Stinkerpants

The State of the Coop

July 8, 2009 in Urban Hippies • Backyard Chickens

p>Many things have been happening with our chicken coop over the past few months, and I’ve barely mentioned any of it!  So here we go: the State of the Coop.

Exciting thing #1 is that we had a structure built to enclose the chickens.  The structure isn’t raccoon proof (yet), so we still have to put the chickens up in their coop at night, but it looks pretty sweet:

The eventual plan for this structure is for Y to build a new coop so there’s more space on the ground for the chickens to run around.  Then we’ll put a bench in there, so we can go in and hang out with the chickens.

A few weeks ago, I went to the Sunset Celebration with my friend Sarah and saw Sunset Magazine’s awesome chicken coop.  I was totally inspired by their coop, which used bark on the ground instead of dirt, hay or gravel.  According to the girl manning the coop, the bark chips work really well to control odor and only have to be replaced a couple of times a year.  Sounds good to me!  So bark is on the horizon, too.  :)

How about some chicken pix?!

This lovely lady is Violet:

What?  You don’t think she’s pretty?

How about now?

Yeah, that’s better.  :)

Exciting thing #2 is that Violet laid her first egg a couple of weeks ago.  We were so thrilled!!  Rosarita has been laying for a couple of months now, but she was the only one.  Then, yesterday, Rosebud laid HER first egg!  And it was green!

Here’s Rosebud and I:

Rosebud has really funny sideburns.

Right now the big chickens (ie, Rosebud, Violet and Rosarita) are all living in our old coop, and the four little chickens (Dahlia, Buttercup, Tulip and Daisy) are living in the big coop/new structure.  We tried to introduce them, but the big chickens picked on the little guys too much.  We decided to wait until the little chickens are bigger before introducing them again.

Here they are the first day we introduced everyone:

It’s important that the little chickens establish their place in the coop at night before we put the big chickens back in.  Unfortunately, the little chickens are kind of stupid–they don’t go up in the coop by themselves at night.  We’ve tried putting a light up there to lure them up the ramp, but nada.  I think we’re going to try bribing them with melon.  As it is, we have to put each little chicken in the coop by hand every night, then lock up their coop.  It’s kind of annoying.  :-/

The little guys sure are cute, though!  They grow every day.  Here’s Dahlia:

And her sister, Buttercup.  Buttercup sits like this a lot.  We call her “little turkey vulture.”

We obviously have a lot of fun with our chickens:

Things we have learned about chickens:

• The term “chicken” is totally accurate.  That is, chickens are totally afraid of everything. They run like the wind everytime they think something is scary.  And for them, many things are scary.
• Chickens like to pace when they’re getting ready to lay an egg.  Luckily, our chickens have plenty of room to walk around, but it makes me really sad to think about the chickens in factory farms who can’t walk around.  Our ladies seem kind of uncomfortable around egg time, and walking seems to help.
• Chickens are GREEDY. They’ll be best friends, but the second you give somebody a treat, they all try to steal it.  Once a chicken gets control of a treat, she will take off running, being chased by everyone else.  It’s really funny, but it takes forever for someone to actually EAT anything!
• Each chicken has a personality, and for the most part, their personalities have been there since they were little chicks.  For example, Dahlia is a total loudmouth, and she has been since the day we brought her home from the feed store.

That’s all, folks!

Business Stuff: Rethinking Etsy

July 7, 2009 in Running A Business • Advice

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What I’m about to talk about might stir up a little bit of controversy with my handmade readers–but I would really like to hear what anyone and everyone has to say about this subject:  I am going to get rid of my Etsy shop, and here’s why.

After having an Etsy shop open for a little over two months, I am really unimpressed.  Here are my first impressions.

I’m not sure Etsy is good for me, or for sellers in general, for several reasons:

1. Updating two shops is a pain in the neck.  When you’re running your own business, time is precious, and it’s easy to get overwhelmed.  I’d definitely be willing to update both shops if they served different purposes, but the shop on my website and the etsy shop do exactly the same thing, and Etsy costs me more to run.  I would rather spend my time giving good customer service to my custom clients, and spend the money I’ll save on listing fees improving my own shop.
2. I thought Etsy would bring me traffic (thus the reason why I started it), but as it turns out, I have to drive traffic to it.  Why would I want to spend energy marketing a shop that is hosted on someone else’s website, rather than my own?
3. I know that I am not being paranoid when I say that people on Etsy steal things from one another, and it’s really not cool.  Yes, you risk getting your ideas stolen by simply being out there on the internet, but Etsy is a virtual treasure trove of ideas, and all the people interested in stealing your ideas know about it.  It seems a bit like you’re marketing to the people who want to steal your stuff, and the people who want to buy and enjoy it are secondary.
4. But the biggest issue for sellers, and the one that I’m going to focus on here, is this: By nature of having a bunch of handmade stuff in one spot, Etsy drives the prices down and makes it extremely hard to make a living wage.

When handmade items were something you could only find at craft fairs or featured in random places, there was a sense of “specialness” to them.  The artist could name their price, and if someone liked the item enough, they could buy it.  The key here is that the artist was able to name a price they were comfortable with, and the buyer could decide whether they were willing to pay it.

