Tag: sales

Five of Eleven

by eileentroemel, posted in Life

I can’t believe my time off is almost half over.  Where did the time go?  I know where it went – lots of holiday things but I’ve still managed to be productive.

All the crocheting I needed to get done, I finished on Sunday!  I was very pleased to finish the slippers Sunday instead of Monday – pushing the deadline of needing them done by Christmas.  Last night I watched a new show while I crocheted.  Wynonna Earp – I thought it was going to be an old time western from the female perspective.  Nope.  It’s a modern paranormal show based on the descendant of Wyatt Earp.  It was enthralling.  There are definitely lots of twists and turns.  I’m binging the first season so tonight when I work on the afghan I’ve got going, I’ll be watching it.

Writing – I’ve been working on updating a bunch of stuff.  It’s been a very productive time which I’m seeing the end of the tunnel for this project.

Today I’m alone in my house.  I can’t remember the last time I was alone in my house for a full day.  I’m enjoying it.  I’ve gotten through the massive number of emails, worked on my website (ongoing) and hope to finish the project today.

In addition, I’ve made phone calls for my daughter and corresponded with our insurance and a variety of other people.

I’ve got a sale going on Smashwords!  Free books include Wayfarer, Defenders of the People, and a short story collection Grandma’s Doilies.  The rest of the Wayfarer and Defenders series are 25% off along with Murder Next Door, Dragon Lord’s Mate, Draconian Peace and Quick & Easy Throws.  Jute & Cotton Baskets, Rise of the Ancients, Moon Affirmations, Secret Past, and the three Moments in poetry books are all 50% off.

Ava Taylor also has items on sale on Smashwords!  She has Sibling Rivalry & Three Races for free.  Exploring Desires, Prospecting, Prisoner 849, Snowbound, Her Captain and Courtesan are all 25% off.

I’ve been trying to stay off social media because again – needed a break but with this sale, I need to be posting at least once a day about it.  Even during the holidays, I don’t stop working because it’s important I keep engaging people.

I went to my family Christmas.  While there, I delivered items to people.  I also got orders for more stuff.  The good thing about this – I’m going to Joann’s over the weekend.  I’m really looking forward to shopping with my niece.  It will be a nice outing for the two of us.  I hope I can find the colors of the items I want.  Joann’s has a sale going on for which I’ve gotten a flyer which I’ll be taking with me.  The fabulous thing – I have two gift cards for $125 so none of what I buy I’ll be paying for!  I get to feed my obsession without paying for my obsession.

Our immediate family is doing Christmas on Saturday!  We normally do ours early and I’m not sure I like the late thing but the girls are all going to be together.  I think it will be good.  We’ll video chat.  There are several things I want to see the girls open and hope they like.

Until then, I have a long to do list… too long to list here.

Where is My Crazy Brain?

by eileentroemel, posted in Life, Writing

In my family, there’s a story my maternal grandmother was a descendant from a Native American.  I’ve heard this story my entire life.  It was interesting to get my DNA testing done and discover where my DNA comes from.  One of which was a slight indicator (1%) of Native American.

But of course, I have two parents.  My father is passed so we couldn’t test him.  However, my mom did get tested and we recently got her results.  There was a lot of similarity in our DNA – as you would expect – but interestingly no Native American, not a trace of it.  This means if there was any (which with such a small percentage it’s debatable) Native American in my lineage, it came through my father’s family.

One of my sisters also got her DNA done and it was fascinating to see the differences between her and I even though we have the same parents.  We were able to see three areas which were not in my mother’s DNA so they are good indicators of our father’s DNA.

I find genetics a fascinating topic and if I were science minded (which I fail at completely) I would go into genetics.  Now it would be interesting to see how the other siblings compare.  I would also love to have my husband and all my daughters tested.  I just have to convince the people and find the money to do it.

We had our rummage sale over the weekend.  We got rid of several of the big items and some of the other stuff.  When it was done, Ken and Vicki filled up her Equinox and took a load to Goodwill.  During the sale, we only sold two big items which was disappointing.  Vicki suggested we post the other items on Facebook.  So I did.  We sold three more items through Facebook.  I have a number of them still posted and we will see what happens.

We still have items in my garage which will need to be loaded into her car and donated.  I’m hoping that will be on the agenda for this weekend.  There were a few other things which were higher dollar items I want to post to Facebook.  Additionally, I have a bunch of crocheting I want to do.  Preventing me is the need to work on my stories.  They’ve been taking over!  I love it but it can also be exhausting.

The next thing for me to prep for is to determine if I’m going to make the attempt do the vendor sale in November.  If I am, I need to make a lot more crocheted items – including a lot more variety.  The thing is I feel if I’m going to do the vendor’s sale, I should be able to take credit cards.  This I’d have to figure out.  It’s a lot of research and I’m not sure I want to hassle with it.  This is why I waffle.

If I do the vendor’s sale, I could take my books and crocheting.  I might be able to put out my books and sell some with more profit going into my pocket.  It’s definitely something to consider.

