We are already a quarter of the way through October and Halloween will be here before we know it! I need to start planning my costume…

Halloween Stuff:

• Yum! Don’t these Halloween Layered Cake Balls look tasty and fun?! The Sugar Turntable has a bunch of great Halloween recipes, like these Candy Corn Cupcakes
• Easy and awesome homemade Halloween costume ideas for the ladies on What I Wore.
• Find more inexpensive Halloween costume ideas on Dollar Stor Crafts.
• FaveCrafts has a free Easy Halloween Crafts eBook available for download.
• Awwww. Check out the cute pet costumes on the Crafts Dept. I like the little dino.
• An inexpensive way to make your home super-spooky for Halloween.
• This is weird, but also totally cool: Post-Apocalypse/Zombie Slaying Family Photo Shoot. (Also a good costume idea!)

Other Stuff:

• So cute! Star Wars softie pattern: Cuddly Chewbacca from DrawPilgrim.com.
• These cross-stitch iPhone cases look like crafty fun.
• Mmmmmm. Fancy hot chocolate.
• Show your support for our troops by participating in Operation Christmas Cards.
• I can’t get enough of the Bakers Royale recipe blog. Today I am drooling over this Mudslide and Brownie Trifle.

Have a fabulous fall weekend! (Or a stupendous spring weekend, for those in the Southern Hemisphere!)

Travis (travisj) and I are still training hard for the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington DC on October 30th. Only 3.5 weeks until the event! Wow!

We are also still raising money for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society…. but only for one more week! This is your last chance to “purchase” a special Swap-bot swag package by donating to the LLS via our TNT Fundraising page.

I will mail the following pack of items to anyone who donates $10 or more via our TNT Fundraising page by October 12th:

• 10 Ernie the Envie postcards
• 3 NEW “Sealed with Love” postcards
• 2 “Love Snail Mail” postcards
• 2 Ernie the Envie square buttons
• 2 Swap-bot 1-inch buttons – 1 of each style
• 2 two-inch square Ernie stickers
• 1 two-inch square Swap-bot sticker

Donate Now!

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Get cute Swap-bot stuff and support a good cause! Sweet! For more information about where your donation goes and how it is spent, read my post on why I support the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

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The fine print: Your $10 donation covers all shipping costs — even internationally. Of course, we’d certainly welcome any additional donation you’d like to include to off set shipping costs. I will ship to the address listed on your Swap-bot account unless otherwise instructed. If your name or address used for the donation is different than what you have listed on your Swap-bot account, please include your Swap-bot username in the comments field. I feel most comfortable accepting the donations through our fundraising page. That way you get an email receipt directly from the LLS that you can use for tax purposes. Your donation is fully tax deductible (in the US – I do not know about other countries). In addition to your email receipt, you will get an email from me confirming that your swag pack is on its way. Contact me at rachel -at- swap-bot.com with any questions or special requests.

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

Do you love photography? Do you use one of the cool photo apps like instagram or hipstamatic to take funky, square photos on your iPhone? (I took the photo above with instagram.) Do you wish you could get equally cool prints of those photos? Now you can with PostalPix!!

Let’s swap our photo prints in the PostalPix Photo Print Swap!!

PostalPix is an iPhone app that lets you order prints of your iPhone photos. They mail premium prints directly to your home. To download the app, just search “PostalPix” in the App Store or  follow <a href=http://bit.ly/qJBnFJ”>this link</a>.

Ordering prints is as easy as selecting your desired size, picking photos from your camera roll, and checking out with a credit card or Paypal. Here’s a list of the print formats PostalPix offers.

For this swap, you’ll be sending three (3) 4×4 or 4×6 prints to each of your two (2) partners, for a total of six (6) prints sent. The theme and style of the photos is totally up to you!

You can either have PostalPix mail the prints to your own home then repackage them and mail them on to your partners, or mail prints to your partners directly from the app.

PostalPix is sponsoring this swap and giving all participants 25% off their photo print orders. I will send an email to all participants after the sign up deadline with the coupon code for the discount.

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Details: New and experienced swappers are welcome. However anyone with recent low ratings or questionable behavior will be removed. This swap is for US residence only because PostalPix can currently only ship to US addresses. Also, you must have an iPhone in order to be able to use the PostalPix app. Sign up now!

I am happy to announce that the winner of the BlogHer Handmade Conference Swag Giveaway is … turtlelady45! Congratulations! I will be sending out the prize package this week.

Thank you to all of you who entered! I was very excited by the large response. Stay tuned… more great giveaways will be happening soon!

Your fun Friday links fall into two of my favorite categories this week: Sweets and Snail Mail! Have fun!

Sweets:

• I want the cookies pictured above right now: Gooey Chocolate Chip Sandwich Cookies.
• A taste of fall, Pumpkin Whoopie Pies. (Plus a free printable cupcake topper!)
• Kids would love these crazy, colorful, Halloween Rice Krispie Treats.
• Learn how to make chocolates on the Etsy blog.
• Good news for coffee lovers: coffee is good for you! No, really. Harvard scientists say so!

  • Bake someone special a mini cake in one of these cute, silicone trophies!</ul> Snail Mail Stuff:

  • A shop in Australia called Newspaper Taxi is having a We Love Mail Competition. Send them a little something through the mail and you will be entered to win one of two beautiful stationery packs.
  • Check out this cool mail-art treasure hunt: Return2.me.
  • Send a real postcard with your own photo on it through the mail via your computer or iPhone with Postcards Anywhere.

  Everything Else:

  • Join one of the Sew, Mama, Sew Holiday Sew-Alongs and make placemats, an advent calendar, and/or a tree skirt.
  • Oh, yeah! Just what Crusher needs: a pet mansion!

