely need to put some thought into this - even if people really do spend a lot of money there, I want to have a nice and elegant looking display. Any thoughts?

Treasury and more crafts

I got myself a Treasury; I am again showcasing the Jewelry on Etsy Team (JET). The treasury is here and is currently on the front page of the treasury (although that won't be true forever). There's so much talent there; I'm honoured to be part of the group. Of course I love my jewelry, too :)

I'm still working on pieces for the show on June 9. I don't have nearly enough; right now I think the count is at about 65 pieces, and I should have double that. I suspect that I won't have enough pieces. That's ok, I guess - I'm sharing the booth with two other people, so in the unlikely event that I sell out, the other two can fill up the booth. I highly doubt that I'll sell every single piece I've made, though, so I think I'll be ok :)

Less tired

Ian and I are trying to make sure that I both get to sleep and get up at the same times each day. So far, I've been going to bed at about 10:30pm and getting up around 10:30am. Except for last night, when I went to sleep around midnight and got up at 10:30pm. I'm a little tired today, but I don't feel quite as exhausted as I used to. Going off of the clonazepam was definitely the right thing to do. I'm hoping to get up a little earlier each day until I'm able to get up at a more normal hour.

I also managed to get some photos taken and edited and put some new stuff up on my etsy store. I've got a ton of stuff that I've made in preparation for the craft show on June 9. I still need pictures of them :)

I think I've got it

Ok, I've re-taken photos for each item in my etsy store. I'm using very pale pastel backgrounds in ivory (pale yellow), green, aqua, purple, and peachy-pink. I'm much happier with these photos because I think that the earrings and necklaces "pop" more than they did with either the white background or the darker, more saturated backgrounds. I think I need to lighten a few more just a little bit, but overall I'm happy. What do you think?

I also think that my pain has turned a corner. It was really, really bad last night and I didn't get to sleep until quite late. Since then it's been well under control. Let's hope it stays that way :)

Overall, it's been a pretty good day. I'm looking forward to actually making some things tomorrow, though - photographing and editing takes a loooooong time.

More on colours, pain, and shopping

Thank you for your comments and feedback on the colours in the photos. I'm not going to please everyone, I'm afraid, but I would like my items to look appealing to someone looking to buy things like mine. I've retaken some photos and tweaked some others; what do you think now? I tend to think that coloured backgrounds are preferable to white backgrounds, because the white goes grey in the photos. However, I'm having trouble with the colours, as you can probably tell.

So, here are some more questions for you, if you don't mind: have I got the "right" colours? I like the colours I'm using as background, but I'm wondering if they're the best they can be. Do you think very light primary colours or very light secondary colours (for either paint or light) would work better? Or some other colour combination, given the colours that I usually work with in my jewelry - pink, aqua, purple, and green. Thanks for any feedback you can give me; I'm very grateful to you for any help you can provide.

I spent the afternoon shopping; I had wanted a few new tops for the season. I went to Winners, where I bought two dresses: I have one of them in black already (it's a t-shirt dress that is super-comfortable and looks nice) and I bought a duplicate in pink. The other dress is brown and flowy and looked really nice on me. I wandered over to Mark's Work Wearhouse afterwards and bought seven tops, all on sale. Finally, I bought some Physician's Formula makeup because it's 40% off at Shoppers Drug Mart this week :) Whew!

My pain is better controlled than last week but not entirely under control because I do have spikes of pain occasionally. They aren't as prolonged or as painful as before, so I'm not taking percocet for them. Realistically, I should take the percocet because I have breakthrough pain. Thing is, I don't like the percocet; they make me hazy and stupid. I don't really know what to do to get this pain totally under control; my doctor said that the pain should go away and that I should be able to start lowering my painkiller intake. Ummmm, the pain is not going away. Sigh.

I have stopped taking the clonazepam at night, I'm drinking more water, and I am establishing a regular routine of going to sleep at about 10:30pm and getting up about 10:30am. I'm having about a half a cup of caffeinated coffee at 11am; I expect this to go down. I am finding that I'm less sleepy during the day (taking into account the increased painkiller, of course). There are a couple of other things I want to try, too. I like being less tired.

Pain, creating, and cancer

So far, increasing my oxycontin hasn't helped :( For the most part, the "spikes" of pain are less frequent and not as painful, but my sternum is aching at a higher level of pain than normal all the time. This makes me cranky. The extra percocet I'm taking makes me sleepy. I know things will get better, but right now the pain sucks. If you've had chronic pain before, then you know how difficult it can be to live with chronic pain. I'm getting tired of it, I'll tell you.

