Where have I been?!?

I've been sucked into the year end inventory and taxes preparation. Trying to get that all in order and clean out the office and studio. Now THAT's a major task!

I've created an anti-valentine pendant. These are entitled "pins in my heart." My 14 year old was having a particularly bad few weeks and I just felt bad for him. It's tough to be a teen. Their hearts are so soft and the smallest slight can feel like needles and pins. When I went to the torch, all I could think of was how he felt. So instead of trying to put it out of my mind, I just let it in and be the inspiration for the day.

Published and going on The Road!

I've received the copy of the Annealer magazine - all the effort I put into taking the pictures paid off! I've had several comments on how good the pictures are - of course, it's not all me - the magazine layout for them is fabulous - nice clear, BIG pictures! Remember, if you're interested in the tutorial, pick up an issue of The Annealer Magazine. I've posted a couple pictures of what you can do with the knotting technique once you learn it.

Tomorrow, I'm going to get back to the glass - now that inventory is done, I've been in the studio creating inventory for the next glass show - Urban Glass in NYC and the Spirals that will be coming out in the April edition of Beadwork.

I know, I know, you're thinking, Cindy, why so early? It takes time to create each bead by hand. Every single bead is wound by hand onto a mandrel. So it takes time to create inventory. Urban Glass will be the first show for the spring - I'll also be at Beadfiesta in Monticello, NY in April - that's a new show I added this year. It's their first in NY! I'm excited as the Beadfiesta people are terrific!

Pushing...err changing website buttons?

Re-vamping the website - I'd like to change the words on the buttons - does anyone know how to do that? I'd love to use this flat spiral - such a great one - you can see where I started to wind the glass and where I took a breather then where I ended - love the texture! Would make a great button....now, if I can only figure out how? Let me know if you've got any ideas!

The Annealer Magazine - Lucky Knots!

The Lucky Knots and Lampwork tutorial is published in the Annealer Magazine! After all the struggling I did to get the pictures just right, it was well worth it! They look great in the magazine and are very clear!

Inventory or how many glass rods does one really need?

Do I really need this much glass?!?

The short answer is no.

But there is it, you see it and I counted it - each...glass.....rod.....one...by....one. I have accumulated 4640 rods of glass during my 8 years of lampworking. Why would someone buy that much glass?

New glass colors are like the box of 64 Crayolas you NEED to have! You need to have the box of 64 instead of your little box of 8 because the kid sitting next to you has the box of 64.

I blame this all on streaky pink Yes, that's what I said - streaky pink. I didn't get any of it when it was around and because everyone else wants it, I want it too!

I've slipped into mob mentality! Bring back the streaky pink!

Darn those Italians! They make a color you think you have to have and then leave you!

So in order to compensate for my lack of...ummm..glass, I have acquired multiple pounds of every color. As many "odd" lots as I can get my hands on.

4640 rods worth.

Yup, it's all streaky pink's fault.

Buy some beads and help me get rid of my excess glass. Purdy pleeeease!

I'm Unique! Guerrilla Angle!

Yep, that's right! I've cornered the marketing angle for me - I'm unique! According to this survey, How Many People in the US Have Your Name? There is no other Cindy Gimbrone in the US....does this mean I may run into another Cindy Gimbrone if I go global?

HowManyOfMe.com

There are: 0 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Now that I've decided to become "guerrilla" - I've got to think of all the angles, right? Well, here is where I tell you all that I'm being sarcastic since reading a blog doesn't carry tone of voice. My sarcasm comes from the marketing research I was conducting this morning - the proverbial "vote for me" buttons on everyone's webpage.

Has anyone actually looked at the statistics, i.e., how many "hits" you get from that "Vote for Me" button? I did. The most popular sites get 60. Some of the best artists have only 30 or less hits. If you get the right 30 to 60 hits then 60 is enough, but if they aren't the right hits, then you're spitting into the wind.

Listing your site and posting the "Vote for Me" button is a painless marketing strategy but how effective is it? The site doesn't give any information on how many of the 30 to 60 hits turn into sales for the listers.

Hey, I'm not picking on anyone here - I've taken the painless marketing route too. I've been spitting into the wind for about 2 years now by listing my site on an artist ring. Generated lots of hits and two sales.

Wow - that stinks.

