Author Archive: Steve on The Blog

Another January has finally passed us by, meaning only one thing. We’re just that much closer to Spring! I can hope, can’t I? That’s probably not why you’re reading thing post, though… So I’ll get right to the point.

Announcing the Winners…

We had lots and lots of people take time to solve this year’s Crossword Puzzle, and we’ve shipped out tons of free gifts. But there are only 3 $50 Gift Certificates to hand out, and I want to announce the winners here. The winners were selected at random from the entire list of people who solved the puzzle. And the winners are…

• Lee from Reno, NV
• Nancy from Port Hadlock, WA
• Cheryl from Cascade, WI

I’ll be e-mailing you the gift certificates personally today. So keep an eye on your inbox!

A Big Thanks…

We are always surprised by how many people take time out of their busy lives to fill out a crossword puzzle about beads. We want you to know that it would be impossible for us to have fun promotions like this without beaders like you. So, from the bottom of our Lima Hearts, thank you!

We’ve got some more fun on the horizon, too. You have all probably noticed that we have Free Shipping February going on… And I just looked at the calendar, and noticed that Easter is really early this year. You know what that means

The 4th Annual Crossword Sale at Lima Beads is back… so get ready for a new sale every day in January!

The Details

We’ve built a crossword puzzle with 31 hints, one for each day of the month. Every day, we’ll reveal a new answer that tells you which products are on sale that day (if the answer is “purple,” you’ll save on all purple beads!) If you print the puzzle and solve it ahead of time, you’ll have a preview of all the remaining sales. The sales only last 24 hours each, but as long as you add an item to your shopping bag on the day of the sale, you’ll have 7 days to complete your purchase and get the reduced price. But don’t wait too long–these prices are while supplies last!

The Bonus…

There’s also a bonus for solving the entire puzzle, just like last year. Unscramble a hidden message in the puzzle and get a prize! You’ll have to solve the puzzle to see what’s behind the curtain though, so grab your pencil and check it out.

The BONUS Bonus…

Just like last year, we have an extra bonus. Every beader who unscrambles the secret hidden message mentioned above will be entered to win one of three $50 Gift Certificates to our shop. Just enter the correct answer on the Crossword page, and you’re automatically entered to win.

Follow Along!

You can follow along with all the sales over on the Crossword Puzzle page. And if you have questions or comments, just leave them below!

After a week of free gifts, a Fresh Pick contest, super scary deals, and too much candy, I think we all had a fun Scream Week. Agreed? But before we jump into the next season, we want to thank you for creating those freaky Fresh Picks and uploading your Halloween designs that were on parade all week. They were awesome!

Fresh Pick Contest Winners

We had a TON of entries in the Fresh Pick contest this year, and the winning entries are in… drum roll, please!

Best Composition: “Wolfen” by Gina P – Delta Chick

We love this shimmering pick by Gina P – Delta Chick! The cool colors of the night aren’t traditional Halloween colors, but definitely speak to the spooky feel of October. There’s an eerie balance to this pick that ties everything together. Love it!

Best Costume: “Iron Man” by Lady425 aka Beth

I’ve seen the Iron Man movies, and I even know one 4-year-old that dressed up as Iron Man for Halloween yesterday. But I definitely didn’t see this one coming… Lady425 aka Beth really built a crime-fighting superhero robot here! Her meticulous choices and vision for the pick led the Lima Team to nominate Iron Man for Best Costume.

Scariest Story or Poem: “Spiders Lair” by Daisy Chick – Dawn

Let’s face it, poetry is hard to write… but Daisy Chick – Dawn makes it look easy. We loved the spooky rhythm of the poem that accompanied her pick… and the beads as well! Our favorite thing about the poem was the personification of the spider–it brings her deceptive face to life!

People’s Choice: “Headless Horseman” by J Shane

The people have spoken… and J Shane’s Headless Horseman pick is the winner of the People’s Choice award! We have to agree… this is a beautiful pick! If it hadn’t won People’s Choice, I have to admit I would have voted it for the Best Composition prize. Lovely colors, theme & arrangement.

The winners will receive their $25 Gift Certificate code in an email from me within the next few hours. Thanks for playing along this year! We can’t stress enough that you all are the ones that make this possible. Thank you!

