Fashion Trendsetter has a fabulous color trends section. I love the Lenzing Textile & Color Trends Autumn/Winter 2010/11 booklet you can download (look for the pdf download on the right). It’s color trend heaven. I’m also using the Interfilière Fashion & Color Trends Summer 2010. I took the forecasts with me to several bead shows to help keep me on track. It can be overwhelming to try to pull together colors on the spur of the moment. A little color prep goes a long way.

Several sites make the Pantone color forecasts available. Fire Mountain Gems has lovely pages for the Fall/Winter 2009-2010 and the Spring/Summer 2010 colors posted. They also offer the Color Association of the United States color forecasts. You can download pdf files for each of these.

If you print a color forecast, be aware of the differences that can occur if you don’t have decent ink in your printer. I sometimes have to run a test sheet to get the ink flowing properly because I don’t print that often. Luckily, I have a little Canon printer that does a pretty good job with color.

You should really check out all of these sites (and look for more) to determine what color palettes work for you. You may not want to be a slave to color trends but you should know what they are. It’s also educational to read the descriptions of and inspirations behind the trends.

I still covet those bowls she made to hold her jewelry.

Per their direction, I filed a support request. Then, I noticed that their support policy states that they have up to 30 days to research my request and decide how to respond. 30 days? Really?? Do they actually consider that an acceptable level of customer service? If they suspend you, they should tell you why immediately.

I suppose I could sign up under another username. But, I don’t want to. I like my username. Changing usernames also feels defeatist since I can’t think of anything I did wrong. For now, I’ll just remove the feed I had in the right rail.

Chalk this up as a lesson learned on why you shouldn’t place complete trust in third party apps for communicating with customers and colleagues. If you do, make sure you back up your posts somewhere. Because right now, everything I’ve posted on Twitter is no longer available. I am not pleased.

Update: Day 2 of my Twitter account being suspended for no known reason. Apparently, they don’t need a reason. A Google search on “twitter account suspended” returned almost 2 million results. Most of these seemed to be similar experiences: account suspended, request for help sent, no response. One person claimed that accounts are being suspended for not using bit.ly as a url shortener. They think Twitter is being paid by bit.ly. Hmm, I do tend to user tiny url. If that’s the issue, Twitter should be up front about it and say they require you to use bit.ly.

Supposedly my support ticket was assigned to delbius. Since she hasn’t responded, I guess the only action I can take is to open more tickets.

Day 3: I finally received a response from Twitter after posting a complaint on Get Satisfaction. Twitter’s reason for suspending my account is “At some point, the link that you had put into your web or bio spot on your Twitter profile or a link you updated with was classified by either Google or Firefox (or both) as having some form of malware attached to it.” They said they removed the link and restored my account. Of course, they didn’t tell me which link it was. It wasn’t this site because the bio link from my Twitter profile to here still works. I went through all my Twitter posts that had links and they all appeared to be there. The only change I’ve made was to remove my Twitter widget. I guess I won’t be putting that back.

The experience as a whole has changed my opinion of Twitter. Used to love it. Now, it’s lost some of its luster. Customer service really does affect how you feel about a company.