Monkey Business

Yesterday, finally I managed to finished my first ever custom oder from this lovely lady. She is really great to work with, very sweet and kind.

Anyway this is what she ordered, an owls applique on her 4 years and 6 months old daughters tank top and onesie with the matching owl hairclips.

It was a great experience for me, the process of making the shirts is very exciting, choosing the fabrics,colors combinations and designing. I've been sending her emails back and forth to ask her approval for every little details since I don't want to mess with my first order, I want it to be perfect.

Like most of the sellers on Etsy, I believe it is very important to make our customer happy and satisfied with our products. Since she is my recurring customer, it makes even more important that she trusted me to come back and purchase more from my shop.

Of course, the reason we all selling our products is to make profit, but to me is just isn't only about money. I am very happy the fact that I could use my creativity to make something for other people and makes them happy. It gave me satisfaction, eventhough the amount of work that I spent sometimes more than the money I asked for ( my hubby thinks I'm nuts :) Putting the prices on my products is a bit tricky, I mean how can I value my work? it could be different perception from my customers. Hmmm I guess, profit has to go parallel with customer satisfaction.

Well there are so many things that I still need to learn about being a "business" woman :)

Chomel second featured in the blog :)

What a beautiful Monday morning to begin with..just received a mail from Ms. Derya from Daily Dream Daily Doodle blog, that she has featured my Cupcake Baby Hairclip in her blog I'm so happy because this is the second featured in a month :)

Ms. Derya is an Etsy member and the owner of Jewellera she made such a beautiful, romantic and delicate jewelleries and accessories.

Cash in the Attic

Last Sunday, my family and I went to visit my mother-in-law. It has been more than a month we didn't see her. Since my father in law passed away we try to visit her as often as possible, at least once a month. It has been a difficult period for her and we want to give her support as much as possible.

Anyway, to cut the story short, I was having a conversation with her, telling her about how busy I was lately with kids, doing this and that, busy with sewing, making accessories for my Etsy shop, and suddenly she's was like "What shop are you talking about? What are you making? What are you selling?...(it was slipped out from my tongue, I totally forgot that I haven't told anybody yet except my husband about my Etsy shop) anyway I got a 3rd degree interrogation from her :)

I explained to her what I've made and about Etsy (in Belgium not many people are familiar with Etsy). I told her that I just bought buttons from US via Etsy and that it's quite pricey for one button. When I told her, she jump out from her chair and dragged me to her attic, and guess what? she has loads of vintage buttons!! and when I saw those buttons I'm like wowwee!! I'm jumping like a small girl in a candy shop!I could see my hubby's puzzled face, he didn't get it why am I so happy .. then he said to me "Honey you do aware it is just an old buttons not pearls!"

Well no point of explaining about vintage thingy to him, he thinks vintage is just another fancy word for old junks.

Junk or not I'm so glad that I don't have to spend money on vintage buttons. They are so many,and I still have to sorting and clean them. I am very excited and can't wait to use them in my future projects :)

Law of Attraction

It has been a month (+ 17 days to be exact ) that I've started selling my handmade items on Etsy and sadly enough I sold only 5 items in January, less than I expected it to be. Perhaps I put a high expectation that I would sell 5 items per day instead of per month!

Anyway, yesterday, despite a very slow business, depressing weather, and school holidays (24/7 constantly busy with M & Y) I kept my head up! I think positive --"if you really want something and truly believe it's possible, you'll get it ", so I console myself that I shouldn't feel bad for not being able to sell anything yet this month, I still have time before March!

Anyway, I can't afford to think, let alone to do anything much regarding my Etsy shop since M & Y at home, I have no choice but keeping myself occupied with them, baking cupcakes, doing puzzles, watching Jurassic I, II & III with them in a row! phewww!

Later in the afternoon, while M doing his homework, I grab the opportunity to check my mail, and for some reason I came across one of my 2 weeks old email from this lovely lady Theresa, from redvelvetconfections which I met in one of Etsy forum. She was interested to feature one of my brooch in her blog and in her email she mentioned that my brooch will be featured on the 17th Feb (which I gave her permission by the way! but I totally forgot about that), so I quickly went to her blog redvelvetconfections and voila...there are two pictures of my brooch in her blog.

I am so happy, eventhough it is not a big deal to some people but to me it is really something, considering I am very green in this area, I can't help it but to feel a bit “tiny-winy-itsy- bitsy-(humbly) proud” the fact that I've designed and made that brooch! It certainly put a big wide smile on my face :).

So this morning, as usual, after preparing breakfast for my kids, empty dishwasher and doing all the boring house chores, I finally get a few minutes to check my mail...and guess what? I just received a message from my customer and she is very happy with my products and decided to custom order for more items this week!! I am really happy when I read her email..is like...for 17 days no sale and now I received order for couple of items!. I'm super happy!

So (the Secret) moral of the story is never underestimate the “Law of Attraction”...

What do I do between the starter and main course??

My blog title - Between The Soup and Potatoes is a direct translation from Belgian idiom - in dutch it is "tussen de soup en patatten". This is the first idiom which I learned during my Dutch lesson. My teacher explained to me that people over here (in Belgium) using that expression to show what they do in between, despite the limit of time... as they relates to Soup - the starter and potatoes main dish hence the "void" between this two courses.

This is my first post, I'm trying to write about what I did or doing in between my busy day. Actually I'm pretty nervous about what I should write, I have nothing interesting to share, who on earth are going to read my blog...but yeah I put that negative thoughts aside and take a plunge anyway. Besides I've nothing to loose...at least I can brush up my rusty English :)

Here my cliché story begin, I am wife to a wonderful man, a mother of two, a boy and a girl, both are very active, curious and talkatives. Like every mothers around the globe, my day starts with them and ended with them...so you can imagine the amount of energy they squeeze out of my body. When they are in bed or when they are at school I will try to make time for myself, a cup of tea, cookies and off to my little oasis i.e. my attic (although that does'nt always happen) where I can be creative and do what I love the most...crafting, sewing and anything that use my creativity.

That's all about me for now, I'm signing off from my first post and hope I will have time to penning down my thoughts soon.