Before I talk about my trip, I have to do the marketing thing. This is Asrai, and it is the Daily Special on Etsy.Now that we have that out of the way, let's get down to how awesome my mini-vacation was. First, we hit the Rings and Things show, where for just under $200, I left with a bag full of stone beads, Czech glass, and two focal beads that I bought on a whim, because they were cleverly placed next to the cash register. I whole-heartedly recommend these trunk shows to any of my beady friends who have a wholesale license. The beads are beautiful, the prices are awesome, the employees are friendly. You can check the show schedule to see when they'll be in your area.After the show, we left Mesa and headed off to Scottsdale, where our hotel was located. I used Hotwire to book the room, which meant I didn't know where we were staying until after I paid. This could have been disastrous, but it turned out to be perfect. We ended up at the Scottsdale-Paradise Valley Doubletree Resort, which was pretty sweet. Nice room, quiet hotel, and a great pool and hot tub to relax in after dance class. Plus, it was really close to downtown Scottsdale, which as it turns out is just like a California beach town minus the beach. I'd happy visit there again. If you happen to find yourself in downtown Scottsdale, you should consider eating at the Stax Burger Bistro, which was delicious.
On Tuesday night I had my dance class at Plaza de Anaya which is basically one of the best places ever. It was my first time taking a real dance class and I enjoyed it immensely. I can't wait to be in the position to drive to Tempe weekly and take classes -- yes, it really is worth driving 1 1/2 hours each way, when you consider that no one is teaching American Tribal belly dance in Tucson, and they also have an amazing selection of dance clothes for good prices. Which reminds me: I finally have a 10-yard full circle skirt. Eeee! I can't wait to dance in that!
Then on Wednesday, it was over to the Bead Museum. Chris and I purchased a membership, then leisurely browsed through all of the exhibits. I had already seen most of it on a previous trip with my parents, but it was nice to see it all again, share it with Chris, and talk about it with him. Then I did my part to save the museum by doing a little shopping in their gift store, where I picked up a bunch of seed beads (including some metal size 11s) and some gorgeous cabs.
After that it was back home, where my cute little corgis and my awesome friend/dog sitter were waiting for us. I'm pleased to say that the girls were very good for their sitter, maybe because they learned that if they laid around being quiet she'd say "Aww! You guys are being so good!" and give them treats without them exerting any effort. My dogs are very treat motivated!
Now it's time to start putting all of my new beads into my inventory spread sheet, and maybe take some pictures of my haul to share tomorrow.
Today I decided that I should really have Daily Specials on both my site and my Etsy store. So today's two specials are Lilac Whisper (website) and Napping Treasure Hunter (Etsy).I also decided that the specials should be easy to find, because I do want people to buy them. My Etsy shop now has a Daily Special section, and on my website, the Daily Special will be featured on the front page. What could be simpler? Well, I guess maybe checking here for them, or stalking me on Twitter or Facebook. Whatever floats your boat.
One reason why I'm so keen on having Daily Specials is that I'm going to a Rings and Things trunk show in a week, and I'd like to have a little extra spending money to buy new and exciting things. While I'm up in the Phoenix area, I'll also be visiting the Bead Museum. As you may or may not already know, they're having some financial difficulties, so I'm going to try to help them out with a little gift store shopping, as well as purchasing a membership. If you live in AZ and haven't already visited the museum, it's worth spending a couple of hours there admiring the collection.
Before I tell you about my fun trip to Phoenix today, I'd like to mention that my website is back up. Apparently there was a problem with it and it had to be transferred manually, so if I had e-mailed them sooner, it would have been up sooner. They were quite quick to fix the problem after I e-mailed them, so I'm happy now... Even though my mail was bouncing back while the site was down. Ugh!
Anyway, on with the trip! My parents and I went to the Phoenix Metrosprawl today, to visit the Bead Museum there. None of us had ever been, but they were having an exhibit by our favorite polymer clay artist, Christi Friesen. Well, as it turns out, the "exhibit" was only one small display case, but she still has some very nice things there. And between the museum's permanent contents, a huge exhibit on African ritual beadwork and the Trajectories exhibit from the ISGB, and the fact that the gift shop is of course a bead store, there was a lot to see. Not enough to really justify a trip to Phoenix, but we all agreed that it was just nice to be out of the house doing something different on a beautiful day.
Of course I had to wear my latest polymer dragon, Sky Dancer. You can see her above. She's a little coatl who likes to flirt. You can see it in the teasing way she glances over her shoulder and the saucy tilt of her wings. And of course she's adorned herself with green pearls, malachite, lapis, and cobalt glass. Making all of those individual feathers was a chore, but sooo worth it!
While we were in Phoenix we also ate In-N-Out burgers (mmmm) and visited a gigantic Bookmans. For those not from Arizona, Bookmans is a huge used bookstore, which like most book stores these days, also sells CDs, DVDs and other forms of entertainment. They are quite possibly my favorite non-bead store in the whole entire world.
Today's Cool Thing is this week's BFAC auctions! They're ending Sunday, so you'd better bid now :D Of course, there will be more beautiful items next week!
Before I talk about my trip, I have to do the marketing thing. This is Asrai, and it is the Daily Special on Etsy.
