This pair started off my obsession for the week. These are little felt bead earrings by Meaghan O'Malley of Oh Ginger. $15.00

Can you say 'juicy'? Tempting hand blown glass from bluembrownlee. $13.50

Peanut Butter and Jelly. Need I say more? Okay, maybe I do because Lauren Swingle at The Clay Collection can turn the jelly into marshmallow or bananas for ya instead. $20.00

Grape Ape. Grape Ape. Cute hand formed clusters of grapes from Sarah at Potato Face $9.90

"Ichigo ga kawaii desu yo ne?" That's Japanese for 'Cute strawberries, eh?!' Thank Tacky Teacup's crafty polymer clay skills and affinity for anime faces. Sugoi! $10.00

Make a Gingerbread House
Ever want to create the perfect gingerbread house? Okay, I have yet to master this skill..but you can! Our Barbara Rolek will show you how.

How to Draw a Christmas Tree
Here is one that will come in handy for all those handmade cards. Master sketch artist Helen South will show you how to draw the perfect tree from start to finish.

Paint a Glass Ornament
Turn a plain glass ball into a work of stained glass art. Our Guide to Painting will show you how to create this delicate trimming.

Silent Night Cross Stitch Pattern
Don't just get cozy, get your stitch on. Create a Silent Night design with this free pattern from Connie G. Barwick.

Stitch a Pear Trio
Hang up something special in your home for that Thanksgiving gathering. This free 'Pear Trio' needlepoint pattern from Cheryl Fall is just what your walls needed.

Easy Christmas Ornaments
Start a tradition for the kids to make new ornaments each year. Sherri Osborn has the shape patterns and project ideas for these ornaments that reflect Christmas traditions.

Print Thanksgiving Placecards
Add some warmth to your table with these Thanksgiving place cards that will have your guests saying 'awwwww'. Barbara Crews has the free printable for you to personalize.

Wine Bottle Wrap Pattern
Instead of giving a bottle of wine in one of those skinny bags, make a felt wrap that the bottle can be displayed in all season. Phyllis Dobbs will show you how.

Make a Miniature Christmas Tree
Why are tiny things always so darn cute? Learn how to make a little pine tree with Lesley Shepherd.

Interchangeable Thanksgiving Pins
Sometimes you just can't commit to just one pin. With this interchangeable Thanksgiving pin by Tammy Powley, you can tell everyone when you're ready for pie...and when you're overstuffed.

Want to Join Make it Merry to show off your holiday crafts? We will showcase your crafts and recipes of all holiday traditions. Learn more.

At Red Velvet Art, they peruse submissions and online crafters to find goodies that handmade lovers want to get their hands on. For the buyer, this means not having to sift through lots of potentially shoddily-made baubles from inexperienced crafters.

Here are some of my picks from the Red Velvet shop which include an owl purse by Brooke of So She Sews (which I swear I've seen on Etsy before), an Autumn Leaves hair piece by the Red Velvet Art studio, and a cutie rib cage bag designed by Elsie and printed locally near the Red Velvet Art home base in Missouri.

What I like more than the sweet eye candy is that this is a real live store in Springfield, Missouri with shelves and a door and everything (imagine that!). We're all getting so used to consuming our handmade fashion online that it can sometimes be hard to fathom that real retail stores are out there buying up handmade items from crafters and selling them to the world.

The shop has a limited number of open slots available each month for new products. If you are a handmade artist, you may want to consider selling to a retailer like this one to get your products moving en mass instead of to the individual buyer as in Etsy and Artfire type situations.

Every Thursday you'll find a new set of tutorials on how to make everything from personalized presents to festive tree trimmings. This will be a group of thumbnails and links to each project. It's an easy way to browse all sorts of holiday decorating ideas from like-minded crafters like you.

If you'd like to play along, just send me a link to your holiday tutorial at diyfashion.guide@about.com. The tutorial must have a photo of the finished craft so that I can include it in the group photo collage.

Each Wednesday night, I'll email you the HTML for you to post the Make it Merry code to your blog for the day. You'll simply paste the code into your Thursday blog post. Everyone else participating will have the same code, so it's a great way to drive traffic to your blog and network with the other bloggers participating in Make it Merry.

If you'd like to encourage other bloggers to join in, you can let them in on how to join by adding this square button to the sidebar of your blog and linking it back to this blog post (permalink). Adding more bloggers to the Make it Merry Thursdays will mean that your own craft is posted in front of more readers.

You can participate any week you like. We'll be running from November 5th to December 24th.

• Make Glowing Jewelry
• More Halloween Jewelry How-To's

_{Stay up to date on DIY Fashion by signing up for Rain's weekly newsletter, choosing to become a fan of this blog on Facebook, or following DIY_Rain on Twitter.}

Handmade by creampuffboutique

Halloween Jewelry How-To's

Click "Comments" below to tell us your ideas.

_{Stay up to date on DIY Fashion by signing up for Rain's weekly newsletter, choosing to become a fan of this blog on Facebook, or following DIY_Rain on Twitter.}

$3.00 by Stars Hollow	$4.00 by Clever Lee
$3.00 by Funny Sky	$4.00 by Sissy S
$3.68 by VickiBo	$4.00 by AntiSparkle

• Comments (0)
• Permalink

Does Etsy Suck?

