It's exhausting.

Photo copyright Aji, 2024; all rights reserved.

Wings hard at work trying to adapt what have turned out to be substandard findings. I've tried sourcing them from both of our mainstream suppliers; I even ordered some from Australia. They're all absolute crap, and he's lost two or three days battling them. It's exhausting, losing that kind of time to something that wasn't what it was represented to be. Too late to return them now.

Now I have to find him some decent ones, but when even the "reputable" places are selling garbage that can't be soldered because it melts, I don't know where to go for that anymore. They're not stainless steel, they're not nickel-plated, they're also not sterling, but what? No idea. Except trash, obviously.

Anyway, without functional pin assemblies, the Warrior Woman pins are delayed. There's a simple cuff that will likely be ready tomorrow, and he's got more bead pieces in the works.

Meanwhile, the pressure from all of these outstanding expenses continues apace. I wish it were more than mostly cloudy in that regard; we need real [metaphorical] rain badly. [Need the real real kind, too.] The part from the truck isn't in yet; as far as I can tell, the mechanic didn't even call to order it until Friday, despite having been paid for it the previous Friday. But we know it's going to be at least another grand for the labor, probably more; another grand for my own cancer screening scans coming up fast now in August. And it'll be at least $4K to take care of the permanent fix to the roof, materials and labor combined, and that will need to be done in September at the latest. The expenses from last year and the first half of this year broke us so badly that we're still way behind on everything. I have GOT to put a big chunk on our tax bill, which is weighing heavily on me constantly. [You wonder why I don't sleep? Like last night, again? much of the last week, actually? Apart from pain, that's one BIG reason.] 

Over last weekend, I finally got 7 new offerings [8 pieces total, 2 sold as a pair] up yesterday: Art Deco Labradorite cuff here; Art Deco purpurite cuff here [and already spoken for]; triangle wire youth bangle here; Art Nouveau vine pattern-wire youth bangle here; small Art Nouveau pattern-wire bangle pair here; malachite earrings here; and Picasso jasper earrings here [very haunted Gothic stones!]. He's finally getting a chance to get caught up a bit on stuff that he's had to back-burner since last year, and I got three more new Deco-infused pieces up last night, big solid silver classic cuff here, new wristband in shades of moon and night here, and new vintage-style naja earrings here. There's another pair of larger earrings with stones in the works, plus four Warrior Woman pins; yesterday he finished the second pair of silver-and-stone ones and yesterday, we got seven new pairs of the gemstone-bead earrings done and photographed, and all eight pairs are up at the very beginning of the Earrings Gallery as of last night. And I still need to make sales at a rate of at least two per week for the rest of the year for us to catch up [and that's just breaking even]. So: Go buy! Please! Links are here:

• Sales here; 
• Testimonials here; 
• Amazon wishlist here (Amazon cards are probably most useful at this point); 
• Patreon here;
• Ko-fi here.

After such a grim year, this one already even worse than the last, we really need to get 2024 onto a better footing, so please share all of the links. 

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2024; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.