Picture Perfect

A Christmas tree made of sea shells

This week I added to my holiday inventory in both my Atelier Mandaline stores on eBay and Etsy. I made one Christmas tree centerpiece, mostly from oyster shells, which I think make perfect trees since the purple spot in each one looks like a round ornament hanging on the tree. I added to the variety of angel and Madonna ornaments as well, so you can really do a lot of coastal style decorating!

A trio of angel ornaments

I thought I would try another product and just see how they sell: photographic prints. I already did a couple doll themed prints and cards and now I added several square Instagram retro-style prints, mostly of beach scenes. Wouldn't it be wonderful if I could make enough money selling beach-themed stuff to justify buying a beach house? Since none of these have sold yet I suppose that's probably never going to happen.

I am, however, proud to have made a lot of progress in my goal to become a better photographer.  I graduated from university Magna Cum Laude with two degrees, so I didn't get a lot of bad grades, but one of my worst was in photography. I got a C, despite spending countless hours in the darkroom and lugging my camera around town. Ever since I've had a sensitive spot when thinking of it. I just can't stand to not be good at something, especially when I really try! Of course, all the technology now makes a huge difference in photography. It's a far cry from the last time I took square photos, using a pinhole camera I constructed from a shoe box! I printed these in 4x6 inch size to try them out in my stores. The photo area is 3.5 square, but it's still kind of hard to find square Instagram frames, so I thought people could frame them in cheap 4x6 or 5x7 frames and not have to special order frames or have them professionally framed.

I had a lot of "help" making ornaments from Oreo the kitten, who it turns out just adores bags of Spanish moss! She's destined for disappointment for a bit, however. I am going back to dolls now that my holiday inventory is filled out.