CRAFTfest is almost here!

Less than a week to go until the FIRST CRAFTfest of 2014 begins. This year the first fest begins on the 24th May, 2014 and runs 24 hours a day throughout the week until the 31st May, 2014. 

Booking forms are now closed if you wanted a stall, but the fest is open for everyone and the best part about it is that the entrance fee is FREE!

We were one of the first online craft fairs, and CRAFTfest isn’t just a virtual online craft fair! The main difference with CRAFTfest to other craft fairs, is that it is a community experience. The whole event is hosted on our Crafters Social Network, we are not just about uploading items to your stall and trying to sell things. We are about the bigger picture, making friends, interacting with other crafters, people who understand your passion, and your craft. We are about having fun in the forums and chatting in the chat room, exchanging tips, learning new ideas and speaking to other crafters that have years, months or weeks of experience. We can all learn something new from other people doing the same as us, running a business by ourselves and trying to make a living from crafting.

CRAFTfest Poster May 2014

The CRAFTfest blog is the best place to get to know the fellow CRAFTfest stall holders. http://craftfest-events.blogspot.co.uk.

Pop along and have a read to get into the spirt for next weeks CRAFfest!
  Here's a peek of my stall!

Wisdom Belle - Mother's Day Gift Guide

Sometimes choosing a gift for Mothering Sunday can be quite tricky. Mums seem to have everything, right?!

Wisdom Belle may be able to help you. Having an aim to provide you with delicious, tempting, heavenly luscious products which you, your friends and family just cannot live without may just offer what you are looking for!

A relaxing evening soak in the bath? Bathroom Essentials from Aromatherapy oils, Trendy Soaps, Magnificent Floral Fizzes and Bath Confetti Roses

Wisdom Belle -
Aromatherapy oils, Trendy Soaps, Magnificent Floral Fizzes Bath Confetti Roses

Or a night in with Candles and a bubble bath?! There are Dreaming Candles (these light up!), Soybean Candles and Bolsius Scent Nightlights (Tea Lights), with Luxury Tea Light Candles Holders too!

Wisdom Belle -
Dreaming Candles  Soybean Candles  Bolsius Scent Nightlights Luxury Tea Light Candles Holders 

How about some Jute Storage for all their Crafts? Wisdom Belle offers Jute Pocket Organisers and Big Jute Baskets

Widsom Belle -
   Jute Pocket Organisers  Big Jute Baskets

Or how about an unusual gift? WOW! - Dressing Table Hand Mirrors (these are stunning), Funky Felt Brooches, a Chocolate Fondu Set (yum!) or some Napkins for the tea table 

Wisdom Belle -
 Dressing Table Hand Mirrors  Funky Felt Brooches,  Chocolate Fondu Set  Napkins

All these gifts.... AND MORE, are available to purchase through Wisdom Belle.com. Shipping is from £2.99 for small items.

Sometimes, unfortunately, items do go out of stock, but we will notify you if you order cannot be made and will let you know of an alternative solution.

Gift Ideas for Mothering Sunday

Mothering Sunday will soon be celebrated here in the UK on the 30th March 2014.

Mothering Sunday is a Christian holiday celebrated throughout Europe that falls on the 4th Sunday in lent. Secularly, it became an occasion for honouring the mothers of children and giving them presents. It is increasingly being called Mother's Day, although that has always been a secular event quite different from the original Mothering Sunday. In the UK, Mothering Sunday is celebrated in the same way as Mother's Day is celebrated elsewhere.

To celebrate the occasion Sprinkles Sparkles offers a wide range of feminine gifts perfect for the occasion. Gifts which start from £3.50 for Handmade Hair Accessories to £45 for a Handmade Bracelet Watch.

All available to purchase from Sprinkles Sparkles.

CRAFTfest - The Virtual Craft Extravaganza

This will be the first of two CRAFTfest fairs that will be held this year and will take place from the 24th - 31st May 2014. 

www.craftfest-events.com

So what is CRAFTfest?

Ever fancied being a seller at a craft fair, but never had the opportunity to take part due to family commitments, travel, or costs?
Well, now you can!

The idea of CRAFTfest is to showcase sellers using interactive albums, 'your stall', which allows your sellers to browse and purchase items through an interactive link in your product descriptions, 'your voice'.

Your stall will be open 24 hours a day during the 8 day long event and all of our stall holders will be busy promoting themselves, the event and you throughout this time. Why struggle to promote yourself when you can have hundreds of others promoting with you!

Stall will cost £10 which will cover admin and network costs. 

There will also be a 'Blog Tour' bus visiting bloggers from CRAFTfest. The bus (which is on loan from Creative Crafting Magazine www.creative-crafting.com) will be visiting all 'festers that sign up to CRAFTfest (an extra piece of marketing there!).  This will be lead by Joy, one of the team leaders at CRAFTfest.

This is a great community event. As well selling your products through CRAFTfest this is a great way to market and promote your business as well as meet new like minded crafters. 

You will also receive free promotional material like badges and fliers to print out or add to social networking sites ie: Facebook, Blogs etc which are available here http://www.craftfest-events.com/badges_and_posters.html

To read more about the fest and/or sign up for a stall, please visit the CRAFTfest website at www.craftfest-events.com

Try Me Kit - Manuka Doctor

These ApiNourish Manuake Doctor bottles are currently FREE on the Manuka Doctor website

I recently heard about this 'freebie', you only have to pay for postage (£2.50) on another bloggers website. I thought I would give it a go as they retail at a high end price at £15.99

The pack contains

• Rejuvenating Face Mask (7ml)
• Age-defying Serum (7ml)
• Restoring Night Cream (7ml)
• 25% off next order voucher, which isn't bad at all! 

