On the street in India - wordless Wednesday

This week I'm joining in with Wordless Wednesday over on My Little Drummer Boys blog.

If you would like to leave a comment you will go into the draw to win a pair of planettreasure earrings, drawn Tuesday 9th October.

Why blog? and a giveaway

Why blog?
Wow! I really opened a can of worms in my head when I asked myself that question.

Because I can?
Because it's there?
Because everybody else is?

I lead me on to think about the many billions of blogs out there. Most of the blogs I am familiar with are to do with crafting, art or creating stuff.
But there are all sorts - travel blogs, foodie blogs, political blogs, financial blogs etc etc and many more, I'm sure that I have no idea about.

There are more blogs out there than we will ever need!

So why me? And why you?

I guess I started blogging as an extension of my on-line business.
Over on etsy (where I have 3 shops now!) we're told that you can't just load you items in your shop and expect them to sell - oh, no - you have to promote yourself.

"Have a blog", they said - those gurus of the etsy forums.

Let people see the person behind the goods, let them get to know you - "connect with your customers".

And so we all rushed over to blogger or wordpress or wherever and blogged our hearts out.
But was anybody reading our blogs?
Why would anybody read our blogs?
We networked and read other people's blogs and we commented like crazy!
We joined memes.
We joined blog rings and jumped through hoops!

Why do we continue to blog in this world of 140 character grabs, flickr photos, facebook friends, and tumblr (plus no doubt many more I have no concept of!)?

Here's what I have gathered.

1. Blogging can be the centrepiece of all your on-line marketing and your social media activities.

2. You can explain more about yourself and your creative processes. you can post works in progress and get those appetites whetted.

3. You can share.
You can share tutorials, display ideas, successes and failures.

4. The posts you write are enduring. Facebook and twitter scroll through pretty quickly and if you want to find something again is pretty much impossible.
You can refer back to blog posts or refer others to them.

5. You can use photos to tell your story - a picture tells a thousand words so they say.
" Ok, you say you can have photos on facebook too". But on your blog you can post several pictures, you can have a coherent storyline - or not, depending on what your post is about.

6. You can hold giveaways or competitions.

7. You can link to all your other activites - you on-line shop, your fabebook, your twitter, your flickr etc. They can all be in your sidebar or wherever you want to have them.

Do you blog?
Why do you blog?
What do you blog about?

Oh, and my giveaway!
Please leave a comment of you'd like to be in the draw for a beautiful pair of planettreasures earrings.
The winner will be drawn next Tuesday 9th October.

 thanks for reading : )

Welcome to blogtoberfest!

Hi and welcome to blogtoberfest!
This is when a whole lot of bloggers will endeavour to blog every day in October.

I took part in this last year and it was fun, challenging and inspiring.
At the moment there are nearly 168 participants. If you would lie to join in or just check out some really cool blogs pop on over to our fabulous hosts blog, I Saw You Dancing.

The gorgeous Curly Pops is hosting the giveaway page for blogtoberfest. Not too many participants at the moment but I'm sure thing will pick up as the month goes on. Have a look - here!


Back here you will find a few stories about me and my life and craft(s).

 On Wednesdays I'll continue the photo essays on my trip to India in July.

Thursdays are traditionally My Creative Space days.

Other things I have planned include some how to's, tutorials and spotlight on some of my artist and designer friends.

I'll include places I've been, and anything that generally rock my socks!

If you are a blogger why don't you challenge yourself and join us in blogtoberfest? Go on!
I'll see you there.

Out and about

My week started on Sunday -

Miss planet and I went to see Tim Hart (one half of Boy and Bear) at the Clarendon at Katoomba.

Seen here with Stu Larsen and Neda - a sweet way to spend the afternoon.

And talking of sweet - it had been Miss planet's birthday so I made her a cake - of course!

 Monday was perfect for a bushwalk.

 Thursday I made the long trek to Cronulla to watch the International Gymnastics festival in which Miss planet was taking part.

 

This isn't her - these are a Japanese University team.

She is in this one.

 We found a really cool place for dinner - all the chairs were upholstered in different and funky fabrics.

 

 ....and I made some stuff!

Piles and piles of earrings - my creative space

There's nothing like an impending festival or market to get the creative space humming!
And I have been in full production, making batches of things.
I know it's not really very creative, but these will help to pay for the stall space (not cheap!)

I made a whole bunch of pendants.
Here are the Alice in Wonderland ones -

I also have some Paris themed pendants, steampunk inspired and some cute ones with birds and flowers.

But earrings are my bread and butter, and what I really, really enjoy making.
Unfortunatley my right hand decided to seize up, making holding pliers too difficult (very inconvenient!) so I had to let these sit for a while.

Instead I reckoned I could do some glueing! (I can hear you all rolling your eyes!)
When I was in Sydney a couple of weeks ago I visited The Button Shop in The Rocks - in fact it was conveniently just behind our hotel, when we stayed here.
Picked up some sweet little buttons to make some stud earrings with.

Here they are all ready to go - 

Then suddenly I am all out of stock of glass drop earrings.
My hand isn't too bad today so I reckon I can do a bit of wire wrapping.

 

I'm posting this on my creative space over on Village Voices - pop on over and have a look at what others have been up to this week.

In which we visit some monasteries - wordless Wednesday

Around Leh, Ladakh, India.

What have I said "yes" to? - Dragon boat racing

Have you ever said "yes" to something and then wondered why the heck did I do that?

Well that was me this week.

I have got roped into a dragon boat race and although it's for a very good cause*, afterwards I thought "can I do this?" "what about my sore hand?" "will I make something else sore?" "will I make a fool of myself?"

Well, of course if you thought like that all the time, you'd never go anywhere, or do anything!

This morning was a free come-and-try-it at my local regatta centre (that is one thing I am very grateful to the Sydney Olympics for!) where a good deal of dragon boating goes on.

When I got there there were a lot of people in bright club tshirts and their own special paddles and of course they all new each other.
Then there were us newbies in civvies standing around awkwardly like 7th graders on the first day of high school.
Anyway once things got going they moved at a cracking pace, we were given a safety talk, signed some forms, got in a boat and away we went!

Well it was more fun than I can explain!
Then we had a race with 4 other boats and we won! And we reached a top speed of 12.7 knots!
Are you impressed?

It's on again tomorrow and I'd love to go  but it's dear daughter's birthday lunch, and anyway I'm not 100% sure that I won't be a wee bit sore tomorrow.

But I'm hanging out for my next practise.

*The good cause is Dragons Abreast Australia which is an education and support group for breast cancer patients and survivors.
The teams in this dragon boat festival pledge to raise at least $2000 per boat for this amazing cause.
If you'd like to sponsor my team in the dragon boat festival on 28th pop over to my team page.
You can donate anonymously if you like.

Or maybe you'd like to join in  this event is in Sydney, but there are teams from other parts of Australia taking part.