Etsy Bitch, fills the gap for Etsy criticism.

The handmade revolution has been coating the crafty attitudes and buyers intellect of Americans over the past few years. A boom in online handmade goodies has offered hope to small businesses and bloggers... but is everyone still happy with it?

With the arrival and staying power of big box stores like Walmart, it was an eventuality that the shopping pendulum would sweep the other way. As buyers have been inundated with cookie-cutter products filling anonymous linoleum aisles, they have started to seek out increasingly unique gifts from smaller retailers. Handmade goods from artisans around the country have filled the national buyer's need for the new, and Etsy was there to fill the void.

We all know that Etsy is the original handmade buying and selling hub, offering everything from hand sewn hoodies to tie-dyed paper for all your scrapbooking needs. You can find cake pops and flip-flops or earrings made from shampoo bottle plastic. The handmade revolution and Etsy go hand-in-hand, without a doubt. For this reason, tales of crafters quitting their day jobs and selling their wares full-time on the mega-site have been tempting many artisans to set up an Etsy shop and start clicking pics of their latest googly-eyed puff-ball amigurumi creations.

But in it's fourth year, Etsy is hitting the rocks and meeting up with criticism from both buyers and sellers. Sellers have concerns about fees, user interface and the ever-dubious 'Spotlight' promotions that yield shaky sales results. Buyers have their own unique set of complaints ranging from regulating product quality to site navigation. Administrator communication with Etsy users causes mass bouts of frustration, spawning mostly from the official Etsy message board.

These complaints often hit a brick wall- which happens to be the chief complaint. The Etsy message boards have become notorious as a place of non-action. Buyers and sellers are left to their own devices, often debating amongst themselves about issues that could be readily resolved with the interjection of board administrators. Complaints of technical issues are famous for going unresolved, and criticism of badly made products is a death warrant for a post. No freedom of speech in the land of Etsy, it seems.

Perhaps a good deal of the problem is that the concerns of users are met with silence, while Etsy keeps constant contact with you and your email box. Newsletters flood in with new information on how you can spend more to promote goods within the site, and even encouragements for sellers to advertise Etsy (of course, Etsy doesn't pay you to promote them) on other sites.

Meanwhile, 'The Storque' reports each month on just how many more users are sprouting up as your competition, and the millions of dollars (16 million in September) that you didn't make every month. To many users, this is adding up to more take than give, and the corporate attitude is clashing with the felted kitty pillows.

Etsy's official photo of their community
is criticized as the company attitude
toward the individual.

Since Etsy will not maintain their own complaint department, someone else is going to fill the need. Many unrecognized complaints have given birth to sites like Etsy Bitch ('Biting the hand that feeds us') and Regretsy ('It looks like you made it with your feet'). These sites offer some fresh perspective on Etsy as a company and creative marketplace, which is a form of free speech that can't be accessed on the Etsy site itself.

These sites are seeing a lot of user response, for the simple fact that these places are an open forum to discuss the issues with Etsy that are otherwise censored or ignored on the Etsy.com site. What do you think? Does Etsy need to turn things around, or are these simply users scorned? Click "Comments" to tell us what you think.

---

_{Stay up to date on DIY Fashion by signing up for Rain's weekly newsletter, choosing to become a fan of this blog on Facebook, or following DIY_Rain on Twitter.}

• Why do You Buy from Etsy?
• Buyers Guide: Before You Buy Handmade Goods

• Comments (35)
• Permalink

User Photos: Olivia's Halloween Cape

Doesn't she look great? Olivia used the cape tutorial here on DIY Fashion to make this great Halloween cape. I'm loving her fabric choice for the hood. What do you think?

• Make a Cape
• Share Your Photos

Click "Comments" below to tell us your ideas.

---

_{Stay up to date on DIY Fashion by signing up for Rain's weekly newsletter, choosing to become a fan of this blog on Facebook, or following DIY_Rain on Twitter.}

• Comments (2)
• Permalink

Halloween Ballroom Blitz and Glitz

As soon as the air turns crisp in late September, I can be found in the middle of a sea of plastic tubs, sifting through pumpkin wreaths and chattering severed heads. I just can't wait to get out those Halloween decorations with a mug of hot apple cider.

Not everyone goes spooktacularly crazy before October, so many people are just now breaking out those rubber bats. Here are some DIY Halloween decorating tips to make sure your party is as dazzling as your costume.

• Make a Haunted House
• Outdoor Halloween Displays
• Halloween Party Planning Guide

Click "Comments" below to tell us your ideas.

---

_{Stay up to date on DIY Fashion by signing up for Rain's weekly newsletter, choosing to become a fan of this blog on Facebook, or following DIY_Rain on Twitter.}

• Comments (0)
• Permalink

DIY Fashion

1. Home
2. Style
3. DIY Fashion

• Most Popular
• Latest Articles

Add to:

• iGoogle
• My Yahoo!
• RSS