Finally, a heartfelt purpose for my blog!

I'm in a bit of a rush today as I am getting ready for a Christmas show that will take place tomorrow, where I hope to sell a good amount of my jewelry and a few other gift items that my mom and I made especially for the show (beaded bookmarks, beaded keychains and cell-phone charms as well as some of my handmade 3D Christmas cards).

If you've read my last post (just below) and the comments posted, you will see that I made quite a discovery/learned something new and now that I know this information, I cannot turn a blind eye. I cannot "not care" because I really do love and care for animals, all of them, with all my heart.

My husband and I are very privileged in 'being owned' by two wonderful, ever so loving Yorkies that bring us an endless amount of joy and so much genuine love. We always say that there's nothing better in life than having "Yorkie Love" in our house :)

And not that I'm a huge jewelry seller (not yet but I aim to be!) or anything like that, and it's not like we're rich either (not money wise, but we are certainly rich with all the love our angels bring us - we call our Yorkies our 'angels' because they are)... but I know that every penny makes a real difference, and although I have donated money and change to various animal rescue/help fund raisers, etc, in the past, tomorrow I have the opportunity to launch my new 'pet' project:

As of tomorrow's show and this will be on-going on a permanent basis, I will not only be donating 5% of all my monthly sales to a selected local Animal Rescue Group, but as a family/household, we will also personally 'match' that 5% as well.

Since it's the end of the month already, tomorrow's fund-raising will be included with the month of December 2008.

So, this is to officially announce that 5% of December's sales (plus my family's matching amount) will be donated to AARCS which stands for "Alberta Animal Rescue Crew Society" - AARCS is a Non-Profit, NO KILL, Animal Rescue Organisation which does not receive any governement help and which is entirely run by volunteers in the province of Alberta.

There are several various animal rescue (including wildlife rescue) organisations in my City and Province and so effective immediately, I will select one of these organisations every month to make our donations to.

It's a first step in 'officially' showing where my heart is... I am a strong believer in animal therapy, I benefit from it myself every single day (animals are great to help battle depression, amongst other things) and so I am stepping forward and I am so happy with this.

So stay tuned, there will be much more to come on my blog!

I am very excited about all this!

Enlightenment - "Why Free-Range is not the answer"

I'm not *currently* vegan and I will not pretend to be. I'm too honest for that. However, this may change at some point, and the more I am learning, the more am I open to learning alternative ways of getting my protein.

I'm extremely allergic to soy and tofu (amongst other things...), so I guess that would leave me with various beans and lentils, which I do love and I enjoy eating them and having vegan meals, but in the end, I admit that I am still consuming some meat. But it doesn't mean that I do not care what happens to the animals, quite the contrary.

Well, I guess for the longest time I was feeling like I was doing a better choice when I was selecting 'free-range' meats and eggs, but reading one of my favorite blogs this evening, I just learned that I really 'assumed' a lot of things (and we all know what 'ass-u-me' means) whenever I read the words "Free-Range" on labels at the supermarket.

Tonight I got my eyes opened quite wide, so much so that I wanted to share Tamara's post here (and if you click on the link to get to her blog, you will learn much more, I guarantee it).

This is what I read on her blog - I am quoting it here in full because I feel that this information is EXTREMELY important :

"...Today I'd like to elaborate a bit on my earlier remark about poultry (and other meats) bearing labels such as 'free-range,' 'organic,' and 'natural'. Once again, most of this info comes from the good folks at Farm Sanctuary.

• Most people don't envision physical mutilations as part of their 'natural,' 'free-range,' or 'organic' turkey. But mutilations, from de-beaking to toe removal, are still performed at 'free-range' farms. These mutilations are a source of continual pain for the birds and can make eating and walking difficult.
• As on factory farms, birds on 'free-range' and 'organic' turkey farms are genetically manipulated to grow at an unnaturally fast rate. The strain of growing so quickly causes many health problems for the turkeys, from crippling joint disorders to heart failure. Premature death on the 'free-range' farm is still common.
• The USDA does not limit 'free-range' animal density or flock size and these turkeys are often packed crowded tightly together on 'free-range' farms.
• Even though 'free-range' operations are supposed to grant turkeys outdoor access after about a month of life depending upon the weather, there are no specific requirements for this access. The provision for 'access', therefore, is practically meaningless.
• In the winter, 'free-range' birds are not required by federal regulations to have access to the outdoors. Due to the fact that poultry is slaughtered at an extremely young age (about 14-16 weeks for turkeys) birds raised during the winter months do not have to go outside at all.
• The size of the outdoor 'free-range' turkeys have access to is also unregulated by the USDA, so it can be surprisingly small and is often nothing more than a tiny, barren dirt lot.
• Since the 'free-range' label has no clear definition it is nearly impossible to regulate the methods by which these animals are raised. In order to obtain approval for labels bearing the claim 'free-range,' poultry producers must only provide the USDA with a brief description of the birds' housing conditions. These claims are almost never verified by on-site inspections.