Onward to November

The Lima Team took a short lunch yesterday to share some homemade (and some store-bought) spooky treats with each other. There were some graveyards, pumpkins, severed fingers, orange & black spreads, and more. We got to talking about dressing up when we were kids, and we dug up a few pictures to share. Enjoy! And thanks for another fun Scream Week!

Matt dressed up Frankenstein

Kate as Peter Pan... she never wants to grow up!

Steve as He-Man

Part of the fun of Halloween is to show off your creepy, creative ideas… from decorations to costumes to jewelry. If you’re feeling extra creepy this year, then this contest is for you! The rules are simple, and the prizes are sweet (even sweeter than junior’s Halloween candy).

Make a Fresh Pick and Win

Conjure up those ghost stories, costumes, and creepy color combos… and make a Fresh Pick to share them with everyone! We’ll pick 4 winners from the Fresh Picks submitted as a comment to this blog post (instructions are below). One winner will be chosen for each of these four themes:

• Best Composition: The overall composition is one of the most important qualities of a beautiful Fresh Pick. Creating the best possible color & texture arrangement (with a Halloween theme, of course) is key to winning this category.
• Coolest Costume: Were you a crayon? A princess? A robot? A superhero? Show off by making a Fresh Pick inspired by your costume idea. Sure, colors are important… but try and tell more about the costume through the items you choose.
• Scariest Story or Poem: Everyone loves a good ghost story (*ahem* most of the time). We’ll read your description that you add to your Fresh Pick. It could be a scary story, a tale about your favorite childhood Halloween memory, a poem (that you write yourself), or pretty much any type of Halloween prose.
• People’s Choice: We’ll total up the number of favorites that each Fresh Pick entry receives… and the one with the most favorites will be the People’s Choice winner! Make sure your vote is counted by going to the Fresh Pick and marking your favorites.

Now, for the important part…

The Prizes

The winner of each theme will receive a $25 Lima Beads gift certificate. You can use it to buy anything from our shop!

When you’re ready to submit your Pick, just select it from the drop-down menu in the comment form below. You’ll be able to choose from your 10 most recent picks. Choose the one that you’d like to submit to the contest and “Voila!” Not sure what a Fresh Pick is? Find out how to Design Your Own Fresh Picks!

Here are a few final ground rules before you get started:

• There will be 3 submissions allowed per person. If you make more than that, only your most recent 3 will be counted. You don’t have to match your picks with the themes above–you can do all costumes, all stories, or a mix of everything. Just remember, 3 is the limit!
• All Picks must be submitted as a comment on this blog post by Wednesday, October 31st at midnight.
• You can win up to one gift certificate per person.
• The Lima Beads team will pick the winners on Thursday, November 1. The People’s Choice winner will be selected by the number of favorites received. The winners will be announced here on the blog.

OK, get picking! Good luck!

I was seven years old when I went to school and told my second grade teacher that I wanted to be a paleontologist. I don’t know if it was the books, the movies, the Discovery Channel, or the inflatable pterodactyl in my bedroom… but something about fossils and dinosaurs was fascinating to me.

So, I didn’t become a paleontologist, but that doesn’t mean I can’t work with fossils every day And there is no excuse not to celebrate National Fossil Day on October 17th here in the US. For three days only, we’re putting all fossils and fossil-like items on sale! This includes a bunch of fossil coral, turritella agate, ammonite, and more up to 20% off. Fossils might last, but these prices won’t! The sale ends Friday night (Oct 19) at midnight.

Check out the items on sale!

Encourage Curiosity and Creativity!

Leftover resin? Or dinosaur eggs??

For me, it started with curiosity about T-Rex and his pal Stegosaurus. For someone else, a passion might be sparked by an art exhibit, film festival, math problem, or a mountain range. The other day, I found some leftover resin from Kate’s Wine Party project and it reminded me of dinosaur eggs captured in time. You never know what will inspire you! Head over to the National Fossil Day website to learn more, and check out the items on sale today thru Friday.

Today, we’d like to announce a new feature on our website that we think will make it easier to stay on top of everything that’s going on at Lima Beads. We’re calling it What’s Fresh and you can find it by clicking the “Fresh” option at the top of the website. We really hope you like it.

