Hi! How has your holiday been? Hopefully full of family, good food, and a little bit of rest!

I closed my shop down for a whole week! I hadn’t done that since the week that I had had Lucy last year! A week off did me a lot of good. I went through my house and donated a lot of things that we really were not using. I cleaned and cooked. Walked on my treadmill a lot.

I really don’t have any concept of how to relax!

The picture above is of my dining room. Ah, I miss the days when I used to have time to decorate my house. I always had a home project in the works, waiting to share on the old blog! Lately, though, as my business has grown, I have focused entirely on art and products.

But during my little vacation from work, I felt the old DIY bug creeping up! Maybe I will just paint a bedroom or something and get it out of my system!

Hope you have a great weekend,

Stacie

***UPDATE: 12/18/12 The Jany has removed the offending fox pillow from their website for purchase. It still shows up in background pictures, but it is no longer for sale! No official word from The Jany, and for all I know they could re-list it once things calm down. But thanks to YOU and all of the comments, tweets, e-mails, we made a difference!

Our job doesn’t end there. Many other artists work is still up on the website. Keep spreading the word! THANK YOU*** 

I am so sad today. I woke up to an email from Kristin Loffer Theiss from KLT Works, a fellow handmade artist who sells her work on Etsy, informing me that a large Korean company called The Jany has stolen my ever popular handmade Orange Fox Pillow and are blatantly mass producing it. I created this adorable design in August of 2011, and have been selling it online in my Etsy Shop ever since.

The Jany has also taken artwork from other popular artists, such as Seventy Tree, printed them onto clothing, and are mass producing them. Selling them for less than we can afford to sell our original work for. Devaluing our brands, and stealing our designs.

Here’s a list of the artists who have had their work stolen by The Jany:

Gingiber
KLT Works
The Seventy Tree
Bobo Choses
Ashley Goldberg
Beau Loves

Friends, I am begging you, please share, RT, blog, Instagram about this issue. Copyright infringement is a serious issue, especially in our handmade community.

Every week I hear yet another story about friends and fellow artists who are finding their work stolen off of sites like Society6, Etsy, Big Cartel, etc! The Jany is located overseas is even more difficult to deal with because they do not abide by the same copyright laws that we do in the US. They do supposedly have an office in NYC, so I am hoping this will give us a way in.

You may think (like I did) that there is no way someone would ever copy your work and pass it along as theirs. But it will happen eventually. Especially if we let stores like The Jany get away with this!

Thanks, friends, for your support.

Stacie Bloomfield

Ya’ll, I know many of you are rushing around doing some last minute holiday shopping, and I am here to help!

Check out this section of my shop titled “Ready To Ship“. All of these items will ship immediately in the US and arrive in time for Christmas!

Stacie

Howdy! I’m here to announce the winner of the $100 Gingiber Credit Giveaway!

And without further adu: Congratulations, Jen! I will be emailing you shortly.

Thanks so much to everyone who entered! And to say thanks, save 10% on any Gingiber purchase with discount code “SAVE10”.

Today was a great day. My husband graduated! He now has is PhD and the job search continues!

How was your day?

Stacie

Today I hit a huge milestone: I had my 3000th sale in my Gingiber Etsy shop!

Honestly, whenever I opened my shop in 2009, I never imagined that I would hit this number. It seemed so unattainable. The artists that I looked up to maybe hit the thousands. But me? I was just doodling seahorses and otters and crossing my fingers, hoping that someone would stumble upon my shop and *maybe* make a purchase.

And this morning, when my little Etsy Phone App made that amazing “cha-ching!” noise, letting me know that I had made my 3000th sale, I almost cried with happiness. I know it is just a number, but that means 3000 Gingiber items have been packaged, shipped, and hopefully loved by their recipients.

Thank you for allowing me to live this dream! 

1. Like the Gingiber Facebook Page

2. Follow Gingiber on IG

3. Follow Gingiber on Twitter
4. Or simply leave a comment on this blog post (in case you already do the 3 options above)

Then come back to this post and leave a comment letting me know how you entered! 

Please please please share this with your friends on FB and Twitter. I’d love for as many people as possible to have a chance to win.

Thank you for celebrating with me,

Stacie

It has been a while, eh? It is amazing how priorities shift around as time goes by. I used to blog here daily. Now I just drop in from time to time 🙂

The holiday sales season has been crazy! I have been living off of coffee and adrenaline for the past month filling orders, drawing custom pet portraits, selling at shows, and simply living life. So, I decided that I NEED to schedule some down time. What better time to do that than during Christmas? 

So shop now! Tomorrow (December 10th) is the last day to place an international order and have any chance of it arriving on time. December 20th is the USA deadline.

Booth at The Little Craft Show

In other news, I was on the local news this past Tuesday! It was art week, and I was thrilled to go to the Fox24 studio and talk briefly about Gingiber. 

You can watch the video here.

Oh, and big news, Nathan has his first job interview! 

Stacie