Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Cat inchies, bird inchies, hand-drawn inchies!

Yep, a whole whack of inchies. First up, the cat and bird sets I mentioned in my last post:


And finally, a set of hand-drawn inchies for a swap I'm hosting in a month or so:


My goal is to get braver about doing hand-drawn inchies/ATCs/etc, so this is the beginning. :) I think they turned out fairly cute! (I hope that my partner thinks so too!) I have so few hand-drawn inchies in my collection that I'd LOVE to add more, so hopefully this swap can be a regular thing. :D

Still have to do: X, Y, Z ATCs. One brown ATC. I really hope that stupid Canada Post doesn't go on strike! :(

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Kid ATCs, and inchies galore.

Someone is hosting a kids' ATC swap, and Kaia (my four year old daughter) was thrilled to make & trade her own ATCs. She makes them with me from time to time, but was SO excited to send them to other kids in the mail...it was cute. ;) I offered her whatever she wanted from my craft stuff, but she chose two pink textured ATC blanks and said she wanted to draw her own. Hey, more power to you, kid - I'm still scared to hand-draw mine! :P

So, without further ramble, some photos:

Kaia's ATCs (plus two by me I'm sending to the moms, because I can):


Punchie inchies:


Butterfly inchies:


Orange inchies:


I'm pretty sure that all three of those inchie swaps only call for five inchies for each partner, but I never can send less than six. They are fun to make and I have the room on the card, so why not? ;)

I've been busily making a TON of machine-sewn postage stamp ATCs lately. Seriously, I've made a few dozen this month. They actually take a fair bit of time to piece together, then they need to be stitched, then if they're not solid enough, they need to be attached to a stiff ATC blank...then labeled and yadda yadda. I'm making a good dent in my used postage stamp stash, using up random scrapbook papers I have, and having fun doing it. :)

I made a couple more sets of inchies today, but I'll take a photo tomorrow - one bird set, one cat set. Both are for swaps I'm hosting in about a month. (I'm taking the month of June away from hosting for the most part.)

Next up - X, Y, Z ATCs. One brown ATC.

(Oh, and I suck - I failed to sign up for the holiday inchie swap in time. Derrrrp.)

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Being sick sucks.

Unsurprisingly, I'm dealing with the cold from hell. Who knew that having two sick kids hanging off of you and using you as a human Kleenex would get you sick in turn? :P I really should have called in dead this past weekend at work, but I went in anyway. Money is money, right? *sighs* Anyhoo, today was the first day in the past week that I've felt almost-human, so it was a super crafty day! (Yayyyy Sudafed! Nothing else has even put a DENT in this.)

ATC addicts color series - green, blue and purple:

Numbers extra swap (plus a 5 ATC because the first went MIA in the mail):


I actually made a LOT more ATCs than I'm posting, but I generally don't post things unless they are full sets or are going towards a specific swap or something. Truth be told, I've actually been bad about mailing ATCs for sender's choice-type swaps without taking a photo first...oops! I will try to remedy that.

Next up/on-the-go: Some random inchies. Possibly some holiday/event inchies. One brown ATC to round off the final color series set - I've already done the pink one, and the black-and-white one. X, Y, Z ATCs. Maybe more stuff that I'm forgetting.

Getting rid of this cold would be pretty awesome too. x_x Both kids are down to super-nasty coughs for the most part. I'm still really sick, but am getting that cough now as well. Too bad Mommies don't get sick days, hmm? Hubby commented on how I'm way worse off than the kids, and they're pretty sick...so that's saying a lot. I told him it's because they get the benefit of some sleep, and I get none, plus I have to expend what little energy I have caring for them. He agreed, and told me to go rest. So I made crafty things instead. >_>

Thursday, May 19, 2011

More ATCs!

The first batch of five are heading to GirlFriday - angelling the batch that stinkin' angelslater SHOULD have sent her. (I don't want anyone missing out!)


The second batch of three is for May's alpha ATC swap - U, V, W:


I don't know if it's a good thing or not, but I'm slowly getting a little more brave when it comes to hand-drawing ATCs.

Next up - 'event/holiday' inchies (maybe - supplies-dependent), X Y Z ATCs. More random inchies for a private swap with Laura next month!

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Vintage-look inchies.

Joined a vintage-look inchies swap this morning, and whipped these up today - fun! (Swap calls for five, so I'm sending six each, of course!)

