Friday, April 27, 2012

Where To Find The Hudson Valley Etsy Team this Weekend... and Tuesday! And Thursday!

It's the perfect time to finalize your Mother's Day shopping and check out some unique events this week!


Kokma
Amy of Kokma will be participating in Beacon Open Studios, which kicks off with an opening reception on Friday night and studio tours on Saturday and Sunday.


Sweet Olive Jewelry
Gnorasaurus
Felt It
On Tuesday, May 1, from 4 pm
to 8 pm, Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson is joining with Etsy Hudson for a night of learning more about how to market and sell your art. The Career Development Office at Bard is coordinating this panel discussion, and along with it there will be a craft fair of local Etsy artists! HVET members include Anna of Retropage, Anne of Felt It, Amy of Sweet Olive Jewelry, Susan of DiGilio Designs and Kathy of Gnorasaurus. The event is free and open to the public at the Bertlesmann Campus Center.
DiGilio Designs


Retropage


Anjali Creations
On Thursday, Hema of Anjali Creations will have a booth at the Montebello Jewish Center Spring Boutique at 34 Montebello Road in Montebello, N.Y. This special event runs from 6 pm to 9 pm.

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Martha Stewart Show - The Etsy Show!

Yesterday Amy Madden and I, Ryan Green, were in the audience of one of the last tapings of the Martha Stewart Show. I am a HUGE Martha Stewart fan so I was super excited to be invited as an audience member on the Etsy episode.

The episode will air Thursday, April 26, 2012 and is all about Etsy!  All the guests and audience members were either Etsy sellers or employees of Etsy.  We learned a little bit about the operations of Etsy, did some crafts with owners of successful Etsy shops, and even watched an all-Etsy fashion show.  Plus we walked out of there with lots of presents from Martha - craft supplies, gift certificates to HP, and books.

Martha Stewart took questions from the audience after the show ended.

Going to a show taping is a lot of waiting in lines and being quiet and clapping for two hours, but loving Martha and Etsy so much definitely made it a very exciting day for the audience.  We all showed off our products to the cameras and Martha requested that we all have our individual photos taken so they can be put on The Martha Stewart Show website/blog.  That is huge to all of us small business owners and we really appreciated Martha's support.  It was obvious that she recognizes and appreciates that our group of people - craftspeople - are the ones who helped make her such a success.

A pillow from my Etsy shop, Wicked Mint, at The Martha Stewart Show!  (Incidentally, I was also wearing a necklace from Amy Madden's shop,  Sweet Olive Jewelry)

Friday, April 20, 2012

Where to Find the Hudson Valley Etsy Team This Weekend!

On Sunday, April 22, take a little road trip and join Hema of Anjali Creations at the Clifton Jewish Center Arts & Crafts Show at 18 Delaware Street in Clifton, NJ. The show runs from 9:30 am until 4:30 pm. Hema creates necklaces, bracelets, earrings, handmade greeting cards, wine charms, and gifts that celebrate the diverse paths to spiritual growth.                        

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Garden Time?

I don't need to tell anyone what a weird winter it was and now this unseasonable, strange spring.  Normally, I would go out to clean and prepare the vegetable garden for planting around this time - mid April - and the skeletons of parsley that froze before I could pick it, dried pickle vines and a few late lettuce leaves that didn't quite make it would remain as a reminder of last year's harvest.  Oh yeah, and a few weeds and some clumps of grass that jumped the wall.  Over in the far bed moss usually begins to grow in the remaining moisture in the shorter days of winter.

This year!  Lordy, lordy, this year is downright freaky!

The weeds look like the garden was left fallow all summer and was never planted.  What's more, the trees are not even leafed out yet.


This kale plant apparently didn't get the memo that autumn had come and gone and it continued to produce tender leaves all winter.

When I pulled it up by the roots, I had myself a kale bush.  Take a look at the trunk that should be a stem.

After hoeing the weeds, pulling what was wintered over and raking everything out, I added several yards of organic compost and a little cow manure for good measure (and a touch of barnyard smell for affect) and now the beds are raked smooth and ready for planting.

I'm not an expert gardener, by any stretch of the imagination.  This will be the 4th year I have planted this garden and I do it by instinct, a little bit of knowledge and just fly by the seat of my pants.  My light isn't perfect and I have planted many things that have not thrived in my little farmstead.  But I know that lettuce loves the darker bed near the woods and arugula, one of our favorites, thrives.  Cucumbers and green beans grow well in the other bed and kale, collards and chard grow like crazy.  I have grown nasturtiums for garnishing salads (I learned that from my grandma when she would pick them wild in Arkansas and use them to dress up the peaches she had "put up" the season before) and last year discovered the wooden box in the corner is a grand place for eggplants.  My tomatoes have to be grown on the deck, in the bright sunlight but I had the blight my first year and haven't really had much luck with them since.  In my flower garden, I grow awesome basil.  I call them my basil bushes.  I just have a touch.  I also tried carrots last year and got some yummy, sweet little gems.  I'm going to do them again this year as well as try some watermelon.

Each year we do a little improvement and this year we are going to lay some landscaping cloth on the paths around the beds and put down recycled rubber mulch to cut down on unwanted weeds and grass and to make the garden nicer to look at from the deck.  After that, the gate needs repair (or probably more like rebuilding), and then by Mother's day I'll be ready to plant my little seedlings.  Then the real fun begins. 

As my garden grows, so too do I.






Friday, April 13, 2012

Where To Find The Hudson Valley Etsy Team This Weekend!


Spring is in the air, and the craft fair season is picking up speed like a kite in the wind.  On Saturday, April 14, head down to the BUST Magazine Spring Craftacular and Food Fair at 82 Mercer St. (between Broome and Spring) in New York, NY. You'll find Marilyn of Pulp Sushi, Judy of JSW Metalworks, and Madeline of The Mad Fawn  at this great one-day shopping event -- a juried craft fair in the heart of SoHo celebrating its 8th year! There are free goodie bags for early-bird shoppers, and admission is just $3. Hours are 11 am to 7 pm.
JSW Metalworks

The Mad Fawn
   
Pulp Sushi