Monkey & Donkey Cocktail Drink Hanger Toppers Sweet Wedding Accessory from Dad: The Destiny of Things, Story 602
Make Love, Not War! With all the stressful things going on in the world, a touch of happy news has come!
6+ Monkey and donkey champagne cocktail wine charm toppers, available here. Photo via JunkDrawerAndMore.Here is the heartfelt happy news I received this morning:
Hi Kennedy,
Just wanted to leave a thank you for my order of 6+ miniature Monkeys and Donkeys.
My daughter is getting married on 7th July 2022 and their nick names for
each other are Monkey and Donkey, so these will be a bit of fun on
their cocktail glasses.
Many thanks
 | ||
That's just the cutest overload story to me! I'm so happy I read my email and started my morning well with this bit of happy news! I don't know why, but I find little tidbits like this so touching, uplifting and inspiring!
Here is what I wrote back:
So relieved they got to you safe and sound! and that they will have a special place with your family! Thank you for sharing your story and making my day! I love it! Best to you and Congratulations and Best wishes to your daughter and her fiance! Kennedy
I hope they bring old memories, while making new ones to everyone who loves them!
Here is a little back information on this story:
A couple of days of ago, this Etsy buyer writes and wants to know when his cocktail monkeys and donkey are arriving. I'm not the postal tech in the family, but I do my best and find that it's in transit and has passed customs in the UK, but I can't find the tracking number, so I have to wait for the postal tech to return from his day job to ask him.
So the Mr. returns from work and he spends a bunch of time looking for the postal tracking number, which isn't on the USPS site, luckily he saves all the shipping label data, but still has to scroll through by date to find it. Anyways, the Mr writes the buyer back and gives him a status update with the tracking number and that's that.
Then I start to wonder, how special these must be to someone in the UK because shipping is expensive and on top of that, now one has to pay VAT upfront. As soon as that thought enters my mind, it's gone! And usually it rolls around in my head for a good while.
Then this morning, wa-la! My questions is answered in an email! Which was perfect timing! I don't watch or read the news much because it usually adds stress, rather than bringing joy, but from what people tell me, the world is still upside down with a war going on and it's destroying people's lives and home life! I haven't been sleeping either for about 1.5 months now, first I had a cold, then insomnia, and then the Mr started on a snoring rampage! So the negativity seems to be piling on top of piles, especially while lacking decent sleep!
My own little world hasn't been perfect either because I've made Etsy a big part of my world, which was going quite fine for the past 10 years until this past Jan! when Etsy locked me out of all of my shops! Yes, I was locked out of all FIVE shops! And the way Etsy is set up, the only way you can get help is if you can log in, but I couldn't log in, so .... it was a very terrible horrible not good experience and I've been quite bitter about it and although I've forgiven Etsy, it still leaves a yucky taste in my mouth, which is why I haven't been blogging either because I just didn't want to remember any of it! So I can forgive, but not forget and I don't even have a good memory anymore!
Saying Goodbye: I have my own stash and collections of these in a shoe box somewhere and mine are vintage and/or have every different color. These remind me of my childhood when my parents would bring them home from date night. My brother and I would play with them long beyond pieces of them breaking off in animal duels! My plans were to use them in my mixed media art, but I haven't used them as much as I thought I would, so I am letting them go. Now they are very popular, so we keep selling them.
What I've Learned:
1. These have become one of our best sellers, but they are becoming harder and harder to source at decent prices, so I'm not sure how much longer we'll be able to sell these at a reasonable price. Also Etsy is raising their fees in April, so I've been raising prices on almost everything, but I haven't gotten to these and a few other popular items at the shops yet.
2. Since Etsy has/had become such a BIG part of my world as a way to let go of tons of my hoard and now my hoard is..... I would like to say dwindled to nothing, but it hasn't yet! I am still hopeful my hoard will become manageable, but unfortunately my latest hoard target has been antique and vintage Japanese textiles. They are just so beautiful to me. Anyways, working on that now, as in working on how or what I'm going to do with it all and why I end up buying so much of things of beauty or cuteness or as stress release! So much so I've had to stop buying, hopefully I don't start buying again, since I've been getting sleep and am finding other ways to make Etsy and stressful events not my entire world!
