Cheshire Grins

Ornaments!

2008-11-24T11:08:00.006-05:00

I got a little quiet on the blog, but that doesn't mean I've stopped working on my Christmas crafts!

I still have cards to post, but I've also been working on lots of ornaments that I have been hand-painting with stained glass paint. I love Pebeo Vitrea160. It is made to be used on glasses or plates, etc, and after baking can be put through the dishwasher. This way I only need one set of paints for decorating anything I want, as long as I can bake it.

I am still working on technique. I have issues getting colours to come out smoothly without brush strokes, especially on some of the ornaments I have painted this year. I tried a foam sponge, but it takes much more practice to get that to work properly I think. So this year, I went with the patchy, streaky look on purpose.

I blended in amber and purple on this one, having seen ornaments like that in stores that I really liked. Not to mention that my mother and I both love amber and amethyst! I used gold outliner to help distract from the spots where the two paints meet. It turned out looking pretty artistic and I'm very happy with it! Not to mention it can be hung up any time of the year, not just Christmas.

This cute little angel is for my friend's daughter. It is quite small. Excuse the blurry photo. Still getting used to the new camera! But you get the gist. The heart is raised up on the ornament, painted red, and then outlined with gold outliner which I ended up using a bit more like paint.

Another ornament with Amber paint. I streaked this one with yellow, red and black to give it a bit more depth. Gold outliner (also painted on flat) to add some interest. My friend loves browns so this seemed like a good choice! Again, one that could be hung up any time of the year, as long as it is out of reach of the crazy pets!

I am not the steadiest of hands, but I actually liked that the outliner wobbled a bit as I was drawing with it. As a whole, I think it works and hopefully doesn't just look like I can't keep from wobbling or was not as careful as I should have been.

And, to finish, a little Christmas tree. The front is painted with green, the back is painted with pearl. It gives more depth to it and adds interest I think. The star is part of the ornament, raised up, so I painted it yellow to help it stand out. I love the effect it has like this giving it shadows!

Fluffles is so cute!

2008-11-16T17:37:00.002-05:00

I just had to make another Fluffles card. As with the previous one, I layered a stamped Fluffles on top of the image to add depth. I also put Glossy Accents on the ornaments, the star, and the pot.

The naughty or nice sentiment is from a set of holiday rub-ons that I've been using like crazy.

This card is for some friends whose cat tackled their Christmas tree the first year they had it up. It seemed to appropriate!

I've been busy working on Christmas ornaments for friends and family and have 4 done, and one nearly so. Another one I have finished, but I am thinking I am not happy with it and want to redo it. One reason I love the Vitrea stained glass paint by Pebeo: if I don't like it I can wash it off as long as I haven't baked it! Unlike regular stained glass paint, this is made for using on surfaces like glasses, plates, etc, and needs to be baked. It can result in some flaws, like burst bubbles, but it also will stay on in a dishwasher once it is baked! Plus it means I only need one set of paints to do any decorating I want to do. Love it!

Holly Jolly

2008-11-15T20:26:00.002-05:00

I was looking at the sheets of MM Fa La La sparkly letters and was thinking how good they would be spelling out "holly jolly." Then I realized that I wasn't sure there were 4 "L"s there. And even if there were, at least some of them would be upper case and I wanted lower case ones. Then I remembered the paper holly leaves and berry brads from the same line! The lightbulb lit up like crazy!

I looked through my paper and I found this wonderful sheet. It is all one sheet, done to look like bits of a bunch of kinds of paper with lots of sparkle. Yum! I love how it turned out. Hopefully the "pictograph" is clear enough. hehe.

I've been having a great weekend, slowly poking away at all the other crafts I have left to work on. Very excited about a canvas tote I'm painting up for a friend. I know she's going to love it!

In Love with Sakura Glaze Pens

2008-11-14T21:40:00.003-05:00

I've had my Sakura Glaze pens for a while. I thought they were neat and bought a set of 10 a while back. So much fun to play with! I kept seeing some ideas in Scrapbook Centrale, using peel-offs, but I never got around to it. Then the last time I was in there I saw a sheet of ornament stickers and they were just too lovely to leave behind, especially thinking of what I could do with them! This set I stuck on white velum and then coloured. The white within the gold I coloured with the white pen so even that is glazed. It is like stained glass on paper! Yum! I'm addicted to stained glass painting, so this is yet another way to do it! I cut out windows and stuck the velum between the layers of paper so you can get a full stained glass effect. I jazzed up the paper a bit by adding pearls on top of the white dots. I just wish I had a better corner punch (I'm using scallop scissors).

The other card I made using these I used plain white cardstock, coloured in, then layered them up. The blue cardstock has raised dots which reminded me of the swiss dots embossing folder which I desperately want. The little brads are MM Fa La La ones and are all sparkly. So cute!

I'll try to remember to come back later and add in the materials. I just put away all my papers and stuff to give myself room to work on painting glass ornaments. I just couldn't wait any longer!

Tea Anyone?

2008-11-13T20:20:00.002-05:00

My mom requested a knit tea cozy for Christmas after I got into knitting again. I wasn't sure I was going to get around to it, but I hunted around online and found a free pattern from Bernat that looked simple enough that I could do it. As it is done in two pieces, I decided to do it in two colours of yarn. When I looked at the yarn in Walmart (I knew they had Bernat yarn which would make it easy to get the right gauge), the two colours I liked best were these two variegated ones. Or at least they were the ones that looked best together.

Getting the pattern going took me a bit, but the second side was significantly easier. I stitched the sides together and looked at it. It needed something on top. The original pattern just had a crocheted loop, but that looked boring. So I decided to make some corkscrews from I pattern I had seen here. I finished up the yarn I had left and sewed them on.

All in all, a nice, cheery cozy to brighten my mom's mornings. I will probably end up lining it after Christmas, but I figure it will be easy enough to do and some parts may be simpler with potential access to a sewing machine (like at my mother's). hehe.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful time! More cards to come, and now it is time to work on ornaments, a bag, some teacups.... You get the point! ;)

New Look and a Scarf and Pin!

2008-11-11T12:52:00.005-05:00

As you might notice, I gave my blog a makeover today. I am feeling a bit frustrated at not being able to completely do what I want due to a lack of knowledge of the code, but such is life. Can't have everything exactly the way I want it without putting in the time to learn. I'll stick to easy for the moment!

So I thought I'd share a scarf I knit that I am giving to my mother for Christmas. I hadn't knit since I was maybe 12 or 13 but during my vacation my mom and I found some fabulous yarn and a scarf pattern and I decided I want to try to do it myself. That meant, however, doing a practice run. This scarf is the practice run. It is just a plain knit, no purle or anything. We made two slits in the scarf so you can interlace the ends as shown. It is quite short, but still cute. Just plain blue yarn

As you can see, I wanted to put something on the overlap to decorate it. I had been planning on making a pin of some kind, initially hoping to find some glass or plastic that I could use stained glass paints on. Then I saw a new tutorial on SCS for making paper pins and I thought it was a fabulous idea! I pulled out my new Stampin' Bella "Group Hug" stamp. I just love the little snowmen! I stamped the image 3 times, coloured each version with watercolour pencil crayons, then cut the layers and covered them with Glossy Accents. I'm not sure of all the differences between that and Uttee or Crystal Effects, but it is not quite as hard as I would have liked. Hopefully with top and bottom of each layer covered in it it will stay stable enough. Dimensionals between layers, a pin stuck on the back with more Glossy Accents, and done. I'm quite happy with how it turned out!

Hope everyone is having a good week! More Christmas cards coming!

Ornaments Galore!

2008-11-05T11:26:00.002-05:00

I have a couple more cards to share that I am very happy with. The first one uses some lovely ornament paper by Anna Griffin. I was feeling inspired by Dawn McVey and her style so that is how I started out the basic layout.

I love ornaments in this style, probably because my mother loves them also. Our family is very ornament-obsessed. Mom and I now give each other a new ornament every Christmas, so I will have a whole bunch on that day, someday, when I have a tree of my own, and Mom's tree won't look barren without all the ones that belong to me.

The sentiment is a peel-and-stick one that drove me a little crazy positioning it. I had to redo it a couple times because I started with the wrong word and, as they are not all connected, I discovered it was wrong after I had it almost all on!

The little gold ornament is one I cut out after embossing with the new CB holiday ornament folder. I love this thing!

Recipe:
Paper: white cardstock, gold textured foil paper, holiday ornaments by Anna Griffin
Accessories: Magenta peel offs (Christmas sentiments), CB holiday ornaments folder, ribbon from Michael's

This card is one of the simplest I've made in ages, but I still really like it. I simply grabbed my gold foil textured paper and embossed it with the CB holiday ornaments folder. And as it was so pretty, and reminded me of really expensive wrapping paper, I wanted to pretty much leave it alone. I just needed some ribbon. I had a piece of white satin ribbon that had come on something or other and was, thus, free. Unfortunately it took me some work to find a long enough span that my cat had not destroyed. With a couple other people in my apartment lately it had gotten classified as a cat toy, unfortunately, and most of the ribbon is unusable. But I found enough. Unfortunately I discovered that Tombow glue is a bad idea with ribbon that is not all that thick and does become a bit sheer. Oops! But the tab I made helps. Again, more Peel Offs letters.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful day! Happy Hump Day!

A Whole Bunch of Cards

2008-11-04T10:35:00.003-05:00

Well, I have been a busy girl, at least over the weekend, and I got quite a few cards done. So much fun playing with all the Christmas supplies I've been hoarding!

This card is the simplest I've made in a long time, but I absolutely love it. Some sparkly paper, some glittery letters by MM, and a couple holly leaves with berry brads, and voila!

Recipe:
Paper: Imaginisce Candy Cane Lane/Polar Pinstripes
Accessories: Fa La La red shimmer stickers and hollyberries by MM.

This card is a bit of a deviation from my usual Christmas fare in that the colours are very obviously not ones associated with more traditional Christmas stuff. In fact, the papers and ribbon are not Christmas ones, but I thought the presents were appropriate. I used one of my favourite stamps for this. The image is the three cats in a line and the sentiment underneath but I masked and stamped each cat individually and broke up the sentiment. I purposefully did not center the cats in the circles as cats are not known for holding still and being perfectly framed, especially when they are feeling proud of their present deliveries. I accented the crowns with a quickie glue pen and some gold EP, and added some sparkle to the "presents" with a Sakura Stardust pen.

Recipe:
Stamps:Wise Siamese by Stampendous
Inks: Brilliance Graphite Black
Paper: shimmery blue Bazzil cardstock, white cardstock, American Tradition Designs "Celebrate Gifts"
Accessories: Sakura glaze pens, ribbon from Michael's, quickie glue pen, sparkly gold EP, crystal accents, Sakura Stardust pen.

I saw this peppermint candy wreath by Stampin' Bella and fell in love. So darn cute! I used a red Sakura Glaze pen to trace the swirls in the candies, then coloured over the white areas with a white glaze pen to make them look more like candies. The image is popped up on dimensionals. The blue cardstock is embossed with swirls that echo the swirls of the candy.

