Twinklyspangle

Posting to Blogger on a Blackberry

2011-09-26T10:23:00.001+01:00

A couple of people have asked how I have been posting to my blog on my Blackberry, so I thought a guide might be helpful. Before I start, I should probably point out the limitations of this service:

1. No image size or positioning editing. Any files I attach are at the top of the post and that's it, unless I then log in to a laptop after and move them about.

2. It always says 'sent from my Blackberry wireless device' at the end of every post and I don't know how to remove that.

3.My fingers hurt after a long post (hehe!)

Its really easy to set up - just go to your blog settings (from the dashboard) and along the top where it says layout etc.) You'll see email/mobile. Click that and the set up a secret word, which becomes part of an email address. Copy and paste the email address and save it in your Blackberry address book. Mine is called Blogger Post.

Save settings. Then go to email and Compose a new email, in the address bit find your saved email address (I just have to type Bl and it comes up) and then your email! I hope this helps :-)
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Dog Beast

2011-09-25T12:21:00.001+01:00

Hi :-) I'm writing this sitting in a bus stop on a windy day, eating a bag of penny sweets. Yum!

I really dislike dogs. Which is why I'm a bit horrified this week that I seem to have adopted a giant beast of one. Its a temporary arrangement, but its causing rather a lot of irreversible damage to the interior of my home.

She belongs to my ex-partner and father of my child, who lives with his brother who also has a Dog Beast. But a boy...and its mating season. I know what you're thinking. Why didn't I Just Say No? Partly because Ramsey adores the dog and partly because, ridiculously, I thought walking it might be the exercise I need to burn off all those cakes I've been eating for breakfast. Which I suppose might be true but more energy is expelled trying not to have my arm wrenched out of its socket.

Do you have a dog? Please tell me why anyone would chose to be woken up by a giant slobbering poop-machine?
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Autumn is here...

2011-09-17T13:27:00.001+01:00

What a beautiful day yesterday. Me and my small guy went for a long long walk in the park, swung on swings and climbed on trees and collected conkers.

I think we'll do the same this afternoon, he was so tired he slept all night and I got some time to do Very Important Things. Mysterious huh? Tomorrow I think I'm going to a vintage clothes and jewellery fair, very exciting except we are utterly and completely down-to-the-last-fiver skint. Window shopping will have to do for now!
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

A special little guy

2011-09-08T22:55:00.001+01:00

This little guy has been my savior the last few months. He sings me a special song every morning, and on the bus, and in the queue at the supermarket, and before bed, in a silly high pitched voice. It goes like this;

Mummy you so beautiful
In the whole world
Because you areeeee!
Because you areeeee!
And I lovers you so much!
In the whole world <3

Its literally the best thing to ever bounce off my eardrums, and fills my heart with joy.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Doughnut Day

2011-09-06T10:24:00.001+01:00

I went to the Krispy Kreme factory yesterday <3 I munched on a yummy lemon meringue doughnut and a glittery strawberry glazed one. Delish!

It was the perfect sugary antidote to a rather black mood that settled over me at the weekend. I've had to pack my son off to Granddads for a few days to sort the house out, and I have missed his little smiley face.

I have a secret! I am working on a new business idea. Its a completely different direction to what I have been doing before. I'm very excited about it! Sorry for being super secretive, I have yet to find a partner in this venture with the skills needed (software engineering skills, website programming, ability to translate ideas into reality) who is willing to work for nothing other than a profit share promise. Let me know if you know of anyone!

Katie xx
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Testing Mobile Blogging and a sweet baby

2011-08-31T21:34:00.001+01:00

Just set up mobile blogging and I want to test that it works :-) many kisses xxxx

And here is a photo of me and my friends sweet baby. Apologies for the freakishly veiny hand x
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Love Love

2011-08-30T14:13:00.000+01:00

Hello.

Okay, I know I have been the most horrific of bloggers recently. To be honest, things have been really quite awful and I have been nursing a broken heart...

I won' go into details. That's not cool. But I would thank you for your continued commenting and interest in my SEO and Twitter courses, links are on the right.

I want to come back to my blog and start again, because I miss having something else to do other than stare at the walls of my flat worrying about where my life is heading now. It's hard starting again...sometimes I think it might be too hard and I might just give up. Yes yes like I said things have been quite hard and I am definitely not fixed or myself again yet.

Just thought I'd let you know x

Absence Explaination

2011-03-23T09:51:00.000Z

You know when you have a crap bit of life and you forget/aren't able to blog? That just happened to me.

I'm back now. Normal service will resume shortly.

Sweetie Rings

2011-02-28T10:07:00.001Z

Don't you love pieces of jewellery that you can just wear all the time? That's why these rings are so perfect...

Subtle pops of colour behind scraps of vintage lace.

All available now in my Etsy shop :-)

Sometimes you see something...

2011-02-26T11:20:00.000Z

...and you just know you *need* it. That's how I feel about this adorable dress from Elsie Flannigan's new dress line for Red Velvet.

The dresses are not available until the 1st March, so I'll just link you to Elsie's blog *here*. I can guarentee that I'll be at the very front of the queue for this sweet dress.

Katie x

Happy New Navajo-Style Earring Day!

2011-02-24T17:50:00.000Z

Currently settling into their new home in my shop is a fun new range of feathery felt earrings!

There are three fun colour combinations and every pair is just $5.

Pop along and have a look x

If you are waiting for me to update the link exchange I promise it will be done by this weekend, and I will send every single person I've newly added a convo on Etsy to remind them to come back and chose someone else to feature! Sorry it's taken me so long to do!

Katie x

sickyspangle

2011-02-15T23:11:00.000Z

I've not been very well :-(

I am now behind on the following things:

*sending out orders
*replying to convos
*responding to queries in the SEO team
*updating the Awesome Link Exchange
*commenting back on blogs

Sorry!! I'm much better now. I had a really bad tooth infection and had to take some serious antibiotics to shift it which left me totally whacked out, then just as I started feeling better I got some food poisoning. I haven't wanted to handle orders while I've been ill, just in case, so if you are waiting for an order from me I'm really really sorry, I'll be doing two large post office runs in the next two days x

Life

2011-02-03T13:22:00.000Z

I went to the dentist! I know, you are proud of me, right? Well, you won't be when I tell you I have to have 4 teeth out and 6 fillings!! I knew it was bad, but not that bad. I feel very sorry for myself. I'm going to have to be sedated, which is very scary for me. Still, at least I bit the bullet (so to speak) and went. That's something to proud of I suppose!

If you are waiting for me to update my Awesome Link Exchange, I'm going to be doing that tomorrow with all the new people. Don't forget to pop over there if you have already been featured and feature someone else. It's a karmic thing <3

Katie x

Blog Lovin'

2011-02-02T16:25:00.003Z

I have joined Blog Lovin'

Click above to follow on there :-)

♥ Want ♥

2011-02-02T14:44:00.000Z

Are you always lusting after things on Etsy?

I am!

Right now, it's this:

Cosy scarflette from KariOriginal - I'm going to link it *here* but if you buy it I will be sad because I want it!

Katie x

Spread The Love

2011-01-30T18:49:00.003Z

This fabulous treasury of items is created solely from artists featured on my Awesome Link Exchange

I can't think of a more fitting tribute. Thank you Sassalynne.

Oh Toothache, you've almost become my friend.

2011-01-29T23:55:00.000Z

Have you ever had a toothache so bad you want to cry, but you can't because moving your face enough to cry would hurt too much?

I should go to the dentist, right? I know...

Instead of going to the dentist and actually getting it sorted and fixed, which will inevitably be less painful than it actually is now, I thought I would spend an hour browsing beautiful tooth-related things on Etsy.

And take a large does of Ibuprofen.

1. Tooth T Shirt By HandnShadow

2. Sterling Silver Shark Tooth Necklace by CraveJewelryDesign

3. Feeling A Little Unbalanced Ring With Human Tooth by CharlotteBurkHart

4. Skull Polariod Transer by Jalinde

I've been talking a lot about SEO and Etsy and business and a lot less about...well, me. That's because I've been all about improving my online presence recently, but not to the detriment of my beautiful little boy. We've been having lots of fun and I promise to share some pics of his adorable face soon.

Next week is UK Craftypants Week on the Twinklyspangle blog. I'm featuring a bunch of awesome UK talent, I hope you're as excited as me!

Katie x

Regarding My SEO Course

2011-01-28T12:37:00.000Z

A full update with all the new shops that have requested to take part in the Awesome Link Exchange will be live later today. I will as usual convo every person added to remind them to go and chose someone else to link. It's a great way to give your backlinks a boost!

It's not too late to take part, even if you miss this update. Go and add your link here.

Things I Never Knew I Loved

2011-01-27T12:17:00.000Z

How did you discover Etsy? I found it through now defunct (well, she's been on hiatus for forever) site, OneGoodBumbleBee. Just one of those random surfing things. Finding Etsy opened up not just a whole new business for me, but a whole world of things I never knew I could adore so much.

I didn't know these things existed....

...and now I love them lots and lots :-)

1. Bakers Twine from InspireLovely
2. Rough Diamond Ring from AurumJewelry
3. Coconut Marshmallows from Sweettreatsbakery
4. Glassine Bags by KnotandBow

What pretties have you discovered?

Katie x

Oh Thank You.

2011-01-25T16:38:00.000Z

How long is your hair? Mine to officially too long. I look like a Romany Gypsy. I am trying to experiment with hairstyles but they have quite a specific set of requirements. They must not include backcombing (because I can never get tangles out) they have to hide my parting (because I don't wash my hair every day - eek) and they kinda have to include plaits, because buns and ponytails just end up knotted. No, I don't know why I have such uncooperative hair either.

I can't fishtail braid, although I keep watching tutorials. If anyone wants to come to my house and fishtail braid my hair, I'll make you a free necklace. Serious.

Anyway, I was reading I Go By Katie, who is so classy and interesting, and she always recommends a Weekend Read. This weekends was Carrie of WishWishWish who I had never heard of but seems to be quite big in the blogging community. I'm so behind the times! She's adorable, her outfits are to die for, and she posting this super-easy tutorial on heidi plaits. Love it! Plus, she's in the UK.

Here's my attempt:

Sorry, awful picture I know, I had to let my dear camera go this weekend as we are having various money worries and I can't justify having such an expensive one when things are so...tight. I'll be getting another one (second hand darling, it's all the rage, don't you know) soonish. This is definitely going to overtake the Side Plait as my most favouritest hairstyle.

I'm wearing this twinklyspangle necklace today:

I think it looks fun with my cosy grey jumper. Snap one up here in my shop.

Katie x

Feather Tattoo Story

2011-01-23T16:03:00.000Z

I finally had my peacock feather tattoo redone for the third time. I know, I know. Getting a tattoo is a lifetime commitment and you shouldn't enter into it lightly. Boy, have I learnt that lesson!

I originally got this feather done on a bit of a whim at Aces High Tattoos Wootton Bassett:

I thought it looked a bit like a crows feather, which doesn't seem very lucky to me. So I had it covered over as a peacock feather. Yes, I am wearing the same skirt, it's just a coincidence! Work done at Blue Gorilla Tattoos Hemel Hempstead.

I still wasn't happy. I felt it ended too abruptly, so I went back to Blue Gorilla to the same artist to extend it slightly. Sorry for the crappy picture.

I feel much happier with it now and have given some details of what I want done next, I want a scroll with some text from a favourite song up my other side.

Moral of the story: Think SERIOUSLY before you get any work done about what you want. Getting random tats can only lead to annoyance and painful cover-ups in the future x

Katie

Twinkly's SEO for beginners day 5

2011-01-22T11:06:00.001Z

We've reached the end of the week. Let's have a little look back shall we? Click the days of the week to be returned to that days tasks.

On Sunday, I explained how to install the toolbar and check your PageRank. On Monday, we talked about how to start gathering words which could turn out to be fabulous Keywords for your shop and item descriptions. On Tuesday we looked at using Google tools to find out how often words are searched, and started to narrow down our words to a tight selection of perfect keywords for your shop. On Wednesday, I went more in depth into searching using Google tools, and then explained a bit about relevant backlinks.We planned a link exchange, and I featured everyone who wanted to take part on my blog post on Friday.

And now we are on Saturday, because I'm a terribly disorganised Twinkly of late. I'm going to presume a few things. Like my friends on Etsy, I'm going to presume you have now filled your shop with lots of marvellous keywords. Although I haven't gone into much detail here, it's easy to see how the same principles and probably lots of your 'words' can be used to make your descriptions as awesome as your section titles and announcement probably are!

So what's next?

There's a lot of in-depth stuff about SEO online. If you want to continue on your quest for SEO perfection, Handmadeology have some amazing articles. But you could also leave it as is for now and follow your progress using Google Analytics.

Here are some quick instructions to checking whether your search engine and Google hits have increased.

1. Keep plugging your link, other people's links and linking, linking, linking. Post your shop section links on your Facebook, your items in your blog, and your main URL on twitter. Or whichever. You get it, right?

2.Wait a month for Google to crawl your page a few times and for people to have a chance to see your link. Now that you've made your shop announcement beautiful and stuffed full of keywords, you're going to be all the more appealing to people browsing. Don't forget you can check when your page was last 'crawled' by clicking your PageRank icon and choosing 'Cached Snapshot of this page' The page will reload with a thin info bar across the top with the date that Google crawled.

3. Open up and log into Google Analytics. Then on the 'Overview' page, select your Etsy shop report.

There's a couple of really useful things we can do from here.

Firstly, run your mouse over the date range in the top right hand corner. Click, and select the date range from the day you started SEO to the day you are checking. (At least a month, really.)

Now, what can we see?

Just above the graph on the right hand side is a little row of three icons. The second one along will change your graph to measure over the month rather than show you each day's results plotted. I love this button. It produces a fabulous upwards blue line that gives me a sense of satisfaction.

Scroll down a little and you'll see a bunch of other tiny graphs. Some will be upwards-pointing, like Pageviews, Visits and New Visits. Hopefully some will be downwards-pointing, like Bounce Rate.

