Hagen Renaker Pekingese Mother & Puppy for Lucky's Memory Shelf: The Destiny of Things, Story 517

Hagen Renaker Pekingese Mother & Puppy for Lucky's Memory Shelf:  The Destiny of Things, Story 517

Lucky's very own memory shelf and story!  BEFORE:

These two cuties have sold, but the rest of my Hagen Renaker and other animal figurine collection is available here.  Photo via VintageToGoEasy

Here is one of the notes I received with a really nice montage photo in Lucky's memory:

I absolutely love the little Pekingese!
Really fast personal service.
Perfect addition to my memory shelf.
I miss my little Lucky. 
Through thick and thin he was my best friend for 14 years.
Thank you for helping keep his memory alive.
Roxanne

AFTER:

Sorry, it's a little blurry on extra large, but I wanted to make sure every little detail was seen on such a beautiful memory shelf!  Photo via Roxanne, visit her wonderful vintage shop, TreasuresOfPandora, here.

Check out her lucky mascot that leads the way to TreasuresOfPandora!

Here's what I wrote back:

Hi Roxanne!

I am so happy you love the Pekingese and that they arrived safely to you! They look great on your memory shelf! And thank you for your heartfelt story. I miss my dog too.

Can I use your story on my Hoarder Rehab and The Destiny of Things blog? I can either leave you anonymous or link it to your shop.

If not, I totally understand. Thank you for your consideration.

Kind regards,
Kennedy

Obviously, she let me share her story and my apologies for taking so long to write about it, but the California heat over here is crazy and I haven't slept in months!  I can't imagine what the heat and ash is like up north with all the fires and firenadoes!  My prayers go out to to them everyday!

These two cuties have sold, but the rest of my Hagen Renaker and other animal figurine collection is available here.  Photo via VintageToGoEasy

Saying Goodbye:  I can almost let anything go now, even with my lack of sleep.  I think letting go of over 5000 items of hoard has upped my tolerance level through practice because in the beginning, letting go of some things was truly painful, like losing a limb!  It sounds crazy now, but it wasn't back then.

Oh wow, this is my only Hagen Renaker listed which means a lot of them have sold.  We'll take photos of what Hagen Renaker I have left and start listing them next week!  This discontinued hard to find "follow the white rabbit" is available here.  I am it's original owner since childhood.

Photo via VintageToGoEasy

What I Learned:

1.  I forget the name of the kind of therapy I've used to be able to let go of my hoard more easily.  It's like building up a tolerance by doing, as in my case, letting go of hoard, over and over until I was used to it.  Also, EMDR, read about here on wikipedia or a 2 min explanation on You Tube, here.  I need to use EMDR less and less and prefer the taping over the eye movement.  EMDR also works for my fears, anxieties, and other negative feelings, and helps bring old memories into my short term memory so I can better deal with them and bring me insight.

For example, someone important to me often forgets my birthday and every year I get anxiety about it and used to go on a retail therapy spree before and if forgotten another one afterwards, but this year, I used EMDR and only had to use it twice because the first time I used it I became much more peaceful and the second I used it the insight I got from EMDR was if that person didn't remember, "it was not my fault."  The EMDR process for me takes less then 2 minutes and I can do it anywhere.

2.  I am doing my best to adjust to living in this heat without air conditioning and lack of sleep.  I've had insomnia since childhood and have tried almost everything!  This time I've started to take Inositol, DHEA and spray melatonin and it seems to be helping me sleep once the house starts to cool down.  Also, my nails are growing faster and my hair appears to be thicker.

What's your favorite way to stay cool that doesn't include air conditioning?  While I do Etsy, I have a bubbling water fountain out by my bedroom window that sounds wonderful.  I take a lot of cool showers and keep an ice pack under my computer when I'm using it on my lap.  Our next house is definitely going to have a/c and either near or on the beach, so I can survive the summers.