Peppermint stripe paper and candycane stripe ribbon seemed the perfect compliment. The sentiment is popped up on dimensionals and "sweet" is written in red sakura glaze and got an extra burst with a stardust pen. Little red crystals worked just right. The little sugar brads just seemed too good.

Recipe:
Stamps: Minty Wreath by Stampin' Bella
Ink: Brilliance Graphite Black
Papers: white cardstock, Swirl Blue cardstock, Anna Griffin red and white stripe
Accessories: candycane striped ribbon, red crystals by me & my big ideas, Doodlebug sugared brads, sakura glaze pens, sakura stardust pens, dimensionals

More cards to come! Hope everyone is having a wonderful Tuesday!

White Christmas

2008-11-02T09:14:00.003-05:00

Last year for Christmas I got a lovely stamp from a friend and her hubby so I knew this year it was getting used on the card for them.

I was thinking about it and what I could do with it and suddenly thought of gold and white. So I grabbed some vellum and my new CB embossing folder. I left the bottom of the velllum un-embossed for contrast and layered it over a plain white card. I used a shimmery ribbon to layer over the divide of embossed and not, and stuck the stamped cardstock up on dimensionals. I added some little crystal star stickers for some added glitter.

Recipe:
Stamps: Merry Christmas Circle by Hampton Art
Ink: black by ColorBox
Paper: white cardstock and vellum
Accessories: gold glitter EP by Top Boss, white ribbon from DeSerres, holiday CB folder, crystal stickers by Mark Richards, dimensionals

Why I Love Fluffles...

2008-11-01T20:18:00.002-04:00

Fluffles is my hero. I adore Fluffles and would own most of the Fluffles stamps if I did not have to work on a budget. This is my only Fluffles holiday stamp and I love it. Being a cat owner, I was terrified the first Christmas that I took Book home and she saw a Christmas tree. Luckily she had no interest in it or in playing with ornaments that were not hanging right at kitty nose level.

I found this layout in the Beautiful Cards... to make and send with love magazine from 2007 (issue 18, p. 42) and I had to use it. The original is by Katina Killey. I replaced the original cat image with Fluffles and chose to cut out an extra fluffles and star to give it a little more dimension. I coloured the image with my Staedler fineliner markers, then went over the ornaments and star with my Stardust pen. The red ornaments got covered over with a red glaze pen also for a bit more dimension.

I finished things off with MM ornament brads, a black pen, and some ribbon. And voila!

The card forms an A shape when it is standing, the back part wider than the front and just in plain white.

More cards to come soon!
Enjoy the weekend!

The First Christmas Card!

2008-10-31T18:36:00.004-04:00

I have finally gotten a start on my Christmas cards! I have a couple others done or nearly done, but this is the only one that I consider actually finished.

The white panel is actually stamped (in white) and embossed (in clear) with a large Holiday Words stamp. The detail does not show up well in the photo (view full size image to see it more clearly), but it adds just the right touch of dimension. The poinsettia I hand-quilled, and the red and green paper have gold on the top edge. So delicious!

Recipe:
Stamps: Holiday Words
Ink: white by ColorBox
Paper: white and red cardstock, poinsettia swirl by ScrapWorks
Accessories: clear EP, red, green and yellow quilling paper, Elmer's glue.

I also had to wait for my new camera. My old one has done a good job, but after my vacation with my mother it became quite clear that it just wasn't standing up anymore. Too many photos came out blurry and it was driving me nuts. So I have an adorable Canon PowerShot SD1100IS Digital Elph in brown. So cute! It has image stabilization which is going to make my life much easier. Please excuse the less-than-stellar picture. I took it with the built-in camera of my laptop. But isn't it cute? My hands are small, so trust me when I say this thing is pocket-sized. Yum! So hopefully this will make pictures much easier.

What else I'm up to...

2008-10-25T00:32:00.002-04:00

On a side note of creative endeavors, I thought I would post a link to another way I've been channeling my creative energy recently. Protagonize is an online collaborative writing site and I've been working on my creative writing. I have been pushing the site to all my friends who write. Great place, lots of fab writers who are also incredibly nice and supportive people, and lots of fun. And it's run by a Canadian! Always a plus in my mind.

Hope to have new things up soon! Been busy stamping 30+ sheets of paper for my grandma's Christmas letter.

Have a great weekend!

Let the Christmas Crafts Begin!

2008-10-23T10:13:00.002-04:00

Well, it's that time again in my crafting space. My vacation is over and I have gotten rid of the cold I caught right after, so it is time to get on with prep for Christmas!

The first things I have done are two door hangers, one for each grandma. As they live in communities where their doors get seen by other people, they each have had door decorations by me before. These are this year's Christmas offerings. The present is actually much more glittery and sparkly than it appears. The bow is metallic gold and covered in sparkly varnish, the ribbon metallic green with sparkly varnish. The reindeer has metallic red and green with a tint of gold paint on his horns.

I bought the two wooden shapes at DeSerres, both unfinished, then painted them myself.

I've been doing a bit of quilling too, but some of those things are going to end up on cards so you'll have to wait to see!

Enjoy!

Vacation!

2008-09-26T11:02:00.001-04:00

That's right, I just got back to blogging, and I'm already off on vacation again. This time it is a real vacation, not an "I'm too caught up in researching for exams to make cards" vacation. My mother is coming to visit Sunday and staying for 2 1/2 weeks! I am very excited. We have a train trip planned, and sight-seeing around the city. Plus I will be doing no researching for exams until she leaves, so I get 3 weeks off (I started yesterday! hehe)! But with my mother coming to visit I had to put away my craft supplies so there will be no new cards until she is gone and I can spread out my stash again.

Hope everyone has a wonderful time! Happy Fall, happy early Thanksgiving for those other Canadians out there, and see you when I'm back!

Heart to Heart Blog Candy

2008-09-21T16:59:00.003-04:00

Just a note to let people know that Carolyn King, that amazing woman so many of us have come to know as Cammie, has posted info for the Heart to Heart Blog Candy. This is an amazing thing that has completely snowballed through the generosity of individuals and companies. My grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimers and seeing the change in her was heartbreaking. So getmaking a card and send a thank you to a caregiver looking after a person with Alzheimers. If you do not know any, Cammie has included the address for a home she knows well. It is a tough thing, so let's all show join Cammie in her amazing campaign to support Alzheimer's research (by purchasing her stamp set from Gina K. Designs) and/or participating in the blog candy. And it is amazing! $1000 worth of candy plus cards from tons of amazing people! Who wouldn't want to be the lucky winner?

Hope everyone has had a great weekend. Now go make a card!

More Notepad Craziness

2008-09-19T13:20:00.004-04:00

I just couldn't resist doing another notepad. Afterall, I had 4 more of them just sitting there! This one is for my grandma, the woman who shared her love of owls with me. I pulled out my Sassafras Lass Olivia and Oliver owl sets and went to work. This time I only stamped at the bottom of the page to keep the notepad together and for my own sanity! This was one of those times I hadn't quite planned out what I was going to do. I stamped the little purple owl on every page first. Then I looked at it and realized that a branch would be such a good idea. Silly me!

The branch is from Oliver & Pals and just the edge of it made it onto the pages. The green is very pale, but my grandma likes pastel colours and I didn't want to overpower the owls. I realized that the little purple owl looked lonely so I had to add a little blue one! Then I couldn't resist a silly sentiment. The "hoo!" is from Olivia & Friends, and the "yoo" are Martha Stewart letters. Sadly my "pink" ink looks a little purple. Definitely going to have to get a nice pink DewDrop sometime (I have one, but it is super pale), perhaps with the free $20 I have at Scrapbook Centrale for filling my loyalty card.

Here is a detail shot of the stamped image. I thought pale images would be nice for the notepaper so my Grandma could write over them if necessary and they would not overpower her note, because that is the important part!

A little proof that I did, indeed, stamp every page of this 50 page notepad! Much easier this time. I could have done it all at once if I'd been thinking right in the beginning, but oh well. I did it one colour at a time. Turned out cute in the end!

Hope you all have a great weekend and enjoy the lovely Fall weather!

Recipe:
Stamps: Olivia & Friends and Oliver & Pals by Sassafras Lass, Martha Stewart Arial letter stamps
Ink: VersaMagic Spring Pansy, Aloe Vera, and Sea Breeze (mixed with another blue), ColorBox chalk ink in orchid pastel and blue lagoon.
Other: 50-page notepad from Walmart, patience

Birthday fishes and some craziness

2008-09-14T20:28:00.003-04:00

Well, as promised, I got a bit more work done crafting this weekend! Finally getting back in the groove a bit, just in time to have to put away my craft supplies a little bit. Oops!

During my request that my friends give me some work, one friend asked for a card for her dad's 50th birthday. I thought about it, and I pulled out a bunch of paper to see what I could find. When I pulled out some Creative Imaginations fish paper I knew what I was going to do. Everyone kept doing such cute birthday fishes cards that I had to do one. Seeing the picture I can see it doesn't quite do justice. I cut the fish out of the original paper to pop them up on dimensionals. I took some plain cardstock and stamped some white wave-like designs on it in white and used detail clear EP to give them a little more something. Then some water dots. The window actually has acetate in it and the green layer is popped up on higher dimensionals. A little bling, and voila!

Recipe:
Stamps: border stamp by Fiskars
Ink: white by ColorBox
Papers: fish by Creative Imaginations, green Bazzil cardstock, blue cardstock, acetate
Accessories: green and blue ribbon from Michael's, white Sakura pen, orange bling by me & my big ideas, Rain dots by Cloud 9 designs, dimensionals, detail clear EP

My other finished project is one that made me a bit crazy. I had gotten the idea to decorate a notepad in a roundabout way when a male friend complained about how hard it is to find masculine notepaper. I thought of the idea of just buying a plain pad and decorating it, although not necessarily for him. So when I offered my friends some creative projects one other one requested a pad, especially one she could stick to her fridge. I bought a stack of 5 plain notepads from Walmart, 50 pages each, for about $4. Not a bad deal, right? So I thought about my friend and the colours she likes: browns and earthtones. So I started out thinking I wanted to put a design at the top of each page. That's right, EACH PAGE! I grabbed some studio g stamps, one "just a note" which I inked up in brilliance coffee bean, and a little flower and flourish stamp. The flower and flourish stamp was my silliest idea: I decided to ink the middle flower in one colour, the outside two in another, and the flourishes on the outside in yet another colour! Well, that was great for the first couple pages. By page 20 I was really starting to think I was nuts! I did it though. Unfortunately I had to press each page up flat to stamp the next page, so the pad started to fall apart a little with the glue not holding the pages together. After I finished stamping the top I looked at the pages again and realized they weren't done. So I grabbed my brilliance coffee bean again and stamped 6 flowers on each page. Yup, that sure was alot of stamping. To hold the pad together I decided to put some clips on each corner at the top. Easily removable if the pad is holding and they want to pull sheets off, or just rip them off and not worry about the pages looking pretty. I just have to find magnets strong enough to hold the page to the fridge. Worth it in the end I hope.

Recipe:
Paper: plain pad from Walmart, 50 pages.
Stamps: "just a note," flower and flower flourish by Studio G
Ink: brilliance coffee bean DewDrop, cocoa, brown and merlot by Colorbox
Accessories: peach clips from Michael's, magnets (eventually)

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend and happy crafting!

