2012 Goals: How Am I Doing?

Instead of waiting till next January to see what I accomplished on my goals for 2012, I thought I'd do a check up every so often throughout the year to keep me on my toes and increase the chances of me completing my goals.

Shop Goals Recap:

• Reach 100 Sales.  At the time I first made up my goal list in January I was at 47 sales, as of today I'm at 54!  Not too bad for a month later considering last year I only had 3 sales from Jan 2011 to Feb 20th.  To reach 100 by the end of the year I only need to average 5 sales a month, so I think it's achievable for sure.
• Grow my Etsy Hearts Beads Team into a larger and engaging team.  This has been going very well!  The team has grown from around 30 some members to almost 50, and it's very active!  I have two wonderful and enthusiastic team leaders by my side and I couldn't have done it without them!  We have fun games and contests and we even started our own creative product challenge where members make an item for sale in their shop according to a theme and then we hold a public vote for the best one!  

• Try something new.  My original ideas were metal embossing or stamping, but I need a nice chunk of change before I start buying the supplies and numerous tools needed for either of those.  I have however tried some new things.  I bought a bunch of red brass wire to expand my wire designs to include brass instead of just copper.  I just love this new wire!  I also bought an inexpensive ring mandrel and tried several times to make wire wrapped rings with little success.  It's not that I can't do it, it's more that I cannot get the sizing right to save my life.  The ring starts out the size I want and then somehow I pull it too tight or let it get too lose.  Considering rings are largely custom work, I'm going to put the project on hold.  It's become very frustrating and if it's not enjoyable I'm simply not going to do it right now.  Perhaps some other time.  Another new thing however is that I just ordered some absolutely GORGEOUS sari silk ribbon that is hand dyed and not edged so it can fray naturally.  I'm looking forward to adding some luscious silk to my jewelry!

New brass designs!

• Be more outgoing and charismatic at craft shows.  I haven't done a show yet, so I can't really address this yet but I have been more open lately.  If I get a compliment on something I'm wearing that I've made I'm more open to forking over a biz card and saying "I sell these and more at my shop on Etsy!"  Before I mostly just thanked them and was on my way in my usual shy manner.  I was always afraid of looking pushy but that's just not the case most of the time I've found out.
• Get a Square card reader.  I have a cool new Droid and I have a cool new Square too :)
• Buy new jewelry tools because mine suck.  Yeah they did suck, and I did get new tools too!  I got a set of ergonomic tools from Bead Smith (the link isn't the exact one I got but it's close enough, mine had less pieces) and some nice flush cutters that I hopefully won't break this time and I absolutely LOVE them!  My fingers don't hurt anymore!

• Grow my blog following.  I joined an awesome blog team on Etsy, and I'm very happy that my following has gone up and I get more comments too!  If you haven't followed me yet, be sure to follow me using any of the following options in the column to your right near the bottom.  If you don't have blogger though, don't use the Google Friend Connect, Google is doing away with it soon for bloggers who use other blogging platforms.  You can still follow me with Networked Blogs, Blog Lovin or by email if you don't use Blogger.

Isn't he cute?

Since this is turning into a novel I'll save my personal goals for some other time!