Melanie Toye's Hobbies

  Image via: pixabay.com  *Please note this post uses affiliate links* If you love diamond painting, here is diamond painting inspiration that you may fall in love with.  This is currently on my AliExpress Wishlist:  For those who love Disney and especially Stitch, look no further than here:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DCaPBd9 If you want to try something challenging, try this balloon diamond painting with lots of colours:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DdqlrCT   For cute Winnie the Pooh, look here:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DE2aXN5 OMG and if you love unicorns like me, you will love this:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DeN8SA7 For something different why not try this:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DeuHBEX I have this exact same panda from paint by numbers so I want to try it as a diamond painting:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_Dc6V3SX This elephant is super cute:  https://s.click.aliexpress.co...

  Image via: pixabay.com  Please note in this blog post there are affiliate links to AliExpress.  Hi there, I personally love shopping at AliExpress, it’s my number one favourite store. It’s not just the amazing prices but the items are quirky and full of colour and generally, AliExpress sells items that are unique and hard to get elsewhere.  So let’s jump right in. Yes, I admit, my cart is always full because once I buy a few things then I relook down the track at what else I would like to buy. I also really like the ease of the online shopping process with the app. There are some online stores that I have no fun when going thorough their online store, so I generally just leave. Alright let’s begin going through my scrapbooking AliExpress wish list:  Normally, I have general themes when I am browsing and currently it’s a Chinese theme.  Check out these washi tapes. Absolutely stunning Chinese  style drawings on the tapes. Great for scrapbooking. I als...

  So…  I was stressing about my scrapbooking paper. I just couldn’t find the paper as easy as I wanted. This is because I had them in a draw with 6in” x 6in” paper and A4 paper. Plus all the excess cut-offs, which I had no idea how I was going to use because I never looked at them.  I decided to create a tub and fill it with my scrapbook paper as well as an ice cream tub filled with my cut-offs. I actually have quite a lot of small cut-offs so this was handy. I then moved my stickers out of my washi tape draw because that wasn’t fun to look through with all the clutter. I made a spot with sticker books to the back of the draw, my box of smaller sized stickers to the front with some other decorations to the left side. Then I re-sorted my washi tape storage draw and have one section for all of my pens and the rest is tape.  I later did some scrapbooking and discovered I used a lot of the cut-offs because I could easy trek through it all. I also enjoyed scrolling throug...

  I hear people all the time buying craft haul’s that they shop at Goodwill. I have a few stores side by side to each other and I thought why not give it a try. I really thought none of them would have any craft but a short walk and there I was.  My best buy are the Alice and Wonderland stickers!! Only $1. I couldn’t believe it. I just bought Alice stickers from AliExpress but they were close to $5 and they are always out of stock online so this was a real deal.  Under those stickers I bought some blue rhinestones for $1, which are double the length then what the picture shows.  I also bought some Lucy stickers because they were so cute. Lucy is my dog so when I scrapbook photos of her she can now have her own set of stickers.  And I bought two colourful and bright necklaces, which I thought were a bit fun. All up it cost me: $11.50. Not bad when I could have bought one or two supplies online instead I got a whole haul.  Have you ever shopped at a Goodwill ...

  So I started crocheting. I have wanted to for a little while now but was finally brave enough to buy a kit from Kmart.  What I have learnt in my first hour:  1. Don’t buy a kit.  I bought a kit because I thought it would be easy but what is even easier is just buying a crochet hook and some yarn (pick your favourite colour) and just trying out one stitch at a time. 2. Use one stitch until it looks good.  So I spent an hour crocheting the chain stitch. It’s my first stitch to learn and instead of following the kit and trying to keep changing stitches, I thought let’s just spend time learning one stitch and commit to memory.  3. Put on some music or a movie you know off by heart I find it less stressful when I play some music to chill out to so I can just use the rhythm to practice the stitching. 4. Outcome Well after an hour I still feel I haven’t mastered the chain stitch and that is ok. I want this to be a lifelong hobby and not just half looks good and ...

*Please note this post includes affiliate links.* I love shopping and I did a big shopping haul for lots of different arts and craft from Kmart and just had to add a little bit extra from AliExpress.  So here is what I got from AliExpress:  Dog stickers - Because I am scrapbooking my dog photos in the scrapbook I needed paper and stickers.  Dog scrapbooking paper:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DkNWzA5 Dog stickers:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DkMWbSH Dog paw stickers:  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DEWgS0V Zoo animal stickers - I have photos with me and my children at the zoo so what better way to scrapbook those zoo photos!  https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_msv6Ef0 Christmas stickers - I still haven’t decided if I should buy Christmas scrapbooking paper or just using wrapping paper as the scrapbooking paper. I would like to know what you use, please comment below. However, I still needed some Christmas stickers.  https://s.click...

  Image sourced via: www.pixabay.com I used to write and publish novels and I was a freelance business writer, I also had an online magazine not to mention bringing up two young kids as well as a part time job. Any spare time I had I would write. Burn out is real.  Burn out happened to me. It was really hard. My computer crashed and I thought may be it’s time to just stop my writing. So I did.  I took six years off writing and started working full time again but no additional work such as the writing.  I spent those six years just looking after myself. Exploring my inner being and using self-care techniques to really just relax.  That is when my arts and craft hobbies lifestyle began. I would just spend the weekend on my hobbies, it started with the super cute miniature homes. Then I added paint by numbers. Then only a year ago did I discover the joy of diamond painting. And until recently, probably the start of the year I fell in love with scrapbooking.  I...