This week I worked to put Grassy Creek together. It took about four sessions of sewing to get all the blocks and sashings together. There was a little fudging and smudging, to get the sashing string blocks to fit. In hind sight I should have squared those pieces up before using them. Some of them were ½ inch too long, which was easy enough to fix with the addition of an extra wide seam. This quilt has a lot going on. I decided not to do string borders, but 1 ½ inch mixed squares. As I was putting away the left over fabrics from the top, I cut a 2 inch wide strip from each. I probably need more neutrals, but it’s a start. I have a piece of left over backing fabric that is the perfect green for the inner border too. Also I “found” the perfect backing at Joann’s yesterday. They had a sale with a 20% off coupon, 3 yards of 108 ” wide fabric for $28.00. I did curbside pick-up for the win.
I’m down to the last row of the Hydrangea quilt. I should finish it today, and bind it this weekend. I want to get a few more baby/crib quilts done to post on Etsy. The quilt that has been getting the most hits lately, is a simple blue and white double Irish Chain baby quilt. Etsy has a way that vendors can send coupons to people who have/leave an item in their carts, to spur them into buying it. Sometimes I wonder if people leave it in their carts intentionally to get such a discount. I don’t give any additional discounts, as I feel my prices are low enough, and I offer free shipping. It is a good thing that I don’t have to support myself on the Etsy income. I’m lucky that it pays for itself.
I have the Halloween figs month 8 to do, and I am getting so close to finishing the Cat, the Holiday Snow Village block kit should be here next week too. I need to get the appliqué done on the first block though. The weather has been so nice the past few days, I planted some Pansy plants in my fence planters, no flowers yet though.
Linking up with Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict AND Denise at Put Your Foot Down for their Linky parties today.
Be Kind
Touch of Grey 
Your Grassy Creek is looking fabulous and I love your cross stitch, too! I didn’t know that about the Etsy coupons. I’ll bet I have items left in shopping carts all over the Internet! Sometimes I’m browsing multiple sites simultaneously, looking for something specific and using the shopping cart on each site to keep track of possibilities as I make a decision. Other times, I get interrupted by a phone call, an urgent email, or a “family emergency” (like brawling children or someone letting the dog in the house when he’s covered in mud) and I forget all about what I was shopping for. And, although I’m pretty sure I’ve abandoned items in my Etsy shopping cart before, I’ve never gotten one of those discount coupon offers from an Etsy seller before. I don’t think consumers are as aware of them as Etsy sellers are.
Thank you, I left GC hanging up, and it’s growing on me, it’s one of those quilts that looks better from afar. I’ve learned a lot about Etsy, being a seller, it’s not easy to make it work for you. There is a lot going on behind the scenes, and you have to dig to find answers and processes. I had a buyer last year who I had an uneasy feeling about (scamming?) so I joined an etsy group to figure out how to deal with the sale. They really helped me, and I was able to complete the sale. But Etsy, itself was unresponsive to any of my queries, they are very good at billing though (lol). The cart thing is a bit annoying to me personally. When I look at my store front, I see a bunch of items that are in buyers carts, I naturally get excited, but then they just sit there. I feel that other potential buyers see items in someone else’s cart, and may feel like they are poaching the item if they put it in their cart too. It doesn’t matter much with things like PDF patterns, or where there are lots in stock, but with one of a kind items, I think, most people would be polite and keep looking. Scary flash back to Black Friday sales? On the other hand, I constantly leave items in my Amazon cart, my DH just saves them for later, or sometimes he surprises me – then I am like “hmm why did I want this?”. Etsy also has the “like” heart that you can use to bookmark something, I use them a lot, especially when looking for fabric 😉