Ann Arbor Artisan Market

If you live in the Ann Arbor area, the artisan market is a great place to see local artists and crafters every week. I've been setting up the last two Sundays and it's been a really great experience. Not only have all of the artists and customers I've encountered been friendly, but I'm also selling some things and getting to spend time with my sister. The Sunday Artisan Market is every Sunday from April through Christmas from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. in Kerrytown in Ann Arbor (where the farmers market sets up on Saturdays). I won't be there every Sunday, but if you like Harvesting Hart on Facebook, I'll be sure to post when I'll be at the market. I try to have new items there each week I'm there, and there are many items (earrings, bracelets, pins, hair bows, etc) that I don't have listed on Etsy yet. You can also like the artistan market here.

Anthro Display Hack: Hat Stand

I'm planning on adding hats to my Etsy shop soon, and have been searching online for inspiration and advice for photography. One site somewhat obviously suggested checking out companies whose product photography you like, and I immediately thought Anthropologie. Their product photos are taken on a white background and use few models, which is what I like in my photography. Here's the hat stand I came across that I fell in love with, and is also my model for my copycat stand:

Cute, right? A simple wire hat stand. I found the original source to buy one, but it was almost $25 including shipping. Call me cheap but I'm not willing to pay that, so I made a trip to JoAnn's, picked up some wire, and made it yesterday evening. Here's what I came up with using $2 of wire:

Boom. Mine is shorter and appears larger in this photo but it works. I have to work on getting a few kinks out of the base, but overall, a success. See the quick tutorial below. I wasn't planning on this being a tutorial, so if you have any questions, please leave them in the comments.

Click on photo to enlarge.

1. Get your supplies: Tape measure, 12 gauge wire (two 3 yard rolls), wire cutters, and a bowl that measures approximately 18" around.
2. This is the wire I purchased. It was $1.99 a roll but with two 50% off coupons from JoAnn's, it was $1.99 for two rolls. You don't want any wire much thinner than this or it won't be able to support a hat.
3. Cut four-one yard long sections of wire. Measure to the halfway point (18") of each section. This will be the top of the hat stand. Mold one piece of wire around the overturned bowl until it intersects. Twist to hold in place. Measure 2" down from the circle you just created and bend the wire outward. Using the bowl again, bend the wire down until it forms a half circle. See photo. Repeat until you have four shaped wires.
4. Set your four forms inside each other and fan out until it resembles a sphere. Attach them together at the top with a small piece of wire.
5. Wrap wire around the top and bottom of the straight section to hold in place.
6. Cut a piece of wire approximately 20" and make a circle around your bowl, wrapping the wire ends around each other to hold the circle's shape. Wrap each of the end wires of your stand around the circle and trim.
7. Cut another piece of 20" wire and make another circle around your bowl, wrapping the wire ends around each other to hold in place. Connect around the middle of the sphere in four places.

That's it! I think I'm going to use these at an artisan's market this spring and fall to show off my hats! Might even make some taller and shorter to complete a display. I haven't decided yet if I want to spray paint the stand, leave as is, or do something fun like wrapping strips of fabric around and gluing. Such a fun project!

Make a Light Box for Under $20

Winter makes me lazy. I get out of work and the sun has already set, it's cold, and I just don't feel like doing much of anything. The only free time I had to take photos in natural daylight for my shop is on the weekend (which I never think of doing at the time) or on my lunch break. And the lunch break photo session doesn't happen often. So when I came across this tutorial to make an inexpensive light box, I made it right away. No more excuses, laziness!

Here's what you need and about what it'll cost you:
A big box, the squarer, the better (Free)
A piece of poster board ($1 at Dollar Tree)
White muslin fabric to cover the holes (I already had this but you can buy $2 a yard cheap stuff from JoAnn's)
Two lamps (Standing lamp was $5.99 and clip on lamp above was $9.99 at Target)
Daylight bulbs - 60 watts ($5 for a pack of 4)
Box cutter, tape, scissors

Buy your lamps before getting your bulbs so you can check the maximum wattage your lamps can handle. I bought 100 watt bulbs before finding that the only lamp that could support that bulb would cost $30.

