marissa belle ｡･:*˚:✧｡࿐

Happy end of March to everyone!

March has been such a crazy, hectic month but at the same time, seems to have passed so slowly. Does anyone feel the same way or am I the only one that has felt this this month?

I did manage to do a bunch of fun, fulfilling things this month which is exciting!

Launching My Own Website (yay!)

As everyone already knows, I’ve been on Etsy since October-Novemberi-ish time last year (I can’t really remember exactly when). The week before International Women’s Day, I decided that I wanted to do a massive sale across my entire Etsy store of 20% off for anyone who used a code upon checkout that was relevant to the special day.

Lo and behold, 2 days before my planned sale began, Etsy shut my account due to an “invalid ID”. I was extremely upset because I had publicized my sale everywhere and people looked forward to it. I don’t know why my ID was deemed invalid but customer service took 2 weeks to get back to me.

Within those 2 weeks, I decided I wanted to have another sales outlet. I already knew eventually I’d have a website but I didn’t want to commit to it yet. But I decided to take the leap and tried BigCartel for $9.99/month. I worked hard on it and was on it for a mere 3 days before realising a lot of features I needed were missing. Shopify, on the other hand, one of the best-known ecommerce platforms in the world, was $29.90/month but with all the features you could dream of.

I opted in for Shopify’s 14 day free trial and within those 2 weeks, I worked super hard on perfecting my store. I learned everything I needed to learn and I set it up, and launched on 24th March 2021. I’m so proud of my site!

And here she is!

Welcome to the brand spankin’ new Snuggly Duck Crafts website where you can get lots of exclusive items that aren’t available on my Etsy. On launch day, I clinched 10 sales, which is the most I’ve ever gotten in a 24 hour period. I couldn’t believe my eyes and I almost cried when I woke to see the sales. I had sales locally, to the US, UK, Ireland, Spain and Australia.

I hope to get your support on my new website too. I believe shipping would be more affordable via my website than Etsy as well because Shopify lets me input the weights of my items so shipping can be calculated more accurately.

Launched my favourite soap so far – the Animal Crossing Fossil soap!

I had this beautiful Animal Crossing fossil mould sitting at the back of my cupboard for months after I got it from a mould maker online, and I have finally put it to good use!

Anyone who knows me knows I am obsessed with Animal Crossing and that I have a lot of friends who are too. I’m so happy with how this soap turned out. I hope I brought justice to all you fans out there.

Not sure why I was surprised as this is a beautiful soap, but it has been my top seller since launching on the 24th! Very pleased. Although it stressed me out a little bit, as I only have 1 mould, and each time I make one soap, it has to sit in the mould for about 12 hours to fully set, which greatly limits the amount I can make daily. Sad but true, the mould was very expensive!

If you’re interested, you can purchase it by clicking this link.

Visiting the Night Safari

The government issued every Singaporean citizen a $100 Re-Discover Voucher which can be used at all sorts of tourist attractions around Singapore. What better way for me to make use of it than to see some animals!

I chose the Night Safari as it is home to 3 adorable Malayan Tapirs and if you knew me well enough, you’d know that tapirs are one of my favourite animals, alongside hedgehogs, dogs and horses.

Sutera, pictured above, was a tapir born a year ago! I was fully aware he would be a full sized tapir by the time I saw him this year but I was still so excited. I can’t get over how cute they are!

My mum and I took the tram which was already included in our voucher, and we soooo close to the tapirs. Could’ve sworn they were about 10 inches away from us, no glass between us either! The tapirs were happily munching away on grass, well behaved, tame and without a care in the world. We were warned not to touch them, sadly.

The Night Safari is a wonderful place to visit, and it is very exciting and unique as all the animals are pretty much nocturnal and you can walk as you please! Would highly recommend it for anyone visiting Singapore in the future.

A Disney+ Subscription, Finally!

Disney+ has finally arrived in Singapore, better late than never! I’m sharing a subscription with a few friends but because of my crazy hectic March schedule, I haven’t been able to sit down and watch anything new like I wanted.

Here are a few things on my to-watch list –

• The Imagineering Story
• Ratatouille
• Raya & The Last Dragon
• Disney’s Fairytale Weddings
• Frozen II

What are some good shows you’ve seen on Disney+? Let me know in the comments!

What did you get up to this March? Did you learn or do anything new?

Let me know down below and we can chat about it!