New cards finally!

2008-09-13T18:02:00.002-04:00

Well, I finally have some new things to show again! I have been feeling creative but finding myself without ideas of what to make. I appealed to my friends for help and they were happy to oblige! One friend requested some notecards. As her favourite colours are pink and orange I wanted to make ones that would show that. Sadly I was sort of lacking in orange paper that would go well with the pink, so I decided to tone it down just a little and use orange ink to stamp the flower on yellow paper. I like how it turned out. Embossing powder helped to bring out all the good stuff, along with some dewdrops. All 10 cards are the same, with relatively plain envelopes that will work well for mailing.

Recipe:
Stamps: "just a note" by Studio G, flower by EK Success
Inks: orange and white by ColorBox
Paper: Pink dots by K & Company, green paper from a Walmart pack, yellow and white cardstock
Accessories: Fire dew drops, white and detail clear embossing powder, corner rounder, oval nestabilities.

My other card for today is a birthday card for a 15 year old girl who loves "spink." Sparkly pink, I was informed, is her favourite colour. So here it is. It took a bit of doing but I rather like how it turned out in the end. I started with a pale pink base card. The bottom of the front was scalloped with a corner rounder punch, then holes punched with a Crop-a-dile. I lined around the holes with my Sakura stardust pen. Beneath the base on the inside I put a strip of dark pink K & Co glitter paper that would make it all stand out. I put a matching piece along the top on the front, scalloped to mimic the bottom. I took a piece of darker pink cardstock and embossed it using a Happy Birthday CB folder. I grabbed an inbetween shade of cardstock for the top. Looking at it now I almost wish I'd stuck with the pale pink again, but oh well. It still looks good. The flower is from a glue rub-on and decorations set using the pink glitter. I topped it with a 1 and 5 from some CB letters which were decorated a bit more with my glitter pen. This was popped up on dimensionals. The oval I originally wrote on with a Quickie Glue pen and tried to get the glitter to stick to it, but the glitter just does not seem to stick well at all. I went over it with a Sakura glaze pen and it shows up much better now. This was also popped up on dimensionals. All in all, looks like a decidedly girly card!

Recipe:
Paper: K&Co pink with glitter (glued the name to the card so I can't look it up!, 3 shades of pink cardstock
Accessories: corner rounder punch, crop-o-dile, Sakura stardust pen, glue rubons and pink glitter, dimensionals, Happy Birthday CB embossing folder, Sakura glaze pen in pink, dimensionals.

I have another project that I have almost finished: a notepad. I bought some cheap ones from Walmart and offered to decorate them for friends. One friend took me up on it and asked for one with magnets to stick to her fridge. I am now in the process of hunting out magnets to stick on the back that will hold it up! The magnets I have just aren't quite up to the job. But let me tell you, stamping 50 sheets of paper with a design has taught me to KISS (keep it simple, silly)! The next one I do for my grandma will be much less involved. But I like how it turned out.

Lovely weather lately, so hopefully everyone has been able to enjoy some of it! Have a great rest of the weekend!

And back in the fall!

2008-09-02T20:04:00.002-04:00

Well, I have been missing in action for pretty much the entire summer. Caught up in school and various other things, but life has been going well. I am eagerly anticipating my mother's visit at the end of September. It is so odd to think that I have been living in my current apartment for 3 years and my mother has never seen it other than in pictures! The only downside to her visit is that it is in lieu of my taking a trip back home this fall. I'm definitely missing all my friends back home! Thus, I thought I should make a card!

It is based on an old SFYTT by Jen Del Muro that I had loved when I saw it but hadn't gotten around to trying out until now. It also gave me a chance to play with a bunch of things I've gotten over the summer. I just picked up some cheap iridescent watercolour paints. I couldn't afford to kit myself out with Twinkling H2O's, so when I saw a palette of simlar paints for much less in DeSerres I was very excited! I used them on the teddy bear, the flowers on the Bella's pj's, and her slippers. I just love the image too! Definitely love my Bellas!

Hope everyone has a great first week of September. I am feeling a bit shocked that for the first time in 22 years September does not mean the start of new classes! I am still working on my comprehensive exams. One down! I write the next at the end of September.

Recipe:
Stamps: Jammiebella
Ink: Brilliance Coffee Bean
Papers: coral Bazzil textured cardstock, dark brown Bazzil textured cardstock, Dream Street "Art Nouveau - Muse," white cardstock
Extras: watercolour pencil crayons, iridescent watercolour paints, Dahlia Box Blends flowers by Petaloo, brushed pewter brads, brown pen

Finally more cards!

2008-06-21T12:04:00.005-04:00

It has been far too long since I last managed to post some cards. I've been busy with things for school and worshipping my air conditioner.

I just couldn't resist pulling out the same paper from BG as I used for the mouse card for another fun card. This time I used Brilliance Coffee Bean ink to stamp one of the Sassafras Lass owl stamps on the checked paper. And I finally got to use my nesties! Too much fun! The owl is up on dimensionals.

Recipe:
Ink: Brilliance Coffee Bean
Paper: BG Oh Baby Girl! and Two Scoops - Waffle Cone, yellow flowers from HOTP, lavender and green cardstock
Stamps: owl from Olivia and Friends by Sassafras Lass
Accessories: yellow and purple brads by MM, pink friend brad, dimensionals, bling by me & my Big Ideas, blue fineliner, striped ribbon from Michaels.

I also got to use some of the fun things I got while I was visiting my parents and got to a Michaels! The floral design stamp is from one of the $1.50 Studio G packs. The paper is a little richer than it looks in this picture, a slightly warmer brown. Both the brown and the orange design are from an amazing pad by s.e.i. which I just loved.

Two of the flowers are up on small dimensionals and each has a matching rhinestone in the middle. Dawn McVey really has got me loving bling! The little dragonfly is from the Sasha Collection by Say it in crystals. They have the cutest designs!

Recipe:
Stamps: flower by Studio G
Ink:Spring Pansy, Sea Breeze, Aloe Vera and Pixie Dust by VersaMagic
Paper: Oasis 8x8 pack by s.e.i., white cardstock
Accessories: white flower ribbon from Michaels, smile rubon, crystals by me&my Big Ideas, dragonfly by Say it in crystals (sasha collection), dimensionals

Finally!

2008-06-05T20:59:00.003-04:00

Well, it has been a long time since I had a new card to post. Between being away, getting sick and trying to catch up I just haven't felt too creative. I hit the deadline though because my mother's birthday is next week and I needed a card!

I had originally been planning to do something with some great paper with pink flamingos, but I just wasn't feeling any inspiration. So I thought about it and remembered a drawing I'd done. The mouse is clearly inspired by House Mouse Designs. I just love the mice and the art but sadly own none of the stamps yet. I just had to draw some mice of my own!

Recipe:

Paper: BG Oh Baby Girl! and Two Scoops - Waffle Cone, white, yellow and blue cardstock

Accessories: dimensionals, pencil crayons, ribbon from Michael's, spiral paperclip, Heidi Grace flower and brad, MM Animal Crackers girl epoxy button

Back, mostly...

2008-05-22T20:49:00.004-04:00

I had a wonderful vacation! Even getting my wisdom teeth out wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. I was able to walk out of the office mostly under my own steam, just a little wobbly. I was even off the couch and out the next day for a little while! Boy was I glad when I finally bit into the pizza and appetizer combo my mom and I ordered on day 3 when I could finally chew again. A girl can only eat mush for so long! So good seeing my friends and family and catching up. I was sad to leave.

One of my best friends even gave me a parting gift at her birthday party: a cold virus! I started feeling a bit off when I got back to Montreal but I figured it was just all the dry air from the airplanes. Silly me. By the next day I was fully sick. I got back Saturday and I am still coughing and having a stuffed up nose. Definitely on the mend finally though! Hopefully I'll be up to getting creative this weekend with all the fun stuff I got, including my Cuttlebug!

So here's a little something I thought I'd share. My mom's best friend loves Elvis. She is also my godmother and has been so great to my mom in the past couple of years especially. So I thought of something to give to her as a little thank you from me. I went to IKEA and got some decent but not overly expensive wine glasses. Then it was time to go to work!

I found a pattern for a stained glass Elvis online (my apologies, but I do not remember where) and then reworked it until it was usable for such a small surface. I used pewter and gold Pebeo vitrea outliners to trace the design, then filled it in with Pebeo vitrea paints. These are awesome and I've shown some other things with them. You bake them after they dry and then they are dishwasher safe! That's right, these glasses can go in the dishwasher! I made a set of 6 glasses for my mom's friend to put in her Elvis museum for parties with her friends, etc. She loved them and had no idea what they were when she got the UPS box.

Hope everyone has a good Friday tomorrow and has a great time!

Woohoo!

2008-04-29T21:20:00.002-04:00

Well, no new cards to share today. I was a little busy as I did the language exam for my degree today. I was assured time and again by the Graduate Program Assistant that it was no big deal, easy to pass. Basically you get a page with an excerpt from some text in French on the religion you study. My supervisor, for the record, gives the most to translate. 5 paragraphs may not sound like much, but it takes a while if it is a relatively sophisticated text and your vocab is only so so. I love my monster french/english dictionary. Anyway, 2.5 hours later I handed in my handwritten pages and called it good enough. Most of it actually made sense! I won't hear anything for a couple weeks as my supervisor is away.

On a side note, I hope I get at least one more card in but I am going on vacation starting Friday. I'm going to visit my parents and all my friends back home for a couple weeks. Also getting my wisdom teeth removed so I'll get nice pain pills and everything! So hopefully I get another card done and posted, but if not, I'll be back after May 18th! My blog surfing will also be non-existent because there are just too many things to do in 2 weeks with people I am away from too much! Looking forward to moving home next year!

Cheers to all!

Martinis for Jen's SFYTT!

2008-04-27T20:30:00.003-04:00

I love Jen del Muro's SFYTT! Always makes Saturdays so much fun, even if I don't have time to do the sketch. But I did this week!

I've had this martini paper for a while and I knew I wanted to make a congrats card, probably for the day my friend finally finishes her MA thesis. When I saw Jen's sketch this weekend this seemed perfect! I also bought Sandylion Essentials martini stickers a while back from a dollar store and knew they were going with this. The clear glass is difficult to see, but I did add some shading around it on the cardstock to help it stand out a bit more. The shaker is silver, hence the little reflection on it.

The blue cardstock seemed too plain so I added some hand-drawn flourishes. The white paper I'm not sure of. I used red ink around the edges but not sure I totally love it. It will be ok though. Overall I really like the card. Lots of room inside to write nice things or find something silly to put inside!

Recipe:

Paper: "Cheers" by Karen Foster, white, blue and green cardstock

Ink: light green and red from ColorBox Primary colour wheel

Accessories: Martini stickers by Sandylion Essentials, red ric rak by Offray, black pen

So cheers to all of you!

Party Owls for Lauren's Sketch

2008-04-27T20:20:00.002-04:00

Still digging the owls! Today I pulled out both Oliver and Olivia sets to find the perfect owls for Lauren Meader's Saturday sketch. I thought her samples were lots of fun and I just love the 4 circle arrangement.

