Good morning everyone!

Well, as per usual I took the weekend off from blogging. Getting ready for Christmas and all (since we're in the poor house I'm making as many gifts as I can) and since it's my first time making a few of these items, I've had to start over on a couple hehe. But that's why I love crochet! Easy to take apart, and since it doesn't take me that long to crochet, it's not so upsetting when I do have to take it apart.


I'd love to post pics of what I'm doing, but alas, then people will see what they're getting for Christmas! I will post them right after Christmas though, very exciting! One thing is giving me problems though. Has anyone ever used the invisible thread??? I thought it would be a good idea, but it's SO hard to work with! (Not on sewing machine... I really need to get supplies so I can sew soon, I have all these ideas for things to make, but alas, no fabric, no needles, no thread.. oy!)

In an update about the magazine article, it's been submitted and the magazine is at the printers! I should have a copy soon and I'm very excited about it. It's a new Canadian magazine for young girls, and they needed a crafting section. And it's actually called "Kat's Craft Corner"!! I'll post pics as soon as it's out. Again, very exciting!!

In other news, took Kermit to see Santa yesterday HA! Oh ya, hilarious. I'll post his Christmas pic one day, although he's going on our Christmas cards, and again, don't want to spoil the surprise yet :)


At the end of last week I was feverishly making cards to list, and I successfully did so. (Finally!!). I have one set up there that is completely customizable. It's the set of 7 - one of each of my cards. Now I realize that not everyone wants to send out a "Merry Kiss My Ass" or a "Let it Blow", so obviously you can choose whichever images you want. Plus, you can choose the main colours of the background paper (to be all green, all red, or a mix of a few colours, what have you) Since Christmas paper is currently in short supply, I can't guarentee that I can use the *exact* same paper for every card, but I can atleast do the same main colour. (But if you get your orders in quick, I can do it!) You also have a choice of white or ivory cardstock. If you want to *really* customize, I can do the red or green cardstock in a large size card, but that will be a little extra. As for quantity - you're not set at 7 :) You can do any quantity and I'll do a custom listing for you. The more you buy, the less you pay per card. Plus, in some of the card listings, I've done a stamp on the inside of the card saying "Merry Christmas". This can be added to your cards if you like as well (for a very small fee.)


And as a friendly reminder, if you previously entered my card giveaway, and didn't win (or if you did win and wanted more - don't want to exclude you MiMi's Babies!!) you get 10% off of your card order. AND if you're a facebook fan, you automatically get 10% off anything from either of my shops. SO... If you're a facebook fan, AND didn't win my giveaway, you get 20% off your card order!! How great is that?!

Man, I should just be waking up right now lol. Hubby hadda work at 4am today, so it was outta bed before 3am. Good times kids, good times. Although I'm surprisingly awake right now.


My question is... I've gotten a couple of orders for my cards back in October and beginning of November. But now that it's getting closer to December, should I put a date on the announcement when cards should be ordered by? I want my customers to be able to have time to mail them out, but with shipping being kinda slow into the states, I'm worried that people won't order them in time. So, do I put a date of when they should be ordered by? I don't want to "Guarentee" anything - shipping's not reliable enough for that and I don't want to get burned. But I don't want to automatically raise the price of shipping to cover express post, because that's really expensive! Should I just leave that up to the customer, and let them figure it out? lol. As a seller of Christmas cards, or even a buyer of Christmas cards, what would you suggest??? I don't want to sound "pushy" in my announcement, but then again, I don't wanna get bad feedback from those non-understanding buyers who think it's up to ME to get them their cards in time, y'know??

Okay, off I go. Gonna see if anyone answered me yet in the forums *snort*. Ya right!

Have a great day everyone!

