I am a Jewelry Designer. Apparently.

I am pleased to announce that my jewelry sales this fall/winter were a huge success!  In fact, I made twice as much money as I did last year!  Of course, I am a lot more skilled now than I was last year, so I put more time and money into preparing for the sale, and I also had higher quality pieces, and more of them, so it makes sense.  But it is still so EXCITING!  Plus, I have tons left, so as soon as I can find the time to take pictures of all of the pieces then I can get my Etsy shop up and running in a big way!  I am pretty pumped!

Ann, my jewelry making partner (see pic above), and I worked our average-sized butts off preparing for our sales, and we had four of them.  Our main sale was held in the charming and beautiful old lobby of my apartment building, our second sale was held in the beautiful home of our friends, Jane and Matt Thomas, and the other two were held in Ann's office building.  (She works part time for Big Brothers Big Sisters.)  It was a LOT of work, and completely and utterly exhausting, but---in my opinion---it was totally worth it.  I didn't get to do anything super exciting with the money like I did last year when I bought my dream DSLR camera, but I broke even and paid off the excess that we had spent on Logan's residency applications and things, so I'm really glad that I put in the work.  (I did allow myself to keep one of my favorite necklaces as a reward as well!  See pic to the right and below . . . it's the same necklace.)  Plus, it was hard, but it was also FUN!  I love, love, LOVE seeing my friends and family out and about wearing my pieces!  In fact, very few things thrill me more!  I feel such deep satisfaction when someone falls in love with a piece of jewelry that I have designed and put together.

I was especially excited that my Auntie Muriel fell in love with the blue necklace pictured to the left.  (The bottom one.)  You see, she is a professional artist---watercolor paintings---who also happens to have great style and impeccable taste.  I trust her taste completely and greatly admire her as a talented artist and as a person.  She's pretty amazing, not to mention the life of ANY party!  She tries to claim that my mom was the "crazy aunt". . . . uhhhhh . . . . yeah, right.  Let's take a survey of the other nieces and nephews and see what they have to say about that!  :)  ANYWAY, she fell in love with the necklace and bought it as a sparkly Christmas treat for herself.  She then wore it out and got compliments on it from strangers.  (So exciting!)  So she decided that I am a real jewelry designer now!  In fact, she even said to me, "Us artist have to stick together!"  US ARTISTS?!  That may be the most flattering thing that anyone has ever said to me in my life!!!  (Seriously, you have no idea how talented this woman is!  She's been featured in magazines and has had custom orders from the resorts in Aspen!)  So she went out and worked her contacts for me and arranged for Ann and I to participate at an event at the health club of which she is on the Board---which is in the basement of the hotel where George Clooney stayed while he was filming Up in the Air, by the way---and a trunk show at the cutest boutique in the Central West End, our trendy St. Louis neighborhood!  Am I the luckiest niece alive, or WHAT?!?!  I am just so amazed at everything that she has made happen for me since my first sale in December that I feel like I am living someone else's life!  I started making jewelry so that I could have cheap stuff and so that I could give fun, cheap gifts.  Now I am a jewelry designer who is having a TRUNK SHOW (special one day sale) at a hot boutique!  WOW!!!  It is so amazingly exciting, and also completely overwhelming.  The big event at the boutique, Ivy Hill, is on February 5th.  Wish us luck!!!

Here are some pictures of the big sale in November.  Enjoy!  If you see anything you like let me know . . . things will be up on Etsy soon (I HOPE!!) and I always welcome long-distance orders!  :)