3. For the past several years, I've been doing my best to improve the soil in my front and back yard, so much so, we can finally grow food and beautiful flowers. One problem: The landlord thinks many of our veggie plants are weeds, or so he says and he rips them out! I'm not sure how you can mistake a cucumber or bean plant that has cucumbers and beans on them as weeds, but that's what got ripped out last year with most of the other things we planted. He's been doing that for the past three years, so good thing I have a hoard of seeds!
One time he commented to the Mr about the tropical trees we had growing and the Mr told him that those tropical trees were actually corn! I've tried talking to him, but he just gets louder and louder until I've completely backed away from him. And the last time, I went out to protect the plants from destruction, I ended up yelling like him. I went back to apologize, but he just kept yelling. I just stay away from him now and leave him lots of notes with the rent.
Improving the soil here and now gardening is now part of my new world. I'm still mending too, but mostly the Mr and my own clothes and other things, like towels, sheets, whatever gets a hole or rip in it! I stopped making patches for the shop when I got locked out of all the Etsy shops and am slowly getting back to it, but have lost heart in etsy, hopefully time heals all wounds.
What new things have you adopted into your new world? Less Etsy and more saving the soil and gardening for me! I wonder what will enter my world next!
Thank you Etsy buyer for sending
your sweet story behind the the purchase! Wish I could be a fly on the wall and see your daughter and groom having a toast with the monkeys and donkeys on them! Your story came at a time when I needed to hear some happy news and thanks for answering the question in my head!
I'm trying not focusing on Etsy so much these days! Due to being disappointed with Etsy's star seller thing and then in Dec. bitter about the Etsy financial fiasco and there lack of support of them not depositing our hard earned cash and triple digit over charges on shipping fees. BUT the straw that broke the camel's back was getting locked out of our shops for 10+ days mid Jan, which happened on a holiday, so we couldn't even call them!
The biggest Etsy fiasco yet! I'm not even sure what worked to get new passwords, but we tried everything, but sending a snail mail! even staying on hold for 5 plus hours to talk to and out of country scripted real human Etsy support! And then, they only wanted to deal with one shop and did not have the authorization to send a new password email, so with four other shops to do, let's say, it gives me heart palpitations just thinking about it! I did write the ordeal down somewhere, even the support conversations!
As for Etsy support, they didn't return our calls, even though we signed up for one everyday. We did talk to a "real" out of country person reading a script, after being on hold for several hours, with five plus hours being the record. Eventually after waiting for days, we did get five emails, not all at once, but maybe one every few days, from a person who put their name on a form letter with a way to get new passwords, but that was days after playing Email Roulette with ANY Etsy email address I could find on each shop! So I guess I am more forgiving them I thought, maybe that's why I've stopped buying because I can't really see myself doing Etsy for another year! Guess we'll see how forgiving I really am! Still not sure what that will look like, but I'm trusting "Life" to show me better ways and days!
Of course, we got locked out of the shops when all of them finally had their Star Seller thing and that incentive plummeted to it's death very quickly since we could only watch our shops from the outside! We could see the sales piling up and the emails too, but could only answer them and ask the buyers to cancel their orders through the secondary email, since we didn't know when we'd be back in our shops! It was a sad and stressful time to work for a company that you could not call or email for any type of support.
I am still thankful to Etsy for being the best Hoarder Rehab ever for me because without them, who knows what I'd still be buying and buying! My house would be chuck full of stuff, probably to the ceiling with little paths to who knows where. Also, during these uncertain times, I guess I should shift to saving my money for more than any rainy day, which Etsy helps me do. I mean, I thought times were uncertain enough with the pandemic and was waiting to breath easy after that's over, but now the world keeps adding more and more craziness.... is the other shoe going to fall off or be put back on? Only time will tell.
Times this by five and it will give you an idea of my shoe box collection of my vintage cocktail party animals! I have been selling off the pink elephants and the monkeys. The pink elephants are available here and the monkeys here.