SleepingWolvesArt – Review

Today’s post is LONG overdue and it’s for a valid reason! I wanted to wait for SleepingWolvesArt to announce their store opening again, as well as their Etsy for UK shoppers. So, finally the time has come to share with you some goodies I bought before the end of 2020 and why you should check them out, especially if you love dogs and puppies!

As you can tell today’s blog post is all about SleepingWolvesArt and their amazing store! I’ve been so excited to share it with you since the start of 2021, I really hope you enjoy reading about this kawaii independent store, especially if you’ve never heard of them before. 🙂

I discovered SleepingWolvesArt back in August 2020 when I discovered their Kickstarter for the Foxy Ita Mini Backpack/Cross-body Convertible Itabag. I nearly backed this Kickstarter but left it in the end due to other itabags I’d purchased at the time. Alongside the itabag you could pledge for some adorable enamel pins, which I fell in love with but didn’t pledge for at the time either. I was gutted and regretted not getting these at least.

Through discovering SleepingWolvesArt on Kickstarter I decided to give them a follow on their social media pages, with Instagram being my favourite place to keep track of any new designs, as well as the Kickstarter. I kept going on and off the website, bookmarking items I liked the look of to order, but I just never did. Couldn’t really say why.

Then SleepingWolvesArt showcased some corgi and shiba designs and I fell in love! I was hoping they’d be enamel pins, but when it was announced they would feature on notebooks, I was a mixture of happy and in trouble. The latter because I’m kind of on a notebook ban, I have too many. 😛

This didn’t stop me though and before I knew it I’d made my first order with SleepingWolvesArt and the two cute doggy designs had been ordered in the form of notebooks! As I ordered these before January 2021 when the new regulations came in, I was able to order directly from the website.

Due to this change that has happened in the UK (I’ve mentioned before) a lot of independent artists/stores have stopped selling to the UK. However, some stores have opened Etsy stores or managed to work on their stores in order to offer us in the UK to make orders I wanted to wait until SleepingWolvesArt had opened their Etsy store for UK customers before writing this post as I know a good chunk of my readers are from the UK, like myself, so at least after reading this post you could make some purchases if you wanted to. 🙂

I will pop all the social media links at the end of this post for SleepingWolvesArt, as well as links to both the main website AND the Etsy store. Some of the items I’m talking about are currently sold out, or aren’t available to purchase on Etsy, but I’ll mention this at the time.

Anyhoo, I hope you enjoy todays blog post! 😀

• Pink Shiba Inu Notebook (link) and Garden Corgi Notebook (link) – $25.00 each.

As mentioned above, my first order with SleepingWolvesArt was these two gorgeous notebooks, one is green and one is pink but aside from the designs they’re both pretty much identical. I haven’t used them yet either as I’ve been waiting to write this post. 😛 I’ve opened the garden corgi design so I could take a look inside, but I’m waiting to use the pink shiba inu one for another day.

I bought both of these notebooks together in a set for $40.00 and whilst this offer is still going, buying both designs is currently sold out, but you can sign up to be notified when these will be back in stock.

As you will have seen from the band around both the notebooks, these are A5 size and 160 pages/80 sheets which is perfect to keep in a backpack for travelling, or for studies. These are vegan leather which is lovely and soft to the touch and inside have dotted line pages, a type of notebook I’ve never bought before. There is also a bookmark ribbon inside so you can keep tabs on your pages, an elastic book strap to keep the notebook closed when you aren’t using it and a handy pocket at the back of the notebook to keep anything small such as receipts, notes etc. The quality of the paper is thick and if I was to write in them with some fine felt tip pens, it wouldn’t bleed through.

The designs for both of these are exactly the same, with the noticeable differences being the colour of the dogs and the tails. The corgi design is red with a short tail, which the shiba inu design is a grey/purple colour with a curly fluffy tail. There are three different designs with one sitting down, one lying down and one doing a playful stance. I have to be honest, as much as I love both the doggy designs, the shiba inu is my favourite for sure! I love this design/print so much and I would honestly love to see it on a piece of clothing, preferably a dress. 😛

These notebooks not only make great gifts for friends and family, but for yourself too! They’re really good quality for the money and perfect for puppy, corgi, shiba inu fans, as well as people who love to do bullet journaling, sketching, a diary or maybe even somewhere to keep stickers or photos. Personally I think I’m going to keep my pink shiba inu notebook as a mini scrapbook for when I next go to Japan!

For UK shoppers/readers these aren’t on the Etsy store, not sure if this is something that will appear eventually. It’s always worth dropping SleepingWolvesArt a message/email to enquire further if you’re after one. I did end up charged customs for these notebooks which wasn’t cheap at around the £20 mark, but to be honest it was worth it.

