For some surprising reason, pictures of my cluttered desk and shelf generated a lot of questions and excitement.
The desk is now clean.
In order of appearance, left to right
- Elaina from Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina (Majo no Tabitabi). She comes from a series of light novels and anime currently up on Crunchyroll. While the anime is cute, I bought her because of what she represented. In my head, she is a different character and I made a little story about her. Now she lives on my desk.
- Frosted glass kitty with glitter on her ears. She made an appearance in Emerald Blaze on Tatyana Pierce’s desk.
- A generic owl, bought because I like owls and I thought it was pretty.
- A labubu. Labubus come from a line of collectible toys designed by Kasign Lung, an illustrator from Hong Kong who currently lives in Netherlands and was heavily influenced by Nordic folklore. They are sold in blind item boxes, meaning you don’t know which labubu you will get until you open the package. Kid 2 really liked them for a little bit and I bought a couple. This one was a gift from Kid 2.
- Umaru-chan from Himouto! Umaru-chan, which comes from the manga series and an anime, currently available on Crunchyroll. A gift from Kid 1.
- Maomao from Apothecary Diaries, anime available on Crunchyroll and Netflix. I love Maomao so much. I relate to her on an inner teenage level. Sadly the second season didn’t quite stick the landing for me, but I’m still excited for continuation of the story.
People asked about the keyboard. It’s a custom keyboard that I built for myself. Keyboards are our main tool of trade, so we invest in them heavily. This one is made exactly the way I like it.
If you would like to build your own, it’s not that hard. There are three parts: the keyboard itself, the switches that go into it, and the keycaps that fit on top of the switches.
- Keyboard: Wobkey Crush 80. I like it because it is heavy and stays on my desk. This thing doesn’t move. I’ve had zero problems with chatter, etc. And it is a cute purple color. It’s not a full keyboard. It’s missing a number pad, but I still get the extra keys.
- Switches: HMX Butter Linear. Love this switch, 100% reliable, feels like a dream. I like how un-wobbly it is, and I like the sound it makes.
- Keycaps: KiiBoom x Cosydiaries Rainy Froggy Day. Cosy Diaries is an Instagram creator, so if you like cute things, you might like her feed.
This is what the keyboard sounds like when I write Maggie:
Gordon’s keyboard.
- Keyboard: Epomaker Galaxy 100 Lite. Gordon will only accept full size keyboards, which limits the selection a little.
- Switches: HMX Frog Tactile. He prefers tactile switch and HMX Frog is the best one I found. Like the HMX Butter, it is a smooth switch with very little wobble and a bonus of a comfortable tactile bump.
- Keycaps: this is half and a half, some came with the keyboard and some came from GMK Keycaps. He likes the color and the feel, but he also wants all of his keys clearly labeled.
Funny thing about custom mechanical keyboards – once you find your perfect set up, you take it for granted. Recently Gordon had a coffee cup accident. The handle snapped off from one of his old mugs. He caught the cup as it fell, but some coffee sloshed out and drowned the keyboard I made for him. The keyboard went into trash, and we had to find a substitute, so we found a high-end gaming keyboard in our AV closet. That thing retailed for like $400 and came with one of the desktops as a bonus.
The face my husband made when he tried to type on it. He ended up swapping to a generic Keychron I use to test the switches, until the parts arrived and I rebuilt the keyboard.
The weird black thing by the keyboard: this is a Vayder Volume Control Knob. I prefer to have a volume knob, but my keyboard doesn’t have one. This gives me volume control dial, and media keys of rewind, play/pause, and fast-forward. We listen to a lot of podcasts while we game and it is convenient to use those keys instead of hunting for them on the keyboard.
Before you ask, I will do a summary of podcasts later.
And finally the deskmat. The one under my keyboard came from Amazon. Here it is, and I had to cut it down to size, because it was too large.
And that brings us to the store update:
First, the bad news: our accountant had a come-to-the-light conversation with us. We have to up the prices on the mugs. We aren’t turning enough of a profit to keep operating. We – that is I, not we – didn’t account for the fees the store charges us on our transactions. It can’t be a wash, so we will be going up by about $2-3 per mug. The mugs are temporarily down while we get the price increases rolling.
Second, good news: the US deskmats are live. A typical custom deskmat retails between $35-40. We are going to try to stay in that range. Please be aware that additional shipping charges will be applied at the checkout and they can be as much as $10.
