Meet DaWanda
I am not an early adopter of things - DaWanda isn’t new - but this could be considered in the early part of the game. DaWanda is a European based handmade crafts venue. It is more strictly regulated than Etsy (people mass producing and mass reselling are investigated and removed when flagged). It has 3 parts; an English site, a German one and a French one and the listings in each do not necessarily appear in all 3. You are asked to have the ability to help customers in each language you post in before posting in it.
All in all I think it’s fascinating. And, so far, listings are free and the commission is a very reasonable %5. I made a shop a bit ago and this Sunday I uploaded a few sets:
OK. So more than a few. All of these canes - or most of them at least - are available in my shop here or I can put them on Etsy for you, instead. If you’d like to be my first buyer on DaWanda I will tuck in an extra cane of your choice from my shop - just message me and let me know!
I am experimenting with how canes shipped with Canada’s Light Packet would do and if they’re fine, then that would allow single boxes of canes to ship to the US for 2.50 which is similar to what we charge on Etsy, for shipping IN the US.
Year of Clay - Fall Leaves Necklace
I’m trying to work through the piles of beads that I have that are perfectly good but for some reason haven’t been used, sold or tossed!
This necklace has a stack of them. I’ve used little antiqued copper filigree rounds between graduated beads for a simple strung necklace. The total length isn’t that long - perhaps 17″.
I hear that other bead people are like me - buying or making beads because they appeal and then hoarding them instead of using them. It’s a bad habit because you then eventually do what I did and knock over a tub of them!
On the plus side, I got to find old ‘friends’ and other goodies I’d forgotten I had.
Year of Clay - Yes I Cane on Vacation
We just got back from a few weeks out of town where I brought my limited tool kit - a tub of clays, a pasta machine and a knife basically - and I did manage to whip up a few canes.
One yellow, sunflower like flower seems to have escaped the group photo. Hopefully it is not sitting, unreduced, gathering dust on my friends countertop…
Year of Clay - Little People on my Cake
I make beads. And I make canes. I make a lot of both and I have for about 10 years so I’m not bad. I can count on the fingers of one hand how many sculpted items I’ve made from polymer clay. For some reason I still insanely promised two new friends that I would attempt cake toppers for their wedding cake!
The wedding was this past weekend, out of town, so I have some raw, unedited pictures of my toppers on the cake:
You can see the bride and groom cutting the cake here and notice I didn’t get a lot of the details correct he he. But I was impressed with actually making the little people that I can sort of forgive myself and the bride and groom, themselves, are enthusiastic supporters of handmade items. The brides jewelry, the decorations, cake, flowers, the flower girls and ring bearers - all wore handmade items or clothes. The overall wedding was cheerful and sweet, full of family and friends.
Technically speaking, the cake toppers are made based off Maureen Carlson’s children’s book for sculpting Your World In Clay. They have little magnets in their feet to stick them to the magnets in the clay base (or to the fridge, I guess). The toppers are about 4 1/2″ at the height of it which makes each little rose about 1/8″.
Year of Clay - Bowls of Sunshine
Red and yellow and sunny, warm colours are not my usual scheme but this bowl just called for a little bit of sunshine so I indulged.
The bowl got more sanding and finishing than I usually do to the glass bowls and the result was a much more translucent look vs the usual slightly frosted one I go for.
Next ‘Year of Clay’ is a project I’ve been playing with a while that is REALLY out of my norm.
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