Countdown to Mother's Day

Oh my gosh, can you believe we are on week 11 of the Mother's Day Countdown hosted by Julie and Blu of BlueMorningExpressions!?! Eleven weeks of handmade and vintage items - where did the time go? Oh, I know - some of it was spent promoting all the wonderful items that have been shared these past weeks (: I'm sure everyone will agree with me that the Countdown has been LOTS of fun with many, many of spectacularly creative items perfect for even the hard-to-please Mom!

Mother's Day is Sunday, May 12 - almost here now. Have you done your shopping yet? There's still time! A perfect place to shop is at Julie and Blu's Mother's Day Gift Ideas Countdown, collection of handmade and vintage items any Mother will love to receive and cherish for years to come. The Countdown will run for just one more week, a total of 12 weeks when its done. Last week 95 items were shared. This week the number rose over 100, to 103 items! Yay! The items shared included: jewelry, fused glass, cards, antiques, gift tags, knitting, crochet, sewing, antique postcards, polymer clay art, jewelry supplies and more - so many different items and techniques! Shop early . . . shop often (:

Natural rose lotion bar with essential oils and rattanjot, handmade by Irena of Gingers-Garden. Comes in a plastic gift container

Sellers who have a studio/shop on ArtFire, SupaDupa, Zibbet, Etsy, stand alone websites and the like, are invited to share up to three Mother's Day gift items starting each Friday of the Countdown. Julie usually posts the link around noon on Friday (MDST). The collection will close for item submissions around midnight Sunday night. Then, the following Friday, a new collection will start - and so on - until the twelve weeks are up and Mother's Day is here! The items that are shared for the collections must be G-rated.

Textured Bali-style disc earrings with malachite handmade by Mary of PrettyGonzo

When you participate in the Mother's Day Countdown, those all important back links are supplied back to your studio, from the collection itself and from the people sharing your items. This helps your ranking with the various search engines. However, if you share your own items in the collection, you MUST promote each item in the Countdown collection. It's only fair!!! Pinterest and/or Wanelo are preferred since everyone can see the items and it is easy to resave again from those two sites. Twitter and Facebook just do not provide the ability to find items easily to share again and don't provide long lasting links.

Ladies gray embroidered sweatshirt jacket by Carole of CarolesJackets

In addition to saving all the items shared to my Pinterest collection and Wanelo board, I decided to blog each week about the Countdown and share an item from each of the ArtFire artists who participated. This helps to provide even longer lasting backlinks in to the individual studios. All you have to do is get comfy, pull out a sheet of paper and a pen/pencil, have your credit card handy . . . and begin shopping! But, above all, have fun browsing these fabulous creations!

Here are the rest of the items I chose to feature from the Mother's Day Countdown Week 11:

Polymer clay beads with orange butterflies handmade necklace and earrings set by Julie of BlueMorningExpressions

Trinity brass Victorian dragonfly, lodolite and crystal necklace by Julie of BeadFashionDesigns

Floral handmade women's messenger bag by Barbara of barbscrochethut

Black and white zebra stone, spotted Czech glass and shell memory wire bracelet by Nancy of jazzitupwithdesignsbynancy

Ivory colored carnation scented handmade octagon candle by Vicki of ShymouseeCrafts

Dog clock or wall art sculpture in golden crazy stripe polymer clay by Ann of MysticDreamerArt

Jellyfish and nautilus necklace by Eve of EvezBeadz

White howlite nuggets, 9mm x 6mm, set of 15 by Diane of BeadSouk

Dark blue magnesite and Czech glass linked bracelet by Connie of TheSingingBeader

Recycled wine bottle trivet with embossed butterfly pattern handmade by Kellie of ResetarGlassArt

Tibetan resin, chalk turquoise and sterling silver earrings by Kat of KatsAllThat

Copper and brass wire wrapped red jasper pendant and coral necklace by Diane of DianesDangles

Crocheted bath puff or shower scrubbie in soft cotton yarn by Carla of ArtbySunfire

Oblong lampwork bead in pale blue gray wrapped in fine silver by Charlotte of Covergirlbeads

Crochet African violet custom made pincushion by Nina of NinasCorner

Copper, turquoise and brown watch charm bracelet by Julie, Nicole and Linda of jnldesigns

African turquoise, antiques copper and Czech glass necklace by Barbara of SolanaKaiDesigns

Periwinkle blue velvet hooded cape or poncho by Donna of DonnasDesignsSC

Antique Yemen silver bead on amber and turquoise beaded necklace by Anna of CraftsofthePast

Sinamay native tote bag with quirky beading by asiansecrets

White glass pearl and Swarovski crystal rhinestone handmade watch by Kathy of Specialtivity

Multi-colored fused glass dichroic pendant with gold plated bail by Jo of Umeboshi

Hand knit beautiful yellow butterfly dishcloth or washcloth by Sharon of HollyKnitterCreations

St. Petersburg glass bead and crystal bead woven necklace by Rose of ThaddeusRose

Mystical looking Tree of Life pendant necklace with pearls by Catherine of ShadowDogDesigns

This is but a small sampling of all the creations shared in the collection. Be sure to click out this link: Mothers Day Countdown Week 11 to see all 103 handmade and vintage items that were shared. Hopefully one (or more!) of the items will make its way to your Mum on this Mother's Day (: And remember, the last collection starts again this coming Friday!

Many, many thanks to Julie and Blu of BlueMorningExpressions for all their hard work in putting this together each week and giving a place where we can promote each other and ourselves! Mil gracias, my friend!

If you would like to make my day, please leave a comment. Any and all promotion you can do will be benefit us all and will be greatly appreciated.

My contact information:

Artfire studio: ShadowDogDesigns

Blog: ShadowDogDesigns' Blog

Facebook: ShadowDogDesigns - Jewelry

Twitter: ShadowDogDesign

Pinterest: Shadow Dog Designs

Wanelo: ShadowDog

SocialBliss: Catherine Waterhouse

Rebelmouse: ShadowDogDesigns

Google+: Catherine W

Zibbet: ShadowDogDesigns