Highway Robbery

Recently, I went to Walmart for a few items (really less than 10 items) and I used to enjoy shopping at Walmart because they always boasted decent prices on everything.  I was shocked to find that the cost of some of the items I was there to get actually went up, not much but everything was increasing in price around the store. 


I guess if the prices hadn't jumped somewhat drastically on some items then I wouldn't have noticed since I haven't been really shopping at Walmart of late.  I've been spending my food money at places like Aldi's and Dollar Tree.  Yes, Dollar Tree, where everything is a dollar.  I can find lots of things in their freezer section for meals for just me.  Sometimes I can get several meals from a variety of items mixed and matched from Dollar Tree.  Aldi's has good prices too and their fresh fruits and veggies are pretty good.  Sometimes I don't like the lack of variety at places like Aldi's and Dollar Tree but then again, looking at the prices of places like Walmart and the grocery stores out there, I shouldn't complain.


While on my trip to Walmart, I stopped at Subway, which is actually right inside the entrance to Walmart and I stopped there before heading to the back of the store to pick up half a gallon of milk (used to be $2.50 and is now $2.60).  Subs used to be priced at a decent cost for eating out and now - for the sub I like, it is $7.50 for just a foot long sandwich.  And the girl was new and very chincy with the veggies she was putting on my sub.  I had to tell her to put more stuff on it because the meat was so little and I wanted to feel like I had a hefty sandwich for the price.  If you want to add a drink and chips to that it's another $2.50.  That's $10 before tax for a complete meal.  When did that happen?  The cost of eating out is outrageous.  It's absolutely highway robbery.


 I recently went up to $2 on my bookworms and I'm sure some of you are saying that it's highway robbery for me to do so, but let me explain why.  I've been working with Elaine C. from AIM (Anderson Interfaith Ministries) and she's trying to work a deal with some local shops for my bookworms and books and other things I make and she wanted me to add labels to the bookworms.  Not an easy task in and of itself but I did it.  I purchased a double sided sticky tape dispenser from Walmart, some double sided sticky tape; I ordered some blank sew-on labels from Starlight labels; I ordered some pocket stamps from Vistaprint which are just the right size for the labels.  This is working out well for the bookworms and the labels once stamped will be sewn onto other larger items, once I figure out where to set up my sewing machine - lol.  I have afghans, a crocheted vest, scarves, and shawls to put labels in so this will be another task.  Labor.  It can be so expensive, especially when you are doing all the work yourself.  Anyway, I apologize for being one of those highway robbers since I had to go up in price on my bookworms.  I had no choice.  The cost of everything around me went up, including the yarn I pick up at Walmart (this is when I first noticed that the prices were going up - I had purchased a skein or two for my daughter to finish a project she was working on and was kind of shocked to see that the cost of the yarn had changed, even if it was only 11 cents a skein - still - that was 22 cents extra on 2 skeins).  If bookworms are purchased in bulk of at least 20, I will go back down to my $1.50 each price. 


Anyway, the economy is shifting, prices are going up on everything, and the small business person will be the one left behind if they don't follow suit.  We are all victims of highway robbery - :)

This and That

Not much going on this week.  Halloween is right around the corner and behind that is NaNo (National Novel Writing Month - November) and my writer inspiration friend is back (and particiapting in NaNo also) and I hope to get Imogene's story written during the month. 

I am still running my afghan drawing special through the middle of November for the special deal of 2/$1 - so hurry and get your chances before the deal goes away.

I am also offerig my 8 "Curl up with a good book" afghans at 10% off until October 31 (reduced from $75 to $68 plus shipping - $80 total).  I would love to see them go to good homes and I did have a lot of comments on them at the Sugarfoot festival last weekend.

