That said, here's the story:
I realize I haven't posted much at all here for awhile, and that's for a variety of reasons, including but not limited to:
- Seriously stressful home life stuff
- Jumping around between shitty temp jobs
- A repetitive-strain injury to my right hand that makes typing for long periods of time difficult and painful
- Battling moar depression stuff (bleh)
But most relevant to this post, I've also been working on trying to get my jewelry business off the ground.
I make chainmaille jewelry (link goes to the maille tag on my tumblr blog where I post photos of completed pieces as well as works in progress [and, ahem, rants and crankiness about the making process when shit gets fucked up]) to sell on Etsy, to family/friends/coworkers, and by word of mouth. And the instability of temp work I've been dealing with lately (along with the raves and encouragement from people who've seen my work helping me to gain confidence in my skills) has made me think - what if I could fill in the gaps in income with this work? Maybe even be able to jump off the treadmill of the 9-to-5? So I've been working on trying to make the shift from hobby to business. I don't expect to make millions, but I'd like to be able to be at least partially self-sufficient from this. The thing is, being a business requires looking like a business and acting like a business, and that requires some stuff I don't have and can't afford what with being between jobs and struggling to get by - more/a greater variety of raw materials, better tools, business cards, displays and packaging, table fees for local craft fairs, a small light tent for professional-looking product photography, etc.
Which is why I've created an Indiegogo fundraiser campaign to help me out with this. The perks I'm offering include discount codes for my Etsy shop and pieces of custom jewelry. Every donation is appreciated, no matter how small, and if you can't donate, signal-boosting is equally appreciated! Toss the link up on FB, reblog my donations post on tumblr, retweet the new-post tweet for this post, any and all getting-the-word-out is awesome.
Or just buy something from my shop. That would work too. ;-)
Thanks!
