Sunday 25 March 2012

BESTeam Feature for March 25


 The Boosting Etsy Shops Team's goal is to offer support
and promotion of one another's Etsy shops primarily through our
personal Blogs, and also through our Twitter Accounts and Facebook Fanpages.
Commitment to this common goal is what makes our team the BEST!

To celebrate nearly three months’ membership of the BESTeam, I’ve finally been let into  behind the scenes secrets of how it operates.  What with our Glorious Leader’s recent computer travails and my total “cack-handedness” (an expression used by our family to describe total ignorance of the right way of doing things on the internet!) my previous attempts at blogging have borne no relation to being the “right way”.  However, this week, Debbi Huntington (see my previous reference) has taken me in hand and I discovered that although my chosen shop features were perfectly acceptable ones, they did  not match her BESTeam schedule!

 Now I know how to access this document, I find that while I have featured some of her suggested targets, there are others that have been unintentionally left out.   So, I am rapidly setting out to rectify this omission   and in my next two posts for the BESTeam, will be including the missing shops.  My apologies to their Principals, and I hope my contributions will be acceptable to them.  By the end of March, I should be in sync with the Team!  Better late than never, methinks!

AbsolutelyKismet is my first inclusion today.  It’s a shop that offers spectacular collection of jewellery designs for necklaces, bracelets and earrings, but has a special item to offer which I’ve previously not come across - WINE CHARMS.  What a lovely way to describe wine-glass labels and the finished articles are as pretty as the name implies.  They are the answer to a hostess’ prayers (or for a guest who just happens to have forgotten where their drink is!) and in particular, if someone caters for large parties, such a practical way of directing guests to their particular seat! 

The set I’ve chosen for this feature is called  The Alphabet Wine Glass Charms, includes all 26 letters of the alphabet, and a multitude of colour combination choices.

Just some of the letters available in multiple colours

You can see more charms, bracelets, necklaces etc at Absolutely Kismet’s shop - www.etsy.com/people/AbsolutelyKismet.  The Facebook  contact address is www.facebook.com/AbsolutelyKismet and there is also a Blog at http://www.absolutelykismet.blogspot.com.

 Why not visit all of them and learn some more, as well as finding about the discounts available for Wine Charm bulk orders ?

Next to be featured is BeaderBubbe, the shop owned and operated by Agnes which is an Aladdin’s Cave of choice jewellery items.  Agnes loves to create in any medium - be it crystal, paper beads, polymer clay, stamping - when she’s not fulfilling her maternal duties towards five children and 7 grandchildren (all boys).  Her ultimate intention is to retire, so enabling her to concentrate on her jewellery creating.

My favourite from her current shop’s collection is her Green Bracelet, using Unakite accent beads.  That’s a semi precious stone with which I have been unacquainted, but they contain a wonderful mix of colours behind the overall green colouration which results in a most attractive combination.

Showing all the pretty colours behind the Green
They also happen to be “my colours”:   so now - off to find the right outfit so that I can indulge myself.

The BeaderBubbe contact details are:

Shop:  www.etsy.com/shop/BeaderBubbe
Blog:  www.beaderbubbe.blogspot.com
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/beaderbubbe

Then there’s Riorita - the shop front for beautiful jewellery created  in Israel by Irith Mashiah,  a gold and silversmith by training and vocation.  Her creations use a combination of semi-precious stones, ancient glass and beach glass, as well as pebbles from the Sea of Galilee (isn’t that an exotic location for the source of one’s designs?)  Her workshop is “not far away from the Mediterranean” and Irith describes her workshop as being a “small paradise” which includes peacocks and geese strutting their stuff amid a lawn with trees and sculpture.  What a picture that conjures up!

One of my favourite colour combinations is green and gold:  indeed, those colours provide important family memories, so I’ve really fallen for the earrings made with Gold Plated Brass and hand cut Emerald Mediterranean Sea Glass.
An unusual shaped earring in beautiful warm colours

Just wish I could actually wear them - but I don’t have pierced ears!

See more of Irith’s work in her shop at www.riorita.etsy.com.  Her Blog can be found at www.rioritajewellry.blogspot.com or you can visit her website  at http://www. irithbzjewellry.net

As part of my BESTeam commitment, throughout the coming months I hope to  be posting short features of each of the fabulous shops and talented crafts persons representing the team.  What is BESTeam?  It's The Boosting Etsy Shops Team and our goal is to give support to each other and to help promote each others' Etsy shops through blogging, Facebook and other social networks.  If you are an Etsy shopowner and are interested in learning more about BESTeam, please visit the team page on Etsy or have a look at the BESTeam blog.