The owls I picked just looked totally perfect. The one in the upper left looks like she's flying high in excitement! Or jumping. And the little boy in top right looks a little shocked. As does the little girl below him! And the bigger one in the bottom left definitely looks interested and surprised! It is a bit of an owl party. So a congratulations card seemed perfect!

It is hard to see, but there is a little glitter blue on some of the blue circles on the bottom pp. I had to add a little sparkle to it! I also cut a small slit in the fold of the card and threaded the ribbon through so it is still visible inside.

Recipe:

Stamps: Olivia and Pals and Oliver and Friends by Sassafras Lass

Ink: Brilliance coffee bean

Paper: beach design by EK Success, blue cardstock, green paper (Walmart pack)

Accessories: seafoam polkadot from Michael's, congratulations rubon, blue glitter glue

More Cute Owls!

2008-04-27T10:32:00.003-04:00

Did I mention I love owls? hehe. They are just so cute and so "in" this season. So I stocked up. This is from Olivia and Friends by Sassafras Lass. I like that some of the stamps look like kids' doodles and some are like this, just so sweet! The two sets, Oliver and Olivia, work together great because you get a branch and cloud with Oliver and two versions of "hoo!" with Olivia. Yummy!

So I've been posting that I was going to CASE a card by Dawn McVey. Well, this is it. You can see Dawn's card on her blog. I loved it. I was scrolling back through her blog, trying to figure out which card I wanted to case. I'd seen a few that I thought were just too much fun but some of them were going to be a pain (lots of circles in different sizes when one only has a single circle punch means lots of cutting down and drawing circles by hand and ick!). I looked at this one again and it hit me that I could use owls!

I put together the base card and the layer of blue design paper, then looked in my ribbon to see what would go. Yummy teal with the yellow! I used it previously here with Jammybella, just ruching it by pulling the yellow strand that comes threaded through it.

The owls were stamped in pink chalk ink on yellow paper and turned out a cute orange. The same with the "hoo!" stamp. I played around with how I was going to sit the owls but this worked best since I didn't quite draw my line at 1/3 of the card. When I got them on I stared at the card and was feeling all squirmy about all that plain orange paper. It just looked so bare, especially with the pattern at the bottom. Something had to happen. So I confined myself to adding 4 dew drops. I am still getting used to placing Dew Drops and the Glossy Accents I used as glue smeared just a little. I think I need to buy some craft tweezers because these things stick to my fingers just enough.

Amazingly enough, I actually think it turned out finished. I am resisting the urge to do anything more to the top. I will definitely have to play around more with this sort of clean style. Of course, I am not giving up all my layering and decorating and adding just a few more bits. But I'm going to try to push myself a bit to do less occasionally.

Recipe:

Stamps: Olivia and Friends by Sassafras Lass

Ink: Orchid Pastel chalk by ColorBox

Paper: blue daisies by K&Co, sunrise cardstock

Accessories: teal and yellow ribbon from Michael's, Flame Dew Drops, orange shimmer brad

ETA: So I couldn't help bringing this up... Have you ever found the perfect pair of shoes, tried them on, felt so comfortable, bought them, brought them home, only to discover they are half a size too large? I was stupidly wearing jeans when I bought them and didn't realize that the heel sticks out too far. They're a pair of cork wedges with cute straps and are super comfortable. The straps are shammi-soft gold and won't dig in or anything. I usually wear flats and I was wanting to find a pair of heels or something heel-like that would actually be wearable during the summer. These were at Winners (Canadian T.J. Maxx) and so were not too expensive. But I just don't think I can keep these shoes. So disappointing. I have an awful time finding shoes I like and will wear. I even found another store that had the same style (for $40 more!) and discovered they don't make half sizes and the next size down was too small and wouldn't even go on my foot. There is no hope of finding this particular shoe in a size that will fit. :( I did, however, get a cute pair of gold heels for very cheap. With reason, since none of the shoe is leather, but they are cute and wearable. But not nearly as great as the wedges. Alas, my search continues.

Gift for Dad

2008-04-24T21:11:00.005-04:00

I know it is very early to be posting things for Father's Day, but I have seen some cute stuff and thought I would share what I put together. My dad isn't much for collecting photos. He took videos, but he was more likely to be in the photographs. I had some photos on my computer of my childhood and realized that a large number of them were of me and my dad. I've always been Daddy's little girl so this seemed like a great way to say thanks and give him a reminder of all the stuff we've done together.

I started off with baby stuff. My parents adopted me so I wrote about that and had a cute picture of getting a bath in the sink. It's been a long time since I fit in there!

I also had a picture of my baptism with my dad holding me. How perfect?

Halloween has always been big with my dad. He loves dressing up in costumes and was always excited to get me dressed up and go trick-or-treating with me. One picture is of me when I was little, one when I was a teenager.

There were many road trips in my life, and dad was on almost all of them. We did trips to the cottage and we stopped to take pictures of a Prairie Lily on one. I also had to mention my cute little beetle that my dad helped me get.

Then there was graduation. Proud papa was there the day I got my first degree.

The last picture is from the drive my dad did helping me move. We drove across the country and happened to find the town where Winnie came from. Winnie would be the live bear that a Canadian soldier donated to the London Zoo. That bear later inspired A. A. Milne to write Winnie-The-Pooh. Disney endorsed a statue there and there is a cute little local museum. Winnie the Pooh is special to myself and my dad and has been. So it was just too perfect.

All in all, I am very happy with how the little book turned out. The ribbon is also special. I'm looking forward to sharing it with him! He'll be getting it early as I won't be home for Father's Day but I will be for Mother's Day. We'll just have to merge the two in our family this year!

The outside edges of the book were painted with gold paint to finish off the project.

Card Box

2008-04-23T13:21:00.003-04:00

I love my new card box. The box I had made last was just too small to hold all the cards I make. It wasn't wide enough to do two stacks of smaller cards so there was lots of empty space. Moreover, I needed something to hold all the cards I had made for my friend. The box I had made previously was perfect for that so I was in need of something new. I found a great undecorated "recipe box" at my LSS and bought it. It was just perfect, obviously sized for potentially putting cards in it since it would fit a regular card you could buy in a store. It will never see any, but I am happy with it.

I bought all the matterials at my LSS. Patterned paper, a sheet of coordinating pieces by My Mind's Eye, flowers, Dew Drops, letters and ribbon. Yum! I like how it came together although it might be too "busy" for some people. But it's just so bright and fun!

I used Mod Podge to glue on the paper covering the box except for the central pieces on the top. Those were attached using Teriffically Tacky Tape to avoid messing them up. I realized in the end that I got the very center red piece a little crooked but I couldn't fix it and it isn't too bad. The brackets are from the coordinating sheet by My Mind's Eye, the letters are Thickers. The Dew Drops and flowers were attached using Glossy Accents (got that tip from a blog although I forget whose, sorry for that). The ribbon went on with Terrifically Tacky Tape.

All in all, I'm stoked. I still have to decorate the 6 chipboard dividers that came in the box, but I need to see if I can find some cardstock that will go with the patterned paper. That's right, I didn't get it all properly planned out even on my 2nd trip to the LSS. Hopefully DeSerres will have some that will match. The colours I have are all just a bit off. Very frustrating, but not too unexpected.

Recipe:
Papers: Star Brigth Dotty Dude, Day Dream Check Her Out, and Day Dream Accessories Sheet from the Just Dreamy line by MME, Organic Poppy from Bo-Bunny's Back to Backs.
Accessories: Poolside Thickers, flame and water Dew Drops, Heidi Grace Aqua common flowers, blue and yellow checked ribbon from my LSS, Glossy Accents, Terifically Tacky Tape, Mod Podge.

As soon as I get the dividers decorated I will post them also. Could be a couple days. The next project is probably a card inspired by Dawn McVey. If you don't know her then you should definitely check out her blog. She does such beautiful cards and her style is so simple and clean and classy. Plus she's just such a sweetie! I always love posting comments on her blog because she writes me such cute emails back! That, and making her laugh is just fun! So now that she's heard time and again how envious I am of her style and how difficult I find it to just leave a card alone I have to try. If I fail and have to clutter up a card then she'll get a good laugh out of it. So hopefully I can do that perhaps this afternoon!

And I will be praying for a thunderstorm. It is humid and sticky here and I do not like it! Plus I miss thunderstorms. I grew up on the prairies where you could watch the storm coming and enjoy the thunder and lightning. Here in Montreal there isn't much of that and it is a bit disappointing. So here's hoping!

SFYTT with Jammybella!

2008-04-21T17:22:00.002-04:00

I finally got a card done for Jen's SFYTT. A bit late, but I was busy with school stuff. I had this image stamped and coloured ages ago but I hadn't come up with a card for it to go with yet. I just love Jammybella and her teddy bear!

The flowers on her pants and shirt have been coloured with a Stardust pen to add a bit of glitter. The flourish on the yellow is actually yellow glitter from the We R Memory Keepers "Foil Glitter Flock" rub on kit. I love this stuff. Makes it so easy and minimally messy. Admittedly sometimes there isn't quite enough glue or it doesn't quite transfer, but I'm pretty sure that's more to do with my error than the product.

Recipe:

Stamps: jammybella by Stamping Bellas

Ink: black by ColorBox

Paper: purple bazzil cardstock, metallic teal (maybe bazzil?), pale yellow and white cardstock

Other: We R Memory Keepers Glitter Foil Flock rubons, ribbon from Michael's, MM epoxy button, "Friends" rubon, black pen, watercolour pencil crayons, Sakura Stardust pen, primas, MM brads

And a special hooray for having completed the last course of my degree! Now on to the big exams. I'm actually kinda excited about them honestly.

Keeping my LSS in business...

2008-04-20T16:55:00.002-04:00

Not that Scrapbook Centrale needs my help. From reading their forums it's clear I am not the only one who goes in and comes out trying not to think about the credit card bill. But definitely worth it. I got Dew Drops! "Water" and "Flame." Between the two it should cover most of what I was wanting them for. I also picked up supplies for my new card box (a Be Creative blank recipe box) so I can get it decorated in the next little while! My Mind's Eye and BoBunny papers, some letters, gorgeous ribbon, and some Heidi Grace flowers. Can't wait!

I also had to grab the Olivia and Pals clear stamps by Sassafras Lass. Now I have both sets, boy and girl owls! Maybe a couple for my box? And definitely more cute cards and fun projects! Love my owls!

Hopefully I'll manage something tonight. Trying to finish up last minute research for my paper which is due tomorrow by email. Hard to believe this is the last paper of my coursework for my PhD. Once I email it in my coursework will be complete! Sure, I'll still have 3 years' worth of work to go before I'm all done, but it is very exciting!

And I'm loving the gorgeous weather outside! Cheers to all!

Tool Time Got Inked!

