Italy: Rome

This is part of a series of posts of my trip to Italy. 

Rome was our first stop on our trip to Italy. The trip I went on was with my school. I applied to Italy because I’ve always wanted to go there and I studied four years of Italian in high school. It was a group of 20 students and 2 professors. This was my first time overseas.



Our flight was about 8 or 9 hours (I watched a lot of movies on the flights because I didn’t have my music or laptop with me). We left in daytime in America and by the time we got to Rome, it was morning there so everyone was exhausted our first day.

I love the way the houses look like in Rome. I did this journal entry while in Rome. As part of our class, we were supposed to keep a journal of our experiences. I also decided to add sketches in my journal entries.




Rome was nice, but there was a lot of noise and traffic everywhere. There were also motorcycles everywhere. One day I liked was when we went shopping to this marketplace.


This was the Elephant and Obelisk sculpture by Bernini.



We went to all the basic famous sights, like The Colosseum, Sistine Chapel and Vatican. The Vatican was a lot of fun to visit. The top photo was a fountain located in St. Peter’s Square.



On one of our last nights, I went down to the Trevi Fountain with a couple other people. The Trevi fountain is the biggest fountain in Rome, designed by Bernini. It is traditional to toss a coin over the shoulder which means the thrower will return to Rome one day.

Check back next week for more photos from my trip to Italy. Have you ever been to Rome?

Sea Themed Appliqués

The last Etsy event I went to this summer was on July 28th at the South Steet Seaport where we made sea-themed appliqués. It was nice they had an event somewhere other than their Etsy labs. The Seaport area was really nice. There were a lot of cute shops around and they had free ice cream right outside where the event was being held.

I sewed a whale cut out on to this sea themed fabric. I might try to do something else with it, but I'm not sure what yet.



I get used to doing paper crafts and journals so it's fun to do different crafts like sewing, which I don't usually do. If you're ever in the New York area, stop by the Etsy Labs. They always have events going on.

Favorite Shops on Etsy

It's Etsy's Birthday! Etsy opened 5 years ago from today. In celebration, I thought I'd share some of my favorite shops on Etsy.

Boygirlparty



This was the first shop I hearted on Etsy. The shop has various items (shirts, stationary, etc.) with designs that are really clever and creative. I've always loved this zebra/piano design which was also used as a logo for the band Postal Service on one of their shirts. I've never bought from them, but I think I will someday.

Willowing



Willowing makes original mixed media art that have inspiring messages. The characters are sort of dream like and the art is always inspiring to me. I had a print of hers that I hung in my room that said "You Are a Beautiful Expression of the Universe" and it always made me happy. I also follow some of her blogs (on Livejournal, Tumblr and YouTube) where she shares how she makes her work.

Sweets and Hearts



Erica, who runs this shop, runs the EtsyU team for college students and is around the same age as me. It's nice to see other people my age on Etsy. This shop sells really fun clothes and accessories. A lot of the stuff has bows or polka dots on it and it's really girly. I got a shirt from this shop and it's one of my favorite shirts.

The Dainty Squid



This is another fun shop run by a girl about my age. She makes cute pouches with great fabrics. She also has a really interesting Flickr/tumblr where she shares vintage items she finds and things from her life.

The Rainbow Room



I recently discovered this colorful shop on Etsy. All the items use really vibrant colors and a lot are multicolored/rainbow colored. I'm pretty sure all the items are made of felt.

You can see all shops I like in my favorites. There's so many great and unique shops on Etsy, but these were just the first ones I thought of. Share your favorite shops/items on Etsy in the comments!

Photography Inspiration

This isn't directly related to my shop, but I thought I'd post some photos that are inspiring me lately. I also have a bunch of inspirations on my craft tumblr.



















I "tag" everyone to do this in your blog if you have one. Just post some photos or things that inspire you. Let me know in the comments if you do a post!

Treasury, Hope Floats and Updates

I'm kind of taking a break from listing new items right now so that's why I haven't been updating my shop as much as I usually do. I'm just renewing items I already have and seeing if anything sells. I do have a bunch of new items to list though that I might list gradually in the next few weeks. What kind of items do you most want to see in my shop?