Right now on my couch, I have a dozen projects but have been so buy writing, I don’t have time to crochet.  I may have to take a Saturday or Sunday to binge watch something and work on finishing projects.  I’ve been getting ideas and ideas and ideas on projects I want to work on so I know I’ll be switching from writing to crocheting in the near future.

Errands, Bookwork, Snow, and Organizing

by eileentroemel, posted in Crochet and crafting, Life, Writing

This morning I got up much earlier than I wanted to but I paid bills, did budget, and placed an order with our butcher shop – Sorgs.  Ken and I ran out to Sorgs through snow and wind.  After Sorgs and bringing the stuff home, we went to Joann’s, Home Depot, and Wendy’s.  At Joann’s I bought material for gifts I’m making.  Of course I had coupons.  While I spent $29, I saved $32 in the process.

At Home Depot we priced out projects we want to do to the house.  I asked a lot of questions and the people were very helpful.  We picked up what we needed to finish my shelves for the craft room.  On our way home we picked up lunch.

Ken has since finished my shelves.  My next stop will be going to the craft room to organize and put away all my goodies.  For now, I’m working on catching up the checkbook and recording my sales for March.  I’ve also figured out how to automatically calculate a breakdown of my sales – so by month by vendor by book type – in January from Kindle I sold how many crochet patterns, or novels, etc.

Formulas and I in Excel don’t always work.  Stephanie helped me find the right one.  I got it set up, copied and now all I have to do is enter my sales by book and it figures out how to count it.  I can now easily tell which category of book is selling at what percent, percent of sales each month compared to the total annual sales.  I can tell you through which vendor I sell the most books.  Finally I’ve broken it down by category and vendor.  This should allegedly help me focus my marketing.  I might have to do some graphs to get a better handle on it.

In the last half hour, I’ve looked out my window and saw blue sky and driving sideways snow.  Welcome to Wisconsin’s spring!  Goofy weather.

On to organizing.  I am hoping to make my craft room look much more presentable by the end of the day.  I’m also hoping to have to ask for minimal help from Ken.  However, I shouldn’t be moving shelving units around so we shall see how things go.  

Weekend Options

by eileentroemel, posted in Crochet and crafting, Life

The weekend looms in front of me with a large list of things to do.  It is pay week so that means all the normal errands.  In addition, I want to go to Michaels for their sale.  They are having a sale on crochet cotton which I use a great deal of.  It’s on sale for 97 cents.  I downloaded their app for my smart phone and got a 20% off my entire order coupon.  This means the crochet cotton will be about 78 cents a skein.  Normal price – anywhere from 1.97 to 2.50 or so.  It is a deal I can’t pass up.

I also have to go to the DMV to renew my license.  This promises to be an interesting event.  Ken is going to go with me.  Hopefully we can accomplish both this afternoon.  If we do, it will leave tomorrow for errands.

Sunday I’m going to my niece’s bridal shower.  I’m so happy for her.  I can’t wait for her to see the gift I made her.  I hope she likes it. 

It will be a busy weekend and yet in my head I’m planning out what else I might get done.  I am nearly done with my student worker’s wristers.  I hope to finish them tonight.  After they are done I’ll turn my attention back to my daughter’s afghan.  My hands aren’t as bent with arthritis.  I can actually make a fist and tighten it with only a small amount of pain.  Her project is not portable.  It will not travel well.  The yarn is delicate and fussy, though exceedingly beautiful. 

If I end up going around while Ken does errands, I’ll probably through a crochet project in a small bag and take it with me.  I have four going on right now and only two of them are overly portable.  Ironically I wouldn’t take any of the current ones with me.  I’d probably take the left over crochet cotton so I could work on trivets or dish towels. 

It promises to be a busy weekend and I’m hoping it will also be a productive one. 

Coupons

by eileentroemel, posted in Life
With the new Roku, I just watched all the episodes of Extreme Couponing.  It is interesting to see the how people save money obsessively.  There are definitely some good ideas on using coupons. 
I guess I was inspired after Ken told me we couldn’t do stuff like that.  I said I don’t have the time to be that obsessive about it.  However, I did make more effort to sign up for our local store’s flyer. 
It was interesting to go out to their flyer and see what they have on sale.  In the past I thought this was a waste of time – I’m just going to buy what I need.  However, I realized if I shift how I buy from the buy what I need to buying what is on sale it will save money.  Obviously starting out, I’m still going to have to buy needed items but over time I’ll be able to stock up on certain items and then they will be at hand. 
For instance, this week there is a sale on pasta.  Unfortunately I couldn’t find a coupon for the pasta.  I can however, stock up on the items on sale as it is a really good deal.  Then I won’t need to buy pasta for a while – plus it is my favorite brand.  My favorite peppers are on sale for an incredible price.  We will buy several bags of them, bring them home, chopped them up, put them in the freezer.  This means when Ken is cooking all he has to do is go in the freezer to grab peppers. 

I’m still going to need all the normal stuff but I will budget to stock up on those items that are on sale so I won’t have to buy them again for a few months.  Then over time I will need less when I go to the store.  Matching sales with coupons increases my savings and lowers my grocery bill.  I’m not saving millions but if I can increases my savings at the grocery store it will help the overall budget.