Cards by Gilly Diary

Now Christmas is over I’ve been thinking of special occasions coming up later in the year. I’ve recently added two new cards to my collection of handmade cards. These are for Valentines Day and are shown below. These are handcrafted for this for this very special occasion and are both based on the theme of “hearts”. You can see some other cards in the “Just for you” section of my Store.

VL001

VL002

Well! Christmas has come and nearly gone. We hope you all had a very happy Christmas.

We have all been very busy preparing the Cards by Gilly Handmade Card Store and Cards by Gilly Handmade Cards Unique Store for 2007. We have some exciting ideas in the pipeline. Watch this space!

We would like to wish one and all a very happy and prosperous New Year. Keep in touch!

I occasionally make a card that I then don’t make again. I may not make it again for a number of reasons, but usually because the card materials turn out to be a bit too complex to use, are not available in reasonable quantities, or are too expensive. These cards are made to my usual high standards of quality though.

These special cards are my “One-of-a-kind” cards as they really are unique and special.

I have now lauched my new site called the “Unique” store for making these cards available for sale on my web site.

During the next few days I will be setting up the process for customers to buy these unique cards.

Visit my new Unique Store: Cards by Gilly “Online Unique Handmade Card Store”

Please check back here for details.

Visit my Olnine Store: Cards by Gilly “Online Handmade Card Store”

Just got round to finishing a few flat versions of 3d Christmas Cards for the Cards by Gilly “Online Handmade Card Store” .

At the moment it seems to take a bit longer to produce a flat versions rather than the normal 3d version. I need to practice!

I have also designed a new Christmas card for the Cards by Gilly “Online Handmade Card Store” . I know I am late getting these up on the internet for this Christmas but it is good experience and I am look forward to a happy New Year in 2007.

I am starting to think about Valentines and Easter now.

Visitors to my Cards by Gilly “Online Handmade Card Store” will notice that some of the images need rescanning as they were made with a camera when the old scanner didn’t work or was erratic.

The above image is of an all white card. My current stock of cards are high quality but mostly have a 3d effect. Even the new scanner produces a shadowy image which doesn’t do justice to the 3d cards. Rescanning these cards though is easier said than done. In order to get a good scanned image I need to produce a special flat version of each card so that it will scan nicely.

Anyone visiting the Cards by Gilly “Online Handmade Card Store” during the next few days will notice that we are changing over the thumbnails images in the Card Store.

When we first set up the Original Online Store we experimented a bit with different image sizes and styles of thumbnails. For the original site 200 x 200 pixel cut outs from each card seemed to work quite well we thought and was quite attractive (example below).

However, now we have implemented the new design for the old style 200 x 200 cut outs didn’t seem to look as good. We have been looking at the styles and sizes again and for the new layout we are now using 100 x 150 pixel thumbnails of the whole card (example below).

We think this looks much clearer. Clicking on the thumbnail will now take visitors to a larger 200 x 300 pixel image of the card together with the description of the card.

Before setting up the Online Handmade Card Store I was heavily into making cards. These are mostly one off cards. I display and store these cards in a purpose designed display cabinet which I take to craft fairs, shows and markets. Having now set up the Online Handmade Card Store I am now looking into the possibility of making these cards available to buy through the Online Handmade Card Store and Blog. Neil, my friendly Web Master at Shortdark is now advising me on how best to move this idea forward.

As a maxim for setting up links in my blog, Neil tells me that it is better to link to other sites where appropriate, for example link to google than to say google is here. I am learning more about how to include helpful things in my blog and I am sure there will be more things in the future.

I have learned how to link an image (see below) back to my Online Handmade Card Store. As we have only recently started doing things online we are finding the technology really clever!

Click on this link to visit my Online Handmade Card Store

Hey hey it has been really exciting during the last week.

Firstly, we have all been busy for the last few days, working with the Web Master at Shortdark to get my new Online Store updated with a sparkling new look. The old store was put up to get us off the ground and it worked really well. We had quite a bit of very positive feedback and I would like to thank everyone for their comments.

Secondly, we have also been busy creating much improved images for the store using our new scanner. The old scanner kept stopping and we couldn’t control the output very well. We all think the images produced by the new scanner are excellent, but please let us know what you think.

The image below is one of the new updated card images uploaded to the site…

A key change to the Online Store is that we are now using 200 X 300 pixel images in the Online Store “shopfront” and also in the card description section. Click on a card image above to see this and let us know what you think…

First of all this is my first entry since going to the craft fair at the Civic Centre last month. The fair went well. Thank you to people who came over to look at my cards as well as buy some!! and those who took the time to talk to me. It’s really good to hear what people think of my cards and to talk to people about them.

Tonight I have been editing some of the card images.. mainly the cards that looked blurred. Eventually I will edit all of the cards… with better images.

The card below is one of the NEW Christmas cards to be added to the site.
This is MC004:

Worked a little on my online Card Store today.

We’re making it so that you can browse pictures and descriptions of my cards and buy whichever cards you like online through Paypal.

The Card Store desperately needs re-designing but the most important thing is that it is up and running for Tuesday. I’ll be giving my business card to interested customers in Liverpool and my e-mail and website address will be on the cards.

I’m told that the store is ready to start adding names, descriptions and prices to the cards now so guess what I’ll be doing on Monday