MayBeads Giveaway - May 8th - 14th

These necklaces are adorable &
1 of you will get to pick one for yourself!
The detail on these adorable necklaces
is amazing! Maybeads does awesome work!
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Introduce yourself!:)
Hi! I’m Lauren, and I’m a lampwork bead artist. I live in a suburb of Chicago, with my husband, three kids, Chunky the dog, Buzz & Newman, our cats and some unnamed fish.

Tell us a bit about your business..
I make lampwork beads, otherwise known as glass beads. I take colored rods of glass and melt them with my Hot Head torch. My beads are mostly what are called “critter” beads - they bead creatures with faces. I love to make turtles, penguins, cats, dogs (those are new!), cows and aliens. I mostly sell just the beads, but I do have some finished jewelry in my shop as well. I like to make charm-sized beads to hang from stretch cords for fun kids’ stretchy necklaces. My two girls have a bunch! My shop is called Maybeads because my maiden name is May, and, well, Mazurskybeads just didn’t have the same ring to it (sorry, honey).

What inspired you to start your etsy shop?
After a couple months selling on ebay, I discovered Etsy. I was completely intrigued by it. It was so easy to set up a shop, so I made the switch.

When you're not being crafty, what do you do?
I’m a stay-at-home mom, so I hang with my youngest who is in half-day kindergarten. I also enjoy reading, running and baking.

Whats your favorite book, song, movie & website?
Favorite book: “The Kite Runner”
Favorite song: Anything by John Mellencamp.
Favorite movie: I’m a huge fan of comedies, so Blazing Saddles, Airplane, Stripes, Monty Python -- they’re all good.
Favorite website: Etsy!

How do you promote your work?
I am on two Etsy teams: the Fire Divas, a lampwork team, and the EART TEAM, which stands for Eclectic Artisans Team. I do a lot of promoting with my teams, plus I post in the forums regularly, I tweet on Twitter and I also promote on Facebook. I know there’s probably a lot more I could be doing and one day I'll figure that out.

What are your short-term & long-term goals?
For the short-term I’d like to continue doing what I love - making beads. I’m just so grateful to be able to support my habit, er, hobby, by selling my work on Etsy. I’d also like to take another lampwork class to learn some more advanced techniques. For the long-term, I’d like to find some other ways to promote my work and increase my sales.

Tell us something random about you!
My birthday is 11/7/69 -- and my son’s is 7/11/96 - that’s got to be lucky, right?

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Item up for grabs:
Stretchy Necklace from MayBeads

To enter the giveaway:
Go to Maybeads, look around.. come back & tell us your favorite item from her shop!

Earn extra entries:
*Subscribe to our blog.
Do no forget to activate your subscription.
*Blog about this giveaway on your Blog.
Leave a link to your blog in your entry.

You will receive one extra entry into this giveaway for each of the above actions you do.

This giveaway will end on May 14th at 11:30 p.m. (Central Standard Time). The winner will be notified by e-mail and it will be posted Thursday night on our blog. Please be sure you have provided a valid e-mail address. If there is no e-mail address provided to contact the winner, another name will be drawn. The winner will have 48 hours to respond to the e-mail notification with their mailing address. This information will then be forwarded to the sponsor. If this information is not received within 48 hours another name will be drawn.