The Past Few Weeks

   Some of you have probably noticed that I've been somewhat AWOL lately. I'm not entirely sure what happened. Or, rather, I am, but I'm a little astounded to see the impact it's all had.

   I've been playing a lot of World of Warcraft lately. I started up a fanblog - The Wyvern's Tail - for the game, and it's ended up with me doing a little creative writing in the form of a journal for my newest character. I'm really enjoying writing the journal, and that in turn is really making me enjoy the game. There are three journal entries up so far, with a further 8 scheduled to post across the next three weeks. I'm working on many, many more, however, as it follows her through the game from level 1 to 90, but it's obviously not written like that. The diary is of a young Blood Elf who leaves her home of Quel'Thalas and goes off to explore the rest of the world. She's rather dejected to begin with, as everything is so dreary and diseased beyond the borders of her homeland, but she soon cheers up as she travels south and forests and the like become much healthier.

   And so, playing the game has somewhat been capturing a lot of my attention as I rediscover the whole world of Azeroth and beyond.

   I've also been putting a lot of time into my jewellery. I've been working on three new products - all of which are a variation of eachother - and they are going just unbelievably bad. In theory there's no reason at all why they should go so badly, but I seem to be struggling so much that I know that the problem is me. Which makes me a little angry, and I stubbornly refuse to give up. It's honestly been one thing after another going wrong with them, with my biggest problem being the resin, from both faulty products and shitty sellers, to just generally making rookie mistakes with the stuff. But it's been keeping me busy, if increasing stress levels.

   I've been working on constructing jewellery for a jewellery bundle, too. My Christmas in July sale is happening, with 25% off of everything. It's going through Etsy On Sale, so it's all automatic with no need for discount codes - although a free shipping code will be created for the sale, anyway - but I've also been working on a big jewellery bundle for the sale, too. It contains 10 items - 3/4 rings and 6/7 necklaces - and 2 £10/$15 gift cards. It comes to a total value of £189 ($280) if everything was purchased individually (not counting any shipping fees) but I'm selling it for just £80 - it's less than half price!

   I'm quite excited about it, too, but I'm not expecting much. £80 is still a lot of money for a single person to spend in my shop, but I figured it would only cost me 13p (listing fee) to try it. I'm only making 5 bundles available, however. I'm pre-making all of the products for the bundle, so that I can just ship them right away without having to make anything (unless the customer requests a change to the bundle), which means that if I don't sell all five (and I doubt I'll sell even one) I have five copies of ten different products premade and ready to go should someone buy them individually afterwards.

   If this bundle goes well, however (perhaps even if it doesn't), then I'm going to do it again for Black Friday.

   My parents have also booked their holiday for September, which means Seeg and I will get our second holiday-at-home of the year (and this time I will NOT spend the whole time on the computer!), so I'm pleased about that. It might only be a week, but it should still be lovely. Plus, last time they went away they brought me back a fricking pleisosaur vertebrae!!

   Money has been pretty tight for us, with our already meagre savings dwindling down to nothing, so we're feel quite miserable at the moment (hence my decision to attempt selling a jewellery bundle), and I've been doing all I can. After changing my monsters, which I hadn't sold since February, into patterns, I've actually sold one of the PDFs, and it's also encouraged me to sew again, since I'd only ever have to make one or two of any single design, so I've been working on some new plushies with what little money we do have.

    All in all, though, we're both pretty happy. I'm seriously enjoying WoW again, and Seeg has a new game to play which he's enjoying too. I was gonna try it but it looks a little frustrating. I don't play frustrating games, because they're frustrating. WoW is easy, so I can get lost in it without having to worry about dying and losing progress since my last save. The summer has been pretty bearable so far, too (knock on wood) so that's good. Mum's been coping better than expected, but she still can't handle the heat without nearly falling out of her wheelchair, so the summer is very hard on all of us. Still, y'know, ice cream.