So, you now know that you have increased traffic to your shop, how can you see where that traffic is coming from?

Scroll right down to Traffic Sources Overview and click 'View Report' Click the date range again to select the range you want, then click that second little button again to view the weeks results plotted on the graph rather than the days. Once you have had SEO in your shop a while, you can also view the graph as monthly results.

Scroll right down and click 'view report' for your referring site. This bit is so awesome, I love it. You're right in the very depth of Google Analytics now! You should now be able to see how many visitors have been directed to your shop from Google and over search engines, plus a load of other information that I have no idea about. I can see I got 747 visitors from Google (awesome!) 84 visitors from my blog (could do better!) and 1,717 direct visitors. Quite a few of those are probably me though.

*** At the same date range last year, I got 84 visitors from Google and 9 from my blog. 183 direct visitors.***

I could rabbit on all day about GA and the things you can find out there, but it takes a really good explore and poke round to really get to grips with!

I hope you have found some of the information that I have shared helpful! I'd love to hear your success stories, and please do feel free to share this information with anyone who can benefit from it

Katie x

Awesome Link Exchange

2011-01-21T09:55:00.007Z

Thank you for your interest in being part of my link exchange! The last post broke my record for number of comments which has made me super happy.

So, I've gone through and picked favourite things from everyones shops. If you want to get involved, it's not too late, just go *to this page* and leave a comment with your shop address. I'll add you to this post, and email you when your link is up. You'll need to return to pick out your linkee. This is only going to work if everyone follows the instructions. Pick one person featured below and find somewhere else to post their link. It could be your blog, facebook, twitter, stumbleupon, pintrest. Leave a comment below stating whose link you shared and where, with a link to where you did it, if possible.

(I know, a lot of posting links right? Well that's the whole point of SEO backlinking! Before long you'll be squeezing your shop link in everywhere you can.)

Please don't forget to thank anyone who links you, and you can use more than one person if you like. The whole point of this is to increase your link network. Linking to this page will build an even bigger network.

I'll post the last post of my SEO course later today, meanwhile if you need to catch up:

Introduction: Installing Google Toolbar and what PageRank is
Day 1: Word-storming your shop to find suitable key words
Day 2: Using Keyword Search Tool to narrow down your words
Day 3: Adding your Keywords to your shop
Day 4: Building Relevant backlinks.

Silk & Pearl Crochet Necklace by Sixskeins

Square Notebook with childrens character BOT by Dabdash

Handknitted handwarmers by SpinningStreak

Cute & Pretty Sterling Silver Earrings by CariadClay

Lilly Pond Cushion Cover by Lucyloucreations

Black Red Bird Of Paradise Fascinator Hat by Houseofhirudinea

Vintage Daisy Embroidery by OrangiesAttic

Upcycled hostess half apron by Katiedidonline

Floral Print Toddler Skirt by Adrianascloset

Black and Red Rose Crystal Necklace by KariOriginal

Ladies Pure Wool Tank Top by TheFeminineTouch

Golden Topaz Vintaj Brass Earrings by ErikaPrice

Rest Assured Photograph Card by DottyBlueBird

Matted Thistle Print by KitzieG

Teal Crochet Necklace By Imynda

Hand Dyed Felt By SassaLynne

Day At The Beach Pendant By FromLauraWithLove

Victorian Charm Necklace By CrookedThorne

Foxy Couple Personalised Print By CuddleFishPress

Hoopy Silver Earrings By AlisonMooreDesigns

You don't need to feature an item like I have when completing this challenge, a simple shop link is just as effective. If you are going to blog though, don't forget to try and squeeze in two links for your chosen person, to really give them a boost! Good luck!!

Katie x

Note: Please try to feature someone who hasn't already been featured :-)

Twinkly's Beginner SEO day 4

2011-01-20T13:13:00.002Z

Good morning :-)

I've been answering a lot of questions about yesterdays post and using the keyword tool. Here's how I would work it:

You need to be searching for the keywords that you dreamed up the other day. Search for them individually first, and then search for them in combination.

Say you were thinking of selling Blackboard Jewellery.
So you might put this in the search box:

Blackboard

Jewellery

Chalkboard

Jewelry

Blackboard Jewellery

Chalkboard Jewelry

Then you can compare these phrases easily.

Then you might search:

Geek

Nerd

School

Back To School

teacher gift

And compare results.

Then, you might pick the two 'best' terms from each list and see what they come up as.

Geek blackboard jewelry

teacher gift jewelry

Bear in might as you narrow the search in this way, you'll be seeing significantly less monthly searches. Don't worry - just try and get the highest you can.

I hope that helps!

-----------------------------------------------

So, we are going to move away from this a bit now. Hopefully you have started thinking about including your keywords in all the valuable places in your shop. So Google search can now see your shop, your items, your description. But how can we move our results UP the search to those amazing first and second page slots?

The key to moving on upwards is backlinks from relevant sources. The more relevant the place featuring *your* shop link (and section links) the more theoretical 'points' you get. Google rates pages on their relevancy based on *their* metatags, content, frequency of updates and other complicated webpage stuff.

So, blogs are a great thing to get featured on in terms of SEO. I'm not going to preach for an hour about having a blog, but it is a great way of reaching customers, getting people interested in you and your shop, and you can link to your own shop as many times as you like. And it's all relevant! I try and link my shop in every post, in fact I've linked to it three times in this paragraph. Ha!

But just posting your link over and over again on your own blog isn't going to really make a huge difference unless you are getting linked from other relevant sources. So, I have a little challenge.

If you comment on this post, I will link your shop in my next post along with a picture of my favourite item from your shop. I'm relevant to your SEO because this is a craft/handmade/etsy finds blog.

Then, when the post is up, come back, have a look, and chose one of the shops to feature somewhere yourself. It could be on your blog, it could be on a forum, on Pintrest/weheartit/stumble/facebook or twitter.

This challenge is all about Karma. If you feature someone and tell them, they might link you back, or mention it somewhere. Backlinking is something that can only have a great effect if you return the favour whenever possible. Something I always do if I feature a shop, although I haven't done it in the last week (bad twinkly) is link to the shop directly from the username, the listing from the image, and the section from the description underneath. That way I'm giving my linkee three links for the price of one.

The great thing about being featured on blogs is that even as the post falls back into the archives as new posts go up, Google still counts the link. Websites might be updated and your link might fall by the wayside, but a blog link is for life!

I try to make a post featuring Etsy sellers at least once a week, and although it's taken a while, I believe I am reaping the rewards. Tomorrow I'll talk about how you can find out where you are being linked from (and don't forget to always thank someone who links you. Courtesy goes a long way to being remembered in the future and building friendships)

So:

Comment with your shop link, even if I have featured you before. I'll create the post tonight and post it over night before the next stage of this SEO course goes up
Come back to view the post, chose someone to feature somewhere else. Even a tiny link on twitter is worth it, especially if you can get it retweeted
Thank anyone who links you

Something to note: the NOFOLLOW tag you might see if you are big into source codes is something that bulletin boards and forums use to prevent Google from finding links in forum signatures. That's because consistent links from the same URL will damage your PageRank. Google is very careful to avoid 'link farms' and spam. That's why finding relevant places to link from is important, and I believe it is something we can all help each other with.

Katie x

Twinkly's Beginner SEO day 3

2011-01-19T16:46:00.002Z

Hi :-)

I know a few of my students have taken the initiative and made some changes to their shops already, which is awesome! But if you haven't taken that step yet, today should help you out. Then tomorrow we are going to talk about how linking from relevant sites will improve where you appear in the listing and how you can get your link out there. On Friday I'm going to sum up how to watch out for changes on Google Analytics, and post a little Q & A session of some of the questions I have encountered.

First, a little challenge. Take your list of five to ten phrases from yesterday. We are going to make what I like to call (in my head. Probably not out loud just in case anyone is listening) a SUPERPHRASE!

This SUPERPHRASE should go on the end of every description. It should be the keywords 'niche' you found by studying all those words yesterday. Take two, or even three of your best phrases, and combine them into one (with no repetition)

So for me, I had:

Sweet jewelry
Fun original jewelry
Handmade gifts

I made this phrase:

"Sweet, fun handmade jewelry and gifts "

All five words individually are *highly searched* In combinations of pairs they have over 1,000 searches and low competition. This gives me a great chance of snaring someone from Google who is looking for some fun jewelry. Or a sweet gift. Or an original gift. Personally I chose three that sounded nice together, but you could just as easily use the highest searched, lowest competition words if you wanted to get serious.

It's worth saying here that there isn't much point in getting hundreds of people into your shop if they are not actually looking for your products, or at least to buy -something-. Keywords need to be relevant or people are just going to click straight back to Google for a different result.

So! We've got everything ready, now, what on earth are we going to do with them?

There are different places you can put your phrases. I've taken this screenshot to show you. You can repeat phrases, combine them, or use different ones. There are differing opinions online which is the best thing to do and that's why I suggest combining the phrases as above to make one really awesome one which you repeat over and over.

(click to enlarge)

A & D
B. Shop titles are METATAGS which Google searches for. Pick them and stick to them, then link to them from everywhere you can (but then bear in mind that if you change the titles, the links will stop working, thereby undoing all your good word) Include TWO keywords or ONE of your phrases. Don't worry about making them look pretty with funny spacing - squeeze in those keywords!

C. Here is a formula for your shop description. It's not the only one that will work, but it's one that you might like to try for a month and has bought me great results.

Short Title Of Item including strong descriptive word / Category of item e.g Necklace / SUPERPHRASE

E. Google will display the first 40 odd characters of your shop description. Delete that "Hello, Welcome to my shop" and replace with either your SUPERPHRASE or three of your keyword phrases. I've seen people separate them with hearts, which is what I have done in my shop. Or you could form them into a sentence if you are feeling brave! This is what is going to draw people into your shop from Google. It' needs to be relevant to your items, appealing to potential customers, and informative for people browsing Etsy. It's a hard challenge!

So basically, today is all about getting those keywords and phrases into your shop. Here's a few tips:

Have the Keyword Tool open in another browser window. The updated version is better for individual words, you can access it here.
The first line of your shop description is a great place for repeating your SUPERPHRASE.
Don't be afraid of making your item titles too long. Just keep the actual title quite short, relevant, and searchable.

Good luck!!

Katie x

CATCH UP:

Intoduction and PageRank info
Day 1 - Word-Storming for your shop
Day 2 - Using Keyword Tool To Establish Useful Keywords

Twinkly's SEO for Beginners day 2

2011-01-18T11:33:00.001Z

Hello lovely readers. You are viewing Day Two of our joint venture into improving our shops Google Search results. I had a GREAT response to the first post yesterday and I'm really happy that everyone is having fun 'word-storming' (Thanks, KariOriginal!)

Necklace by KariOriginal

Right, so now you should have loads of words on a piece of paper. Most of these are probably not going to be helpful in terms of SEO, we need to weed them down. However, you might find them useful when writing interesting descriptions of your items, or describing your shop on your blog, so don't throw the list away after todays task!

We are going to look at our words and find out what Google thinks of them. Luckily, Google provides us with a great tool for this.

Google Keyword Tool

I would recommend starting with a very basic word. So pick a BIG word for your shop, knitting, jewellery, art, print, gift.

The tool will come back with a chart. The first entry in the chart is the word you are having a look at. You'll probably need another bit of paper, or if you are like me and love any excuse for using a highlighter, you could highlight words that come back with great results.

So, we are making a note of 'Monthly Searches' first. I would imagine that the first word you try will have over 100,000 searches. This means that people have searched that word either alone or in combination with other words a total of 100,000+ times in the past month. Imagine ranking as FIRST! 100,000 people will see your result! Around 40% of people will click the first result. We'll talk about getting people to click YOUR result tomorrow.

Now, you'll see below that is a huge bunch of other words in combinations. So you'll see 'Art print' 'Costume Jewellery' and other phrases. Notice that the monthly searches is lower.

The second thing to look at is 'Competition'. The more full that little bar, the more competition for those vital first and second page spots. Now, here is your task.

Go through your list of words from yesterday in combination with a 100,000+ results word. So I might search JEWELRY (American spellings always have higher searches. This isn't a time to be patriotic.) and a word I found yesterday with my word cloud. SWEET JEWELRY.

Oh dear. It's come up telling me only 82 searches for Sweet Jewelry. It's also telling me some other phrases that are getting more hits. So I'm going to note them down and move on. Competition is very low.

You'll need to carry on trying out combinations now. Ideally I would be looking for Monthly Searches of around 1,000 with around a half full bar for 'Competition' It might not happen that way, especially if you sell especially unusual items, but it's something to aim for.

You can try all sorts of combinations, even if they don't seem obvious at first. The key is to find a selection of five to ten words or combinations of words that go well with the majority of your items, have good monthly searches and relatively low competition.

I'm going to use a member of the Craft Britannia team as an example here, I hope they don't mind. My friend StupidCats sells sweet felted cats and beautiful cat-related art.

So, a quick search shows HUGE searches for CAT and ART. These people are not necessarily looking for feline art. But did you know that 1,200 people are searching for CAT ART monthly? And the competition is less than half. I'm happy to see she has this in her titles anyway - because over 1,200 people want Cat Art every month. She should definitely be getting a share of this traffic.

Get your five to ten highly searched, low competition words and phrases ready, and come back tomorrow :-)

Katie x

I also want to say a huge thank you to Craft Brit members for being very supportive with both this project and some personal issues that I have been having, you guys rock!

Seriously Stunning Art

2011-01-17T16:52:00.000Z

I found this shop on Etsy and I can't get over how beautiful these paintings are. I'm not usually a big one for art, my walls are covered in splodgy toddler paintings and photos. I can't wait to own one of these pieces though, they really speak to me.

All from Jeremy Miranda.

Katie x

Twinkly's Beginner SEO day 1

2011-01-17T00:15:00.002Z

This is Etsy SEO for total beginners, Day 1. I will be your tutor, you can call me Miss Spangle, Or not. You know, whichever.