Just wanted to make a small little blog post about how excited I was! Weeeee! I didn't even realize I had made one, i went into my "sold" section on etsy to double check which swiffer cloth colours I had previously sold (knew it was the "pinks" but wanted to see what the colour names were) and at the top of the list was "Reusable swiffer cloths - set of 3 "Yellows" and I'm like, Yellows? I didn't sell the Yellows! I sold the pinks! HA! And the other great thing, was yet again this sale wasn't to anyone I know!! :)

The great thing about my "Go Green" items on my shop is the FREE shipping! Check out the "Swiffer Browns" and the "Swiffer Greens" sets on my etsy shop - and my other go green items, the "Don't lose your grapes" market bag (which i have to redo photos for... ), and my duster mitts - the "green" and "playtime pink". (The reason I love these, is because you wear 2 at the same time! Need to pick up a frame and dust underneath? Go for it - the free thumbs allows enough grip to pick up sumfin' with one hand, and dust under it with the other!)

These are the newly sold item! These things actually work amazingly well, i have a bunch i use at home (my very first time making them - needed to fine tune them a tad, so i have a few that were my 'not perfect' stash which i use myself!) I knew they'd work great at the pet hair, but with the texture of the yarn, it picks up so much more dirt than the regular swiffer cloths. Then I just take it outside, beat it around a little to get most of the crap off, and use it again. Normally these aren't washed until after 4-5 uses (but it's all up to preference of course!) but after using it wet, I'll wash it right away.

The best part? You no longer need to put away the swiffer away, because it's so cute you can leave it out and it won't look gross hehe.



Alright, off to make some more things to list. Oh, and i just finished my mom's blanket! That took way too long. Note to self - next time you're making a blanket, try to do a continually huge granny square that you just change colours for, instead of making 60 individual granny squares and sewing them together. OY!



Ooo - one more thing. Kermit had his very first puppy training class today! AND - he wasn't the worst one! hehe. I had nightmares that he would be kicked out. See, he's a great dog, listens so well, learns really fast, *but* as soon as there's another dog, all that goes out the window. He did so well tonight, I'm very proud of my Kermy. Oh ya, I also fell down the stairs this morning. THAT was fun. Can't sit now mind you, and that doesn't go well with drawing, crocheting and blog posting.

Have a great night everyone! And there's only 3 more days 'til the end of my contest! Hurry and enter if you haven't yet - and for anyone that has, you can still gain more entries!!

So, since I mentioned the scarf in yesterdays blog post... was it yesterday? My days are all messed up since my hubby was on nights and i found myself staying up all night in fear i wouldn't hear the alarm at 4am to go pick him up! Anyhoo, the last blog post mentioned the beading i've been doing, and today i took the pics. I'm relatively new to beading on crochet items (not new to beading and not new to crochet, but the mix of the 2.. ya, that's new!) But i thought this scarf needed to be dressed up a little bit. Add some bling! It's a gorgeous yarn (and an expensive one!) and i felt the yarn deserved some special attention! Check out the pics of the beading in progress - i'd love any comments (good ones OR bad ones - don't worry, i can take it!) And i'm also planning on doing a bit of a beaded fringe on each end of the scarf... Good idea?! Or bad one?!

(for all the pics of this scarf in progress, check out my facebook fan page! Sassmowth Designs On Etsy - and don't forget to be a fan! All fans get 10% off all items on my shop, and pretty soon i'll be starting contests where all fans are eligible to receive free merchandise!!)



I had a good question about it the other day, like, hey, how big is it?! Well, it's 68 inches long and 3 1/2 inches wide. So it's perfect to wear as just an accessory to sass up any outfit wrapped around once, or wrap it around your neck a few times on those chilly fall days!

In other news, i'm contemplating printing my Christmas cards myself. I was hoping to go to a printer and get a bunch done, but i dunno. Can't afford to do large orders, and if i print them, cut them, and stick 'em, i can pretty them up as i see fit. Who knows. I still have to head on down to 3 printers next week to get pricing, and then i'll make my final decision!

I was on the etsy chats today and some fellow etsyers were discusing how they re list items often to stay on top of the searches. I know it doesn't cost much to list or re list an item, but i can see it getting pretty pricey after awhile and not sure if it's something i should be doing! Do any of you re list often, and does it help?