What’s the big deal?

I’ll be very honest with you all. With the hundreds of Fresh Picks, design ideas, tips & techniques, new products, restocks, and more that happen here every month, it’s really hard for us to keep track of it all. So we started thinking of ways to combine it all into one easy view, organized by date. We’re thrilled with the results.

When we were creating this page, one thing was abundantly clear: we have our customers to thank for so much of what goes on around here. We’re grateful for everyone’s willingness to share their design ideas, Fresh Picks, comments, pictures, and more. We wouldn’t be here without you.

Your feedback is important to us!

As always, we would love your feedback on the new What’s Fresh page. You can leave your comments below!

Well, it’s on from one thing (Easter Egg Hunt) and onto the next (Spring Rain Contest Wrap-up). The winners have been selected… and you’ll find the results below.

The Winners

There were 50 Spring Rain designs submitted, racking up over 700 “Add to Favorites!” Based on the number of favorites and activity, here are the three winners of the Vintaj Spring Rain contest:

First Place: Spring Rain – Dance in the Rain by JustImagine – Val

From the designer:

“Made from the Spring Rain Necklace Kit. I did a little play on words and made my own “Spring(s)” for this design. This was so much fun!”

This was by far your favorite design in the contest. Not only were there a ton of favorites, JustImagine – Val also received a lot of praise in the comments. Here are a few comments:

“Very beautiful and creative. A one of a kind piece.” – R Grizzuto

“Absolutely stunning! The “springs” are a wonderful detail! I love the colors!” – Violet D

This is such a beautiful piece and so creative. I would love one just like it. And the photos to display it were very unique. Good luck, Val!

Second Place: Raindrops & Posies by D Beach

From the designer:

“The thing that I love most about Spring rains, is how the lingering raindrops seem to bring out the beauty and color of the flowers. I wanted to create a bracelet that combined the beauty of raindrops and flowers.”

Designer D Beach mentioned in her comments that this was the first time she entered a piece into a contest! So much for practice makes perfect…

Third Place: It’s Raining, It’s Pouring! by Bucci Handmade Jewelry

From the designer:

“I made this piece for the Vintaj Spring Rain contest. I made dangles of all the glass and pearl beads and hung them from some Arte Metal chain. The simple S-hook clasp allows you to adjust the length of the necklace to suit your desire.”

The pearl and glass drops in this necklace are the perfect metaphor for the “Spring Rain” theme. It’s great to see how far super-creative people like Bucci Handmade Jewelry can push the limits of a basic kit.

All of our winners will be contacted shortly with their gift certificate codes. Thanks to everyone who participated in the contest, and we want to give a special thanks to Vintaj. This was our first time working this closely with them, and we hope that you had as much fun as we did! We’re looking forward to working with them again in the future.

The 2012 Easter Egg Hunt was a crazy ride! 4,338 people hunted for eggs and every egg was found at least once this year. I’d like to announce the winners and address some of the concerns from this year’s hunt.

The Winners

First of all, congrats to the winners of the 3 $25 “Golden Egg” gift certificates! Here are the winners:

• GypsyMom
• Jeanne S
• B Miller

If you’re one of the three winners above, we’ll be sending you a gift certificate by e-mail. Congratulations!

Now, for the moment you’ve all been waiting for. The winner of the $250 Lima Beads gift certificate is… J Pilkington! She found a total of 77 eggs, which put her in 9th place on the leaderboard with a chance to win the big prize. You can watch the video of how we picked her name on Facebook. Congratulations, J Pilkington!

The Second Prize is a $100 Gift Certificate, awarded to Snowy, who was in an 8-way tie for 65th on the leaderboard with 55 eggs found.

Congratulations to you both! We’ll contact you directly with your prize.

The Golden Eggs

We never imagined how quickly the golden eggs would be found this year. We thought the hiding places were super hard! Here’s a picture of where the three golden eggs were hidden:

The pictures above show the golden eggs on the following pages: the 12mm Winter Shell Pearl Mix, a search for “golden egg”, and on the “Add to Fresh Pick” screen for the Abalone 1″ Silk Ribbon. Congrats to those who found the golden eggs first. We’ll contact you directly about your prize.

