How do you fail at blogging? You can't right? At least that's what everyone thinks. I on  the other hand have found a way to do just that. LOL I told myself I was going to sit here and not forget to blog and keep it up. Even if I didn't have anything to say or post about. However, here I am calling myself out for not doing that.

     I told myself " How could you forget? You are on the computer almost every day! It's impossible." ... Hehe... I still managed to forget.... :Stands up: Hi, I'm Jackie and I'm addicted to gaming. :Sits down: Yup that's pretty much what I do when I turn on my computer. I play MMOs and forget almost about everything else I had planned. The current addiction has been FFXIV for the last year plus ^.^ before that it was SWTOR for awhile. When I think about it or things are slow in FFXIV I jump over to WildStar.

     The plan was to post a blog before I started gaming or even after before going to bed. So much for that idea. Do I sit and game the whole time o.o ? I could but no. The butt starts to hurt after awhile and you need to get the blood moving again in those legs of yours! Also puppy + kids = adulting. That I at least still get done ^.^ yay for adulting.....wait did I just say that o.o I did mention I wasn't exactly sane right?

     You know hen you are typing and the little blinking line you see on the screen to see where you left at is? The one that shows up waiting for the next letter to be typed in hopes a word will be formed? I have lost mine and am typing in the blind! Or maybe it never blinked like I thought it did. Anyways mine is broken. (A.D.D. Moment)

     Since my blinking line is broken I hope all the paragraphs are lining up together .... anyways. Fail blogging! Yes, I have done it and it is possible! Just my random thought for the moment because I am tabbed out of game and randomly surfing the web when it hit O.O I have a blog I was trying to keep up with OMG! Heh. Back to gaming!

   So, yeah. I seem to have fallen off my blog completely. Haha....yeah so much for sticking to it. Though sadly the past months of not blogging I've done really nothing creative. I live in a 2 bdrm small ass apartment. My "Crafting" table was our kitchen table I took over. Well I had to choose between crafting or penpalling. Yeah well my penpalling won.

   You might sit there and go "Well, Jackie clean your shit up every time when you are done and you wont have to worry about mess." Dude......have you seen what I craft? There is no "clean" way to craft. Creative Chaos is my blogs title for a damn reason. My Flickr for your enjoyment When I do craft craft I get all kinds of down and dirty. Yeah, I should clean up after. Know what happens? Oh shiny! Off to something else. LOL Anywho, who cares. Don't judge me! Come clean for me!

   So yeah. I did happen to do a bit of crafting though. I got addicted to Pinterest again. Yay cellular devices! Since I missed crafting I decided to look up some penpalling fun. I found some cute things too.

  

   ^^ An idea from Pinterest I made. I've got the crafting stuff and what not so why not. Also I figured it would be something fun for my penpals to enjoy. I also found other versions and tried them as well.

   ^^ Now the above version is big enough to fit my 4x5 kawaii memos inside without htem getting ruined. As well as my kawaii letter paper folded in half just fine. Not to mention the two mini envies inside hole kawaii sticker flakes and the mini kawaii memos. Everything nice and safe while adding extra fun for my penpal.

   ^^ A mini version. Made two mini envies and glued them together. Inside kawaii sticker flakes and mini kawaii memos. Tadah! Easy to make. Anyone can do it.

   ^^ Now this one is one of my FAVORITE to make! I love this idea. Two larger envies put together. With two mini envies on the inside and a little note. So many goodies can be added to this for your penpals to enjoy. I make these more then anything now. The hardest part? Stopping because once you get to making them OMG how to stop. So quick and easy. Stickers, washi tape, decotape, and so much more can be used to add detail to these. Or you can send them plain like this one. Looks pretty damn cute to me still. You don't have to be an expert to have fun and craft something special. Just glue some envies together and you're in business.

   ^^ See another version. This one has an extra envie though! Wow! See how easy that is. Haha. Now before anyone ask. I made my own envies templates. What ya do is easy peasy. I swear. Take an envie you have. Store bought whatever. Take your (insert choice of crafting knife) and CAREFULLY and SLOWLY peel apart the envie. If you mess up a bit who cares. As long as you have the majority of the envie shape you are good. Tadah! Now you have an envie template. If you want to clean it up a bit and make it sturdy get some cardstock and trace it on there. Now you've got a template that will last a bit longer then some flimsy piece of paper. The same can be done with the mini ones. If you need a template just go to the google machine and find one. I was lucky and penpal sent me some templates for different sized mini ones.

   Or you know craft stores sell the fancy envie maker things. I thought hardcore about getting one. It would have been easier. However, every time I went to the store to get one I bought other stuff....we all know how that goes. Or when I went to actually buy it for once something else came up and there went that idea.