2008-04-19T11:39:00.002-04:00

When I saw the sneak peeks of the Hanna Stamps set Tool Time at first I wasn't sure what I thought. Then I looked at it again and I realized it would be perfect. My dad is a handy man. He has always been a jack-of-all-trades, building me a 2 story playhouse and putting electrical wiring in it, fixing stuff that goes wrong at the house, repairing his machinery when he farmed, etc. He grew up that way. Being Daddy's little girl, I went to the farm with him and he and my grandpa amused me by giving me tools to play with, setting up blocks of wood with nails started for me to hammer in. Those nails spelled out my name, by the way, and my dad still has those blocks on his desk at home. As I got older dad got me to help with projects. When I moved out on my own I requested tools for Christmas from my dad. Afterall, he knew what I would need. Then I requested some tools to put in my car after growing up with dad's truck being the moveable tool kit. Most recently I requested a drill which he helped me pick out. So tools definitely make me think of my dad.

At the same time, I feel relatively competent with at least some tools these days. Not big power tools, and only somewhat with my drill, but still. So a set with a girl and tools seemed just right.

I got my set on Thursday in the mail but hadn't had a chance to play with it much until yesterday. I stamped everything. Didn't use it all on this card (although the envelope still needs decorating) but I just had to see it all. The quality is awesome. I coloured in Hanna and the tools with watercolour pencil crayons. I chose to give Hanna short hair since my hair hasn't been long for years, but it was easy since it just meant cutting out a few pieces that I didn't think to mask. Then I went over all the tools with my Stardust glitter pen and glossy accents to make them stand out. Cut everything out and voila! The base card was stamped with a paisley design in a light brown which just barely shows but reminds me of a faded hanky. The blue paper is Bazzil cardstock and with the texture it reminds me a bit of faded denim. I love how it turned out!

Recipe:

Stamps: Tool Time by Hannah Stamps, paisley by Inkadinkado

Ink: black and light brown by ColorBox

Paper: faded blue cardstock by Bazzil, wood grain dp, and red cardstock, Measurement paper by 7gypsies

Other: dimensionals, watercolour pencil crayons, Glossy Accents, Sakura Stardust pen, brushed pewter brads, white Sakura gel pen, black Sakura glaze pen

Loving the gorgeous day here today. Time to get lots of work done on my paper and hopefully get around to a couple sketches (Jen's and Beate's). I might even challenge myself to try something in the style of the fab Dawn McVey since I keep saying how much I love her style and how incapable I seem of managing anything that clean.

Lack of posting

2008-04-18T12:51:00.003-04:00

It has definitely been a while since I posted anything and I don't have much to post now. School is keeping me busy. This week was a mess, with a sinus headache hitting for 2 days and making me useless. Now I'm trying to finish up my last paper of my last course. And to top it all off my ipod appears to have broken. I am sans music for paper writing. Quite depressing, actually, but I hate listening to music on my computer while typing at it. This is the second time since January that my ipod has made bad noises that indicate a hardware problem. As it is nearing the end of the 3 year service plan I bought for it I am actually hoping it is dead and I will get a replacement of a much newer variety. Last time they fixed it, but obviously something is wrong again. Going to have to drop it off sometime. Bad timing since it is 2 weeks until I go on vacation for 2 weeks. Then again last time it took them 3 weeks to get it back to me.

I'll leave you with a picture of the box I decorated for my friend's upcoming birthday. It was a plain old box that I bought at DeSerres, ready to be decorated. Some paint, ribbon, bling, chipboard shapes, metal letters, and flowers and voila. All personalized. I'm quite proud of it and I hope she'll love it.

Happy Friday!

Hoot!

2008-04-15T11:23:00.003-04:00

I love owls. I have owl mittens for winter that I got for Christmas. I was talking about it with my mom last night and was reminded that I come by it honestly as my grandmother also loves owls and had various pictures and crafts up at her house as well as having some homemade puzzles for me with owl pictures. Not to mention Owl (Wol) from Winnie the Pooh and Wise Old Owl from Mr. Dressup.

When I kept seeing owl stamps out this year I got excited. I tried to figure out how I could justify buying some, but unfortunately most of the suppliers were American and not ones with friendly Canadian shipping. Then I went to my LSS finally and discovered they actually HAD the owl stamps from Sassafras Lass. I had to get them. The set is Oliver & Friends. You get 5 different owls, an adorable tree branch, and a cute little cloud. And they are clear so I can see exactly where I am putting my stamp. Yay! Sadly they did not have the matching paper, but maybe I will have to look again.

I wanted to make a thank you card for my boss, the prof I have been working for all semester as his Teaching Assistant. It has been a great experience and I just really wanted to thank him for that. An owl card seemed perfect since I had no particular Confucian ideas. I was inspired by Jen's SFYTT. Didn't quite get it done over the weekend or anything, but I had a blast anyway.

I started with the idea of having the three stripes being trees and my little owl. The owl was stamped on cardstock that actually looks like cheap cardboard with all the little flecks. I used a dark brown ink but eventually discovered I would have to outline him because the ink just wasn't quite dark enough. I coloured in his beak with an orange pencil crayon. I think punched him out with my circle punch. The white matting was a later addition, but helps him stand out more.

I grabbed a great piece of fibered paper in dark green and made my card base from it. The fibers give it a nice feel of nature. The "trees" were purposely placed slightly crooked as trees do not always grow straight. I think pulled out the branch stamp from my set and inked it up with light brown to stamp on the trees. Most of the time it did not reach the background, but I was ok with that. It was intended to be somewhat subtle, just add pattern. I put the little owl on a good gap on a branch. I used the same paper as for the owl for the sentiment. I free handed it with my black Sakura Glaze pen. Some orange ribbon and a bronze brad finished that off.

Recipe:

Stamps: owl from "Oliver & Friends" by sassafras lass, branch from the same set

Ink: light brown and chocolate by ColorBox

Paper: dark brown cardstock by Bazzil, dark green fiber paper by The Paper Company, brown cardstock

Other: sakura glaze pen, orange ribbon by offray and someone else, bronze brad, brown fineliner, orange pencil crayon

Loving the spring weather, even if it does mean snow mould! I think a walk will be in order this afternoon!

Another Kittycattabella

2008-04-14T11:50:00.002-04:00

I couldn't resist doing a couple Kittycattabella cards. I love cats and quite a few people I know do as well. I had done this one with a particular friend in mind, originally thinking of putting it in the pile of birthday cards I'd made for her to give. Now, however, I'm pondering keeping it to give to her for her birthday next year. The two cats are coloured to look like her cats, as much as I could manage. The colours are all ones she likes. So tempting. I will have to think about it. It would be perfect if I had masked out the long braid as she has short hair and has had pretty much forever.

I added a bit of sparkle with my Stardust glitter pen on her shirt, outlining her pants, the bow in her hair, and the ribbon on her presents. I used my Sakura glaze pens to help outline the presents a little bit and colour in the red present and the green dots. A little crystal for the dot on the "i" of birthday and it was set.

Recipe:

Stamps: Kittycattabella, happy and birthday by studio G

Ink: black by Colorbox, white by ColorBox

Papers: heart design by K & Co., cream, red and white cardstock

Other: Sakura stardust and glaze pens, watercolour pencil crayons, white EP, dimensionals, brown fineliner, white gel pen by Sakura

I may be pretty scarce for the next week. I have my last assigned paper of my degree due a week from today and needless to say it is not finished. Also have a few other things on the go school-wise, so there will be less card making while my brain is busy keeping a bunch of things going. But I will be enjoying all this wonderful sunshine and nice weather we are getting again!

Purrfect for Grandma

2008-04-12T11:41:00.002-04:00

Can you tell I was waiting anxiously for my Bella stamps? I already knew which ones I was using for which cards and everything.

This card is for my grandma for Mother's Day. Although my grandma has never had cats she has always appreciated the ones my mother and I have had. She thinks Book is just quite adorable and always tries to interest Book in some play time when they are together. She sent me a very adorable kitty card for Valentine's Day this year too. All that leads to the fact that a kitty card for my grandma worked just great.

I stamped the image on plain white cardstock and coloured it in with watercolour pencil crayons. Then I went over the shirt, shoes, and bow in her hair with my Stardust glitter pen. After looking at the cats they really didn't seem to stand out enough, so I stamped the image again and coloured the cats, one to look like Book and one to look like my mom's cat Percy. I cut out those cats with my fine scissors and put them on thin dimensionals. They stand out much better now, at least on the actual card. I decided that book should be sitting off the edge of the mat for visual interest and simply because it looked odd with all that extra white space.

I picked up this fab DCWV paper during my excursion to the LSS. The hearts are very shiny and glittery, hence the reflection, the base paper is creamy. A nice contrast. I punched out two scallops with my circle punch, one at the top and one at the bottom, then covered the rest with the matted Bella. Felt hearts from DeSerres finished it off, stuck on with Terrifically Tacky Tape, and a little sentiment in dark brown pen.

Recipe:

Stamps: Kittycattabella

Ink: black by ColorBox

Papers: Hearts and Paws by DCWV, blue and white cardstock

Other: watercolour pencil crayons, Sakura Stardust pen, dimensionals, felt hearts from DeSerres, brown fineliner

The day here is decidedly grey and dreary, but hopefully I can get some work done on my research paper and maybe some cards too! Yay for Saturday!

Sweet Pea

2008-04-11T10:09:00.003-04:00

Who could resist such a cute little stamp?! I had to get the Baby Bella Pea for the occasional baby card I make, and also just for random cuteness! Afterall, my mother used to call me Sweetpea.

This is a card for the daughter of my parents' friends. This will be her (and her hubby's) 2nd baby, the first was a girl and this one is a boy. A matched set! I sang at this woman's wedding so making a baby card definitely seems appropriate. I had made a card previously based on a design I'd seen in a mag (sorry I don't remember who did it or which mag) that was a square card with the front cut diagonally and a medallion in the center. So I wanted to do a variation on it. I cut a regular square card then measured out all the lines to make it concentric squares. The base card is the yellow cardstock. Then I drew the diagonal line and cut off the edge of the yellow cardstock on the top right side.

I grabbed some pretty green paper I got JUST for this card and used the piece I cut off as a template to layer it on the front bottom left corner. The inside of the card is covered in the green paper so it peeks out. Another square in the middle, but I had to rotate it. Alas I hadn't totally thought out the corner rounding before I cut out the green edge on the front, but it still looks cute. I used the baby stamp to cover up one square corner. The baby was coloured with watercolour pencil crayons then put on dimensionals. I freehanded "sweetpea" on more yellow cardstock and put it on dimensionals also. The blue ribbon I also got just for this card (and now I have it for lots of other cards!). I cut two slits so I could loop it through and tie a bow. And voila! A relatively simple card (other than my having to measure things which is somewhat risky!) but there is just nothing I want to mess with on it.

Recipe:

Stamps: Baby Bella Pea

Ink: Dark green by ColorBox

Paper: Mint Dot by BoBunny, yellow cardstock

Other: Watercolour pencil crayons, dimensionals, spring ribbon by American Crafts, green fineliner

Hooray for Friday, even if the weather is pretty grey here!

Bellas!

2008-04-10T11:28:00.002-04:00

Things have been very busy here for me and I just had the last night of class of my degree! Whoohoo! Moreover, I finally have my Bellas! The ice under my car finally melted so yesterday I charged up the battery with a wonderful little Black&Decker booster I bought and away I went. If you are one of those people who has a bad habit of leaving lights on or is nervous about winter time stuff, this thing is worth it. It fits in most glove compartments and you do not have to open up the hood and stand outside to charge the battery! You just plug it into the 12v power outlet (the cigarette lighter outlets). Super easy.