I've been trying to play catchup with work so I best get over there and really buckle down today since romorrow is laundry day and editing for a friend day.  See you all in the postings - E :)

This and That

The week has flown by but that's because I've been extremely busy with work, since my supervisor was supposed to be off all week and we had to do some of her work. It's all good though. "Train of Clues" (A Mystery Destination story) went on sale Friday both as an ebook and a print book. I haven't put it on smashwords or nook yet as my cover isn't the right size for nook, but it will get there. I did have an ebook sale already - woohooo - made all of 52 cents on that sale - lol. I also have an unreported sale from the week ending 09/22, a copy of "The Tulip Kiss" sold. I'm almost ready for the Georgia COMO event in that I've got all but one afghan completed but I'm not too worried about finishing it since I won't be taking my computer this week and can crochet Wednesday night while I'm chilling. I also need to make up some bookworms in the same color as the afghan and all the crocheting will be behind me. I'll have my tablet with me but that is mostly for taking credit cards and playing games while manning the SELA booth. But hopefully, I'll be so busy that I won't have to play games on the tablet (or read some books I'e recently acquired). I've printed out order forms for the librarians, offering them a 20-25% discount on all orders (some may be just under 20% but all titles are discounted). I've got my tote bag almost packed and ready to go. I'll do laundry tomorrow or Tuesday and pack my suitcase. The car is pretty much packed. Tablet and phone and kindle will be charged and ready to go. So I think I'm pretty close to being prepared. Don't forget that the chances for the red, white and blue afghan are still available through the end of November with the drawing to be held on December 1 and the winner receiving the afghan sometime during the second week of December. If you purchase any book, you get 5 chances for the drawing, so put your orders in now. Books make great gifts. Bookworms make great stocking stuffers and teacher gifts. My Curl Up With A Good Book afghans make excellent winter gifts as well. There are only 8 afghans available - Watercolor, Woodsy, Primary, Aspen, Mirage, Melonberry, Bonbon print, and Marrakesh. If you are wanting an afghan as a gift for someone special, please make sure to order early as I need a three week lead in time to get the yarn and crochet them. No orders will be taken after the end of October, so basically you have one month to place an order. See you all in the postings - have a great week. I may or may not post a WWYWWQ Wednesday but will past next Sunday about the event and everything else that I usually report on. See you all in Macon for the GA COMO - E :)

This and That

Let's get started with sales or downloads. Since technically "The Tulip Kiss" and "The Proposal" are being offered for free, they aren't really sales but I've had a few this week on smashwords, 3 of "The Tulip Kiss" and 1 of "The Proposal", none of Finally Home. On Kindle, there have been no sales this week as well as on Nook. So far this month, though, I've had something sell every week except the week of the 15th with "The Tulip Kiss" having a download on the 1st of the month when I actually started the SSW50 coupon participation on smashwords, Finally Home selling a copy on Kindle the week ending the 7th; Finally Home selling a copy on Nook the 11th; "The Tulip Kiss" selling a copy on Kindle the week ending the 14th; and then this week's downloads on smashwords. None of the downloads on smashwords this month will bring me any royalties unless someone purchases a copy of Finally Home at the half price special in the next couple of days. Tuesday is the final day for the special over on smashwords. So if you haven't received your copy yet and you enjoy reading Nancy Drew mysteries or know someone who would enjoy reading a short mystery similar to Nancy Drew stories, pop over to smashwords and get your copy for only $1.50 (don't forget to use the coupon code SSW50 on checkout).

I've started an Etsy store this week and have put all my bookworms and afghans on there and will be adding the kindle/nook covers and tablet covers soon. I hope you all will stop by and see everything. I'll be adding some more bookworms soon as I picked up three skeins of yarn the other day for bookworm purposes only. For more listings, stop by my shop.

I've been watching the Olympics some but mostly crocheting bookworms and finishing up more afghans. I've got 2 more skeins to finish the Watercolor one and I think I just started the 3rd skein of the Woodsy. All that's left is the Marrakesh. I keep forgetting to take the handheld sewing machine back or purchasing a power cord so I can sew the velcro on the tablet covers but for the most part, everything is finished other than the velcro and a few buttons. I have buttons for half the colors and have sewn those on but need to find buttons for the rest of them. Will be looking for buttons this week.

Nothing else to report for this week so see you all in the postings - E :)

Last Week

This is the last week for all the special deals I have going on. Afghan combos 20% off; ebooks available on smashwords for 1/2 off or free; and chances for the red, white, blue afghan drawing now only $1/chance (actually a permanent reduction in price).

