My happy bride’s mother bought jewelry for the wedding as well. I’ll be doing a necklace and earrings to match her dress. We have discussed ideas and I’m just waiting for my supply order to arrive to begin work.
In other news, three items sold in the shop this weekend, which was a nice surprise.
My happy bride is back! She wants me to do her bridesmaid jewelry now, which is awesome. And her mother loves the jewelry so much that she took it to her work to show off and now also wants me to do her jewelry for the wedding.
This makes me very happy. Not just for the profit side of the business, but because it means they really do like my work. Gratifying in every way.
I never really imagined that bridal jewelry would become my bread and butter, but it looks like that may be the case. Time to learn new skills like knotting, wire wrapping, and weaving, I think.
My latest bridal customer sent the following yesterday, after she received her custom bridal jewelry set:
O MY GOODNESS JEN!!!!!!
I just got the package today and could not wait to open it. Once I saw it I almost started crying because it was just so perfect and beautiful! It looks so much more beautiful in person and I could never thank you enough for making something that was so beautiful and perfect for my wedding. It truly means the world to me that you put that much time and effort into helping me and make my jewelry. Thank you so much and I will be telling EVERYONE about your awesome work and helpful manner.
I love a happy customer.
I’m finally getting back into the crafting swing of things after the vacation. I made two gifts this weekend - one is a bracelet for my friend’s daughter who is graduating from high school this week; the other is a similar bracelet (different colored pearls) with matching earrings for a friend whose birthday is coming up.
The supplies I ordered for the new bridal set arrived this morning so I’ll begin a “draft” of that necklace for the bride to approve tonight and also a couple pairs of earrings for her to choose from. I’m excited about the possibility for this set. It’s simple but different from what I’ve done previously.
I have an unofficial commission for a long necklace for a friend from church. I’ve back-burnered this project while I collected interesting beads and thought out a design for her. She said there is no rush and I haven’t been paid yet, but I know that she’s good for it and even if she changes her mind the beads collected are cool and totally usable for other projects. I’m thinking about making this one more in a rosary style than simple stringing, but it will involve a lot more work to make. Fun, though.
OK, I need to go get my son, who is supposed to be napping, but is playing in his crib instead.
When I got married I did a lot of the printing myself. I printed our invitation envelopes and the maps/directions inside. I printed our wedding program, which turned into a little booklet since we sang 4 old hymns and I included the lyrics to them inside as well as the program/people information. I printed the rehearsal reminder notes to our bridal party to let them know of the date/time/location/other specifics. And I printed the tags for our wedding favors and for the gifts that I gave to the women in our bridal party. (The link is to my mother’s shop, she did our wedding favors and the ones pictured in the listing are from my wedding.)
Since Mom offers wedding favors in her shop, I get recruited to do the tags. So she has a new bridal client for 150 favors needed for an August wedding and I’ve been put into service. The colors are brown (mocha) and teal. The bride’s invitations were on cream cardstock. So I’ll be doing a few tag samples to include with the ribbon samples that Mom will send to the bride for final approval. I’ve ordered sample sheets of cardstock from the vendor I used for my wedding. Once I get those in, I’ll start designing and printing and cutting.
It’s a nice side job for my creative self. I have no plans to get into graphic design or printing. I don’t have the skills or capability for making that a full craft in my repertoire. But it’s fun to do anyway.
For my 2 regular readers, I am alive and working. Just not working on my business lately - still in vacation mode.
That said I have been working on it some:
1. I bought new storage containers for my beads. I bought two, but I think I need at least 3-4 more. Crazy! I definitely like how they look lined up on my craft table. It’s much cleaner and easier to find the beads that I want. And because the drawers come out completely, I can rearrange them easily.
Next up: a label maker so that I can mark the drawers and really get the beads organized.
2. I’m still waiting for the supplies I ordered for the new bridal set. I’m excited about this one because it’s a different style from the others that I have made.
3. My good friend’s youngest daughter is graduating from high school next week. What’s crazy is that when I first met them, this child was 9 months old and amazingly cute with white hair that stood straight up like a baby chick’s. She is now a very lovely young lady and still light blonde. Where does the time go?