So with a charged up battery I finally made it to Scrapbook Centrale. This was, of course, a dangerous expedition for my credit card. But so many yummy things to go with my new Bella stamps!

This card is my mom's card for Mother's Day. My mum was a reference librarian and it is thanks to her that I am a total bookworm, so this was the perfect Bella for me! And for her! I used colours I happen to love for the Bella's clothes and discovered I'd bought new paper and glittery flowers and little bubbles that matched perfectly! Yum. I pulled out some of my glitter glue to spice up the top edge of the bottom paper with the sentiment. I also used my Stardust pen on the work, the flower on the Bella's shirt, and the flowers on her glasses. My mother is not notably a glittery person, but it was just too much fun!

Recipe:

Stamps: Bookwormabella

Ink: black by ColorBox

Papers: MME Spirit "Bright Electric Glow/Lime, blue and white cardstock

Other: blue glitter glue, Heidi Grace designs glittered flowers, Hannah's Story Rain Dots by Cloud 9 Design, watercolour pencil crayons, Stardust glitter pen, black fineliner

Can't wait to play more with Kittycattabella, Jammiebella, and Sweet Baby Pea Bella! Not to mention my new owl stamps by Sassafrass Lass. And all the new papers! And decorate my new card box. So much fun stuff to play with, so much time that I should devote to a paper. Oh well, the paper will get done but so will some cards!

Hope everyone is having a great week!

Sunshine!

2008-04-06T12:15:00.002-04:00

It is a lovely sunny day outside and the temperature is quite nice, even if there is still a large section of ice on one side of my car and a large snowbank outside my appartment. It feels like spring.

My mother mentioned to me that my father had found her quilled Easter card quite adorable and seemed rather taken with it. The suggestion was that I see if I could think of something small to make for my dad involving quilling. His Father's Day card was made ages ago, as was his present (before I discovered blogging and found lots of excuses to make cards and crafts). I had, however, bought a mini easel and canvas at the art store because I was sure I would find some use for them. The canvas is only 2 -3/4 inches on each side. I had thought perhaps of a fish, as I have a cute pattern for that, but then I thought of a sun and remembered the ribbon I have. When I was young my dad always used to sing "You Are My Sunshine" with me. I admit I got a bit tired of the song, but the sentiment is sweet. So it is sort of "our" song. So a lovely sun seemed just right.

I used a nice yellow, tangerine, and dark orange variety of quilling strips and voila! The canvas I coloured with a blue chalk cat's eye stamp pad. Too lazy to pull out my paints and mix the right colour then wait for it to dry! ;) The ribbon is just long enough to reach to the back of the canvas and the words curl around a bit, but I wanted to keep enough to do a scrapbook page some day. I used plain old white glue to attach the sun to the canvas, and gluegun to attach the ribbon.

Hope everyone is having a lovely day and is getting some sunshine!

Sundae card!

2008-04-04T20:02:00.005-04:00

Looking through all the stickers I have I found a set I'd found at Dollarama of ice cream cones and sundaes. I couldn't resist! The sundae was great because it had coloured ice cream, plus chocolate, whipped cream, and a cherry (made with a little red rhinestone!). Yum! Then I thought of some great paper I have that is just pictures of chocolate chips! How sweet! ;)

I decided to try a flap card so I pulled out a piece of double sided plain paper from a pack I'd gotten at Walmart. It was the perfect colour to go with the blue in the sundae. Then pink paper for the same reason. I covered the chocolate chip paper with plain white vellum to tone it down a bit, which allowed me to write the sentiment right there. I used a brown fineliner then went over it with clear Sakura gel pen. I was excited that I could even get my shimmer brads to match! It was a card that was meant to be!

I repeated the chocolate chip paper, vellum, and then a piece of pink cardstock inside. I pulled out a doodlebug stamp I have of an ice cream cone and stamped it in brown in each corner, then used my glaze pen again to go over the ice cream. Just nicely muted but tying everything together.

Recipe:
Stamps: Doodlebug ice cream cone (not pictured)

Edit: no more double "s" on Stamps. I am not Gollum! Oops!
Ink: dark brown by ColorBox
Paper: Chocolate chips, card brown and pink cardstock, blue paper from Walmart
Other: sundae sticker, pink, blue and clear Sakura glaze pens, blue and pink shimmer brads, scalloped edge scissors

This is definitely making me crave ice cream! I must resist!

WSC42

2008-04-04T19:50:00.003-04:00

Today was less than stellar weather-wise. Although they predicted rain we got snow. Big, fat, fluffy flakes of snow all day. Yuck! It melted as it hit the ground, but I was still very disgusted. Luckily I had some card ideas to cheer me up!

I really liked the samples people had done for Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge this week and I finally felt inspiration hit me on it! I pulled out two papers I have from LilyKate line by BG. I just love BG papers! The colours work much better in person. I should stop taking pictures at night in my appartment because the light is just not conducive to it, but I was too excited to wait! The colours are paler than they appear, more muted. I pulled the green from the bamboo paper to use as a mat for the two pieces.

The birds are by Jolees Boutique and were just too perfect. I was trying to figure out if there was going to be ribbon and then I remembered some old lace I have. It worked great. I used a pink safety pin to gather it a little bit to put on the little message tag. The primas were a last minute add but they just added what I was looking for. I love how the card turned out!

Recipe:
Paper: Bamboo and Chenille from LilyKate by BG, cream and green cardstock
Other: pale pink/lavender primas, tiny yellow button brads, birds by Jolees Boutique, old lace, pink safety pin, antique gold eyelet

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Celestial birthday

2008-03-31T21:09:00.002-04:00

I had to pull out some old stamps for this one. I stamped the sun and moon in black on white cardstock, pulled out my watercolour pencil crayons, and went to work. Good thing I had some Robin Hood episodes to watch because this sure took a while. I love the detail though and it was totally worth it. I also used my Sakura Stardust glitter pen to accent the faces and the outer corners. I used thin dimensionals to mount the images on plain cardstock, then put those on thicker dimensionals.

The background paper does actually have hints of blue, although it doesn't show well in this photo. I used some edge stamps in silver to make the lines, then embossed them with clear EP. The sentiment was written in silver ink. Overall, I like it, although I am a little iffy on the background paper. It does look better in person though. My camera is not great at night with the lights in my appartment.

Hope everyone has a great day tomorrow!

Tiara!

2008-03-31T20:58:00.003-04:00

Well I'm still working on the cards for my friend. This is the last of the cat birthday cards. Don't you love cat people? So glad she has so many friends and family members who are also cat people!

This particular card was inspired by a card I found that is a photo of a female persian wearing a tiara. How perfect?! A cat in a tiara is definitely the ultimate in queen imagery. Book the wonder cat agrees.

I was inspired by the CPS #58 sketch. I just really liked the idea of it. There are some fab examples up there!

Recipe:
Paper: Basic Grey Romani, purple, blue, white and orange cardstock
Other: teal ribbon from Michael's, Prima polkadot daisies, rhinestone brads, pink fineliner, watercolour pencil crayons, green ColorBox chalk ink, dimensionals, Sakura Stardust pen, Glossy Accents.

King Percival

2008-03-30T19:30:00.002-04:00

This is a quick sketch I did of my mom's cat Percival, done from a picture and imagination. I found a card today that is a picture of a female Persian wearing a tiara and it made me think of Percy in a crown. It is mostly pencil with a bit of added colour from watercolour pencil crayons. I have since added a bit of colour in the background to make the kitty stand out a bit more. I pondered making this into a card but I think I'm going to frame it for my mother in May.

I have definitely missed drawing! Hopefully I keep finding enough creativity for that AND cards! I'm sure I'll manage. ;)

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!

Circles, Circles Everywhere!

2008-03-30T16:40:00.003-04:00

I have seen a couple cards ( here and here ) that include an arrangement of 4 circles (although Taylor's includes one square instead) and I liked the look of it. Of course, that meant I had to try it out myself!

I punched out 4 1.5" circles from cream cardstock and immediately knew I was going to use more brown polkadot paper. I love this stuff and will have to get more when I run out. I also wanted some brown cardstock underneath although I did not quite have the shade I wanted. Not sure exactly what I did want, but I never seem to have quite the right shade of brown. Oh well. The corners of the polkadot paper were cut using my circle punch. Not perfect, but not too awful. That will take some practice.

For the stamps I grabbed a VERY old set I have from All Night Media. It is one of those sets of numerous small stamps that were rubber mounted on foam and you put a sticker on top to identify the stamp. Needless to say all the stickers have fallen off. I love that there are multiple cat stamps in the bunch! This sleeping kitty was just too darn cute! And the paw print too appropriate. I stamped them both in brown ink, then put a bow in one circle and then just a plain greeting in the other. I finished it off with some scalloped edges and shimmery yellow brads.

For some reason the finished product reminds me of old men's dress shoes, or even women's saddle shoes. I think it's just the cream and brown together. But I like that edge of retro feel.

Recipe:
Stamps: sleeping cat and paw print by All Night Media
Ink: dark brown by ColorBox
Papers: brown polkadot, brown and cream cardstock
Other: 1.5" circle punch, brown polkadot ribbon, brown fineliner, yellow shimmer brads, scalloped edge scissors, white gel pen

Lauren's sketch

2008-03-30T16:34:00.002-04:00

I also found Lauren Meader's Saturday Sketch and liked that layout. I too pulled the colours together from some ribbon I had. I love this ribbon and I don't use it nearly enough so it was fun to try to find paper that would work. I had to colour the orange with a brown pencil crayon because I had no paper that was more pumpkin than bright.

I adore these cat peel and sticks. Just so cute! This one was coloured in with Sakura Stardust pen (I just got it so it is going on everything it seems!). All in all a fairly simple card, but I'm happy.

Recipe:

Paper: dark red, orange, blue, white, and dark brown cardstock

Other: striped ribbon from Michael's, peel and stick cat, Sakura Stardust pen, birthday rubon, black fineliner.

SFYTT kitty style!

2008-03-30T16:26:00.002-04:00

I'm still working on making birthday cards for a friend of mine so this week's SFYTT by Jen del Muro was another chance for me to work on it. I didn't want to cover up too much of the patterned paper so I went with small ribbon instead of wider bands. I had also seen some cards with more rounded lines and liked that so I chose the bottom panel to round.

I love this kitten stamp. I got it when I was a kid and one corner of it has been chewed, although I forget if it was by a cat or dog. It doesn't show up well here but I used my new Sakura clear Stardust pen to add a bit of glitter to the stamp.

Recipe:
Stamp: kitten
Ink: ColorBox black
Paper: doodlebug valentine's hearts and flowers, glittery dark pink swirls, pink and white cardstock
Other: buttons, heart brad, Sakura clear Stardust pen, black fineliner, red rikrak by Offray, white satin ribbon by Offray, white daisy sticker

I Own a Cuttlebug!

