This Month on Zazzle and Redbubble

Today marks the end of my 2nd month on zazzle and my first month on redbubble! This month was up and down for me, for many reasons. For the most part I was really productive, I added many new designs, explored different things, did tons of research, branched out to different social media platforms and even updated my zazzle store front! But at times I felt really discouraged, despite the awesome feedback I received from friends and fellow zazzlers on my shop and items, because my shops didn't see much action this month. I added most of the designs from zazzle to redbubble, but I don't advertise my redbubble shop as much as my zazzle shop. Here are some of my noteworthy things from each store.

My Redbubble Shop

I've now been on redbubble for 1 month. Earlier in the month I noted that I get way more views on my redbubble items that I do on my zazzle store. That trend continues, even with minimal advertising off site. What I have continued to do is add my designs to groups. I add each design to maybe 1 or two zazzle groups that they appropriately fit.

Page views: 2738 Total views across 14 designs
Most viewed design: 365 views on my Red Fox and Hearts pattern
Despite the high amount of views, I have had no sales in my first month at redbubble.

A pillow from my most viewed design. I do like how redbubble groups page views by design,
but it would also be nice to see which item specifically is popular.

My Zazzle Shop

My Zazzle store has been open for 2 months now. I was very productive on zazzle, I have now designed 1,465 items, and just in time for February I have designed a brand new organized shop front! As you know I made my first sale in December, and I was really excited about that. I expected atleast one sale in January, and I started to feel a bit down when it seemed like that wouldn't happen. Just as January came to an end however, I sold my first iPad case, which means I have sold something for each month I have been on zazzle! :) That definitely boosted my spirits, as I know all the promoting I am doing isn't for nothing. Hopefully I will see this trend grow. Here are some noteworthy things from my shop this month!

Pageviews: 518 in January
Most Viewed Item: I Survived Valentines Day Pillow with 36 views

I survived Valentines Day Pillow by TanyaDraws

My shops most liked item on zazzle (3 likes):

Pink Chrysanthemum and Chevron Coffee Mug by TanyaDraws

Sold In January: Illustrated Flowers & Laurel Leaves iPad air Cover

Illustrated Flowers & Laurel Leaves iPad Air Covers by TanyaDraws

My Personal Favourite from this month: Glitter Tropical Pineapple Pillow

Glitter Tropical Pineapple with Stripes and Dots Throw Pillows by TanyaDraws

Another noteworthy thing I would like to mention is that 7 people "like" my shop! :) I also learned a lot this month about creating items, designing patterns in illustrator, and new vector tricks as I continue to explore different styles of digital art.
Also, completely unrelated, but I really really like the Apple Custard Tea from David's tea. I am drinking it right now and it is soo good! I just had to share this. :P
So there you have it, the highlights from my January in one blog post! It will be interesting to see what February brings.

So what was noteworthy in your first month of 2015? :)

If you find this post useful and would like me to track something in my February 2015 summary, let me know!

New Zazzle Fabrics : Pineapple Retro Print

So yesterday I found out that zazzle has a new product available for creation.. fabric! I am really excited to be able to print my own patterns on fabric. I wanted to sign up for spoonflower, but I can now use zazzle to test the waters before jumping straight in. I plan on making TONS of fabrics... I even created a new category to display them in! In fact, I was quite productive today and revamped the whole storefront of my zazzle shop with a new banner and more organized categories. Head on over to my shop and see it, and let me know if you like the changes! :)

Now about those fabrics! I made all my designs available in fabric patterns... and even created a new bunch of designs just for the occasion! I created new vintage inspired pineapple designs using watercolour textures, my trusty vector shapes and my new favourite thing, glitter. I used a retro colour palette for some of them and kept the pineapples simplistic. I am really happy with how they turned out, and they look fantastic on the fabric. Here they are:

This is my favourite pattern out of the bunch! I used chartreuse green and a light tiffany blue to go along with my glitter pineapples. I think this one looks the best on the fabrics, too. I can see it being used as fabric for curtains, accent pillowcases and chair cushion covers in someones summer home. I would also love to see someone make an ironically summery circle scarf out of this one! ;)

Glitter Tropical Pineapple with Stripes and Dotted Fabric by TanyaDraws
Check out more Zazzle Fabric

A more modern trendy piece, featuring geometric tribal print lines and of course, the glittery pineapple. I put this pattern on a neon green background for fun, and I actually like it so I kept it. The colour is very different from what I usually use on designs! As usual however, you can change that background colour to be whatever you want. 