Whether or not the artist charged a rate that could pay the rent is another story completely.

Unfortunately, artists aren’t generally the most savvy business people.  After all, they don’t teach pricing, marketing or tax management in art school.  As a result, a lot of artists don’t attach a fair price to the items they create.

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Take, for example, a scarf. Anybody buying or selling scarves is going to have a problem breaking even.  Yarn is darn expensive.  Say each skein of yarn costs you $8, and you need 4 skeins to complete a project.  You just spent $32 on yarn, and now you have to make your scarf.  If it takes you 12 hours to complete a scarf (which is modest, I’d say, at least for my knitting skills!), and you want to make $8 per hour, your labor comes to $96.  So in order to be paid a fair wage and cover your materials, you need to charge $128 for your scarf.

Now, who the hell is going to pay $128 for a scarf, even a pretty one, when they can go to the Gap and pay $20?  That’s right: no one.  And that’s by paying yourself the same wage you’d get working at a fast food restaurant.  Unless you have a partner who is responsible for paying the rent, you’re not only going to be a “starving artist,” but a homeless one as well.

For the sake of argument, though, let’s say you’re not responsible for paying the rent with your scarf business, and you’re doing this for fun.

So you’re a pretty smart person, right?  You know that no one is going to pay you $128 for a scarf.  But they might pay you $50.  If you charge $50 for your scarves, and you’re able to sell a few of them, you’re feeling pretty good about your situation (likely because you’re trying to forget that, after the cost of yarn, you’re only making $18 a scarf, which is equal to $1.50/hour).  Yeah, that’s way less than McDonald’s.  But at least you don’t smell like hamburgers at the end of the day.

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One day you come across a website called Etsy, where you can sell your scarves for a small fee.  Suddenly, everyone who wants a handmade scarf can find you by searching for “scarf.”  After your listing fees and Paypal fees, you’re making about $15 per scarf, and you’re feeling even better about your little business, because you’re really busy!

Then one day, a new seller starts a shop.  The new seller realizes that there’s no difference between her scarves and yours, so she decides to charge $45 for her scarves instead of your $50.  Your customers leave you until you undercut the new seller by only charging $40.  Before you know it, you’re not even making 50¢ per hour because you’re charging so little. Think I’m being dramatic?  Search Etsy for “scarf”–I’m not even kidding.
Have you heard of Etsy’s custom section, Alchemy?  Basically, a customer can name a price for a custom-created item, or ask sellers to give a price at which they’re willing to create the item.  Usually, people are requesting something like a custom necklace for $10.  A custom necklace for ten dollars.  And you know what?  They’re getting their custom necklaces made for $10.  This is not cool, people.

Yes, I know that these people are naming their own prices, so theoretically they’re only hurting themselves.  Unfortunately, though, tha’ts not the case.  Even if these sellers aren’t trying to make necklaces for a living, their prices are hurting the sellers who are trying to do this for a living.  I’m sure that the quality of that $15 necklace isn’t as good as the person who is selling a $150 necklace (at least, I hope not!), but the buyer doesn’t necessarily know that.

At the end of the day, I think Etsy hurts sellers.  Yes, I think it’s awesome to make handmade items available to the general public…but at what cost?

I would love to hear your thoughts.

The Kitchen Remodel

July 6, 2009 in Personal Projects • Our Home

I hope everyone had a fabulous Fourth of July!  Ours was relatively uneventful, but it was nice to have such a long weekend with Y.  Yesterday I spent driving all over the bay area, picking up random things from Craigslist.  Why?  Because I bought a fancy new printer, and it’s big.  Too big for my tiny office.  So we’re moving the office into the living room and splitting it into two rooms.  Ah, yes.  Time to rearrange and redecorate.

And speaking of rearranging/redecorating…how about remodeling?

Remember back in January, we were having our kitchen remodeled?  And remember how you guys were super supportive, and you all wanted to see the finished product?  And remember how I never posted the finished photos because I suck?

Well, here’s hoping you forgot that last part.  ;)

Here I am, finally, with the finished photos.  I am so thrilled with how it turned out, let me tell you.  There are a few things I didn’t know about before that turned out to be great, and a couple of things I might have done differently had I known then what I know now.  I’ll share it all with you guys, just in case some of you are looking to upgrade your kitchen at some point.

First off, here’s a photo of the kitchen as seen from our dining room: I love it.  I love our pendant lamps, which we got on sale at EXPO when they went out of business.  The bar is totally awesome–I don’t really eat there (which I’d pictured in my head), but I love that my friends (and Y) sit at it and talk to me while I’m cooking.

Also, you can see our fridge from this vantage point.  Holy heck, you guys.  Seriously.  She’s everything I dreamed about and more.  This fridge makes me so happy.  She holds so much food!  And that deli drawer is just as fabulous as I thought it would be.