Hopefully after yesterday's post you are now staring at this post with a beautiful Google Toolbar hat. If not, you'll need to install the toolbar. Very simply, it allows you to view your PageRank

There are lots of complicated reasons to improve your PageRank. Being higher up Google Search inevitably will gain you more visitors. Gaining Google visitors who might not have meant to shop Handmade, but suddenly want to because they see your items, is the difference between a hobby and a quit-your-day-job.

Three important points:

PageRank is named after Larry Page. Therefore, the 'page' refers not to your 'webpage' but to a guy's surname!
I cannot tell you how PageRank is worked out. It's a long and complicated formulae that is based on incoming and outgoing links, and the importance of the pages those links come from. It's called a 'iterative eigenvector algorithm' I don't think any of us need one of those in our lives.
This guide isn't really about your PageRank. The number is a vague representation of where you *might* appear. Don't get me wrong, a higher PageRank means more people will find your shop. But what I really want to do is help people find and love you.

So I'll get started...*nervous*

I assume you have Google Analytics set up for your shop. I also assume that you have either not looked at it because it's scary and confusing or just use the most basic of functions. You don't need it right away, but make a note of when you read this post. In exactly one month, you can check your GA and you should see a significant change in your stats. A few blue lines should start pointing their way *up* after that time.

Today's task is super simple!

You need to make a brainstorm of words to describe your shop. You need to be thinking, with every single word that you right down, "yes, I can imagine someone putting that in a search box if they were looking for me"

Brainstorming words is hard, especially if you overthink it. Here's a sneaky tip I've thought of to help you:

Go here: http://www.wordle.net/ and select the option to make a new Tag Cloud. You'll be presented with a large blank box to fill with words, and below that a smaller box to put a URL of any page with a RSS Feed. RSS is something that applies to websites that are frequently updated with new content, such as blogs or Etsy shops. Type your full Etsy shop address and hit Create.

You will then be presented with a 'cloud' of words, with ones you use most larger and generally more towards the centre. Here's mine:

Gosh, I must have used 'sweet' in near enough every description. So, it's likely to be applicable to my whole shop, would you agree? I also love how 'choose' and 'choice' are big words. Original! Fun! Sweet! Gift! A perfect four word sentence to describe my shop :-)

This will help you see what words you are using a lot of in your descriptions. It's not a complete brainstorm though, but it will help you when you are thinking of keywords for your shop. Pick out all the descriptive words you can. Put them into a thesaurus to find synonyms. Use them as prompts for more words. Fill your whole piece of paper with words that relate to your shop.

Come back with your list of words tomorrow. We are going to put them into action!

Katie x

How To Install Google Toolbar and Check Your Page Rank

2011-01-16T12:07:00.001Z

If you are struggling getting Google visitors to your shop, this week I am going to help you. Every day I'm going to post something you can do to increase your Google ranking. It's going to be awesome.

You're probably thinking, "hang on, miss spangle, why are *you* qualified to talk to me about this?"

Well, I'm not, not really. But I did launch a major campaign in November to increase my Google page rank, from 'Google does not rank this page' to at least 1/10 (bear in mind, Etsy itself is only 8/10). Well, my Page Rank is now 2/10. So some of the things that I learnt and did must have worked, and now I am going to share them with you.

♥ Don't worry! If you normally come to my blog for fun craft projects and sweet Etsy Finds, I'll be posting those as usual too ♥

What you need to do to prepare yourself to improve SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

Install the Google Toolbar. I know. It sucks having another thing cluttering up your screen. But you will be able to easily check when your page was last 'cached' (i.e, when Google last bothered to look at your page) and what your Page Rank is. Please note, the Google Page Rank icon is not visable with the standard Google Toolbar. You won't see it when you first load it up. You might have Google toolbar and not know what I'm on about.

Right click on a blank space on your toolbar. Select 'Show Button' and the Page Rank button can be selected.

It shows as a small green/grey bar on your Google toolbar. Spend a little while in your favourite Etsy shops and your favourite websites, noticing what their Rank score is. Just run your mouse over the button to see.

Check out some top Etsy sellers. Check out Facebook and Blogger and your bestest blogs.

Think about what Rank you are aiming for, and come back tomorrow for your first *tip*

...if only I could optimize from behind this screen! Via weheartit

In a few days, I'll be launching a fun Creative Business Challenge for myself. The challenge consists of *10* weeks of fun, Apprentice-style tasks to complete to improve my business and satisfy goals that I have had for a while. I'll give you a little hint, if your interest is piqued.

One of the challenges involves getting a celebrity to wear a Twinklyspangle piece :-)

If you want to follow my progress, or even try the challenges yourself, I'll be posting the first challenge on Monday too :-)

Katie x

Bargains To Be Had!

2011-01-12T13:48:00.000Z

Don't you just adore a sale? There's nothing like snagging a bargain. I've *sold out* of lots of my sale jewellery, but you can still snap up a few pieces from the Sale section of our Etsy shop!

Each package I've been shipping out recently comes with a handwritten note, a gift box or handsewn giftbag for necklaces, rings and brooches, and all orders over £5 get fun freebies too.

Katie x

Jewellery Encyclopedia

2011-01-11T22:02:00.000Z

A fellow Craft Britannia member has started a super awesome glossary of jewellery making terms, stones and techniques.

Three magical things about her & her idea:

These beautiful earrings which are for sale in her shop.

I learnt a little more about my birthstone, Amethyst. I couldn't find anything in Erika's shop made with my favourite stone, and I know I've been posting lots of jewellery recently, but I did find this super amethyst engagement ring by JennyandronyK, which I'm so drawn to. The way the stone is all pointy and the setting for perfectly round really appeals to me.

There's 25 more posts to come! I can't wait to learn more about stones, tools and metals. Read the first installment *here*

Katie x

♥ I'm The Boss

2011-01-10T17:03:00.000Z

Today at Twinklyspangle Towers was my first full day of working on my business by myself. I don't mean I usually have a gaggle of workers, no no, Twinklyspangle is a one-woman show. But I *do* usually have a small, inquisitive toddler trying to get involved. Today he went to pre-school ALL DAY. So, I started my work day at 10am. What did I get done?

I whipped up a pile of tiny hedgehog giftbags. Each season I'll offer a different style, this month, it's these sweet hogs & hearts. The gift bags come with any of my rings and necklaces. Blackboard jewellery is still gift boxed with little wipes and chalks!

If you love perfect quilting, I would look away now. Or possibly before you look at the above picture. It's my first attempt, a present for a tiny baby I know. The squares (triangles), well, I'm proud. But the back is awful and all caught up and creased. I added a new backing piece but I'm struggling with the binding, what to do, what to do?

I promised myself I would add a stationary line to my shop this year, and my supplies have arrived. I have a sweet plan for a range of notepapers that I'm getting started on. I'm thinking hearts, feathers and adorable black cats. Watch this space.

The rest of the day was devoted to writing my hand-written notes for my weekend sales. They are all laid out and most are ready to be flown off to their new homes. It was a good weekend for my vintage lace earrings! Can you spot your purchase?

Coming this week:

♥ Fun shrinky hearts tutorial

♥ Home makeover photos

♥ My search for a vintage hat stand

I hope your year is working out well for you so far!

Katie x

If Only...

2011-01-05T22:20:00.000Z

...if only I was here:

Looking at this:

And wearing these:

I would be pretty happy right now.

Katie x

Published

2011-01-03T20:52:00.000Z

I love writing tutorials, and I was thrilled to be published in Popular Crafts this month. I chose to write a how-to for this sweet cupcake bracelet;

Fun story! I was having trouble finding just the right cupcake stamp for this project, and the article was due quite soon. I popped over to the next town to the craft store I love, and I *still* couldn't find anything, really frustrating. Just as I was walking forlornly out (with a bag of craft supplies I neither needed nor have used yet!) I overheard a conversation. The Papermania rep was standing by the counter talking about a new line of stamps available in January. I explained my situation to him and he let me have a whole set of the stamps! I couldn't believe my luck, a stamp set that wasn't even out yet. I love how this bracelet has turned out, and I think the tute looks super sweet in the magazine.

(Dodgy photo, I know!)

I'm going to be posting tutorials a-plenty this year, and submitting to more magazines. So excited!
There's a *sale* going on in my shop. Lots of sweet fun jewellery is 40% off! Click HERE to visit Etsy and have a little browse.

Katie x

Jewellery Wish List

2011-01-02T21:05:00.001Z

I wear a lot of jewellery I make, but I also love adding to my collection from other handmade sellers. Here are some of my newest favourites.

I love, love, love these beautiful pieces by OrdinaryMommy on Etsy...

Charcoal Dove Bow Felt Necklace

The Love Cloud Necklace

There's something I just adore about enamel pieces, and Ohcilly does it just perfect for me...

Rose Earring Pink

Merry Birds Go Round Ring

...And beautiful, classy pieces by GlitzGlitter.

Iridescent Abalone Shell Mosaic Necklace

Tiny Sky Blue Chalcedony Briolette Earrings

Hope you are having a very sparkly day x

New Year, New Look

2011-01-01T23:45:00.000Z

Little sweet blog refresh...for a sick, sick twinklyspangle.

I've not been very well, it's been all migraines and lying in dark rooms and general sulking at Twinklyspangle Towers this week, I have been struck down with a mystery virus, boo hoo. Everything aches and I'm medicated to the max!

I hope you had a marvellous New Years Eve, I stayed in with my little boy and went to bed at 10pm. Hardcore. Anyway, not the perfect start to the year, I haven't even had the energy to blog (so you know it must be super bad.)

I completed nearly all my goals for 2010, and I'm looking forward to an awesome 2011.

Here are some goals for 2011.

200 Etsy sales
Cohesive Packaging
Learn a new craft (lino cutting supplies already ordered!)
Master my sewing machine
Get stocked in a shop
Get my tutorials published in more places
Shake this stupid bug

I'm also planning on working super-hard on my blog. I'll be posting fun tutorials weekly, pretty pretty Etsy finds and showing sneaky peeks of my works-in-progress.

Here's to a great one for everybody!

Katie x

Branding

2010-12-23T10:37:00.000Z

Packaging, parcels, business cards, banners, buttons, logos...I'm working hard right now on my cohesive brand for the New Year.

I found out yesterday that I have been accepted onto a Women's Enterprise program. It starts in January and there are lots of benefits, including specific business advice, tax advice, marketing contacts and coaching. I'm really excited! One thing I want to have done by January is a new colour scheme for my packaging, blog and Etsy shop.

I'm loving soft greys, muted colours and hints of mustard and pale green. Do you have a favorite of these schemes?

Katie x

What's Around The Corner?

2010-12-21T17:12:00.000Z

Do you have lots of exciting things planned for next year? I'm making resolutions and thinking up crazy schemes.

Here is a sneaky look at something I'm planning:

So exciting! I think this is the time of the year filled with the most promise and excitement :-)

Katie x

Cheap to Chic Wreath {DIY}

2010-12-20T10:01:00.000Z

I know, it's a little lacksadasical of me to be posting Christmas DIY's right now, 6 days before the Big Day. But if you are anything like me, you'll *hate* spending fortunes on expensive decorations, which inevitably get put in the loft two weeks later and retreived, broken and dusty next year.

I saw this bell wreath in Poundland (presumably, similar to the dollar store for American readers :)) and it came with a tacky silver cardboard adornment in the shape of a holly leaf. I snipped it off and added a fun bow in a Christmassy fabric and hung it on my door. Of course, the same kind of technique could be applied to any cheap 'n' tacky wreath that you can find - snip off all the excess decorations, add a big fabric bow, and hang!

Materials Needed:

Cheap tacky wreath with bells in fact, this wreath would be quite easy to make. It's done with a round piece of wire, and some small pieces of vinyl tubing separating bells attached with thin wire. A tinsel, yarn-wrapped or even cheap fake holly wreath would also work.
Fabric choose a Christmassy, contrasting fabric.
Thread
Needle
Iron (optional)

I followed Elsie's Fabric Bow Tutorial to make my bow. I'm not going to rip off her tute, so you can follow the instructions here. There are loads of fabric bow tutorials online on various crafty blogs.

I've found the bows look best if you bunch the middle bit a little and pull hard on the corners to spread it out. I ironed my bow to flatten it out so that it would hold it's shape.

Thread your needle again and poke it upwards through the middle part of the bow, on the back. Poke it out again. You can use this to tise your bow to a point in the wreath.

Tie a loop and thread it round the wreath near to the bow. Loop it through itself to create a hanging point.

Et voila! I've hung mine on my front door

Katie x

♥ Initial Pendants

2010-12-19T16:02:00.000Z

Are you ready for Christmas? We've have a variety of set backs this year, not least that our oven is broken so I haven't been able to do any Christmas baking, we won't be able to afford to replace it until the New Year. Luckily we have lots of family ready to accept us over the holidays! Then a whole load of snow fell yesterday and we got stuck in the car for an hour trying to get to the Post Office before the last post. Nevermind, I can face these challenges head on when I know that a yummy dinner and a few nice presents will be coming my way in a few days.

I received a *very* last minute custom order for some initial pendants that I thought you might like to see...

I actually ended up redoing the 'S' after I took this, I wasn't happy with the shape of it. I drew my own alphabet for these pendants on graph paper and I tested most of them out first, but the S just wasn't how I dreamed, so I've made it curlier at the ends and now it looks lovely.

I also whipped up these little puches so that the package would fit through the letterbox without chunky giftboxes. I think they are adorable and I plan to include them with all the initial pendants next year.

I'm dreaming of gingerbread houses and hot chocolate next ♥

Katie x

Craftbritannia Rules!

2010-12-16T10:38:00.000Z

Yesterday Etsy ceramic artist and treasury maker CariadClay had a marvellous idea.

UK Love by Twinklyspangle

The idea was for all the members of the CraftBritannia Team on Etsy to create a treasury of UK gifts.

