Update

I haven't even thought about updating this blog in a while - things have just been so busy. But when I created my item of the week listing, I thought I'd better update on what's happening, especially since the last post had no closure (about the water in the basement).

The water is gone. We had a sump pump installed, and that's doing a bang-up job of keeping the workroom dry. Things are still moved around down there, and there's still a huge pile of things in the garage. My tablecloths and dressmaking mannequin probably all smell like gasoline because the generator (in the garage) had a gas line leak the other day. But, c'est la vie. I'll run things (that I can) through the washing machine to take the stink out.

Actually, moving some of my stuff back into the basement is on my list of things to do. I just can't seem to get motivated to do them. Stupid Facebook has become my new obsession. Not Facebook in general, but a few of the games. *sigh* If only real money poured in at the rate of $10 million an hour, like my imaginary mafia money. But anyway, I'll have a chance to go through some things when I reorganize the basement and maybe put together an actual crafty area where I can work on things and see what I have at a glance. I couldn't believe the pattern/idea books that I had (past tense) that were just lying on the floor down there. If I make a real effort to keep things on shelves and organized, then I can track what resources I have and be more efficient when I work on things for my Etsy shop.

Speaking of Etsy, I found a couple of great sites that are a must for any Etsian looking to streamline a bit. They were featured recently in a "Sellers Helping Sellers" email, but I found them a while back. And of course, I meant to blog about them... before they were famous. One is Craftcult*. Their site tracks shop and item hearts, as well as front page, Storque and gift guides, so you can see how much love you're getting from the Etsy community. My favorite part is the item hearts. I used to go through every listing in my shop to see if they had any hearts. Now I can see them all at once.

The other must-see site for Etsyians is Etsyhacks. The site itself, while clean and easy to navigate, doesn't seem that interesting. But it's the brainchild of an Etsy spouse, who has created little programs that streamline many common Etsy tasks. They work in the Firefox browser, using an add-on called Greasemonkey, and they're wicked awesome! My favorites right now include "Copy listing" that allows me to create a new listing by copying another one. Then I just change the applicable text, upload new pictures, and submit. SOOOO much faster than doing it from scratch! The other one I think is super-slick is the Printable Receipt Enhancer. It uses style sheets to change the standard Etsy invoice, so that I can make it match my other materials and branding - and print on a single page instead of the 2 that the standard format needed (save my paper and postage money). Ian at Etsyhacks is also super-helpful - I'm having an issue with one of the hacks, and he's been great about keeping me updated.

Well, I guess that's enough rambling on for now. Enjoy Spring - and go out and play!

* Fixing the link colors in this layout is another thing on my to-do list. The issue is that I need light links on the side columns, and dark ones in the center. And I just haven't felt like CSS-diving to update the colors.