So that's why I'm rolling up my sleeves and "getting guerrilla." I've got to put better effort into this. I've got to look for the right niche and find what's unique about me.

The first thing I've found is my name. I thought for sure I'd find someone else with my name but nope, nada, none!

Kewl!

Merry Christmas, y'All!

The Next Big Thing!

So, I'm looking at some vlogs 'cuz I'm sick and tired of reading about marketing when I come across this - The Next Big Thing! Ok, so I gotta admire the guy for taking on the concept of marketing and making it BIG! Makes me think that marketing can be done in a cynical, outlandish way that might be pretty funny. He's taken the idea of fame and turned it on its head - this guy's a marketing genius and very insightful at the same time! Bravo!

Ok, I gotta go and make some stuff today! Think marketing, Y'All!

What the heck? Guerrilla marketing

So I have to kick myself in the a#$@ for the coming year. I've taken things in hand by buying a book called "Guerrilla marketing in 30 days" - if a guerrilla can't kick me in the you know what who can? The book sounds like a fitness plan - get fit in 30 days! See results fast!

Sell more beads in 30 days!

Earn more cash than you ever thought possible!

Ok, so now I'm getting cynical.

I do need to think about the business end differently. I miss opportunities for people to see my work. Gotta do something about that. So, I've got some pictures up for you to see some of that work!

These are flat spirals - they're made along with the long spirals and are made to compliment them. I love the reactive glass - this is from Doublehelix and is called Gaia - it's their best recipe yet! They're cooking with glass!

Another opportunity to see my handiwork is in the Annealer magazine that will be coming out this month. I wrote a tutorial on Lucky Knots and Lampwork. Can't wait to see it!

Women Flameworkers in the 1940's....

While I'm on the subject of being a "baby boomer" or as I'd rather call myself, a "tail ender" - I've put up a publicity shots of my mother that appeared in brochures for a company called Fachney's. My mother was a flameworker during World War II. making glass thermometers at Fachney's. She set up a bench at home to do "piece work" - thermometers she'd blow at home and then take into work - she was paid by the thermometer or "piece."

Yep, that's my mom in the picture at the bench with her torch with the 1940's ribbon tied in her hair. She's doing the "Rosie the Riveter thing." Look at the glass! Where's the ventilation?? (Mom's 87 now and her lungs are fine!)

I wasn't born yet - so I don't remember her bench at home. I don't remember her working with glass. I don't remember her being a flameworker. Yet she was.

Tail Ender - or did I want to call the end of the boomers BOO-menders? Well whichever I decide in my own personal revolution, the reason is the same - wasn't there, don't remember - so how can you call me a baby boomer?!!?

Duh! Baby boomer vs Tail Ender

The cable internet connection hasn't been working for the past two days. We were cursing the switchover of companies when my husband realized he'd disconnected the cable - DUH! Sometimes, we're just not very bright in this household!

I've been re-evaluating my business goals seeing how it's the end of the year and all. I'm re-vamping everything including how I present myself in writing and so it's time to take a look at my nice safe bio. It's time to mess with it a little and put a little bit more of myself out there - say a few things in writing that I'd say if you were having coffee with me. Be all I can be! Deep breath, here it goes....

I'm a baby boomer but never liked it much - I just don't identify with the boomer generation - never have, never will - probably because I'm a "tail ender" - born near the end of the baby boom (an "oops" baby as my mother describes it - as in "oops" I didn't mean to get pregnant at 40). I missed most of the things that "define the generation."

I think I should start a revolution - Tail Enders unite! Ok, so maybe I do have some of the generation's 60's rebel in me but seriously, how can those born in 1947 have anything in common with someone born in 1960? So, call them the boomers, I need a new name! Tail enders - boom enders....hmmm let's merge that into one word....boomenders - say it like BOO menders. What do you think?

So, keeping that in mind, I've re-written a more irreverent bio:

Being born at the tail end of the baby boom, Cindy has never felt a part of the baby boomer generation – she doesn’t remember when Kennedy was shot, she didn’t go to Woodstock and she didn’t iron her hair. Having a parent from “the Greatest Generation” has made her a packrat - saving and recycling everything because you never know when the stock market will crash again!

Quick! Go stuff your mattress with money!

More Spirals.....