Fabulous UK Gifts by ErikaPrice

The idea really took off! Around 15 treasurys were made, all filled with fabulous gifts from UK artists.

Last Minute UK Gift Guide by StupidCats

I was so glad to be part of it, because I'm quite a new member of the team, and also because I was featured in quite a few of them, can you spot my Blackboard Rings?

We HEART Cute UK Sweetness To Make You Smile by Lucyloucreations

I found some lovely items from UK sellers that I had never seen before. How adorable are those little Cloudling ornaments?

Last Minute Christmas Treats by DottyBlueBird

If you don't use Etsy, a Treasury is a member-chosen selection of items available for sale.

UK Folk by CariadClay

The UK is full of people making amazing things! And there is still *just* enough time to order some extra gifts for under your tree.

Gorgeous Gifts From Talented UK Sellers by TheSequinnedSheep

See that coconut ice up there? I ordered some of the last year and it is DIVINE. I ate the whole box in one go. I'm a piggie like that.

UK Christmas Gifts From UK Sellers by Therainbowgirl

I hope you have enjoyed this little round up. Don't forget, every click on these collections makes them more visible, so give us a little boost and have a browse x

Katie x

Amazingly Awesome Bauble {DIY}

2010-12-13T17:56:00.001Z

I'm so excited to share this fun DIY! It's really easy and amazing looking - let me know if you try it!

You will need:

Styrofoam ball

Clear faceted beads

Small sparkle beads

Wire cutters

Head pins

Glue (not shown)

Start from the very top of your ball, it will have an indentation. Slide a small bead and a big bead onto a headpin, chop off the end to leave a length of at least 2cm. You don't want it TOO long, as when you start covering your ball you'll find they bump into each other, but they need to be long enough to give a good grip.

Dip the end in glue and poke right into the ball. I worked in a flower formation to keep the coverage even. It took about two hours, while watching a cheesy Christmas film, to cover the whole bauble. It's pretty impossible to count the beads now they are all the ball, but I would say around 50 of each size for a 5cm bauble.

When the entire ball is covered, glue a piece of ribbon or ricrak to the top and hang from your tree with pride!

I used PVA glue, but if you have little ones I would recommend a stronger craft glue to keep the beads in place.

Don't forget, last posting dates for the UK are looming, grab 15% of in my shop with the code 'KOALA' .

Facebook me if you have any questions about this DIY, or just want to say hi! HERE.

Have a beautiful day,

Katie x

Beautiful Christmas Things

2010-12-12T15:16:00.001Z

Have you got your decorations up yet? I've been looking for inspiration and found some truly beautiful displays, DIY's and trees on some of my very favourite blogs...

Holly Sarah for SmileandWave

This sweet tree belongs to Holly Sarah who writes her own blog, Create Loves. I actually saw the tree on SmileandWave, where Rachel is running lots of adorable home decor posts for the holidays, and there's a sweet DIY for tree flowers. I've always loved white trees, they look so fresh and modern!

Glitter Bangle DIY by igobykatie

Squeee! Couldn't believe it when I saw these awesome bangles by Katie, her blog is super stylish and interesting, and I love all the unusual photography she talks about. I remember having a purple glitter bangle just like this when I was younger, and I've been trying to hunt down some vinyl tubing to make some from her DIY.

Vintage Tree by Elsie Flannigan of ABeautifulMess

I know I go on about her all the time, but I seriously love everything Elsie does. This tree would look ridiculous in my messy flat, but in her Springfield home it just looks so cute and classy - so jealous of her adorable style, and how amazing are those yellow walls?

Danielle Thompsons decor from last year...seriously, have you seen anything more gorgeous?

Sometimes, you see a home online and you just think, stuff it, I want to move in there. That's how I feel about Danielle Thompsons home, I love the details and the incredible way she creates things herself that look expensive and designer. That wreath is all kinds of amazing! I'll confess, I haven't got our decorations up yet...I had all these crazy ideas for giant paper chains and cute wreathes...but I just haven't done it yet, and time is ticking on! I'll have to get onto it first thing on Monday, as we have relatives visiting on Friday, arrgg!

Would love to see *your* holiday decorations! I'm also on the look out for no-bake Christmas treats x

Sick Little Boy

2010-12-09T15:53:00.000Z

My little one hasn't been very well, hence the random and huge gap in posting. I'm planning to make it up though, with the rest of December chock-full of interviews, fun DIY's and crafty things.

Here are some things I'm loving right now...

Image via weheartit

Coffee. Nothing beats it. I don't care if it's instant or if you picked and dried the beans yourself, I adore every hot drop. I think maybe because my hands get so cold at this time of year that I just don't want to finish my cup. I have it hot, strong and black...no giggling at the back!

Leggings by Prettypennydesigns

I'm wearing leggings over tights and my boots which I found in the back of an old wardrobe when we moved into our first flat. They are white and fluffy and I think possibly handmade and everyone laughs at me when I wear them but I don't care because they are so, so, so warm. Now all I need to complete my winter wardrobe is some of these beautiful tights by Prettypennydesigns.

The Classics Gifting Kit by KnotandBow

I'm all about the packaging. I fell slightly behind with orders and things the last few days as my bobbleboy has been sicky, there's nothing I would love more than this perfectly put together kit to finish off my Christmas packages. Rest assured if you have ordered something from my shop, it will be winging it's way to you today. I'm off to the Post Office with a grumpy toddler in tow. I stayed up super late last night popping fun freebies into packages and writing addresses.

Don't forget, you'll need to order by the end of FRIDAY at the latest if you are in the USA and you want your package by Christmas. Happy shopping!

Katie

Initial Pendants & Last Ordering Dates

2010-11-30T14:27:00.000Z

I can't believe how quickly Christmas is creeping up on us. I'm determined to make this one magical for my funny little boy...tonight we are going to make snowflake curtains and mince pies!

Don't forget...

...if you want to order a Custom Initial Pendant, you'll need to do it by the end of this week (5th December) or there isn't much hope I'll be able to hand sew it and get it to you before Christmas. UK customers have until 14th December to order. Here's a schedule.

5th December - Last day for international customers to order custom items
8th December - Last chance for any international orders
10th December - UK customers last day to order custom items
18th December - Last posting date for UK customers

I have the hugest pile of packages ready to ship out, but my sweet little guy is sicky, so we are snuggled up warm, and we'll get Daddy to go. Here are some fun things to look at if you are snowed in:

♥ Fun wreath DIY that I posted yesterday
♥ Awesome folded fabric origami from FoldedFrippery
♥ Beautiful Morrocan inspiration from Decor8, I just love Morrocan style.

Have a great day x

Fun Wreath {DIY}

2010-11-29T16:38:00.001Z

I made this super cute yarn wreath this morning. It didn't take very long, and cost basically nothing apart from the polysteryne base. I think it would make an adorable christmas decoration idea...

You'll need:

Polysteryne wreath (available from craft shops)
Wool
Headpins
Glue
Beads
Floristy butterfly or other small toy/ornament

Tie a knot around the wreath and wrap the whole thing. I wrapped it loosely then pushed the wool up together. It took about 15 mins to cover the whole thing. I tied the ends to each other once I got all the way around. I didn't manage to take any photos because of the weird cold light we are having right now!

Now you can plan out your design. I used a pack of cheap plastic beads that I bought in a sale. The headpins I had just slipped right through the beads, so I added a tiny pink one to the end to make sure it was secure, which gave a sweet contrast.

Thread a tiny bead and a bigger bead on to each headpin, then dip the end in craft glue. It's really easy to just push the beads into the ring, and the glue means it won't just slip out.I used a simple flower pattern, and did 12, 3, 6 and 9 'o' clock first.

To add the butterfly, I just looped a headpin with the head cut off over the body and pressed it in. Simple!

To hang the wreath, I made a wire loop and pressed that into the back.

Done! It's sweet and sparkly, and there are loads of ways you can customise this idea. Try:

Odd stud earrings make great flower centres, you'll need to hold them in place until the glue dries as the pin part will be shorter.
Using two or more colours of yarn - just tie off the ends and make sure they are at the back or wrap over the knots.
I was lucky to have the butterfly from some floristy deadstock that I collected one day from a closing warehouse (along with loads of other cool stuff) but they are available in most craft shops. You can also fold the wings up and make it look like they are perching on the wreath. Or use more!
Hang a matching christmas ornament from the top so it dangles in the centre
If you don't have a butterfly, try making a sweet bow out of ribbon or fabric
Try wrapping the wreath in ribbon or fabric strips instead for a different effect.
You could use pins instead of headpins if it's not going to be anywhere near a child
Instead of using a tiny bead to stop your bigger bead slipping off, you could use those sequins with the tiny holes in the middle.

Have fun! I'd love to know if you try this idea!

Katie x

I'm looking forward...

2010-11-28T23:05:00.001Z

It's been a hard and worrying week...it looks like my Gran is going to be okay though ♥

I'm looking forward to an inspiring & creative few days...

image credit: elsie flannigan

...taking Elsie's Blog Love e-course. I love settling down with a hot cup of coffee and reading her blog and previous Red Velvet courses I've taken, so I'm hoping this 'Blog Love' e-course is going to be just as creatively inspiring...

Frames from MountainCoveAntiques

...redecorating my dingy corridor area. Tiny toddler has scrawled his happy pictures all over my wall in purple pen, so I'm repainting a bright white and hanging and painting ornate frames. Some will be filled with blackboard paint (I know, I'm obsessed) and some will have adorable new family photos. So excited!

Christmas Card: Babypicturethis Etsy

...I think it's going to snow this week, so we'll be making snow angels and throwing snowballs, as well as keeping our heating on...I hate being cold!

What lovely things do you have planned for the week? I hope you are keeping warm and toasty x

200th Blog Post

2010-11-28T10:30:00.000Z

I wanted to do something special for my 200th blog post, but my Gran, who brought me up until I was 5, has been rushed into hospital with a suspected stroke (although we are hoping it's a mini-stroke) and we are off up the M4 to see her.

Standard blogging will resume shortly. It the meantime, I'm still open and have a bundle of parcels to post on Monday. Don't forget to use the code KOALA to gain a 15% discount in my shop - http://twinklyspangle.etsy.com/.

Works In Progress

2010-11-26T12:18:00.000Z

Have you been super-busy with lots of random tasks lately? I have. I spent the morning folding lots of origami boxes from recycled paper, and now I have a wholesale order ready to go! I thought I'd share some pics of some projects that I have on the go right now...

Trying out a new glaze on my 'Love Flowers' rings...not as shiny as my old one. I'm going to stick with what I know!

Luckily I had just enough to fulfil a small wholesale order, otherwise there would have been panic.

...and a just-for-fun project, I'm making a sweet cupcake cushion cover in pink. It will be my first big 'zipper installation' test!

Don't forget, it's Black Friday, so lots of your favourite sellers will be doing fab promotions. I'm offering a shopwide 15% discount, just type the coupon code' KOALA' at checkout.

Image via weheartit

It's my total dream to cuddle a koala...I don't even think we have them in zoos over here anymore, I think I saw one when I was very, very young at London Zoo, but they are not there any more :-(

Katie x

Vintage Glass

2010-11-25T15:42:00.000Z

I've been searching Etsy for beautiful pastel vintage glass to display in my kitchen. I felt so overwhelmed by the amazing pieces available that I branched out of my comfort zone and made a treasury...

Pastel Glass Perfection on Etsy

I'm especially partial to the frosted pink vase pair...maybe I'll treat myself after this busy holiday period.

I'd love for you to visit and comment or click on my treasury. I've only ever made one before, so all support is appreciated!

Katie x

Tiny Pleasures & UK Etsy Love

2010-11-24T17:31:00.000Z

Sometimes being a stay-at-home mummy is hard work. There's a lot of work and noone to say thank you at the end of the day. Today I've been trying to appreciate some of the little things that have made me happy...

This adorable vintage brooch by TemporalFlux...I might buy it :-)

A hot cup of coffee in my favourite cup...

Sweet & funny ninjas by Lilley on Etsy

Looking at my nails and remembering I painted them with silly spots last night...

Some lovely feedback from a customer who purchased my Gift Baubles...

Gorgeous vintage-look tags by Craftypagan...

...and *almost* selling out of my third batch of Blackboard Rings, so I'll be painting up a storm tonight!

Don't forget:

Enter the code 'KOALA' at my Etsy checkout, and you'll get a snazzy 15% off your purchases. There's only a week left to order a custom necklace, and last posting dates are looming for international buyers. Have a browse *here*
I'm running a great promotion for UK crafters. Your ad/image will be printed on the face side of a card of your choice in a promotional pack I'm producing. Read more details and apply *here*
To tell me what little thing makes you happy in the comments :-)

Katie x

Discount Code!

2010-11-24T09:39:00.000Z

It's meant to be one of the biggest weeks for online shopping, and although I'm busy packing and shipping orders, I think I can squeeze a few more in!

So, beautiful blog readers, I'm offering a new discount code just for you. Buy anything in my shop and enter the code 'KOALA' at checkout (my favourite animal ♥) and you'll be rewarded with a 15% discount.

Necklaces from a selection available here

Katie x

Brand New {just in time for Christmas}

2010-11-23T14:00:00.001Z

I've spent the morning listing some fabulous new earrings :-)

All studs just a sweet 5 bucks!

I'm doing a special week-long offer, it's Black Friday/Cyber Monday coming up, and a lot of my favourite online stores are doing some amazing promotions! So I'm joining the rabble and doing one of my own. I'm doing a buy-two-get-one-free on ALL the earrings in my shop!

Have a look *here* at the selection I have. Add two pairs to your cart, and pop a message-to-seller in the box stating which you would like as your free pair! It doesn't even matter if one is a little more than the others. As long as you pay for two pairs, you can chose *any* other pair free!

Still to come this week: A special blog code for a discount in my shop (don't forget to follow me on twitter if you want one right away - http://www.twitter.com/twinklyspangle), some of my very favourite UK crafters and a fun screenprinting DIY.

Katie x

Etsy Love

2010-11-22T18:07:00.000Z

Some lovely picks from my favourites for this chilly evening...

