Helpful E Books

I thought you might enjoy these e-books from www.PatternMart.com. These e-books are delivered via PDF format and contain lots of helpful tips for craft business success.


Secrets to Pattern Profits eBook

Price: US$9.99



Is Your Business Ready For The Web E-book

Price: US$12.99



Primitive Hints Tips and How do they do that

Price: US$7.50

Wool Offerings

It's been a while since I've looked for supplies to post for you. Below are a few of the beautiful wool hair selections available on www.PatternMart.com.



1 Oz.~ AUBURN~ Hand Dyed Wool Fleece Curly Locks
Price: US$8.95






1 Full Oz. Lovely Primitive White Raw Wool for Doll Hair & Crafts ORP
Price: US$6.95






DOLL HAIR ~ Primitive Black Doll Shade~ Dark Charcoal
Price: US$5.99

Dipped Bulb

There are so many different bulbs we can dip and so many ways to do it. Below are just a few of those ways available at www.patternmart.com. You'll delight in turning those ordinary bulbs into extraordinary bulbs.



Grubby Wax dipped christmas bulbs
Price: US$4.50






How to Make Scented & Colored Silicone Bulbs Recipe
Price: US$5.99






Scented, Colored, Silicone Dipped Bulbs
Price: US$6.50

Free - January/February Issue of Creative Times Magazine

It's time for more creative reading. What better way to get inspired than grabbing your free copy of the newest Creative Times Magazine issue. The January/February issue is one I think you'll really enjoy. So grab your copy, sit back and let the creative juices start to flow.

http://www.creativetimesmagazine.com/

Designing Minute

I made it back into my studio over the last couple days. It's amazing just how much I missed designing. I was itching to sew and work on a new doll.

I usually start out with a idea in my head and then opt to sketch it. It's just a quick 1-2 minute sketch to just get the idea on paper. Usually the finished doll doesn't look exactly like the sketch and that's ok. The purpose of the sketch is to give yourself a outline of sorts.



This doll is not quite finished yet and I'll work on her a bit more later. I have her sitting next to my desk and throughout the day I glance at her as if I'm waiting for her to tell me what else she needs and what creation I should make for her hold.

Try sketching your ideas. Even if drawing isn't your most natural talent and your sketch isn't quite as good as your 4 year olds, that's ok! It's meant to simply get the ideas on paper and give you a foundation to build upon.

Altered Art

I must say that I am completely intrigued by altered art. Everything from scrapbooking to altering books. It's all just so interesting looking and amazing how you can take something, add neat elements to it and voila...you have a piece of altered art.

Well, ok it may not be as simple as that. At least with my first attempt I made I learned a lot and while I'm very pleased with how it turned out, there are some things I would do differently.

This is a vintage book that I altered. The most tedious part was cutting through hundreds of pages to create the "window". Once I finally got through that the rest was quite fun and I look forward to the next one. This one is more of a patriotic, americana theme. It has a boy in his little attire riding a bar of Pearline soap which comes from a actual vintage ad from the 1800's and is mounted in a 3-D fashion within the window. You can find great vintage printables at www.InstantPrintables.com which you can download instantly.

I am looking forward to the next piece of altered art. This is quite addictive and I find myself looking at different objects these days and thinking to myself "that would look neat altered".



Try your hand at altered art, I think you'll love it!

Do You Like Freebies?

Pattern Mart recently unveiled their new Freebies page, where every other Monday there is a new fun short survey and once you take the survey you get a suprize free gift! The fun part is you never know what it's going to be. It changes every other Monday. So you can come back every couple weeks and take a new survey and receive a new free gift. How neat is that!?

The first freebie was given away to almost 600 people who took the short survey and the feedback in response to the new freebie page has been tremendous. Folks are really enjoying it. So be sure and stop by and check it out!

The current survey is up and running and if you miss that one, a new one will be up on these dates: Monday, December 11th and Monday, December 25th and every other Monday there after.

Have fun and enjoy the freebies! Ofcourse feel free to also browse through Pattern Mart as there are some awesome new patterns up including some new Punch Needle Patterns and Knitting patterns.

I've become "hooked"

I have become "hooked" by all this talk of Needle Punch.
After reading the article that Kelle wrote awhile ago....I knew that I wanted to add it to the blog and learn more about it. I have been seeing it in different magazines and more and more folks are trying it as their craft.

I have been looking into getting my supplies. I live in Canada and not everyone will ship items up here so I have to look around. For patterns.....that part was super simple....PATTERNMART of course!