Anyway, I was trying to come up with a creative gift idea and then it hit me - jewelry! She’s a girly girl who loved every second of helping to plan her older sister’s wedding (I helped as coordinator). As her sister made decisions, she would whisper into my ear the things she would like for her wedding when she gets married - all were much more formal and traditional. Since I know this about her, I think I’ll do something in pearls for her - a bracelet and earrings. Although I think her ears are not pierced, so I need to check on that with her Mom.
4. My mother is still selling well with her Etsy shop. I spend more time on her shop these days than my own. New teas have been added and she has some teas newly discounted as well, including some she is closing out. So go check them out and buy now because when those teas are gone, they’re gone.
5. The PayPerPosts have dried up. While I was on vacation my Google PageRank sank from 3 to 0. So now I don’t qualify for most opportunities that get listed which makes it hard for me to increase my chances for better opps. So you’re spared from blatant advertising for a while.
6. It stinks because I was really hoping to earn more side money to pay for our trip to California. At least we didn’t spend as much at Disney, so we have that leftover money available. And we found a hotel for half of what I had been seeing, so that’s a huge money saver. My husband is now planning our touristy things for that week, one of which is a trip to Monterey (one of the places I lived when in high school - it’s one of my favorite places, too) where I want to go to Cannery Row and the Aquarium.
7. I still want to feature other Etsians here, so I’ll get to working on that…
I have another bridal set to work on - necklace and earrings only. Just sent the invoice and once she has paid, I will order the supplies I need (she wants pure white instead of the cream rose pearls - I have a plethora of cream rose in all sizes; I only have a few pure white in 10mm, which are too large for what she wants), and then begin work.
This set will be different from the previous ones in style - she wants a simpler look to go with her really lovely dress. Pictures to come when I’ve got it done.
So I’m thinking that I should learn some new skills to increase my repertoire in bridal jewelry. Simple stringing is working well for me, but it might behoove me to learn harder things to increase my marketability to the bridal market. There is a small part of me that doesn’t want to get pigeon-holed into doing bridal jewelry almost exclusively, so I hesitate a bit. But I do like working with brides to come up with the accessories they desire for their big day.
I received the following feedback from the bride who received her custom bridal set on Monday.
Oh, Jen! The set arrived earlier this afternoon (the 19th), and it is ABSOLUTELY gorgeous! My fiancé picked up the delivery from my doorstep and said he thought it was gorgeous, brought it to me when he fetched me from work, and then I put it on later because we both wanted to see how it was! I will DEFINITELY send you pictures after the wedding, but I have to thank you over and over again for the lovely set!
It doesn’t get better than that.
*happy sigh*
First, I finished and shipped the Elizabeth bridal set this week. I really hope the bride is pleased with her custom bridal jewelry. Here’s the finished necklace.
Second, remember the key fob bracelet that I made for my sister a few weeks ago? She likes it so much that she sent an email to all of the ladies that she works with and generated four orders for me. One has since canceled her order (no reason given - no worries, that’s her prerogative), but three custom orders is still pretty good! I am waiting for supplies to arrive and then I will make and ship them to my sister to hand deliver at her office.
Third, my mother and I are working on a cross-promotional package to be listed in both of our shops. I have made a beaded tea infuser for breast cancer awareness (I have one made, still need to photograph it. And I need to get more of the pink ribbon charms to make more so that we each have one in stock for our individual listings). She has a tea for the same. So we’re going to each create a listing for a combo of the tea and infuser and we will donate 10% of the profits to the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute. We think it will make a great gift for a woman who is dealing with yucky treatments for breast cancer.
I’m almost done with the latest bridal set. I think it’s really beautiful - the addition of the deep crimson crystals with the cream rose pearls makes it special. I hope the bride is pleased with the finished products.
The necklace is still to be finished. I’m just waiting to hear back from the bride about the layout of it and also for a decision on which pendant drop she wants to hang at the clasp - she opted for the red instead of “something blue.” She asked that the necklace be 15″ so it will lay more like a choker around her neck.
I’m really curious to know what her dress looks like. She said she’s going to wear red shoes as well, which is a bold choice.
