It's Been A While

So its been a long time since I have been on my blog.  Its been crazy.  The last update had to be back before I had Alex, our second.  The family picture I had posted was of me pregnant with Alex.  Its been crazy.  Since then I had her and another little girl Jessie.  God has been so good to us.  They are three beautiful little girls and we love them very much.  We are so blessed.  Thankfully we are done having kids though.  Three has been very hard.  Now they are 6 and a half, three and one.  Last year had to be the hardest year of my life.  I have noticed though that as the girls have gotten older it has gotten easier.  Jerry has been working on starting a pool/maintance company and he has been working basically two full time jobs.  So that's also part of what made last year so hard.  He is still really busy with that, but over this past winter its gotten easier.  But we know that as summer comes it will get busy again.  Jerry started his own business called Sandlot Pools.  He has been able to help his dad by providing a job for him and helping his parents move here back to Arizona!!!  We are soooooo thankful to have Jerry's family back here!  He is hoping to continue to grow the business.  An opportunity has presented itself for Jerry to higher a guy from our church to work for him cleaning pools while the guy attends our churches bible institute.  When starting this business we had no idea it could become an amazing opportunity to help men provide for their families and have time to also take classes through the church for the purposes to leadership training.  Kind of like a seminary but without all the official degrees.  With all that said I haven't had a chance to post anything to my blog.  So here I am.  Come March 1st 2015 I am going to become a consultant for Jamberry Nails!!!  I am so excited.  I have decided to wait until then until I get back from an amazing trip with Jerry.  Jerry has been working for Cloud Pool Supply for 10 years! now and for that they are sending us on a trip to Hawaii!  We leave Saturday morning.  We have one full day left until we leave.  I can't believe it.  We are done having kids, so no pregnancies, the baby is over a year and weaned so that means this is almost like a second honeymoon.  Jerry's parents will be watching them at our house while we are gone!  Plus when we get back we will continue our hunt for a new house!  We found one we like but not sure if it will still be on the market when we get back.  If so then we will see if there are any new houses.  From there we will decide if we will make an offer on the one we like or not.  I think that is a basic recap of our lives since the last post.  I do still have my etsy store, but at the moment it is empty.  I haven't sold much on it, oh well.  But I have been organizing boutiques through my church for all us gals who make and sell stuff to sell.  I have been very successful doing those.  I will be using my blog to keep posted my two businesses and Jerry's business as well.

Boutique

So just over a week ago my friend Lori and I had a boutique at my house! It went so well. We had 10 people show up. It was a lot of fun and we even sold some stuff. It was very encouraging. I know I get discouraged with my etsy store because I haven't sold anything in a few months off of there. Lord willing that will change soon.

The hardest part to our boutique was that about a week before it Lori announced to small group that she too is pregnant with me! We are about 9 days apart on our due dates. But by God's grace we both survived. We have both not been feeling well, so it was good that we felt good that day. But I am so excited that we are both having babies together. Right now I am just hoping I start feeling better soon so I can get the house cleaned back up and get caught back up on house work. Taylor's birthday party is Saturday so I better start feeling better and getting a lot of work done to get the house ready and get everything we will need for it!

Promoting Etsy: My Story

Here's my story! I joined etsy a while ago, but I had plans to sell little girl clips. It didn't work, I sold nothing. But then I received a large amount of yarn from my grandmother who no longer needed it. I have so much. That's when I decided to would crochet stuff to sell instead. That's how much yarn I have, I could never use it all for my family and friends. I do how ever make things for friends as gifts. Just recently I have gotten a few sales from friends and that motivated me to work hard to promote my store. I love having my store on etsy. I just wish it was easier to sell stuff. I have gotten lots of advice as to what to do. I have updated my photos, still want to redo them yet again, added more than 24 items to my store, and I was putting one item in a day to keep my store fresh and at the top of the list. But there comes a point when it costs to much to do it all the time. Now that my store is full I decided to hold off on renewing for now. I intend to add more stuff to my store once I get photos of the new stuff done. So with that not working I decided to look into getting involved in teams. I started in the newbie team. From there I found out about another team called the promotion and fun team. I love that team as well. There are two threads on that team where if you purchase something from the store on the list you will be added to the list! I have joined both threads, I love that since this is a business I keep track of all my expenses and income, so the cost in buying into these threads goes toward advertising costs!!! One of these threads the gal who runs it also runs a lot of bnrs. So when she is short on stores to fill a bnr she will pull one of us from the list to fill in the blanks! It's great because I have gotten three sales from it. But sadly that is the only sales I have gotten. I have been fortunate enough to have some sales threw friends as well.

I have done some other advertising stuff, but with no availe. I gave a pair of earrings to a waitress that was extra sweet, giving out business cards to people who comment on the stuff I made that I wear. But the one I am the most excited about is an upcoming boutique a few friends and I are planning on holding! I am hoping to not only sell lots of stuff, but to hand out lots of business cards that they will in turn give away to their friends and family, you know, get my stores name out there even more! For now I am just working hard making stuff and trying to continue being a part of all the teams I have joined, and get my store out there for others to see.

Here is the link for the fun and promotion team that has the two threads of sellers:

www.etsy.com/teams/7693/fun-and-friends-promotion-team

one of the threads is called: under$20bnr fun and prizes
the other is bns buy and stay treat yourself (this one is updated daily, so just look for the days date. Also this is the one the gal does all the bnr's that she adds people too.)

I hope this is encouraging and helpful to all you etsians out there!