I just saw "Hope Floats" the other night. I had never seen the movie, but I had an old VHS cover of it and made a recycled journal out of it here:



I was featured in a treasury here. My mini journal is on the bottom left.



I need a new journal for myself right now. I'm not sure if I'm going to use one I already made (I feel bad taking a journal that's already listed so I probably won't do that), making a new one or if I just want to buy a moleskine and alter it.

Etsy Labs

Etsy has these craft night events in their labs in Brooklyn, NY. Since I stayed in Brooklyn for the summer, I went to a couple of them. They were a lot of fun and it was nice to try different crafts. I think I'll make a series of post where I post photos from each of the the events. Here's just some general photos of the Etsy Labs.

The labs are located right by the Brooklyn Bridge

At the Etsy Labs events, they usually had a sign pointing where the Etsy offices are located.



I got excited when I saw the big Etsy sign and doorway.





The Etsy Labs are really cute and look very Etsy-ish. They have cute crafty things everywhere and I even recognized a few of their spots from their video blog posts. I loved this stuffed typewriter:



At the events, they usually had Etsy merchandise for free to help promote Etsy. I love all the cute things they had.



It's not really related to Etsy, but when I was trying to find the Etsy labs, I saw this sign for a restaurant which I thought was cute:

Look out for my upcoming posts about the events I went to and what crafts I made. If you're in the Brooklyn area, you can hear about Etsy events on their blog.

EtsyVeg Challenge, 4th of July Items and Sale

I'm in EtsyVeg's monthly challenge this month. The theme is "May Flowers" and the winning entry gets to be featured in an ad on the EtsyVeg blog for a month. I've entered their challenges a lot, but I haven't won one yet. You'd do me a favor if you voted for my Yellow Flower Thank You Card here.



Thanks for any votes! If you really want to help me out, you can tweet or blog about it too. :)

I renewed some greeting cards for Fourth of July. I had these up last year, but I'm just putting them up again for this year.

Fourth of July Tissue Paper Greeting Card



Fourth of July American Flag Greeting Card



Also, I'm having a sale in my shop this month. Since June 4th was my second anniversary, you can get 10% off any order if you enter the code "ANNIVERSARY" in the message to seller box at checkout.

365 Food Project

As I've posted before, I'm doing a 365 project where I'm posting a photo of a meal I've eaten every day for a year. I'm kind of behind on it and there's still a lot of photos I need to edit/post, but I've updated it. To see the whole set, you can click here











What's your favorite thing to cook in the summer? I'm always open to recipe ideas.

Etsy Anniversary

It's Move the Needle's anniversary/birthday today. I actually officially opened it in late June of 2008, but since I registered on June 4th, I just consider today the anniversary date. I can't believe it's been two years. Some important things that have happened since I opened my shop:

- I've sold 41 items on Etsy (and some more offline) and 369 users call my shop a favorite.
- I did a couple of craft shows. My first one was last July at Esperanza in Chicago, IL.
- I've also gotten my items in a few different shops. Even though my items aren't in any shops right now, I had my items in Light Speed in Chicago and Market House near Pittsburgh. I'm hoping to put some more items in shops soon.
- I've done a couple custom orders such as this Tree of Life Box and this Newspaper Altered 2010 Moleskine Planner.
- I started with just journals and gradually added more items such as greeting cards, calendars and photo frames.
- I'm a member of several teams, such as EtsyVeg (for vegetarians) and EtsyU (for college students). I've been featured on team blogs and participated in team activities (such as swaps and promotions).
- I've been able to connect with other crafters and people through social networks such as Twitter and Facebook and this blog.
- Through being a member of Etsy, I've discovered a ton of handmade items and have bought/won items on Etsy.

These are most popular/most hearted items:

Blue Marbled Coptic Bound Sketchbook



Postcards from Europe Coptic Stitch Journal



Blue and Gold Marbled Journal



Green Bird Journal



Good News Greeting Card



Cow Grazing in Grass Journal



What is your favorite item(s) from Move the Needle?