Wide-leg toddler pants by justpretty.

3 Heart Tray Set by DarriellesClayArt

The Tiny Meteorite Necklace by TheAngryWeather

Wooden Bunting Necklace by Lucie0ellen

I hope you enjoyed my picks for today, I'll try and make it a regular feature.

Katie x

* Happy Mondays *

2010-11-22T11:18:00.000Z

It's Monday, the day of the week filled with the most promise ♥

Today I'm going to be...

Packing up orders...

Popping my little guy to the doctors for a quick check-up...

Making loads more vintage-lace earrings and brooches and rings!

I'm also offering a *discount* for my twitter friends. The code is 'TWITTER' but don't forget to follow me first! http://www.twitter.com/twinklyspangle .You'll get a 15% discount off anything in my shop. have a look here

I'll be back later with some of my Etsy favs this week x

Playing Card Promotion

2010-11-21T19:29:00.000Z

Just a quick note, I am now sending out application forms for my 2011 Playing Card Promotion.

You can read more about it *here* but the basics are:

Sponsor a single card in a deck of 52. Your advert will be placed directly in the center. You can choose which card you would like, subject to availability.
1000 packs will be ordered and you will have the choice of how many you would like to distribute. Think pubs, craft fairs, or sending them out to loyal customers. I'll be posting more ideas in a blog post later this week, so stay tuned!
Cards are a great promotional tool because they'll be used and looked at again and again!
I already have around 50 interested crafty businesses, but I'm going to send out as many applications as people want. The final 52 will be selected on a first come first serve basis, based solely on when payment is received. There is no obligation at this point.
Payment will be due before 15th January.

If you want to be involved, be sure to mail me before the 16th December on cakeadaykatie@hotmail.co.uk

Katie x

Customizable Cupcake Toppers - {DIY}

2010-11-19T17:05:00.000Z

Today I'm sharing this sweet tutorial for making cupcake toppers to fit in with any party theme you can dream up :-)

You will need:

Cardstock in a co-ordinating colour to your party decor
Skewers
Wire cutters
Glue
Scissors
Stickers

I didn't have any little cocktail sticks, so I used barbeque skewers and chopped off the blunt end with wire cutters. If you do this too, you'll find that the wood splinters a little, but don't worry as that end will be covered up. Or you could use cocktail sticks, that woud probably be better!

Make a fold about 2 inches wide. The width will be just slightly longer than your little flags, so you can try different sizes if you want a different effect. I've used a candy-lilac textured cardstock.

Cut deep triangles into the fold. I tried to keep the triangles all the same size, but I didn't measure it out first, I think this gives them a fun, crafty look.

Now you can stick your stickers to the flags. Don't go too close to the fold, you'll see why in a minute. I used puffy stickers in sweet florals and hearts for a 3D effect. I love the idea of creating a tiny scene on each one, perhaps with green flags and dinosaur stickers, or black flags and rocket stickers! The great thing is that you can easily use the flags again, most stickers just peel off after.

Put a huge blob of glue over the fold on your opened-up flag and a teeny smidge on the point. Place your skewer about a third of the way up and fold your flag over, making sure that the points meet. Press down firmly.

I've actually used a glue stick here, which dries quite quickly anyway, but for a firmer hold, especially if your cakes are going to be handled by littlies, you could use PVA. You'll need to hold the flags together somehow while they dry. I've used my handmade heart peggies, but paperclips would work just as well.

Now pop them into your cakes! I have also used the same technique for skewer flags to hold my homemade burgers and sandwiches together.

I hope you liked this tutorial today, feel free to leave a comment, I always read the blogs of my commenter's.

Have a lovely, warm evening.

Liberty Of London Open Call

2010-11-19T08:30:00.001Z

Yesterday I read on the Folksy forums that Liberty Of London, a large upmarket department store, is having an open call for designers of women's and men's clothes, accessories and housewares.

I was breathless with excitement. Imagine! So I've applied and I will be there on the 5th of February, debuting a new Sterling Silver range that I have had in my mind for a while.

How can you get involved?

Go *here* and sign up. You'll get an email straight away with more details. Let me know if you decide to sign up, I'm super shy and could do with some friendly readers to prevent me legging it when I get to the front of the queue!

I have a busy busy day today...

I'm going to whip up this fab quilt by Katie from I Go By Katie...there's a sweet DIY here, and how cute is her dog?

I'll be posting a fun cupcake topper DIY post...

Pink Cupcake Print by Stoopidgerl

I desperately need to tidy my house.

I don't have a cute photo for that one, because if you saw the state of my living room right now you would probably never read my blog again!

Have a beautiful day x

Calling UK Crafters

2010-11-17T17:42:00.000Z

I've been working on a great promotional opportunity for UK-based creative microbusiness. Is this you?

You have a Folksy or Etsy shop where you sell handmade products
You are based in the UK
You plan to be involved in your business for at least a year

This might be a great chance for you!

Here is the plan. I am producing a pack of playing cards, in the traditional size and form. There are 54 cards in the pack. As you can see from the example below, each card has a large space in the middle of the face card. This is where your advertisement will go. There are a few options:

Include a logo and your web address
A product image (preferably with a clear white background that will look good in a vertical fashion)

Because of the shape of the available space, your web address is likely to look it's best along the side of your image.

Here is what you will get if you decide to get involved:

Your choice (on a first come, first serve basis) of which card you would like your image to be included on
19 packs of cards. If you don't want the full allocation I will be happy to distribute any extra at craft fairs. I do about 10 craft fairs a year.
A feature on my blog, including an interview.

Here are some questions that I have had so far:

Why would I want to be involved?

Traditional paid advertising is usually for a defined period of time. This is necessary to keep blogs and pages fresh. With this project, your advert will be seen again and again. Not just by the person who owns the cards, but everyone who plays with them! As the cards are based on a traditional pack, they will be kept in peoples houses and brought out for games for months to come. As your web address is directly ON the card, they will always be able to visit your site if they like your advert. This is why it's important that you plan to be in business for a while. We don't want the pack to full of dead links.

What will happen to the packs once they are produced?

Each advertiser will be distributed a number of packs. You can give them out at craft fairs, pop them into packages (although be aware this will slightly increase your postage charges, so might be a good option for your repeat customers only), take a few packs to your local pub, give them out with birthday presents, take them to your local handmade gift store and ask them to give them out. Over the next few months I'll be posting a variety of ways you can give them out, so stay tuned.

How much will it cost?

The cost will be £49. This includes the cost of producing the packs, postage to each person taking part, and specially designed boxes for each pack.

I own a business that isn't crafty. Can we sponsor a card?

Right now I have a list of over 60 people interested in this project. I'd rather fill the pack with crafty businesses only.

What about supplies?

UK based supply sellers are welcome.

Why am I the right person to run this project?

I have been involved in other large scale craft promotions before, including Handm@de craft fairs and The Diary Project. I have qualifications in both Business and Marketing, and I have been involved in the craft community for three years. I currently have the time and knowledge to make this a great promotional opportunity.

What about the backs of the cards?

There will be a short application form to fill in, before any payment is taken or images need submitting. The form has a few survey questions, including whether sponsors would prefer a generic or designed card back. The back image needs to be identical on each pack. I will welcome anyone who would like to take on the challenge of designing this, and they will receive a credit on the box.

When would you need my image/payment?

Here is the time frame for this project:

17th November - Detailed blog post and email to all interested crafters directing them here. From this point I will be sending out the short application forms to anyone interested in taking part.

17th December - Deadline for applications.

18th December - Information on how your payment will be spent, how to pay, your provisional card and image resolution and size information sent out.

15th January - Deadline for payment. Once your payment is received you will receive a short questionnaire for your blog interview.

30th January - Deadline for interviews. Once your interview is received you will be informed when your interview will be published. I will chose images from your shop to compliment your business.

15th February - Deadline for final image. I can provide some help if you need it on resolutions and images to use.

20th February - I will send all the information to the printers. There is a 6 week turnaround on the packs.

You can expect to receive your packs by the end of March, in time for Easter craft fairs and promotions.

I want to be involved. What do I do now?

If you have emailed me and registered your interest already, sit tight. I'll be sending out the short applications over the next few days. Otherwise you can leave your email address in the comments of this post, or you email me at cakeadaykatie@hotmail.co.uk.

I know, it's an odd email address. But it's the one that goes straight to my phone, so I can reply instantly to any questions that you might have.

You are not committing to anything until you have paid, so don't worry!

Follow my blog to keep up-to-date with infomation and to see who else is getting involved!

Petal Bowl Find

2010-11-17T13:57:00.000Z

I have to say, I'm not terribly gifted in the thrifting department. I love browsing blogs to see other peoples vintage finds, but here in the UK there is a big price difference between a charity shop and a vintage store. Very occasionally I will find something worthy of posting about. Yesterday, I scored this sweet petal bowl for £2!

I wish I had one of those homes where a bowl of rainbow sweets can sit safely on the (solid wood) sideboard, but it's not going to happen. Mainly because I can't help myself when it comes to sweets...

So, I've filled it with a bunch of my Baubles, filled with fun handmade jewellery! You can just see a sweet owl ring peering out there :-)

I'm getting a bit of a collection of random bowls.

Anyway, stay tuned, because later on today I'll be posting about an exciting new promotional opportunity for UK crafters that I'm working on - so exciting!

Katie x

Beautiful Lovely Things

2010-11-15T18:58:00.002Z

So, did I mention I'm an exhibitor on Papernstitch for the next two weeks? Well, I am. This means I have been spending even more time than usual on the site browsing the beautiful selections that Brittni has made. I thought I would share some of my favourites, but please do go on over to the site and have a browse, there are some beautiful gifts listed right now, some with fantastic offers if you find them through the site.

Decorative Clipboard - Box64Studios

Firstly, the design on the paper used to decorate this clipboard is beautiful, secondly, the clipboard itself is put together by adults with disabilities, which means you are supporting people who may not be able to work in the ways that you have the chance to. I'd love to use these a la Rachel Denbow's fabulous display!

Customizable Hand-stamped necklace - Hazelnut Cottage

I love the selection of charms and the option to customize this rocky necklace - something about metal stamping really interests me, I don't think I have the time to take up another craft though, so I might have to make do with treating myself to this.

Swirling Leaves Scarf Wrap - PrettyPennyDesigns

I want this scarf. I saw it when I was browsing Papernstitch before I was an exhibitor and I thought, I need that in my life. Isn't it beautiful? Hand sewn and screenprinted and such a sweet design for Autumn. It's top of my buy list!

Embroidered Wall Art - Monkey & Squirrel

When I finally get my living room decorated in colour that isn't Tobacco White and Poo Pink, I want a wall filled with embroidery hoops, both mine and others. This is so sweet and kind of reminds me a little of chalkboards, which you know, I just love! And the perfect saying for me too :-)

I hope you see something you love over at PapernStitch - have you heard of the site before? Click below to let me know :-)

Katie x

Fun News

2010-11-15T10:27:00.000Z

Have you had a beautifully perfect weekend? It's so bright and clear ad cold and crisp here, the perfect weather for Disney films and sewing :-)

I did a craft fair on Saturday, it was a bit of a disaster all round really, the lights that I bought were the wrong colour (red instead of blue), my tablecloth didn't quite fit my table, and it was very, very quiet. I tried to maintain a positive attitude throughout the day though, and did manage to recoup the cost of my stall, plus a little extra for cakes and coffees.

Anyway, my *big* announcement that I have been keeping a secret for a few weeks is...

I'm featured on PapernStitch! If you haven't heard of it, it's a great website run by Brittni who also writes a fab craft blog. The site showcases different handmade talent every few weeks, and links direct to your shop. I'm hoping as it's coming up to Christmas that this is going to be really fabulous for twinklyspangle!

My 'Sew Pretty' necklace in green is currently showing under 'New and Notable' on the front page, but I think she switches things around daily. I'm looking forward to this week :-)

Katie x

Busy Spangle

2010-11-12T14:02:00.001Z

I shouldn't be blogging. I have so much left to do. I received a call while I was on a playdate on Tuesday saying a cancellation had come up at a local craft fair. It's behind the shops near where I went to school. Not a prime location, but for £20 I think it might be worth giving a go. I'm nervous though, really nervous. There's something about doing a local fair that strikes fear into my heart.

Modern Fabrics covered with scraps of vintage lace...

So I've been knocking up earrings a-go-go, stamping mini envelopes to use as little baggies...

I stamped a lot of tiny Kraft envelopes with this fun cupcake stamp from skullandcrossbuns

...and attempting to turn a pair of curtains into a tablecloth, my first serious, important sewing-machine project. I'll be popping the earrings I have left into my Etsy shop, so keep an eye out after the weekend...

I also got a huge wholesale order which I have to start working on Monday or it won't get there in time. It's so nice to be busy, and I felt very important yesterday sipping coffee in my favourite shop and ordering from my wholesalers on the phone, tapping away convos on my laptop. But today I feel...slumpy. I think I'm tired, it's been a long week, Daddy is back tonight and the house is total sty. I need a list. I need to prioritise. I need cake.

Katie x

p.s. I do reply to all blog comments (although I'm usually a few posts behind!), but I can't do that if you don't link back to your blog or shop :-)

{Blackboard Jewellery} Ideas...

2010-11-08T16:01:00.002Z

Some cute ideas for doodling on your new Blackboard Jewellery...

Hearts on Cufflinks for a quirky wedding party...

Doodle yourself a giant diamond necklace...

Remind yourself to buy some milk...or cookies...or cake...with a cute ring.

Doodle a fun night sky on a necklace...

Beat everyone at noughts and crosses on a sweet brooch...

Design a fun scene on a pendant...

Remind everyone not to take things too seriously...

What would you do on yours?

Katie x

P.S I should probably mention that the 'Milk' design is drawn on a random circle, the same I use for the rings. But I did the design on the back, which only receives one coat of paint, hence why it looks a little bobbly. No real reason, other than a toddler being very distracting! I wish I had taken a Milk ring out today as it's horrible weather here and I have forgotten it and have to go out again. Silly.