Glitter Tropical Pineapple with Geometric Pattern Fabric by TanyaDraws
See more Fabric at Zazzle

My second favourite pattern! It was a tough choice between this one and the stripes one, because this one also looks fantastic on fabrics. I used the same colour palette as the stripes and dots one, but I went with a more 60s fabric feel with a multi coloured circle pattern. Despite liking the other one better, I do think I maintained the retro look more consistently in this one!

Glitter Tropical Pineapple with 60s Circle Pattern Fabric by TanyaDraws
See more Fabric at Zazzle

This was actually the first pattern I made, using multiple watercolour textures in object masks! This file was so big that I couldn't open it again to alter it. So while I sent it over to my boyfriend for him to open on his way better computer, I started creating the pineapples above! I am so glad I couldn't open it, or else I wouldn't have made the pineapples in that style. I like them so much more than this one. 

Tropical Summertime Watercolor Pineapple Pattern Fabric by TanyaDraws
See more Fabric at Zazzle

Any zazzlers out there? I would love to see your new fabric designs! Feel free to comment with links to them below. Happy crafting!

Mustard Yellow & New Projects

Hello, hope everyone had a fantastic weekend! I spent mine watching a lot of movies and not doing anything productive at all! :) Sometimes its nice to take a nice break away from all the things you have been working on, in addition to work itself. I did miss a few daily drawing posts, but I will catch up on that eventually. While I wasn't doing very much creative stuff this weekend, I did do a little research on adobe illustrator and I have a few projects that I want to try!

In the spirit of my newfound urge to use glitter in my designs, I decided I am going to try to create my own glitter rather than using glitter photos. Here is the TutsPlus tutorial I am going to use! I'm always excited about learning a new effect in illustrator. ;) 

Last week I started playing around with polyvore and wanelo, and both are very useful for posting my products! Already I have seen an increase in views on the items that I have posted there, and they are both so easy to use. They may replace pinterest as my go to product viewing and posting websites. I am especially loving polyvore, making sets and collections is really fun and it allows me to create outfits without actually shopping! :) I mix some of the items from my shop into my sets to show how they can work in an outfit while focusing on the set itself. Here is my latest set, featuring some of my snails illustration designs in a mustard yellow outfit theme! I just love colour themed sets.

For the love of Mustard Yellow by tanyaleannel featuring Vera Bradley

And finally to end this monday post, here is a preview of the sort of projects I want to work on this week. I created this glitter tribal print pillow which is perfectly glamorous and rich in colour. I plan on making more glitter patterns like this all week, be prepared!

Glam Turquoise Glitter Tribal Print Pillow by TanyaDraws
Browse Tribal Pillows

Illustration Friday: Toy

I used to do drawings every week for Illustration Friday's picks. If you are an artist looking to keep creative, illustration friday picks a new topic every week and many artists submit their weekly drawing. I decided to hop back on board when I saw that this weeks topic was Toy! I thought about drawing stuffed animals or my 3ds, which is my favourite toy of all...... but when I opened up my new illustrator document I just knew I needed to do a marble study.

I have a lovely collection of real glass marbles from when my mom was a child, and I loved playing with them when I was a kid. Now I didn't play them the traditional way, in fact I never even knew there was a game! My brother and I made up our own game, we used to roll or flick them down my pool table to knock over different pokemon clay figures I made. The person who had the most pokemon at the end won! XD

The marbles are so beautiful and every one is unique, which is why I loved them so much as a child. As I am trying to improve my adobe illustrator skills, I decided that drawing glass marbles would be a good way to familiarize myself with shadows and highlights with layers. I paired my marbles with jacks (another toy that I didn't properly know how to use.... ) and together they make a nice study.