I know this is pretty depressing information, but I heard a quote today that
really resonated - We must not refuse to see with our eyes what they must endure with their bodies.

I promise - tomorrow I'll focus on something more upbeat, and for today I do
actually feel surprisingly grateful to possess this knowledge and to be able to
share it in hopes that it might change someone else's perspective..."

Now, after reading this, I am glad I was sitting on my chair because I would have fallen flat on my rear-end.

I am truly sick and tired of Governments taking us all for idiots. Making half-a** regulations that clearly give an exit door to all those producers.

We, as consumers, vote for better treatments of animals and we also vote when we voluntarily choose to pay more money to purchase so called "free-range" products in hopes of supporting more human ways to raise the animals that feed the world, and in the end, these animals are still not treated with any more dignity or respect than the ones being raised by 'regular' producers. What's the point in all this?

Tamara, you have certainly given me a lot of food for thoughts here tonight. I will pass on this information to everyone I know, starting with this post on my blog.

And rest assured that we are not having turkey this weekend. It's not Thanksgiving up here anyway (and we didn't have Turkey for our own Thanksgiving back in October either btw).

I've learned something new today and I will not let this new knowledge go to waste. I'm grateful to you T.

Remember the old way of shopping?

So, we're in a recession, yup, even in Canada now... (they just officially announced it on the news today).

We all saw it coming. Nobody wanted to say the dreaded "R" word, but heck, you can call what ever you want, in the end, we're here and I can't help but to think back in history and see that this is a natural cycle.

Those cycles are needed, as it weeds out the wheat from the shaft, and without it, we just get more and more crowded. If we keep having these big huge bubbles squeezing in all the time, eventually, they can only do one thing: Pop! So the more bubbles blowing at the same time, the more crowded we get - which is not healthy either. We need to clean up and start fresh once in awhile.

I see what is happening as a way to do that. A way to stop and look at how we're doing things. Streamline, be more creative with our resources, be less wasteful of our time and supplies, etc.
I don't know if any of you are old enough, but think back when you were younger (I'm 43) and I remember when I was a very young girl, we didn't own a car and the few stores we had were far away from where we lived.

So, my mom used to do a lot of her shopping by catalogue because we didn't have any big stores nearby, since not every company had stores in every city back then (it was just too expensive to have stores everywhere - maybe the big retail business of today needs to learn from this)...
Well, I see online shopping as the New Age of catalogue shopping of the old days!

People didn't have easy access to stores 40-50 years ago, so they shopped by catalogue and their purchases were delivered to them by mail or they picked it up at a local counter.
I think that the current economic crisis is going to make us sort of go back to this and those were great times! I don't know about you, but I much prefer to shop from the comfort of my home, in my jammies and slippers, drinking a nice cup of tea, than having to drive out and waste a bunch of time on crowded roads, crowded parking lots and crowded malls!

With the Internet, we have our 'catalogues' online (unlike the old days, there is no printing costs, no catalogue mailing/distribution costs) and people worldwide can purchase our creations and get their purchase delivered straight to their homes no matter where they live.

And you don't have to have the Internet at home. There's libraries and Internet Cafés where you can pop in, pick up a few books to read for the week, get online and do your shopping then go back at home.

As online sellers, I think this will actually play in our favor down the line, *if* we pay attention to what consumers are looking for, and if we offer top-notch friendly customer service. It also helps to have good clear attractive pictures to present our products in the best light possible... remember, first impressions count!

I think that what is going on at the moment is going to help push even more customers to turn to online shopping. Big companies will not be able to keep on paying for high rents in commercial shopping centers (hugely expensive) and they are going to scale down their operations and most likely shut down some of their retail branches.

Online sellers have a big advantage over Brick & Mortar stores as we don't have their huge overheads, and over the next couple of years, this will be extremely important. I won't be surprised to see more of those big companies develop their online shopping experience even more in order to direct their clientele to shop online instead of in their B&M stores.

So, what are you going to do about it? :-)

It's been awhile...

Well, it's been awhile since I last posted...

The loss of my best friend Callie has really affected me (of course) and I didn't feel like writing much of anything after what happened.

I'm keeping quite busy right now preparing for a Christmas show that will take place on November 29th, and things are coming along well.

I'm also working on revamping the look of my websites and blog, and I've started taking new pictures (like these copper bangles) using the new purple background with some pretty rocks. I like the new look, and I hope that you will all enjoy it too.

I've always loved Purple, and so did my 'Sistah' Callie. It's a lovely rich color. So I decided to start using it :)

Time sure flies - make sure to take the time to be with your loved ones every day. You just never know what might happen.