"Hearts Me" Giveaway

**THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED! THANKS TO ALL WHO ENTERED!**

I haven't done a giveaway for awhile, so it's time for another one. In this giveaway, you can enter to win any one item in my Etsy shop priced at $14 or under. (Or $14 off any one item if listed for more than that.) Of course, your item will be shipped for free. But wait....that's not all! I'll also be sending a mix of various goodies to go with your one item. How do you enter? Go visit my shop and find the one item you would pick if you won. While you are there, "heart" the item you want by adding it to your favorites. Then leave a comment here telling me which item you'd pick. Don't forget to leave your email address so I can contact you if you win. (If you don't have an Etsy account, you can still enter. Leave a comment here telling me which item you'd pick and your favorite holiday.) One winner will be selected at random. You must leave your comment here no later than 5 pm, November 4th (next Wednesday).

Happy Crafting!

New Stuff in the Store!

I've been sadly neglecting my Etsy store lately. Not anymore! I listed a bunch of new stuff in the last couple of days. Here's a couple of the items I've done recently.

There's more new stuff in the store. Check it out! So far, most of the new items are jewelry, but I hope to have some new and different items listed by the end of the week. I feel like I might actually be getting back on track with everything before the holiday season begins this year.

Happy Crafting!

Inspiration Tuesday: Thanksgiving Decorating

Okay, so you already know I've been bitten by the Christmas bug early. I thought for today's Inspiration Tuesday I would show some great decorating inspiration for the post-Halloween through Thanksgiving season.

First up is a couple of Thanksgiving table settings from Country Living.

I love the edge of the tablecloth! This could be easily replecated with burlap and a fabric marker or you could use the drop cloths everyone is making curtains out of.

I love the vivid colors of this tablescape paired with the muted tones of pewter containers holding bright berry twigs.

What a great idea to use black and white family photos for a centerpiece! The photos here are just propped up with a display of gords, but you could put them in frames, glass containers, or use any number of different ways to display them. All of these and many more great ideas can be found here.

Check out these fun clip art projects from Martha Stewart:

Cute turkey place cards (project link here):

Or how about these adorable squirrel favor wrappers (project link here):

Find these projects and several others for Thanksgiving centerpeices and decor on Martha's website here.

And lastly, how about taking advantage of the fact that a lot of fall decor is already going on sale or clearance, even those fake pumpkins. They just need a little love to make them look fabulous like this:

Head on over to Shanty2Chic for a great tutorial on making these bad boys.

Wow. After seeing all this great Thanksgiving decorating, I need to clean my house. The second that Halloween is over, I'm changing out the decor! (Not that it will take much. I only managed to decorate my porch and have a few things hanging in the dining room.)

Happy Crafting!

What the heck's going on around here?

So...if you visited my blog at all today, you may have noticed some weird looking stuff for awhile. It was just me, trying to figure out html code. Yikes! That's scary folks! I am pretty clueless when it comes to computer stuff, but luckily for me, I have two saviors in that department, my husband and the internet. This time it was the internet that saved me. I have been wanting to do three columns on this blog foreva! Finally today, I googled a way to do that. I found this blog called Blogger Buster. It has amazingly simple step-by-step instructions for how to change things if you use Blogger as your platform. It took me seriously five minutes to change this bad boy from two regular columns into three awesome looking ones. I am planning on changing the look of my background and header soon as well...watch for the unveiling of the new look of Hindrance! (Here's the direct link to the 3 column tut if anyone is interested.)

Happy Crafting!

Christmas Preview

Am I the only one who is over Halloween and wants to skip straight to Christmas? For some reason, I've caught the Christmas bug extra early this year. Maybe it's all the random snow and rain we've been getting lately. I started gathering ideas for the holiday season already. (I can't help it!) I thought I would show you a sneak preview of one of the things I'm working on: needle felted Christmas trees!I plan on making a tutorial later on for a more simplified version of this. This tree is needle felted with wool over a Styrofoam base. The star was felted separately into shape and then attached to the top of the tree by felting. Then I attached some cute pom pom trim, and ta-da! Christmas.