Festive Bling

2010-11-07T15:42:00.000Z

Holidays are coming...

I've just updated the shop with some fun new Christmas designs...the necklaces come in a sweet gift box and would be a perfect little pressie for Decembertime.

Christmas Present Necklace is available *here*

Baubles filled with fun jewellery are available *here*

Christmas Tree Necklace is available *here*

Don't forget, if you live outside the UK, you'll need to make your order before the 2nd December.

Katie x

Blackboard Jewellery Packaging

2010-11-06T01:08:00.002Z

A couple of people have expressed an interest in how my Blackboard Jewellery is packaged up to send. As I sent off a few pieces yesterday, I thought I would snap a quick photo.

The boxes are all decorated with either a sweet bow or a slightly imperfect round piece that I can't use for rings or cufflinks.

And if the sweet packaging has convinced you to buy, hop on over to my Etsy shop, where you will find the full range of fun Blackboard pieces.

If you feature one of my my pieces, please don't be shy in letting me know! I found my blackboard rings featured in three places using social mention that I hadn't even known about!

Katie x

Workspace Tour

2010-11-05T11:16:00.001Z

A little sweet workspace tour for a cold and windy Friday morning...

This super old and chipped glass table sits in the corner of our living room, piled high with supplies and books and cuttings and magazines and empty bottles of coke...and my beautiful sewing machine that I love with all of my heart...

Husqvarna 95 with a extension table and millions and millions of inherited bobbins and needles. I *still* haven't quite gotten the hang of it, I'm working on a few quilts and a cushion but it's a slow learning curve for someone who has only ever sewed on an antique hand-turned sewing machine with one stitch type!

My tissue paper poms...I did have more but people kept stealing them and now I only have two. I got my tutorial from here at SmileandWave, there are millions available online and they are super easy to make, each one just takes a few short minutes. I want a whole garland strung up over my table. In the background you can see a cute display that I thrifted from a 'Free Car Boot Sale' where people take along stuff they don't want and then they can choose two new-to-them things to take away. I got this and a yellow vase which broke in the car on the way home. I've filled it with pots of glitter and tiny animal ornaments and a mini globe.

Yes, my obsession with blackboard paint continues into my home. The postcards are from the Natural History Museum and are accurate photos of gemstones. I try to come up with 5 goals every day. Usually one of them is 'Get properly dressed.' We have another blackboard painted on a cupboard lower down for my little one to draw on, although he still draws on my bedroom walls. In pen.

Have you posted a picture of your workspace recently? I'd love to see it, don't be scared to say hi in the comments and link me to your blog, I'm always on the look out for fun new blogs to read!

Katie x

Party Decorations DIY

2010-11-03T10:04:00.000Z

I mentioned before that I had to quickly through a party together for my little boy. I kind of mentioned it to a few people and then got totally distracted by life, and then the day was upon me! I couldn't recall *where* I saw this super-easy paper garland DIY - but it was on some one's blog, so if you know where it's from please do let me know so I can credit the original idea-haver.

I grabbed a whole big pile of scrap card, cardstock I had used a bit of already, cheap card I bought for Ramsey to make collages with, bits of random card that were lying around, and using a 1.5inch circle punch, punched out as many circles as I could. I wanted to string the garlands from the light to the edges of the room, so I used approx. 6 pieces of card for each strand. This gave me around 3 meters of garland.

Sorry for the terrible, grainy photo, I'm having some camera issues and have had to revert to a point and shoot that won't let me change the shutter/aperture settings. So annoying. By the way, if you don't have a circle punch, you could just draw round a cup, use a different shape or a craft knife. It will take longer though!

Next, I set my sewing machine to the longest single straight stitch that I have. I used regular thread and an old, dull needle. Sewing paper is BAD for your bestest sharpest needle.

Starting from the middle of your first circle, sew to the edge and then pop another circle right up to the edge. You want to try and avoid your needle poking in between, so you can slightly overlap them if you like, but usually the card will just sit flush up to the previous circle anyway. Once you get into a rhythm, you'll find you don't need to hold or guide the card, you can use both hands to pop the next circle under. This makes it super quick. Once you have popped in all your circles, you'll find you have a long strand of quite strong garland. Fun! Backstitch over the end as you would with fabric to seal the deal.

I didn't pin my garland to the wall, I just slipped the first circle into my lampshade and it kind of help itself up. Then I hung a few circles over the curtain rails to hold up both ends.

Everyone said how fab they looked! Let me know if you give it a go!

Dinocakes!

2010-10-31T19:44:00.004Z

My little boy was *THREE* this week, my precious little baby is all grown up...

We had an impromptu dinosaur-themed party. I picked up these fun dinosaurs from a cheapy shop, bought some ready-made icing, and put them together to make fun dinosaur cakes!

So colourful! I used apricot jam to stick the dinosaurs on, they held up pretty well. I think I might make some necklaces out of the spare ones.

I have some fun DIY's for decorations coming up, plus a post about some achievements people have been making, such a fun week, stay tuned!

Katie x

Project Positive Day 2

2010-10-27T18:06:00.003+01:00

I have five amazing things that have happened to me to be grateful for in this post.

My blog, and a link to my shop, is featured in *this* article on Etsy. Wow!
I got an enquiry about a HUGE wholesale order...that if it comes off will make my Christmas amazing - incredible!
I was able to buy a new camera today - well, I exchanged my crappy Fujifilm one for a decent Kodak one. Woop!
I finished the patchwork part of my very first quilt...finally!
Daddy is coming home mid week to celebrate our little ones birthday tonight...which means I might get a lay in tomorrow :-)

I know a few people who are taking part in this fun little blogging project with me - what are *you* doing to be positive this week?

Katie x

This took my breathe away...

2010-10-27T00:48:00.000+01:00

I wish this was my bedroom. Even though the trees on the bedspread are made with a bone design, I don't care. I would love to dream that I'm in a magical forest...

If you are lucky enough to be able to afford this incredible bed, you can buy it for just over $9,000 on Etsy, from AttilaDesign. Click *here* to visit her shop.

Katie

Project Positive

2010-10-25T21:53:00.004+01:00

All available from my shop

This week I am going to blog 5 things that I am thankful for every single day. 5 things that I can be positive about. 5 things that I am grateful for happening to me. I'm calling it Project Positive. Feel free to join me on this adventure :-)

Today I am thankful for...

The person who taught my little Ramsey that giving Mummy flowers was nice. On our walk today I heard "Mummy I pick you a beautiful flower' three times.
Gorgeous, bright, clear Autumn weather. Sunny skies and fire-coloured trees.
Being approved for *two* handmade product showcases.
My laptop cable *not* being ruined after I left the end dangling in a cup of water for the second time, for over an hour. God bless you Dell and your awesomely amazing products.
It's cold. I'm thankful for my duvet!

The aims of the week are; Only positive tweets and status updates, no complaining or negativity, blogging my five grateful things, and maintaining a *positive* outlook.

I hope you'll follow my journey into happiness this week xoxo

Katie

Hearts Goal

2010-10-25T01:43:00.000+01:00

Twinklyspangle's Etsy Shop has gained 96 hearts this month. I'd love to make it 100 before the end of October!

Show your love for pretty much *anything* with a fun Blackboard Heart necklace from my shop

Katie x

Etsy Holiday Bootcamp Week 5

2010-10-24T17:37:00.009+01:00

This weeks bootcamp's featured Adam Brauns 7 Key Life Lessons.

I loved them! This is how I will be tackling each on, both in my life and in my creative micro enterprise. (So glad I got to use that phrase again!)

1. Get Out Of Your Comfort Zone

I *wish* this was my comfort zone! This adorable bedroom belongs to Danielle of Thompson Family Life. You can see more of her beautiful home on her blog *here* and visit her website for fun digital downloads *here*

Behind my computer, lying in my bed is my comfort zone. I find it super hard to get out there and pimp my products. I'd love to walk into some handmade stores and galleries and try and get my pieces on show, for sale. I'd love to have the confidence to do that! There's a sweet store on the high street that sells handmade things. But I'm too scared. I guess I can embrace this by taking a showcase of jewellery and going down there. There worst they can say is no, right?

2. Embrace The Late, Sleepless Nights

Cute little coffee cozys are just the thing for sipping hot starbucks on frosty mornings...these are by Flufftail. Visit her sweet shop *here*

Er, hello? I have a child! My little son will be three this week and he is still waking up super early, sometimes 3am, and telling me he needs to watch telly. I certainly can't get anything done during the day, with little curious fingers all over everything, so I always work, blog and list late, late, late. If I didn't embrace late nights, I wouldn't get anything done!

3. Speak The Language Of The Individual You Want To Become

...or let these fun earrings speak for you! These cuties are designed by CannyBelle and are available *here*

This aim really *speaks* to me. I've been trying to do this a lot to day. I think the biggest issue I have is with negative words and feelings. I seem more likely to broadcast negativity sometimes, and that is not the person that I want to be. Taking my cue from some of the more popular crafty blogs that I read, I've banished complaints, negativity and bad feeling towards people from my blog, twitter and facebook. Of course, it's easier when you can read what you are saying before you push it out there into the world...

4. Find A Mantra To Anchor And Guide You

Everyones favourite mantra...by Barnowl Primitives. Buy this fun sign *here*

When I was 14, a group of mean girls made my school days really horrible. I felt like I didn't have anyone to turn to, so I took a book out of the library, a self help book. I can't remember what it was called, but one of the stages involved repeating 'It's All Going Wonderfully'

I still use that as my mantra when I am stressed or worried about something. It helped me to remember that there are bigger things in my life than a group of horrid girls. It helps me to feel positive about things, when I remember that I coped with that sad situation and came out fighting.

5. Always Stay Guided By Your Values, Not Your Necessities

Work out your values with a fun Blackboard brooch from *here*

I'm interpreting this Aim as being about not making as much money as you can by any means possible, but staying true to the core person and business I want to become. I had a hard decision recently, when working on SEO optimization for my shop. One particular word was getting LOADS of hits, but was a pretty tenuous link to my items. I knew that including it in my Meta tags would mean more traffic, but that people might come to my shop and be disappointed. I decided not to include the word, and stick to using keywords that accurately describe my shop. A tough decision, but the right one.

6. To Achieve Unreasonable Things, You Must Become An Unreasonable Person

Positive, Inspiring Art Print by HoneyBoo

Unreasonable to some is reasonable to others. I have 100 online friends who think that it's perfectly reasonable to aim to make a living from making and selling what you love. I can't say the same for my real life connections. I think many people already thing that I am an unreasonable person. Nevermind.

7. Become Hopelessly Idealistic About The Things That Make You Feel Alive

My son, creating, empowerment, independence, exploring, beautiful skies, stars, biscuits, craft supplies, being able to afford a takeaway, long drives. being a Mummy, having a long, lazy lie in, sparkles and glitter and fun and love...all make me feel alive.

I hope you have a lovely day, thank you for reading a little more about me. I'd love your opinions or links to your own inspiring bootcamp posts!

Katie x

Can't Wait To Try This...

2010-10-22T01:00:00.001+01:00

I've made no secret of the fact that I simply adore A Beautiful Mess, the blog of Elsie Flannigan, who is pretty much the closest to a vintage/handmade celebrity I've ever seen...she's just so inspirational!

Anyway, over on her blog she's doing a super-fun Trick Or Treat week in the run up to halloween, with loads of cute DIY's from various fun bloggers.

I saw this today:

Argg! How cute is that? There's a tutorial *here* by Lori-Marie of Pretty Little Things

I've dug out an old black cardi and I'm going to give it a go this evening, I'll show you how I get on.

Katie x

Etsy Holiday Bootcamp Week 4

2010-10-21T15:09:00.005+01:00

The keyword lesson really got to me this week. I've had words going round my head for days. In the end I decided to show them to you like this:

The task was to come up with words describing your key customer base, your item keywords, and your business keywords. I found that some of the words overlapped one or two categories, and these are bigger on the tag cloud. I've used 'sweet' ' fun' and 'adorable' as my keywords in my shop (so, I've used them in every listing, every description and my shop sections)

Did you know that your shop section titles are used a metatags for google? I've worked on changing mine to all include at least one of my keywords this week. So, for example, I've changed 'Blackboard Pieces' to 'Fun Chalkboard Jewelry'.

I know, I've used the American spellings...but I figure I'll get more hits that way. I'm a traitor!

I've also changed 'Sew Lovely Collection' to 'Sweet Embroidered Jewelry' and 'Brass Pieces' to 'Brass Filigree Jewelry'. I'm hoping that these changes will really increase traffic to my shop. Something that I've seen already is I am currently the number one Google listing for Blackboard Ring, awesome or what??

The next stage of the bootcamp for this week is to update my Etsy profile. I don't think I've done that for a while, so it should be fun.

Meanwhile, why don't you stop by my shop?

Available *here*

All of my Brass Filigree pieces have 25% off right now, and I'm bashing out Gift Baubles like there's no tomorrow...I only have *8* more to last the whole Holiday season. I think they'll be a sell-out!

Gift Bauble (stuffed full of fun handmade jewellery!) available *here*

Do you have any offers on? I'd love to hear about them - I've started my online Christmas shopping already ;-)

Katie x

Little Boy Love

2010-10-19T22:40:00.002+01:00

My little boy is three next week - I still find it hard to believe I'm a real life Mummy! I don't share many pictures of us, him because he moves too quickly to photograph and me because I'm not terribly photogenic!

But here he is in all his squirmy, attention-seeking, adorable glory, check out that cheeky laugh...
...and here he is showing me some beautiful love, he fills my heart with happiness.

Katie x

Like Me ♥

2010-10-18T19:45:00.003+01:00

I would love your *likes* on Facebook...

Twinklyspangle Jewellery has a page here.

Thank you so much!

Bestsellers!

