finishing party

Oh, a pretty sky!  This is from walking to the train station this morning.  The camera did something funky, because I don't remember it being quite that red!

I still need to work on creating a good blocking space.  I have a scarf (well, two scarves actually), a shawl, a necklace, and a few other things that need blocking magic.  I keep putting it off, because I am currently blocking on a blanket on a hard wood floor.  One of the nice things about our condo was that it was easy to pin blocking items through a towel or fleece blanket into the carpet.  It felt secure, especially for things like shawls which require a firmer hand in the blocking if you want the points and other details to show.

Last night instead of blocking, I did market research on Etsy (can you see the air quotes?).  I mostly looked at items for sale and shops on Etsy by keyword searching things like knit bracelet or knit hat, and looking at both high end items and more run of the mill items.  My short list of findings were like this:

• Pictures matter. Well lit, modeled products with a variety of shots sell better than the product lain out flat. Especially for items that are meant to be worn.
• The more successsful shops have moved into selling both their products and patterns for some of their easier projects.
• If it looks easy enough that you are shocked that someone would buy it, then you are probably right. No one has bought it.

The clincher for a couple of these was a necklace made of loosely spun merino singles, wound together and tied.  It looked like something you could make with leftovers from a Malabrigo or Manos project.  Possibly attractive, but not something I would buy.  One very successful store that had a large number of hats modeled by a young, attractively made up woman.  Her looks were classic enough that people probably could see themselves in the products.  Her items all had 3 or 4 pictures showing different angles and options for wearing, and were all well lit and clean.

Finishing off last evenings blocking avoidance, I took a project I was working on a couple of years ago - the ascot I started out of Summer Tweed (a bad idea. I finished the project in the called for yarn) - and ripped it.  I then took the two balls of Summer Tweed and started something else.  Mostly doodling with the hands and needles during the football game.  I went to bed after the 3rd quarter, when I realized that my opponent could not beat me if his tight end was out of the game. 

I think I will be doing a lot more ripping in the next few weeks.  I have a pair of gloves that I never got past the wrist and a few other projects like that which would benefit from a bit of yarn reclamation.  I have even started pulling bits and pieces of saved stash and started giving them another going over (oh little half ball of tweed yarn... what was I going to make with you?).  It's pretty freeing going stash diving and WIP destroying.  Maybe I'll have a few less WIPs in my Ravelry by the end of the week!