Central Florida Etsians February 4th 2012 Meeting

Welcome to the Central Florida Etsians Blog Page! Our first meeting of 2012 kicked off at Panera Bread in Heathrow, Florida.  Of the over 300 member we have in the Central Florida area 14 team members were in attendance and we had a fabulous time getting to know one another face-to-face.

Highlights of our meeting included team goals for 2012, an open question and answer forum on how to improve our Etsy shops, sharing our works of art with each other, planning future arts & craft shows, stressing the importance of shopping with local shops and expanding our clientel on Etsy!

Pam from PinkPupsDesigns made the banner for the conference room for us and we sincerely appreciate it!  You can find her shop on Etsy at www.pinkpupsdesigns.etsy.com

Here are some pictures of the meeting in progress.  Gabriela our Team Captain and owner of the Etsy shop Inyourbones www.inyourbones.etsy.com kicked off the meeting by reminding everyone to tag all listings with the "CFEST" tag so our Florida shops can be located easily by customers and the tag can be utilized to find group items to build treasuries.  She also stressed the importance of targeting customers and reminding the team of the importance of shopping local in Central Florida.  

Discussions ranged from arts & craft show venues to where we could hold the next team meeting so that members who could not attend or do not live near this meeting location can come to the next one.  More

details will be published on our Etsy team page soon. 

During our meeting each Etsy shop owner showed a sample of their work and talked about their shop and the inspiration behind their designs.

We talked, ate wonderful Panera Bread goodies, and laughed alot!

Harmony from 3Giraffes 3giraffesinc.etsy.com brought our youngest and most beautiful Etsy team member who is surely going to have a shop as lovely as her Mother's very soon!  After showing us her gorgeous clothing that she designs, Harmony also discussed a charitable auction which she is donating to and that is very near and dear to her heart, the Choose Joy Team Ashley Auction & Benefit taking place February 27th through 29th to help pay for a young mom's cancer treatments. To read about the journey of this incredible mom fighting cancer and find out about how you can donate something to this auction the blog link is www.evystree.com/blog

Mercy Natal from www.creativegadgetcovers.etsy.com makes Laptop sleeves, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro Sleeves, iPad Sleeves, Accessory pouches and more! They are colorful, functional, and well made as well as so much fun!

Katlaya from Kat's Meow www.katlaya.etsy.com shared her passion for creating upcycled copper and other materials for her Pagan jewelry but more interesting Kat makes gorgeous one of a kind Garden Witches and other dolls made of corn husks. This is one of my favorites...

Team member Kristina Serinn from www.kserrin.etsy.com shared her colorful duct tape wallets and crocheted wire jewelry items with the group.

Team member Carolyn Flynn from www.ablazeincolor.etsy.com shared her colorful pen and ink designs with the group.   She explained her passion for creating unique designs and broughtan impressive portfolio of her works.

Susan Burton from www.susiebdesigns.etsy.com shared her silk pillows with us. Susan travels the world to find unique, high quality fabrics and lace for her pillows. The one she is holding is a one of a kind ring bearer pillow. We are also very excited that Susan has stepped up to the plate and volunteered to be our official Central Florida Etsians Event Coordinator and help us stay informed of future arts & craft shows and plan team shows in which we can all try and participate in together as a team.

Our team member Meghan Schuman from www.mescouture.etsy.com shared her unique jewelry creations and we thank her for leaving work early to be with us and brighten our day with her smile!

Unknown to the group, Team Captain Gabriela came over the day before our meeting to put together surprise gift bags for all the members that took the time out of their busy schedules to meet with us. We stuffed the bags with beads, thank you tags, unique findings, soaps and more donated from local Florida shops and wonderful Etsy shops. I will be doing a blog in the next day or so to thank all the people who sent product samples and business information so please check it out once I get it up.

Gabriela handmade each bag for all the goodies.  These bags can be purchased in her Etsy shop www.inyourbones.etsy.com

These photographs are only a sample of the wonderful members who attended our meeting and shared their works of art and ideas for the team.  More photographs from our meeting can be viewed on our Official Facebook team page www.facebook.com/pages/The-Etsy-Central-Florida-Etsians-FB/234169873326435  I apologize for those of you that I did post pictures of...I am a very amateur photographer but the only one who remembered to bring their camera so I did my best. Next time we will have someone else "officially" take the event pictures:)

And if you are wondering who I am...I am Anastacia the Central Florida Etsians Team Blog Writer, happy member, and owner of www.rayvenwoodmanor.etsy.com

To wrap it up...one of the things we talked and joked about was who had a professional or designated work room in their house.  I thought I would share the current official workspace of Rayvenwoodmanor with you with this photo of my assistants. Please note: the cages seen in the back of the photo are not the assistants but the official homes of the Rayvenwoodmanor Pomeranians:)