Currently working on: U, V, W ATCs. V is almost done! :D

Yellow inchies for Laura.


Laura got flaked on, on her 'Yellow Submarine' inchies swap - so these are for her. :)

Flakers drive me nuts! My Flakers list (just the people who have flaked on me personally) has more than doubled in the past two weeks. :( If you're not going to send, GO AWAY, thief! No matter what you tell yourself, theft is exactly what you're doing. >:O

So yes, I was all for happy inchies to make up for the ones she didn't get. Boooo flakers!

Sunday, May 15, 2011

Yay, Blogger is working!

That means it's time to upload a whole whack of photos! :D For whatever reason, my poor abused camera has been taking even worse photos lately...please bear with me! I really need to get a new one, one of these days.

I've been crafting a fair bit as per usual, but I've also been very other-ly occupied - not only did we get a new kitten, but the hubby and I have been working on clearing out the basement...what a can of worms. D:

Anyhoo, pictures!

A set of name inchies I made for a Wishlist group member's wish:


May's 10 twinchies:


May's kawaii inchies:

May's sender's choice inchie sets:


Sender's choice skinny #2:


ATC addicts color series (red, orange, yellow):

And last but not least, Mr. Nervy Kitten (his actual name is Koopa):


As usual, I have a lot of stuff on the go. Next up: Yellow inchie set for Laura. U, V, W ATCs. X, Y, Z ATCs. Attempting to wrangle my craft supplies into a manageable mess. More stuff I can't think of right now.

I'm cutting back on swap-bot a bit, and not hosting much (if anything) for the month of June...I've been flaked on and had to chase people around WAY too much lately. I'm experiencing major burn-out as a result, and need to take it easy before I lose interest in it entirely. I know that it isn't the userbase as a whole, but it's so completely frustrating...ugh. So yeah, that's why there isn't much crafty-to-do stuff listed - I'm not doing a ton of swaps, and lots of the ones I am doing are just postcard swaps and the like. I will be crafting random goodies and maybe joining a few random not-hosted-by-me swaps throughout my semi-hiatus, though!

Speaking of postcards - Postcrossing is fun! A few of my very first wave of sent cards have arrived, so I should have three coming to me from other people now, and was able to send out some new ones. Yay! :D

Thursday, May 5, 2011

My first Dotee doll!

So I went ahead and gave it a go. I decided to use felt for my first one since it's easier to work with, but I'm sure I'll make more - and I'll start using my massive fabric hoard! ;)

She's about 5.5" tall, not including the hanger or tail. A bit big, as it turns out, but I'm pretty happy with her! I had no real idea what I was doing so I just sort of went for it...and this is what the end result was:


Bottom half:


Her cute face:

If I had blush, I'd give her some rosy cheeks. I debated giving her little pink felt cheeks, but opted against it.

I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to viably swap Dotees, because Canada Post is freaking evil and their pricing is insane. Unless I could manage to smush it between cardboard and get it to magically fit in their stupid slot-tester thing, it would be $7+ to send it to the US, and more to anywhere else, INCLUDING within Canada. Even if I COULD manage to get it to go via light packet, that's just under $3 to the US and just over $5 international...which would add up fast. We'll see if I can manage to pack them well enough to make it work!

I think this one will go live with my Mom as part of her Mommy Day gift. It's super-random, but I made it with love - hopefully she will like it! ;)

Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Flower inchies and whatnot.

I've been crafting steadily, but not many full sets of anything. Lots and lots of random postage-stamp ATCs, some inchies, twinchies...yeah. I'll get to finishing up those sets ASAP and get more photos up, but for now, I have some inchies and stuff to post. ;)

These are for an upcoming flower-themed inchie swap. The swap calls for five, but I went ahead and made six anyway - I have the room on the card, so why not? ;)

Nine-themed ATCs:


Two-themed ATC (resend - apparently the first didn't arrive):


Next up/on-the-go: Lots, as usual. Need to finish my yellow ATC - did red and orange already. More random twinchies. One random skinny. U, V, W ATCs. X, Y, Z ATCs. Green, blue and purple ATCs.

Annnnd - I want to give dotee dolls a try! I'd never been interested in them until lately, so I really want to attempt to tackle one myself. Goodness knows I have enough fabric and felt and sequins and beads around here to do so! :P Here's to hoping they turn out well enough to swap!