I am still managing to create things, though. I made a beautiful pair of garnet and freshwater pearl earrings and a matching necklace today. The garnet is high-quality polished, transparent, marquise-shaped ovals. As long as I can still make things, I'm (mostly) happy.

There is an excellent interview with a doctor about metastatic here. The doctor talks about coping, emotional impact, differences in treatments based on estrogen-receptor status, how they do those tests, and pretty well all of the different treatments available. There are a lot of pages with an index on the left and everything is explained in a very clear way with user-friendly language. I'd strongly recommend that you read it if you have any questions about my diagnosis or treatment. The doctor explains everything better than I can.

While reading this article, please keep in mind that I have ER-positive, HER2-negative, metastatic breast cancer and that I was premenopausal when I was first diagnosed with the bone mets. I am currently taking Femara (an aromatase inhibitor) and I'm taking a bisphosphonate. I had my ovaries removed for treatment, making me postmenopausal. I did take Tamoxifen for the first cancer but was taken off it early due to crystals in my corneas - this is a sign of toxicity, which means that I won't be able to take it again.

Back to normal

I'm starting to feel more normal now that I'm not busy all the time :) I can sleep in as late as I want to tomorrow, and I'm actually working on new things, which is good. I missed being able to just go to my bead tackle boxes and playing with stuff to put it together.

I'm still thinking about the photograph and colour issue. I have to start taking some test photos. I don't think I would change anything that's already up on my site, though.

I am still really tired these days, which kinda sucks. I've been getting up before 10ish and having a nap every day. Ian wakes me after 3-5 tries so that I don't sleep too long. This being sleepy thing isn't so fun, though.

More on colour

As you can see by the banner above, I have joined the Jewelry on Etsy Team. I have to add a tag to all of my jewelry :) I'm hoping that the team will be used to help promote our collective jewelry outside of etsy.

Thanks for your suggestions about another background colour for photographing light-coloured jewelry. I'm already using black velvet to photograph my hanging earring pictures, so I don't think I would use black velvet for the other ones. I would consider purple - especially since I have purple fabric left over from the purse. If I can use things I already have, that's better :)

The most important picture is the first one that shows up in the search engine and is the one you see in the shop. People who have good photographs of their jewelry on etsy do not necessarily use the same background colour for every piece, but use colours that somehow all work together because they're the same tone, hue, or saturation. So I'm thinking that if I use a colour other than white, then it might not look cohesive to use white in the photos. I'm not sure. I might need to sit down with a colour wheel and see. I do have deep rose, deep green, and deep purple fabrics, but I might want a yellow, too, if I used those so that the photos didn't get too dark. What do you think? What do you think is the maximum number of background colours I could use? And what should those colours be?

In very sad news, a former colleague of mine from my current company has died. He was admitted to the hospital on Saturday and was diagnosed with leukemia. It seems that he was bleeding into his brain; he died 4 days later. In that time, his second child was born, but he never knew her because he was in a coma. He was 31. I'm so tired of cancer.

Purse and craft news

The purse has gone to its home now. I was kinda sad to see it go, because it is so beautiful. I hope the recipient will love it as much as I do. This purse turned out to be very gorgeous and very special, and I hope the recipient puts it to good use. It sounds like I'm giving up a pet, doesn't it? :)

I had ordered a whack of beads for $1 a strand from Fire Mountain a while back but I only got around to sorting them today. I got three strands of labradorite tubes and nuggets! It is such a beautiful stone because the greenish colour matches a lot of other things I have and the blue flash makes it so special! I know anything I make with these will be difficult to photograph. I think I also got a strand of white moonstone.... it's got an inner glimmer and softness to it that I associate with moonstone.

Speaking of photographs, I've got necklaces that have been photographed in the same way as the earrings. I'd like to keep the "spilling out of the vase" look, as I like it, but it doesn't work as well for thin silver necklaces - they get lost. Do you think a different background colour would work? Like a purple, or a blue? I have this problem occasionally with earrings; if they're white or ivory then they don't show up. I'm willing to introduce another background colour or two, but I'm not sure what tone or colour they should be. Any suggestions?

The show

I had a great time at the show - unfortunately, there were almost no customers :( Only about 15 people came through the door. I guess the organizers didn't promote the sale enough and so no one sold anything. I did make one sale to my tablemate, who is getting married next week :) She bought these earrings (they're uncropped and un-retouched, so they normally look better). When I made them, I thought they'd be perfect for a wedding :) At least I covered my cost for the table.

