Which One, Where, Why...really? Too much?

Been thinking a good bit lately about the amount of time one could spend just promoting a product...and then which is most effective, why is it effective, what gets the most exposure, and does that exposure turn into profit or sales, why or why not? and when is too much, simply, TOO MUCH!

My current venues are:

this blog, obviously, Indiepublic, FaceBook, Hooked n Felt website, Flickr, Ravelry, Etsy, Google +, ...and probably a couple of places that are not coming to mind right off the top of my head, like Pinterest and Linkedin. When does it all just become too much? Too much time, too much energy, too much information, too much invasion of creative space? Really, are all of these necessary? Why?

Got thoughts? Would love to hear them...and what is it that brings you back to this blog? What would you like to see here?


http://www.etsy.com/listing/89303117/nuno-scarf-fabric-5mm-habotia-hand-dyed



...anyway, I've been making a goodly number of flowers for the galleries that I supply and I've been dyeing 5mm habotai silk for nuno felting. You can find the new fabrics on my etsy. I am in a good spot on the energy-meter and that feels wonderful...coming out of the holiday funk....yeah!

Good Peace to you and Shalom,
Suzanne

Finding Peace in the Midst of Choas

There are times that can trouble a soul; death, defeat, illness, separation, grief that overwhelms, depression, sadness, the great unknown. But of late, I've come to make peace with all of these thieves of joy. They are simply part of the human experience, part of makes us who we are, how we deal with it all says even more about us, I think. Embrace, embrace...and then let go.

http://www.etsy.com/listing/88346276/hand-dyed-habotai-5mm-silk-fabric

I've been dyeing a good bit, but only for myself. This is a newly listed piece of 5 mm Habotai silk that I dyed and named BREATHLESS because the colors simply left me that way. I adore this piece of silk. I've too many projects in front of my right now, so this one has to go up for sale. I do wish my old camera could capture the nuisances of the colorways. Totally YUMMY colors.

I've been making and selling a lot of hats and tams and so have not made much felt lately, but decided that I would make a few small pieces of felt jewelery pieces. This is one of them and yes I did do some hand sewing on it...but it was just a few stitches, so I don't think it really counts as sewing, does it?

About 4 years ago, I was given a huge book on needlework, embroidery, needlepoint, knitting, applique, crochet, macrame, pacthwork, rug-making, quilting and lacework. I am most interested in the embroidery stitches. Pam MacGregor, http://www.tarveycottagestudio.com/will be here this next week and I hope to have her show me a few of the stitches. She does amazing, yet very simple, stitch work. She does "elegant simple" the best of anyone I've seen. I am very much looking forward to the time with her. We will also be doing some experimentation with the Feltscraft.com Rolling Machine during her three day stay. Should be more fun with felters!

We had our first real snow this week. Already I am looking forward to the long hours of white, gray, cold, but not the shoveling, of the lovely white stuff, so much. There is an amazing stillness in winter that is astoundingly beautiful. A full moon on newly fallen snow...what a memory, what a sight!

Off to go enjoy the rest of this day.
Happy Felting, Shalom,
Suzanne

Oh, One more thing:
http://www.lindasfund.com/
Sometimes we want to do good... but we don't know where to help.
Dear Linda is a fellow-feltmaker who could use the goodness of our hearts, our prayers, thoughts, encouragement and obviously any financial support we can give her as she struggles with the payment of specialized cancer treatment. Please think about it and help if you can.

Can you come to the Winter Retreat in Ashville, NC ?

http://friendsandfiberworks.com/
Lisa Mackey is holding a Winter Retreat in Ashville, NC the 14th, 15th and 16th of this month in Ashville, NC. The details are on the link that I've posted. Will you be able to come? Would you like to? There are some great teachers there, Chad Alice Hagen to start with. We will be in a mall! How neat is that? I think it should be a very interesting venue.

Jone Rakoski and I will be traveling together to be at the show. We've already made plans to have dinner with Chad. I am looking forward to that, just wish some of her genius would rub off on me. I wonder if she'll mind if I sit really close to her so our shoulders are touching? (You're right , that would be inappropriate. I'll try to behave myself!) Anyway, if you are in the area, or looking for a fiber road trip, please think about coming to this event. I think it is going to be wonderful! For spinners, I'll have my "Bling Batts" Jone will have wonderfully dyed prefelts, her incredible felts, and I'll be bring a few hats. ( I only have a few and didn't know about this show until two weeks ago..Yikes, no time to get much done!)

These are three of the nuno felts that I'll have at the show. I put the photo up on Facebook and got a bunch of questions off and on the thread. I've been asked about the type of silk I am using and how I get the intense crinkle effect. For the purpose of brevity, I am going to re-post here what I wrote there. Hope you don't mind.

Here it is:

These three were done on silk gauze. I roll them a lot, maybe more than most. I roll in each direction, on both sides 500 times, by actual count. Then I may roll again another 200 hundred times if I want it a bit tighter. It also gets "slapped" on the table top about 200 times. Then I will toss it in the dryer on AIR ONLY until I get the texture that I'm looking for. I also do this with the habotai silk, except the initial rolling gets bumped to 1000 times each way on both sides. Added note, I use cold water through the entire process.

Well, I've got lots to get done before we leave and am starting to get excited about the trip. What's not too exciting, is that we are to get 17 inches of snow over the next few days, right when I'm packing the trailer! Snow is so beautiful...shoveling it is not.

I'm wishing you all wonderful felty moments.
Shalom,
Suzanne