An update on the afghans and what is available: Aspen is completed; Watercolor is 2/3 completed (need to purchase 2 more skeins tomorrow when I'm in town); Melonberry is completed; Primary is completed; and Bonbon print is completed. I started the Woodsy last night and all that is left is the Marrakesh to start and complete. May also get yarn to do another Monet - that will give me 8 afghans. Would really love to start selling them. The Kindle or Nook sleeves and the tablet sleeves are available in Primary, Monet, Bonbon print, Aspen, Woodsy, Watercolor, Melonberry, Marrakesh, Old Glory and Mistletoe. I do need to find some buttons for some of them and get the velcro strips sewn onto the tablet sleeves but for the most part they are completed.

See you all in the postings - E :)

This and That

It's my weekly summary of everything going on and all I can say is that not much has been happening here. There was only one in person sale of Finally Home to the local library as I had given them a copy back in January but somehow it never got to the main branch so the local librarian bought a replacement copy so that it can get catalogued. I also informed her that all my books were available through Baker & Taylor in case they wanted to order more copies of any of the books.

There were no ebook sales at all.

Tuesday was my birthday and I kind of played around all day but did manage to somehow put in 4 hours of work and gained quite a few lines in those 4 hours (I'm paid on production so the more lines I type the more I make). I also had started a 50-day giveaway blitz but only had 3 participants on the first day and none the second or third at all, so I decided to randomly give away things and go back to my regular blogging schedule as I was struggling to come up with 50 days of postings to preschedule.

We had a great speaker, Maggie Toussiant, at our local Sisters in Crime meeting Thursday who talked about pacing, which I posted about here. On the same day, Heidi Thompson from the Writers on the Move group talked about pacing here.

If you would like to be entered to win a copy of Finally Home, stop by my posting from yesterday and leave a comment. If you decide on the ebook copy, I will send you a free kindlegraph, so you are still getting a signed file. Only persons living in the United States are eligible for the print copy (sorry everyone but shipping is rather pricy for outside of the US).

I gave Ms. Faye her nook cover and she suggested I sell them as sets as well - an afghan, a kindle or noo case or a tablet cover (your choice) and a bookworm. So I'll probably drop the afghan price and then do a bundled price for the three matching items. All afghans and covers/sleeves can be found on my website under the gifts tab.

This week coming up will be random repostings from the Writers on the Move blog and the start of a possible series on using pictures to inspire my story Imogene. See you all in the postings - E :)

This and That

First, Happy Mother's Day to all my readers who are mothers and hope your day is extra special. It's definitely spring as my allergies are acting up and I've had a hard time with the runny nose and itchy eyes; one reason I try to not to go outside too much.

Yesterday's welcome center event was pretty successful on several accounts. First, one of the folks there was a representative for a hotel in Greenville, which is the town where our local Sisters in Crimes group meets and he gave me contact information for the owner or person who books their meeting rooms. Hopefully we can get the room booked when we need to for months that we can't have the Runway Cafe without paying a fee to book the meeting room. What's even better is they have a restaurant on site.

I did make a sale of Finally HOme from my car to same representative for his niece when I was packing up some of my things (but that is a hush hush sale since we aren't technically supposed to sell anything at the welcome center secondary to it being a Federal Right of Way). When I got home I checked my kindle stats and noticed I had sold a copy of Finally Home.

That leads me into sales for the week. I sold 1 physical copy of Finally Home as noted above, 1 kindle copy of Finally Home and someone apparently ordered a print copy of Finally Home from Amazon as per my createspace accounting. I had a copy of "The Proposal" sell for kindle during the week and yesterday a copy of "The Tulip Kiss" sold in the UK - pretty good week for me - considering that I've not sold any copies of Finally Home since March at the SCASL conference.

All my ebooks are now available for all ereaders - nook, smashwords (which includes the Sony, Kobo, and computer files to read online), and kindle, except "Bride-and-Seek" as I'm waiting for Heather to get me a correctly sized cover for the nook and reformat the interior for smashwords. When Butterfly Halves is released, during my half a century celebration, I'll offer free downloads of several of the stories from smashwords. (My 50-day giveaway postings start June 5 and run through August 2, minus Sundays and holidays (but I may run a special giveaway for the 4th of July, after all, my JGDS series all about the United States, and what better giveaway than red/white/blue themed one.))

