Several years ago, this would have proceeded at a somewhat slower pace. I'd find a great link, write about in my blog, publish and think- that's enough for the day. With a crazy desire to do more, share more and be more visible on these sites, I often forget to stop and blog about some of these finds. My bad. But a practice I'm finding in more of the blogs I used to follow regularly. We've become "victims" of the instantaneous society. Visual ADD junkies who need a fast and frequent fix - like junk food. Forget developing thoughts into stories, adding depth and interpretation to what someone else has already done and shown to the world. It seems enough to simply say: Hey! This is WORTH LOOKNG AT BECAUSE I LIKE IT!

Time to take a virtual "chill pill" and spend some time thinking about my (our?) habits and consider ways to make the social network experience less frantic and more productive. How to add value to these items. Maybe even how to use them to push us back into the blogosphere. (come on, folks- my once-overflowing RSS reader has been depleted by the lack of great writing. Actually- come on me! My own blogging has been pathetic.)

What has gotten me thinking about how I present myself in media- how things look, how often to share, what am I doing and doing right? was reading Diane Gilliland's new ebook: Social Media for your Crafty Business. While this may be a MUST READ ebook for many business crafters, I think it's likely a great book for any artist trying to build their personal brand on social media- whether a crafter, musician, or sculptor.  Gilliland goes over the basics -focusing on her primary network, Twitter- then suggests methods for developing a good relationship. 

My personal favorite point from the book?  Building trust means talking about more than just yourself.  Gilliland suggests that at least 50% of your tweets should be sharing links and information created by people other than yourself.  Only posting links to your material is broadcasting; old-school style marketing.

Now, if you're finding links, maybe you don't wish to share them right away.  So how do you organize your links in an easy to find and use method to find them and share them later?  Right now, I'm experimenting with two methods.

Last time I looked at any social media tools, it was Smub.it. I'm still using this site to save links for myself and to share links on Twitter. On Facebook, however, it does not format the share to show the original post -and whatever great picture I may wish others to see. So I'm not using it there. Means a multiple step process if I share the same information on multiple sites. A pain, but worth it to me to make my presentation of information the way I wish. Unfortunately, by sharing a page link directly on Facebook, I also lose the ability to quantify who clicks through based upon my recommendation.

For links that I will be sharing at a later time, I'm now saving them to EverNote.  Yes, I could bookmark them to Smub.It - but there isn't yet a folder/file system that lets me organize my links.  EverNote lets me organize items into folders.  Me and organizing the information AFTER I save it -that's what it's all about. 

Gilliland suggests using HootSuite to "schedule" your shared links every couple hours during the day.  This keeps your online presence visible even when you're off actually getting some crafting work done!  I haven't yet started doing this-but it's on my list of things to try in the next few weeks.

How about yourself?  How do you encorporate your crafty life and your social media life?  How do you find time to do it all?  And what would be your #1 hint to someone just entering into this?

Others are talking:

Keep it Social came up with 5 Ways to Optimize Your Facebook Marketing.
The Chicago Sun-Times reported that A.C. Moore Arts and Crafts has hired a digital agency to create and present their presence online.

Debra Roby blogs her creative life at A Stitch in Time and her journey to fitness at Weight for Deb.

At the Long Thread, use thin cardboard and a stick from your yard or a field to make this Bat Mobile.

So here’s an easy project made with thin cardboard. You can use cereal or cracker boxes, or save chipboard from packing materials, like I did here. I think these would also be pretty cut from patterned paper, if you are so inclined. I just cut these from cardboard, poked holes where the eyes should be and hung them to a branch using clear thread. This clear thread looks completely invisible and is light enough for the bats to fly around a bit.

Jennifer Perkins, aka Naughty Secretary Club, posted of her favorite Halloween How-To Videos. These include some fun costume accessories and party decorations.

When you empty your next cereal box, use it to paint a canvas tote in a halloween theme.  Ellen Baker posted this fun tutorial at Alpha Mom.  This same idea can be used to decorate t-shirts or sweatshirts -and I would suggest that using a "glow in the dark" paint would increase visibility for those out visiting the neighborhood Halloween eve.

Rachel Hobson at CRAFTzine found this felted sweater jack-o-lantern wall hanging project created by Betz White.He's made from a scrap of felted wool sweater placed in an embroidery hoop that I spray painted black. Then I pinned yellow felt to the back and reverse appliqued the features with black embroidery floss using a backstitch. After stitching, I cut away the orange to expose the yellow. The stem is a rolled piece of felted sweater ribbing, fringed, and glued on top of the hoop where the screw was.

Cheeky Magpie designed a number of small tombstone shapes perfect for decorating a shelf or desktop.  Print these out, glue them to cardboard, then decorate as you desire!  I think these would be fabulous placetags or name tags for a halloween party.  Would they?