   The point to all this rambling and showing off is: Crafting is NOT hard. We make it harder then it has to be. We over think things. We don't believe in ourselves and that we can do it. Craft paper and washi tape is all you need really. Hell just craft paper. No one said they had to be all decorated. After all you are the one making things because you want to.

   So yeah tadah! Ways to make penpalling more fun! You'll enjoy it and so will your penpals. If anything it makes for cute mail if you decide to only make your own envies!

   Well of course we all knew this was going to happen. Haha. Life happened and I just got busy or bored. My blog has been completely neglected. However, since being neglected I have of course found a brand new addiction.

   FILOFAX ADDICTED! 

   Yes, I have become addicted to the Filofax brand organizers. I LOVE them and thanks to Instagram got sucked into the Filofax world.

   Were have they been my whole life? Of course in the UK. Why does everyone else get all the cool stuff? While others sit there and go "OH, How cool! Why does Americans get this or that...." Okay.

   What's nice about these planners / organizers they come in all kinds of colors, designs, and sizes. Also they have rings so you can add, move, take out, and whatever with whatever you have inside.

   My first baby would be the Aqua Saffiano Personal. I just LOVE her! She's my baby and I use her ALL the time. However, my Personal Pink Classic was a well sought out item. I searched forever for one online for a decent price. Considering how "Rare" they are I got mine for a STEAL! A steal for only $85 total! YES! I jumped and squealed with glee when I won her off eBay. She's perfect.

  

   ^ Left is my Aqua Personal Saffiano and on the right is my Pink Personal Classic. The sizes of a personal is Width 5.3", height 7 1/2", depth 1.37" paper size is: 3 3/4" x 6 3/4".

   Now the paper I use it not the original paper. No, it's too thin and my felt tip Le Pens bleed right on through it. Heck I can see regular pen ink through the other side. No, that will just not do. I order custom paper from Piaric I jsut love her inserts. The paper is high quality and she have various layouts.

   For my Saffiano I get the week on two pages (wo2p) and month on two pages (mo2p) I am not currently using my Classic. I haven't quite decided exactly what I am going to use her. Though I am really leaning towards pen pal stuff. Since I love penpalling. I have quite a few and would love to get more in detail on their likes and what not. Along with important dates for them.

   I am currently looking for a green A5. I am not being too picky on the design. An Original would work for me. I just want it to be green or a shade of green and an A5 size. I need a bigger one to keep information on other various important things.

   Now onto what I use the Filofax for? Organization of course. Haha. I also have fun with. I decorate it all up to keep me entertain with it. If it was interesting  for me I'd just stop using it and they would collect dust. Which for the amount of money I've invested into the Filofax's themselves and items I use to decorate....yeah can't exactly do that.

   I use kawaii stickers, sticker flakes, kawaii sticky notes, sticky notes, various different color LePens, and washi tape to decorate my pages. I've also made my own dividers to make it even more custom to myself.

   Sadly I do not have any recent pages to show you. I have other priorities to take care of before I can spend extra money on my hobbies right now. The only thing I can really do at this moment is my penpalling and some flat swaps here and there. Though you are more then welcome to check out my instagram page and scroll through and find my last Filofax pages I finished.

   I miss my Filofax and hate how she is just sitting there. I can not wait to get back to using her. Ugh. It's be slightly hectic too not having her to write down everything. Though I am managing.

   If you want to see anyone else and their pages all you have to do it search Filofax on Instagram. OMG! You will be devoured by all the yumminess. Don't let it suck you in. You will become addicted and soon find yourself looking for your own on eBay. Haha.

   Totally been slacking on this blog thing. I told you I would. I'd be able to keep p with it for awhile then it would slip away from me. It's not like I haven't been crafting either! I have been. Not as much as I'd like but hey money is kind of tight right now and swapping is something I'm trying to hold back on a little. 

   So what have I been crafting when I can and do splurge a little? Well it has to do with kawaii of course! I mean I am better off killing 2 birds with 1 stone after all. I need my kawaii fix as much as I need my crating / swapping fix. LOL

   I hosted a swap on Swap-bot that required everyone to go to their local craft store and try to get a cardboard box as close to 3x3x3 as possible. That way everyone was semi doing the same amount of work. 

   You have to then take kawaii loose items. Like mini memos, 4x6 memos, sticker flakes, and whatever else you liked to decorate the box all up in kawaii. Not just slapping it together. No no no. Try to have some order to it. The whole outside. Not the bottom of course though. Inside was optional as well. Then take some of your goodies and embellish the lid a little if you liked. Again not required. 

   After all the way done or before you can spend time sitting in front of the tv folding origami paper stars and filling your box with them. Yay...so much fun. Let me tell you. That took way longer then I thought it would. Boy was I happy I only made it a 3x3x3 box. Haha.  

   Once your box was all decorated up and filled with stars off to your partner it went. Making sure it was packed well of course. 