I did have a good time, though - I met new people and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Some people did come to my table, and they liked my jewelry. Some necklaces were popular, as were some earrings. I think that if there were more customers I would have sold a LOT more. You can see pictures of my table here.

I did sign up for another craft show too :). This one is in Ancaster on June 9 as part of their Heritage Days festival. It's an outdoor show and part of the day includes a parade and whatnot. Everyone says that people buy things there; apparently the people in Ancaster have money and will spend it. I will need to make more things, of course, but I hope to do well there.

Everyone packed up early and we stopped by Robert Hall's shop to buy a couple of strands of beads. He makes pewter things and has a rock shop, too. They were having an open house this weekend and had studio tours while we were there. We didn't go on one as we wanted to go home for a nap :) We were up way too early this morning for the show.

All in all, while it wasn't a particularly successful day, it was still fun. I'm glad that I had the experience of subbing in for my mom at craft shows, back when she was about my age and making quilted items and other art. That experience gave me the confidence to do my own craft show, and it meant that I wasn't too fazed by the fact that there weren't many customers and that some of them ignored me. Thanks, Mom!

Getting ready for the show

Except for when I went to bellydance class, we spent the whole day getting ready for the show on Saturday. Ian took photos of the things that I've made and not photographed and he made all of my earring cards!!! I really appreciate all of his help because without him, I wouldn't have time to get everything done. His help means that I'm not as stressed about finishing everything as I would normally be at this point.

My original idea for earring cards for the display didn't quite work as planned so Ian engineered another solution. I'm quite pleased. I don't have stud earrings and so all of my earrings hang free from the card. I have rubber backs for all of the earrings and the card design is such that people can get the card and earring off of the display but it won't be easy to steal them.

I made all of four necklaces. I'm still new at making them, technique-wise, if it doesn't involve chain or a toggle clasp so it took longer than I wanted it to. I'm pleased with the ones that I made, though.

Tomorrow I am getting up early and working on necklaces (plus maybe one or two pairs of earrings :) until 1pm. After that, I'll get everything ready for the show, including a sample display. If there's time afterwards, I'll make more necklaces and/or earrings :) I'm not going to count on there being time, though, as these things take longer than you might think. I have to number all of the earrings on their cards to correspond with their bags. The composition of each piece will be on the bags. I'll stick a label on the earring card with the prices.

The show itself is being held at the Pauline Johnson Collegiate in Brantford from 9:30am to 3pm. It'll be a short-ish day, but I'm sure it'll feel like forever to me. I hope I sell some things. I'm starting to get nervous and excited :)

Tomorrow we leave for Las Vegas!

Ok, ok, I know that you're dying to see the first necklace I've ever made... there are some pictures here. My hair should look better, since it was styled today, but I put it behind my ears. I realize that the necklace isn't everyone's taste, but I like it for evenings out. The dress in the photo is one that I bought specifically for Las Vegas. I thought I'd put a note about it in my blog, but apparently I didn't.

The dress is cream silk with black dots on it. It's a sleeveless sheath dress and it looks like it was made for me. Really, it is figure-clinging; Ian complained about the cost of the dress (only $50) until he saw it on me. It's very sexy :) It doesn't hurt that I've been working out and bellydancing for the last 3 months, so my tummy looks pretty awesome. I think I'm going to wear this figure-hugging sexy dress with my sky-high shoes (the ones I wore to the Christmas party - see them here). Pretty nice, huh? I don't know which night I'll be wearing this outfit when we're in Las Vegas, but it'll be one when we're seeing a show and I don't have to walk much. Maybe to see Penn and Teller on my birthday on Saturday?

We packed up our clothes for Las Vegas tonight - we leave tomorrow night, so we want to be ready. I have to pick up a couple of things tomorrow and then we'll be leaving tomorrow night. I'm very excited! As far as I know, we'll have the laptop and (I hope) internet access while I'm there, so I should be able to update you on our fun events each day. If for some reason the internet thing doesn't work out, then I'll upload all of my entries when we get back next Monday night.

Branching into necklaces?

I made my first necklace today!!! I need to shorten it just a bit because I didn't take into account how long the clasp was, but I can do that easily tomorrow. It's got hematite, onyx, and Swarovski crystals on a silver chain. It matches the earrings I made that have a black Swarovski round crystal, a hematite bead, and a clear Swarovski teardrop. They're beautiful. Will I have time to make a bracelet? Maybe :) No, I didn't take a picture; you'll have to wait until you see the Vegas pictures :)

I'm very woogly again tonight; I think I'm exhausted. Since I have a long day tomorrow, I'll go to bed now.