More spirals today - I've been trying them in every transparent color I have! I particularly like the "reactive glass" - Doublehelix being the best of the bunch I think. The green/blue spiral is Doublehelix's Gaia - awesome!

That time of year! Spiral Remembrance Ornament

It's the holiday season and every glass artist worth her weight in glass makes ornaments of some kind. This is the the first year I've come up with an ornament. I haven't really gone to production level on the ornaments but am testing them out for the 2007 Holiday season. Right now, I call them Remembrance Ornaments. They incorporate the spirals and I may end up changing the name later on because of that.

The Remembrance ornament combines the meaning of the spiral with the significance of a milagros. Living in the Arizona, you would see these little metal charms left at the foot of a St. Francis statue. Wondering what they were, I researched them and found out that one says a prayer for the health of a loved one or any other significant person or event in their lives and leaves an offering to the saint. Living in a city where 85% of the population is Catholic, I was familiar with the idea of praying to the saints to ask for assistance.

A few years ago, I purchased a stock of white metal milagros that were handmade in the countryside of Mexico. They are raw and aren't meant to be jewelry quality as they are left with the statue.

The milagros paired with the handmade glass spirals makes a special ornament. I've made up several and am selling them through Chochkey's on Elmwood Avenue in Buffalo, NY. I have this one up on my website. I have only one to sell this season. I have one other left, that one is hanging on my Christmas tree!

New work...Spirals

In the drive to express ideas through my glass, I wanted to express the never-ending cycle of life. How events will happen at one time in your life and then circle back to them again - or how we repeat patterns in our life - you know when you think, "why does this always happen to me?" We have our own life-spirals and we travel around on them and come back to events although maybe not in exactly the same way. But a spiral can bring you peace too, the assurance that everything WILL circle back around. In that sense, it serves as a rudimentary mandala for us to meditate upon.

So, I chose to make spirals in glass to express that idea - glass is a perfect medium because of it's potentially fragile quality. A glass spiral can be beautiful, colorful, reflective yet if you don't treat it with some care, it could shatter.

I make these spirals out of soft glass and the "silver" glass. The silver glass reacts in an unpredictable manner, changing colors as I create the spiral. You can see this in the spiral entitled Spiral of Kronos II. I use two different transparent colors for the Water Spiral.

The Kronos style spirals were sent to Beadwork for the April 2007 Challenge. I'll be excited to see what they do with them! I've made a few into Christmas Remembrance Ornaments and placed them on my website along. If you like them, you can see more at my website

Beadwork Challenge!

If you're familiar with Beadwork magazine, there is a regular column called "The Challenge!" (I added the ! - it just needs to be ! don't you think?). Artists, shop owners send in a "kit" of beads for the editors to incorporate into jewelry. Apparently it is a very popular column. I had to sign up last year for the April 2007 Challenge. The kits have to be sent off early of course so they can make the items and then photograph them, etc.

I'm giddy and nervous!!

Ok, so I've broken the first law of business, "never let them see you sweat!" My business goal for the past year has been- pimp my beads! If I had my druthers, I'd do the middle child thing and just be quiet! Pimpin' the beads is a HUGE step for me! So, I'm excited that I actually have done it and scared to death at the same time!

Ack! Feels like the first time I performed with my tap dance group when I was 5 years old! People are looking at you, Cindy, smile and keep tapping!

I'm tapping off the the post office now to send out the kits! My beads will make an appearance in the April 2007 Challenge column of Beadwork magazine! (tap, tap, tap!)

Guilty pleasures.....hooks and patterns

November 26, 2006....Ahhhh today I confess my guilty pleasurs! Totally off the glass topic, I'm a crochet addict when not in the glass studio! I've mentioned this before but today I'll come clean! Along with hording glass, I'm hording crochet patterns!

My mother taught me how to crochet many years ago when I was a kid. Mom didn't know how to read a pattern like she never followed a recipe - crocheting was all trial and error and figuring out what looked good. I think she probably had memorized a few patterns taught to her like the granny square or an afghan pattern and the rest of her work was done in a combination of the stitches from those memorized patterns.