   

   ^ There is the box I made for my partner. I had so much fun making it. Didn't take no time at all...for the decorating the box part. The stars on the other hand. Man. LOL But totally worth it. My partner loved it so that is all that matters. I am thinking of doing another on in the future. Maybe a little bigger though and instead of stars maybe some kawaii goodies!? Like a whimsey box instead?  Possible once I can splurge again. 


   That was a swap made well before I got to seriously cutting back on my postage spending. So since then I've been trying to come up with flat creative kawaii swaps. 

   I already had my deco tape covered postcards so what else could I do? :light bulb:

   ^ That is when I remembered once of my very 1st kawaii swaps I ever did. This was also when I had hardly no kawaii so I was limited on to what I could do swap wise as well. Someone had done a public sticker flake postcard swap. I was in. I wasn't too worried about flakers. It was only sticker flakes. 

   I decided heck why not! Something different and easy and quick and cheap to send. I didn't want to make the postcard the same as my 1st one. I had lined the sitckers up all nice and need in rows and what not. Not this time.  Nope. Not this time. I am going to see exactly how many I can get on there without overlapping them too much. 

   Wow! That took a long time. I swear I was working on it for a good 1.5 - 2 hours. LOL I did it though. I got as many on there as I could nicely done and only overlapped a tiny bit towards the end. I was very proud of myself! Partner loved it so another well done job! 


   I needed another swap. Something creative yet flatish. I have to keep the creative part of the group going. I need to do what people like but add different fun things in here and there. What to do? What to do? 

   ATC! I LOVE doing them! Others mentioned they would like to do them too. Yes! 

   ^ Kawaii themed senders choice ATC swap. Simple. Make 1 kawaii themed ATC featuring any character you choose and send to partner. I waited until I assigned partners before doing my ATC. I like to do that sometimes. Make swaps profile based. I just loved the ATC. I actually had a hard  time sending him off. Haha. He sat here done waiting to be mailed for probably 3 days. I am still waiting to be rated. I sure do hope she likes him! 

   It's the end of the month so I need to get ready to throw up some more crafty swaps soon. People seem to like the quick deco tape or sticker flake postcards. I'll keep them going. Think it will be round 4 for deco tape and round 2 for sticker flakes. I can keep going with the kawaii matchboxes. A nice little group has had fun doing them. This will be the 4th round on them. What to do what to do though? Hmmmmm.....somethign to think about. 

   We have a new officer who is happily throwing up tons of swaps right now. I'll have to see when those are going and when they end. Try not to overwhelm the end dates too much for swaps. 

   I should come up with a different type of crafting swap maybe. Or try the ATC again. I'm not quite sure. I tried to switch it up and did a PVC flake swap instead of regular flakes. Not too many joined that one. Poor PVC flakes no love. No love. T-T 

   Well now since thinking about it I have a few ideas roaming around in my head now. Haha. I should get to posting them and what not. More creative chaos to come!
 
 

   Well it's been quite some time since I've been on here. Ugh. I'm finally 100% back to feeling healthy again. I caught a nasty little thing on the 21st of April. Let me tell you that was not fun. My lovely 4 year old son got it. Then he gave it to my 8 year old daughter. Luckily for them and myself they had it for a day and only a tummy bug. I on the other hand had the full blown thing. So not fun. 

   Since  then though once I started to get better I did nothing bu lay around and read. Lots of reading. I think about reading a lot lately. HAHA. Since being sick it was hard to get back into my creative mindset for my swaps. Though I wasn't in any. Good thing to with me getting sick like that. 

   Today it hit me though. I've been in a creative mindset all day. Without even knowing it. Without trying the creative world was talking to me. Haha. 

   Saw this on the way home from getting groceries. I couldn't get into my apartment fast enough to get my camera! Everyone was looking at mall crazy standing in the middle of the parking lot of my apartment complex snapping pictures. They changed their minds once they saw what I saw! Isn't that how it happens anyways? Haha. 

   Since then I've been is a music funk. Listening to all sorts of musicians I enjoy. Now that's some creative chaos for you. After all music is art! 

   
    If you've never seen a violinist rock out then you are missing out on something. I love Lindsey Stirling.  She is just EPIC! She even does music game songs. Like Zelda! Yeah dude how awesome is that? Pretty awesome for us gamers! That's some creative mojo going on right there. 

   To think she was on what? America's Got Talent and they told her she would not make anything out of herself? ROFL! Looks like someone was quite wrong. 

   Not really into that stuff? Well fine forget you too! LOL jk jk. How about some awesomeness in another direction? 

   Maybe you are into some Dub Step? Pretty awesome group if I do say so myself. Check out some of the other videos. Oh I would not recommend watching the above video with kids around. the little kid might freak them out some. 