2008-03-30T10:01:00.002-04:00

I finally own a Cuttlebug of my very own. Unfortunately I have to wait until May to play with it. My mother was thoughtful enough to phone me and ask if I did want one for sure and offer to pick one up for me (intending it as a gift for some point in time) as Michael's had a 50% off coupon this week. I decided to spend Easter money on it so we solved all dilemmas. Luckily they weren't sold out. It was a bit more than I'd hoped, even with the coupon, since they are one of those things that has not had a price change with the change of the dollar. But still cheaper than Walmart! Very exciting for me. I am not good at cutting circles, am definitely not good at ovals, and I always seem to have problems getting my scalloped scissors to work out when edging things. So I will be slowly adding some Nestabilities to my collection! I had a little trip to Walmart the other day and bought a couple embossing folders and the tiny tag die set since they were all on sale.

I will also have some new cards to post later today, including my take on Jen's SFYTT from yesterday. I was participating in Earth Hour last night and did not feel like turning my computer back on after that. Then this morning I discovered that my camera batteries needed recharging anyway, of course! So it's time to get some homework done so I can play later! Hope everyone is having a lovely weekend!

Drawings

2008-03-28T13:01:00.008-04:00

As I mentioned in my last post I had finally realized (with a little help) that I could draw images as stamp-style outlines and colour them to use on cards instead of always buying a stamp for what I want. And I want quite a few so this is a much cheaper and more creative alternative! So over the past week I have been looking around at stamp sites to see what I am really liking and thinking of how I could do it myself. I have been having warm fuzzy moments over giraffes since I saw some diecuts used for a baby card. I had a stuffed giraffe named Gerome (after the giraffe on The Friendly Giant) when I was young and I love him still. I gave my friend's baby a giraffe for her first birthday. Of course I need giraffe images! So I finally got myself in gear and drew one. I wanted it to look a bit like a stuffed animal and I think he turned out not bad. Not too hard to customize to change the face, make it bigger or smaller, etc.

This frog here is a cute little guy who could easily be adapted for a number of purposes. I could trace him but give him flowers, or a crown, change his mouth, give him a bow and make it a her, lots of options!

This grumpy cat was inspired by this stamp at Whipper Snapper Designs. I saw it and in the back of my mind I was thinking about how my cat would react to a party hat. This stamp is my rendition of what Book's expression would be, if one were able to actually get a party hat on her and make her stay still. More probable is my cat racing away to hide or playing with it so much you can't get it on her. I'm going to need a caption for this one, but I'm still pondering options.

Needless to say I had to try a variation of the grumpy cat. I traced the outline and simply changed the expression. I think the eyes need to be fixed, but that is how easy it is. I just put the two images up against my window and traced (the cheap girl's lightbox)!

I've done a couple more images, but I'm holding onto them to colour in the originals since I do not expect to trace them. They are also more obviously inspired by card layouts and particular artwork so I want to use them in cards and do a proper post with all the inspiration and that listed. But it's a beginning! A nice chance to get back to drawing as I haven't felt inspired to do my usual pencil and heavy shading in a while.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

It almost feels like spring...

2008-03-27T15:23:00.002-04:00

Today actually felt like spring outside here this afternoon. As long as I forgot the snow I'd seen this morning. Ugh. Still dropping snow on us! But I was running around downtown without my jacket in a t-shirt. In and out of stores, of course, so it hardly counts!

I've been awol from cards for a few days and I'm starting to feel guilty about it, especially as I offered to make 15 cards for my friend and I still have 9 to go! Hopefully this weekend will be productive without hot cross buns to slow me down! I've also been working on drawing some images which I will share as soon as I work them into cards. My mother kept reminding me that I should draw more. To explain, in high school I was sure I wanted to teach art. I loved to draw especially and took an extra art class before regular classes started. I even applied to university initially in Visual Arts. That did not last as all the forced creativity just felt wrong. Slowly over the years I have drawn less and less, especially since I started making cards for my creative outlet. I usually draw with pencils and do alot of shading, and almost exclusively faces. Not the usual choice of images for my cards! After I kept finding stamps that I wanted but just couldn't justify, especially considering shipping adds up nastily, I had the light go on: "Why don't I just DRAW images that are inspired by things I like?" Yes, one would think that as a PhD student I would be smart enough to have thought of this long ago. Apparently not. I have since drawn a giraffe (after I drooled over numerous giraffe stamps), a cat in a party hat which I have done in two versions with different expressions, started a cow jumping over the moon, and stared a frog (to be varied into frog prince, princess, holding flowers, etc). I have gone outside my usual comfort zone for drawing into more cartoon/animated types of line drawings finished in black ink that I can trace against my window onto cardstock. Now the problem is finding what images I want and getting them to look the way I want. But then I get to trace and colour them! That's where all the shading comes in! And someday I'll actually do something in my usual style, probably a fairy as I am amazingly inspired by the work of Brian Froud. (In case you're wondering, he did the conceptual design for Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, and is the artist behind Lady Cottington as well as the book Faeries.) Amazing artist, to say the least. After looking through his books I find it difficult not to be inspired to try a variation on a pose he's done. Almost like having a live model, but easier because everything is already flat!

Hope to have some new pictures to post soon! Hope everyone has a great day!

SFYTT take 2

2008-03-23T16:35:00.003-04:00

I just couldn't resist taking another stab at Jen del Muro's SFYTT! Yet another card in the large batch for my friend. This time I pulled out a new stamp from a doodlebug set I got this past week. I just had to join the cupcake fad! And I was wanting to make it at least somewhat gender neutral, despite the glitter.

Recipe:
Stamps: cupcake and border by Doodlebug, "happy" and "birthday" by Studio G
Inks: dark blue and black by ColorBox
Papers: circles on red, white and blue cardstock
Other: green and blue ribbon by Offray from Walmart, dimensionals, watercolor pencil crayons, blue glitter glue, detail clear EP, primary buttons, checked ribbon in red, orange, and blue by Offray, dimensionals

WSC40 and ssnotime27

2008-03-23T16:27:00.006-04:00

I decided to try out Beate's sketch finally this week and had fun. A friend of mine requested a whole bunch of birthday cards so I've been working on getting some made and it gave me an excuse to do sketches and challenges! I even decided to use the Stamp Simply challenge and make sure all my corners were rounded. Worked so well with the circles.

Stamps: Fluffles Birthday or Bust, "just for you" by Studio G

Paper: ProvoCraft stripes and circles, blue and yellow cardstock, white velum

Ink: black and dark green by ColorBox

Other: watercolor pencil crayons, white Sakura gel pen, detail clear EP, dimensionals, corner rounder

Hot Cross Buns!

2008-03-22T20:09:00.001-04:00

I just had to share! My hot cross buns are done and they turned out pretty well! Most of them I put on baking sheets but the last 6 I did in a muffin tin, hence the little ones at the bottom of the picture. I only iced one of them since they're still warm and it will just drip. But so yummy! Imagine the scents of cinnamon and nutmeg. That's the smell of my appartment right now!

Happy Easter to everyone! Wish I could share!

Jen's SFYTT

2008-03-22T18:40:00.002-04:00

When I saw Jen del Muro's sketch for today I was originally thinking of a new doodlebug stamp set I got, but upon reading the SCS DD challenge that had helped inspire her which required using everything old I had an idea! Jen was kind enough to let me know that her challenge didn't require using everything old, but I'd already decided I needed to do at least one version of her sketch with an old stamp set of mine. When I was in my early teens I had bought a fairy stamp set and I recently pulled it out again (finally!) to do a couple fairytale cards. So I just had to use some of the images for this.

Moreover, the stamps lend themselves well to becoming Inchies! So I'm getting in on that craze too! I used a purple ink which would stand out well on the pink paper, then coloured the images with a mix of fineliner markers and watercolour pencil crayons. Then I pulled out some new (cheap) tubes of glitter glue I got at Walmart in the kids' crafts section.

It isn't obvious in this picture, but the trail from the little star is actually mounted on dimensionals while the star end is stuck down with a mini glue dot to give it a bit of depth. I dotted more glitter glue in the center of each little flower because I wanted the inside of the card to be clean and none of my brads were tiny enough to be hidden behind the petals. "believe" is written with a blue Sakura glaze pen, and the faux stitches were done with the same pen.

Recipe:

Stamps: incredibly old rubber on foam fairy stamps which might be by All Night Media?

Ink: purple from the primary petals by ColorBox

Paper: blue, pale pink, pale yellow, peach cardstock, green polkadot from a pad from Walmart

Other: paper flowers by MM, glitter glue, dimensionals, watercolor pencil crayons, fineliner markers, blue Sakura glaze pen.

Definitely need to make another one of this sketch with my new stamp!

My OSW cards have been claimed... by my mother! I emailed her pictures, as I do with most of my cards, and she asked if she could buy them. I promptly replied that I would give them to her as a thank you for looking after me in May when I am on "vacation" there getting my wisdom teeth removed. I was really happy that things turned out so serendipitously!

PS I finally made myself a watermark! I just couldn't convince myself to mess up the simplicity of this card by putting it overtop. Eventually I'll do it right!

Now back to the hot cross buns which I hope have continued to rise!

One Sheet Wonder

2008-03-22T09:50:00.025-04:00

I finally finished my OSW! I know usually only a couple pictures are taken of the whole lot, but I really liked all the cards! I got my initial inspiration from Melanie Muenchinger's card. I had a fab piece of paper from The Paper Company that was white with black velvet flocking, and I remembered a very old stamp I have that my mother actually bought but which ended up in my collection. We both know who will actually use it! So I did one card. Then I looked at the paper, looked at the stamp, looked at my single card and thought I might as well use up the paper and make a set! This way I could give it as a gift.

And once I'd thought about giving it as a gift I remembered the awesome gift set Amy Rysavy made and showed on her blog, especially the customizable sentiments she included. I had to improvise a bit since I didn't have a set of sentiments stamps or a cuttlebug, but a marvy punch, xacto knife, and a Sakura glaze pen worked not bad. I also used her idea of glue dots on the back stuck to the paper they come on to make them removeable. This didn't work as well for me as I'd hoped as I had some serious problems getting my Terrificly Tacky Tape to stick to the backing paper, but it seems to be holding on for the moment. I'll make an envelope for it to protect it. I also chose to leave three circles blank to let the person add in what they need. I may turn one of the blanks into a birthday sentiment as I realized after I finished last night that I hadn't included anything for a birthday, but I like leaving options. Two of the cards already have small sentiments on them, meaning that they could get a sticky also, or not. Lots of options.

All in all I had fun! Not sure who I'll give it to as most of my friends are just not that likely to send cards, but I know I'll think of someone eventually!

Recipe:
Stamps: dried flower bouquet by Crazy Stamps Ltd. (small company out of Alberta)
Ink: black and white by ColorBox
Paper:Black Velvet Flocked Floral by The Paper Company, black and white cardstock
Other: dimensionals, black and red brads by MM, buttons, black satin ribbon by Offray, thin red ribbon, triangle crystal stickers, white Sakura gel pen, black Sakura glaze pen, brushed pewter square brads by MM, mini Glue Dots, Terrifically Tacky Tape, red satin ribon by Offray, red heart brad, large white satin ribon from my remnant pile, black and white EP.

Hope everyone has a great day! The sun is shining here, even if it is chilly outside, so it's time to do a bit of homework, some cleaning, and definitely my hot cross buns!

