Holiday Sale Now On!

I feel so behind with the holidays this year. Every year around this time, I say I will start prepping earlier next year, but I still haven't mastered that feat. There's always next year to get my act together, though.

Since I don't think I'll have time to partake in any holiday shows, I'm having a big sale in my shop. (Click on image above to enlarge it) I've got an abundance of summer tees that I'd like to clear out to make room for new stock in 2009. So for every 2 tees or totes or a combination of 1 tee and 1 tote, you get a free tee/tote of your choice. The catch is that the free item has to be of equal or lesser value than the lowest priced item and also that the free item must be in stock.

Several new tees have been added to the shop and I will be listing more later today, as well as some other items.





I will be selling some of my goods at this event next Sunday, but won't actually be there. This lovely lady will be selling things on my behalf. Hope the event is a success. If any of you readers are in the Montreal area, please check it out.

And here's a cute image (I'm a little biased) that I came across the other day, c/o this awesome store's new site. They carry an assortment of my kitty items, which reminds me that I should send them some more stock soon.

I'm Back!

It's been ages since I've blogged. Okay, well only several weeks. I feel a little rusty though. I missed posting about Halloween, the beginning of November, Remembrance Day and American Thanksgiving. Now Christmas is just around the corner. And I haven't had a chance to create any new holiday cards this year as of yet. So the ones from Christmases past will have to do for now. You can find them here.

I'm happy to report that I'm back working from home these days. The job that I started only a month ago was making some changes as far as how we'd be paid, which made it all the easier for me to tell them "Sayonara!" (I'll elaborate more in tomorrow's post.) So I will hopefully get back to creating some new things for the shop very shortly. For sure there will be gift certificates available this year. And I'm considering a holiday sale to clear out an overstock of summer shirts. Check back later this week.

The Times, They Are a-Changin'

It's Sunday, so what better day to reflect on things of the week past. The Clothing Show was pretty good, as my sales improved from the first show I did back in Spring - thank you to all my buyers for your support and purchases!- but they weren't so spectacular that it's convinced me to do another one again. Plus, as my post title suggests, the times, or should I say my times will be changing, so who knows if the show circuit is in my near future?



The most significant change coming up, or the one that has me feeling mixed emotions, is my acceptance of a job outside of the house. While I'm happy to have gotten the position - I've only been applying for jobs since the beginning of this year - it will require me commuting close to 2 hours each way, 6 days a week. Plus, rising hours before the sun comes up. Not a lot of fun, especially since darkness pervades these mornings leading up to winter. I swore that I would never take a job that required more than an hour of commuting one way, but (here I am quoting another song) you can't always get what you want.

It's been several years since I've worked outside of home - thanks to my dear hubby, without whom, I think I'd be in a heck of a bigger mess - and as much as I'd love to continue to do so, the reality of it, is that I'm not making as much as I need to be making to live a comfortable life in downtown Toronto. I'd love to say that I am. I'd love to say that Etsy allowed me to quit my day job. But really, my day job was working from my home. Well, IS, for now. For another week and a half. So my reality is that I have to quit my day job to make more money. How bizarre is that?



My big concern is that the new job won't allow me enough time or energy to devote to my shop and other projects and commitments. I'm also upset that I haven't been able to "make it work" as well I want it to. I know this is just another leg of my journey in life and so I should embrace it and take things one day at a time, but part of me can't help feeling like I've failed a little. I certainly am not going to give up doing what I love, but this post is also to let others know that I may have to close shop temporarily to maintain my sanity.

And speaking of sanity, Matt and I could only handle so much of Nuit Blanche last night before we returned home. We didn't see anything really related to the event aside from lots of people out and about, as we had our own adventure planned for the evening. Some people are okay with crowds, but we are not among them. I love the idea of the event, but maybe if I were 10 years younger, I'd be more into it. Hope whoever was out last night/this morning had a swell time!

Fall Clothing Show Tomorrow!

I'm in the final stages of prep for The Clothing Show, so this will not be a long post. For any of my readers in Toronto, please come by Booth #513 if you can and take advantage of some great deals. Hint: Print the above image from this post out and you can save 20% off my New Fall tees.

I was thrilled to see another of my items on the front page of etsy the other day. What a great looking treasury for Fall too! Well, wish me luck at the Show! I'll let you know how it goes after the weekend.