A few years back, I decided to pick up the hook again and knew I needed to know how to read a pattern. So off I went to JoAnn's and signed up for a crochet class. Within a class or two, I had the knack of pattern reading and was so pleased that I started buying every pattern book I could get my hands on! Ponchos, shawls, shrugs, sweathers, mittens, hats, purses, scarves....you name it! I have a pattern for it!

Here's my latest guilty acquisition....Japanese Arigumi crochet dolls and Hello Kitty pattern books. I won't tell you how much I spent for a pattern book that's written in Japanese! But there aren't any English books like this and I have a hankering to crochet some dolls! (Darn that Crochetville!) I believe or hope that between the international crochet symbols and the pictures, I can figure out the doll patterns. Otherwise, I have spent alot of money for some great crochet eye candy!

Crocheters who make dolls are really sculptors at heart. Crocheting 3D objects is sculpting with yarn. Funny how most of us go into the yarn shop and don't see a 3D object when they look at skeins of wool and acrylic. Doll makers do.

My mother was able to crochet dolls without a pattern. That's the reason for the Chilly Willy picture. I loved Chilly Willy - you know the penguin that cried ice cubes?! He was soooo cute! Mom made me a Chilly Willy once without a pattern....hat, scarf the whole penguin! I'm pretty sure I still have it in the basement somewhere. Kewl she could do it without a pattern!

I'm sure that after I do a few, I'll memorize the pattern just as I've done with the mittens I've made this season. I've made so many, I no longer need to look at the pattern to make them. Then I'll be able to crochet just like Mom!

Glass artist required to be graphic artist!

I wish someone would have told me that I needed to become good at graphic arts, photography and business when I started making beads! There's really no end to the number of times I need to have an ad made or tweaked for a magazine or website. Including my own! This is the new banner I made in Photoshop for the Cindy Gimbrone Beads website. I had a lovely ad made from a graphic artist - I really loved it! The problem came when I needed to tweak it for the website or a web-ad I wanted to take out - I couldn't tweak the ad! I decided as well intentioned as it was to have someone else make the ads, I just had to make them myself. It was the only way I was going to know how to tweak it and update it regularly. I like what I've come up with and I know that I can do the adjustments on it as necessary. When I get my logo completed, I'll be able to tweak the banners and include it.

Memberships and Logos.....

November 15, 2006....Flare up with overuse syndrome has kept me from posting as often as I like. Today I'm going to circle back onto the idea of logos and memberships. I'm a member of the International Society of Glass beadmakers and I've posted their logo today. It's a nice clean logo in blue and white. It makes the point and is very recognizable in the glass world.

Along with it, I've posted a photo of a drawing my son made of me. It's "mommy anime style." He actually drew a complete anime figure but I've only included the head here. At one time, I thought of using this as a logo. Afterall, how awesome is it to have your logo be drawn by your son!?! I love this drawing and keep it at my desk but I don't think it qualifies as a logo. Logos need to be simple and convey the idea of what I do or my name in a basic way. So, I continue to tinker away with ideas of flames, beads and image. I'll continue to circle back around to the logo idea every so often until I find one I like. Stay tuned!

Knots and the Annealer...November 13, 2006

My tutorial for the Lucky Knots and Lampwork bracelet will be appearing in the Annealer Magazine in December. I did a bracelet because in teaching the class, I realized that a necklace takes too long for a beginner. I've also changed the closure/clasp on the bracelet from the original design (shown in the picture).

Let me tell you that photographing knots can really tie you up in knots! You'd think black cording on a white background would work but it's hard to see which cord goes where. So I had to choose two colors of cording and show the knots in progress. You get to see the "reject" photos here, I sent the two colored pictures to the magazine. The entire tutorial will be in the Annealer magazine in December.

Lost blogposts.....

November 3, 2006....Do your posts sometimes go off into cyberspace and disappear? I've had a few that once I hit the publish post, the screen blinks repeatedly and then tells me that there was an error. My missive has disappeared and errored! When I go back to re-write, the moment is lost!

I've been working on the other craft that makes me ruin my hands - crocheting. I love the fact that a generation of young women (in their 20's) are hooking! I see alot of fun and innovative patterns coming from them and it's fabulous!

I've been on a mitten and fingerless glove kick lately - hooking up a mitten in a couple of hours gives me a sense of satisfaction - I can complete something and don't just have an ongoing throw or shawl project - I actually get something made!