Celebrating 10,000 Etsy Sales with Celtic Folk Instruments

At the end of last year, I was discussing with my husband the exciting realization that my Etsy shop should reach 10,000 sales by this summer, and I wanted to celebrate it somehow. I talked about throwing a party or taking close family and friends out for a nice meal, but the ever-eccentric and, well, shopaholic within called for something different and frightfully selfish. Maybe I could just buy myself a really cool treat...

I had recently decided to add a music lesson to our homeschool routine and shirking the shrieking plastic recorder of my own youth, chose an instrument slightly more dignified and culturally relevant to use for the course I wrote: the Irish tin whistle. It is awfully recorder-like, but as my children are at least 75% ancestrally Scottish and Irish and the tin whistle is, well, tin and not plastic, it felt a little more special. It is also, unbeknownst to me at the time, traditionally made in the key of D major - relatively unfamiliar territory for a concert flautist, former cellist, and occasional ukulele picker.

To my delight, once our whistles and music book arrived from McNeela Music in Dublin, the fingering chart looked remarkably like the fingering chart for a concert flute. They are, in fact, VERY similar note-for-note! The little whistles have a thin barrel and little finger holes, and were easy to jump into lessons with, with 34-, 7-, and 4-year-old hands. We had fun learning scales and simple songs, and I was very surprised at the tone-quality these $25 whistles could manage. It truly was a very fun time, playing music regularly again and knowing that it harkened to our inextricable link to the British Isles.

In looking for more Irish tin whistle music to play and checking out some YouTube tutorials, I started to come across many references to the Irish flute. The Irish flute is also traditionally in D major, fingers the same as the tin whistle in D, and is typically wooden. It has a gorgeous, smooth, rustic, comforting sound and like the tin whistle, is pleasantly simple in its construction. My complicated silver concert flute - the poor thing - has sat in its case loved, but not played regularly for about 17 years. Over that time, as is to be expected, it has tarnished and the corks and pads have all but completely dry-rotted. I regret this deeply, but also cannot afford to restore it to its former glory, nor will I play it often enough to warrant that investment. But I do so miss playing the flute. At one time, my whole world revolved around it. And I was pretty good at it, and the piccolo too.

My assumption was that because the Irish flutes have such a simple construction, maybe they are quite affordable like the tin whistles - maybe that's an easy entry to flute-playing again. I returned to McNeela Music and learned how naive I am. Obviously, a flute is a bigger instrument than a whistle and obviously, to make a stick of wood sound like a dancing angel, it requires the careful work of a master's hand....and they're priced accordingly. Duh. There went that idea. That is, until I did something I knew was very dumb and likely to be fruitless by searching Amazon for Irish and D major flutes. As expected, there were loads of cheap, East Asian-made wooden Irish flutes with 2-star reviews, but there in the rubble was this listing for a keyless folk flute...made of glass?

Enter the Hall Crystal flute: American-made, and under $150. James Hall has been making them out of Pyrex in Washington State for 50 years, and offers them in an expansive range of pitches. I had to try one! But the big Low-D flute was among the priciest, and since this would very much be an experiment (I mean a glass flute, come on...), I wasn't willing to shell out for his highest-end instrument. So I bought the D piccolo for fifty bucks, and it hasn't disappointed for a second. It is a gorgeous little thing.

The kids and I carried on with our Irish music lessons through spring of this year - them on their whistles, and my accompaniment with the chimey crystal piccolo. I practiced on my own, too, exploring loads of Irish folk tunes, but enjoying the nostalgia and simplicity of songs like Greensleeves and Auld Lang Syne. I loved playing it so much and became so dedicated to it that I decided investing in a real Irish flute would be a deserving treat for my upcoming Etsy sales milestone.

I started researching them more and shopping around, trying to find the best-quality instrument for the money. But allow me to divert the subject for a moment with a reminder to both you and me: I am celebrating 10,000 sales (maybe 5x that, but Etsy has a weird way of calculating things) of handmade niche gothic ancient faith Christian stickers, and...there's not a lot of money in that, especially after Etsy, the IRS, and Meemaw take their cut. So while I would like a treat for the successful innovation of a lot of Catholic Christian designwork and busting my arse running a business while homeschooling my kids, I can't afford the Rolls Royce of Irish flutes. Or, frankly, even the Toyota. sighs in Scots Gaelic

After that reality check, I decided to start looking at other traditional Irish and Scottish instruments, hoping that something may be equally exciting, but within my means.

Ooohhh, the humble 16-string lyre. I saw them over and over on folk instrument sites. Ancient, simple, completely foreign to me, but for the low, low price of $60 (the version made in China and sold on Amazon, of course), it is extraordinarily accessible. That's it, then. I'd humble myself, buy a lyre, and learn how to play it.