Anyone interested in adopting these two lost dogs, available here

Photo via VintageToGoEasy

Thank you Roxanne from TreasuresOfPandora for sharing your story and sending an updated photo!  I love your memory shelf and reminds me of my dog too.  I have a little shrine for Spidey, some where in my hoard and even saved his last walking leash.

Love Roxanne's shop!  Watch out it's a fun Pandora's hoard trap with all it's cool treasures!  Check out her shop of vintage items, she has many animal figurines for your collection!  She even has some Hagen Renaker still glued on their original paper cards!  See HR elephant here and HR rhino or is that a hippo, here!

I browsed through her entire shop and my favorites were Critter Corner, here and Curiously Cute Cats, here.  Okay, and if I weren't on a hoarder rehab diet and could buy one thing from here shop, it would be these really cute kokeshi bobble head pens, here!  Thanks again Roxanne for everything!

My purge pile has gone no where!  I can't even remember what I've done since the World Cup!  Yikes!  I did buy several, okay many frames and shadow boxes at Ikea, another fun hoard trap! for my art that's now at our local coffee shop.  Other than that, who knows what I've been up to!  I've been doing a lot of reading and have started too many books to mention!

Everyday is such an adventure dehoarding on Etsy!   I never know who I'll meet and I have met so many Etsy buyers who share their stories with me and every time I glean some insight about where my dehoarding journey is taking me.

Thank you Etsy for the best Hoarder Rehab ever!  And for all the kind people I'm meeting who are helping me indirectly and directly in so many ways with my Hoarder Rehab! 

Bisque bone china Boxer dog set, or if you just need one for your memory shelf, let me know and I'll split them up!  Available here.  Photo via Hoarder Rehab

I've reached my goal of listing 170 items in each shop. My new goal is to list 180 items per shop or 50 new items per month.   

Sales are up and down, but still enough to say we are steady, as in about 100 sales per month from all four shops!  I think it might be from adding at least three new listings almost every week to each shop.  Even though I'm still trying to narrow down my crafting options because I have way too much craft supplies, I keep flip flopping about it and still need to decide what to list and what to keep.  

Lately, I've been flip flopping even worse because some of my art has been selling at the shops, so now I need to decide if I have the time to do more art or list more hoard!

It's been a month since Etsy raised their fees across the board, except for the listing fee and we have felt the Etsy increase by seeing our Etsy bank account profits decrease.  So I have to decide to either list more at slightly higher prices or sell more at lower prices and just be thankful of letting go of my hoard. Until I decide what to do, I've been taking renewed sale items off sale and listing them a dollar or two higher. 

Here are the new fees, as I understand it, correct me if I've made a mistake about it.them

Transaction fee was 3.5%, but it's going up to 5% on July 16, 2018.

New shipping fee, all shipping fees get charged 5% on July 16, 2018.

Processing fee is staying the same, I think, which is 3% plus .25 cents per transaction

Listing fee is still the same of .20 cents for 4 months, or .05 cents per month.

We will be joining the Etsy Labor Day Sale, this weekend and it will end around September 9, 2018.

Also, Etsy has added some new features and I wanted to talk about "notifications," but have run out of time, so hopefully I'll remember to write about it this coming Wednesday.

Click on the shop names to visit new hoard listed daily and/or weekly: HoarderRehab with 172 items, The Destiny of Things- 170 items, VintageToGoEasy - 172 items and JunkDrawerAndMore - 171 items. 

Maybe you'll find something and give it new life and a new home!  Thanks for looking!

An unlikely pair and both need some TLC!  One more than the other, available here.

Photo via Hoarder Rehab

“When you stop living for luxuries, you understand the real meaning of life.” ― Abdul Sattar Edhi

Anyone out there, know where to find Abdul Sattar Edhi's autobiography, A Mirror to the Blind?  That's less than $100?  Thank you!

and Thank you for visiting my Hoarder Rehab and The Destiny of Things!