The Hardest Hunt Yet…

It’s been widely publicized that the hunt was more difficult this year than last year. We agree! We thought it would be a nice surprise to launch a new web site for the hunt, but doing so made the eggs difficult to find. We weren’t able to gauge how good our hiding places would be because we hadn’t had a chance to spend much time on the new site. As it turns out, they were very good hiding places. We’re sorry it was so difficult. We hope that the extra prize helped and YES, it’ll be easier next year

Shipping Fees

Some people expressed displeasure with the shipping fees. Our goal is to make the Easter Egg Hunt as cool as possible, and we wish we could ship the prizes for free–but we just can’t afford to. We always put a statement in the rules about how normal shipping rates apply to set expectations, but some people were still disappointed–and we want you to know that we totally understand. We know it’s not the cheapest thing out there (in fact, it costs us MORE than the $4.95 we charge you). Even though it’s a little more expensive, we keep using USPS Priority Mail because it’s fast and trackable. It wasn’t the most popular choice, but rest assured that we are never out to make money on shipping fees.

Thanks Again!

Even though it was hard, we hope that everyone had fun finding those blasted eggs. We’re turning our attention to the rest of 2012 now, and we have some awesome things in store. One thing is for sure… we think we have the best customers on the planet, and we’ll continue to try as hard as we can to put together fun & crazy promotions for everyone to enjoy. Thanks again for making this the most exciting week of the year for us, and keep your eyes on the blog for more fun in the future.

It’s finally a wrap! We’d like to send out a big THANK YOU to everyone who took the time to follow along with the Crossword Puzzle Sale during January. Hundreds of people solved the puzzle, and thousands of products went on sale over 31 days. We couldn’t be more thrilled with your participation. But that’s probably not why you’re reading this post…

The Winners Are…

As we mentioned in the rules, there were three winners to be chosen to receive one of the bonus prize packs from Nunn Design, Vintaj, and TierraCast. And the winners are…

1. Anna C from Minnesota (she’s Anna C WonderChick if you’ve seen her around here)
2. Maria from New York (known as NY Bella on Lima Beads)
3. Joan M from beautiful Nova Scotia, Canada

CONGRATS! I’ve e-mailed the three winners, and I’m awaiting their choices for the bonus pack they’ll receive. In the meantime, I’ll take one last look at the bonus prizes before we pack them up and ship them out to the winners.

One Last Special Thanks

We want to give one more special thanks to our friends at Nunn Design, Vintaj, and TierraCast for sending along these awesome prize packs to give away. It was a great gesture, and we’re grateful to be able to pass along these cool collections to our customers. Thanks again!

Now… off to think about the next big promotion right around Easter…

The Crossword Puzzle Sale of 2012 ended with a bang, and we’d like to thank everyone for playing along. We’re doing a mad rush through all the bead shows in Tucson right now, but we haven’t forgotten about the bonus prizes. We’ll be contacting and announcing the winners in the next 24 hours… so keep your fingers crossed! We’ll be posting an update right here on the blog.

Good luck!

The Lima Beads offices will be officially closed from Tuesday (1/31) – Friday (2/3) next week for our annual trip to Tucson for the big gem and jewelry shows. Last year was my first year making the trip, and it was waaaaay bigger than I expected. You can’t possibly prepare yourself for that many beads.

Shipping and Customer Service

During these 4 days, you’ll only be able to reach us by email. A small (and super dedicated) portion of our team is staying behind, so orders will continue to ship, but it may not be as quickly as you’re used to. If you need something urgently in the next week, be sure to place your order by Monday (1/30) and if it’s super time-sensitive, it would be a good idea to choose UPS as your shipping option.

Stay Tuned for an Update

We’ll be sending along an update next week, so stay tuned! Don’t forget, the Crossword Sale ends on 1/31–and watch the blog for an update on the winners of the bonus prizes. Adiós!

Here’s to all the creepy creatives on the Lima Beads site… we want to have a little fun this Halloween, starting with collecting some Fresh Picks and Designs that are scary, spooky, or just plain fun like those odd-shaped pumpkins carved with big silly faces. We’ll be featuring these Fresh Picks and Designs on at our Halloween HQ for the rest of the month. We think it’s going to be a cool source of October inspiration!

