Blog art store up and running!

Well, I finally finished setting up my NEW blog art store. 

I am selling original art, fine art prints in different sizes, my dolls, and merchandise directly from me. As of right now I have custom orders set up for my rag dolls and screen printed clothing, but I am currently working on putting finished products up. I am also working on some art pendants that I will have up as soon as they are finished. 

I also have some newly finished original pieces I will add as soon as possible.

The store setup took a lot longer then I planned because the paypal buttons were giving me trouble. I finally figured it out and am pleased to say they all work. I take paypal as a source f payment, but for full information please visit the purchasing info section. 

Go check the store out =)

Some photo's from my computer

I was looking through some photo's that I still have on my computer. They are not old, but have been on my computer for a year now. I really need to catch up on my photo development. I guess that is the problem with digital camera's, you get so behind. Enjoy!

This is my cat Smokey

 

This is the backyard that my apartment looks over. This photo was taken was last spring. It is so pretty and the buds are blossoming again, so I am getting excited to see this view again.

This is my dog Puppy. She was scared and hiding from the thunderstorm that was going on outside. 

Oddmall Festival

I came across a new festival called Oddmall - Emporium of the weird. I learned about this strange but really cool looking festival from fellow artist, Jessica Rohr on facebook. 

The Oddmall festival was set up to celebrate the weird art. Check out their website here. 

I believe this is the 2nd year for the festival and is held in Ohio. Jessica will be attending the Oddmall festival on May 8, 2010 and has said that she will let me know how it goes. This might be one that I have to put on my list, if my art is weird enough =) 

Working on a Blog Art Store

I haven't posted anything in about a week, so I'm due. 

First I wanted to say that I hope everyone had a great and safe St. Patrick's Day. I went to the parade on 5th ave. in NYC. It was fun. I took a lot of pictures of the horses, dogs, bag pipes, and much more. I then went out to dinner and had shepherds pie. It was very yummy.

Now for an art update...

I have been working on a store for this blog. I have been working on it for over a week now. 

It is taking so much longer then I thought. Once the store is done, it will have prints, originals, dolls, merchandise, and much more for sale directly from me.

Rain Rain Go Away

Rain, Rain, Go Away!

It has been raining for almost four straight days and not just a drizzle, it's been down pours. I really do like the rain. The smell of the mud mixing with the fresh rain water always makes me smile, but this is getting ridiculous. 

The streets are flooding like rivers, trees are falling because of the wind gusts, and the sun has not been out for days. My husband and I took our dog for a walk in Central Park last night and there was a stream running through the trail. The decorative tunnels and bridges throughout the park are all closed off because they too are flooded.

People lost power all across the area because of falling trees. It's just a mess. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny and 50. We will see =)

Ebay vs Etsy for selling art

So I have been debating for some time now which place is the best to sell my artwork on, Ebay or Etsy.

I know that many other artists ask themselves the same question. You would not believe the blog posts on this subject that I encountered when researching this topic. I must have read like 50 posts and forums discussing which place was better for art.

What I came up with was that many people enjoy Etsy because it has the handmade, small shop feel and is more personable. Ebay however, gets way more views and many more people know about them. Ebay advertises everywhere and has TV commercials. Ebay is however, less personable and is not completely handmade geared.

I can go on and on about the differences about the two, but than this would be a very long post. So instead, I am just going to tell you the results of my little experiment between Etsy and Ebay.

The Experiment

I listed an Original ACEO card on Etsy about 4 months ago. I constantly promoted it on Twitter all the time, this blog, facebook, and where ever else I could. It got about 150 views and a few hearts, but it did not sell.

Once it was expired off Etsy, I listed that same ACEO card on Ebay. I listed it as an auction style listing for 7 days. I only promoted it on my blog once, and put a link to it on my facebook. It got about 200 views and on day 5, it got a bid. The ACEO card sold.

The Results


The ACEO sold after one week of being on Ebay and did not sell at all on Etsy.  It did sell for less on Ebay than what I had it listed for on Etsy, but it sold.

I still love Etsy. They are very personal and have the little store feel, but my art sold on Ebay. Now I do not know why it sold so much faster on Ebay. I think maybe because my art is more geared towards the lowbrow, fantasy, folk art feel. I can only speak for this one experiment that I did.

I am starting to list more on Ebay and want to see how things go. My rating is still low, at only 3. And I noticed that not everyone leaves feedback. I sold a couple of items ( ACEO cards) after this experiment, and the buyers never left feedback. They did leave very nice emails about loving the ACEO though.

Anyway, my conclusion so far is to try different selling places. On March 25, I believe, Ebay is starting a free listing promotion. You can list up to 100 items for free if they are an auction listing starting at $.99 cents or under. You can still charge shipping as whatever you want. If you never tried Ebay and would like to start, I would take advantage of this promotion.

Hope this helps and happy selling =)

Interview on iprintfromhome.com

I just wanted to shear with you the interview I did for iprintfromhome.com. I have written about this wonderful printing company before and was so happy to get a chance to be apart of their interview section called 'What, How, & Why - A Closer Look'. You can check it out on their website here or on their blog here .


For those of you who haven't heard of iprintfromhome.com, is a family owned printing company with the best customer service. They are from my hometown of Buffalo, NY so go and support my local business =)


They also have 'Thank you Dollars' where you can get your first prints for free. More about this promotion below.

Thank Your Dollars

If you are referred to iprintfromhome by a friend, you get a $10:00 credit to your new account. I used this credit to order my first prints, which is great so I could test the prints before ordering a large amount. 

*To get your $10:00 credit in 'Thank you dollars' 

Sign in as a new member and enter "TWEET - referrer's name" in the registration box when you create your account.  

So for example if I refer you it would look like this ( Tweet- juliafinucane ). Hopefully if you are reading about this promotion here, you would be kind enough to put my name as shown above =)

Once that is done, they will then deposit $10.00 into your account.

Rose petal lamp shade

My latest project is one that I have been trying to finish for some time now.

I have a lamp that the shade got spotted and now is very ugly. My last apartment was very damp because we were on the beach, and I believe that this is why my shade got spotty.

Because my lamp is connected to my end table / book shelf in my bedroom, I want to save the shade. I got an idea to use fake rose petals to cover the shade. I came up with this idea during my wedding. I had these petals all around the tables and they were so pretty.

I researched this idea and found some photographs of lamps already done. These are the photo's in this post. Hopefully my shade comes out just as good. I will post the finished product when it's finished.