And that I did. On July 15, 2025, Seraphim Print Studio made its 10,000th sale and I became the proud owner of an Aklot lyre. Beautiful wood. Beautiful sound. A mammoth of history, a staple of Northern Isles music, and a feature of Christian scripture itself. But let me tell you, it is kind of really freaking hard to play anything that doesn't sound like Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star coming out of a haunted music box if you never played anything piano-like before. Like all other hobbies throughout my life, though, it became an obsession, I found a groove, and I fell in love. Now I dream of the day (in the most absurdly grandeur, unlikely way) that I will take over the position of cantor at my parish...with my little lyre.

All foolishness and drama aside, I couldn't get the flute out of my head. Playing the flute - a big, real flute and not a piccolo - is something I crave. I spent six years of daily training on my lips for the perfect embouchure, cultivating enduring breath control and crystal-clear tone, and building my shoulder muscles and finger joints as to become one of the best, most tireless little pipers in Mississippi. And that training - when you love it - isn't something that leaves you...even after 17 idle years. Truth be told, the end of my flute career wasn't altogether my choice, anyway. I had emergency surgery at the same time I should have been auditioning for my university's music program and the recovery took too long for me to catch up. Meanwhile, I became committed to almost 21 hours of honors classes while living on my own at 17. Academics had a chokehold for the next 5 years. The ship sailed.

If I was to pursue playing the flute again, I believed I was on the right course by going the Irish route because they are low-maintenance and although pricy, are not as pricy as a working silver concert flute. I dug in on my research again and decided to ask around on Reddit where I was greeted by elitists who looked at my budget and swiftly decided my goal was monetarily out of reach (the lyre community is a lot less snobby, just so you know...), and then proceeded with an interesting list of obscure individuals who make "good Irish flutes." Most of these good Irish flutes, even used and abused, were over $1,000. But hidden among the maker names was Mr. Doug Tipple - a kindly and brilliant man out of Indianapolis who offers up renowned ergonomic Low-D Irish flutes made of black PVC PIPE (!!?!!) for $135. Since his work truly had the most charm, was quite innovative, and was the most affordable, it was an easy choice.

I ordered my Irish flute! At last! And today, she arrived...packed lovingly in a hand-sewn quilting-fabric pouch alongside a homemade swab and a very sincere letter from Doug with helpful information about playing his instrument. I was happy to find my flute embouchure still relatively in-tact and that my child-sized hands could indeed fit around the thick black barrel and onto the ergonomically-placed finger holes. I spent the afternoon playing Greensleeves, Auld Lang Syne, and Danny Boy. Creep by Radiohead, and Take Me Home Country Roads. I played hymns and Celtic jigs. I marveled at the sound quality, and that I am a flautist once again. It is not with the $1,000 authentic wooden Irish flute the Internet bossypantses would have me to go into debt over if I had any sense, but it suits me absolutely, and it has that sweet sound of a lilting, playful and sometimes sorrowful angel.

Now, this wouldn't be a scree written by Yours Truly if there wasn't some sort of splendid wrap-up, so here it is:

I did not make 10,000 Etsy sales by offering something trendy, and effectively using e-commerce sales tactics. I made 10,000 sales by spending years honoring the movement of God in my life and His whisperings into my creative soul, in order to make things that are meant to help Christians live out virtue in bold and brave ways...because I need help living in bold and brave ways. I take this intention and turn it into art prints, emphemera, and apparel, and pray that other people out in the world who need these reminders will seek them out. And my goodness, they do.

Monetizing your passion is a slippery slope and your motivations need a regular vibe check if you're planning on retaining your mental health. And your soul. So this, my friend, is why I can't afford a $1,000 wooden flute. I'm not an artist to be cutthroat, Instagram famous, and rich. I am an artist because it was a gift given to me. An artist's work is quite personal: it is the ability to craft a piece of yourself and put it out into the world. And I think there's something to be said for putting it out there for other people and deciding to monetize it in an accessible way. Doug Tipple and I both probably have enough leeway to raise our prices a bit and retain good sales, but it would start to negate one of the most important facets of what we do. We handmake high-quality, niche things with very specific and beautiful functions, and we want to share them with as many people as possible, beause we love them. We believe in them. What we do has a function that takes precedence over generating wealth.

Somewhere in that, I hope you can see how much the purchase of a $135 black PVC pipe Low-D Irish flute suits celebrating the 10,000th sale of a nobody of an artist.

Today I am at 10,133 sales, unexpectedly with a funny little collection of Celtic folk instruments in tow: a whistle, a glass piccolo, a lyre, and a flute. And there's this:

Psalm 150
Praise the Lord!
Praise God in his sanctuary;
praise him in his mighty firmament!
Praise him for his mighty deeds;
praise him according to his surpassing greatness!
Praise him with trumpet sound;
praise him with lute and harp!
Praise him with tambourine and dance;
praise him with strings and pipe!
Praise him with clanging cymbals;
praise him with loud clashing cymbals!
Let everything that breathes praise the Lord!

Praise the Lord.