All of my photos have now been uploaded to my Picasa Albums. The link top left will take you there if you want to take a peek. It took me days to find them from all over, so I’m glad that little job is over.

I started working on my website again yesterday and spent very close to 10hrs on pretty much the home page finding and editing photos for it, doing the links and fixing the darn code when it wouldn’t play nice. So the home page looks good now and is finished as much as it can be atm, but I’m sure there will be a few minor tweeks to come.

I’ve not loaded the page up yet, so the old one is still there for now because I need to re-do the tutorial pages (and there are nine of them), to remove links and make it all cohiesive in look and function… otherwise it would be all wrong and confusing if I stuck the revised home page up now.

The website is going to be different, because well..the function of it has changed over time. Despite my best efforts and wishes, I cannot find that extra time to put together lesson and tips and upload them here as I hoped. I have to be realistic and I have to remove that content because having those empty pages in there eats at me all the time. So my apologies to those who were looking forward to that content.

My website now will primarily be for my Jewerly Tutorials (and yes..I would love to write more, but again..it is a time issue). As well as my tutorials, the home page will be more like a landing page I suppose, where I will have links to where I sell my lampwork beads and jewelry in my online shops and links to my other weblife, Facebook and Twitter.

I may at a later date, setup a shop on my website to sell my beads and jewelry, but the jury is out on that one atm, especially since the fees in some of the online shops are so minimal. I am selling directly from my blog however.

Well that’s it for now…. til the next update.

I am delighted to share with you,.. someone found my blog by using the search term in google “birds are pooping all over my trampoline”. Now how many people do you think can brag about that one hey??

So welcome to all you folk who have birds pooping on your trampoline. In the 25hr, I will write a short e-book about the benefits of cleaning your trampoline before the kids get home from school, and how to retaliate by messing up the offending bird’s nests to see how they like it. Eh hemm… yes I will make a note of that on my list of things I need to do. Was that a squealing pig I heard fly by?

Two whole days to clean up my photos and put them here Albums . What a frustratingly slow process that was, but wow,..it is so great having them organised at long last.

You might also notice that this blog has had a bit of a thrashing with the virtual broomstick. I’m still working on it,..so things will keep changing for another day or so. So what do you think so far?

My website, blog, ebay, etsy, artfire, photos and internet life in general is such a mess that I’m confused…so I can only imagine it would make no sense to anyone else.

So,.. you know when you’re doing a big clean out?,.. and the very things you are trying to organise get into a waaaaaaaay bigger mess during process than what they were to start with??, and you begin to panic a bit because you think you’ll never regain any sort of organisation back???… well…that’s what it’s going to be like in my internet sites for the next little while.

I’m going to throw all of my internet sites into a huge pile in the middle of my desktop…mix ‘em all up,..make some smart changes and toss out a lot of uneccessary and defunct content. I’m aiming to once-and-for-all declutter and simplify my internet sites and the management of those to create a more steamlined presence on the net that makes much more sense and will be easier for me to maintain.

Here goes……Wish me luck!

Hi everyone, I have found the need to take a step back and seriously re-think about the direction I want to go with my lampwork beads and where to offer them for sale. I was selling my beads on ebay for a few months and while some beads went for prices that I could live with and would make it worthwhile continuing to make them, sadly,..most beads went for very little and so I couldn’t help but question over and over whether to continue selling on ebay.

To be honest, I think it would be foolish to continue spending so many hours at the expense of neglecting my family and home,…making, cleaning, photographing, listing, doing after auction admin, packing and shipping etc,.. for 8 auctions per week,.. when many auctions bring sales of $4-$6. It’s a huge amount of work and time and I could be spending my time more wisely. In fact…. as silly as it sounds,.. I would be better off not listing on ebay at all,..(saving a full day and night of work on Fridays),..and posting on my blog to give away free beads to the first 8 people who reply.

I’m not naive in thinking that my beads are that great that they should fetch huge dollars. I think they are nice enough to be worth more than ebay bargain hunters are willing to pay though,..and for the time invested in them, it certainly would be nice to at least make it worth my while doing them.

So,.. I really needed to take a break,.. step away from it for a bit and re-think what I am doing. I am still thinking,.. and working on a couple of projects that need a few more elements piece together before I can see if they are the way I want to go with my beadmaking. I should know the answer to that hopefully this week or next when I receive some tools that I have had custom made for one particular project. I am very excited about the ideas I have, and apart from selling a few random beads now and then on ebay again…I think my main outlet for these items will be in my Artfire shop and possibly Etsy shop also.

I can’t wait for the postman to deliver my parcels this week,.. I have some serious torch sessions I want to do.

..because I’m off on vacation to Darwin on Tues Whoot!. I’m only missing one week and I’ve scheduled more .99c auctions to start on Sat PDT July 11/Sun AEST July 12 as I’ll be back home in time for end of auction.