Small Successes

I'll admit it, I have moments of extreme self-consciousness and low self-esteem when it comes to putting my creations out there into the world.  I have been known to obsessively check to see how many people have viewed my items on etsy and favorited them.  If no one favorites them, I second guess my work.  If it doesn't sell, I second guess the entire endeavor.  I've been plagued by doubt my entire life and while it's easy to be confident when all I get is positive feedback, it's unbelievable how fast that turns around when criticism comes my way.  But I'm pleased to report a few successes:

First of all, I met the sales goal I set for June 1st!  Granted, it was a low number when compared to what I make at my day job, but it was a huge jump over what I sold in all of 2010.  And I reached it by March 18th.  And I'm feeling really, really good about that :)

Second of all, I made it into the Queen City Craft Bazaar!!!  I've never entered a juried show before and when I heard that it was really competitive this year, I was incredibly nervous - like checking my email constantly for news nervous.  But I made it!  This will be my first show having my own booth and I'm excited, terrified, doubtful, overjoyed, and a million other emotions all rolled into one.  But mostly I'm just thrilled to have a way to connect to the people buying my work, since I'm pretty sure they're awesome.

So that's the update for now.  I'll post tomorrow about a few truly fabulous vintage finds I scored over the weekend, but for now this is the big news.  And I said I'd post about the good, the bad, and the ugly of growing a small artsy business, so here it is!