2010-10-17T21:51:00.002+01:00

Blackboard rings are selling super-fast! I'm so happy with the love they are getting on Etsy and on the blogosphere. If you feature something of mine, please don't be shy in telling me! Every feature or mention lifts my heart :-)

Blackboard Ring - $15.40 / £9.89 for sale *here*

What's your best-seller? I'd love to see!

♥ Impulse Purchase ♥

2010-10-17T03:56:00.000+01:00

Literally the most beautiful dress I have ever seen...

I saw it in Etsy's treasuries...and now it is on it's beautiful way to me. I've been looking for a floaty sweet dress to wear to my office Christmas party...yes, I know I am redundant, but I'm still invited, and so are all my office friends. Since I haven't got a great new job to brag about, my aim is to look totally awesomely amazing.

The dress is from RiverOfRomansk. Have a look in her shop for more beautiful, floaty dresses!

Katie

- Free Shipping Offer -

2010-10-16T11:30:00.002+01:00

Free International Shipping on my *new* hand embroidered letter pendants all weekend!

Visit my Etsy shop to take advantage of this offer

A Marvellous Gift

2010-10-16T05:11:00.000+01:00

Just found this...totally awesome! I can't imagine the level of skill and presicion neeeded for this kind of amazing piece...

I think a perfect gift for proud Grandparents.

Custom Double Fingerprint Cutting by LoriDanielle

Katie x

Custom Letter Pendants

2010-10-14T19:25:00.004+01:00

Do you love custom pieces? Something that was created especially for you? Then I have something exciting for you *squeeeeeeeee*

Custom Personalized Hand Embroidered Necklaces - $16.42 / £11

I present - Custom Hand Embroidered Letter Necklaces, in your choice of fabric, colour, and of course, letter.

I was inspired to create these by the Etsy Holiday Bootcamp - it's been SO inspiring for me to read some of the articles and this one, about offering custom items, gave me the idea. So last night I worked until it was light to create some samples, and today, worked super hard photographing and editing and listing, and now they are available in both my Etsy and Folksy shops!

Custom Necklace in Pink - $16.42 / £11

I took the pictures on the pages of my 1954 Singer sewing manual, gifted by my grandmother. Despite the interesting advice at the beginning to 'never put sewing before preparing your husband a delicious meal - he's been working hard, after all' and to 'get all your chores done before you settle with your sewing' it's still the most useful and comprehensive manual for sewing techniques I have ever found. I think it makes a great backdrop for these vibrant pendants.

Custom Necklace in Blue - $16.42 / £11

I've created a separate listing for each fabric I'm offering, and I've also suggested a few thread choices for each. There are 5 gorgeous fabrics available.

I designed the pattern for these myself. I wanted a simple, striking alphabet with perfect proportions that was just the right size for the 28mm buttons.

So, pop on over to my shop and snap up a sweet stocking filler. I'll be making each one separately, snuggled under a duvet and sipping hot chocolate - it's getting super cold and wintery here!

Katie x

♥ Unicorns Are Awesome ♥

2010-10-14T02:30:00.001+01:00

How sweet and perfect are these earrings? By lithiascreations

Gorgeous Unicorn Print by Vol25

Adorable Unicorn Postcard by Skunkboycreatures

Unicorns are awesome...x

I'm Making A Quilt

2010-10-13T15:47:00.004+01:00

Oops *blush* I overspent in the fabric store today! Did I mention that my very first sewing project is a quilt? I've always dreamed of owning a huge and beautiful quilt, and although I know it's an ambitious project I figure you don't learn anything unless you challenge yourself.

I've completed 4 squares of 9 blocks so far, and today I couldn't resist going to purchase more fabric and some batting. Here is what I snapped up:
How cute is that fishscale fabric? I thought I might try my hand at a smaller quilt as well, in girly shades that I can gift to a friend having a little girl, plus it will increase my confidence on my sewing machine.

I could not resist these fun little hedgehogs, I'll be making sweet purses with this fabric, just as soon as I figure out how to install a zipper. Anyone have any tips?

The starry fabric is just so beautiful, I'm going to use it between my quilt blocks.

Look at my stash growing! The cherry print is my absolute fav, I'd love to make a sweet dress out of it.

I'll be regularly updating with my quilts progress and pictures, you can follow my blog either from Bloggers dashboard or the Google reader thingy on the right.

Have you ever taken on an ambitious project? I'd love to hear about it :-)

Katie x

Have you seen...

2010-10-13T01:55:00.000+01:00

...something sweet in my shop?

My hairslides have been getting a lot of love recently...I don't have many left so if you like them, snap them up right away!

All available in my Etsy shop - click here - for $9.24 / £5.67

Etsy Holiday Boot Camp Week 3

2010-10-12T11:59:00.006+01:00

I read this article on 6 Secrets Of Success for my Etsy Bootcamp homework and just found it so inspiring...Here is how I am going to embrace each Secret..

Be You

Express yourself with a Blackboard Heart Pendant - $18.48 / £11.97

Sometimes I find it hard to be myself. I don't feel like people in my 'real' world will accept me for the person that I am underneath my mask. My family expect me to be a certain way, and often, so does my partner. I can be myself online - and that part of me is growing so much - and hopefully that will lead to me being myself offline more.

Trust Your Compass

Point Me In The Right Direction Print by Winterberrycottage

I think anyone who works in a creative field needs to be able to trust their instincts. I've been making jewellery for three years and it's only just now that I am starting to learn whether an idea is worth creating or not. Sometimes I let something knock around in my head for ages before I actually sit down and make it...maybe because I am scared it will fail and I will lose my confidence again. I must learn to take more risks.

Embrace The Optimist

Happy Blender Cross Stitch Pattern by Andwabisabi

I am always optimistic about craft fairs, but I do not wake up every morning thinking, 'I'm going to sell loads on Etsy today' I think because there have been (quite a few) days where I haven't sold anything, and it's hard to keep positive...Michelle Ward talks about always taking positive lessons out of things that go wrong (and she says 'crapballs' which is my new favourite thing to say). How can I embrace this? I guess by waking up every morning and saying 'I WILL make sales today' would be a good start!

Know What You Need And Get It

A Sweet View Print by AmeliaKayPhotography

Mostly I want cake. Second to cake I want my child to be happy. After that, I want to be a successful Etsy seller. I want a successful website of my own. Now that I have been made redundant, it's my chance to follow my dream of crafting and designing full time, well, as much full time as you can do with a grumpy toddler...I just want noone to say I should get a 'real' job

Surround Yourself With Love

Hand Sewn Sew Lovely Necklace -$15.42 / £10.02

This is a hard one for me. Sometimes I feel a bit lonely. 'Crafting' isn't really something that anyone in my life understands or gets. I don't have a group of crafty friends, and I sometimes feel that I do not have anyone to share my successes or triumphs with. When I was in Etsy finds recently, I wanted badly to tell someone, but there wasn't anyone to tell who would share my enthusiasm. So I can focus on surrounding myself with beautiful inspiring things. I started by redoing my whole craft area, putting up shelves and ordering some adorable prints to inspire me when I'm working.

Enjoy Where You Are

You Are Here Now Print by Farouche

I am enjoying my time now - I am enjoying not have a routine I have to stick to, to be able to pop to the post office or spend an hour doing some research or rifling through vintage sewing patterns or books...I am enjoying making some spending money from something I love to do...I am enjoying spending my days with a small, happy little man. I am enjoying now.

I feel so inspired after thinking about each of these secrets, thank you to Michelle Ward for her wonderful insights and positive, uplifting article.

Katie x

Want, Need, Love

2010-10-12T01:45:00.006+01:00

I need gorgeous fabrics. I have been searching Etsy and I'm blown away by the sheer choice of material that I can purchase to ruin in my sewing machine with my terribly-not-good sewing skills. I won't splash out just yet, maybe, but here is a little wishlist...

Delicious Kate Spain fabric - I'd love to add these into the quilt I am attempting. So far I'm just using scraps but I'll need to make some purchases soon...this is just a gorgeous selection. I'm thinking cushions and cute summer tops and fabric storage buckets...I'm thinking I might need a book called 'How To Sew'

Fandango, Kate Spain, LolaPinkFabrics

Sweet creepy fabric - if I could work out how to install a zipper, I think these would make the cutest purses and washbags.

The Ghastlies, Alexander Henry by Onceuponastitchinc

My little boy would love car print curtains and fun cushions...maybe a beanbag...am I being a bit adventurous?

Riley Blake, Wheels by Fancypantsfabric

Can you sew? How did you learn?

Katie x

Super Amazing Week

2010-10-11T17:57:00.003+01:00

The most awesome thing that happened to me this week is that my Blackboard Rings were featured in Etsy finds! I sold LOADS of them and now I need to get down and dirty with some blackboard paint and make some more - so happy! Plus, with my newly revived paypal balance, I can buy some amazing new supplies. I'm so happy and grateful for the exposure that I received because of this :-) I almost can't keep them in my shop long enough! Pop over and have a look.

I also got my sewing machine! You might know if you follow me on Twitter that I had been looking to buy one, well it turned out that a relative had one tucked away that they were not using, and have gifted it to me! I have started making a quilt and have lots of plans for fun things to sew. I'll keep you updated on my progress.

I finally know what a bobbin is!

Lastly, we went to the zoo! I love going to the zoo, there were lots of baby animals and we had a great time, my little guy can't stop talking about the tigers he saw

What a great week...

Katie x

Undiscovered Monday

2010-10-04T15:36:00.003+01:00

Since we still haven't had our oven fixed, and are surviving on a diet of salads, fruits, microwave chips and sandwich mixes, I've had to put off another Fussy Toddler Monday.

I thought I would replace the feature with something new for this blog, Undiscovered Monday.

Each Monday I will browse Etsy & Folksy for shops that currently have no sales, but awesome stuff...I hope you love this new feature

This gorgeous applique journal is by Tratgirl

I fell in love with these sweet Octopus earrings - such an original idea by The Grizzly Squirrel

A fun owl toy made from dress scraps, what a great use of materials. Snap it up from Taylortotsabq.

Have a beautiful day x

Etsy Holiday Boot Camp 2

2010-10-02T22:14:00.004+01:00

Hi :-)

Okay, so the second part of the Etsy bootcamp is out, and the challenges are a little harder this time.

The first part was to brainstorm new product ideas. This article shows what sort of things will be popular this holiday season. I was super happy to see that 'things with a writable surface such as chalkboard items' were included in the list. Currently my range includes necklaces, brooches, cufflinks and rings. Over the next few weeks I'm planning to expand into bracelets and earrings, as well as a super-adorable homeware idea that I've had.

Christmas gifts also featured heavily. I'm going to be hard at work promoting my fun handmade jewellery-filled Christmas Baubles. They were already featured on Cuteable this week, but I think they might be getting lost in a sea of things tagged with 'Christmas'. I need to work on getting them seen by more people. They've had such a great response, I feel so blessed to be part of the amazingly supportive Handmade community x
The next challenge was to find which items are your most popular. I know that my chalkboard jewellery has the most views as they were featured on a large craft website last week. I checked out Craftcult to see what tags people were using to find my items. Pretty much the most popular tag people are coming to my shop under is 'PINK'.

I also discovered that although I tag all of my items 'UK', not one single person found an item in my shop using that tag in the last week. I'm concerned I might be wasting a tag on that - something to think about.

The final part of the week's bootcamp was the hardest part for me - Find a Bootcamp Buddy.

I'm quite shy...and to be honest, this 'reach out to another Etsian' thing was a little scary for me. I guess that's the whole point of doing something like this though...

Anyway, after much searching I have found the most perfect, adorable, supportive buddy! Lucky me! Alterity is a fellow jewellery maker residing in the US who uses collectible antique and vintage buttons to make fun, unique pieces. She has such a great little niche! Here are a few of my favourite things from her shop...

Pink N Black Charm Bracelet - $84.00

Check out the awesomeness of the buttons on this bracelet - black and pink is one of my favourite combinations.

Pewter Floral Antique Button Earrings - $17

So cute to wear daily, and the antique buttons are not damaged in any way by her techniques - so clever!

Okay, so goals for the week are:

Finish prototypes for new chalkboard pieces
Get baubles in a big crafty blog or magazine
Add more *pink* things - I have a new design of embroidered jewellery going up this week, keep an eye on my shop because they are the sweetest, most fun things I have made this year, in all shades of pink, purple and turquoise.
Talk to other UK Etsy sellers to see if the UK tag is bringing in more views/sales for them
Build new friendship with fun holiday bootcamp buddy :-)

I'd love to hear your experiences and new learnings from the bootcamp so far. If you link me in the comments I'll be sure to check out your bootcamp blogs -I'm also interested in hearing whether you thinking tagging 'UK' is worth it.

Hope you are having a super-efficient day, I'll be back tomorrow with some fun new embroidered cards that I'm ready to show the world :-)

Katie x

Beautiful Things

2010-09-30T10:51:00.004+01:00

Just some things that I want to own...

...How adorable is this t-shirt from Dandyrions?

...These fun journals from Red Velvet Art are filled with vintage papers and maps

...These breathtaking images are cut from a real leaf by Nature' Art

It's a beautiful sunshiney day here, and me and Rambo are taking a walk to the craft store for sweet fabrics and fun buttons.

I hope your day is filled with sunshine too.

Katie x

Etsy Success Boot Camp 1

2010-09-29T21:36:00.005+01:00

I've joined the Etsy Success Holiday Boot Camp!

The first newsletter is available here (it might not stay up forever)

There is a checklist of things to do, and I'm hoping that it's going to help me and my shop have a successful holiday season. Everyone knows that October and November are the best times for selling online, and I really hope to make the most of it, especially as I am off work for now.

I learnt about writing a mission statement from the Etsy talk I attended recently, you can read the write up here.

Mission Statement.

My creative micro-enterprise is remarkable because I think up unique ideas, like my Blackboard Jewellery, fun ways to reuse materials, like my Sew Pretty range of necklaces, and cute ideas for gifts, like my Gift Baubles. I believe there is a space in the market for adorable handmade jewellery that will make you stand out from the crowd - that doesn't come with a designer price tag.

