~ New Facebook Game: Zuma Blitz ~

I just love Popcap Games!  I have been addicted to their games for almost 10 years!  Ever since they introduced Bejeweled Blitz on Facebook, I have been playing every week, trying to score higher than my friends.  A few days ago, I was playing Bejeweled and noticed an ad for Zuma Blitz.  I have played Zuma before and it's a good game, so I clicked on it and my addiction began!

Zuma is a simple game.  Color balls come out of 2 holes in the rock and follow tracks toward the golden skull at the end of the tracks.  You have to shoot color balls from the frog's mouth at the center.  The balls you shoot will squeeze between the balls on the track and if your ball create a group of 3 or more of the same color then they disappear.

This game is pretty much the same as Magnetica on Nintendo DS.  It's a pretty addictive game.  My mom actually broke her DS screen playing this game.  Zuma Blitz has a lot of other add ons though.  The add on are similar to the ones you see playing Bejeweled Blitz.  You have the score multipliers (x2) and you have these "fruits" that you can shoot at for bonus points.

 

And similar to Bejeweled Blitz's coins and powerups, in Zuma Blitz you get Mojos depending on the number of balls you hit and you can use those for powerups.  The difference is that you need to earn XP (which you earn per game) to level up and unlock these powerups.  You can also get Idols when you are lucky, which you can use to purchase Mojo and other items. 

 

 They also have spirit animals that represent the number of times you get a certain score.  Whenever you "level up" a score level, you gain a "new circle".  Note the words near the bottom, they are kinda funny.

 Now, the most interesting thing about this game is that you get Life, which are the little hearts at the top of the screen.  When you first play, you get 5 hearts that are all filled.  Every time you play a game, a heart goes away.  When you don't have any more hearts, you can't play anymore.  You can either wait for the Next Life or buy more hearts with real money.  This is pretty ingenious!  You can play for free, but if you really want to play a lot, you have to pay!  What a great system!   I love it 'cause it's a way to control my addiction.  Sometimes though, they may be nice and give you a chance to flip a coin and refill your life gauge.

 

Don't worry, you get your hearts refilled when you level up using your XP.  And you get idols and Mojos too.   I think this is a very well thought out game and they learned a lot from Bejeweled.  I always thought that there's no point to level up for Bejeweled.  Now, there's a reason to level up for Zuma and I just want to unlock more and more features!  Ok, after writing all this, my life bar has refilled.  Time to play!

 

~ Dollar Sale at Happy Cloud Supplies ~

I got my 900th sale last night for Happy Cloud Supplies!  I suddenly had the crazy idea of trying to reach 1000 sales by 1.1.11.  Is that too crazy??  Well, to help speed things along, I am having a Dollar Sale!  Really, I have marked down 14 items so that they are only $1!  I am practically giving these away considering my etsy fees!

If you are planning on getting multiple items, please let me know and I can set up a custom listing for you.  Depending on the response to this sale, I may mark down more items.  Please help me spread the word!  I am thinking of doing something special when I reach 1000th sale.  Maybe another $50 gift certificate giveaway?

~ Havanese Puppies from HALO ~

My brother and SIL loves HALO and started to help out by becoming foster parents for rescue puppies.  Check out the four that they picked up!  2 of them went to another foster home and 1 of them got adopted already.  They are super cute!  To learn more about them, head over to Mimolo :)

~ New Romantic Pink and Gold Jewelry ~

I usually only use sterling silver in my jewelry, but that is getting ridiculously expensive! Prices has risen more than 33% over the past 2 years! So, just as a warning, I will be raising prices after new years. Anyway, I love these gold and pink charms in my supplies shop and just can't resist them anymore. So, I got some gold-plated chains and findings and made a few necklaces.  This one is my favorite!  I love this charm!  So romantic....

This just reminds me of a girl with long flowy hair, riding down a country road during sunset, after picking flowers in the fields.  So, I call this necklace, Country Road.

