Nest Candles Have Arrived!

If only you could receive scents through the internet, then you would be lucky like me right now smelling the wonderful aroma of Nest Candles. This new product is a holiday pick for this season and comes in 4 wonderful scents-

Bamboo-Flowering bamboo is mingled with a variety of white florals, sparkling citrus, and fresh green accords

Moss and Mint-A touch of oak moss and vetiver infuses garden mint, apple blossom, and muguet

Grapefruit-Pink pomelo grapefruit and watery green nuances are blended with Lily of the Valley and Coriander Blossom

Holiday-Mandarin orange, cinnamon, cloves, pine and eucalyptus are combined to produce the perfect ambience for the holidays

The classy packaging and heavenly smells are reasons why these candles have been featured in Oprah, Lucky, Travel and Leisure, Town and Country and InStyle Magazines.

New Stationery Featuring Your Dog!

We have just added 43 darling foldover notecards that features your dog on the card! Donovan Designs created these cute cards to offer personalized stationery for dog lovers. Check out all 43 breeds available, and until September 17th we are offering free shipping!

Get organized for school with the momAgenda dayplanner-

Just in! The 2009-2010 version of the momAgenda dayplanner ! It is geared toward the typical school year and runs from August 2009-December 2010. Along with calendar and scheduling features for mom and up to 4 kids, it includes a favorite websites section, space for notes on books, movies, fashion, and music, vacation and party planning pages. It is sylishly bound and comes in pink, brown, and lime.

Missing New York

I am feeling like I just want Wednesday to get here so I will not be in the process of missing the National Stationery Show as I am right now. I go to this show every year and absolutely love it. Not only is it a fun trip to New York, but I love meeting with my vendors, finding new products, and gaining inspiration to continue to do my best for Charming Cards. I booked my hotel back in December and was looking forward for May to get here. But in the recent months it became very apparent to me that many of my larger vendors were skipping the show this year in light of the economy and the big expense it takes to participate as a vendor in the show. Even the big ones like Boatman Geller, Noteworthy, and PSA, just to name a few are staying home this year. I felt as much as I want to be there, I need to be financially savvy both for my business and my family and make a smart economic decision. So I am determined to do my own research via the web, local markets, and stores, to find new products and will diligently follow up with my existing vendors to get their latest and greatest. But getting all the "tweets" on twitter about those attending makes me so jealous that I am not there! I am already looking forward to next May...

To stay fresh and current, I have recently been adding many products including graduation announcements and gifts, fun chunky notepads, jewelry, and personalized ribbon stationery.

2 Men, Hot Oil, and a Bird, plus the 2nd Day of Deals

We are fortunate to have some great neighbors on our street. Robert, a few doors down, talked to my husband before Thanksgiving about how he was going to deep fry his turkey this year and was very invested in researching the techniques on how to do so properly. He said if my mom could find a way to fix our tv on Youtube (see my earlier post) he could find an easy explanation on how to deep fry a turkey, and he did. His wife said the the time he spent looking into preparing this turkey, she could swear her husband was starting to have feelings for this bird! The day after Thanksgiving he brought down a plate of their deep fried turkey and I have to say, it was delicious. Well today he invited my husband down to deep fry our own turkey in his backyard which my husband, the food lover jumped on. I invited my Mom over to try it out with us and the adults and kids alike agreed that it was AMAZING! I have never been crazy about turkey and put a token amount on my plate at Thanksgiving, but I have to say as I write this I am stuffed! My mom and I both said we have never eaten so much turkey at one sitting in our lives. It is moist and juicy, the skin is crispy and tasty- it is so good! It takes a good amount of precautions-including a handy fire extinguisher but if done right is safe and fast- it cooked our 18 pounds in 1 hour.

And moving on...

Todays 2nd Daily Deal of Christmas is our reusable shopping bags!

30% off today only on our assortment of environmentally friendy, yet trendy reusable shopping bags.