My mission is to sell fabulous, great value handmade products for individuals, that make lovely gifts. I aim to provide stellar customer service, as expected from a small business that genuinely cares about each customer they have.

I want people to love the things that I make, look at my shop and want to make a purchase, and want to tell their friends where they got that fabulous bracelet.

Gift Baubles available now in my shop

I'm so excited to see where this Boot Camp can take me! Are you doing it too?

Katie x

Published!

2010-09-28T12:07:00.003+01:00

Not quite sure why I haven't blogged about this before! I'm in a magazine this month...

It's a tutorial for my 'Sew Pretty' necklace in Popular Crafts, which is edited by the lovely Kerry of Pennydog Jewellery. It's so strange seeing words that I have written in print. I love how the tutorial looks, the two pictures on a blue background are mine and I sent the necklace in for the main picture. It's also on the front page!

The magazine is on sale for the next month as well, so please do have a look next time you are in a magazine shop - it really is very exciting for me to see my necklace peeking out at me from the shelf at WHSmith!

The necklace is currently on sale in my Folksy shop. It's a one off, and comes sweetly gift wrapped with some fun free gifts, like all twinklyspangle purchases. You can buy it here.

On another note, a crafty project that I have been working on for a few months is finally nearing completion! I haven't got the finished product for photographing yet, but I like to give a sneaky little peek of future twinklyspangle products. This is something totally different for me, and I really hope that you love it as much as I do! I'm hoping to have it all ready to show by 6th October.

Follow me on twitter for up-to-the-minute news on new twinklyspangle items :-)

Finally I got a really sweet convo on Etsy today, just saying 'Your shop is so cute!' I thought that was such a sweet thing to randomly do. I'm going to pass it on and do it to someone else today!

Katie x

♥ So Excited! ♥

2010-09-26T15:08:00.005+01:00

It's a big day at Twinklyspangle Towers :-)

I'm applying for something to be in a big gift guide. Do you want to see it?

What do you think?

The round pieces you see in the collage I have designed exclusively for this very purpose, they bring a bit of magic sparkle to your tree!

I think they would be perfect for:

Hanging on your tree on Christmas Morning
Stuffing the toe of a Christmas stocking
Final-Advent-Calender-Day gift
Sweet present for a friend

Etsy - $23.72

Folksy - £15

Each bauble contains a selection of stretchy bracelets, cameo rings, embroidered jewellery and blackboard pieces. You can even message me for a specially customized bauble to suit your needs . I hope you love them as much as I do!

Have a great day!

Toddler Scavenger Hunt

2010-09-25T21:47:00.002+01:00

I'm one of those people that wishes they had the patience to homeschool their child, but wasn't blessed with the patience. I love the idea of teaching my toddler, though, and I try to do fun educational things with him while I have the joy of being with him full time.

I read lots of blogs daily, and after I read this entry on breezy Acres Farm, I was inspired to try a scavenger hunt with Ramsey. I wasn't sure he would do so well with the colours, right now everything is 'PINK!' so I drew some pictures of things we might find, Acorn, Sycamore Pod, Feather, Stone, and put then in a little bag to collect what we might find.

We spent a long time finding feathers, the first card he pulled out. I don't actually like feathers since someone told me they can have mites in them, but he gets very excited by them so I had to swallow my yuckiness over them.

We learnt a new word - 'Sycamore'

You can't really see it here but he is clutching the bottom part of an acorn. He was a bit fed up with me taking shots by this point!

On another note, I'm trying to figure out how to schedule blog posts using blogger. I've been trying for ages! Does anyone have an idea how to do this?

Have a great day! x

Hard Week

2010-09-24T12:03:00.003+01:00

This week has been really hard - stroppy toddler, the realisation that the scanner I had planned to use for my new range of cards doesn't have the driver disk with it, and my Internet connection is too slow to download it, stroppy partner, realising I have put on nearly 6 pounds over three weeks, stroppy Mummy.

So I'm trying to resolve each problem one at a time. Stroppy toddler is having more creative play and fun activities. I'm trying to schedule a post about a nature walk we went on for this weekend, and we went to the Natural History Museum again to look at dinosaurs, plus lots of arty fun things at home. I love how is developing this fun little personality, he has a favourite song (lollipop, lollipop, ooohh lolli-lolli-lolli-lollipop!) and can't wait to spend more time with him now I'm not working.

I've come down to my favourite cafe to use their free wifi. I love this cafe because they are the kind of people who will run over to the shop when they run out of butter for your crossiant (that just happened!) and they don't mind me plugging my laptop into their power supply!

Some things I hope to have done by the end of the week;

Finished my Christmas items ready for submitting to various gift guides. I've been working really hard in the evenings making bracelets and earrings for a fun idea I have had for giving a sweet little Christmas Gift. I'll have photos to show you by the weekend!
Written up my tips for taking your stroppy toddler on a fun nature walk and uploaded photos of Ramsey having a great time doing it.
Ordered the first run of prints of my brand new mixed-media cards, the prints are just the start *secretive* I'm so excited about this project I have been working on it since the summer and as soon as this driver is installed I can get scanning!

I hope you are having a beautiful day x

Etsy Talk Notes 2 - SEO & Pitching To The Press

2010-09-17T22:07:00.004+01:00

I've had a lazy, lazy day today, and we are now waiting for the arrival of Chinese - naughty I know, but their lemon chicken is just to die for, what's your favourite take-away? I wish we had more Mexican outlets round here, I'm a sucker for nachos...

So now I'm going to continue my write up of the talk I attended on Tuesday (see here for Part 1) run by Etsy's marketing man Matt and organised by lovely Amity who is the UK Etsy blogger. This part is a little more technical and will focus on optimizing your shop and listings for search engine results, as well as how to pitch to magazines. I hope you find it useful. As usual, I'm always grateful to read comments, especially if you have found the post interesting, or have any additional tips to add. Reading comments makes writing the post worthwhile!

Okay, so Matt talked about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) which I hadn't heard of before, or if I had I don't think that I expected it to apply to me. But it does, and to you too!

The idea is to make your listing higher up in Google (or generic search engine of your choice). The more links you have coming IN to your shop, the higher it will appear. Therefore, it is excellent to try and get your shop and item links mentioned where ever you can, not just by yourself, but by others. Matt talked about featuring your competitors in your blog, and linking to their shops, as the whole community has a karmic atmosphere and we have to support each other as artists. So if you feature other people on your blog, you will be adding to their links going in to their shop. Spread the love!

Another point of the talk was to use searchable terms. One example he used was to name your pictures with searchable words. For example, no one is going to be searching Google images for 'new pic 1' but they might search for 'star necklace' or 'yellow sock monkey'. He did say this wasn't relevant in terms of loading your pictures onto Etsy because of the way they store them, but might help with other sites.

Using searchable terms came across as essential. Because we are attempting to market our shops outside of Etsy, we need to be using strong searchable terms in our titles and item descriptions. Not only that, but people searching Etsy are going to need to be guided towards your shop. This means giving your jewellery a sweet name like 'Delilah' might look adorable, but isn't going to help you show up in searches. You'll see that successful Etsy sellers use keywords in their titles that would be the kind of thing a buyer might search for.

Keywords are useful in :

Item titles
Shop Description
Item Description
Image filename

A keyword is a word the describes your item. I usually create my keywords (and, incidentally, tags) by thinking of what I would type into Etsy's search box if I was looking for a similar item. "Silver Wire-Wrapped Amethyst Necklace" contains more words that might be used in a search than simply 'Purple Necklace' or any kind of sweet name you might give it.

Based on this information I have changed my shop description recently from "Hi, how are you? Welcome to my shop, please have a look around etc etc etc..." to this:

Sweet, fun jewellery, Girly Accessories, Cute Unique Pieces.

You can read more about me, my craft fairs, young family and other fun stuff at my blog, http://twinklyspangle.blogspot.com/

Pitching The Press...

I really liked this section of the talk and felt genuinely inspired to try some of the tips that Matt suggested. The idea of getting my handmade products into a magazine seemed so much more feasible! Here is the plan:

Find a relevant publication - Referring back to the profile of your target customer, find magazines or blogs that you want to be featured in
Make a contact - With blogs, usually just one person writes and it's quite easy to find out their name, but with a magazine you might need to work a little harder. Find out the name of the person who writes the section. There was a cheeky tip for this. If you can find out the email format for the company (usually someone will have an email address listed at the very beginning of the mag) and the persons name, you should be able to email them. i.e if their name is John Smith, and the editors email address is jane.smith@fashmag.com, it's not hard to figure out what John's email address is - great tip, Matt!
Be prepared to send out a press kit with a few free samples, but ask the recipient first, and follow up your package with a friendly email.
If you are featured, thank them. They might think of you again
Big publications run two months in advance - now if a great time to get yourself included in Christmas Gift Guides but you'll have to act quickly!
A tip from a journalist in the group was to try and provide hi-res images with a pure white background. There are lots of tutorials for doing this all over the web. Attaching some examples in this format to your email, making sure to include a separate list of prices for the items, means you are seriously cutting down the work someone has to do to include you in a last-minute vacant spot.

So that's pretty much what I learnt...except for a few random Etsy facts, which I'll share with you now...

- 30% of Etsy business comes from outside the USA -

- 22 items is the magic amount to have in your shop (at least!) -

- Etsy provide grants for groups of three or more people wanting to put on a handmade event. -

Again, I truely hope that some readers have found these posts useful, please do let me know - although I obviously can't take credit for the infomation, thank you Matt and Amity!

Katie x

Etsy Talk Notes 1 - Business Plan

2010-09-16T08:49:00.003+01:00

It's been a few days since I last blogged, we've been super busy around here visiting family, getting our loft insulated and generally trying to get sorted for Autumn. I see a lot of love for Autumn going around blogging land right now :-)

So, on Tuesday we visited Gran Gran who is my son's great grandmother, who lives across the country in Swindon. About 3pm I idly flicked through twitter and noticed that Etsy were doing a talk in London that night, free to go. I wasn't sure if I would make it but we whizzed back down the M4 anyway and I hopped on the train to London.

The talk was held in a sweet shop just off Pentonville Road, I regretted not taking a friend as everyone seemed to know someone and although I knew Alice (snapdragonbeads) would be going she wasn't there yet and I felt a bit lonely.

The shop itself had a selection of beautiful handmade products, a sweet shop, tables with vintage-dressed gals knitting and a bar...I headed right for the back where the talk was being held and we all crammed into a tiny room, it was boiling hot! I did manage to wrangle a free screen printed tote bag and a cute badge though - and a free glass of wine.

I'm not going to go crazy listed everything that Matt talked about, the talk was quite long and there was quite a lot of information about Etsy itself which was really interesting, especially how they started up. I'm going to split the contents of the talk over two blog posts as it really will be too long otherwise - and just a note, I'm sharing this information because the talk was free - if Matt hadn't shared this information freely I wouldn't be posting it.

So I'll just summarize the main points that I think will be useful to me (and possibly you!)

The theme of the talk was 'Marketing your creative micro-enterprise' I can't tell you how many times I have run over the phrase 'creative micro-enterprise' in my head the last few days, I love it! Matt was a nice guy too, charismatic and had that fun American habit of using words like 'factlet' and 'caveat'.

The first part of the talk focused on making a business plan to efficiently market yourself. One of the key points, and this is coming directly from Etsy's marketing man, was to 'sell your story'. he described your product as being the merchandise of your brand - and yourself as your brand. I thought this was a super-interesting concept and I think it's something I really need to work on.

He asked what made our businesses stand out, what made up remarkable, and where we hope our business would be in five years, there was a lot of focus on loving what you do, especially if you want to be doing it in a years time.

So, according to Matt, your business plan should include:

Mission Statement - Why & What
Niche - What makes you remarkable
Market Research - What else is out there, abandon things that don't work
Identify Customers - create a profile of your ideal customer, what they read, where they live etc.
Identify Clear Goals
Make a Budget - marketing expenses, business cards, camera.

Matt recommended reading Seth Godin for more marketing information, so I'm going to the library this afternoon to have a look for some.

'Telling Your Story' was an important theme of the evening, and there was a lot of great information about selling yourself as part of your handmade brand. People buy handmade because they believe in the principles of sustainable, eco-friendly, fair trade, unique products, and they want to hear about how you came to create something, why you love what you do and who you are. You can tell your story through tweets, blogging, facebook and most importantly in your shop descriptions and through your items and photos.

Matt suggested making everything you post or write relevant to the profile of the target customer that you established in your business plan - really interesting and so relevant to me and my 'creative micro-enterprise'

So, tomorrow I'm going to talk about what Matt suggested to bring your items and pages up higher in search results, both on Etsy and Google. There is some really great information on search engine optimization (SEO) so come on by tomorrow x

Folksy Friday

2010-09-10T10:23:00.003+01:00

Happy Friday!

It's been a funny old week...I had my plaster cast off and now have a giant moonboot thing that I am meant to walk around it...except people keep giggling at me because it's giant and makes me look like I am half dressed for a spacewalk!

Anyway, I'm still going strong with the September Stars, listing a new item on both Folksy and Etsy every single day.

I'm featuring some more of the Stars in my Folksy Friday this week, stop by their shops and have a look at the lovely things they are listing all this month.

I love how this Folksy seller, AudreysCat, has set this shot up, and the fabric of these cushions is beautiful! Buy them here.

This citrine necklace is beautiful, and the beaded chain gives it a fun vintage twist. It's by Facets, and you can buy it here.

This sweet TTV card (through the veiwfinder) would be perfect for a tea-lover or vintage collector. It's by Gail Griggs - have a look here.

Don't forget to comment if you have stopped by - I love reading them :-)

Katie x

Twinklyspangle

Posting to Blogger on a Blackberry

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A special little guy

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Absence Explaination

Sweetie Rings

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sickyspangle

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Regarding My SEO Course

Things I Never Knew I Loved

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Festive Bling

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Workspace Tour

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Dinocakes!

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Twinkly's SEO for beginners day 5

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