Week One...What Have I Done???

So, here we are...my first post. I guess I have to start somewhere, so let's start with what I've done so far in my first week as an Etsy seller. Prior to actually opening up shop, so to speak, I did a little research and created a base inventory of about 25 items -- all jewelry so far, but I hope someday to expand to other stuff, like home accessories, maybe a purse or two if I get the sewing or crocheting bug...who knows what else will come if the mood strikes me?! After I had made several items, I enlisted the help of my oh-so-talented Aunt Sue, who takes the most amazing pictures. Her photographs of my jewelry look so focused and professional, and I am eternally grateful for her help...heaven knows it would be a big, hideous mess if I tried to do it myself! So, yeah...research, check. Inventory, check. Photographs, check.

Now what, you ask? Well, I still had to come up with a name for my shop. This was actually much harder than I anticipated, and it took a surprising amount of mental energy, some thumb-twiddling, a bit of head-scratching, brainstorming, and the like before I finally found a name that seemed to "fit." I already know your next question: how did I come up with the marvelous name, The Pink Persimmon? Sit back, relax, and I'll tell you the story:

First of all, for those of you who never met her, I wish you could have known my Grandma. She was one funny, funny lady, and I miss her and think of her daily. She had the most wonderfully wicked sense of humor and was the perfect blend of sweet and long-suffering mixed with inappropriate and irreverent. I love her, and hope that people who knew her can see some of her in me. Anywhooo...moving along...in my "crafting room" (aka: the abyss where my husband throws anything that I ask him to put away, the spare bedroom where all of my crafty stuff is crammed, and my special safe haven where I go and sit when I need a "time out") there is a pink comfy lazyboy-style chair that once lived in my Grandma's house. It was her special chair, and my cousin Adam was kind enough to give it to me when my little family purchased our first home. So, as I sat in my Grandma's special pink chair contemplating the all-important decision of what to name my Etsy shop, it occurred to me that I wanted my shop to have some sort of a connection to my Grandma. I kicked around several names: SASsy Red Shoes (she LOVED these red shoes from SAS...so much that we even considered making them a part of her burial outfit. In the end, I think we just placed them in her casket...just in case she needs them in the hereafter), 3002 Deer Park Drive (her street address), Magnolias and Tangerines (trees that grew at her home), but nothing seemed quite right. So, I sat in her pink chair and thought some more, and suddenly The Pink Persimmon came to my mind. And I instantly loved it. For those who haven't been blessed with a Grandma who lived in California and had a wide variety of fruit trees in her yard, persimmons are a delicious, but dangerous fruit. Eaten too early, they are perhaps the most disgusting thing you will ever experience in your mouth. If they are not ripe, it literally feels like your tongue is growing fur at a rather alarming rate, and it is extremely difficult to remove that feeling for several minutes. Yucky. But, when they are ripe, they are exquisitely sweet and they basically just melt in your mouth. Pure heaven. And so, as I pondered the similarities between my Grandma and myself, I thought that perhaps we are both somewhat like the infamous persimmon: caught at the wrong time, we can be MOST unpleasant; but, if you're patient, you might just find that I, like my Grandma, am a little slice of heaven...if only for a moment. :)