Here’s how to participate…

To join the fun, start by designing a Fresh Pick or uploading one of your beading designs to our Design Gallery. There’s an easy way to specify that your new pick or design should go on the Halloween 2011 page. If you’re uploading a design in the Design Gallery, you’ll see the following option when filling out the entry form:

If you’re designing a Fresh Pick, first finishing adding all the items to your pick. Then go to the My Fresh Picks page. You’ll see a choice next to each of your picks that allows you to choose the Halloween promotion. Just like the bottom of this example:

You can always go back and choose the Halloween promo later, so don’t feel like you need to finish everything in one sitting. One last thing… only picks that area created in September and October 2011 will be featured on the Halloween HQ page. No fair using “creativity of old” this season

As always, feel free to ask any questions in the comments. And have fun!

Lima's costume last year...

Believe it or not, it’s that time of year again. No, I’m not just talking about visiting the local cider mill or U-Pick pumpkin patch. I’m talking about getting scary-creative with your halloween designs. This year, we’re going to put your “creepy creativity” on display… but we can’t do it without you!

Next week, we’ll be putting up a page on our site that features halloween-themed designs from the Design Gallery, as well as Fresh Picks with a halloween twist. We’re not sure exactly how we’re going to gather them all up yet, but we’ll make an official announcement next week (so you don’t need to begin creating anything immediately unless you’re super excited about it). Check back here on the blog for more info next week!

I’ve got some news that will make some long-time Lima Beaders happy. After a lot of thinking and a little elbow grease, we’ve lifted the restriction of only one coupon code for every order! We hope this makes shopping at our web site just a little bit easier.

The Back Story

If you’ve taken part in our promotions like the Easter Egg Hunt or the Crossword Puzzle Sale, you’ll know that we occasionally offer coupon codes that can save you money on certain items on our web site. In the past, we had a rule that you could use just one coupon per order–which ended up being a big hassle once in a while. So, we decided a while back to change the rule, and we recently launch an upgrade to our web site that accommodates this change.

How it Works…

Here’s the scoop. If you have a couple coupon codes, just enter them on the bottom of your shopping bag one at a time. After you enter each one, the total at the bottom of your bag will update with a summary of how much you’re saving. Every penny counts! Plus, we made it so you always get the maximum discount for every item. So if you have a “10% off charms” coupon and a “15% off Vintaj” coupon, you will get 15% off any charms made by Vintaj. In other words, each item can have one discount applied to it, and the highest discount wins.

Want to try it?

OK, OK. I know. You want try it out, but you don’t have 2 discount codes? I can help there, too If you sign up for our e-mail list, you should get a coupon to save on regular price items across our site. That’s one. And I had a special coupon code made just for this blog post. If you enter coupon code RE98432, that will save you 15% off all regular priced metal beads in our shop. This coupon will expire on September 30, 2011 (just a few days away), so don’t want too long to try it out.

A final word

We really strive to make our web site a pleasure to browse and shop, and we hope this makes it a little easier along the way. If you have any questions, you can always leave a comment below or send us feedback. Thanks for being a Lima customer–and keep your eyes on this blog in the coming months for more announcements, promos & contests.

Over the past 7 years at Lima Beads, I’ve had to play a lot of different roles–from packing orders, to answering phone calls, to managing the web site. But until this month, I had never gone on a buying trip… and boy, that was an experience!

It all started innocently… I had other business in the city where one of our suppliers has a showroom, so Kevin asked me if I wouldn’t mind stopping by their shop and picking out some items. It seemed easy enough, so I said “of course” and planned to spend some time picking through beads.

A familiar sign...

I’ve spent enough time digging through boxes of beads at our own warehouse, so I figured I would be prepared to pick out some sparkly additions that our customers would enjoy.

I had a long drive ahead of me, so I packed a bag, hopped in the rental car, and rehearsed my strategy while humming along on the expressway. I knew I would have about five hours to pick out beads, so I wanted to find a handful of new additions, plus some trusted favorites that we’ve carried in the past. Lo and behold, near the start of my trip, I passed a road sign that gave me a chuckle: “Lima Rd.” I figured it was a good sign!

