Status Reports & Other Ramblings

The adorably fierce MINE! dragon returns, this time on vinyl window clings! 

They're free (limit one per person, please) and you can add one to your next order right over here.

If you've already got an order in the shipping queue, or if you're in the Earring Club and would like to get one in your next shipment, just let me know and I'll put a note on your order for you.

And yes, you CAN just order one right now if you like it so much that you want to pay for shipping, but since it is a very smol fierce dragon, you should probably make sure it has at least one shiny thing to guard on the journey...

(actual photo of me wondering why I even bothered to get out of bed on my birthday)

Okay, so last week there were four days of totally NOT made-up-as-I-went-along coupon codes that were supposed to lead up to a big sale on my actual birthday on Friday. Except Friday was a Terrible Horrible Very Bad No Good Day, and I ended up sending it to its room to think about its life choices. And then the weekend happened, and there was cheesecake and an art museum and dancing and then on Sunday I was deeply regretting MY life choices, especially the dancing in 3 inch heels part.

THEREFORE, I am declaring that Monday is the new Friday, and for the next 24 hours everything on the website is 25% off. Also shipping is free in the US and discounted by $3 for everybody in other countries on all orders over $15. You'll need to use coupon code BIRFDAY25 at checkout, and it's good until noon tomorrow.

Other things of note today:

• The Awesome Beads that I ordered for May's earring club are SUPPOSED to arrive by 8pm tonight. I will be very cross if that doesn't happen, but they are definitely in this country, and the thing I have planned for them will be super fast to do (I'm opting on the side of "awesome stones, minimal wirework" this month) so hopefully everybody's orders should go out tomorrow. Well. Everybody whose billing day falls in the first half of the month, anyway. 
  
  
• Also theoretically arriving sometime this week, I hope: static window clings featuring a variant of the adorable MINE! dragon that you may have seen on stickers last year! I am super excited for these. Only 50 are being made, and when they're gone they're gone; I'm probably going to actually put them on the website as a free item for you to add to your cart so you can get one if you want one or not get one if you don't want one. (I can English.) I'm also working on a new sticker design that will probably be out next month.
  
  
• I have also plotted out June's earring club and just ordered the materials for that, and unlike May these beads are a) coming from California not the other side of the world and b) I planned ahead this time GO ME. As usual I'm not saying what it is, but if you like things that are color-shifty and/or purple you might want to get in on the magical automatic shiny delivery service.

...I think that's all the news I've got for today, but I haven't had enough coffee yet so who knows? 

Wait, no, I lied. Speaking of not enough coffee... I just came really close to accidentally selling a pair of my personal earrings. *facepalm*

See, this weekend when I was clearing out some of the clutter under my workbench, I discovered a pair of long-since-sold-out obsidian earrings without earwires. "Huh, that's odd. Guess I accidentally made an extra pair of these at some point? Or maybe I made up a pair and they fell off my desk *eyes cats* and I forgot that I'd already made them and assumed I'd mis-counted somewhere so I just made another pair?"

This IS a thing that happens occasionally, so I shrugged and tossed them into the bowl where I keep finished shinies that need to be put on the website.

Fast forward to this morning, when I was going through the bowl: "Hey, I should really wear my pair of this design more often. Maybe I'll go put them on now. Wait, why isn't my pair on any of my earring holders? And come to think of it, why is this pair slightly shorter than the version that was on the website? Wait. These ARE mine."

...I still don't know how they ended up under my workbench with no earwires attached, though. Maybe I was in the process of changing the earwires (I had a batch of leverbacks that I bought for myself last year that turned out to be too delicate to withstand my hair, so it's possible) and got distracted by something shiny? In any case, hey, I found my obsidian earrings! 

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go remove a cat from a box of beads. AGAIN.