  Anything to add? Leave more links in the comments…

‘Tis the season for Halloween and harvest themed merchandise! If you search “pumpkin” on Etsy, you will get ten of thousands of results — like that cute pumpkin hat for cats by scooterKnits seen above! Here are a few more of my favorites…

What theme gets you most in the mood for October? Pumpkins, fall leaves, or ghosts?

I do a Halloween matchbox swap every year… and this year is no different. I have already joined MelodyMoon’s Halloween Matchbox Swap. The international swap calls for one decorated 32-count matchbox to be sent to your one partner. As always, you can use my matchbox template to create your box from scratch or decorate an empty, commercial matchbox. Sign up before the end of September!

For more Halloween fun, check out these other swaps:

• Handmade Halloween Cards
• Halloween Dotee
• Halloween ATC – a top swap! Over 140 participants!
• Halloween Themed Deco Swap
• Halloween Jelly Roll

October is right around the corner!!

Fall has hit New York hard. It has been raining all week… which makes it difficult to feel peppy while catching up on all my work after traveling last week… but these fun links cheer me up! Enjoy!

• Isn’t that custom craft suitcase seen above cool? It was created by Amy Powers, creator of Inspired Ideas magazine.
• Cute, free, downloadable, coffee-themed embroidery patterns from Wild Olive.
• Now this is adorable: mix and match, hand-carved cupcake stamp set.
• Make fun and easy fall banners using tags from the office supply store.
• Five tips for taking better self-portraits.
• For fashion lovers: DIY Python Print Sunglasses.
• Swap-bot style:airmail striped sticky tape.
• Yum! Chocolate, peanut butter, and banana rice krispie treats.
• More tastiness: Candy Corn Cheesecake Mousse.
• Snail Mail blogs: Postcard Perfect, Jonathon’s Postcrossing Blog, Save Snail Mail, Viva Snail Mail.
• Just a beautiful, little online shop: Pikku Wares.
• You have already heard about my trip to BlogHer Handmade & The Creative Connection, but I also posted my Top Ten Business Tips from the conference over on Ace Department.

Happy weekend to all!!

You already know that I was at the BlogHer Handmade and Creative Connection conference last week. The three-day event was packed with classes, keynotes, tutorials, and a handmade marketplace. We heard from Holly Becker of decor8, Christina Ferrare, Jo Packham, publisher of Where Women Create, Stacy Julian of Big Picture Classes, and many more accomplished, smart women. My favorite class was Inspiration Boards taught by Leslie Shewring of A Creative Mint.

It was an inspiring and informative event, and it was great to meet in person some of the women I have been following online. It is motivating to see so many creative women starting their own businesses. (If you’d like to read more about the conference, I am in the process of putting together a full recap on my personal blog.)

Now, on to the GIVEAWAY!!

One of the reasons that many people love these creative conferences is because you come home with lots and lots of swag. The Creative Connection was no different. At nearly every meal we were given a little gift from one of the sponsors and publishers were there giving away free copies of their magazines and books.

You, my lovely Swap-bot users, are always in the forefront of my mind, so I made sure to grab a few extra items when I could. I was planning this giveaway from the beginning and I think I collected a great prize pack… one lucky winner will receive the following bundle of goodies:

• Home Made Simple – a hardcover book full of recipes and home tips gathered from the Home Made Simple website.
• Two Minneapolis postcards – which I purchased before realizing that the conference was actually in Saint Paul. Whoops.
• A large tote bag from Archiver’s.
• The Oct/Nov issue of American Craft magazine.
• The June issue of Scrapbooks Etc. magazine.
• The summer issue of Quilts and More magazine.
• A crisp, new pencil from See Jane Work.
• A pack of Tim Holts Idea-ology facets.
• A cute hanging plaque/sign and a greeting card from Curly Girl Designs.
• A cuff bracelet for embellishing from Ruby Violet.
• Two sewing patterns from Indygo Junction.
• A magnet from Starbucks explaining the fundamentals of a great cup of coffee.
• A pretty magnetic bookmark from The Kelly Rae Roberts Collection.
• A 1″ button from BurdaStyle.
• And, my favorite item… a beautiful “Aspire” necklace from The Vintage Pearl!

Whew… that is a long list of items! Wouldn’t you love to win it all?

I’m making this giveaway extremely simple. Just comment on this blog post to be entered in the drawing. In your comment please include your Swap-bot username and your answer to this question:

What swaps or crafts are you doing to get in the mood for fall?

You must be a Swap-bot member to enter this giveaway. Each individual can only enter once. The giveaway will be open for entry until September 30th. I will randomly pick and announce the winner on October 3rd. Good luck!

I am at the BlogHer Handmade & The Creative Connection conference this week. I have been to a day and a half of seminars, classes, and keynotes. It has been fun and inspirational and I have met a lot of cool people! (Above is an “idea board” I was working on in my marketing class with Traci Bautista.)

Here are some of the awesome links and sites I’ve learned about so far:

• Healthy Slow Cooking
  • So You Think You’re Crafty
  • My Desert Cottage
  • Nancy’s 7 Sisters Marketplace
  • Inspired Ideas Magazine
  • Dilly Dally Blog
  • The Sew Weekly
  • Crafty Diversions
  • Inspire[d] Magazine
  • Princess Lasertron
  • Inspirations by Ivy
  • And, of course, Crafty Chica – she is awesome!</ul> If you’d like more info from the conference, check out the liveblogging section on BlogHer. Or, follow along on Twitter: @SwapbotNews & @rljart.