A sidebar chock full 'o goodies ... and a giveaway

Since I'm a gal who loves to read my favorite blogs in my Reader, I realize that I often miss out on all the goodies some folks have going on in their sidebars. If they are organized nicely, a sidebar can be a treasure trove of fun stuff in addition to the main course of the blog. I've added some fun tidbits in my sidebar and wanted to point them out for folks who either read me in their Reader or just don't pay attention.

And since I mentioned more than a week ago that I'd do a giveaway in honor of my 100th post that passed during the crazy week of the CRAFT Release Party, I figured I better finally make good on that. I'll warn you, though, that I am horrible at getting things out in the mail. My last two giveaway winners can attest to that. But I will do my best to get the stuff out ASAP, just bear with me.

So! Sidebar goodness! And then the giveaway.

Subscribe to my blog via email - If you aren't a fan of a feed reader like I am, just pop over to the top of my sidebar, enter your email address and - whammo - my posts will be delivered to your email inbox. (Leslie, now you have no excuse not to read ... take that!)


Twitter - oh lordy. I've been sucked in. I don't know what I was thinking, but I took the jump. I'm Twittering ... or is it Tweeting? I don't know ... I'm just typing in random bits about my day and sending them out into the world. But I have found some fun friends to follow, and I can follow the Mars Phoenix rover (which fascinates and amuses me), so I'm sticking with it. Follow along!

The Craft Business Resource Page - with a fancy graphic and everything! So if you are starting a craft business, running a craft business, marketing a craft business, or just like to read about craft businesses ... check it out. I've been updating it constantly, so you can just pop in to that page from the sidebar anytime you like.


My Shared Items - let my sweet blog finds be your sweet blog finds. Sharing is one of my favorite things to do, and now that I can add notes to my shared items through Google Reader, I'm all kinds of giddy. I have a shared items widget in my sidebar, and you can even subscribe to my shared items here. Some of my favorite shared items from the past few weeks have been this most fabulous embroidered shirt, these hilarious uncensored bunnies (warning, might be offensive), these awesome Vicky-T Earrings (from craftlog, whose blog was also featured on the Crafzine blog this week), and a great tutorial for putting together a screenprinting screen cover for unexposed photo emulsion screens. You can pull up my shared items page and see weeks and weeks and weeks of shared items. Enjoy!

Austin Art/Design/Craft Bloggers - I've set up a blog roll specifically highlighting Austin Art and Design and Craft bloggers. If I've missed you, shoot me an email at averagejanecrafter at gmail dot com and let me know. It may take me a while to get you added (just 'cause I like to actually read your blog for a bit before I add them and because .... I'm slow!) but let me know.

Free Embroidery Pattern web sites - I've also got a little blog roll with some web sites that feature free embroidery patterns (some vintage, some new, some exclusively and some just on occasion) If I'm missing one you know of and that has an rss feed, let me know.

And now, on to the giveaway!
I was cleaning up my office the other day, and realized that I had a few prints left over from my screen print class that I could pass along. Up for grabs are four items. They are some of the extra prints I made during my silk screen class.

I'll be giving away one of my deer/bird/tree prints, an E.T. print, a deer vintage embroidery design print and an Obama print. The deer/bird/tree print and the Obama print are on a linen blend fabric (the photos don't show the colors correctly *at all* - they are a nice deep aqua and a fun lime color, respectively) The vintage embroidery design and E.T. are on scraps of a heart print fabric from an IKEA duvet. The Obama print isn't *perfect* - there are some blank spots on his collar - but it's still a cool print. You can make the prints in to anything you like - a pillow, bag, wall hanging - and I'd love to see them in action in your home once you receive them.

So how can you win them!? We're going on a bit of a Flickr scavenger hunt. I have Kari to thank for this one, who was inspired by something she saw at woot.
1. Pick ONE WORD from the list below and search it on Flickr. Pick a picture from the results (try changing the variables of "most interesting/most relevant" etc.) and put a link to it in your comment. Let us know what word you chose, and why you picked the picture you did. And, if you're so inclined, let me know which of my sidebar features you like the best.
2. Post about this contest on your blog with a link back to it, and I'll enter you twice.
3. Post this blog entry to Facebook/Myspace, etc. and send me the link (averagejanecrafter at gmail dot com) and I'll enter you again!
4. Subscribe! Since I've set up the handy dandy email subscription thingie up there, sign up or let your friends know they can sign up and I'll enter you .... again!

Here's the list: (pick one)
80s hair
any celebrity you want - there are some interesting candid celeb shots out there.
carpet
Velcro
soup
shake
rattle
roll
cinch
smell


So there. You have several options, some fun eye candy, and a week to enter. Enjoy! Comments will close at 8AM Central time on Wednesday, June 25th, and I'll post the winner sometime that day (chosen randomly).