We've Moved!!

Hi everyone! Very very excited to share our new home with you, over at sharethemess.com!!

All future blog posts and activity will be through there. Blogger will always be our first home, but it was getting a bit squishy and we'd like to keep it for memories' sake.

Please head on over to our new online home for today's Tuesday Treasures featuring a lovely, fresh green treasury by tigstogs and for future Gloriousmess! activity!

Tuesday Treasures: Coral and Turquoise

With gloomy grey skies
and a downpour or two
This coral and turquoise
made a new month less blue

 So let the fun and games,
So let them begin!
To keep Winter at bay
and that grin on your chin!

So, what are your plans
For this chilly season come?
Will you ski, bake or craft
or just stay at home & bum?

This lovely set inspires,
Inspires to get out and play
To play and dress all warm & bright
On a gloomy Winter's day!

* * *

'Coral and Turquoise' curated by pinkneonvintage

Treasury tool by StylishHome.

A little recap & some housekeeping

Hope everyone's having a good weekend!

It's been an eventful week, and it was great to finish our first month with a bit of a bang! I had a lot of fun (and lots of painted, glittery fingers) creating custom stickers for a research project involving pre-schoolers.. how fun does that sound, to work with such little ones! 

As a result of this project, we're now stocking some glittery pearl star stickers and am pretty excited about these!

Someone is also enjoying their little jar of hearts out there and I hope her eyes will twinkle just as much as mine when she got it in the mail! 

Also, we made it to the Etsy front page several times this week as part of a lovely treasury and once as a curator with our Flowery Dreams treasury!! Below is a screenshot of the Etsy front page with one of the hand-picked treasuries that featured us (thank you Sylwia!!).. you can see our D'Vines sitting there in the top row :D Our Pegged! Summer Fruits were also on Etsy Australia & New Zealand Finds newsletter!! I couldn't believe it when my wonderful Australian Wandarrah team mates told me about it at first!

We were lucky to have perfect weather for viewing all the awesome exhibits at Vivid Sydney and I was quite happy with my haul of pictures during our little jaunt. My feet were less happy the day after, when they finally realized that they had been traipsing around Sydney the previous day.

And of course, our first ever giveaway celebrating our soft launch concluded yesterday with 3 lucky duckies being randomly drawn to win some limited edition mini wooden pegs and lots of shiny, shimmery stickers. My favorite part was the anticipation of finding out who would be drawn when I clicked the "pick the winner" buttons, followed by wrapping and packing their prizes!! I absolutely adore wrapping up presents to make them pretty! So much so.. I sometimes forget I'm supposed to get excited about what's inside! Here are the prizes, ready to be shipped with their hand-lettered, handmade name tags.. Brown paper packages tied up with string, these are a few of my favorite things! ♫ ♪ 

And now.. some general housekeeping for Gloriousmess!

Shipping policy update

We've had a month to settle in and I'm finding and ironing out the kinks. The one that's been a thorn in my side is international shipping! GNNAARGH! The prices are atrocious! Seriously.. AUD$19 to mail a pack of straws? I did what I had to do, because there was no other option but my initial reaction was the same as the lovely Kim's when she got her floral straws earlier this month. Her reaction made everything worth it and made my entire day though!!

   "When I saw the price of that I about died!"   

*Giggles* 

I tried to offer a flat shipping rate so people would know how much shipping fees were right off the bat and not worry about them anymore, regardless of how many things were added to the shopping cart. It seemed like the best option available until Mr Pancakes honed in on it and suggested lower shipping rates. Unfortunately, this is quite impossible because the private courier companies charge even more than Australia Post. A lot of teeth gnashing ensued.

After a lot of thought and consulting, I've decided to get rid of the flat rate shipping starting Monday, June 3rd. We're going to try and mail as many of our goodies as possible in envelopes/mailers so they get classified as letters instead of parcels. There's a huge price jump between the two.. 

If you've got your eye set on a particular one that is too chubby to pass as letters (such as our wooden cutlery sets, burlap bags or Hospital Helpers stickers), we're encouraging everyone to buy a lot of different (or same, if you like!) goodies all at once. Might as well make full use of the shipping costs because they're valid for parcels up to 2kg!

Radiant Gradient collection launch

You probably have seen the sneak peeks already..
In preparation for all the upcoming fun that Summer usually brings, we've concocted an oh-so-sweet collection of ombre rainbow goodness! Even though it's going to be Winter here in Sydney, we figure that's all the more reason to inject some happy rainbows into the gloomy, grey season.