I hope to have at least 2 more afghans completed this week which will be available at the SC Book Festival next weekend. I'd like to have most of them completed, but I took some time away from them to work on a special order and with work and crazy things happening, I just haven't worked on the afghans steadily like I should have. If anyone wants to order an afghan that isn't completed yet (so far Bonbon print is the only completed one but Primary is half completed and Melonberry is started), I will be happy to complete that one before the others. Now is the time to start thinking ahead for presents for the holidays. Afghan orders can be made through my author website or the JGDS website under the gifts tab. Bookworms are still available in all colors and I'm still running my special of 25 bookworms for $30 through Thursday of this week.

Don't forget that chances for the red, white and blue granny square afghan are available throughout the year as well. These can be purchased on either website under the events or calendar of events tab.

This week coming up, tomorrow I'll talk about "website promotion versus book promotion, are they really that different?". Wednesday will be an open day as I've exhausted my WWYWWQ questions and didn't realize I had another week to go before taking a break. Thursday will be a pre-SC Book Festival posting. Saturday evening will be an update of the day's events and Sunday will be a 2-posting day as I'll post my This and That posting and then probably upon returning home after seeing what the event held as far as sales and what not goes. Hope you all have a great week. See you all in the postings - E :)

Curl up with a good book afghans

It's never too early to plan your holiday season list. As of right now, you are about 8-1/2 months away from Christmas. If you have a reader in your life, these afghans would make the perfect gift for a birthday or Christmas. Some areas are just naturally cold all the time and some folks love curling up under a warm afghan and reading a book. So delight your reader with these modified alternating V and cluster stitched afghans. Each sample below measures 18 clusters (about 1/3 of regular width) and 12 rows (1/6 the number of rows a full afghan has). The full afghans measure about 50" (cluster/V rows across) x 45" (72 rows). They sell for $60 each plus shipping and tax ($70 total when ordered from websites; if purchasing at in-person events, only tax would be charged). When ordering, please leave any special requests (if doing solid colors, please indicate the 1st, 2nd and 3rd choices of preferred colors) in the notes section. Also, please make sure your mailing address is correct so that I can send your afghan to you upon completion. Turn around time is about 3-4 weeks.


Colors available are:

Bonbon print (looks like Cotton Candy to me and my daughter keeps trying lay claim to this one)

Woodsy (looks very earth-y to me and this would make a great gift for a guy on your list)

Primary (the colors really don't look like primary colors to me but this is what the yarn is called)

Monet (sold first one but more are on the way) - (this one looks very Easter-y or springy to me)

Melonberry (again has a spring look to it - this is one of my favorites)

Marrakesh (this is the one that has that fall look to it)

Aspen (another one that is guy looking).

(SOLID 3-COLOR, 4-ROW CHANGE SAMPLE; THESE ARE NOT THE PARTICULAR COLORS BEING OFFERED AS THAT CHOICE WILL BE UP TO YOU BUT IF I CANNOT FIND YARN SIMILARLY PRICED THE PRICE WILL HAVE TO GO UP)

(SOLID 3-COLOR, 2-ROW CHANGE SAMPLE; SEE NOTE ABOVE)

(SOLID 1-COLOR SAMPLE; AGAIN SEE NOTE ABOVE)

Also available are 1-solid color afghans (this is the completed afghan in one color of your choice and if ordering solid colors, please say things like sky blue or navy blue or emerald green - something to give me an idea of the color you are looking for - I can't guarantee exact colors on some of them but I will do my best to get as close to the requested as possible); 3-solid colors, 2-row switched out (every two rows (a cluster and V row) will change; please indicate which color is 1st, 2nd and 3rd); or a 3-solid colors, 4-row changed out (this is very similar to the 2-row switched out but every four rows (there will be a cluster row, a V row, a cluster row, a V row) before switching colors. Again, please indicate 1st, 2nd and 3rd colors).

Samples are above. Remembering that the solid colored afghans are not the actual colors I would be restricted to since these are just samples using yarn I happened to have available at the time I was making the samples.

You can order these afghans from either my personal website under the gifts tab or on the JGDS series website also under the gifts tab. With each afghan, you will also receive a matching bookworm at no extra charge.

See you all in the postings - E :)