First Day of Autumn

This morning I was treated to a nice surprise when this made it to the front page. I love it when that happens!

Last week, this sweet gal wrote some very kind things about me and my shop.
Thanks, Kristen. You are a sweetheart!

Today is also the first day of my favourite season so I'm looking forward to the cooler days. No more need for a/c, lots of excuses for hot chocolate and less sweat exuded from my body (hopefully). Of course, I've yet to step outside. The day was devoted to making a ton of buttons for my various retailers and also the upcoming Clothing Show. Most of my stock is together, I just need to make signage for the booth and price it all. I will have some great deals on the Summer tees and older items, plus will unveil some new Fall stuff. If I have time, I'll post some pics of what to expect in the next few days.

The change of seasons also means all the Fall lineup of shows are starting up again. Tonight is Heroes, one of Matt's favourites. Tomorrow is House, I believe. Next week, there's Grey's Anatomy, my fave... So much to watch and so little time! Yes, we are tv junkies, but hey, it beats being addicted to other vices.

Edit: I forgot that the Season Premiere of House was on last week. Duh! And I meant Thursday instead of next week for Grey's Anatomy. Geez, where's my brain?

Can you "handle" this?

I've been on a blog hiatus lately but only because I've been working real hard. A new design is here, finally! And yes, I've hopped on the moustache bandwagon, but only because it looks so cute and funny on this kitty. I'll be listing tees and totes with "moustache kitty" in my shop later this month.

Other new designs are in the works, along similar "dress-up" lines. With Halloween around the corner, I've been inspired by that theme of donning costumes. Stay tuned.

As well, the Clothing Show is just weeks away, so I'm preparing for my second time there. A lot of summer stock will be marked down and I will have some new items too. It may be my only show for the rest of the year, since a lot of the deadlines for Christmas shows seemed to have already passed. Please come check it out. Same spot as the Spring show. Booth 513. September 26-28.

Bubblemint!

I was admiring this beautiful treasury (wink wink) the other day and was thinking how lovely it would be to see on the front page and voila! It happened this morning. Sweet! And I have to thank Stacey and Christine for letting me know that it was on the front page, as well as Margaret for including me in the treasury.

I took the cats in for their annual checkups this morning and both got a clean bill of health. It was a bit tough juggling two cat carriers on my own, but can you imagine looking after 500 cats? Check out this link I discovered today. What an amazing woman! I think for the upcoming Christmas season, I will be donating a portion of my etsy sales to The Cat House.

Running back to Saskatoon

August has been really slow so far in my etsy shop but when it's slow, instead of getting down about it, I have to take advantage of that time for creating new things. I finally made some more girl aceo's which are all listed in the shop now. My favourites are the pink and yellow girls. If I didn't have black hair, I'd want to be a redhead.

In an effort to get some new wholesale clients, I pounded the pavement today along Queen Street West. After the first shop owner was less than impressed about my drop-in, I decided to just get the rest of the owner's/buyer's contact info from each store. Lesson learned. But you never know until you try. Plus, I don't have a ton of money to invest in getting catalogues printed and mailed out right now, so a face to face meeting is the most direct and cost-effective way for feedback right now, even if it means dealing with some up-turned noses and dirty looks.

The highlight of my excursion was when I spotted a woman wearing one of my Bad Kitty shirts. I even held the door open for her, but was too chicken to blurt out that I'd made her shirt. I think that was the first time I've seen someone wearing one of my shirts.



And last week when I stopped by the vet's to pick up more pills for Suki I got another ego boost. The receptionist asked for my name and when I told her, she said "Oh you make those shirts! I have one (bad kitty)."

The feeling I get when I sell one of my creations, especially an original painting or one of my shirts makes what I do worthwhile. While it doesn't make the tough times go away - how I wish it would - it fuels my fire to keep doing what I'm doing. After all, Bad Kitty was the original design that started off my line of kitty products. If people are still interested in her, then I'm doing something right.


Tomorrow, Matt and I are off for a week to Saskatoon. It'll be my first visit in several years - I can't even remember how long it's been, that's how long it's been - and Matt's first time ever. I'm looking forward to my mom's cooking, seeing my sister's place, playing Scrabble with the family, catching up on reading and checking out the annual Folkfest that I used to partake in. I'm sure we'll be following the Olympics too. Hopefully the kitties will be fine here (yes, that's an old photo, but I haven't gotten around to uploading new ones). Our cat sitter has promised to keep us updated with daily emails. While I will have internet access, I probably won't be updating my blog until we're back.