We've got our SLURP eco-friendly wooden cutlery, as well as a Hearts version. These can be matched to our ice cream shovels (oh, they're so cute.. I want to eat everything with them!!) and our ombre heart stickers. All Radiant Gradient goodies can be found in-store from Monday, June 3rd onwards!

Online homes update

We have an open subscription to our newsletter and you can sign up using the link located on the right side of this page near the top. The main purpose is to keep you informed of sales and new products coming to Gloriousmess! and we envision emailing a newsletter quarterly at most. 

Gloriousmess! is now also on Instagram as @sharethemess and we post random snippets of our daily adventures along with a peek at the Tamago's antics every day. We invite you to also tag any of your pictures (especially "action shots") involving our goodies with #sharethemess or #ohwhatagloriousmess so we can find them and give send out some shout-outs! 

If you have any requests for Tamago antics, email us your ideas and the Tamagos might enact it!

We continue to also live on Facebook and Google+. 

Our Twitter page is more for you to ask us any questions.. like an online chat so come and say hello! You can find us as @ShareTheMess.

Have a happy weekend!!

And We Have The THREE Winners!

I can't believe it's been a month since we've found our online home! For those of you who participated or remember, we held a "Thank You" giveaway to thank all our supporters for getting us through our first week.

I hope you all had fun, and enjoyed your adventure so far with Gloriousmess! 

A HUGE THANK YOU for joining in the merry-making & for continuing to support us!

Well.. we had a total of 37 entries & three winners were picked via PromoSimple's giveaway widget, powered by random.org. The lucky winners of this giveaway will be getting their prize pack in their mailboxes soon!! Yes, the prize pack contains a limited edition of a limited edition set of Pegged! wooden mini pegs, one pack of shimmery kraft heart stickers and one pack of shiny gold kraft heart stickers like you see here! (Mini bunting not included)

And the winners are...

*drum roll*

...

..

NICHOL

MAEGAN

and

HELGA

If you are one of the three listed above, please check your email for further instructions. I can't wait to mail these little goodies out to you!! :)

Thank you again to everyone who played!

Shopping on a Saturday: Knick Knacks, No Paddywhacks

We have too many knick knacks at home! That being said, I can still easily tell you how each one ended up in our home so I guess we're still doing ok. May start to worry when I start losing track.. 

This doesn't stop me from window shopping all over the internet though! I thought I'd share some of my favorite online stalks shops with you and maybe get a teeny weeny bit of validation knowing that I'm not alone in wanting/owning one of these goodies below!

By the way, do you know what paddywhacks (or wacks, depending on the source) are? All I know is that they're part of the nursery rhyme/song called "This Old Man." So, a bit of digging around revealed that a paddywhack could mean an informal spanking, or refer to the yellowy elastic nuchal ligament found in sheep and cattle to relieve the weight of their heads. EW! What was that old man doing making a knick knack out of ligament?!

Anyway, back to the knick knacks.. Enjoy!

From top to bottom, left to right:

• No Sign Holder by Avichai Tadmore - The Hubbs first saw these on vacation and just HAD to get one but it was sold out... So we tracked down the source to Monkey Business and ordered it online. Now, it's sitting at his office with a stick of sugar there to control the temptation to snack on junk foods!
• Edible Eyes - Very cute at first.. and edible too apparently! But I really couldn't imagine chomping down on a strawberry, or anything else with googly eyes looking back.. 
• Beaker Mug - We're a bit nerdy like that.. after all, we had our guests drink out of conical flasks at our wedding reception :) It's no wonder we own these mugs.. in both the 350ml and the 1L version! Besides, they proved very useful when I got sick & had to be hospitalized earlier this year.. I was able to tell the docs I kept down 2 mugs, or 700ml of water overnight!
• Gummy Bear Lights - They're squishy, they're gigantic and they light up! I've been stalking these online and was so excited to see them in real life here! I've spent an indefinite amount of time rooted in front of these at the Australian Geographic store and was this close to buy one but self-control kicked in at the last minute. They used to be quite rare, but you can now find them on Amazon (what can't you find there?), Urban Outfitters and Peters of Kensington amongst many other places. You can also get these as Gummy Bear Magnets... How cute!!
• Tetris Light - Maybe it's not such a good idea to drop these giant tetris blocks from ceiling height, but you can arrange them however you'd like to. One brick gets plugged in, and the others will auto-magically light up when you place it on top/next to the plugged-in brick. How cool is that?!

Have a happy weekend!