Reader Giveaway on The Hostess with the Mostess

I am very excited to be featured today on one of my favorite blogs- The Hostess With The Mostess. This blog has fabulous entertaining ideas and the colorful layout of their site is like eye candy. The blog offers a $100 shopping spree on my site to a winning reader- so check it out and enter!

Toss Bag to be Featured with Oprah on 30 Rock!

Must See TV Alert: The Toss Designs Balboa Rolling Duffel will be featured on tonight's episode of 30 Rock (Thursday, November 6th, NBC at 9:3pm). The episode will guest-star Oprah Winfrey, who chose the darling pink with green accents- Balboa Rolling Duffel as one of her favorite picks of the summer on her yearly special this past May. Use the promo code FREESHIP and shipping is free until November 15th- what a great holiday gift!

3 Special Products and a Contest for You!

The contest is on and you can be part of it! 3 of my new products were chosen by my fashionable and savvy sales associates as part of our annual contest. Between Oct 1- Dec 31, the product with the highest net profit will award the associate with the coveted trophy and a percentage of the profits. The products are completely different from each other with different price points, but have the same mark-up and will be featured equally. I will extend this contest to my customers. Post your comment on my blog with your choice for the winning product and we will randomly select from those who pick correctly to find one grand prize winner of $100 gift certficate to Charming Cards. The products are:

Environmentally Friendly- Reusable Shopping Bags

Not only does it save a tree or a barrel of oil — it makes your shopping trip easier and stylish. The trend is to reuse these type of bags instead of paper or plastic at the store. Many adorable designs to choose from. Make every day Earth day!

Utensil Pot Clip

The Utensil Pot Clip attaches directly to the edge of a pot or pan and holds utensils while cooking, allowing residue to drip into the pot and not make a mess on the stovetop or kitchen counter. It is heat resistant and dishwasher safe. At $8.50 and free shipping it is a great little gift and during the month of October, the manufacturer is donating 5% of the proceeds of this pink color to breast cancer research. It also comes in Indigo, Red, Orange and Blue.

Trendy Travel Bags As Seen on Oprah

These adorable travel bags come in a weekender size or a rolling duffel as seen here. The adorable designs are printed under vinyl for easy cleaning and have storage pockets inside and out.

So cast your vote- The Shopping Bags, Travel Bags, or Utensil Pot Clips. Comments until Dec 1st will be eligible to win $100 Charming Card gift certificate, winner will be selected randomly from correct answers and will be announced early January.

My (rocky) road to finding a great web designer

Along with being a fruitful business, my website and blog are a source of great enjoyment and satisfaction for me. Getting to this point did not come easy. I started in 2000 with a very simple website that sold only my discount notecards. In 2006 I expanded on this and decided to sell online all of my products and for a brief time had a 2nd website designed. This ended up being a flop and a big waste of time and money (lots of both). Updates and changes were beyond my control and the simplest modification took weeks to accomplish. I was back at square one trying to find a good web designer that could meet my needs and budget. I remember the moment I came across Cathy at Cgonsa Web Design. I knew right away I had stumbled upon something special. I spent hours looking at all of the boutique websites she had designed and how each one offered different features that were hip, girly, had fun character illustration and just the feminine touch I was looking for. I contacted many of the other websites she designed to ask about their experience with her (I highly recommend this when picking a web designer) and every one of them vouched for her quality of work and professionalism. I contacted her immediately and got on the wait list. I was so excited and couldn't wait to start and when my turn came up and we started with the design process, I could tell I was dealing with a pro. The communication was quick, responsive, and I knew I had all of her attention until my site was complete. Within a few short weeks she (virtually) held my hand as I learned how to add my own products and work in the admin side of my site. Having complete control over my website felt so liberating and the end result was better than I imagined and search engine friendly. If you are looking for a hip web designer to design a website that you will learn to completely manage on your own, check her out and the other couture web designs she has done at http://www.cgonsa.com/.