Look for this little guy to be appearing in my Etsy store soon!

Happy Crafting!

10 Tasks in 10 Days: The Finish Line

Remember Gina's challenge over at The Shabby Chic Cottage to complete 10 tasks in 10 days?

Well, here's my list again:

1. Paint the free standing cupboard in craft room
2. List all finished items on Etsy!
3. Finish at least two Halloween projects
4. Decorate my house for fall/Halloween
5. Switch out my summer/winter wardrobe
6. Clean and organize our bedroom
7. Finish cleaning and organizing craft porch
8. Bake cookies I bought supplies for
9. Take piles of stuff I'm donating to thrift store
10. Make terrariums I bought plants for and re-pot dracena plant

Everything that's bold, I got done. That means there are four others left to do yet. I am going to keep plugging away at the list even though the 10 days are over. I have torn apart my craft room and organized everything into piles of like stuff (all fabric together, jewelry making stuff, etc). Most of the jewelry stuff and fabric has been put away, so I've made progress.

I'm going to showcase the one thing on the list that I'm especially proud of. Remember that microwave stand I refinished awhile back? I had a tall free standing cupboard in the craft porch that I wanted to refinish to match it.

Here's the before:

Boring country pine finish. Not for long! Finished job in the porch (which is still messy by the way, so just ignore that fact.)

Yea! Much better. I didn't photo document the whole process, but I used the exact same steps as on the microwave stand. The cupboard didn't turn out quite the same color though. I may have to put a second coat of stain on it some day. But for now, it's across the room from the other stand, so I think it will be okay. Plus, it's kind of growing on me that they don't match exactly. They seem more naturally antiqued that way. I am filling this cupboard with all my fabric and sewing supplies. As soon as I actually get the craft porch fully put together and organized, I will do a big long post about that.

Don't forget to hop on over to Gina's to check out the linky party for 10 Tasks in 10 Days!

Happy Crafting!

10 Tasks in 10 Days

Gina over at the Shabby Chic Cottage is hosting a challenge. She's calling it the 10 Tasks in 10 Days Challenge. The idea is to make a list of 10 things that you've been putting off doing or even started doing but haven't finished. I am constantly starting projects and not finishing them, so I thought I would join in the party. To join, follow the second link above and leave a comment that you're joining in. Then make your list either on your own blog or in your comment to Gina. On October 15, Gina is having a party to highlight what everyone got done. Here's my list:

1. Paint the free standing cupboard in craft room
2. List all finished items on Etsy!
3. Finish at least two Halloween projects
4. Decorate my house for fall/Halloween
5. Switch out my summer/winter wardrobe
6. Clean and organize our bedroom
7. Finish cleaning and organizing craft porch
8. Bake cookies I bought supplies for
9. Take piles of stuff I'm donating to thrift store
10. Make terrariums I bought plants for and re-pot dracena plant

Whew! That's quite a list. I hope I can get at least most of it done. I unknowingly got a head start on it last night as I cleaned out the cupboard I want to paint and began organizing all my jewelry making supplies. (Finally!) I will keep you posted as I get things done. Items on the list will be bolded in this post as I finish them, so check back for updates!

I hope this inspired you to do those things on your to do list that have been hanging around for awhile! :)

Happy Crafting!

Funky Find Friday: Halloween

For this installment of Funky Find Friday, I thought I would feature some great Halloween themed items.

First up is piece more geared toward fall in general. It's a beautiful pumpkin silk scarf from Ocean Avenue Silks.

Gorgeous!

How about some simple but cute cake decorating ideas from Country Living Magazine?

These ideas actually come from Chef Mary Maher of Chicago's Cakegirls bakery. I love her on the Food Network!

Check out this awesome coaster set w/ storage tin that littlepooky made over at Craftster.org.

Then there's this cute fabric banner from Addiebugs.

I love it!

All this Halloween goodness makes me want to throw a party even more. That's probably not going to happen this year. *sigh* I'll have to settle for decorating my house anyway! ;)

Happy Crafting!