Follow the tutorial here to put it all together!

Here's the first photo I took without any adjustment:

And after a little adjustment in iPhoto to brighten it up:

Not perfect, but it'll get there. I might take the photos into CameraRAW or Photoshop to lighten up the shadows more. But overall, it's a success!

Business Cards on the Cheap

Look what I got yesterday:

Hello, cute box. The envelope even had a "Yay!" sticker on it, which is exactly what I said when I saw it was in the mail. They know me so well already.

Mini business cards! I love anything miniature and these are just so sweet. They're from Moo, a printing company I came across from a blog I just started reading, megan E sass. If you have an Etsy shop, you can take advantage of an offer they have going to get 100 of these little cards for free (though there's a $5 shipping/handling fee). If you ask me, $5 is totally worth it for these high quality, front and back printed cards. 

I'll give you a look at a couple other cheap things I've taken advantage of to get the word out there. In the past, I've ordered business cards from Vistaprint, which I purchased a deal on (I can't remember if it was Groupon or LivingSocial), so if you're looking to get a deal on business cards, keep an eye on the deal sites. At the time, I didn't know what I really wanted to specialize in, so I designed some generic ones in Illustrator with my logo and info that were pretty versatile.

A picture's worth a thousand words, huh? The minicards do a much better job of showing what I do, but you can add photos to the ones in Vistaprint if that's what you'd like to do too.

There are lots of websites now that show DIY business cards. For the sales I make in my shop, I don't like using my fancy cards to attach to packages, so I often make quick tags with my website info on there and tie them on the item with some matching bakers twine.

For these, I use scrapbook paper I've had around forever cut into 2"x4" rectangles, a corner punch, a slot punch for the hole (or just a regular hole punch), and a stamp kit I found at a garage sale. The kit is one of the best things I've found at a sale and it can be used on a lot of different projects. It's similar to this one that I found at a flea market. Both were under $5 each:

I also designed a stamp and had it made into a self inking stamp on Vistaprint using that deal. I use it to stamp random things, like the outside of packages.

So there you go! A few ideas that I use to promote my shop. Have a great weekend!

Struggling with Creative Distraction in Business

I’m distracted constantly. At work, at home, everywhere. I can hardly even work on a project without having music or a movie on in the background. I can’t even speak without getting so sidetracked by my thoughts that I forget what’s actually coming out of my mouth (this was a particular problem making presentations in school). Although most of that doesn’t bother me too much, creative distraction has been a struggle for me recently. Especially how it relates to dedication to my small, hobby business. I desperately want to build a small business selling items that I make. However my lack of dedication to a specific project makes it tough to commit to developing one line of items. As soon as I get a project ready to sell (aka clutch purses, fabric flowers, iPhone cases), I immediately lose interest once it’s online to be sold. I no longer care to develop ideas ... I just want to move onto the next thing!

My interests are ever changing, and I don’t know how to find a project to sell that will continue to allow me to explore different creative avenues and keep a cohesive product line. I thought I’d found it with the iPhone cases. I could print whatever I wanted on them, which allowed for some creative freedom, and I sold two within the first two weeks of listing them online so there’s some market for them. But unfortunately I still feel limited by the medium, and since posting them online, have began personal embroidery and crocheting projects. 

I really just need to split my time between my current interests and my business. As much as I’d like to work on the things that interest me the most at the moment, I need to continue being dedicated to my business if I have any hope of being successful. It’s going to be really difficult; especially because I have hardly any discipline when it comes to doing things I don’t want or have to do, and I feel like my time is limited as is. I’ll give it a whirl though! If you see new designs in my shop soon, that means I’m going through with the plan. If not, I’m probably working on something I’ll enjoy myself (and maybe share on here!)!

Do you have a distraction that gets in the way of your goal? How do you deal with it?