We have winners!

We had ten votes in our EtsyNEAT Creative Challenge Challenge and ended up with a tie! With three votes each, the winners are:

May / June: Water / The Ocean

AniaJane

July / August: The Forest

Stitchnmomma

And of course we can't forget our $50 moo.com gift certificate drawing! I used random.org to select a number between one and ten, and here is what I got:

Comment #6 belongs to crewelwhorled! Congratulations!

Reminder that January 23 is the date on which we start accepting submissions for our next challenge. The theme is winter sports, and there is still time to make something if you haven't started yet! We're planning on doing another vote like this at the end of 2013 and awarding a prize to the winner this time, so this could be your change to get yourself in the running.

Thanks to all who took the time to have a look and vote!

Captain's Notes

Chocolate & Banana Blackwork Wall Art by stitchnmomma

Hi everyone! I hope you've had an enjoyable holiday season and a productive end to your Etsy year. The Etsy Needle Arts Team went through some changes in 2012 and I'm happy about where we're headed in 2013. I want to thank everyone who joined our team this year and participated on our discussion boards and in our creative challenges. And I especially want to thank our team leaders, both those who have stepped down after contributing their time and effort to the team and those who have stepped up! Kelly and Michelle have been amazing so far; wouldn't you agree?

We have a few team things coming up, including our first creative challenge for the year. I'd like to remind you that Kelly / stitchnmomma won the last challenge of the year and chose "winter sports" as the theme for January's challenge. There are still almost three weeks left to stitch up something sporty! Submissions will be accepted here on the blog between January 23 and 26.

We are also looking to do something fun to honor the winners of 2012's creative challenges, so stay tuned! Staying tuned would be a good idea in general as we keep looking to engage our members in new activities. I hope you all have a wonderful, prosperous, healthy, happy, stitchy 2013!

Creative Challenge Winner!

Congratulations to stitchnmomma, the winner of our last Creative Challenge!  Her Thanksgiving inspired piece is just lovely.

As the winner of the Creative Challenge, stitchnmomma got to choose the theme for our next Creative Challenge... and that theme is... WINTER SPORTS!

The rules are simple.  Create something with needle and thread that is inspired by Winter Sports.  Get creative and think outside of the box!  Submissions will be accepted between January 23, 2013 and January 26, 2013.  This should give you plenty of time through our busy holiday season to get something made!

On January 23, we will put up a post asking for everyone's submissions.  It can be a link to something you are planning on selling on etsy or other venues, or just a picture of something you created!

Starting January 27 and ending January 31 will be our open voting to decide who made the most awesome piece!  All you have to do to vote is leave a comment on the voting post.

Feel free to leave comments about different ideas for this challenge, or just to cheer everyone on!  Come on everyone, let's finish this year with some awesome Winter Sports inspired creations!

Creative Challenge Winner!

I'd like to congratulate stitchnmomma for winning our latest creative challenge! She won with this very cool entry:

As the winner of our challenge, stitchnmomma had the opportunity to select the theme for our next challenge and she picked Thanksgiving!

So, start stitching up some gourds or turkeys or whatever design the holiday inspires you to create and be ready to submit your entries Wednesday, October 24.

Thanks to stitchnmomma and FunWithNeedles for making it interesting :) I am sure we will see some great entries next month!

Captain's Notes

(marysgraddaughter)

It has been a week of changes on the team.

For starters, let's welcome all the new members that have joined:

Marysgranddaughter

fishboneskeletonkey

yellowdandy

purpbutt

and

dimenstitch

I am so happy to see all the continued growth and the amazing artists that keep joining our team!  To all new member, please be sure to check out the "New Members" discussion thread on the team page for some good newbie info!

This week, we would also like to announce a change on the team leadership.  Unfortunately, Bekah of Beetastic will be stepping down from her position (but thankfully staying with our team) and Liz of ThisTinyExistance will be stepping up to take over for her.  Thank you to Bekah for all your work on our team and for getting us this far!  

Thank you as well to Liz for joining the leadership.  We are happy to have you.  You all can look for Liz to start recruiting members for the team blog starting around next week.  If you are interested in being featured, please convo myself or Liz!

