New look.

To match the official site. Because I am nothing if not all about the matchy-matchy.

It’s official.

This site, that is.

Oh, and happy Earth Day! If you haven’t seen it yet, you should read this compelling and thought-provoking article from The Storque.

Hotel spoons.

Britling, originally uploaded by Avenue [Handmade].

Check out my Flickr for a sneak peek…. New goodies will be available in the shop tonight (after 7 p.m. EDT)! Including some brand spankin’ new designs using vintage hotel spoons and vintage high school charms. Yep. Rad.

Today’s press day at work. Bah. Stress! When where I really want to be is home, listing new lovelies on Etsy and lurking in the Forums. Sigh.

Oh, and Happy April Fool’s Day! Google has a funny joke on their Gmail login page, and Etsy’s blog, The Storque, pulled one over on me as well. Had a good laugh at both.

Flea markets and features.

Tin dollhouse found on side of state road 419.

Oh, Saturday, I love you. Hubby and I just got home from a sweaty but fruitful jaunt at our favorite flea market: Renninger’s in Mount Dora. Scored a sweet rack that I can use for my earrings at craft fairs, and a couple of rare silver spoons. And now we’re readying the grill to cook up some chicken and veggies. Think I’ll make some couscous too.

Anyhoo, I just found out that one of my cards was featured on a blog called I Like It Don’t You earlier this week. Sweet! Also, I’ve been meaning to mention this but keep forgetting: one of my local buds, Jenipher of Cherry RunWay Jewelry, interviewed me for her blog fairly recently. You can read her article here. And you can buy her lovely jewelry here (food miniatures–what’s not to love?). Thanks, Jen!

Did you notice I have blogged daily this week?! Wow. I hope the posts leaned toward quality over quantity, but at least I’m getting more consistent here. One more notable thing about this week: not one, but two treasuries I curated made it to the front page of Etsy this week! [EDIT: Margins has a screen shot of one of them.] I know that may seem like a small thing, and I promise not to post every time it happens (although I hope it does become a more regular occurrence), but I put a lot of thought into creating treasuries and I love that by doing so I am promoting the featured artists, and it’s quite rewarding to have that effort recognized. Plus the fact that it gives those artists soooo much extra exposure. Almost all of the items in one of the treasuries sold during its front-page stint. Yay!

OK, I’m off to chop up veggies and get ready for the Sanford Art Market tomorrow. Happy weekend!

Salsa and advertising.

Easter, when I was home alone waiting for my husband to get home from an 11-hour shift at the airport, seemed like the perfect time to attempt making salsa. It turned out delish, but more like pico de gallo than traditional salsa…pretty chunky. Pretty time-intensive, seeding and dicing six tomatoes, though. I think next time I’ll try the food processor. I used this recipe from the Food network, with a few small tweaks: I added red and green bell pepper, and reduced the amount of jalapenos to one, ’cause I’m not big on the spiciness. And I think I used a lot more cilantro than the recipe calls for…’cause I am big on fresh cilantro! Heehee. Oh, and it gets much better the next day, or after a couple hours to let flavor infusion happen.

In other news, I was in an Etsy Forums thread about off-Etsy marketing today, and Ryan from Littleputbooks posted a link to one of her blog posts about paid advertising. Increasing my advertising is one of my goals for my business this year, so half of my reason for linking to Ryan’s tips here is as a note to self. But maybe you’ll find some good tips on it too. I would love to hear about the personal experiences of anyone who has used any of these avenues–Google Adwords, banner ads, print ads–or any other paid advertising. Has it been effective/worthwhile for you? Which one(s) would you recommend to someone with a limited budget? Which do you feel offers the best return on investment?

Mmmm…coffee and chocolate.

Back in my days as a slave–I mean barista–to Corporate Coffee my colleagues and I developed a pretty refined eye-rolling reflex whenever someone (teeny-bopping middle-schoolers, particularly) ordered a frappucino. I mean we really loved to hate this making drink, and it may have unfairly extended to frowning on those who ordered it (which may have included frequent muttering of the not-that-clever nickname “crapucino”). I suppose you’re entitled to a bit of coffee snobbery when it’s your job to know all about the farming, roasting, brewing, tasting and describing of the bean beverage, but at the same time, everyone’s entitled to their own tastes, and I can’t say I don’t enjoy an icy coffee beverage myself from time to time. Anyway, far removed from that milieu, I have no opinion either way on the famed frozen concoction nor those who order it, except that good Lord, are they unhealthy! (Check out the nutrition info on the coffee giant’s website.)

Therefore, I’m delighted to find this homemade alternative on Knitastic’s blog. Looks delish, and as we’ve already had temps in the eighties here in the Sunshine State, this drink might be just the antidote to what promises to be another sweltering spring and summer.

Fontify

Wow, I am all up in the almost-daily blogging here lately, aren’t I? I may be subconsciously trying to discipline myself because soon I will have to begin blogging as part of my day job, and no one likes to be thrown into a new responsibility with creaky knees and rusty writing chops. Or it may be that my voracious appetite for reading blogs is taking over my life–and, consequently, I find myself inspired to post on an almost daily basis. Probably a combination of the two. Soon I think I shall start posting my favorite Etsy finds, to satisfy my desire to support all the wonderful artists whose work I cannot afford to buy at present. Yay!

Anyhoo, I’m mainly posting this as a note-to-self: the CRAFT blog today alerted me to a swell tool called Fontifier (which was brought to their attention by Jessica of How About Orange). Not to be vain, but I kinda dig my handwriting sometimes, so I think I’ll try this. For 9 bucks it just might be worth it. End note to self.

Happy hump day! Here’s a picture of something I made:

Handmade Nation March Fundraiser

Here’s a great chance to support an independent filmmaker and the independent crafting movement at the same time: enter the Handmade Nation raffle. You could win about 80 bucks worth of rad goodies! A raffle ticket is just $2, and the money will help Faythe Levine complete post-production on her documentary about the handmade movement sweeping the nation.

Elephant LOVE

Check out the adorableness by Teresa at Sewing Stars (via the Craftzine blog)! Not only is it possibly one of the cutest elephants ever, but she made it while she was sick! Last time I was sick, I tried soldering some stuff…and gave up after about 10 minutes. I was coughing so badly I almost soldered my wedding ring to my hand. Thanks, Teresa, for sharing this and I wish you a speedy recovery!

new.

Introducing Avenue Handmade, the new name of what was formerly Cripple Creek! Over the next few months I will be transitioning all of my signature products to be sold through my Avenue H store (& offering some great deals on Cripple Creek items that will be discontinued!). I’m really excited about this chance to reinvent my creations, designs, & website…basically to start all over from scratch. But I’m also a tad nervous about that very thing: starting from scratch (again).

But hey, it’s probably easier to (re)start from scratch after only 1 (fairly successful) year than to struggle through several years with a muddled focus and eventually be faced with the dilemma of whether or not to reinvent or just throw in the towel all together. I think the young handle growing pains more easily–probably cause we’re used to them–so why not just dive right in while my company is still young.

Anyway, more to come in the next few days as I get everything set up…I’m excited to have a “table” at Poppytalk Handmade’s November Market! You can check out my new wares there after November 5. I’ve got lots of new recycled silverware jewelry & plenty of adorable new (also recycled!) holiday cards.