Yes! It's Sunday and that means it is time for my new spot! Featured items!

Because I see so many lovely items on Etsy and it's very difficult to get a Treasury spot, I felt I may as well use some of this blog space to highlight some of the lovely things I see as I browse!



This gorgeous scarf has been knitted by tallib, who specialises in knitted items. Her shop is full of hats, scarves and gloves and the occasional doll, all knitted by her. And she's currently having a Spring Sale!



I make cards as welll (obviously from my last post) but I can't make them nearly as lovely as this one, created by mrsdstahl, who doesn't just do cards but also has wedding invitations and stationary sets! Currently 10% of her profits are going towards the Fisher House charity which helps the families of injured military personel (the English equivalent would be Headley Court in Surrey). So not only do you get some lovely things to give people, but you're also helping a charity!



Being a jewellery maker myself I can appreciate pretty pieces, especially when they're made of memory wire!!! (I love memory wire). This green bracelet was made by greenstar9, a relative newcomer who Etsy as she has only been there since January this year, but she already has two sales (including this bracelet) so I think we'll be seeing more of her in the future!



These adorable tags were found in the shop of detailshomegoods. This shop is a veritable treasure trove of items, from greetings cards to napkin rings, all involving some kind of sewing! Plus they ship internationally! Always good to know when you're browsing.



Raise your hand if you want a cushion made with that fabric! Yes, I've raised my hand too. I love the pattern and I love the shade of pink used. LittleMissQuarter printed this by hand, and has got lots of other lovely printed materials in her shop! She is VERY new to Etsy, she only joined at the end of April, but she has 2 sales and is currently offering a "Three For Two" offer to celebrate her shop opening. If you're better at sewing than I am and would like a funky or cute cushion cover for your home, this is the place to check out!



And last but not least, cupcakes! Not for eating though, purely for your hair. Charity5 is currently taking a mini hiatus to catch up on her orders because she is incredibly popular, and I can see why! Her shop is full of items for you to dress your children in, including some GORGEOUS costume pieces that make me wish my sisters were 5 again. Her shop is still open but with a reduced line from the look of things, so I would recommend this place as the place to go when you need to buy Christmas presents for little people.

And now go check out the shops themselves!

Featured Crafter will return next Sunday!

I have come up with a new feature for my alternate Sundays (until I get bored :P)!

It's quite difficult to choose a particular crafter, especially with so many lovely items that I see on Etsy.

So I'm going to stat doing a Featured Item selection, 6 items from 6 different crafters, and this way more people get featured, I get more to write about, and you guys have more pictures to look at. Everyone wins!

So keep your eyes peeled like onions tomorrow!

So a little while ago I decided to start planning what Christmas cards to make for next Christmas. I now know from last year's experience that the time to start making Christmas cards is some time in June, so I thought I should jump ahead and get planning while I had inspiration.

I absolutely adore Woodware Clear Magic stamps and bought 2 lots of Christmas ones back in November, and decided to put at least one set to good use this Christmas (a bit more difficult to use the other set and they are a bit larger and I tend to struggle to get an even amount of ink on them).

These are all hand stamped and hand coloured so believe you me, it takes me a while to make them XD I apologise for the poor quality of the pictures, I took them using my tiny little Nikon, my Etsy photos are taken by my Dad using his awesome stock photography camera so they look a lot better.



As you can see, this one involves 3 Christmas stockings and then mittens in each corner. I just the same mitten stamp for each corner but I might change it so I have two different mittens, in diagonally opposite corners, need to test that one out next. I don't particularly like this one because I think there is too much white space.



In this one I have 3 stockings, 2 hats and 4 mittens. But it took much longer to colour because the mittens are all different and I kept losing track of which pens I had used (I have the full range of 36 Whispers double end markers). The stocking on the right is actually sky blue rather than a sort of mental glowing turquoise glowing blue. If I put these into production when I will more than likely only use 2 mittens and, as with my plan for the one above, have them diagonally opposite.

The text reads "Christmas Wishes" and I will probably do it in red or green rather than black, just need to get a red or green ink pad.



And here we have nothing but mittens! The text reads "Warm Woolly Mittens" and I added little springs of holly to the corners. I think this is my favourite one because I managed to space all the mittens fairly evenly so it looks quite colourful and the white space is more scattered than in big blocks.

I'll probably end up doing some cards as mixed packs and some as packs with just that theme (i.e. one pack with cards with the first design).

I made some earrings the other day so now I just need Dad to photograph them and I can list them on Etsy! Yay for new things!

It's Sunday, and this time I remembered!

Today's featured crafter is Donna from cutedesigns, she is actually remarkably close to me, geographically speaking, as she lives in England, just a few miles down the road from me (not something I was expecting when I joined Etsy I must admit, I started singing "It's a small world after all" when we realised XD).

Donna has been crafting since she was very little, although she confesses that she fell out of the crafting habit for a few years before returning to it properly 3 years ago. And as her shop name shows, Donna sells cute items.



And this shows just how cute! I swear I went "awww!" the moment I saw this gorgeous amigurumi cupcake in her shop. From the strawberry on his head to the little felt blushes on his cheeks, this little guy is the epitome of cute. Apparantly it can take several hours to make each crocheted item, longer if they have limbs, but I think a labour of love is always worth it. Especially when the result is an adorable cupcake.



And here we have Felix Scout McFrosty, a penguin in a badge! My boyfriend loves penguins (possibly because people used to call him "Wingy" at school) so I always keep my eye open for things with those flight-less birds on, and then I spotted this badge! Unfortunately it's the only badge available at the moment, and there won't be for a while, Donna says that she has got so many cute animals in her head waiting to come out in crochet that badges are on hold for the time being. But I'm sure that once she has got enough of them out of her head and in to reality, then we'll see more of Felix Scout McFrosty and his penguin clan!

All of Donna's cute items are inspired by animals (apart from cupcakes), which would explain why she has crocheted bunnies, a hand-sewn cow, and a felt chick pin badge, along with The Blobs (both crocheted and hand-sewn), all scattered amoung adorable cherry polymer clay charms and kawaii cup of tea clay charms.

So go and check out cutedesigns and add a bit of adorable to your life!