My New Favorites on etsy!

I always feel special when I see someone has added me to their favorites. When I choose favorites I choose carefully and I hope others take the same consideration. Not just anyone can make it into my Hall of Fame (haha). So today I will introduce some of my hand picked favorites so that you can fall in love with their handy work too!

1. ) KatKrafty aka Kathleen Bostick.
You can find her work on etsy at both www.studiometalsmith.etsy.com and www.katkrafty.etsy.com
She is a terrific silver smith..if thats what they are called...and cool lady. I know her from Dartmouth where she works in the jewelry studio. Check out her Big Carved Moonstone ring. It's fabulous and if you are familar with silver and stones....the price is very affordable.


Big Carved Moonstone ring on etsy. So beautiful.

2.) it's your life.
I don't know this artist personally but I just recently found her shop. She has all kinds of vintage goodies!! I love all things antique and vintage....which fits in with my love of history and archeology.
anyways...
She's from our neighbor to the north Canada...like so many etsy favorites....and she specializes in taking something old and classic and giving it a bit of new life. Very cool. Plus she has great pictures. The backdrops to her images are just as fun and colorful as her jewelry!!
I just recently purchased some pieces to make jewelry from her...look for them in my shop soon!


I love love love cameos! This is one of her many!


OK last one
3.) bonspiel
This clever and funny lady named Ellen also hails from O-Canada! They must have something in their water...
Screen printing seems to be en vogue these days but Miss. bonspiel stands out for me.
She does a beautiful job with her designs. Very simple but they all seem to make a statement. Plus she uses really great materials, American Apparel tee's (so soft and great fit) and yummy leathers for her bags (sorry vegans). It's a good thing I'm poor or else I might go broke buying all her work! I actually just bought one of her leather key chains with a puffy fish on it! It's adorable and affordable.
She also makes silly little "beings of cuteness" for the kiddos or for you!


A beautiful purple suede bag and a minty fresh bunny.
for prices and more items click here!

I am going to try to talk about my favorites at least once a month. So stay tuned for more Adventures in Etsy Land!

Green Key Weekend and nostalgia

(sigh) Students on the Green at Dartmouth
image located at http://www.dartmouth.edu/~gallery/

This coming weekend is one of the great times in Dartmouth's calendar year...Green Key.
We have Homecoming, very traditional, Winter Carnival, very historical, and Green Key. There are concerts, sporting events and tons of parties. I'm not really sure what goes on besides that. All the carnivals are fun but there's something about Green Key that students get really excited about. Alums crawl in from all corners of the country and everyone crosses their fingers the weather stays nice. Graduation and finals are getting closer and closer and pretty soon most people will leave Hanover. It's kind of like the last hurrah before everyone buckles down for exam period. It's hard to explain but there's just a blanket of excitement as people prepare for the weekend. My favorite part was the freedom to do everything or nothing at all. May in New Hampshire can either really suck or be incredibly perfect. I loved sitting on the Green (big grassy area in the center of campus) goofing off with friends not thinking about school work and not having to worry about practice since the season was over. You can get great parties in college any weekend but the feeling of being free from your commitments for even a short time was gold.
Right now many of the members of my class are heading back to Dartmouth for this weekend. I didn't even think of it. I go back east next week for three weeks. I should have just made it four and gone this weekend! O well...I will be at Dartmouth for senior week with my sister Jadah and my two best friends...can't get much better than that!

And to relate it back to Betty Jewels (for all those that made it to the end of this blog) i'm going to give Dartmouth students a Green Key discount this weekend. So if any of you are reading this contact me if you see anything on etsy you like!

Blogger dud

I'm refering to myself.
Geesh...how do people do this everyday! Is my life that lame I have nothing to talk about 7 days a week?
hmm......I should make a point to write at least once a week right???
Well I am going to blame it on my lack of computer acess. My poor little Mac is still broken and so is my wallet...so therefore it has to wait to be fixed. If I had it I could put it on my lap and blog away while I watch hours of TV. Maybe I will start a 'Fix my Mac fund'. All the proceeds from jewelry sales in June will go towards my sick computer.
Don't worry. I'm only joking. I would never do that. It would be dishonest and selfish.
But a girl can dream right?
Actually the truth is I would write more often if I knew people read it. What comes first, readers or the writing? Maybe if I write more interesting topics I will pick of some fans (ha!).
Or I could just post incredibly cute pictures of my niece.


