Interfictions Auction & Music Project

Interfictions Auction & Music Project

I know I mentioned the Interfictions Auction here a while ago but there have been some new developments which allow me to mention it again. I’m tricksy.

First thing is to remind people that, though this auction is mainly to benefit Interfictions 2, we’re accepting creations based on stories from the first anthology, too. We’re not offering to send free stories, but you can always buy it (tricksy!).  If you’re interested, let us know here.

Second thing is that we have a separate but related initiative: The Interfictions Music Project. Since auctioning music doesn’t make much sense, we’re going to sell music, instead. Same deal as with the auction: musicians can base songs or mixes on any story from Interfictions 1 or 2 (they can request an advance story from IF2). We’ll sell the music as downloads during the auction. If we get enough, we’ll create an EP or LP. More details and sign-up form is here.

Click and pass it on!

Technical Help (of the artistic kind)

Technical Help (of the artistic kind)

So I’m almost ready to start working on the IAF auction call to artists but there’s one last technical hurdle to get over. I am putting it out to you, my friends and assorted readers, hoping that there’s a simple solution to this issue.

For the Interfictions 2 auction we want artists to send us stuff based on the stories in the new anthology. However, the auction is going to happen when the book is released. Someone — I believe it was Genevieve — came up with the brilliant idea to put the first few lines or first paragraph of each story online, point artists at them, and then allow the artists to request one story to read and base their creation on.

The technical hurdle I have to get over is how to best present the lines/paragraph of the story. We could just list them all, but that may result in many artists choosing stories at the top of the list and those in the middle or bottom not getting as much love.

I think it would work best to have a dynamic page/form that loads the excerpts in a random order each time somoene loads the page.  It will also allow the artist to choose the story they want by clicking on a radio button right next to the excerpt then filling in their name and information at the bottom.

Does something like this exist already?  Would be cool if it integrated well with WordPress as we intend to use the existing auction site for all this.

The Jewelry I Made This Weekend

The Jewelry I Made This Weekend

For those of you not subscribed to the Raven’s Nest feed (or the LJ syn, it exists!), here are the pieces I made this weekend based on the votes and such:

Optimism in the Face of Darkness
Optimism in the Face of Darkness

Sanguine Spring Pendant
Sanguine Spring Pendant

Sanguine Spring Bracelet
Sanguine Spring Bracelet

They are for sale. Just click the pics. (You’ll be able to see hi-res images, too.)

There’s also a new Reader’s Choice today in honor of Jill Sobule, one of my favorite musicians. She has a new album out soon.

Sound Wave Bracelet

This is so cool.  The Sound Advice Project is a website where you can record a short message to your kids which is translated into a visual representation of soundwaves which is then turned into a bracelet you can give your kid. It’s really awesome! You can customize the colors and the prices look very reasonable — $18 – $25 or so for a bracelet.

I found this on Popgadget and I agree that it would make a great gift for anyone.  Imagine recording “Will You Marry Me?” and then giving it as a gift?

I can already see the awesome possibilities in custom jewelry — take the sound wave bit and create a necklace for it, or even make a long, dangly earring.

If I were creating a special piece of jewelry for someone, I’d definitely consider this.

The Return of Shiny Things

The Return of Shiny Things

In between the 10 million other things I have been and need to be doing, I spent a couple of hours last night updating The Raven’s Nest, my little portfolio/blog for jewelry and prayer beads. As I mentioned not too long ago, I want to start beading again to make a little extra money. Now more than ever, right?

The site is now all controlled via WordPress with galleries conveniently taken care of by the Flickr Photo Album plugin. There’s an RSS feed and an email notification thing.  No LJ-syndication of said feed yet because I don’t have a paid account anymore. I’ll start selling stuff as soon as I make it.

Speaking of: remember me mentioning that I wanted to make a game out of it? I solidified that idea into a feature on the site called Reader’s Choice. That is, you pick the beads and the theme, I then work within those constraints. Check out the first post and vote and stuff!

Money For Nothing

This week I discovered that my workplace is raising my contribution to our health insurance to $50/paycheck.  (Before it was $30.)  I’m not too upset about that (whatever keeps my insurance from going away is fine, plus, they are paying a big chunk), but it does mean more of a crunch on my budget.  I decided that the best way to deal with it is to resolve to make fifty extra bucks a month via creative means.

In some months I’ll get money from stories I sell (and yay that), for the others I think I will again attempt to sell jewelry.  Or, I should say, I will start making jewelry again.  I haven’t for a while, mainly because I have so much else to do.

It used to be that I would make websites for extra cash.  But now that both of my jobs involve dealing with web stuff, I DO NOT want to spend my free time doing it.  At all.  Besides, Jeremy Tolbert is far better at it than me and he is more in need of serious gigs at the moment.

I think that I can swing making two reasonably priced necklaces or five $10 earrings a month.  I may even make a game out of it and solicit your participation.  That’s right, I’m making my readers my accomplices.  Mwahaha.