I am a little late with this week’s featured swap, but I have chosen the Nature Books Speed the movie swap hosted by Pablo. The Nature Books swap is an easy one-partner swap for those nature lovers out there. It is open to join through March 15th, so you have plenty of time to find a cool nature book to swap and tell your friends to join in!

p.s. If you truly are a nature lover, you should check out Pablo’s blog, Roundrock Journal. It contains daily nature writings as well as photographs like the ones seen here.

A little while ago I was interviewed by Sister Diane of CraftyPod. We talked all about Swap-bot and how it relates to the craft community. I am so excited because the podcast of the interview is now up on the CraftyPod website! It is only 16 minutes long and I think it turned out quite well. Check it out!

CraftyPod is a great website where you can find craft related podcasts as well as daily bloggings about crafty goodness. Sister Diane is the organizer of a chapter of the Church of Craft in Portland, Oregon.

For those of you who would like to tackle a simple sewing project, I suggest joining the Spring Apron Swap. Organized by purplemorgan, the Spring Apron Swap is an international swap, but you must have a rating of over 4.7. Each participant has one partner for whom they will sew one “half apron”. This is what purplemorgan says about the aprons:

Have you noticed that aprons are making a comeback? Not the butcher/chef/BBQ style that you can find anywhere, but the more vintage-style hostess/housewife aprons. I LOVE these, and they are SO easy to sew! I’m brand new to sewing but even I can do it. Make sure you get your assigned partner’s waist measurements and add plenty of inches to make certain the strings will tie! Also, it’s always nice to add a few tuck-ins to your package. For this swap, a wooden spoon or other kitchen utensil, potholder, a few recipes or tea bags, any of these would be a lovely little tuck-in surprise for your assigned person. This isn’t required. All that is required is a simple half apron with one pocket.

You might be able to figure out how to sew one of these aprons on your own if you are an experienced seamstress, but just in case you need some help here are some websites that offer patterns for the cute half aprons and a few other types:

• Fannie’s $1-1 hour Apron
• Crafty Gal Apron
• Clean Sweep Apron
• Hostess Apron
• For more fun sewing aprons check out Tie One On

Have fun sewing a vintage-y, spring-y apron! While you’re at it… make one for yourself!

Swap-bot is going to be down for a couple minutes tonight as I begin the process of moving to a new server. I’ll start the move late tonight, and the site will only be down for a few minutes as I move around a few files in preparation for the move. It shouldn’t be too noticeable and the long term gain will be a Swap-bot that doesn’t go down as frequently as it does now.

**UPDATE**: The move is under way. I’ve switched what I can, now just need to wait for our DNS records to update across the web. If you see anything strange going on at Swap-bot please let me know.

Matchbox swaps have been quite popular lately, and this week’s featured swap is th SpringTime Kawaii Matchbox Swap coordinated by Straycat.

Kawaii is a certain style of cute products from Japan. And when I say cute, I mean CUTE! Check out the description of Kawaii on Wikipedia, or visit the Japan Cute! blog [Sideways film](http://utero.pe/?sideways) to learn more about it. There have been previous swaps on swap-bot based around Kawaii, including previous Kawaii matchbox swaps. A matchbox swap basically entails decorating a small matchbox and filling it full of little trinkets and goodies.

The swap home page explains it this way:

Simply load up a decorated matchbox with tiny kawaii items & mail it to your partner! At least 1 store-bought Japanese kawaii item must be included. Handmade goods are optional & adored! Please try to jam pack the little matchbox as much as possible. Springtime: Let’s welcome the new season with pretty colors & cute animals! Kawaii: It means “cute” in Japanese. ie Sanrio, Q-Lia, Kamio, Lemon Co., Midori, etc. Matchbox: A cutely decorated 32-stick or a Euro matchbox is our goal, but… hehe If it’s cute & tiny, it’s accepted! DIY, tiny candy boxes, or other purchased equivalents are a-okay.

Things you might include in your matchbox: stickers, erasers, candies, paper clips, pins and buttons, tiny stationery, anything small, cute & spring-y! The Springtime Kawaii Matchbox Swap is international, but it does require a 4.0 rating or higher. Matchbox swaps are a great way to express your creativity without spending a ton on supplies and postage! Happy swapping!

Thanks to Swap-bot member Gem for sending along info that we were mentioned in February 2007 issue of Quick and Simple Magazine. I tried looking for the magazine last night, but didn’t find it. Their website has a list of locations to get the magazine, so I’ll continue my search tomorrow.

This week we are featuring the Themed Paint Can Swap coordinated by fairykiss. Each swapper only has one partner for this unique swap, which is a good idea because of the creativity and time needed to create a themed paint can. A themed or altered paint can is simply a new, clean, one-gallon paint can that has been decorated and filled according to a specific theme. Check out these instructions for step by step directions on how to make one.

The Themed Paint Can Swap is open until February 17th for signup. Participants then have over a month to check out their partner’s profile and decorate and fill a lovely paint can that matches their personality. There is a $10 minimum for the things you put inside the paint can. This swap is US only.

Some themed paint can ideas: If your partner’s favorite colors happened to be pink and yellow, you could create a spring-themed paint can filled with spring stickers and stationery, flower seeds, lemon drops, sunglasses, etc… A spa-themed paint can filled with pampering goodies like bubble bath and nail polish would also be fun. Or, if your partner likes scrapbooking, a paint can filled with fun scrapbooking embellishments and tools would be sure to please! A single favorite color, or two, could also be interpreted as a theme.

This fun swap really gets your imagination going! It is perfect for swappers who would like to put a little extra care in creating a beautiful swap package. Have fun!

This week’s featured swap is Friendship Pins coordinated by noel. It is a unique and simple international swap that will bring you back to the 80s! Each swapper sends a set of five friendship pins to each of their two partners. Friendship pins are safety pins decorated with seed beads. Check out this website for design ideas. This is such a fun, easy, and inexpensive swap – don’t miss it!

What is this little heart? It happens to be the newest feature of the Swap-bot rating system. Ratings are still based on the 5 point system, but now there is a way to re Full Mind Control ward those swappers who really go above and beyond the swap expectations. You know the swappers I am talking about – the ones who send you those super-adorable swap packages, all decorated and filled with extra goodies, or the ones who look at your profile and manage to send you just the PERFECT item. Now you can give those special swappers a heart for being so wonderful.

This is what the rating info page now says about the heart system:

If someone sends you an extra special swap package that far exceeds the swap requirements, you can give that person a heart. The option to give someone a heart only appears when you give them the highest rating (“I got my stuff and it met posted swap requirements”). Under this rating option a check box will appear that you can mark if you want to give a heart. You do not have to give anyone a heart just because you gave them the highest rating. We suggest that you reserve giving hearts to those swappers who you think deserve even more than the highest rating (more than 5 points). The number of hearts a person has collected will be shown on their profile page next to their average rating. Lots of hearts indicates a very special swapper!

And, don’t fret, you can go back to your old swaps and retro-actively give hearts to anyone who previously sent you awesome swaps!

See how many hearts you can collect!

Full Mind Control

The Magic Yarn Ball swap and Swap-bot were featured on the Craft: blog today. So cool! We love Craft: magazine and Natalie Zee Drieu, the associate editor. For all of you crafty swappers out there, Craft: is hosting a handmade, recycled Valentine’s Day card contest. Sounds fun… and there are prizes!