This was when she was two weeks old. Shes 7 m now.

Isn't she precious?

Love Jewelry and Fight Cancer

See-thru my Heart(s)! 13$ at www.bettyjewels.etsy.com.
100% proceeds from heart earrings to go to RFL.

For the community of Hanover, NH the time has come to start putting teams together and rasing money for Relay for Life. For those of you who have no clue where Hanover is it is the home of Dartmouth College. For those of you who have never heard of Dartmouth....shame on you.
Anyways...
Relay for Life is still fairly new in Hanover but thanks largely to the students it has been a huge success! This year things are heating up already. I can feel the school record (yeah Track Team) about to burst. But that's a good thing! I hope Dartmouth raises more money every year!!! The big fundraiser last year was a Date Auction (yay track team!). We raised about 1500$ in a few hours. This year the whole date auction concept has been over done (boo to copycats) but no hard feelings. Who knows who will come up with the big deal breaker this spring......my money's on the Tuck Business School. They are not part of Dartmouth but affiliated...and did I mention Tuck is consistently in the top 10 for best business schools. So if anyone knows how to make --i mean raise-- money it's Tuck students.
How to help:
You can go to the American Cancer Society to donate, volunteer, sponsor or find an event to attend.
But if you want to personally help me and my friends you can donate to the Track Team's RFL team.
Or
You can buy some jewelry from our etsy shop!
Betty Jewels donates a % of whatever we have to RFL. For this month if you buy any of our Heart earrings we will donate all money made on them to RFL.


I wear my heart on my ears. 13$ on etsy.

Betty Jewels has purses now!

Well sort of.
It's a new project for my days off and when I need a break from making jewelry....hunting for used purses, wallets, clutches etc. Of course to stay en-vogue I must use the word retro or vintage instead of used...but let's face it...it's the same thing.
Once I find my new treasure I put a little embellishment on it to make it more trendy and fashionable.
I prefer stamps since they make inks in every color (or you could use paint) for non-porous surfaces including leather. And they are permanent. So as much as I would love to own a silk-screening thingy stamps are much more affordable and you can use them for a variety of other crafts.


A clutch I bought at an antique store.
(I added the domino). Someones junk
was my treasure! check it out on etsy.

I found a local store that carries my favorite stamps. Yes...I have favorite stamps. Until recently I wasn't even aware that artists had their own line of stamps. Claudine Hellmuth a fantastic collage artist has her own line, unless there are two Claudine Helmuths in the world. I also like Carin Anderrson's stamps.
Ok..enough of my nerdery for now.

Lentils and earrings

Southern California hasn't prepared itself for Betty Jewels. I walk into the boutiques and see only petite (a dime a dozen) earrings that are only moderately eye catching and flashy. I thought SoCal was fashion forward........hmmmm.....well maybe it's just Carlsbad. Anyways, the point to this mini-rant is that I have had Zero success at selling anything to boutiques. A few places looked, took a card and said they would call me (hasn't happened) but most places politely said they weren't right for their clientele. So I guess it will be up to me to bring "big, bold and textured" into the Carlsbad market.


I consider these "tame"...they are lighter, more delicate
but they still hang about 2 inches! haha. You can find
them on etsy.


I think my biggest problem will be that the target market is 40+ and stores are going to make the assumption that only young women wear big earrings. Well I think that is ridiculous. I hate those age rules.....I think that the older you get the crazier you should be able to dress! I plan on walking around in bright colors, big jewelry and even bigger hair until I can't walk anymore! I will celebrate any age by decorating my self in jewelry and no one will dare say a thing!


And these pieces are small to me! Both the snowladies (left) and mini
cut-outs can be found on etsy.

Aza the traveling Gnome!

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Aza baby at the Flower Fields in Carlsbad, CA!
well actually it's Aza under flowers....they wouldn't
let us put her in the field for a picture.

My family came to visit me in Carlsbad at the end of March. My dad, sister and niece drove from NH to Arizona to see my younger sister and then to Cali to see me.....and that was just half the trip!!




Even Aza wanted to drive! She's so cute!

One of my favorites. Look at her curling her toes!