Archive for the ‘shopping’ Category

Yesterday was quite a rush, so today we’re taking it easy. Thanks to everyone for the congrats! We went out to eat last night to celebrate, and stopped by the local Borders to pick up a copy of The Somnambulist just so I could stare at it and giggle.

In other news, I finally finished up the layout I’ve been working on for the last week! Go see!  I normally don’t like a three-column layout because it can look crowded, but this layout lends itself very well to blogging and shopping, which brings me to….

… the surprise: I’ve set up a shop at Sixhours.net! I’m experimenting with Prestashop, an open-source PHP-based Web interface. It was relatively easy to set up, and I think it is easy for potential customers to use. Etsy has been great to me, and I’ll continue to maintain those shops as well, of course. But I’ve wanted to have something hosted on my own domain, too, in the event that Etsy goes down for an extended period of time. I believe it’s sage advice to not have all your eggs in one basket.

There may be some kinks to work out, and for now I can only accept PayPal (support for Google Checkout is coming soon), but I look forward to seeing how it goes. I’m sure that, like everything else involved in running a business, it will be a learning experience.

My very wise friend, Sarah, wrote about Etsy on her blog, The Quest to Become Debt Free, which is about… well, I’m guessing you can tell what Sarah’s blog is about!

At first, I had a difficult time trying to figure out how Etsy and saving money go together. In my personal experience, it’s very hard to save money when you have Etsy’s vast array of goodies tempting you on a regular basis. As someone who spends most of her hard-earned Etsy money on Etsy, I know this!

But then I realized that, if I’m going to spend money on gifts or other potentially frivolous purchases, it makes more sense to give that money to regular folks–people who are probably also in debt or struggling to make ends meet, or maybe they’re just trying to make a little extra spending money, like me–instead of patronizing the big box stores, where your money will only serve to make the executives at the top of the food chain wealthier. When I support an economy that’s a bit closer to home, so to speak, I don’t feel so bad for splurging!

Oh, gee. It’s not been four days since the end of NaBloPoMo and already I’m slacking. It’s just, the computer is allll the way over there (read: in my lap), and my brain is… well… I think I left it behind the toilet during the great grandma-juice incident of 2007. It’s the fumes, you see. November? What’s a “november”?

The other day I posted a link to sixhours.net on NotCot.org, just for the heck of it. I was totally not expecting to see my Web traffic multiply tenfold as a result. So, hello! If I’d known you were coming I might have whipped out the lipstick or taken off the mumu… or something.

(Is it a faux-pas to talk about your Web site traffic on your Web site? Probably. I am the queen of the faux-pas.)
Sixhours has also had the good fortune to grace the pages of Spray Glue, Skirmisher, The Word Cellar, and Cajsita Design recently, so thanks to all for the good karma!

More random things:

• I won a little contest over at Indiefixx and there are presents coming my way in the mail. I love presents!
• My hair is short. Short, as in, they-used-the-automatic-clippers-on-the-back-instead-of-the-scissors short. Yes, that short. I love it. Some day I will be brave and go bald.
• I’m infatuated with Ghirardelli’s Peppermint Bark, which is unfortunate, being that it costs upwards of eight dollars a bag. We may have to refinance the house to cover my addiction. Someday you’ll see me on Intervention, 150 pounds heavier, wearing a mumu and a ring of chocolate around my mouth and telling the camera, “I can quit anytime I want to!”

And with that lovely mental image, I bid you adieu!

new etsy banner
Originally uploaded by calobee

This weekend, in an effort to branch out a bit and explore my options, I opened two new online shops for my prints: One at Dawanda and one at eCrater. I’d heard good things about both venues via the Etsy forums and figured it couldn’t hurt to see what the fuss was about. So I opened up shop and listed a few prints at each (the same works are available at each shop).

My initial impression is “they’re pretty cool”. Both shops have slightly different ways of getting things done. When compared to Etsy, some aspects of shop maintenance are simpler, and some are more complicated. Dawanda is definitely more friendly toward international customers, and eCrater is intuitively designed. Overall, I think Etsy still leads the pack in terms of community, traffic, and design… but it can’t hurt to have more options, right?

• Sixhours at Etsy
• Sixhours at Dawanda
• Sixhours at eCrater

I also designed a new banner for my Etsy shop to reflect the current Web site design at sixhours.net. I like this one much better!

I’ve been waiting for this day for weeks, and it’s finally here! Jess Goldfond (with help from her boyfriend, of Spray Glue fame) launches The Shiny Squirrel online boutique!

There you’ll find a beautifully-curated selection of artists and designers showcasing a variety of gifts and goodies.

And yes, I’m there, too! Presenting five new prints from the dollfood series that I’ve been sitting on not-so-patiently for just about ever.

So go see, and support independent artists and designers! Go go go!