When I arrived, I was really shocked at how many beads there were! I only made it through a portion of them by the time I had to leave. There were so many sparkles in one building! I picked out a selection of beads that I really hope you’ll love, and we just added them to the web site this week. Check them out! And if you don’t love them, you know who to blame (you can blame Kevin ).

Enjoy!

One of the great pleasures of our jobs here at Lima Beads is to surprise one of our customers with the news that his or her name has been drawn as the winner of our $500 shopping spree. I personally had the pleasure of contacting our latest winner, Beth from Cleveland. Congratulations again, Beth!

Every few months, we select a new winner for the $500 shopping spree. Sometimes, the lucky winner is a little skeptical, and might call us back just to make sure. Other times, there might be a few days that go by and we don’t hear anything… only to find that the winner was on vacation–and very surprised when checking their messages upon their return! In Beth’s case, she celebrated with a “happy dance,” which we thought was pretty awesome.

Congratulations again, Beth! We hope you enjoy your beads. For everyone else, head on over to the contest page and you can enter the next one. We’ll announce the winner here on the blog. Happy beading!

Hi everyone! In celebration of Fairy Day, we’ve got some special deals for you! Fairy day is the “official holiday for fairy collectors, believers, artisans and the young at heart.” You can read more at the Fairy Day web site… and don’t miss Ali’s blog post on the Fairy Doors in Ann Arbor (where the Lima headquarters is).

Special Fairy Deals

We have 10 fun fairy items on sale below, and here’s how it works: you have until Sunday night (6/26) at midnight to add these items to your shopping cart and place your order. After Sunday at midnight, the prices to back to normal. And the only place to get the special price is right here in the blog (they are listed at normal price everywhere else on our site). These items are available on a first come first served basis, and we can’t offer rain checks–so don’t wait to get your fairies!

Happy Fairy Day! And remember to place your orders by Sunday night!

Green Girl Pewter 1000 Wishes Fairy 18x43mm

Piece: $6.00 (-7% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Green Girl Pewter Fairy Button 23x21mm

Piece: $6.00 (25% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Green Girl Pewter Dragonfly Fairy 63x57mm

Piece: $11.96 (20% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Green Girl Pewter Forget-Me-Not Fairy 16x22mm

Piece: $6.00 (25% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Stampt Antique Gold (plated) Fairy Door Link 18x6mm

Package of 2: $0.75 (21% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

TierraCast Antique Copper (plated) Fairy Wings 5x13mm

Piece: $0.44 (20% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

TierraCast Antique Gold (plated) Leaf Fairy Charm 10x21mm

Piece: $0.90 (25% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

TierraCast Antique Gold (plated) Woodland Fairy 11x25mm

Piece: $0.90 (25% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Vintaj Natural Brass Whimsical Nouveau Fairy Charm 17x25mm

Piece: $1.20 (25% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Vintaj Arte Metal Fairy Flight Link 42x35mm

Piece: $2.16 (20% off!)

This expired on June 27. Watch for more deals soon!

Hi all, I just wanted to post a quick note about some updates to our web site. We’ve got some big changes in the works that will make Lima Beads even more fun for sharing ideas and getting the most out of beading! We can’t give away all the details yet, but I wanted to let you know that we’ve been busy behind the scenes working on The Garden. Since the launch back in the summer of 2009, we’ve watched beaders around the world share ideas and meet new friends, and we couldn’t be more thrilled with the results.

One area of the Garden that never really got much attention was the concept of “groups” and forums. We found that people would rather have a conversation and express ideas through creating awesome designs and Fresh Picks instead of chatting in forums. Plus, they were hard to find and use! Since there was so little activity there, we decided to take them away to make room for other things. Stay tuned to hear more about these changes!

The 2011 Easter egg hunt is here! This is the third annual hunt and it’s bigger and better than ever! If this will be your first Lima Beads Easter Egg Hunt, it’s simple. We’ve hidden Easter eggs (a lot of Easter eggs) on our web site. Find them and win beads, supplies, coupons and even gift certificates.