It's getting really cold here, but somewhere people are wearing bikinis!  And I am sure they will love this necklace with the pink enamel bikini charm and the pretty clay rose.  The bikini charm comes in white too and I can always make it with that if you like.

This one uses the carriage charm with a rose water opal in helix and a powder rose pearl.  Just perfect for a cream lace shirt.  Does this remind you of Cinderella?

All these necklaces are made with delicate twisted curb chain.  I think these chains are very feminine.  If these are popular, I will make more with other charms like this grandfather clock.  Hope you like these!

~ Nikon D90 vs Momo ~

My brother always made fun of me about how blurry my pictures are.  I tell him it's because Momo runs too fast, but he doesn't believe me.  So, we went to a dog park and had a duel:  Nikon D90 vs Speedy Momo.  Out of the 200 pics he took, I think he only liked 3 of them.  haha!  He tries to blame the clouds but whatever.  Check out more pictures at Mimolo!

~ New Holiday-Inspired Jewelry ~

After a mild November, December started off with dreary skies and biting winds.  I really wanted to go somewhere over the weekend, but it was just too cold and I was recovering from a bad headache on Friday.  So, I just watched lots of movies through Netflix and made jewelry!  Most of the pieces are inspired by the cold and the upcoming holidays!  First, let me introduce the Tiny Ornaments!

These earrings are one of a kind!  I don't have any more of these beads so if you love them as much as I do, get them now!  Before I decide to keep them all for myself.... :)  Here is a close up of each pair.  Which color is your favorite?  I can't decide between the green ones and the black ones myself.

 

Next up, I have some sparkly kawaii phone straps that will be great for stocking stuffers!  These are made with charms that I sell at Happy Cloud Supplies if you want to make your own.

I am running a special on these snowflakes right now. If you buy 4, I will send you a free one! Send me a message so I can set up a custom listing for you.

I absolutely love these star bracelets and I made 3 new ones for the holidays.  This one is "Wishing for Pinecones".  It has golden shadow and olivine stars and smoked topaz bicones.  It's very earthy!

This one is "Wishing for Snow".  I am wishing for snow now!  We are supposed to have "flurries" today but so far, the sky is clear.

This one is a special Christmas edition.  Nothing says Christmas more than red, green and white stars.  You can also wear it to support your favorite sports teams... I am pretty sure there are ones with these colors. 

Lastly, I made this awesome necklace with silver shade crystals.  They bunch up and look like a cloud!  It's super sparkly!

Which one is your favorite?  Don't forget that I do custom orders so you can design a "Wishing for... " bracelet yourself!  By the way, I put discount codes on Retailmenot.com for both of my shops.  Remember to always check for coupon codes on Retailmenot.com before you buy anything online!

~ Design Business Cards Using Picasa ~

I have been waiting for VistaPrint to have free uploads for a while!  I was so desperate that I almost ordered business cards when they had a 50% off uploads sale.  I am so glad I waited!  I haven't installed Photoshop or Gimp on my new mac and I was too lazy to.  So, I made everything using just Picasa.  This is an address label that I am just going to put on my packages.

I really like these crystal silver night butterfly studs!  So, I used them as the focal piece in my business cards.  This was made using the Picasa Collage feature.  I cropped the butterfly earring picture to the business card size.  Then, I set it as the background of the collage.  I added 3 pictures as "Pile" and arranged them on the right side of the card.  Then, I hit "Create Collage".  Then, I just added the text.  There isn't a lot of fancy stuff you can do with the text in Picasa, just rotating and adding border.  But this is good enough.

I also typed a Thank-you message on the back of the card because frankly, I only put my business cards in my packages.  This way, I don't have to write Thank you notes anymore.  I think the text may need to be a little lighter.  I hope VistaPrint can handle these colors.

I mentioned before that I ordered from Printsmadeeasy and OvernightPrints.  Those turned out fine.  The quality is ok with both sites.  I just think VistaPrints has better deal when they have free uploads.  And of course, I love Moo!  But that's way too expensive!