Wisdom Belle

Wisdom Belle offers great value for money gifts and treats perfect for birthdays, occasions, and celebrations.

 Our aim is to provide you with delicious, tempting, heavenly luscious products which you, your friends and family just cannot live without!

Wisdom Belle products are unique and range from Aromatherapy, Jute Storage, Bathroom Essentials, Candles, Collectables, Games and Woodware.

It is a fantastic website to browse around and pick up gifts for males and females of all ages.
Check it out now!
www.wisdombelle.com

Behind Closed Doors

I thought I would do a 'behind the scenes' of Sprinkles Sparkles, aka, me! Other than a huge interest in designing, creating and selling jewellery I am also real person. I think we can all tend to forget that there is human being behind the computer screen typing away.

How much do you actually about that person that you are reading the blog about, or following on Facebook, Twitter etc?

I am not about to reveal my inner most secrets, my weight or bra size! But I thought I would share my other interests and hobbies with you all, and also start to create this blog around my joys in life other than focus 100% purely on Sprinkles Sparkles. 

January has been a slow old 31 days.... so this month I have saved up my Christmas money and spent it on make-up and beauty products. 

This is definitely, I wouldn't say passion, but an enjoyment of mine. I am no way a 'beauty blogger' like the 100's of you lovely beauty bloggers out there, but I really do enjoy reading them. Anything from budget make up products, nail art and high street beauty creams. 

The money I earn no way goes anywhere near being able to afford any piece of MAC, Benefit, Bare Minerals, Urban Decay brands, so I am definitely a lower end budget Boots, Superdrug, e.l.f, discount makeup land kinda girl. Sorry!  

Make up haul - A "makeup haul" is a phrase commonly tossed around on social sharing sites suchas blogs, vlogs and youtube. It is a way of updating readers or viewers on yourmakeup collection after you have made several purchases

Last week e.l.f (eyes, lips, face) had an online deal that you could receive a £15 box of goodies for free (oooh!)  or receive free postage (neh!) So yes, I went from the freebie. I was a bit worried that the goodies maybe of no use to me, but I was pleasantly surprised.

Here is what I ordered -

Studio Makeup Mist & Set - £3.75

Mineral Personal Blend Foundation (light)- £8.00

High Definition Powder (yellow)- £6.00

My freebies!

100pc Eyeshadow Palette - Was £15.00 now £7.50

Lip Balm SPF 15 (plum) - £3.75

Jumbo Lip Gloss - £2.50

Mineral Eyeshadow - £3.00

I couldn't be more impressed. None of it is unusable. Well done e.l.f. I'll let you know how I get on with them, but the e.l.f reviews tell it how it is!

I can't let you go without sharing a piece of my jewellery. 

Blue Petal Bookmark - £8.00

Handmade Blue Petal Flower Bookmark.
A perfect accessory for a bookworm!

Made from mixed blue glass faux pearls, that are attached in groups down the length of the chain. Blue lucite petals are mixed together to form flowers are attached to the bottom of the chain. The chain is attached onto the shepherds crook design silver plated bookmark.

Dimensions -

• 6mm and & 4mm glass faux pearls.
• The charms falls at approximately 2 inches (5.08cm).
• The silver plated bookmark is appropriately 5 inches (12.7cm)

Creative Crafting Magazine

Well, we are already a week into the year 2014 and some exciting changes are already happening! As well as creating and selling jewellery and accessories, I am also the Technical Editor of Creative Crafting Magazine. (original post)

Creative Crafting magazine began in August/September 2009 when a group of crafting friends on the Creative Connections Crafters Network decided that it would be a good idea to raise awareness of the Crafting Community. From this point they started work and the first issue of creative crafting was published in October 2009.  You can find this issue on our back issues page.
This issue was welcomed by the community and subsequent issues have followed. The magazine attracts worldwide readers and its popularity is growing rapidly. The most popular issue so far has been the February/Valentines issue which received over 66,000 unique page views in its first two months until the next issue was published. All of our issues are still online to be discovered today and we look forward to creating many more.You can find all of our issues up to number 23 free to read on our site. All later issues are available for purchase both in digital and printed format.

You can purchase our Christmas Issue here!  

For this coming year we have some BIG NEWS!

We had an editorial meeting at Creative Crafting HQ on Monday afternoon and some big decisions were made.

For 2014 Creative Crafting will be changing to a quarterly magazine where we flow with the seasons giving our writers more time to submit their work and more defined issues. If you would like to be involved in any of the following issues please let us know (sprinks@creative-crafting.com) (Thank you to everyone who is already going to submit for our March Issue, previously Feb)

Spring Issue - 1st March (copy deadline 1st Feb) themes to include spring and Easter and other holidays through spring.

Summer Issue - 1st June (copy deadline 1st May) themes to include, holidays, summer, beach, back to school etc.

Autumn Issue - 1st September (copy deadline 1st August) themes to include autumn, Halloween etc.

Winter Issue - 1st December (copy deadline 1st November) themes to include Christmas, Winter, Valentines etc.

In between these issues we will also be releasing some Kindle Books on Amazon and other e-reader sites.

There is LOTS to look forward to.