Mother's Day

It was a good day. Got to listen to Smed preach on day four and five in Genesis! It was amazing. What a great reminder to look at the sun set and rise and remember how amazing God is. Also the stars and the moon, and enjoy the sun, all praising God for what He created. Then lunch with my parents and my brother! I finished the laundry yesterday, so I got to sit back and enjoy the day. Its the first time in a long time that I got to hang out with Jerry and Taylor and not have house work to work on. It was great. So to all you mothers out there, I hope you also had a good mother's day.

Smiles

Well in the past three weeks I have gotten three sales! Its funny I have sold a lot of earrings and earrings isn't what I intend to keep making and selling. I guess I will have to re-think that. But I am excited I got one sale from a friend and one sale from two people that I don't know and through promoting on etsy. I guess it paid off to join some teams and buy into a Buy and Stay thing on etsy. Its kind of cool how they work. Someone picks some stores, mine has been chosen a few times, to feature. Then its open for up to 12 sales. Those that buy from that list will then be featured the next time. The only problem I see is its mostly sellers involved. So we are buying from each other. That is cool and all, but some of us don't have money to be buying a bunch of stuff. But I am greatful for the sales I have gotten. I am just hoping I continue getting sales now that my sale count has gone up and my feed back has as well. So I am hoping that non-sellers that see my stuff are more inclined to buy from me. I really enjoy crocheting and making stuff, I just hope my store takes off soon. I am also excited because some friends and I are planning to have a boutique in July! I hope that will also help get my store out there and encourage people to pass on my site. We shall see!

Etsy

So as many of you already know, I have a shop on etsy and I am trying to cultivate sales. I know I am always trying to find ways to make extra money for our family and this is the latest venture. I work for my dad part time, mostly from home, but its accounting work and mostly once a year work too. There is a little bit through out the year, but not much. Our hard times are the fall. I work spring/tax season, then Jerry works over time during the busy months of summer at his job. Then comes the fall/winter. His work slows down. I did partylite for a while, technically I still can, but not really trying to. So I inherited all this yarn from my grandmother as many of you already know. What am I going to do with it all. I had already tried selling some hair clips on etsy and jewlery, but that didn't seem to go over well (no sales). Then I decided to sell the stuff I crocheted. After all I can use only so many blankets, earrings, shawls, and hats before my house will be overflowing with such items. I have had lots of interest from friends and gotten quiet a few sales. So this is where I am going to stay, crocheting and trying to sell on etsy. I have had two people that I do not know threw etsy purchase baby blankets. It was a dream come true, or at least an answer to prayer, Thank you God for allowing me to sell to someone outside my friends and family, what a blessing! Anyway, so now I am doing all I can to try and promote my store. So, if you have gifts to give, or know of someone who might be looking for what I am making, please let them know about my store, I would greatly appreciate that. My site is princessandq.etsy.com I would love to have you and your friends stop in and take a look. God has blessed me with a tallent, and crocheting is it. Yes I love to ride horses, but I will never be amazing at it. I enjoy it and love doing it, but I have refused to ever jump higher than 3 feet. I did once and it scared me to death. Okay not really, but I am glad I did it but never want to do so again. But with crochet I love it and I don't want to brag, but many friends have commented and said they love my stuff, thanks my dear friends. It has really encouraged me and excited me that while my Grandmother was an artist that painted beautiful paintings, made beautiful pots out of clay, knitted beautiful things, gardened, and even crocheted, that I inherited something from her. I just love finding fun projects and taking what I have and making them. Some projects are on hold until after my stash is small and I can actually purchase the yarn and colors I want. It has been good though because my desire is to eventually only make some items for my store. They will be baby blankets, baby, toddler, and little kid beanies, baby booties, and flower clips and headbands. These are all simple projects that I just love making. If there is something you see, but not the color you want, I do take requests. I will let you know if there is a problem and I am not able to make it, but Lord willing I will be able to. Thanks for taking time to read about me and my adventure of running my own store through etsy. Hope you stop by and see it! princessandq.etsy.com

Family Get Away

Well this last weekend our little family took a trip up to my parents new cabin. This was our first time just the three of us. It was fun. Saturday it began to snow! It was beautiful, but it was so strange thinking back to only months ago when we were there last when it snowed. I had just found out I was pregnant, so I was only 3 1/2 weeks along, and we had lunch that weekend with my Grandfather. Since then I miscarried at 6 weeks (December) and my Grandfather died right after the new year. God has taught me soooooo much through this hard time. I am so thankful for everything God has done, it was so hard to go through, but I have gotten to know Him even better because of it and I know that I can trust Him. I am really learning a lot about what it means to trust Him completely. I am finding myself learning again what it means to be completely content. Meaning yes I want another little one, but that I love Taylor and I am okay if she is all He chooses to bless me with. She is a wonderful daughter and I praise God everyday for her.




Just after Thanksgiving

The rest were this last weekend!




Well, as for our really fun weekend, it was awesome. We got to play in the snow! Jerry taught Taylor how to throw a snow ball, she loved it. Then we played hide and seek again with her. Jerry hide while Taylor and I went looking for him. To make it fun for her I made up a silly song and sang what I was doing. I decided to look in the pantry (the lights turn on when you walk in) and as I was going to look behind the door I was singing to Taylor that I doubted Jerry was going to be there since the lights weren't on. As I pulled the door back there stood Jerry, trying so hard not to laugh at my silly song! I screamed so loud! I was soooo not expecting him to be there. It made for some fun memories.