Have you seen the patterns offered for this? Oh I am going to have a hard time picking which one I want to do first. I have been a good girl this year and think I need to send "santa" a list to order from. LOL

Have you tried this yet? How long did it take you? I am thinking I am going to become hooked quite quickly and will be finding it hard to want to do anything else for awhile! LOL I already have an array of ideas racing thru my mind on how I can incorporate needle punch into what I already create.

Come on....... lets join the fun and get "punching"

Cedara of http://www.thrutheatticdoor.com

Punch Needle Revival

Posted on 2006-07-25 by Kelle Arvay
Category: Punch Needle

Originally called Russian Punch Needle Embroidery, this unique art form has been around since the days of ancient Egyptians and widely used in the 1700's. What we are seeing today is a renewed interest in the art form with the possibilities of designs being endless. In the last six months or so there has been an increased popularity when it comes to Punch Needle and you will find many more designers offering Punch Needle patterns. Punch Needle is a very easy craft to do even for a beginner. It consist of a punch needle tool, gripper frame, weavers cloth and skiens of cotton or wool floss. Basically you use your threaded punch needle tool to "punch" the floss through the weavers cloth over and over to create a finished design. If you haven't tried Punch Needle, I'd highly recommend it. Not only is it easy but it's a craft that is portable and can be taken with you anywhere. The great thing about Punch Needle is you can create a work of art of just about any design. Everything from primitive style designs, flowers to more cute designs. Your imagination is the only limit. There are also so many things you could put punch needle designs on.Everything from framing them to creating handbags to just name a couple. Designs can range from very simplistic to very intricate. I would recommend if your a beginner to start with a simple design. Most Punch Needle designs are quite small. Ranging from three to four inches in size. Once you get going though you certainly could become more ambitious and create designs that are larger. Happy punching! © Kelle Arvay

Author: Kelle Arvay
Bio:Kelle Arvay is a doll pattern designer and long time artist. She also is the owner of http://www.patternmart.com/ which has thousands of craft patterns that can be downloaded instantly. In addition, she is also the co-publisher of Creative Times magazine, http://www.ctmagazine.net/ which is a bi-monthly downloadable magazine full of crafting articles, trends, interviews and several free patterns in each issue.

TOOK A COURSE!!!!!

I did it!
I took one of the courses offered on Patternmart.
It was so simple to do.... just found which one I was interested in...clicked....took my class.
The price was perfect and I now have some great tips on how to help me create a round doll head. Its something I've been wanting to learn for quite awhile and now I have.

What are you waiting for? Its so simple!

Cedara of http://www.thrutheatticdoor.com

Marketing Your Crafts - Part 1

Marketing your Crafts

Whether you have a new website or an existing one, you can always benefit
with more marketing idea's and tips to draw in more traffic with potential
customers to your website.

Here we'll cover several ways I've found to be very successful in increasing
exposure to your website, increasing traffic and building repeat customers.

Mailing Lists:

Mailing lists are an invaluable tool to gaining and keeping customers. You
may already have a mailing list and right now may be thinking why am I
mentioning even mentioning this as it's not a new concept to you. Well,
while many people have mailing lists only some of them know how to use them
to their full benefit. Let's start by the task of getting people to sign up
for your mailing list. Try some of the following techniques and announce
them on your website:

-Offer discounts exclusively to mailing list subscribers

-Offer a free product with orders from members who are on your mailing list

-Offer contests exclusively to your mailing list members

-Offer preview sales to your mailing list members so they can see your
product before it goes on your website.

-Offer online "Yard Sales" exclusively to those on your mailing list. This
is where you can host pictures of items either on a page on your site known
only to your mailing list members with yard sale priced items for them to
purchase. You can also host a yard sale on many of the free picture hosting
sites and simply send that link to your mailing list when your sale begins.

-Insert tips, links to articles, links to other freebies, etc on your
mailing list



Next lets talk about building your mailing list subscribership. There are
several ways to do this and these are what I've found to be the most
successful:

-Exchange links or banners with other business's mailing lists. This is
great additional exposure for both of you. Say you have 800 members and the
other business has 800 members, you just doubled your exposure. Do this with
as many business's you can that are willing to exchange with you. Be sure
and sign up for that business's mailing list so you can make sure your link
or banner is correct. You can agree to exchange for any time period you
would like ie; 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, etc.

-If you have a Blog, insert a mailing list sign up form on it

-Post on your favorite message boards telling members about any specials
you'll be offering to those that sign up for your mailing list

-Post on your favorite message boards asking if anyone would like to
exchange mailing list links or banners.

Kelle Arvay
Patternmart