Freebie Friday #10

So... did any of you REALLY expect me to get this posted earlier than this? And are any of you REALLY surprised that I haven't shared those photos yet, or that pretty package tutorial, or those blog posts I mentioned ...?

Didn't think so. by now most of you know I'm easily distracted...by laziness. ;)

And naps... naps are good. I have a very comfy couch that inspires naps...you sit on it, snuggle up intending to read or watch a movie or work on some beading... and then you just feel so comfy that you just have to close your eyes for a few minutes...

... then three or four hours later you open them again and wonder what the hell happened ;) lol

And rainy or dreary weather doesn't help avoid that 'need a nap' feeling.

Anyhow, all plans aside, I WILL do those things... just not today. Today I have winners to announce and goodies to show :)

First off, the third 'Pay It Forward' spot goes to Micheladas. :) I'll be sending you a note off soon to find out a few things and get your address from you.  Carolyn , I sent you a note about a week ago and haven't heard back from you. Please check your email and if you don't have anything from me, email me at skye_sands@hotmail.com so I'll have your email :)

Next, the earring giveaway.

First off, thanks to everyone for taking part :) I loved reading your favorite Autumn things :)  I love the leaves.... the way they change colours, the smell of them, the crunch of them under your feet as you walk... everything. Autumn leaves are the best :D  I also love designing and carving my jack-o' lantern, and getting all slimey when scooping out my pumpkin seeds to roast them :) It's gross, but so much fun! I'm not fond of the smell of my hands after scooping out pumpkin guts though >.< lol

So, do you want to know how I chose the winners this time? lol  No  I didn't let my cat choose this time ;) I let the beads choose !

I had fifteen people leave entries... so I assigned each name a number, and then took fifteen brown glass star beads ( because that was the closest container lol ) , sat my roll of packing tape on the floor a foot or so away, then tossed the beads towards the roll. The number of beads that landed inside the roll was the winner. I did this twice for the first place ( 7 stars!), then the second place ( 2 stars >.< lol.).. put the beads away.... then got them back out and tossed them again for an extra winner ( 11 stars! whohoo!).

Kimberly gets first choice of which pair she wants.

Originally, the other pair was to go to Jami... however, if she likes the same one Kimberly chooses, I'll make her a similar pair, and Gina will get the left over. Other wise, I'll just surprise Gina with a pair ;)

Are you drumming your fingers in anticipation of what's in the pot for this months FF?

I could make you wait longer, you know ;)

I had thought to make a set of Halloween themed jewelry for the giveaway... but I got hit by the blahs and didn't get them beyond the design and prep stages. And then I turned around and knocked over a stack of bead packages and realized... I should share. If I shared some of these, then I wouldn't have to put them away ;)

So another bead bundle it is :)

October Goodies

I decided to share some of the goodies Lori Anderson sent me from our beadswap way back when - I think those are shell beads, and two charms - one plain white, and the other pink that says 'hope'.

There's some of the lovely lucite flowers I just received from PineRidge Treasures :)  A couple of the magnasite beads I got from the CBC Destash Day event; Four glass amber coloured tear drop beads, and a selection of wings, connectors and two large copper hearts, all from Yours, Mine & Ours.

PLUS, in addition to what's in the photo, there'll be a bundle of faux suede cording and a baggie or two of seed beads mixes, and I think maybe some other fibers to play with. I may decide to add a picture of that stuff... or I might not  ;)

I'd debated on doing a color coordinated bundle but... nah. Maybe next time ;) When I start putting different coloured beads together ...I get the urge to play with them.. and then get distracted >.< lol

a Rafflecopter giveaway

and I think I'll leave you with one of my pictures from PumpkinFest...

 ... of what else? A pumpkin :D

 

 

Isn't that an amazing carving job? These two guys carve two huge pumpkins every year... They'd just started on the second one when I took this picture, so I didn't get to find out what it was... until the other day at work. It was a frog... and I NEED to get my coworker to send me a photo of it for my mom! she LOVES frogs :D  For those curious,The eagle pumpkin most likely weighed around the two to three hundred pound mark! A little kid could climb inside there! the 'soon-to-be-frog pumpkin was a bit smaller.. well... flatter.. lol

 ~ Skye

Winners of stuff, and more stuff to win :D

Okay so I'm a *tad* late with the blogging... you all should know by now I'm unpredictable in my procrastinating :P  I've been saying for the past.. so many days that I was going to post, so... here... I'm posting :D

Actually, I went from having one thing I 'could' post about , and maybe toss a couple of these other things in.... to having a crap load of stuff to ACTUALLY blog about.

