Well this will be a very LONG blog post.. but if you want to know about the artist this is the blog post to read!
My story... It all began on June 11, 1987.. the day I was born! LoL.
Well I can't remember the day I was born, but I can remember a lot of my child hood, which is pretty much my crafting background.
When I was growing up, back when you had nap time, always it seemed when the Price is Right was on, and then my mom would turn on golf because it was boring and usually made us go to sleep... that's how long ago.. I remember my mom working on crafts all the time. I grew up in the country, with 3 brothers.. at this time though, only 2. Zack came later on. So anyways, at this time, in the country, my mom stayed at home with us kids. She made crafts all the time, and on the weekends my parents would go to craft shows. My mom was into sewing, my dad worked with wood.
So many things were made in this house.. doll clothes, bears, sheep, tissue box sheep cozies, anything you could think of that could be sewn. In the garage... bird houses, bird feeders, lawn ornaments.
My brothers and I helped where we could, not often could we help with the sewing but when my dad was building, we were out there drilling holes in the front of the bird feeders, sanding feet to cat lawn ornaments that had a feather in the mouth saying "what bird?".. things like that...
This was my happy, content, ful-filling childhood experiences.
When I was 6 my brothers and I joined a 4-H group, and then a couple years later my parents decided to have their own 4-H group. Through all the years in 4-H we had animals, horses, and made crafts. We made wood crafts, fabric crafts, any kind of craft you could think of.
Many years of my life was spent making crafts as you can see. When I was 15 I started my first job, good ol' McD's! lol. Gradually I got out of crafts through those years. During high school I took some business classes, attended Bay Arenac ISD Career Center, took the Business Information Processing class, was an officer in Business Professionals of America both years, 1st as the Secretary, then my senior year as Vice President. I competed in the BPA Regional and State competitions for Prepared Speech 2 years, Global Marketing 1 year, and Advanced Office Systems & Procedures 1 year.
When I graduated in 2005, I then attended a community college in the Fall. I planned to be an Accountant. Started out with 7 different classes, attending 2 classes a night, 4 nights a week, after work. Big mistake! lol. Talk about an overload. Accounting, Economics, Math, Step Aerobics, Lifelong Wellness, Desktop Publishing, and some other class.. it was a long semester.. When I started college, I didnt receive any financial aid, so my mom, knowing I was interested in business and such, decided we would start a partnership.
A&K Gift Gallery was born! I started by having this HUGE home party. Which actually consisted of 3 hosts, and was held in a banquet hall. I sold Home Decorating items.
In the fall of 2008, my mom shows me this tv show, where they showed a Felting Machine. I was in love... so then, I went out and bought one.. needless to say, I unfortunately did not use it much yet.. HOWEVER, a week later, after buying this machine my mom introduced me to single needle felting. I then found my calling. It was the one thing I loved to do.. which introduced me back into the craft world. I started making 3D sculptures, and from then kept adding to my collection. I started selling items on eBay and was REALLY excited when I got my first sale. I named by business
A.D.Designs. We then decided,
A&K Gift Gallery, would no longer sell home decorating items. No more manufactured items for us. My mom already had her business,
T&K Country Treasures and now that I found my niche, we could sell ONLY handmade items.
A.D.Designs - One-Of-A-Kind Needle Felting Sculptures. I hope to one day add on and start making OOAK designs with my felting machine. Purses, Bags, Pillows, etc. But for now, It's single needle felted sculptures.
One day, I needed some beads for eyes for a needle felting sculpture. My mom and I went into the bead shop and this lady told us about how she loved Etsy and how much she didn't like eBay so her and another person made things and sold them all on Etsy. My mom and I decided to check it out. I found my eBay store wasn't worth keeping open for as many products as I had, it wouldn't be profitable. So I then opened an Etsy store.
OOAKbyADDesigns had joined the Etsy Community!
My mom joined Etsy under
T&K Country Treasures and had success not long after!
I then opened up
A&K Gift Gallery on Etsy as well, for all the things I made that didn't fit into my Needle Felting theme under
OOAKbyADDesigns.
Just yesterday, I also had my grandma join Etsy!
Puppets by Margie! She has been making and selling her puppets for over 40 years now! She is very please with Etsy and was happy to see how many views she already had this morning, and even had an item hearted!
But anyways, that leads us to now...
While all of the eBay and Etsy happenings were happening.. I recently was married, on May 30, 2009. Left my Insurance Agent position at a small agency in Auburn, and now work from home full time. :)
So, if you made it this far in the blog post, thank you for staying and reading it all! I know it is quite scattered and VERY gramatically incorrect... however it took about 4 different sittings to finish the first blog post! For now on, the rest will be shorter! lol.
Until Then, Happy Shopping!
~Alicia Marie~
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