To add here, if you like this print but you need to stop buying notebooks (like me…) then it’s also available on a microfiber cleaning cloth! Store links here and here and Etsy links here and here.

After I made my notebook purchase from SleepingWolvesArt I decided to order some enamel pins after it was announced the store would be closing for UK shoppers! All of the enamel pins I ordered are B-Grade, which means there might be some slight faults or issues with the pins. I didn’t mind this personally and in all honestly I’m so happy with all of the pins I bought. Although these are b-grade enamel pins I wouldn’t have thought so in all honesty, they’re such perfect condition to me! Not only am I linking back to the B-grade enamel pin, but also the normal grade AND the Etsy store. 🙂

• Foxy Ita B-Grade Enamel Pin (link) – $9.00
• Foxy Ita Enamel Pin (link) – $12.00
• ETSY LISTING – Foxy Ita Enamel Pin (link) – £11.08

The is the other design I really fell in love with from the fox itabag Kickstarter, so I had to pick it up. As you can see this enamel pin is of a cute little white fox inside of an itabag, with the itabag in question being the design that SleepingWolvesArt had created for the Kickstarter in question. I thought this was such a cute and unique idea! This enamel pin was also a freebie for people who backed to get the itabag, which is even better! I just love the design and the fact it’s an original character of SleepingWolvesArt makes it even more special to me.

Although I chose the lavender itabag design, you can choose from six different colours – mint, pink, teal, maroon, black and lavender.

It’s a double back pin, with purple rubber backs to match the purple itabag. On the back of the enamel pin “SleepingWolvesArt” is etched on the back, which I always love to see on enamel pins.

• Mini Fox B-Grade Enamel Pin (link) – $8.00
• Mini Fox Enamel Pin (link) – $11.00
• ETSY LISTING – Mini Fox Enamel Pin (link) – £10.16

This is one of the two designs I really loved the look of from the fox itabag Kickstarter. This cute little foxy is an original character design and has a maroon coloured bow around it’s neck and the cutest little toe beans too! The little smile on the foxes face is really sweet and the design makes me smile whenever I look at it! It’s on a gold enamel and overall the design is just gorgeous! It’s a nice size too, which I always love with my enamel pins. It means all the detailing is in there and not ruined.

Although I chose the maroon bow design, you can choose from six different colours – mint, pink, lavender, teal, black and maroon.

It’s a double back pin, with red rubber backs to match the maroon bow. On the back of the enamel pin “SleepingWolvesArt” is etched on the back, which I always love to see on enamel pins.

• Black Shiba Bowtie Puppy B-Grade Enamel Pin (link) – $8.00
• Black Shiba Bowtie Puppy Enamel Pin (link) – $11.00
• ETSY LISTING – Black Shiba Bowtie Puppy Enamel Pin (link) – £10.17

This was a whim purchase I picked up to make my overall order worth the shipping and potential customs I was due to pay. I decided to get one of the bowtie puppy designs and again settled on the B-grade version. At the time of purchase this was the only puppy available with a pink bowie or ribbon, which was a shame. I would have really liked the red shiba but the black one is just as cute and the pink bowtie works really well! Alongside all of this, this enamel pin is on a rose gold enamel which really compliments both the black and white shiba and the pink bowtie. I have to say, this is such a gorgeous enamel pin and I’d love to own a red shiba variant in the future.

There are different varieties of designs to choose from with this enamel pin including a white puppy, pink shiba, cream shiba, red shiba, black shiba, orange corgi and black corgi Alongside this you can choose either a bowtie or ribbon design which are either pink or mint.

It’s a double back pin, with pink rubber backs that appear to match the bowtie colour. On the back of the enamel pin “SleepingWolvesArt” is etched on the back, which I always love to see on enamel pins.

Overall I am so happy with my purchases from SleepingWolvesArt and all the goodies I purchased! I’m so glad they have finally reopened the store, as well as their Etsy store too for UK shoppers!

I’ve got my eye on some other items from their Etsy store including the Sleepy Wolf Enamel Pin, Pink Shiba Inu Enamel Pin and the Red Shiba Inu Enamel Pin.

I’m going to pop SleepingWolvesArt’s links down below for you, including their stores as well as social media.

Store

Etsy Store

Instagram

Twitter

Facebook

So, what do you guys think of SleepingWolvesArt and their designs and cute pieces? Not only do they design their own original character designs but they do have some Pokemon dogs, as well as Animal Crossing wolf villagers. You can definitely sense a theme that the artist loves foxes, wolves and dogs. 🙂 Make sure to let me know in the comments below, plus what you would buy from her store?

Until next time guys, stay safe and take care.

Goodbye 2020!