This year’s hunt is very similar to last year’s with two exceptions:

1. The hunt is a bit easier because I can tell you up front that there are NO eggs hidden in “The Garden” or “Fresh Pick” sections of our web site. We figured that with almost 12,000 fresh picks (wow!), everyone would go crazy looking through all those pages for eggs and we don’t need a bunch of crazy beaders running around! All other pages are fair game and may contain eggs.
2. Second, there’s a new twist! We’ve hidden 3 golden eggs somewhere on the site. Whoever finds them first wins a gift certificate. Read below for more details…

100 Easter Eggs

That’s right, there are 100 eggs hidden on the web site RIGHT NOW (plus an additional 3 special GOLDEN eggs). They’re scattered all over the Lima Beads web site. The only pages where you won’t find eggs are those in the Fresh Picks or Garden sections, as I mentioned above. As you find eggs, you’ll see this status bar:

We don’t want anyone to go crazy, so we should tell you up front: finding all the Easter eggs will be difficult. Some of them are very well hidden. It’s not really about find ALL of the eggs this year, it’s about finding the most

The Leaderboard

Just like last year, there’s a leaderboard that shows the top 100 hunters. It will show the position of each person, but not the number of eggs they’ve found — we’ll reveal those at the end. See the Leaderboard.

Prizes

The more eggs you find, the more prizes you get. When you reach 10, 25, 50, and 75 eggs a new set of prizes will be unlocked. You can choose from a variety of FREE beads and even a collection of coupons worth 15% – 25% off various items. There are also prizes associated with the Leaderboard. At the end of the Easter Egg Hunt, the top 10 people on the leaderboard will be entered to win The Grand Prize, a $250 Lima Beads Gift Certificate. Everyone else on the leaderboard will be entered to win second prize, a $100 Lima Beads gift certificate. See all the prizes.

The Golden Eggs

This year, we’re also hiding 3 special golden eggs (in addition to the 100 eggs, making a grand total of 103)… If you’re the very first one to find a golden egg, you’ll win a $25 Gift Certificate to our store! If the same person finds multiple golden eggs, that lucky beader will win one $25 gift certificate for each golden egg they find. Yowza! The golden eggs don’t count towards your leaderboard total, and you can keep an eye on who’s found the golden eggs on the leaderboard.

Rules

• The contest ends at 11:59pm on April 24, 2011 (Easter). This means you need to make sure and do the following by this time:
  • Collect all the eggs you can find.
  • If you unlocked any prizes, add them to your shopping bag and place your order—all prizes (except the discount code explained below) must be redeemed by the end of the contest. Normal shipping rates will apply.
  • If you unlocked the coupon prize, write down your coupon code (you can use it any time until the end of 2011)
  • Watch the blog for an announcement about the $250 drawing
• There are a total of 100 Easter eggs plus an additional 3 “golden” eggs that we’ve hidden for you to collect. Those are the only ones that count toward the prizes, and you must click on them to collect them. You might see some picture of eggs in promotional materials (like the ones in the grass at the top of this page)… those don’t count toward your total.
• We can’t offer rain checks on the prizes, so make sure to place your order when you’ve unlocked the prizes, because they’re only available while supplies last!
• We think we have enough free beads to go around… but in case we run short, we reserve the right to substitute a product of equal value as your prize (hey, it’s free, right? . We can’t offer rain checks on unavailable prizes. We also reserve the right to update this list of rules if it needs clarification later.
• Please don’t share the locations of the eggs. This ruins the fun for everyone Also, you must find the eggs yourself–you can’t have a robot (or a computer) do it for you. Location sharers and robots will be disqualified from winning prizes! Gotta keep it fair for the rest of us!
• The most important rule: have fun!

UPDATE: Here’s a big, loving “THANKS” to everyone who created a Fresh Pick in the past day about hearts! Random picks are featured on the bottom of the Funky Valentine page, and you can see all the heart picks here. You rock!

Cupid’s headed for Lima Beads… and we need some Fresh Picks to show him love! We’ll be collecting all heart-centric Fresh Picks over the next few days, and it’s easy to get involved. If you create any new Fresh Picks with either “Heart” or “Valentine” in the title, we’ll gather them up and show them off on a special page later this week. Here’s an example pick that I just created.

We hope it will be fun to show off your lovely picks! If you have any questions, just leave a comment. And if you’re new here, you can find out more about designing Fresh Picks. Thanks everyone! Check back soon!