Lastly, We will be seeing Stitchnmomma step down from creating our weekly treasuries.  We thank her for her hard work as that is not an easy job.  The leaders are currently reworking the weekly treasury aspect of the team blog.  If any members have suggestions we are all ears.  For now, we will leave that spot open on the weekly blog schedule.

Whew...I believe that is all for now.  As always, have a great weekend!

Cheers,

Amanda AKA Pilous Percilla

Weekly Treasury

Weekly Treasury

Weekly Treasury

I did something a little different this week. I had a specific theme in mind and couldn't find 16 items from our team to fill the treasury, so I selected 16 items from shops that would be lovely additions to the already fabulous team we have.

Weekly Treasury

I've been a little tight on time this week, so I thought I'd use this lovely team treasury recently created by BRadleyBB. I hope you all enjoy it as much as I did.

Featured Member stitchnmomma

Sorry for the late post it appears I posted this on my blog by accident.  Well better two blogs than none.

This week's Featured Member is stitchnmomma

Q.  Tell us a bit about yourself and your shop.

A.  I’m a proud mom of a future U.S. Army soldier and 3 furbabies. I work full-time by day in the Operations Dept. of a franchise office for a national pizza chain and almost full-time by night and weekends as a stitchaholic. My Etsy shop started as a way to sell my original design patterns and other cross stitched goodies in the hopes of building a nestegg to one day move to Italy. I try to keep a variety of patterns as well as finished items (magnets, buttons, wall art, etc.). I have a personal business philosophy that I won’t sell a pattern until I’ve stitched it myself to make sure it looks just right. It takes longer for new patterns to be available, but at the end of the day, I’m happy with my decision.

A.  What or Who inspires you?

Q.  I’m inspired by many things, people and places. Sometimes it’s a quote I’ll see, others it may be a piece of artwork or something from nature and sometimes it’s just a color combination. As an example I recently went to the M.C. Esher exhibit at my local art museum and came home and immediately started sketching some ideas I have. Unfortunately the ideas always outweigh the time available to design and stitch them.. I also love bright, bold colors and try to incorporate those into my works as often as I can.

Q.  When you're not doing things for your shop can we find you around the internet?

A.  I have a poorly neglected blog and I’m on Facebook and twitter  which is also neglected since my son set my Facebook account to auto-tweet for me.

Q.  What tool could you not live without?

A.  I would have to say my colored pencils. It may sound a little crazy, but I use them to sketch out new designs with the colors I’m thinking of, and “color in” my patterns as I’m doing them. I typically have 5+ projects going at one time and it makes it so easy to put one down for weeks (or sometimes months) and know right where to start stitching when I pick it back up.

Q.  How did you learn to stitch?

A.  My mom taught me how to needlepoint when I was 6-years-old. My first piece was a boldly colored geometric pattern that my dad and I designed on canvas with markers. I did that for about 10 years and then around age 16 I saw a cross stitch kit of an oriental fan that I fell in love with and taught myself how to do it. I’ve belonged to a few needlework guilds over the years and have taken classes in many other techniques (hardanger, couching, peyote beading, etc.) but always come back to cross stitch. It’s truly my passion and a day without stitching just doesn’t feel right.

~Bekah

Weekly Team Treasury

After many unsuccessful attempts yesterday, I was finally able to get Etsy Treasury to cooperate with me this morning.

Enjoy! :)

Team Member Needlework Patterns

Modern Squares Cross-Stitched Bookmarks PDF pattern from stitchnmomma

Happy Monday! I seemed to have missed posting last Monday...sorry about that! But this week I am showing a couple of wonderful patterns from two of our very own team members! Stitchnmomma features lots of her beautiful finished cross-stitch work to choose from, from buttons and bookmarks to magnets and wall art. But she also sells several of her original patterns. I especially love the Just Desserts patterns, a collection of 12 modern squares cross-stitched bookmarks. Great for stitching up as little gifts, and still have several left over to keep!

Gnomes at Home PDF Pattern by ThisTinyExistence

ThisTinyExistence features delightful hand-embroidered art of home life, featuring little views into rooms or gardens. Everything is beautifully done and you can even get custom piece of your own home or garden! But if you wish to stitch up your own "tiny existence", several of her original patterns are available for sale. I particularly like this gnomes at home pattern...look at the little gnomes hanging about! Sweet!

Happy Stitching!

xxx Rebecca aka melysbaby xxx

Weekly Team Treasury