Top of mind, for obvious reasons, is my surgery that is scheduled for 11.30 Pacific tomorrow. Any positive vibes or prayers would be appreciated!

I knew I wanted hot colors for the landscape itself, but I die cut the landscape from white. Then I used Distress Oxide Inks to color them.

Now that I’ve done the early August flea market, it’s time to look at my priorities for the rest of the month. The next De Anza Flea Market is on September 2nd.

This week I’ve been busy preparing for the De Anza Flea Market on Saturday. Attendance should be better than last month, because it’s not a holiday weekend and it’ll be less hot. I’ll be in the same location as last month, O45.

I cut out the parts of the whale from inexpensive watercolor paper and colored them with Distress Watercolor pencils following photos of humpback whales. The upper part and tail are colored with Black Soot. For the shadows under the whale I used Hickory Smoke.

The Unique Boutique is actively looking for new vendors. They jury new products on the second Wednesday of every month, except of October and April. So right now is a great time to apply!

I’ve signed up to sell at the De Anza Flea Market in Cupertino for the rest of the year. I’ll be in the same booth number all the time - O45. The August date is on the 5th. I’d love to see you there!

The bottle die is 5.5” tall. That means that you can use it to create a shaped A2 card. Unfortunately that also means that it’s a little too big to fit comfortably on an A2 card. So that’s why I chose to make this a 5 by 7 card instead.

The bottom line is that I made back the fee I paid and then some. So I reached my goal. That feels good. I also learned a ton.

My booth number is O45. That’s under the solar panels closest to the Food Court and the ATM. Yay! The star marks my spot on the map.

This mini album is very easy to make and has room for lots of embellishments. It will available for purchase at my booth at the De Anza Flea Market on Saturday, July 1st, 2023. If it doesn’t sell there, I’ll list it in my Etsy shop.

As expected, pretty much everything is about preparing for my first flea market day right now. The big day is Saturday July 1. There’s a lot riding on how well I do there. If it’s profitable and sustainable, I’m going to buy a six-month pass. The six-month pass doesn’t give you a discount, but you’re assigned a booth for the duration. That’s going to be more important in the run-up to the holidays.

Ink smooshing is a very popular technique that creates backgrounds with random blotches of ink. A couple of tips: You can smoosh your ink pads onto your craft mat. That’s where the name of the technique comes from.

I’ve signed up as a vendor for the De Anza Flea Market on Saturday, July 1st. If you’re in the area, come by and say hi. Entry and parking are free!

The main feature of these two cards are from the Spellbinders Playful Koalas stamp and die set. I stamped the koalas, birds and greenery in Memento Rich Cocoa. This is a solvent-based dye ink that enables you to color stamped images with alcohol markers.

I’m looking for offline venues for selling my cards. Here’s what I’ve found so far. If you’re aware of other low-barrier-to-entry options, please let me know.

Once the glue has set, turn the piece right side up. You should be able to tug at the sliding tab and get the center of the sliding mechanism to fold up. If the mechanism works smoothly, you can remove the release paper from the foam tape and place the mechanism on the card base.

The way affiliate programs work is that if you as a shopper click on an affiliate link, your browser saves a cookie. If you buy anything from the affiliate site within the referral window, the affiliate (blogger) gets a percentage of the sale as commission. The length of the referral window differs from merchant to merchant, but 1-3 months is common.

This is a relatively simple card, but it gets the message across and who doesn’t love a vintage typewriter? I got the idea for this card when I was looking at the die set on the Spellbinders web site.

I went to Washington DC last week. It was a very expensive errand, but also very necessary. Here are some pictures from my trip.