the direct approach

 It’s time for me to work. Not just the usual day to day work, but the sort of work that earns money.
I did finish all of my CA client’s clothes and ship them off last week ( hooray!).  Then I made a several yoga mat bags ( someone else in my class asked me to make one for them ).
 
Is there something wrong with me that I feel like celebrating by doing some personal sewing?

I’ve been struggling to make sales on etsy, with not too much success. It seems like there is a ton of stuff you need to do to keep your items in view – refreshing the listings on a weekly or even daily basis(!) which is not only annoying, but the cost of that could add up in short order. I started with Artfire, but that’s been a bigger bust. I like the idea of having a site similar to etsy but with flat fees, but every time I’ve looked around there I’ve been unimpressed. I’ve given it more than a year, but still it just isn’t going in a good direction as a site in general, so it’s time to cut the cord. 
I’m considering taking out a small ad in the paper for custom sewing/alterations, but ………..
I get comments on things that I make regularly, so the other day I thought I’d finally make some business cards to hand out. I tried my hand with some of those that you self-print since I had them here from a long time ago. If I decide that they’re exactly what I want I’ll have some printed; for now making 60 or so is just fine.
You have to remember that I’m not the graphic designer that my sister is.   I sew.   And working in Word is not in my comfort zone. Here’s what I came up with:    

I’m going with a simple and to the point message here. I may revise it a bit ( removing the underline on the title word), but for now I’m happy with it. Any feedback is welcomed. I think I’ll drop a few off at both of the quilt shops here, as I know there are always people who come in asking for someone to sew. I’ve given a few out already, so we’ll see if this gets me anywhere.  I figure that I can continue to make new things for the etsy shop and try to understand how that whole thing works.  

When I was thinking about a direct approach, I remembered something from a long time ago. I was a teenager, waiting to be seen by my doctor. The receptionist and the doctor were having a discussion about his listing in the phone book, and he thought it would seem unethical to have his name listed in boldface type in the white pages – and a yellow pages ad was out of the question! 

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