And that concludes today’s post.
First?
Ordered my desk mat! Woo!
Clean First 🤗
Love the stories behind the little writing guardians on your desk!! 📚📚📚
Happy new week to all!! 💖
Thanks for the Monday desk update. I should go out to the store and look. I don’t think the Horde will mind paying a little extra for the mugs.
Enjoy the clean desk and shelves while you can. The clutter bug can creep up when you least expect it.
Almost first!!! This is the closest I got to First!!!!
I was waiting for the mat to go live before I order my mug… but totally understanding that you need to make a profit!
I am trying to set up a store for my hubby’s art and let me tell you, these profit margins are making my head hurt. Especially since his is in his art!!!!
A quick question, will the be coming from the same place i.e. will ordering mug and mat together or separately make a difference?
Happy Monday everyone
All shipping is per item, unfortunately, it’s how the vendor charges House Andrews (a flat fee per item).
Well, by the time I finished writing I was 5th, but close enough 🥰
I wondered about the pricing because I swear I paid $30 – $35 for my BDH mug a few years back and was surprised that my new Barsa Barsa Barsa mug only cost $20 and they are the same size. I would have been content to pay more and I feel bad you lost $$ creating something special for your fans to go along with all the wonderful books you’ve written. Hmm, I guess I will have to buy more after you adjust the pricing to make up for it. Hopefully there will be some Maggie merch next month because I am excitedly waiting on the full book after I read the long preview on Kindle.
I love how our questions are anticipated. Pat*ently wa*ting for podcasts list. Challantness fueled by my new Breach mug o’ espresso coffee.
Oh dear! I’m sorry you ending up taking a loss on the mugs; as someone else here noted, it’s an extra shame since you put them out just to be nice to all of us. That said, I will definitely be on the Maggie merch train come March and so willing to pay more to ensure the headache is at least marginally worth it! Loving the little side quest on keyboard customization; I am far too lazy to do so, but it’s fascinating to see (and hear!) the differences. I do love a clacky old-school keyboard – I’m sure my coworkers do NOT. 🙂 May your clutter free desk bring you a clutter free mind this week, and the desk guardians a little break.
Maybe I missed it, but will the store be open for EU at some point?
Negotiations are happening today for the VAT lines. Thank you for your patience 🙂
hooray for accountants. Will continue to wa*t p*tiently to buy my mugs. happy to pay enough to get you in the green and love the transparency.
I don’t know if there’s a price point at which stickers become possible, but I would happily “overpay” (as i am sure Ilona sees it) for a few stickers. they’re great for telling my corporate stuff apart from everyone else’s identical corporate stuff😀
They put some free downloads on the store (or there were, at least) that you can use to print off on a sticker. That’s my plan, as soon as I remember to order sticker paper. And decide what kind. 🤗
Depending on how “sticky” you want your sticker to be, most office supply stores have Avery mailing labels and name tag stickers. The mailing labels come in several sizes and should be fairly permanent. The name tag stickers are made to go on clothes and then pull off after awhile and not all of them say “Hi, my name is …” 😄
I’m waiting until Maggie mugs come out, so I can decide better. But let’s be honest, that’s only going to make my indecisiveness even worse.
I REALLY like the barsa barsa all over mug that got added!
Trying to decide on a desk mat. I use a full size keyboard (can’t stand the laptop keys), so I’ll need to measure and see how it would fit, but they look fun!
Sorry that you took a hit on the mugs. I have been drinking out of my Ripper Cushions mug since Saturday. I won’t mind paying a few bucks more if you do some of the Ability to Even ones in 11oz. *puppy dog eyes*
The desk mats are beautiful!
I love “clicky” mechanical keyboards and their “old typewriter” feel too, to the despair of my husband who hates the sound of mine ^^
As I’m French, I keep a eye on the shop to order a pair of big mugs when the VAT problems’ll be solved <3
I’m keeping a list of requests and I lob it at Ilona every week (poor Ilona).
Some may have to wait a bit because it is very tiring work and there’s a lot of writing to be done! Thank you everyone for your patience 🙂
I swear I’m not being ungrateful for what’s been released! Just wondering if there will be additional designs of the desk mat. Specifically here kitty, kitty. I want to purchase one but figured I’d wait just in case. Plus I don’t want you guys to be overwhelmed with orders like you were with the mugs!