Honey Bee Treasury

Here's another one of those lovely treasuries of photos from Etsy with honey colored items: The Quiet Bee.

The creator has kindly included my citrine stone earrings. Thanks!

Suggestions for Etsy?

I haven't posted in a while, mainly because it is much too hot to take pics in the garden. Lots of daylilies are in bloom right now, and the annuals are practically bursting out of their containers with color, but the heat index is making it pretty miserable to be outside for more than a short time. We have been to a number of good jazz gigs, but I failed to remember the camera unfortunately. I promise a blog post for next Saturday's final performance of Sandunga, for sure.

So what's been happening on Beaded Jewelry by Susan, my Etsy site?

Well, for one thing, I recently sold and shipped this lovely pair of poppy jasper triangle earrings to a woman far away from Illinois in Blackwood South Australia. I've now had forty-four sales since the site opened at the end of April in 2009. So it's kind of difficult to assess what direction to take. Maybe you readers can offer some suggestions for future planning.

I used to do a number of shows, mainly outdoors, every summer for many years, which gave me an outlet for my earrings and necklaces and an excuse to add to the bead collection and to design and make more jewelry. But it got to be too difficult physically to continue and I sold my tent and other equipment year before last. Last year we tried doing a couple of indoor shows, but even that wasn't easy and we decided to quit doing shows altogether. I miss it, of course, because it was fun as well as being hard work and it was a good way to use up some of my inventory!

I've been maintaining 300 items on the Etsy site. I'm trying to balance the Etsy costs for listing with the sales that trickle in, and that limits the number of items I can keep showing. I probably have about three times that many pairs of earrings in my inventory that aren't yet on Etsy. No way I could even estimate how many beads I have that I'm still yearning to turn into earrings (and necklaces, of course, but they sell even more slowly, so I've temporarily stopped making them).

I am investigating having someone act as a sales representative for me, maybe selling at home parties, farmers market, or shows, but it's slow getting started and she isn't sure yet whether she wants to do it or not. Meanwhile, I lower the inventory a little bit by giving earrings to friends and as "tips" to folks who help us out at the grocery, gas pump, and restaurants. I do enjoy that and so do they--it's a nice way to say "thank you."

But sooner or later I need to make some decisions about the Etsy site. One possibility is to expand it and add more from my inventory or brand-new earrings yet to be designed. What do you think?

I also have a new camera and could take some new photos, but I haven't figured out how to make them small enough (it's a camera with lots of megapixels) to upload properly. Anybody know how to do that? Also, I've got some white foam board for making a little enclosure for better lighting, but haven't got that quite figured out either.

I'm happy that I have had a few more sales this summer and that they seem to be coming in from people and places far and wide, but I need more sales to justify expanding the listings very much. I know that jewelry, maybe especially beaded jewelry, is all over the Internet and so there is a lot of competition for getting people to your website.

Also, lots of stores have started importing inexpensive jewelry, usually made of plastic or poor quality materials that won't last, and selling it more cheaply than I can afford to with the stones, glass, crystal, and so on that I use. It's such a "throw away" society that people don't pay as much attention to quality and the idea of keeping things a long time as they used to, I guess.

In addition, the hobby of making beaded jewelry has exploded over the twenty-plus years during which I've been collecting interesting and unusual beads and designing with them. Everyone can learn to make jewelry, but it isn't always as easy as they think it will be to find the time to actually do it, to come up with a successful design, or to make something that doesn't fall apart the first time it's worn.

I suppose it's also a factor that people want to see jewelry in person, hold earrings up to their ears, etc. rather than shopping online. On the other hand, they do have the leisure online to read a detailed description of materials, view various photos (five for each Etsy item and the option to use the "zoom" for close-up views) of each item, and check through their closets at the same time for clothes that need matching jewelry.

I do mention my site on Facebook and I use Twitter whenever I get a sale. Does anyone have other ideas for promoting my Etsy site or thoughts about what direction I should take? Please comment if you have ideas for me. Thanks.

June Flowers

It's been a weird summer so far in Illinois, with lots of heavy rain, some very hot days, some very cool spells, and then more rain. So I take garden pics when I can ... in between rain drops. I even have to keep the plastic chairs tipped so the seats don't fill with rain!

But of course roses love rain. That's why they love England, I guess. The pic above is a cute little shrub rose with diminutive blooms of light pink called The Fairy. Many of our other roses have died back to below the graft, and so the common red rootstock is all that's left. But they are pretty in their own way too.

Roses are not easy to grow in Illinois in my opinion, especially the delicate tea roses that don't like water on their leaves (but plenty in the soil), winters that are too cold, summers that are too hot, bugs that eat them, etc.

 I have had better luck with shrub roses and mini-roses, like the one shown above, in the raised beds than I have with tea roses. I tried the exotic and beautifully full hybrids between modern tea roses and old roses that David Austin creates, but they don't like Illinois much either. This year we just planted a Knockout double red shrub rose. I see it all over town this year, so maybe it's going to work for us!

Hydrangeas are coming into their own about now all over town too. The so-called mopheads in brilliant colors don't really like Illinois winters, except for a few hybrids (like "Endless Summer") that bloom on new wood, so don't lose the next year's blooms during an extra cold winter. But the oakleaf hydrangeas do great here (and so do the later blooming paniculatas).

Here's a close-up of our oakleaf hydrangea, blooming in the northeast part of the garden in a fair amount of shade. The blooms last into the fall, slowing turning the color of old lace.

Quite a few years ago, I bought a small plant in a pot at a private sale that was labeled "native hydrangea." It has turned into a huge bush, blooming very reliably every year, forming a nice background for the ostrich ferns.