P.S. This round-up is no way endorsed or sponsored by any of the aforementioned shops, websites or companies. These are finds that I've stumbled on during my internet travels that have impressed me enough to share with everyone else.

Tutorial Thursday: DIY Washi Paper Tape Bows

Washi tape. It's this paper tape.. kind of like masking tape or painter's tape. You can stick it on practically anything, it seems! I had no idea what it was, let alone what to do with it when I first heard about it. Why on earth would anybody go nuts over some tape, no matter how pretty it was? Horrible thoughts of sticky, gooey messes and hours spent with bottles of Goo Gone made the tapes unappealing. 

And then.. yes.. wait for it.. 

 Then I had a lightbulb moment when I had nothing nearby but had to mark where a roll of packing tape ended. Out rolled the washi tape I had owned for the longest time, but hadn't touched. RIIIPPP! went the tape and I stuck it onto the end of the packing tape. I was astounded at how easily the washi tape disentangled itself from the packing tape with no sticky residue (or any trace, for that matter). I was sold!

There appears to be a bazillion and one ways to use the thing.. from decorating thumbtacks to making over keyboards, broken ipads or room walls. The MT tape site is pure visual overload for me (seeing that I can't read Japanese, but that's no hinderance to appreciating the site!). You can even use the tape on your keyboard to teach someone how to play! It's all here in the MT Casa Gallery.

In the midst of all this clicking, I came across these DIY bows. It was one of the more original tutorials and my interest was piqued. 

Seemed simple enough, so I gave it a go. They turned out exactly the way they were supposed to but I didn't really like the bit in the middle. Seemed too fat and wide in relation to the rest of the bow so I made my own modifications.

Here's what you need:

Scissors, some washi tape and a something to decorate!

So I started by measuring the lengths I needed.

I roughly guessed it to be1.5x the width of my present.

Then I cut a 2nd strip that was about half that length.

This shorter piece is what you use to make your ribbon tails.

So I started folding my long piece of tape length-wise..

You can follow the tutorial and fold the tape onto itself across too.

All that matters is that at the end of it all, both sides of the strip of tape aren't sticky.

If you choose to fold the tape transversely, don't forget that you'll need double the tape length!

So anyway, I take my non-sticky strip of washi tape and loop it around to form a circle

I cut a thinner piece of washi tape (just cut one strip down the middle to get 2 thin strips)

This thinner short strip of washi tape is used to tape the ends of the loop together.

Instead of wrapping it all the way around, I left a bit of a tail.. You'll see why soon!

This is the fun part.. you sit the loop up like a wheel about to be rolled and then you squish it!

This is where I use the bit of extra tail and wrap it around the squished loop to form 2 loops of the bow.

This is where I made another modification to the tutorial.

I didn't like how uniformly squat the middle of the bow was, so I made 2 transverse snips in middle of the shorter piece from the beginning of the tutorial (make sure you don't accidentally cut all the way across and join up the 2 snips!). Then I folded the corners in to make a "waist" for the tape.

I found it easier to wrap the thin, middle piece of washi tape around both loop and ribbon tail piece when the tail piece had a "waist" to wrap around.

Now, all that's left is to fluff up the loops of your bow and trim the tips of the tails and you've got a bow! The middle bit between the 2 loops are a tad naked, so it's a free-for-all when it comes to deciding what fills up that space. I made a mini-loop and stuck it on with double sided tape (seen in 1st picture of this post). You could attach a flower bud, rhinestones, bells or other embellishments as you please :)

Tips and hints

• I prefer a narrower middle section between the two bow loops so I trimmed the little strip to a smaller width before wrapping it around. This one's just a personal preference.
• To cut a perfectly symmetrical "V" at the ends of the ribbon tails, pinch the ends together (sticky side facing out) and snip off the corner starting about 1cm before the end of the tape at the folded side and heading towards the end of the tape to the open side
• Take your time and have fun experimenting with the different lengths of the tape! The 3 lengths are only a reference because really, doesn't it depend on how big a bow you want to make in the end? No point having a teeny 2cm bow on  a big happy gift hamper..!

Tuesday Treasures: Patterns In Red

Polka dots and dotty dots, Starflakes and stars, Squigly lines and curly ones, Checkered prints and bars
Patterns, patterns everywhere As you can plainly see Matching them with solid blocks Is definitely key!
So have a play with patterns, Start with these below.. Hope that you'll be inspired And get a happy glow!
* * *
'Patterns in Red' curated by kerrianneanderson

Treasury tool by StylishHome.