Finding: Whitney

Hello Friends,

Today we will enter the head (figuratively speaking, no Hannibal Lecter stuff) of yet another new artist in the vast handmade jungle, otherwise known as Etsy. Whitney from the shop "Whitney's Wish to Be" has agreed to reveal her soul, or at least the creative part of it, in front of us.Enjoy!

• Share a bit of your story, please.
  

I live in Florida with my husband and elementary age son. Crafting is like therapy to me. I have always enjoyed making gifts for my friends and family. Each year I create a unique Christmas card to mail out. Sometimes I do ask myself "Why do I do this to myself?" , but in the end when the friends call saying how wonderful it is I know why.

Recently I have started going to Estate sales. You have no idea what you will find while you are there. At one sale, I found old necklaces which had wonderful beads but not a great style. When I got home I broke it apart and started using the beads along with beads made from magazines to create new bracelets and necklaces. This is where the idea of Wish To Be came from. Creating new items from old items. 

• What place does art have in your everyday life? How do you manage to balance creativity and chores?

Balancing act is hard to do. I work, serve on my PTA board, I am Mom, Wife, Friend. I am no different then most women...we are busy. Crafting for me is therapy. It gives me time to be creative and work on something I like. Everyone needs to find something they enjoy, whether it be gardening, reading, working out...mine is crafting because it's two fold. I enjoy it and when I gave someone an item they enjoy it too. 

• What is it that inspires you? 

My son. He is impressed that his Mother creates gifts from items that would otherwise end up in a landfill. Our children are more environmentally conscious then we were at that age. They know about recycling, landfills, and global warming. I can say when I was at his age I never gave those things a second thought.

If we are in a flea market or estate sale he will look at an item and say "What can you make out of this?" He keeps me creating and raising the bar.

• What do you expect to happen to your Etsy store in the future? Where do you see yourself in one year?

I would love to have a core group of repeat customers. I don't have to have everyone buying from my site, just people who have purchased from me or who have been referred from previous customers. A referral is an honor, someone liked you and your products enough to put their reputation on the line to refer you. 

Making sure I have a quality product is key to referrals. So, I have several friends, my sons teacher and my mother in law testing products. Several items are in different stages of testing. Products I sell are tested and revamped and tested again, so people know they are buying a quality product. I want people to keep coming back and see what crazy idea has popped out of my head and is now a new item on "Whitney's Wish to Be" . 

• Any strategy to help you achieve your artistic goals? Would you share one tip with all new-born artists? 

My tip is try it. If it doesn't work try it again and again and again. My book purses had several revamps. They were good but not great. so I tried again and again. I still have the original purses and I think I will make picture frames out them. We will see if it works...if not - oh well. I tried and will try again.

• Anything else you'd like to say?

 Thank you for all the people who have , listened to my crazy ideas, tested items for me, visited my Etsy shop, blogged about me, and I can't wait to thank my first Etsy customer. 

• Sharing Pictures:

I Wish to Be your pair of 1/2 Butterfly Lampshades.

I wish to be a purse instead of a Breaking Dawn book.

I wish to be a paper bowl instead of a magazine.

I wish to be a bowl instead of a Barry Manilow Record.

I don't know about you, but I think this is one of the most original shops I've seen recently!
I wonder what my old shoes wish to be? Well, this remains a mystery to me but I'm sure our friend Whitney here can figure something beautiful and practical out!
The only thing left is to say thank you, Whitney, for showing us how art can be green!

I hope you enjoyed "Whitney's Wish To Be"!
Goodbye until Monday, when Bilyana will be with you again,  take care!
Writing to you strapped to a chair in front of the computer by his loving partner,

Kyril