My only gripe with the fridge is the fingerprints.  When we were looking for refrigerators, I saw a few advertised as “fingerprint resistant.”  I had no idea what that meant, and I definitely didn’t think it was worth the extra money.  But…yeah.  That would be nice.  This sucker holds onto fingerprints like nothing I’ve ever seen.  I try to use the handles, but we still end up with smudges.  I can only imagine how dirty it will look with kids in the household.  And considering we’re going to have this fridge for the next 5,376 years (because it was just that expensive), I’m sure it’s going to see some kid fingers.  Wish me luck with that one.

On to the counters.  We are very, very lucky that Y’s dad does kitchen and bathroom remodels for a living.  As a result, he got everything in this kitchen at a deep discount.  This limited our choices a bit (for example, we got to choose between three types of cabinets and 10 types of granite), but obviously our choices weren’t exactly shabby. ;)  When Y’s dad talked to us about the counters, he stipulated that he wanted a granite backsplash.  At the time, I thought it would be too dark, and I wasn’t sure it was going to be a good idea.  But who was I to argue?

Man, was I ever wrong.  I was soooo wrong.  That granite backsplash is so classy!!  I love it!!   I also really love the combination of colors we chose for the cabinets and the granite.

I need to decorate above that window.  I didn’t notice it was kind of bare looking!

One thing I wish we would have spent more money on (and if we were going to stay here forever, maybe we would have) is the dishwasher.  We bought the absolute cheapest dishwasher we could find, and maaayyybeee that wasn’t such a good plan.  Every dish has to be scrubbed before it goes in there, which kind of defeats the purpose.  It’s also really loud and the cycle takes hours to complete.  But alas, I hate doing dishes, so I use it anyway.

When we got our sink, we discovered that it came with a weird grate in it.  We had no idea what it was for.  Y even went so far as to say, “that’s stupid.”  He ate his words pretty quickly, though, as we discovered that the grate is the best thing to happen to dishes since…maybe the garbage disposal?  Even if you’re a slacker and leave the dishes in the sink (I’m not naming any names!), the nasty food stuff hangs out underneath the grate, so spraying it into the garbage disposal is easy peasy!

The other appliance I’m totally thrilled about is our range.  It’s a Bosch gas range with convection oven, and it’s one of the best things that’s ever happened to me.  I treasure it.  I’ve been cooking (and baking) up a storm!

This is our pantry, which has a ton of storage space, and a little wine rack.  Yes, that’s Elvis Purrsley in there, begging for food.  He is always hungry.

One last little detail is our menu, which was totally Y’s idea.  He bought some wood molding, which we painted to match our barstools.  Then he painted the menu on the door using chalkboard paint (which I promptly scratched and tried to fix, sorry darling!).  Pretty sweet, huh?

I still can’t believe that I get to use this kitchen.  I feel so spoiled!

Stinkerpants is Featured?! SWEET!

July 2, 2009 in Blog • Press

A few weeks ago, I learned that my office was featured on Ikea’s website!  How cool!

Then, about a week later, I was contacted by Angee of Sheic Space, who saw my office and loved it.  I am really excited to be featured in the latest issue of Sheic Space.  Super cool!  Thanks, Angee!

I am also really excited that my “Will You Be My Bridesmaid?” card was recently featured on Here Comes the Guide’s blog and Brides.com.  Super cool!

I’m thrilled! Thank you!!!

The Fanciest Bar Mitzvah Invitation I’ve Ever Seen!

July 2, 2009 in Blog • Kids

A few months ago, I was contacted by a very nice woman named Linda, who lives across the pond in London.  Linda’s son Marco is being Bar Mitvah’d this year, and she wanted an event theme based on the one I did for Nathan Fischer.  Linda was super fun to work with, and we included all sorts of details in the drawing, such as the title of Marco’s Torah portion, and his family in the audience behind him.

Check it out!

Their family’s synagogue is orthodox, so the men and women are separated.  Marco’s dad is the one in the front row all the way on the left in the men’s section, and his mom and sisters are in the front row in the women’s section.  I love this detail. :)

Linda wanted to include the drawing in the invitations for the party, but we decided it would be too complicated to have me print everything for her, then ship it overseas.  Because Linda had a printer she had worked with before, I sent the completed drawing directly to him–then he and Linda worked on the invitation.

About a week later, Linda emailed me with a genius invitation idea, which would incorporate the Bar Mitzvah reception as well as the ceremony–and it required another drawing!

This is what we came up with for the reception:

I absolutely love how this drawing turned out–it’s so fun!  And yes, that’s his dad in the bright blue tie.

When Linda told me about the invitation idea, I really, really wanted to see the finished product–so I asked Linda to send me a copy of it.  She was kind enough to oblige!  I received it yesterday, and I was SO IMPRESSED.  It is the fanciest, coolest Bar Mitzvah invitation I’ve ever seen.  Seriously cool.  Check it out:

You really have to see this in person to appreciate how cool it is.  The part with the drawings is super thick, and each drawing is protected by a thin layer of clear plastic.  The invitation itself is made of different colors of stardream paper (which is sparkly!) and each invitation is personally printed for each recipient.

I’m seriously impressed.  Thank you Linda, for sending this!  I wish I could come.  :)