Hope everyone has a great week!

A, B and C

A. I tend to go through creative spurts where one thing will excite me and I keep at it for several days or longer, but somehow I always seem to get sidetracked or start to feel uninspired, so stop. That's what happened last week. I added several new ACEO's - including the one above, my current favourite - to the shop and was planning on doing a lot more but... instead I spent the latter half of the week making buttons and preparing stock for an upcoming show and to restock my consignment shops. Perhaps I was a little influenced by this lady's productivity.

B. In any case, I think I have enough buttons to last for a while now.



C. Hopefully the weather will cooperate this Sunday for the craft show I'll be doing. The way the summer has started out it feels more like Spring with all the rain we've been getting. For those of you in the Kensington Market area, please come by and check out the vendors who will be at the Kid Icarus 1 year Anniversary Craft Sale! It's pedestrian Sunday so the streets will be car-free.


p.s. the title of the post refers to A for ACEO's, B for buttons and C for craft sale.

Sw-eeeetness!

I reached 700 sales today, thanks to a sweet buyer from Toronto who first found me when I sold my stuff at St. Lawrence Market! She was the lucky recipient of a free print from my shop. And upon returning home from the post office, I was pleasantly surprised to discover a timely deposit into my bank account. At least, I think that's where it's from. Now I don't feel so bad for spending more than $40 on some much needed skin cream.

Some wip photos to come this weekend.

It's Hump Day... I can't think of a better title.

I've neglected my blog for nearly 2 weeks now, not because I wanted to... other things just took priority. Matt's mom was visiting and stayed with us last Thursday to Sunday. Since we let her sleep on our bed, Matt and I split the couch and his old twin mattress for 3 nights. I think the whole sleep experience was a little back-breaking for all of us. All except the kitties...



Seriously though, our current mattress is the one that I bought back in my first year of College, which is about 8 years ago. It cost me all of $350, so go figure that the springs are starting to poke their way through. A slight exaggeration, but seriously, I wake up most days feeling like something has dug into my back all night. So needless to say, Matt and I are more than a little excited about the brand new bed we are getting delivered in 6 days!!! Courtesy of his parents and Sleep Country Canada, as a belated wedding gift. We had a terrific salesperson - he even knocked off $300 for us - guiding us through the various beds in the store and fell in love with one called "Clarion". I'm hoping that a full night on it is as dreamy as the five minutes we spent on it to test it out. Guess you never know until you take it home. Thankfully there's a 60-day return policy which we hopefully won't have to use.

Among the "other things" that took priority, I revamped my portfolio site this past week. I forgot that the way I formatted it meant I would have to link buttons on every page. A bit time-consuming, but I think it's pretty easy to navigate. If anyone finds any missing links, please let me know.

I feel like I had more to write, but am at a loss right now. My tummy is calling for lunch, so that's all for now. Oh, and I just liked the etsy treasury at the top of the blog post, so I took a screen capture of it the other day. Isn't it pretty? Turquoise and red make a lovely combo.

Home Sweet Home

Today has been all about relishing the comfort of home. It's the first full day I've been at home in the past week, so I've been catching up on emails, cleaning and just enjoying the fact that I didn't have to change out of my pj's, except to go get the mail.

The cats seem to have missed me too. Suki never used to be a lap cat, but since her past few health issues and visits to the vet, she's grown accustomed to being in my lap at least once a day. Dex decided to eat some ribbon this afternoon, maybe out of spite for me not being home much this weekend. I was a second too late to grab it out of his mouth, so I hope it comes out his other end fine.

The Clothing Show this past weekend was not as successful as I'd hoped but I had good company so that made it worthwhile. Here I am with my boothmate, Cheryl, who makes really lovely jewellery.


Most other vendors who did the show seemed to say it wasn't that great overall for them either. So, personally, I look at it as more of a learning experience and a way to promote myself as well as getting feedback. It's especiallly hard to compete - as an independent designer - with vendors who are selling mass-produced items for $5 or $10. Most people who go to these shows seem to be searching for deals. The one time I went as a buyer, I admit I did the same. But if I had the money, of course I would support other indie designers.

