As I mentioned earlier, I have an exciting giveaway to announce today. Lindsay Nicole Design, one of our lovely new sponsors, has offered to award a lucky winner one free Blogger template ($40 value). *Note: Templates are for Blogger/blogspot blogs only.

Lindsay specializes in custom and template blog designs. From design concept to installation, she creates a blog that fits both the authors personal and written style. The winner will receive:
• A fully-funtional, unique blogger template – they can choose any template from her collection!
• Complete Installation of new template
• Customization of pictures and blog title in blog header
• Specialty fonts on header and post-titles (as shown in template preview)
• Setup of standard widgets (About, Archive, Labels, Followers)
• Unique background pattern (as shown in template preview)
*The winner can also choose to add-on extra custom features at their own expense (available add-ons listed here)

This is a great prize and a fantastic opportunity if you’ve wanted to revamp or start a blog of your own and don’t have all the skills or tools to design one.

To enter to win:
1. Visit the Lindsay Nicole Design Studio to see her template shoppe.
2. Leave a comment at the end of this post telling us what your favorite blog is (not including Twig & Thistle – obviously! wink!)
3. Include your email address along with your first name and last initial. Only one entry per person please!

Giveaway closes Friday, November 12th at 10pm PST. One lucky winner will be randomly selected from the comments and announced Monday, November 15th.

Good luck everyone!

I am so excited to announce the winner of the Small Talk Studio Giveaway today. But before I do, I wanted to thank Alyssa Nassner for creating such wonderful and playful work and so generously offering to giveaway such a great gift.

Everyone’s stories of who they’d take in a hot air ballon if given the chance were touching, hilarious and inspiring. I enjoyed reading each and every comment and I honestly think this was by far the most entertaining giveaway yet. Thank you to everyone who entered! And now, for the winner…

Congratulations to Tanya, you are one lucky lady! I will be in touch with you shortly. If you aren’t Miss W., you can still purchase your own print or cards through the Small Talk shop and get updates by visiting the blog.

I’ve got an exciting giveaway today to brighten your Tuesday morning! This one comes from the incredibly talented Alyssa Nassner of Small Talk Studio. You might remember me gushing about her craft inspired prints. Well, Alyssa’s recently added some new prints, cards and notebooks to her Etsy shop.

To give back, she’s generously giving away alimited edition Up and Away Print along with a set of  Delightful Foxes Cards. How charming are both of those?! I just love those two foxy foxes!

To enter to win:
1. Visit the Small Talk Studio Shop to see all her beautiful goods.
2. Leave a comment at the end of this post telling us who’s the one person you’d take on a hot air ballon ride if you got the chance.
3. Include your email address along with your first name and last initial. Only one entry per person please!

*Contest is now closed Giveaway closes Tuesday, October  26th at 10pm PST. One lucky winner will be randomly selected from the comments and announced Friday, October 29th.

Good luck everyone!

I am so excited to announce the winner of the Silhouette Cutting Machine giveaway! First, I want to thank you all so much for participating and spreading the word. I wish I had one of these to give to each of you since everyone has such amazing ideas! I am beyond impressed with all the talent, creativity and inspiration you guys came up with. I hope to try a few of these ideas in the feature and share them with you along the way. So, without further delay, the winner is…

Congratulations Kiki for winning the giveaway, I’ll be in touch shortly!

For those of you that didn’t win, you’re still in luck! Silhouette is offering two great discounts (see below for details). The first is good from now until September 30th and the second from October 1st through the 4th. Enter code: TWIG at checkout. Thanks for playing everyone and thanks to Silhouette for a great giveaway!

I’m signing off early this week to attend a going away party for a friend. I hope you all have a great weekend and see you next week! xoxo, Kathleen

Ok peeps, this is our biggest giveaway yet and I have been so excited to share it with you! I was recently given a Silhouette Cutting Machine to test out and review. If I wasn’t happy with it I could send it back, no questions asked. Um, ok!

I’d seen similar machines on the market and had actually looked into purchasing the Silhouette a while back but wasn’t entirely convinced. This was the perfect opportunity for me to see it what it could really do. The Silhouette works just like a printer but instead of printing your artwork, it cuts it. The best part is that there are no cartridges – you create your own text and shapes. Plus, it comes with images and even more available to purchase online! Being a designer, I wanted complete control over the designs and I have all the tools I need to create custom designs so that’s why this particular one appealed to me most.

They just launched their Mac software so I haven’t had a ton of time to test out all the features but so far I am overwhelmingly pleased with the results. I’ve managed to cut out 200 envelope liners in 45 minuets which normally would have taken me at least five hours. I cut out perfect leaf shapes without using an x-acto knife and even a box template which can be a bit time consuming.

There are so many things that this little machine can do and I honestly can NOT wait to try them each out. You can purchase vinyl to cut and use to create custom displays in your home. You can even use the vinyl to adhere to glass and create custom etchings! You can buy Tattoo Paper to make temporary tattoos as well as heat transfer paper for adding designs to fabric. Seriously, the possibilities are endless!

Above is a quick gift I wrapped for a friend who bought her first home. I wanted a unique embellishment that would be indicative of the momentous occasion. Keys seemed like an obvious choice and I thought they’d make a pretty addition. I love how it turned out and with the Silhouette it was super simple to do.

So, here’s the EXCITING part, Silhouette is giving away a machine to ONE lucky winner!!! That’s a $299.99 value! The gift includes the machine, software for Windows XP/Vista and Mac, 2 cutting mats, a blade and a $10 gift card to their online store. WOWZA!

There are three ways to enter:

1. Visit the Silhouette website to view all the creative possabilities. Come back here and tell us what you’d make with your Silhouette by leaving a comment at the end of this post.
2. Blog about it with a link back to this post, then come back and leave a comment with the link.
3. Mention it on Twitter or Facebook using the links below, and then come back and leave a link in the comments.

Be sure to leave your email address and your first name and first inital of your last name (i.e. Stacy P) in the comments. Winner must be in the USA and only one winner per household.

Tweet

Competition closes Wednesday, September 29th at 5pm PST. The winner will be randomly drawn from the comments and announced Thursday, September 30th. Good luck to you all, I’m so excited! I’ll be sharing some more projects over the next week so stay tuned!

The contest is now closed!