Another thing i've been toying with is splitting into 2 shops - SassmowthDesigns and SassmowthPhotography. I still have 12 photos to list, have 3 albums full of photos that i still have to consider listing, so many shots i want to take, and it just seems like my photography is taking up so much space that when i do add more of my other items they'll not even get seen. I have 2 sections other than photography right now which is SassmowthCrochet and SassmowthGoGreen, but i still need a section for original art, art prints, custom art for kids, seasonal items, and greeting cards. Things i also do but think i won't bother putting up on etsy are tshirt design and jewelery making - there's so many etsyers who make jewelery, and a large percentage of those are one heck of alot better than me! Plus, with so many other projects on the go, i needed to cut some out! (hmm.. maybe thats why i'm beading on my crochet!)

Oy, too many things to think about! And not enough money to consider most! Problem is, since i desperately need money, i should be getting a full time job, but if i had a full time job i couldn't make anything to sell! Sucks big time. BUT i have just enough money to get all my supplies and anything else i need, so let's hope i have some sales soon! :) Wish me luck!

Smurf Village Black and White - 8x10 Fine Art Photograph.


I'm very excited. And my husband is annoyed because I keep telling him I made a sale. I've done this atleast 6 times now. Yes, if you happen to check out my etsy shop, you'd see i've made 4 in total, so you may wonder why the heck i'm so excited about this particular sale? Well, because it WASN'T FAMILY that bought it! Now, I'm completely 100% appreciative of my family who purchased my wares, I really couldn't thank them enough. They've gotten "my name in the books" so to speak, because being a brand new seller with no purchases or feedback makes people hesitant to buy from you. Which is completely understandable. How can you know you'd trust the person? But on the other hand, it really flippin' sucks, 'cause if you've had no purchases because no one will buy from a newbie, how are you ever supposed to get purchases? So yes, incredibly appreciative of my fam! They got the ball rolling for me, and now other people can say "Hey, she's gotten positive feedback, i'll buy from her!"

I have to say though it's also helped a lot going into the etsy chats. At first i was hesitant to do it, because i didn't know what to expect. And my very first time going in there i felt like the new kid in school sitting in the corner with no one paying attention to me. I'd say something, no one would respond. All they did was talk about going grocery shopping and eating too much cheese. But the second and third time, i ended up meeting a heck of a lot of great people, and started having lots of fun. I've even gotten fans! I'm up to 21 "hearts" on my etsy site, 7 followers on this blog (my regular blog only had 9, and it was 60% family and friends!) and i'm up to 29 fans on my facebook fan site. It's pretty exciting! And i've also done my part of helping out fellow newbies by being the first purchaser from a young girl who makes jewelery. It wasn't particularly something i wanted, or needed, but i can definitely use it as a gift, it was only 6 bucks, and now a newbie has a purchase that she was incredibly excited about.

So far i've only had one bad experience on the etsy chats. And it's not like this person was outright mean (being mean in a public chat on etsy will get you booted) but y'know how you just get a vibe from someone that they're purposely doing things and saying things to make a point like "i'm not even going to look at your site"? This guy was a fellow photographer, onna those who boasts about how many galleries he's been in and how great and professional he is. It just seemed like he's the type that looks down on others, thinking he's so much better than them. I for one am supportive to other people. I'll help someone else out, i'll give suggestions, i'll answer questions, even if they're my direct competition in selling the same crafts i'm doing. But this guy's sitting in the "Featured Seller" chat room, and while i'm being featured (my products only being posted by other chatters to feature my shop) he's putting up his photographs, and since they were the same subject (flowers) it was hard to tell that it wasn't actually mine going up. Ass. Ah well, what can ya do? Y'know what I can do? Sell more damn photos than him! I made a sale today after all. I can sell more.

But forget about that dickwad, because he's a waste of time! I've met far more people that have only been great on the chats. And i'd like to mention one of them in particular, because as a fellow photographer, she's just starting up like myself, and her photos are fantastic! Love them all, but alas, (and this is another thing we have in common) our husbands don't give us a big enough allowance to purchase things. :) But please check out Rebecca's blog - Car Farm Creations . You won't be disappointed! She's a fellow Canadian, and i'm all about supporting Canadian arts! And if you don't support either of us, we've hashed out a plan where we're coming around to all your houses, pulling out hammers, smashing holes in the walls and then saying "Hey.. I have a perfect solution for all these holes... why don't you check out my photos for sale!"