Image taken from Pinterest

I can’t quite believe a whole year has flew past us as we prepare to go into 2021… Sorry but 2020 was a big year for me for so many reasons but of course it wasn’t a great year either…

2020 was the year I entered the 30-35 tick box and I don’t feel ready to turn 31 next week. :S It was also the year me and Dane travelled to Japan for the first time. It was amazing and I’m so glad we were able to go before COVID started to manifest. I remember my dad messaging me our second week into the trip and saying, “There’s a virus called coronavirus going around Japan. Be careful!” and us shrugging it off. Oh how times have changed, eh?

Going back to that trip, it was amazing and I have clutched onto the memories we made and photos we took to get me through 2020 when I felt rubbish. I’m really hoping 2021 will be better COVID wise as I would love to return back to Japan in 2022, maybe even 2023 if that’s the case.

Image taken from GIPHY

Me and Dane have already said we’d like to go around March/April time to see the cherry blossoms, travel around more (Kyoto, Nara, Osaka and Hiroshima) and especially go for Dane’s birthday this time around. We’ve also discussed going for Christmas/New Year at some point too as that would be lovely. We could eat KFC, stay at a private onsen for a few days and again, travel around and have the perfect kawaii/otaku Christmas… But we don’t know when this will be. It’s just an idea.

I wanted to briefly do a bit of a chat about how 2020 was for me overall (including my favourites), mention how December has been and of course talk about 2021 and what I’m looking forward to so far.

I need to get this off of my chest out of the way because it’s still semi ongoing and it’s pissed me off something awful.

I mentioned back in September 2019 on a post (8 Games I’m Excited To Play) about being excited for a game I’d backed on Kickstarter called Calico. The game released 15th December 2020 and was announced on the Nintendo Indie World Showcase. As someone who had backed the game I was pretty meh to discover that people who HADN’T backed the Kickstarter had access to the game before we did and may I add, for less monies… Just felt like a bit of a punch to the stomach. I’m on the Discord channel and started hearing nothing but bug complaints/feedback from people who had been playing the game. Turns out not much testing had been done… Not good! I waited a week for my game code on the Switch, but no sign and I was given excuses of, “we’re new to this, wasn’t aware how long it would take.” etc. Then North American codes were being sent to people in the EU, which of course wouldn’t work. It was just a bit of a shit show to be blunt. I asked for my money back on Sunday, which has been processed and I’m waiting for. I can’t be arsed to play Calico now. It sounds like a rushed out mess and I just don’t want to support a game like that. I’ve heard nothing but complaints from friends about it who have played. I’m happy to have supported the game and help it come to life, but I’m not happy to wait and constantly feel mugged off. The developers have now advised for UK backers to ask for refunds so they can go and buy it themselves on the eShop.

It’s just so poor and clearly rushed out. I was really excited for this game and especially when they announced it as coming out a few weeks back. Dane was away with work and with the game coming out I thought, “Awesome, something to keep me going until he’s back home!” which of course wasn’t the case.

If you’re thinking about getting Calico, get it on Steam if you can. The console versions are full of bugs (I think some may have been fixed?) and from what has been said it can take a while to get them fixed. Or just wait a while for it to go down in price, as I’m sure any bugs will have been amended by then too. I’m not saying don’t support the game, but be wary of the bugs…

I’m sorry if that above has come off as bitchy but I was so frustrated for those two weeks that I just had to be honest with you guys on my experience. I’ve got two other games backed via Kickstarter and from the start I’ve definitely had a better experience with them, so I have very high hopes for how the games will be when they release. 🙂

Now that little rant is out of the way, I thought I would mention some stuff I have loved this year!

Animal Crossing: New Horizons – Okay, who DIDN’T love this game in 2020? For some it was a sort of lifeline during the start of COVID, I know it was for me. I don’t play it daily now, but when I do pick it up it just relaxes me straight away and it’s also a game I love playing with my friends online. The Toy Day event on Christmas Eve was so lovely and started to get me in the Christmas spirit. I know a lot of people who ended up buying a Switch/Switch Lite due to the need to play Animal Crossing on it, I even helped two of my friends get a Switch/Switch Lite of their own so they could play!

The Mandalorian – I’ve honestly loved this series in 2020 and it’s actually one me and Dane binge watched over the Christmas period. I couldn’t get into it last year, especially with our Japan trip coming up so we just… Didn’t get into it. Season 2 is AMAZING though and I was all there for it. I highly recommend watching The Mandalorian even if you aren’t a huge Star Wars fan, as it’s just good all around show that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Plus some of my favourite Star Wars characters make appearances in season 2, which made me so happy!

