Christmas Cards

I started working on Christmas projects early, you might think.
But, actually I am not early at all...
That is one of the things with owning an Etsy shop.
My stuff must be out when the customers started thinking of Christmas. Otherwise, the things I make are not going to be reaching my customers before Christmas.
Interesting, right?
Here is a new card added to shop today

I used acrylic paint to make the green background. Other things are just stickers.

It is looking great.  If you want to make one, it is an easy DIY card project.
Just paint the cardstock with the paint. Then add otherwise blah looking sticker on top of it.
Add your greetings or just stamp a message.

Bindu

Queen : Mixed media art

There was this bandana. It is made of cotton. 

The paisley designs was pretty and cotton is good to absorb color.
I bought it to experiment with water soluble markers.  You can see some colors there already, right?

Looking on it, suddenly I could see a face.  So the face got cut and and glued to already started background paper. The rest is whimsical. 

With her red hair and gold crown, she is rocking, don't you think?
She is going to be framed and will be on the wall soon.
The paper needed to be trimmed to fit  the existing frame.  

Bindu Designs

DIY texture making for Mixed Media Back grounds

It is fun to experiment with foam sheets. Remember the last post?  Today, it is fun time again.
So I made two more simple designs.

 The first one is made by pressing the top of a marker. Then I draw with pencil on top of it to make the marks more clear. The second one is hand drawn with pencil. I tried it on printed paper already. You can see they are used and pint is still on them.

I stamped the foam sheets with different colours on the paper. It is just printed paper, which is served it's purpose already. So, by printing with foam sheets, I am recycling (upcycling) them for my art work.
There is one more I have made today. I cut the sheet with  paper scissors in wave pattern. Then glued them on a piece of cardstock. I haven't tried it yet. 

 I would like to experiment with ordinary plastic buttons next.. You know, the type usually on the dress shirts? What other things you think/know to be used in Mixed Media to make texture

Bindu Designs

Wednesday's Mixed Media work and tips

I am not particularly interested in making something. But, doing nothing is not so great. 
So, decided to view Kelly Donovan's Youtube video to get inspiration. 

Kelly knows a lot about mixed media, (in my humble opinion).
She has a unique style of explaining things. 
Now, she is kind to join me in her facebook group.
Today, I decided to work on watercolor paper. 

It is hard for me to draw. Glad to tell you, the eyes came out the way I wanted. I call this one "Loneliness". 
I want to say, I made a stamp with rubber bands as mentioned in the book I was reading. I used acrylic paint to stamp it over the eye. The white part is homemade fiber paste.

While making the background, I placed a printer paper on the sheet to remove excess paint. See what happened...

Isn't it beautiful? I have another paper to torn and use on the future projects. When I mixed one color more than I wanted to, it was used on my journal 

Do you have any tips to share? 

Bindu Designs

What am I reading?

I want to tell you that I am reading "Mixed-Media Master Class with Sherrill Kahn"

The cover is eye catching. So, I looked inside. For a beginner in Mixed-Media, I am trying to learn as much as I can.
If you are like me, this book has a lot of information. Many techniques are explained step by step to make great backgrounds.
I am pretty sure, you may have your own unique ideas to make backgrounds. I am very interested in  keeping the spending a minimum while learning things.
I borrowed this from the Toronto Public Library. If I am going to do more mixed media, I might buy my own copy later.
I really want to incorporate fabric in my work. This book shows how to do that.
I am happy with the book as it is. Yet, I just wish to view more of her finished works in the book.
Which is your favourite book about Mixed-media?



 Bindu Designs

I was busily working on the shop and was experimenting with stitches and colors. It was also fun to connect with other sellers through online.
Made a few friends, and got few sales...
The new product added is keyboard dusters and dust mitts.

Then there is one more:

In the shop, they are listed as sets of one duster and one mitt. 

Bindu Designs

Path to success on Etsy.

I have 138 items on Bindu Designs shop. The views are over 100 now a days. The sales are not hitting though.


Before complaining too much about  the sales. let me write down the dream projects.
I love to make another scarf, using granny stitches in stripes. That is a work in progress right now.
The next idea is to make few stockings to give away as gifts.
The next one is to have few nice caps with brims or earflaps and cute applique on them.
Then, I saw a picture of a crochet mannequin head. there is a pattern available too. When I get next order, I am going to buy that pattern.
The Facebook is getting 150 likes. Hopefully, it will stay that way.

For advertising, I need to do some thing. That is the next most important thing on my shop's path to success.

Bindu Designs

Path to Success on /Etsy

 Today I wrote answers to the interview questions on a blog.It will give me another link. Glad about that. My orange scrunchie is showing up in the browse and got couple of views from it. So, i decided to add few more scrunchies. Linking them to each other and linking to matching items...That kind of helping the customers.
Reduced the price of soap savers.
Also, posted new items to shop. Right now I checked and found that 95 views for me. That is great, I guess. Usually it will be around 70.

So, today, I took photos of caps.

Then the scrunchies, I put them on my hand as bracelets for the picture. They will make nice bracelets. I love them

They are added to the shop. 

Blue, Grey and burgandy are added to the shop. The multi color ones may go tomorrow. It is too late to take pictures. That is it for Bindu Designs today.

Bindu Designs

Positive Thinking: The path

Everybody heard of "law of Attraction", and the "Secret".
I read a lot of books about positive mental attitude and learned many people succeed in life with their attitude.
Even with all the information came to me through books and websites, I was not getting anywhere.
So, I started my journey with this blog.
All I want to achieve is to have 200 items in my Etsy shop and to make a $1000/month income.
While I cannot control my sales on the shop, I can add more items to it.
So, today I added all the soap savers I make yesterday. Then made and added a new one with a new pattern too. So altogether I have 107 items in Bindu Design shop. The views are not great. Just 11 views today.
I tweeted the listings. Making Facebook postings. Not a sale in this week yet. I really needed to keep adding the items.

Bindu Designs