   Or maybe you are a little more old school? That's okay. I've got you on that one too. A song that I just love! Who wouldn't like them some Prince!? 

   Now there is something for the old school people. Now did you know this song was dedicated to his mother? Well now you know! Knowing is half the battle. 

   What's your favorite artist? Favorite song? It's Friday people! Go on and put it on and turn that good stuff up! Get those creative juices going! 

   Mini zine. What comes mind when you hear or read those words? Confusion? What the heck is that? Blank.... You are not the only one. I had no freaking idea what that was at all when I first came across it. The only thing I knew what there was some crafting factor to it since I ran across is via Swap-bot. 

   Wikipedia defines it as:

 A zine (pron.: /ˈziːn/ ZEEN; an abbreviation of fanzine, or magazine) is most commonly a small circulation self-published work of original and/or appropriated texts and images usually reproduced via photocopier.

   Now what does it mean to you? Still have no freaking idea? That's fine. Until I saw an actual picture of one it didn't click either. Don't feel less intelligent because you have no idea. Some of us learn something by seeing not reading. You're more normal then most people. 

     ^ My first even kawaii zine. This was done in the I LOVE Kawaii group. Thanks to the wonderful hollycopter who did all the hard work. She came up with the template then blogged about it so everyone could click her template, print, and go. 

   The blank template itself is fairly easy to master. It's the theme of the zine itself. Okay so you've come up with a theme. Easy. Now come up with something different to put in each box. Something EVERYONE can answer in a creative fun way. Not so easy is it! If you said yes (whatever and be gone :p lol) good for you. 

   Okay, you've got your zine. Time to get creative. Fill it in! Go on. This is the easy part. Fallow what each page says. 

   I personally like the keep certain aspects blank. That way when I go to photocopy it some parts will be individually unique. Like the stickers section. I kept blank and did that by hand for each on. Also the deco tape parts as well. Let's not forget about the glitter pen parts too. I'm pretty sure glitter doesn't photocopy so well. You don't have to be picky like I am. By all means go right ahead and photocopy the whole thing. It's up to you. It's your zine! 

   Alright, so you've got your mini zines ready to go. Now how to make it into a booklet? I've decided to not fail at explaining this process to you. So I found a YouTube video with great music to entertain you while learning. Cliky.    Tada! You are all done and ready to show the world your new mini zine! 

   Okay now the reason I've made today's blog is for the Kawaii Mini Zine swaps I plan to host. LOL I needed somewhere to link my zine for people to print off. So two birds with one stone! Blog done and Clickable template for my swaps. Ta da! LOL If your not in the group and still want to use the template for your own fun by all means go ahead. I'm not stingy...on somethings. ^.^ Haha. 

   For those in my lovely swaps needing a zine. Click the image. Right click and save. Open and print. Make sure to set it to full screen printout. When I made the zine I made sure it was the exact size of standard size printer paper. So you don't need to make it bigger or smaller.

   Kawaii Mini Zine: 

   ^ Spring Edition.

   So, I've been really trying to figure out what to put on here next. I have covered so much over the shirt time I've had this blog. Which I now realize was a really idiotic idea. I should have spaced everything out intelligently and I would not have this issue. However, growing a pair have allowed me to set up for today's blog! Woots.

   Altered Playing Cards. What fun. I've wanted to do these since I joined Swap-Bot. Though I never did. Hell I even went and got myself two decks of cards to use for this craft and am NOW just deciding to jump in head first! 

   These are just like ATCs. You can go to town with them. The ONLY major rule is the suits at the corner can NOT be covered. That way people can see what card it is. Though I highly doubt anyone uses these to play Poker. LOL 

   Other then that they have the same rules as your ATCs. Use whatever to decorate and ta dah! You are done. I was really nervous about my 1st set. Yes, I joined a swap where we were doing all of the 10s. Very nervous. 

   Shit! It's not just one or two. No, it's four. So if I mess up I really mess up. Though if you fallow the rules how could you mess up? It's not like it's my 1st ever craft either. How hard  could this be? Not hard at all.  Okay, pick your theme. We have to do a theme because we are doing all 4 of the 10s. What to do what to do? Shit! You need to buy printer ink damnit. Okay fine what do we have to work..... :light bulb: 

   OMG! You have vintage black and white along with vintage color Alice in Wonderland printouts from a swap you did a LONG time ago. That's it Alice in Wonderland vintage. Hmmmm? Black and White or Color? Let's see what we have.

   :Wonders to crafting area and finds print outs: COLOR! We are doing this in color I have 4 perfect pictures to use. Now what else? Hmmmm.....Let's just do this! 

   LOL Yes, there was absolutely NO planning to these. I just went with. I LOVE them! 

   There they are. I love how I was also able to find a different ticket for each picture and they match wonderfully with the character! I was also so excited to remember about the gears as well. Can't wait to do more!