Ah, that still makes me laugh! Anyhoo, in other news, i've finally started the bead work on my italiany yarned scarf! And what took me so long to do so you ask? Well, even though i have 3 buckets of beads, none of them were the colours i needed. (apparently when i was going through my biggest "bead phase" a few years back, i didn't purchase any turquoise or blue beads.) So, i went out to where my hubby works with his discount card in hand, and got myself some really nice glass beads! So then i began my attempt at putting the thread through the tiniest holed needle in the world and ya. That didn't happen. Despite trying for 2 hours and almost breaking the needle. Even crying didn't help! So, i hadda make that trip right back to the store, and buy myself a needle threader. I didn't really have the 6.50 to spare, but i ain't gonna be makin' money by crying and pleading with needle holes.

I'd put pics up of the beading i've been doing, but alas, i forgot to plug in the battery for my camera. So you'll all have to wait kids! Yes, i know you'll all be sitting there with baited breath for me to post a pic of a string of beads. But for now, i'll post a pic of my Smurf Village, the pic i sold today!! I should go, but, i'll leave you with an interesting story. Some of you may have noticed my avatar on Etsy. It's my pic i drew of Wendel Clark quite a few years back. Well, i've changed my avatar. Apparently there were people who thought i was a guy! And y'know, that makes so much sense, because sometimes it seemed like there were girls who thought i was creepy when i said i was following them on either blogs, facebook or etsy! Huh... I was the creepy guy. Anyhoo, i'm a nice pretty daisy now! So no need to get freaked out. :)



Have a great night everyone! I'm going back to not sleeping since my hubby is working overnights. (Now don't make too much fun of me like his boss Bill did "oooooooh someone can't sleeeeep without their husbaaaaaaand at home? Pooooor baaabyyy!!"... ass. hehe) it's actually the dog's fault. He's a whiney bitch ALL night without his "Precious". Oy. Hey! Maybe it's my husbands RANK feet smell which actually knocks the dog out and *thats* why he actually sleeps through the night! Oooh, now i get it.

*snort*

So, one of the many things I have on the go is a decorative scarf. The end result will have bead work on it as well. This is onna those things that i hope it's worth making! I always bought my yarn at Michaels arts and crafts because hey, i get a discount. And i figured, this is pretty much all the yarn that's out there, right? WRONG! My husband insisted i check out Spun Fibre Arts, so i thought, alright. Might find some cool new yarns. I went into shock as soon as i walked into the store. None of the yarns there would be found at a place like Michaels. There were kinds i've never seen, never heard of. All it of was incredible! The quality of it was amazing, unlike i've ever seen! (but of course, so were the prices!) I fell in love with this store, but it made me cry at the same time because at 10, 20, 30, 150 dollars a ball, there was no way i'd be able to afford to stock up on this stuff! The Friar insisted i buy atleast a few balls of yarn, and he'd fit the bill. Aww ain't that sweet. So, this scarf is made from 2 of those balls! It's call Filati Fantasia Mondrian 100% cotton from Italy. It took me quite a few weeks to decide what to make with it, because this isn't just any old yarn. I just hope I made the right choice!





You may wonder what the juice container in the picture is there for! Well, it perfectly fits my yarn, and with the yarn end coming out the juice pourin' hole, it's great for keeping any dust/pet hair outta the yarn - because even though i crochet in a pet free room, once in a while one of those bugger hairs embark on a "great escape - freedom in craft room land" adventure. Thanks yarn lady at Spun! That was a fantastic idea!

So if anyone has any comments on my scarf, whether it be i made the wrong choice as to what i did with the expensive yarn, or you think it's cute and can't wait to see it with the eventual bead work, please let me know! I'd love the input!

Off to crochet some more. Have a fantabulous day everyone!