So, to start things off.

There have been several giveaways here this month. Half of those prizes were won by previous winners/ participants here, and so, since I already had their snail mails, I just packaged up their goodies and mailed them off to them... without telling them they won.

So... if you won something here before, or took part in something where you gave me your address, and entered any of the giveaways here this month... you might very well open your mail box next week to a little surprise :)

Freebie Friday #9 was one of these... and while I won't say the name of the person who won it,  if you really want to know if it was you, just pop back to the FF blog and the winners name is listed right on the rafflecopter widget.

So, while we're in between F.F.'s, I'll do another little giveaway or two :) 

Speaking of which, I had two little ones last week that had very few entrants, but wow, what entrants they were!

In ' Slogging Through' I tossed up three bundles of faux suede cording , and to enter you just had to tell me a joke. Anonymous (zanc@att.net) , Lisa ( Pine Ridge Treasures), Beth, Shaiha, Jami , & Anvil Artifacts, all left a joke or two to brings smiles :) Six entries... so I took six flower beads, assigned each person a color, and tossed the beads towards a roll of packing tape I put on the floor. The only bead to land inside the roll of tape ( and stay there, since one bounced right back out again) won. That would be the bead assigned to Anonymous - who's entry I'll count because they left an email addie I can identify them with. I'm not emailing them... if they'd left their name or linked to their facebook or blog... I *might've * dropped in and left a little nudge, but... email is too impersonal.  So 'zanc', if I don't hear from you by Friday, Oct.5th, One of the other jokers will get them instead ;)

On 'Who Wants Free Stuff?' , I asked for links to funny websites or videos in exchange for a chance to win some pretty little glass beads. I received one comment that didn't seem to have anything to do with anything so I tossed it as spam, >.< lol  Rita ( Toltec Jewels ) & Susan are the only ones who entered that one, and Susan's link damn near killed me. I had to force myself to keep reading through the laughter and tears. When I recovered, I immediately shared it :D I haven't heard from my mother since... so I don't know whether she read it... and wet her pants from laughing so hard and so is rather ticked at me for sharing ... ;) or if she never read it.. in which case, I'll have to print it out for her :D hehehe  At any rate, I'd decided as soon as I read it, that whether Susan won or not, I was totally sending her something... THAT was a prize worthy laugh, let me tell you. Two entries doesn't really inspire me to come up with a way to choose the winner though, so... I'll just put together a twin bundle of beads to match the one I photographed and send it to the both of them. Ladies, you've got until Friday, Oct. 5th to send me your snail mails! 

As well, on the same blog, I posted for participants in my ' Pay It Forward'.

Lina58 & Carolyn will both be receiving a little handmade surprise from me at some point when they least expect it ;)  I'll be contacting you both for your snail mails and a few ' likes/dislikes' to play with.

Rita, I wasn't sure if you were saying you wanted to PIF again or not. If you do, let me know. If not, then I have one more spot open. Anyone interested, stick  the letters 'PIF' in a comment  to this post, and if Rita says no, I'll go with you :) If more than one person 'PIF's' , I'll... roll a die or throw some beads to pick which one gets in ;) lol

Okay.. so THOSE are done. The new FF for October will go up next Friday, and it'll be another 'extra nice' one. I'd like to point out that when I packed the last up, wow that little sucker was heavy... I hadn't realized it would be.. I was almost afraid to see the shipping cost, but amazingly enough, it was the same as most of the others I mailed off... must have *just* slipped under the wire though lol

Okay... off track again... 

Like I said, I have lots of stuff to share... but I'll just tease you about most of it today ;)

I finally used some of my precious artbeads ( *gasp* ), as well as some of the VERY FIRST lampwork beads made by a talented gentleman, who I guess I'll finally post about now *L*. I have some jewelry photos as well as other photos to share, plus I'm heading off to Pumpkin Fest at some point this weekend, so I'll have even MORE photos to share next week :) If you haven't heard of it, google it ' PumpkinFest  Port Elgin' . It's HUGE. they've had the Guinness World Record  Pumpkin, as well as several other veggies, there a few times, plus they have a MASSIVE antique car show... as in they shut down the entire main street as well as at least one of the side streets. A few years ago they had one of the original 60's tv Batmobiles  there... of course I didn't go that year >.< My brother took a pic for me though! Last year they had some gorgeous motorcycles too :)

Crap...distracted again... where was I? Oh right.. stuff to tease you about that I might remember to blog about soon...