Happily though, I sold one of my new bags which feature adjustable straps, like a messenger bag. You can see one in the photo above. And pretty kitty seemed to be a popular design. Now I know better what to expect for the Fall show, which I will most likely partake in.

I will be listing a new item in my shop later this week. Stay tuned.

No Jacket Required

Oh my, it's gorgeous outside. Just before leaving the house to run some errands, I checked the weather online and was amazed to see that it's 21 degrees out! It feels so different to be outside and seriously, I didn't need to don a jacket, though I did. (I tend to feel a bit naked without one, unless it is boiling hot).

So this new illustration is very fitting for a day like today. It will be making its way into my shop shortly, as a new print.

Matt has tomorrow and Monday off so we'll have a long weekend together and will hopefully be able to take advantage of the warm weather. Taxes are waiting to be done and I really want to paint the walls upstairs. We'll see how things go.

Something New for the Shop

I introduced some ACEO's into my shop last night. I've always been a fan of miniature things and have been trying to create some new illustrations both personally and professionally, so these were a great way to get the creative juices flowing. The one above is sort of a portrait of Dex, and probably my favorite of the bunch, but in real life Dex is usually much more chipper.

Here are all of them together:



While I don't usually like to make one-offs, I'm only offering these in the original form. So no prints will be made of them and well, they are a pretty affordable piece of original art.

Raining Cats

After a fitful night of sleep - I blame Dex, pictured above - it's nice to wake up and read something pleasant about yourself. Especially after being a bit unpleasant to said sleep disturber. I think he was acting up because of the rain, which is quite horrible today.

"It's a good day to stay inside", as Matt just said but unfortunately (or fortunately) I have to make a trip to the post office. He'll have to go in to work soon too, though a bit later than usual. It's moving day for them.

One good thing about not sleeping that well: I was busy brainstorming new illustration ideas, so look for new art in the shop in the next few weeks.

On the Catwalk...

A new print is in my shop.

And in honour of Spring Cleaning, I'm having an Art Sale to clear out original paintings that have been collecting dust in boxes since we moved in. I will be parting with some much loved artwork but then again, if I love it so much, why isn't it up on our walls yet?
So hopefully my art will find many new homes where it will be more appreciated.

Quick, someone hurry up and buy something!

I reached 666 items sold today! It was a moment I was sort of dreading though as that number has certain connotations associated with it. But really, I'm happy to have sold that many items on etsy.

I've sort of been in a creative funk of late and blame it on my less-than-perfect home office setup. So the past week has had me moving stuff around several times and I'm still not satisfied... so no photos yet. Other than that I've been putting together consignment shipments for a few new places and have been brainstorming ideas for new illustrations, etc, but no finished things to show off right now.

My stomach is calling for lunch. Soup's on!

A New Lucky Kitty?

Although St. Patty's Day is almost over and Matt and I don't really celebrate it, I happened to unveil a new design at Fresh Baked Goods today. So I just wanted to share a bit of green here. Plus, I must say "Pretty Kitty" is becoming a new favorite of mine. I will list some shirts and other things featuring her in my shop soon, though I may not get around to it this week. We'll see.

A Fresh Start!

Hello! I've started a new blog. With a new year, I'm trying new things and while I liked my old blog, it doesn't offer as many possibilities as I would like. I love all the features you can add in this blog format, like the etsy mini, links to other sites and lots more. If you could do that in livejournal, I never figured it out.

This blog will be devoted to Cathy's Sweet Shop whether it's new items added to my shop, new things in the works, special promos, etc. I will of course intersperse details about my ever-exciting life when I get the chance... life with our cats and yummy food and the latest movies we've watched. You know, THAT exciting life :) Plus, whatever tickles my fancy at the moment. There are so many great blogs out there and amazing creations by other indie artists and designers that inspire me that it's about time I start writing about them.

These days I divide my time between etsying, finding new retailers and restocking current ones, painting portraits and coming up with new ideas for things to make and sell. I wish there was more time in the day to do everything I want to do, but I also do my best to spend time with loved ones. It's tough running a business solo, but I know I have to be thankful that I am able to do what I love to do for now while Matt works his buns off outside of the home. Hopefully I will be able to grow my business enough this year, so I'm able to hire employees soon. That would make me one spoiled kitty.



Saturday, I move into Fresh Baked Goods in Toronto's Kensington Market. For those of you in Toronto, please pop on by. I will be working Mondays at the store and I will have new things available for sale.