So many creative Etsy buyers who use this date stamp in so differently! BEFORE:
NEW 2019 library date stamp 2019 - 2026 mechanical rubber date stamp teacher classroom scrapbook craft stationery journal birthday invites, available here. Photo via JunkDrawerAndMore
This is one of our most popular items and as a third grade teacher one of my most loved classroom tools, not just for me as a teacher, but my students as well, but now that I'm retired, I'm not the only one who uses it for art and other creative adventures!
AFTER:
So creative and fun! I'd love to make some and receive some!
photo via Etsy buyer from JunkDrawerAndMore
Here is the message I received from another inspiring and talented Ety buyer:
Fast shipping and loved the extra bag of goodies that came in the package! I used the date stamp to make library-themed Christmas cards for my bookworm coworkers.
Saying Goodbye: Now if you are like me and end up not sending Christmas cards for whatever reasons, you can send either "Thank You" or "Thinking of You" cards that includes a New Year's greetings or just "Thinking of You" cards, if it's after New Year's. I'd use the song, Auld Lang Syne by Robert Burns.
I'd use the rest of the lines on the library card to thank them for holiday gifts and send personal messages, like wishes and affirmations for the New Year.
NEW 2019 library date stamp 2019 - 2026 mechanical rubber date stamp teacher classroom scrapbook craft stationery journal birthday invites, available here. Photo via JunkDrawerAndMore
What I Learned:
1. Have I been MIA for that long? Time sure does fly at the end of the year! I've been using all my blog time changing stuff on my Etsy shops, however Etsy buyer stories are piling up again, so it's going to be one of my New Year's Resolutions to blog more often and set up a better balanced schedule and start making a list of the stories as they arrive!
2. I usually get the winter holiday blues so terribly that I call them, "the dreads," but this year it's not as bad and I'm surviving quite well, despite my usual retail therapy being a lot worse than last year. Retail therapy seems a small price to pay for feeling more centered this time of year, which means you'l be seeing new and different items listed in the shops this coming 2019!
3. I've been busy changing all our shop items to free shipping, which is a little tricky, if and when you want to have a sale and anticipating USPS shipping fees rising, but it seems worthwhile since Etsy added all the new fees and "live" accounting that many items needed to be bumped up, so we make a little profit to keep on trucking!
4. Many of our best sellers and other items are labours of love, but being in the hole is no fun for anyone, so let's see what kind of abundance 2019 brings for us all!
5. I have many New Year's Resolutions this coming 2019 and I'll think I'll be writing them down in January, rather than my usual March.
How are your New Year's Resolutions coming along and do you write them down? I write them all down and next to each one write when I think it will be accomplished or become a new habit.
For instance, next year I'd like to send out library themed Christmas cards, which for me I'd have to start after Halloween, so I can take baby steps to get them all done. If I wait last minute, I usually end up buying all the supplies and then giving up, but I can remind myself that the date stamp has 2020 on it, so I could send out New Year cards and ask everyone about their resolutions!
Something like this for Christmas and if I miss Christmas, I can change the title to New Year's Resolution card and add their name as the author and they can use the lines for their New Year's Resolutions or at least start a book list of favorite reads for the New Year!
photo via Bustle
Thank you Etsy buyer for sharing your exciting creative idea! It has so inspired me and turned into many more ideas! I'm already looking forward to next year's Christmas and usually that's impossible for me due to the dreads I usually have at this time of year! Thank you so much!
I've been hoarding again, but like I said, I think it's a small price to pay to have the Christmas spirit, rather than the Christmas humbugs battling in my head! Plus I'm tired of seeing the same old hoard in my shops, so I think we'll be having a clearance sale to celebrate me changing almost all the items to free shipping and then I'll add my new hoard.
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!
Here's a cute example for Christmas gift "thank you" cards.
photo via google
I did at one time have 180 items listed at all 4 shops, but that was between the last blog posting and this one and although 180 items, seems to be the magic number or silver bullet for all our shops to maintain and keep sales up. I feel differently now with the new Etsy fees and "live" accounting, I don't feel as carefree and I feel, as though I should be more discriminating on which hoard I list. We'll see how the free shipping and clearance sale goes.
Christmas sales were really down this year, but according to Etsy's "your year in review" we have made more sales than last year and have earned about the same, if not more at some shops, so hopefully it evens out. I'm thankful for that.
I am still waking up at 3 am because I feel better and get most of my health routines, reading and my fun creative stuff in by 8 am and then do hoard organization, home and financial maintenance and then by 11 am I am ready to do Etsy stuff.
I've let go of the Etsy fee changes that were bothering me by figuring out new prices by changing most listings to free shipping. I've been working hard to change my thinking lately and this is my new thinking towards Etsy sales and life in general, "I am willing to forgo all perceptions of gain, desire or profit and thereby be willing to be of selfless service to life in all it's expressions." Still easier said then done, especially "selfless service" because I do think it's best to break even, rather than in the red, but everyday I'm taking baby steps and practicing it.
Click on the shop names to visit new hoard listed daily and/or weekly: HoarderRehab with 178 items, The Destiny of Things- 172 items, VintageToGoEasy - 177 items and JunkDrawerAndMore - 175 items.
Maybe you'll find something and give it new life and a new home! Thanks for looking!
This chronicle of a courtship is inspiring me to chronicle my own milestones for 2019!
photo via google
It feels so good to be blogging again! I didn't think that would happen. I hope to blog again before Christmas, but if not Happy Holidays to you and yours!
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