I guess these marbles are "cats eye" marbles. I knew there were different patterns, but I didn't know they each had their own names, and I didn't know just how many types of marbles there were!

I chose modern and bright colours for these marbles, rather than
the light glass traditional marble colours. They were fun to make!
I am not sure if I like the jacks in there, but I will keep them for
now.  

Other than that, here are some shop and zazzle updates! Zazzle is having a 33% off sale, code GOSEMIANNUAL! I added my cute kitten faces design to all the rest of the products that I liked it on. Check out my cute kitten face and heart "cat lovers" items! They say things like "meow" "I love cats" and "cat lover". Here is the design in a mug and in refrigerator magnets. Have a happy Wednesday!

I love cats cute kitten mug by TanyaDraws   Cute Kitten Face Pattern Cat Lover Refrigerator Magnet    by TanyaDraws

Valentines Day Survival Guide

If you feel like punching out heart covered teddy bears in stores
then this blog post might just be for you 

Valentines day is coming up fast! Already the store shelves are decorated in pink and red and flower shops are eagerly awaiting the day they get to bump up their prices.

But what about those who have a strong hatred for valentines day? You don't have to hate it, have a comedic valentines day survival party with your friends! Bake anti-valentines day message cookies, mix yummy anti-valentines day drinks, exchange cheesy kids valentines cards with your friends, play pin-the-tail-on-the-teddy-bear-from-stupid-jerk-face... the possibilities are endless! Here are some great anti-valentines day party ideas from around the internet. Enjoy!

Latina.com blog gives  some great valentines day and anti-valentines

day cocktails and mixed drinks, such as "cupids broken arrow" and

"valentines day on the rocks". 

Martha Stewart has an awesome conversation heart

cookie great for gifting to your friends. You can write

the regular lovey-dovey stuff, or you can stamp these

bad boys with anti-valentines messages, such as "No way"

"table 4 1" "not a chance" "U wish!"

Over at buzzfeed they have hilarious "villaintine" valentines
cards featuring disney villains.. absolutely great! Valentines
like these are way cooler than the regular kind

And what valentines day is complete without the conversation
hearts themselves? This year, have the candies but with a twist:
bittersweets, that come with the awesomely bitter messages
already on them!

Valentines Survival Kit by tanyaleannel featuring a valentines day mug

In celebration of the very possible anti-valentines day parties, here are some new "I survived valentines day" products from my shop, featuring one of my watercolour heart illustrations. These would be awesome in anti-valentines day party gift bags! Stuff gifts for your friends in the valentines day survival tote bag, or just take it grocery shopping with you to see how many smiles you get.

Now you are prepared to survive Valentines Day and maybe have a bit of fun too! ;)

The Blues & Polyvore Collages

Today is one of those days where I'm just feeling blue, and I'm not really up for doing anything creative. So I opted for some social media time while starting to watch Elementary... which I quite like! It looks like a promising show, and will definitely entertain me on my social media marketing days. I recently joined Polyvore, and just joined Wanelo yesterday. I am still getting the hang of both but I am finding them very nice. I really like the ability to make collages in Polyvore, but I find it easier to find and post items in wanelo, so I am using them both in conjunction. I post my products to both polyvore and wanelo, and then clip products I like from wanelo into polyvore to make my collages. I think these websites are a great way to get your products out there, in addition to pinterest.

I was reading up on wanelo in particular, one tip I read was that you should always look at what is "trending" and post items that are similar to the ones trending, using similar hashtags. As usual, using hashtags never hurts (might be really noob advice to those of you who already use wanelo... but to me its so new!).

So I didn't make any new products today, but later on in the week I will add my cute cat faces design to more products, and maybe even design something new.... who knows. But for now, here is a Polyvore collage I created, the theme being... you guessed it, the blues. They are cheery blues at least, featuring my hydrangea accessories to go with a cute blue dress. I am actually surprised that I put together something classy and fancy in a sad mood like this, considering in real life I go straight for the sweatpants and oversized sweater.

The blues by tanyaleannel featuring a clear nail polish