Following Halloween, come the two days of Dia de la Muerte.  Rely on the Crafty Chica, Cathy Cano-Murillo, to create some fabulous crafts for this celebration, including this Embossed Tin Prayer Candle

All project photographs copyright their blog owners.

Debra Roby blogs her creative life at A Stitch in Time and her journey to fitness at Weight for Deb.

In The News:
Andrea Bellamy, from Heavy Petal, had a chance to preview the Michael Pollan Special that will be playing on PBS later this fall: The Botany of Desire.

Subtitled “A Plant’s Eye View of the World,” The Botany of Desire is based on the best-selling Michael Pollan book of the same name. It examines the unique relationship between humans and plants, with the premise that plants use us for their purposes just as we use them. Linking our fundamental desires for sweetness, beauty, intoxication and control with the plants that gratify them — the apple, the tulip, marijuana, and the potato — The Botany of Desire shows that humans are intricately woven into the web of nature, not standing outside it, as so many of us like to believe.

Susan Harris at Sustainable Gardening is one of the creators of the Lawn Reform Coalition.  They are still looking for links to articles that support their basic practices of

• refraining from using synthetic fertilizers and feeding turf grasses with lawn clippings, clover and compost.
• refraining from using broad-spectrum insecticides and fungidices
• treating weeds by growing a thick healthy lawn and overseeding in the fall.
• allowing lawns to go dormant in the height of summer and winter instead of forcing growth through watering.
• mowing grass at a height of 3"- not shorter to cut down on weeds and maintain moisture in the soil.
• reduce the amount of lawn to only those places where their low growth, walkability, and toughness are required.  In all other parts of a landscape, plant more sustainable plants.

At Away to Garden, Margaret shares tips for overwintering tender plants.  I like her first tip best:

No two gardeners’ potential places to stash such treasures will match in temperature or humidity, so when I say the basement works well here, your cellar might not. I have identified my best spots by experimenting, and by killing many things in the process. But every year I score another victory or two because I don’t let failure stop me.
(Isn’t all gardening like that?)

But she's take you through, plant type or plant-by-plant to discuss how to try to save some of the tenuous wonders of your summer garden for next year.

COMPOST:
I got a lot out reading Daisy's analysis of a summer of compost challenges. The woodier items in her compost did not break down well, but she's giving them more time -a whole nother year. But her main challenge:

My main goal was to add in papers of many kinds - papers and cardboards that are food-tainted or otherwise unsuitable for recycling. Take pizza boxes, for example. The lids are usually contaminated with bits of pizza sauce and spices. Advice from the Interwebs said this: tear these lids in strips, soak them to further break down the fibers, and then bury them in the compost. The cardboard circles from the frozen Tombstone can go this route, too. Further experiments: the wrappers from butter/margarine sticks (hoping such small amounts of dairy won't cause a problem), waxy wrappers from orange dreamsicles, an occasional paper towel.

Coopette was also talking compost: of the worm kind.  At a local workshop, she learned how to build her own,  and shared the instructions for making your own worm composter (PDF download) from CAG Oxfordshire.

In fact, anything stackable can be made into a DIY wormery. The bottom tray needs to have no holes in the bottom, so it collects the worm ‘tea’ that drains out. You can fit a tap if you want too, but you could also just tip the liquid out as and when necessary. The upper trays need to have holes drilled into the bottom so that liquid drains down and the worms can move through the trays.

And at Garden Rant, there is a guest rant by Roy Mastronauro entitled: Make Compost, Not Garbage where he explains that the landfill is just a stinkier, less efficient form of composting. And we should have as little to do with adding items to the landfill as possible:

You like dirt, you keep your eyes out for sales on soil amendments. Once in a while, you might buy a bag of it. Meanwhile, you're trying to figure out the best way to deal with your leaves this fall, all those weeds you pulled. "They've got seed heads," you say. If your damned garden was so precious, you wouldn't have let the thing go to seed in the first place, would you? Compost the stuff, give your plants the nutrients, and let them crowd out the weeds.

And other news:

Nickie at Girl Gone Gardening wonders if there my be a silver lining in the dry summer she's had:

Oddly enough, the lack of rain has been joined with a lack of squash bugs. I did not see a SINGLE squash bug this year when normally there are overwhelming numbers of them. I wonder if the lack of rain this year has anything to do with that or if there happens to be another explanation floating around. But anyway, I wish the rain would hold off so I could get some dirt hauled, spinach planted, mulch lain down, and strawberries dug up and shipped out.

At All The Dirt on Gardening, Molly Day discusses the Monarch butterfly caterpillars in her garden.

Debra Roby blogs her creative life at A Stitch in Time and her journey to fitness at Weight for Deb.