**Super Mega Ultra GIVEAWAY!!!****

This giveaway is huge! The winner will receive 1 hand carved cupcake stamp, 1 hand carved bird cage stamp and some journaling spots for scrapbooking! Scroll down for entry rules.



To Enter:

Go to my shop, come back here and tell me what your favorite item is. Remember to leave your email or other way to contact you.

You will receive EXTRA entries for the following (these are not required for your first entry, but will get you extra entries):

1.ONE extra entry for following my blog. Leave a separate comment letting me know you are following.

2.ONE extra entry for writing about this giveaway in your blog and linking to this giveaway. Leave a separate comment with your blog link.

3. FOUR extra entries for making a purchase from my shop! Wow, 4 extras!

Giveaway will close on Saturday, March 14th. Open to U.S. and Canada only.

Spring is coming!

WOO HOO! Our high temperature today is 72 in Kansas City, MO! I'm so excited! I absolutely love when the air starts to turn warm this time of year. It's like starting over. Every year I feel like the end of winter and the entrance of spring means new things to come. We have a rental house and outside have noticed some kind of plants sprouting up. Who knows what they are, but it's still fun to see! Here they are, with my kitty Maddux

We want to plant some flowers in the front this year, and we're going to attempt to grow some veggies in the back in containers. I think we're going to try tomatoes, green beans, cucumbers and red bell peppers. I've read these are the easiest for newbies, except maybe the red peppers. We love bell peppers, and I can't eat green ones, so we always buy red. But they cost about $2-$3 each at the store! WAY too much for one vegetable!

Here is my amazing stamp that I just finished for a customer. It's huge, measuring 4 inches by 4.5 inches.

Definitely the biggest one I've done.


I've been getting a lot of custom orders lately which is so amazing and I'm so happy for it. However, I haven't had time to work on any new designs for my shop!

What direction to go in...

My etsy shop has taken a totally new direction in the last couple of months. I've made and sold greeting cards for about 3 years and I totally love it. I sell pretty well to my mom's avon customers and friends, but online, I just wasn't selling. I got so many comments about my items; "oh that's so cute" but the sales just weren't happening. I even sought out veteran sellers, who gave me some small pointers, but basically were as bewildered as me about my slow sales.

So I decided to try something new. What do I like to buy and obsess about? Scrapbook embellishments and stamps. That's how I started to make them more, and it appears that my stamps are far more popular than my cards were online. It's a weird feeling though because I still love my cards and still want to sell them offline, but I'm trying to come to a decision of if I should offer stamps exclusively in my shop. Maybe an occasional card, but I  want to make more of a brand for myself, and I think going with only stamps will help. It seems silly, like an easy decision. If one thing is selling, and one thing isn't, offer only what is selling. It just feels weird to part with my cards.

Why YOU should buy handmade soap!

Handmade soap. What's all the hype? Well, this was my question. Sure, it's great to support small business, but what else is in it for the buyer? If you're like me, you might have concerns, maybe certain skin conditions or sensitivities. I am no expert on skin conditions, but I do have severe eczema and overall extreme dry, flakey skin. I can at least tell you my experience with handmade soap and why I think everyone should give it a shot.

But, soap dries me out! Right? Wrong! This is what I thought my whole life, until I learned on the etsy forums that it's the harsh detergents in commercial soaps that dry you out and not the soap itself. In fact, with out all those added detergents, soap just cleanses the skin and does not strip it of your natural oils. So I decided to give handmade soap a shot and I found a shop with some soap that looked really cute and I'm so glad I found it!

Annie's Powder Room is my new favorite source for soap! That lovely popsicle soap picture at the top is what I ordered (in a different scent), and after only a couple uses I noticed my skin was not nearly as dried out. Annie's soap, like most handmade soap, has glycerin in it, which is nice and moisturizing. Did you know that most commercial soaps actually REMOVE the glycerin? Just another reason it dries your skin. After a month of using her soap my skin has vastly improved. I know I sound like a commercial, but after a lifetime of dry, cracked, sometimes oozing skin, I have finally found a good solution.

I have been told with eczema that you shouldn't shower daily because water is drying. But I just can't do that, I love my daily showers, so handmade soap is my best option. No, handmade soap has not CURED my eczema, but it has made my skin feel so much better. I mean, I'm writing a whole blog post on it! It must be good. Please check out Annie's shop, and take a gander at a few of my other favorites that I haven't tried yet, but can't wait to!

I definitely recommend a soap with glycerin if you have particularly dry skin. Also, a lot of soap makers on www.etsy.com have samples available either in their shops, or if you ask them by convo. It's good to try samples of several kinds to test what is best for you.
EpicallyEpicSoap:

pinkparchmentsoaps:

DirtyAssSoaps: Yes this IS soap!

Custom Stamp

This is by far the most challenging stamp I have made. It was a custom order for someone to stamp on their wedding invitation envelopes. There are so many little crevices to carve out, it took a while, but I think I'm better at carving now! I want to try making this stamp in different fonts because it's a really cute saying. I see a lot of hand carved stamps that are images, and not a whole lot of words or text. I want to get really good at carving text so I can be unique. It's really challenging to carve text well.

Here is the sketch I made to lay on the rubber before carving:

And again the finished product: