Hi Everyone! This week it's my birthday and I really treated myself to it this time, as I have several mini hauls to report!

This haul is huge, and I'm bound to leave some things out and I do apologize!  And not to mention this post is now 2 months late!  Time sure does fly.

Here we go!

Joann.com

I used my NZPost YouSHOP address for the first time and tested how easy it was to receive packages and the associated costs.

It was really simple, and in most cases you get free shipping from most retailers in the US.  From there, it was shipped to the NZPost site and forwarded to me.  An email came from NZPost and I checked out online and BAM, within a week my package was here.

Stamps were decided a steampunk and hot air balloon theme.  Hero Arts Hot Air Balloon Trio and Inkadinkado Steam Punk was the stamps that I was completely digging from Joann.com.

Corner Chomper collection is growing as I have just added the angle and stub cut - meaning that I can do shipping tag edges!  I love shipping tag edges.

 

CraftySteals

The Pink Paislee Soiree Collection was on offer at Crafty Steals in late September.  Even though I had ordered this in late September it didn't arrive until early November!  It had gotten lost in the international post once, and after a few weeks Crafty Steals sent another (sans stamps :()

All aside, it's an awesome collection and so happy that Crafty Steals replaced it.  Thanks Stephanie!

Scottie Crafts

On my Birthday trip up North we stopped in to a few scrapbooking supply stores because I'm an addict.

Tim Holtz Distress Stains are a new product for me and they were on sale at Scottie Crafts. Still haven't gotten the hang of it and hopefully I'll expand my collection a bit. For now I have the basic primaries in Barn Door, Mustard, and Tumbled glass.

Pipettes will be a big time saver in scooping up the distress stain inks and water.

Sticky Canvas is a new material, and I really should get started using it. I could do iron transfers of printables and then color them with inks or distress markers!

NZ Scrapbooking

I picked up the Epiphany Punch in Pennants and a few glossy shapes to go with it.  I'm eager to give this tool a try as I love pennants!  Maybe something with pennants and hot air balloons.

I also bought some Green Tara rhinestone branches and silver orb branch sprays.  They're really gorgeous - I should see about making my own!

Scrap-a-bull

Scrap-a-bull's little store in Bulls is not to be missed.  Though it may be small, there are quite a number of brands that you just don't see in the other NZ stores like Jenni Bowlin, and even some of the Prima items like inks!

I bought some Glitz Giant Bling in 3 different color varieties - all that they had!  Can't wait to use these for centre of flowers or other giant accents.  These are giant.

Trademe

Trademe has been my home of scrapbooking bargains since I started nearly two years ago.  I thought I deserved a bit of Studio Calico and bought the Studio Calico Mist Circle Template, and the Studio Calico Mist Chevron Template.

The Chevron template I've already used and love, but hard to find a home or niche on the Circle templates on what projects I could use it on.  Maybe some experimenting is in order.

Thanks to my Partner!

In conclusion, it was a great scrappy birthday with a wonderful trip!  It was so wonderful in fact, that I made my partner who was instrumental in making this trip happen a Thank You card!