PVRIS Use Me (Deluxe) – Use Me released this year and I had been excited for this album since it was announced. I discovered PVRIS when I started my job in April 2019 and I have since fallen in love. This album is one I’ve found myself listening to time and time again, whether I’m out and about driving/walking or working in the house. I’ve found myself dancing in the kitchen whilst making a cup of coffee, that’s just how much I love it. My top three tracks from the album are – “Gimme a Minute”, “Stay Gold” and “Loveless”. They’re all such amazing songs, with “Stay Gold” being my favourite on the album… And the one I danced to in the kitchen whilst grabbing coffee. 😛

Lyonsleaf Calendula and Marshmallow Balm – This balm has to be mentioned here because it really has helped with my hand in 2020. My eczema/dermatitis is still ongoing and hasn’t improved at all and I’m still waiting to see a specialist. Since about August I’ve been using this balm and it really does help with the dryness and cracking and since using it religiously, my hands haven’t cracked and bled for as long as I can remember. I’ll be continuing to use this for as long as I can as it really does help. 🙂

Aveeno – I’m just going to add Aveeno as a whole, as this is another product that has really changed my life since purchasing it, in so many ways! I use the intense body lotions on my hands, which has really helped recently and I even bought the shower cream to see if that would help too. It smells delicious and makes my body feel lovely and soft. I highly recommend Aveeno in general, let alone if you have really dry skin like myself.

There are a few things in 2021 that I’m excited to have come up!

31st Birthday – This is actually a week from today and yeah it’s scary how quickly it’s come around! I think for the day I’m going to bake some red velvet cupcakes, play with my new resin molds and get a takeaway. At the time of writing this post, Birmingham has actually gone into tier 4 and I’m gutted. Good job I’d planned to do something at home, eh?

Eight Year Anniversary – I can’t believe me and Dane have been together eight years in 2021… It’s really flew by and I hope we can do something for it in 2021. For our seven year anniversary we went for a drive around the countryside and grabbed a Japanese takeaway on our way home. Who knows what we’ll do this year, but I’m sure it’ll be good. 🙂

My Chemical Romance in June – That’s if COVID doesn’t come along and cause it to be postponed/rescheduled like it was this year.

Potential planning for Japan trip #2 – This would be amazing to do! I really hope it can be done towards the end of 2021…

Maybe a puppy(?) – We were really close to getting a dog in 2020 but due to the issues we faced with adopting we gave up and said we would wait and either try to adopt again (although doubtful…) or get a puppy in 2021. If we go for the latter, I already have a breeder in mind that we want to go with… We shall see what happens. Getting a pet is a big thing and we need to make sure we’re ready and able to do it.

Speaking of 2021, I also  wanted to mention what posts I am hoping to bring to you guys in 2021, these are just some ideas of what I have swirling around my head. This isn’t definite, as it never is but it’s ideas I would like to get down on my blog eventually. At the moment it’s mostly independent stores I’ve discovered/known about for years and bought from! There are a lot of USA based independent stores mentioned here as due to the changes in the UK with VAT, a lot of them have stated they aren’t able to sell to the UK anymore, so I went all out!

Quirkory – I’ll be writing a review of the Mostari Mystery Pack, as well as the Animal Crossing Gimme my Joycon 2 enamel pins I’ve pre-ordered. They won’t arrive until January/February.

Lunaticgumis – I’m planning to talk about the Puppycat Amigurumi, stickers and enamel pin I picked up a month or so ago. I wanted to talk about the goodies I picked up before Christmas but I just didn’t have time, sadly.

Pikarar – I only discovered Pikarar in October/November time and I’m already in love with their designs and items! I’ve so far made two orders, one being a pre-order for after Christmas. When my pre-order arrives, I’ll be showing you all what I bought! It’s mostly clothes. 😛

SleepingWolvesArt – Review where I’ll be talking about some notebooks (which have arrived) and enamel pins (literally just ordered) I’ve bought.

Sugar Bunny Shop – It’s still on it’s way to me but I ordered the Doki Fox sweater I’ve wanted for MONTHS.

So there is a sneak peak of what I will be sharing in the future on my blog! Of course I will talk about other things in between, but until the weeks/months come I won’t know 100% what may come up to discuss. As always I’ll have my monthly favourites and wish list too.

I can’t quite believe 2021 is just around the corner and we’re entering it with practically in lockdown, which sucks. Whatever though, it isn’t going to affect me much in regards to work, or my social life. I’ll just miss not being able to be closer to some form of “normality”.

I’m not feeling glum about 2021 and if anything I’m hoping to grow some of my hobbies, as well as see some of my friends again who I haven’t seen for ages.

What are you excited for in 2021? Is there any specific content you would like to see more of on my blog in the New Year? Make sure to let me know in the comments!

Until next time all, Happy New Year for tomorrow/Friday and I hope you’re all safe. 🙂