My comments on some new glass I got in!

I received a glass order yesterday from Frantz Art Glass and I seem to be on a Creation Is Messy glass kick.  In the green fascination mode.  Most of the colors I got in were in the green pallet except for CIM Tuxedo.  (I use a lot of white, black and clear glass in bases and encasing.)

I really like the 2 Unique Great Bluedini colors from CIM.  One is on the blue side and the other is on the green side of the original Great Bluedini.  I love teal colors and will enjoy experimenting with these two colors!

I am sooo happy with the shade of Celadon unique 2 glass.

I have been searching for a few years for more of this Mint Leaf shade of Ornela glass made in Germany.  When I saw Celadon unique 2 I ordered some because I liked the color but when I unpacked the box and saw the color...WOW!  The color was so close to the Mint Leaf glass I had be searching for I was thrilled!

I am most surprised with the color of CIM Dirty Martini!  I thought It would be close to the shade of Vetrofond's Extremely Light Olive...which I wasn't that taken with.  Dirty Martini is a beautiful shade of very light green that makes a wonderful base for silvered glass!

Look at this thimble I made with it!

You should really see this puppy in person!  I used Precison Miro (also known as Rembrant) stringers on top of Dirty Martini.  Wonderful fuming effects as well as a super mirror effect!

Lately I've playing with silvered glass using the same pattern on different glass bases.

I have been very pleased with the effects!

Been playing with hot glass mixing

I love some of Effetres new "Cool Colors" that have a marbled effect to them like Blueberry Marble or Cherry Shake.  The only trouble is that I'm frugal...I don't want to spend money and order something that I use once and then it sits and gathers dust.  (I've done that way too many times as it is!)  So I've been holding out on purchasing the lovely Cool Colors.

Then one day I was busy making some big hole Pandora type beads that get the liners through the holes.   I was on the search for a very light yellow marbled glass for a background for some yellow camellia flowers I was going to put on the bead.  I could not find any yellows suitable out of my color pallet.  The color Buttered Popcorn listed on one of my glass suppliers websites would probably fit the bill but it would be at least a week and a half before I got the glass.  I wanted to make the bead NOW!  What to do...

I started playing around with the glass rods.  (Now some of you may use this trick all the time but I thought it was pretty neat!)  I ran a line of stringer, oh about an inch long down the side of a white glass rod from the tip down.

Then when I made the bead, I wound the glass on with the yellow stripe towards the mandrel so it would swirl or marble it while I was winding the glass.  Then I put on the vines and flowers as usual.  

  The result was a very light marbling effect that did not overpower the background with yellow but lightly gave a hint of yellow tones.  I liked so well after a few beads I decided to make a thimble.  It had the same light marbling also.

I was very pleased with the limited amount of work involved in achieving that look.  A few days later I decided to try this with a red marbled effect.

I ran the stringer down the side in the same manner and wound the glass in the same way.  The bead that resulted had the same marbled effect just a bit brighter because of the color used.

I also tried this by making a thimble and I loved the result!

The marbling was not as pronounced on the thimble as on the small bead but it seemed to have just enough to make a beautiful background.

Now I just have to try this with other colors!

Why I closed my eBay store

I kicked around closing my eBay store for a while and then when they announced the price changes that made my mind up.  I had just the basic store and since I sell loose beads most of the time I was competing with all of the importers too.  My monthly store fee was $15.95  with store listings @ .03, fixed pricing @ .35 and the first 5 auctions a month free.  Then when you sell something it was 8.5% of the sale.

On March 30th the store fee remains the same the store listings disappear and fixed pricing will be .20 a listing per month.  The first 5 free auctions disappear also.  Then eBay gets 12% of the sale. (this is for my basic store and the price range for the items I sell)

Now I've been going by holiday sales too.  My sales on eBay in 2008 during the holidays were half as much as 2007.  2009 sales were half of 2008...so that figured into my decision.

Lately I've been getting more traffic on Etsy and Artfire, with eBay sales barely paying my fees.

On Esty there is no monthly store fee.  It costs 20 cents to list an item for four months (5 cents a month).  Etsy's commission fee is 3.5% of the sale price.  It is an "Artist Friendly" site.  (I figure I can take the money I was paying eBay for a store and list almost 80 items per month on Etsy if I wanted to!)

Artfire is a newer selling site a couple years old if that.  I happened across it a year ago and signed up right away.  I'm a Charter Artisan with a Pro Seller store.   They have unlimited listings and no commission fees, just the monthly fee. 

Silkfair is a very new site also.  I have a Market Shop there with unlimited listings.  (You can get a Custom Shop but that costs $24.99 a month and to me it's for a "Big Dog" and I'm just a little pup!)  No fees to list.  If you sell something, the commission is 3% of the sale.

Upillar is an extremely new classified ad site.  You can get a store there for $10.00 a month I think.  I have no store there all my listings are in the classified section.  There the customer emails you if they would like to buy anything and then you send them an invoice.  No fees for listing or commissions.  I thought I'd list things there just to see what happens!

So after weighing all this information I decided to close the eBay store because it wasn't cost effective for what I sell. It was the right decision for me.

 
I hope you have a great day!

I got some new glass!

  I got some new glass in in the last few days.  I tell you it's like Christmas when I get some new glass! 
  Lately I've been working in pastel colors primarily when I'm making glass thimbles.  So I've been searching for some nice light transparent colors of glass.  In my regular inventory of transparent glass rods, I have mostly dark transparent colors but the light and pale colors produce wonderful pastel when placed over white.  So I'm "discovering" an untapped color pallet right now!
  Got some pretty light transparent colors in from Devardi Glass.  Took a snapshot of some of them.  They still need to be tagged and put away.  (I like to put a little tag on each rod so I know which color of rod I'm using when it's time to grab a new rod.)

  I can't wait to play with some of these colors!  I had got a 20 pound box of mixed colors of rods last month from Devardi Glass and here are some of the thimbles I came up with from them.

Too fun!

  Who knows what kind of beads I'll come up with!