Oh, three quarters of the parcels I mailed off yesterday are in fancy envelopes. Some of the previous ones I've sent have been in 'special' packing too, but I've decided to keep adding that special touch and ensuring smiles when those mail boxes open. No more looking at a plain, boring brown or white envelope and wondering who it's from or what it might be... no... you'll see a pretty blue and white butterfly bedecked envelope and KNOW it's from me :D ...or.. at least know it's special ;) lol   I sent two 'non-butterfly' packages yesterday, too.. but that's only because they were a smaller envelope and I hadn't had time to figure out the best way to fancy them up. Next time I send out that size, they'll be fancy too :)  

 See? Isn't that much nicer than a boring old brown thing in your mailbox? lol  btw .. that white squiggly thing on the top right corner .. that's a piece of fishing line taped to the board..  I was hanging earrings off it for photos earlier and never took it off >.< 

The reason I just told you all that... aside from making you cross your fingers and wish to see butterflies every time you open your mail boxes ... was because I was thinking I might just do a little tutorial to show you all how to make your packages extra special too :)

I'm sure there was more that I was going to say but... my brain is now stuck on making butterfly envelopes and walking around looking at fancy cars with a coffee in my hand on a (hopefully) nice Fall morning lol

I'll leave you with another little prize for a couple of you to win :)

All you have to do is tell me your favorite thing to do in Autumn. And yes, that includes baking or cooking something special.. but I think you should share a link to the recipe if you've got one ;)  A random winner will get their choice of which pair they want.. and the remaining pair will go to a second winner.. that may or may not be random.. which is.. kinda random if you think about it ;) lol

~ Skye

Who wants free stuff?

Silly question, right?

Well, while I AM posting another little giveaway in here with some of those beads I mentioned in my last post, that's not what I am talking about.

It's IS free stuff, but... not the free stuff in question...

... if I'm not making sense, please keep in mind I'm sick, feverish and generally blah, so ... yeah... I'm weird enough on a normal level.. when I'm sick, I'm down right freakin' bizarre :D

 ... and I lost my train of thought.... >.< Oh Free Stuff, right! lol

Well this stuff isn't exactly 'free' ... since you have to reciprocate ..( oooh.. remembered the word I wanted AND spelled it right the first time...  you have no clue how amazing that is... )

 .. crap.. stop distracting me >.< 

 PAY IT FORWARD !

there... 

Pips of Pips Jewelry  got me :)  I'd been seeing the various pay it forward posts and wanted to get involved, but just had too much on my table at the time. Once I cleared my list a bit, I decided the next blog I saw with it, I'd try to jump in... and wow was I lucky  it was Pips :) 

Anyhow, I wasn't one of the three... but then neither was she... she was an extra add in from the sweet person whose blog she commented on, so she did a couple extras on hers and I was one of them :)

So the rules of this are simple.

The first three people who leave a comment will receive a hand made gift from me some time in the next year ; the exact what and when will be a surprise. I'll note you about  your snail mail addie, and any favorite colors or allergies or stuff like that , then one day you'll open your mail box to find a surprise :)

IF you are one of the three chosen, than you have to do the same... post a blog and make three gifts. If that seems like too much for you, keep in mind, you have an entire year to make and mail off those gifts. Plus, the rules state 'handmade' ... not anything specific. Just because the majority of the blogs I've seen this on have been jewelry blogs, doesn't mean that handmade gift has to be jewelry.. or even jewelry related.

I do a bit of everything so you never know... you might get some jewelry from me... or maybe a little painting... or a little plushie... Heck, it'll totally depend on what your reply to my note will inspire me to do ;)

Hmm.. you know what...? I just realized that if I do the little giveaway in this post, the first three comments might end up being people who aren't interested in paying it forward...

So... how about this.

If you're commenting about the the pay it forward,  have 'PIF' in your comment, along with your 'entry' to the giveaway :) That way you can enter both in one comment ;)

If your one of the first three comments but don't have PIF in it, I'll know you're not interested in taking part and will move to the next one.You'll still be entered in the giveaway .... assuming you followed the rules ;)

So... giveaway :)

sorry for the slight blur...I didn't have the energy to get the tripod and set it up.  So here's a selection of glass beads, some a soft minty green, some orange and some flowers in greens and browns. The flowers are about 10mm wide, and the largest of the rounds is about an 8mm.

The last giveaway , which is still open, asked for jokes to cheer me up. This one.. hmm... send me a link to your favorite internet funny; whether it be a video, comic, or blog :)  One link per comment, please :).. but you can comment more than once ;)  

So leave a link to enter the giveaway, and 'PIF' to enter the pay it forward :)

I'm gonna go curl back up on the couch now and burrow back under my heaps of blankets >.<