As pretty much everybody knows by now, I have all the short-term memory of a squirrel on crack, because brain damage and also AHAHAHAHA WHAT SLEEP. So when Facebook's advertising algorithms recently decided to show me a planner designed specifically for people living with chronic illness and/or executive function issues, I was deeply intrigued. And then I fell down an Instagram rabbit hole lined with washi tape and color-coding and I may possibly have invested in a rather large set of erasable gel pens which are DEFINITELY a legitimate business expense SHUT UP THEY ARE TOO and also this thing is impressive because a migraine took me out for a couple of days last week and I STILL got a lot done. 

• A lot of what I made last week promptly sold (y'all are FAST with the clicking and buying) but a few pieces are still left, including a restock of the dainty sapphire pieces that went WOOOSH out the door the first time I listed them.
  
  
• Earring Club is running late this month, because I ordered something really really nifty for it but the package is currently in *checks tracking for the eleventeenth time* Germany, where it has been for two days now. *taps foot impatiently* If it doesn't get here in a couple of days I'll go to my backup plan and save this for next month, but I'm really hoping it does because EEEEEE PRETTY ROCKS.
  
  
• My birthday is Friday and I am turning a prime number! As is traditional, there will be a sale, and since I believe in celebrating birthdays for at least a week, it's starting now with everything in clearance being BOGO41%OFF (buy one, get a second item at 41% off) all day today if you use coupon code BIRFDAY1 at checkout.
  
  
• (Also a few things on the site might get marked down to $41 over the course of the week because why not.)
  
  
• Today's agenda also includes posting the new shinies that I didn't get around to photographing this weekend - including a spectacular pair of long dangly diamond and opal earrings that are one-of-a-kind, and a pendant with Victorian mourning glass and thermally-reactive color changing beads. 

(actual photo of me trying to get anything done in the month of April)

HIIIIIIIIIIII so uh April happened? I don't know either. But hey, for once I got my taxes done on time, despite getting sick not once but twice this month. THANK YOU DARLING CHILD, but when I said "share that with your mother" I was talking about the chocolate, not germs.

I'm honestly not sure what happened last week, because it was school vacation week, aka the week when I resign myself to living in chaos and watching a whole lot of tv. Although now that I've gotten the Tiny Evil Genius hooked on Doctor Who, at least it's good tv? I am a more than a little concerned that her favorite character so far is River Song, though. 

• I let the Tiny Evil Genius and her BFF put things on sale! They were mostly pretty sensible about it, but a few things got REALLY good prices because, well, they're 8 and 7 and they might have had sugar. 
  
  
• I bought diamonds for the first time ever! Diamonds are super sparkly and I kinda want to put them on everything. 
  
  
• I also got some labradorite and opal and moonstone beads for an earring design that I've had in mind for a while and the photos really don't do a very good job of capturing how nifty these are. (I wear my pair constantly.)
  
  
• There's still the better part of $400 available if you are a transgender/non-binary/gender non-conforming/etc person who would find a shiny thing helpful in exploring or affirming your identity. Please don't hesitate to reach out to me, I am loving getting to send things to people who couldn't otherwise afford it! 
  
  
• I made a pendant called "D is for 'Doorway'" that may be one of the best things I've ever made, and I'm pretty sure it's actually a portal of some sort so y'know, wear it at your own risk? 
  
  
• You can now get any pair of earrings turned into clip-on earrings, if you don't have holes poked in your head. In two varieties of pinchiness, even! (HUSH SIRI THAT IS SO A WORD.)

Probably some other things happened, but between the sudafed and the antihistamines and the cough medicine I am NOT all here today, let me tell you. But at least vacation week is over so the little plague-bearer is back at school with all her other germ-ridden friends and oh heck it all I'm just going to be sick forever, aren't I?

(Don't worry, I wash my hands a LOT, as my poor ragged cuticles can attest. Also I'm pretty sure germs can't survive for the length of time it takes the USPS to get my packages from point A to point B, and I promise I don't lick any of the shinies.)