hello, friends! i am so excited to share with you that after submitting a few designs to uncommon goods’ summer picnic design challenge that three of my designs were chosen to go on to the next round! what does that mean? well, if you would like to see any of these at your next summer picnic, i need your vote! 15 designs were chosen for this stage and the 5 with the most votes will go on to be judged by their panel for the final product decision (voting ends march 28th).

after taking a glance around, i would be so excited if you cast a few votes! you can vote for as many designs as you like (that’s 15 votes folks!), and are welcome to leave a comment at the bottom of each design as well.

more about the challenge:

uncommon goods gave the designer a prompt and a few color choices. these designs will be turned in to actual stamps (which will be sold with the picnic plates and cups!), so they had to be pretty simple. basically, they needed to be summery, simple and picnicky.

wrap up: {bonnie christine} {challenge} {design} {picnic} {summer} {uncommon goods} {vote}

the kind over matter project : help us help you! from kind over matter on vimeo.

focusing heavily on the handmade community, kind over matter is dedicated to kind acts, inspirational art, kind projects and feel good nouns. a while back, i was able to write a little post for them, and the more and more i’ve learned about their project, the more i’ve fallen in love with it.  please, take a moment to learn about the kind over matter project and what you can do to help them continue spreading the love!

kind over matter was born in february 2009. they began encouraging others to ‘card drop‘ — an act of kindness in which you leave an inspirational card in a random location for a loved one or stranger to find.  they found and shared inspirational photographs, art, handmade items, bloggers, websites, diy freebies and etsy shops, all with the sole intention of bringing a little hope and light into your day.  they want to inspire people to live better lives, be kinder, connect, and gain perspective and peace of mind.

their goal is to help independent artists in the handmade community achieve their dreams by awarding micro-grants to polish off their businesses. their hope is to turn kind over matter into a non-profit and start selling merchandise that promotes kindness and positivity. they will be using donations and a percentage of the proceeds to fund the grants. these grants will not be awarded by professional curators they will be appointed by YOU! after initiating website upgrades and design changes, they plan to use an interactive voting system so that members of the handmade community will be able to vote for their peers. now called the kind over matter project, they are trying to take it to the next level.

but they can’t do this without you – they need our help!

they are in the running for the pepsi refresh project. pepsi is giving away millions of dollars to fund great ideas, and they could be one of them! from november 1st to december 1st you can vote for the project- and you can vote for it every day! you can go directly to their page to vote, either by creating an account on pepsi refresh or by logging into facebook.

you could also help them by spreading the word!  here are some easy ways to do that:

you could share their announcement post, where they explain what the project is all about. or if you have facebook or twitter you can share this link: http://bit.ly/d0ZKAf with your friends and ask them to vote for them!

here are some sample text for twitter, to make things a little easier: Vote for @kindovermatter to win a $25K grant in #pepsirefresh! Helping artists & promoting kindness — vote here: http://pep.si/c7WhzZ

you can also sign up for daily e-mail reminders to vote: Click here to sign up! and, when you sign up, you get a little something special as their way of saying thank you!

this is about spreading optimism, donating, and changing lives. it’s about the community pulling together to nurture individual wealth in order for our collective wealth to grow. so let’s vote!

wrap up: {community} {donation} {kind over matter} {non profit} {pepsi refresh} {vote}

hi dear ones!  did you happen to follow the poppies awards last week?  well, i wanted to give a HUGE thank you to each of you who voted for going home to roost, it won 3rd place in the blog category! i was so excited!  thank you thank you thank you! and alas, if you fingers aren’t too tired of voting yet…

i’m really excited to announce that both of my etsy shops, going home to roost and old renewed have been nominated for rikrak’s handmade olympics! yay!  one of my aprons is nominated for favorite handmade goodie that inspires loveliness and wellness (what an pretty name!) and one of my vintage frames is up for favorite eco friendly goodie.

voting ends wednesday, february 17th so try to check out all of the amazing events before then.  if you would like to vote for going home to roost or old renewed, you can just click on the buttons below.  and, don’t forget to vote for all of your other favorite artists, too! have fun!

click to vote for going home to roost’s reversible apron!

click to vote for old renewed’s vintage frame!

are you nominated as well?  let us know in the comments so we can vote for you!

wrap up: {contest} {etsy} {handmade} {olympics} {vote}

have you heard of the poppies?  it’s a way to acknowledge & support the handmade community – and i am very excited to announce that going home to roost has been nominated for both the favourite handmade artist blog and favourite handmade housewares!

this is such an incredible honor to be a part of, and i would love it if you would consider supporting me, as well as your other favorite artists.  you can vote once per IP address (i.e. computer) and voting ends friday, january 29th.  winners will be announced friday, febuary 5th.  keep your fingers crossed!

to vote for going home to roost (the blog) visit ‘favourite handmade artist blog‘

to vote for going home to roost (the shop) visit ‘favourite handmade housewares‘

thank you thank you thank you!  xoxo, bonnie

wrap up: {award} {blog} {contest} {poppies} {shop} {vote}

“where the handmade world comes together to celebrate making things!

think alpine sewing.
downhill woodworking.
pairs cooking on ice!
and all of the other amazing things folks in the handmade world do + make + create every day!

oh what a wonderful handmade world we live in!“

have you all visited rikrak studio lately?  they are hosting a 2010 handmade olympics!  there are 8 fun events to enter and for each of them, you can nominate both yourself and another shop, blog or handmade item.  nominations end january 31st and after the {amazing} judges post a short list of their 10 favorites, everyone will begin to vote on february 8.  there are some amazing prizes and fun to be had, so get over to rikrak studio for all of the details and to start nominating! have fun!

wrap up: {contest} {handmade} {nominate} {olympics} {vote}