 This past year we added two of the "snowball" type of hydrangeas, and they are blooming now. Here's a pretty white one.

And a pink one with one large lovely bloom so far.

 Related to the climbing hydrangeas is a fantastic vine called Schizophragma. They take a long time to establish and flower (six years or more), but they are so beautiful and are one of the few flowering vines for shade.

Here's a close-up of the interesting flowers with their two very distinct parts.
I have another one climbing up the pin oak, but it's too young for blooms yet. My friend Frank has a pink one. I want a start from it sometime!

I can't talk about shade plants without giving praise to hostas ... one and all. There are so many lovely ones ranging from dwarf hostas in barrells to giant like this sieboldii planted in a circle beneath the northmost Chinese dogwood. Its pure white flowers (most hosta flowers are lavender) are just delightful.

When we moved this hosta to the present garden from our prior garden, it was really big, so we decided to break it up into six pieces and plant in a circle. Now each one is as big as the original was!

Here's the tree the hostas encircle. It's a Chinese dogwood (Cornus kousa). The Cornus florida, in white, pink, or rose, is the more common early spring-blooming dogwood in these parts, but this one has huge flowers and blooms late enough that it is never ruined by spring frosts.

As you can see, the four-petaled flowers are very striking. They last a pretty long time as well.

Let's go from cool white in the shade to hot orange in the sun with these very bright Asiatic lilies. They come from bulbs, large ones that are planted very deep in the soil in the fall. I've had these a while and they are always a welcome bit of color in June.

Speaking of bright color, these Lychnis coronaria, sometimes called Rose Campion, are like neon signs. The foliage is a soft hairy downy light green, almost white in places, but the blooms are pure magenta. It seeds around a bit, but it isn't too hard to pull up (if you can force yourself to do it ... I'm such a soft-hearted gardener that we have "volunteers" everywhere).

 Dianthus can be brightly colored too. Here's one we just got this year; it's blooming already with that cute dark eye. These are in the "pinks" family along with florist's carnations and tiny alpine dianthus with itty bitty flowers.

Here's another beautiful dianthus with remarkable patterning. Dianthus aren't always reliably perennial because they dislike the wet winters we have in Illinois, so I'm not sure which named hybrids are still around or not ... but I think this is one called Laced Romeo.

Now that the evening primrose has finished, there aren't too many bright yellow things in bloom in the garden. This is a tall sedum with starry flowers (a bit out of focus, sorry) that I grew from seed and transplanted from an earlier garden. The seed was from the garden of a French gardener who was here visiting and came to my garden because we both belonged to the French seed exchange society at the time. So it's a special sedum for me.

For a delicate range of colors both bright and subdued, this small shrub is perfect. It's an Anthony Waterer Spirea. The flowers themselves resemble those of the Achillea, but they are not related as far as I know.

The close-up shows even better the range from light rose to a soft fuschia color. It's an easy shrub too, pretty undemanding in good light and reasonable soil.
There are lots of different spireas, including the well-known white bridal veil spireas you see blooming earlier in the spring.

Soft pale colors are wonderful in the garden too, and the "moonbeam" Coreopsis is a lovely lemony yellow. The foliage on these "threadleaf" types is pretty even when they aren't in bloom.

I'm not sure why Clematis don't seem to be so easy for me to grow. I think they are hard to establish. It's said that they like their feet in the shade and their heads in the sun ... and that isn't a common situation in my yard. I have planted them many times in several different gardens. I seem to have the best luck with the purple ones, especially the jackmanii variety of vine.

This pretty little wine-colored one near the gate is proving me wrong, however. It is establishing quite well and although the flowers are small, it's a charmer. I think is a Polish hybrid of a species clematis.

Of course, some plants are a bit too easy. This penstemon with its white flowers and red stems is a cutie, but it does tend to sow around in places in the path as well as in the beds. It's tall and cheerful though. I guess I never met a flower I didn't like?

Even the recently planted annuals in pots and containers are starting to show some growth. Here are terra cotta planters with red wax begonias in them.

And a concrete planter, also in the shade, with bicolored impatiens.

Double impatiens is a favorite annual of mine in shade. Here it is in a hanging basket in front of the kitchen window.

Although this pot isn't very showy yet, it will be later as it fills out. The purple wave torenias with orange impatiens were a striking combination last summer.

This pot in the sunny east side contains an interesting dark petunia I hadn't seen before, along with a red aster, a salmon geranium, a white angelonia, and an orange dahlia. Lots of colors!

Here's a close-up of that petunia. The color here is pretty true ... it's really that dark!

Here's a lively combination of pink and red verbena with a dark foliage plant and a yellow lantana.

The Calibrachoa "superbells" are charming little guys. Here we have one called Blackberry Punch and another magenta one mixed in with white vinca to show them off. I think I've got a dark red ivy geranium in there too that hasn't quite taken off yet.

Angelonia, blue scaveolens, orange osteospermum (from South Africa) and white/plum petunias fill this pot and will, hopefully, look even better in the next set of pics.

The yellow here is an annual called Bidens; it's a new one for me, but supposedly it is drought and heat resistant. There's lantana in a pale yellow and pink combination too and purple angelonia.

The bright red pentas (my mom used to have these in her Florida garden) and red superbells look good with that variegated fuzzy foliage plant (helichrysum of some kind?).

This shot shows the bicolor aspect of the lantana better.

For the small pots near the front door where it's less sunny, I'm hoping this blue lobelia can last through the hot days. I know the red vinca will endure and stay brilliant all summer.

Well, that's all for now folks. Hope you enjoyed it!