http://www.nikiandlola.com

We are excited to bring you new pieces and the creative process!

Cheers!

Angie

I think I have been 10 weeks out of commission, my beads had been all put away and tidied for me to heal and for people to not be sticking their little fingers all over my beads. I have continued to do some business research, reading business strategies and other sources of materials I can get my hands off.

Never have I realised how much a business partner would have been ridiculously handy for me… my business took a stall like I couldn’t express in any other way that the stand still almost echoed. I could barely type twitter statuses, Facebook fan page took a dive, and well I never got a chance to come on here. It would have been nice to have someone continue the momentum I had started, the feel, the creation, the meetings or organising…

Business alone is great, you are solely gathering 100% of your profits, you don’t have to split it and you don’t have to fight over it… but if you are sick, if you can’t work that day there really is no profit, the momentum lags and your business suffers to some small degree.

I can put together pieces now, and that Look-book is finally really getting put together…. this is something to think about though, partners not really a bad idea!

So this post not going to be about me… want to know what you did?

Never realised how much I can’t do without having the mobility to bend down and rotate my wrist. Personally I am of no help in my house, can’t change diapers, wash dishes or pick up my babies!

Business wise… it’s a task to type- twice the time typing with one hand; but I cannot create any new jewelry pieces which is really bothering me creatively… I need a creative release!

So 6 weeks out I will be.., trying to keep busy, shoot me a line a fun conversation would be nice!

Having a business start-up is a learning curve all on it’s own for me. I read and read mostly everyday about ways to get my brand out there, my name recognised, my business work in order and MARKETING!

Ohhh what marketing has become in this day and age. You cannot read a paragraph about small business marketing without reading the words free social media sites. Makes sense of course, here you are a start-up business with not tons of sales coming in… you can’t be paying for a coloured page in Vogue which fetches around $128,000 and I am not talking about front inside cover or back cover (anyone who works in fashion understand what the difference is here.)

I have to use the most inundated social media forums, much to the chagrin of my fellow friends who get bombarded by me all the time with new products and info regarding my business. I am on Facebook but by now you already know that and now I have dived into the realm of Twitter. I had been attempting to understand it’s functionality, how it works and why… and today was my most successful date for my acct. I had about 8 new followers.

So here’s to put puting away, so incase you wanted to come on over and join me on twitter please come follow me at http://twitter.com/nikiandlola

As a mommy of 2 running a business from my home I need to come up with promotional ideas that don’t take up too much of my time. And today a Fellow Etsian posted a link to Animoto.com.

Animoto makes video shorts that are about 30 seconds in length, they are so fun and fantastic, I haven’t been this excited about something in such a long time. The song in my video is called Flaunt, by Girls love shoes~ on a side note now I LOVE this song!!!

So please take a moment to check out my video, let me know what you think.

Niki & Lola video short

A lot has happened to me in the last while and I promise to update soon enough I thought I would let you know that I am running a SALE!!!

This weekend only on Etsy, I am having a 10% sale on everything in the store. If you get a minute please stop by www.nikiandlola.etsy.com

Thanks again faithful supporters!

But I am obviously understanding that if I want to have a sustainable business I need to keep my ideas current and fresh and be thinking about what is coming up.

So I have started to concept out my Fall collection and think it will be Fantastic. I know I told you all I was working on Feathers a while back, I have reworked the idea and it will be Feathers for Fall. I am also thinking of Vegas a lot. Never stepped foot in the place, but hey sales might be so fantastic this year that I might go and celebrate my 29th birthday in Vegas. No wouldn’t that be an idea…

OK back from my tangent…. I am thinking glitzy but harsh. Rock and Roll meets Cindi Lauper. Colour… just because I can’t work with only black. Still rocking the gold, but a lot more dirty silver, as I will call it.  Sneak peek at my Vegas inspired pieces…

I love my city, as much as the next person. It has it’s ups and downs like every other city in the world. I am not a fan of my local government…

We have had a Garbage Strike (or so that is all the focus is on) in my city for over a month now. We have not had one physical garbage pick up since the first day of the strike.

I don’t believe I should take my garbage to a land drop off site, so that it can sit and rot inside a grass pit, be soaked by unseasonable rain down pour  and wait for the fellow garbage men to deal with once they return to their posts.

What I find is that it’s real convenient for my Local Mayor, who has on many years budgets complain repeatedly he doesn’t want to pay for swimming pools, that all those services are on strike as well as garbage. That no compensation will be awarded to all the people who have been paying property tax accordingly… especially someone like me whose house jumped 30% in value with the new taxation.

We had politely attempted to store our garbage, got rid of most of our diapers, we have about 10 a day around here… but I believe it’s time that our Mayor Miller here in Toronto, get off his arse and put all those teenaged kids who are lifesavers for the summer have their jobs back. Because Garbage does NOT affect them, they need money too!

**** Image provided by the ohh soo generous Joanne, who we are very thankful too!! Please take a look at the advertising on the can, speechless!***

Sometimes things are difficult or drawn-out! Sometimes things make you tense, sometimes people exasperate you…

but how often do you blow your modem? Literally!

About a week ago or so, I was happily doing my thing on my computer, my computer is on at least 20 hours a day; the Internet that whole time as well. I am a multi-window browser.

On any given day I have my Etsy, my Blog, my Facebook, my twitter, craftcult.com, craftopolis.com, and various other websites that are open. I am addicted to Google Analytics open a bunch of hours a day. If you look at the bottom of my screen there are 4 browsers open, and within those browsers an average of 5 browser tabs open. I am a constant thought person… I really thrive on Multi-tasking.

With all this activity I throw at my computer, plus the extra no break my husband provides to our Internet service… we blew our modem. Didn’t think it was possible did you?? First we blew the fuse itself with the modem, had to plug in the modem to a whole other jack, after a few days…. total Internet disconnect. No Internet because we baked the modem to oblivion!

Completely toast, kaput, no function… one little red light of dismay! Multiple phone conversations with the Nice Folk over at Bell Canada; who were perplexed sent me a new modem in a day flat and with patience and a million questions help me figure out why I was Internet less.

So, here I am back on… Finally! 3 days feels like an eternity to me. All browsers open again, 5 tabs on the browser currently… and a smile of redemption on my face.