Etsy's New Coupon Codes!

From Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday I'll be offering 10% everything in both of my shops when you use the coupon code:
BLACKFRIDAY10
I decided that I may as well, that selling things for less is better than not selling anything at all. Happy shopping everyone, please stop by one or both of my shops, you can get a preview of all my fun gifts in my Etsy Minis to the right.

Soap Sales

Hooray! I sold two bars of soap today- my honey oatmeal and my eucalyptus exfoliating bar:
I'm planning on renewing everything on Black Friday and I even added a few new items to my first shop, hopefully I'll move some merchandise before the end of the year.

Blog Carnival: How Am I Preparing for the Holiday Season?

I know I've been around very little for the past month or two, but I've been overwhelmed with school, extracurriculars and writing. Anyway, here's my entry for this month's blog carnival:

The Holiday (hopefully) Rush will soon be here, I've noticed my focus shifting more to my soap shop which I have been stocking with new varieties and gift sets. I just got a new camera a few weeks back, so I put up some jewelry I hadn't been able to photograph before in my first shop.
Before the holidays I want to put a few more items in both shops and on Black Friday I'm probably just going to go through and renew everything.
I've been playing with some new recipes for lip balm, bath salts and bath bombs which I probably won't have ready by the holidays, but would like to introduce them in the new year at any rate.
I'm probably going to put Blackbird Crafts on vacation mode for a while after the holidays so that I can re-evaluate what is going on with that shop and focus on Morning Valley Soaps for a while- in a business sense I think that shop is going to be more lucrative, almost everything in my other shop is one of a kind and sort of specialty. MVS is a little broader and I can make multiples of all my items. That just seems like a better business strategy on Etsy.
Etsy Bloggers are holding a big Holiday Sale and I'd really like to participate, but most of my stuff is already priced down to where I make minimal profits, I'm afraid if I put everything on sale that I'll lose my profit margin entirely. Everything I make basically goes straight back into buying supplies, but that's okay for now. I just enjoy what I do and want to be able to afford doing it- I'd like my hobby to pay for itself, that has always been my goal. If I can go beyond there that would be awesome.

My First Alchemy Creation

I occasionally apply to alchemy requests without much hope, but someone accepted my bid and I have just completed the order-I'll be sending it tomorrow.

The order was for a set of mini versions of several of my soap scents. It turned out well and I think the way I packaged it is adorable, very homey, very much in tune with the sort of image I'm trying to present of my business. In fact, I'm so fond of it I'm posting a picture below:

It's a simple cardboard backing (recycled from some boxes) wrapped in unbleached muslin with a hand-written card listing the scents in the package and all tied up with a silky brown ribbon. I think that might be the standard for all my multi-soap sets.