New Template

2008-03-21T18:41:00.003-04:00

I was messing around a bit and decided I needed a new template, which meant a new banner. I'm liking the change. I'll even work up a watermark while I have my editor open. The brushes used in the new banner are AvH Amaranth and an unknown source (looks like the site is gone now), but the brush set is 165_nero. Wish I could give credit where it was due, but I tried.

Almost done my OSW set! Just 2 cards left to finish up, so that makes me happy. The weather does not. Sunny today, but very windy which made it quite cold. Had a nice walk, but felt darn chilly by the time I got home. My car is obviously still frozen to my parking spot. Oh well. Hope everyone has a great Easter weekend!

Cherry ABC Time!

2008-03-20T20:19:00.003-04:00

I decided to do something that wasn't a card finally so I pulled out my glass paints and a plain heart-shaped glass ornament that I bought after Christmas when stuff went on sale. I had decided to make something for my Grandma and in honour of all the cherry pies she has made I decided on cherries. I started on the front, used the outliner, let it dry, then painted in the cherries, using black to shadow the bottom and white to highlight the tops. Then I did a leaf with the same thing. The back of the ornament I painted with pearl medium, a few coats. I didn't let it dry enough between coats apparently so it buckled a bit, but it just looked like cracks and weathering from the front.

I finished it off with outliner to write "Sweet as cherry pie!" then painted the edge with red and used gold outliner to edge it then paint on dots. And voila! I have glass paints to be used on dishware, so I have to let it dry then bake it, but then it will be permanent.

Aside from that I've been working on a OSW set of cards which I haven't quite finished yet. Looking forward to sharing them when I do finish though!

The weather was nice for a couple days but is supposed to head back down below freezing for the next few days. My car is still frozen to my parking spot, so that is less than exciting news. Oh well. Still waiting to get an email from my LSS about the Bella stamps I ordered so I guess it's good I can't drive out there yet.

Hope everyone has a good Easter weekend!

Chocolate Bunny

2008-03-17T20:51:00.002-04:00

The other night as I was trying to fall asleep I got an idea for a card. What else would I think about when trying to sleep? I remembered the chocolate Easter bunny my mom and dad sent me (I still get a little Easter basket because they're so sweet!) and thinking about a cute bunny stamp I have. And then I thought about biting into that chocolate bunny and I had my idea! A bunny stamp with a bite out of it. Who said bunnies needed to be white?

It took me a couple stamps to get two images I was happy with. I pondered masking the bite out, but it didn't work all that well. It was much easier to just grab some edging scissors and cut scallops.

I had to continue my pink and brown kick. I am just addicted to salmon and brown. Plus I was thinking chocolate. I love this based DP. The EK success Beach line is so much fun! And double sided with contrasting patterns (green stripes in this case).

A silly little saying was a must, although not quite as clever as Far Side cartoons. This is probably destined for a friend of mine teasing her about all the goodies she will eat over Easter.

Recipe:
Stamps: bunny by All Night Media
Ink: brown and black by ColorBox
Paper: blue and white cardstock, Beach Bursts by EK Success, chocolate polkadot, cream cardstock
Other: peach shimmer brads by MM, brown polkadot Offray ribbon, dimensionals, watercolour pencil crayons, corner rounder, pinking shears.

Needless to say after making this card my Easter bunny seemed to disappear. Oops! But it was so good! I looooooove Bernard Callebaut dark chocolate!

As an extra present for Easter my parents bought me some great tins with glass lids for my embellishments! I love them. They came from Lee Valley of all places! They have a variety of sizes and combos. I started out with a set of 12 of the largest flat tins and some higher ones that look a bit like spice tins or salt and pepper shakers. Great for bulldog clips and things like that. Might have to get more little flat tins sometime! So much fun to play around and figure out how to reorganize my goodies!

Ducky Stamp!

2008-03-16T19:18:00.003-04:00

I have had this Ducky stamp for a while and I've used it a couple times. I used it originally for a baby gift, then later for an Easter card. This year I had too many ideas for Easter cards but I felt like using this stamp again. I am working on colouring more and this one is perfect for that so I pulled it out and stamped it. Then it sat waiting for me to pick up my pencil crayons for about a week. I finally felt inspired today and grabbed it. Although it doesn't show up well in the picture there is more contrast between the yellow duck and the green around it. Watercolour pencil crayons are the best!

Originally I had been thinking of doing a "just ducky" card, but looking at it I just kept thinking of relaxing. I saw my "enjoy" stamp from Studio G and knew the sentiment needed to be "enjoy a little 'me' time." The rest of the sentiment is inside the card. I played around trying to find a good combo of colours, happy with the middle but not sure about what DP to use. Finally I pulled out this fab BG paper and decided it worked. Some brads, a mix of some bars and shimmer ones, and voila! Perfect for reminding a friend to destress! And I know she needs it since she's working on her master's thesis right now! Been there, done that, know all about the stress!

Recipe:

Stamps: "Sleeping Witzy" from Little Suzy's Zoo by Rubber Stampede, "enjoy" by Studio G

Ink: ColorBox black and dark blue

Papers: BG pink herringbone, dark and light blue cardstock, white cardstock

Other: green bar brads, green and yellow shimmer brads by MM, flower ribbon from Michael's, blue Sakura glaze pen, white Sakura gel pen

Hoping everyone had a little "me" time this weekend. And I think I need to get myself a colouring book. I haven't had any ideas for drawings to colour and I just do not have enough stamps to feed my colouring craving! Although I do have some Bellas on the way, assuming I can ever get my car out of my parking spot. Stupid ice around the wheels not melting!

Rainy Day Blues

2008-03-15T19:17:00.003-04:00

Today has been gray with a bit of snow. Definitely not the spring weather I'm hoping for. I am actually wishing for rain, which I know I will regret later. Just the way I now regret all the snow!

With all my dreams of rain I was overjoyed to find a great tutorial by Lauren Meader on how to make a paper umbrella! She had two gorgeous examples on her page and I just had to test it out. I looked at what I had done when I had just the paper and wasn't as happy as I'd hoped. I really was not liking the line between the panels, but then I remembered something I'd seen on Melanie Muenchinger's blog about using sticky tape to adhere beads to a project. Of course! I could use some beads to cover up what I didn't like. I pulled out my container with all my beads and felt bad for neglecting them. I haven't used beads much for quite a while since I stopped playing around with jewelry much. But now I have a new use for my little beads! And then after I had stuck the rainbow beads on the umbrella I decided the handle would look far too lonely. So I used beading wire to string the same beads randomly.

Now I had to decide how to make the card. Then I remembered Jen Del Muro's sketch that I had wanted to try. So I adjusted it a little bit to work with the umbrella and voila! Although the picture isn't the clearest, it says "rainy day blues?" at the bottom. Good for a get well or even just a cheering up card for someone sometime. And I got to use some of my lovely buttons! All in all a fun card for playing! Now if only it would rain outside and melt the snow and ice that is still holding my car captive!

Quilled Turtles

2008-03-13T19:09:00.002-04:00

I finally decided it was time to do some more quilling and I figured out what I wanted to do: turtles! The design came in the Little Critters kit I bought so I had to try it out. Not perfect, especially the bigger turtle who has different sized feet, but still cute! I'm still learning.

Unfortunately the colours didn't come out quite right on this. The turtles are a medium green, they are mounted on pale blue velum and the background cardstock is more orange/peach than it appears. I added in shimmery peach brads to hold down the velum on white cardstock, used edge scissors to shape it. I used yellow chalk ink on the edges and then grabbed my blue Sakura glaze pen to make dots. The bottom ribbon was a last minute fix. I had originally written the sentiment directly on the peach cardstock in white, but I just did not like it. There was just something not right, so I went for some ribbon. I cut slits in the cardstock so I could tuck the ends of the ribbon inside the card. I used a black fineliner to print the words on the ribbon with minimal bleeding.

I still wasn't happy, so I pierced the paper all along the scallopped edge of the card, even if it doesn't show up well in the photo. And then I decided the velum still needed an edging, so I drew a dot and dash line between the brads with a pink Sakura glaze pen. Not totally sure about it, bit it's ok.

Recipe:

Papers: light blue velum, white and peach cardstock

Other: peach shimmer brads, quilled turtles and flower, pink and blue Sakura glaze pens, yellow check ribbon, black marker, piercing tool.

Here's hoping the weather gets nice and the ice holding my car captive melts enough that I can drive it again soon! And I am fairly certain the parcel at the post office is my Easter parcel from my Mum. Isn't she sweet? I'm hoping for chocolate from the bunny Easter morning!

Sketch

2008-03-12T21:58:00.003-04:00

I was looking at the new sketch over at sketch this: cards and I really liked this week's design. I was really happy to have some time today to play around with it and see what I could do. I took the original design pretty literally and only did a bit of playing around with it, but I love how it turned out.

I started out with the brown polkadot paper and then pulled out the peachy pink DP. I wanted to do a bit of shadow under the polkadot circles so I picked the blue out of the DP and used dimensionals to make the brown stand out a bit more. I alternated where the "shadow" would be. Then I grabbed some cream that also matches the DP and used a cute little "thank you" stamp I have in blue. A little EP, some textured brown paper, some photo brads and I stared at it for a bit to decide if it was really done. I finally decided it did need a flower. I got lucky and had a large blue flower and a little pink one that matched! I picked out a shimmery yellow brad and voila!

Recipe:
Stamp: "thank you"
Ink: blue pigment ink from ColorBox
Papers: mint green cardstock, brown polkadot, blue cardstock, EK success beach design
Other: photo brads, shimmery yellow brad, pink fiber, dimensionals

Masculine Invitation

2008-03-10T09:59:00.000-04:00

As it turns out I needed to make another invitation for the cheesecake and movie night. We decided to invite a friend's little brother who is a sweet kid (can I still call him a kid even if he's closer to 20 than 10?) and enjoys hanging out with us and us with him. Needless to say I figured his invitation probably shouldn't be pink or flowery, just in case. It's the same layout with some minor modifications of how I cut out the stamp. I decided to use edge scissors on the yellow cardstock underneath the stamped image also. And of course I ended up liking this one best. Isn't that always the way?

Happy Monday!

Snowstorm results!

2008-03-09T20:02:00.000-04:00

Just to share the pain, that is my beetle under all that snow. Admittedly it is the result of 2 snowstorms in a row, but I am not enjoying all that shovelling! Good exercise but I'd rather go to the gym or go for a walk! I just felt too depressed at the thought of shovelling it out, then having to do it all over again. I never manage to get my car moved before they plow the parking lot at something like 6-7am (or in the middle of the snowstorm sometimes it seems). So I did maybe half the shovelling this evening since I felt the need to burn some energy. And more to come tomorrow. le-sigh.

Invitations

2008-03-08T20:27:00.001-05:00

After a conversation with a friend who was planning a birthday party for her hubby and was going to have cheesecake, it was decided that we should have a cheesecake and movie night when I'm visiting next. After checking to see if that was still a go, my friend agreed to enable me and let me make invitations. How much fun is that? I pulled out my Fluffles stamp and got to work.

Fluffles is coloured in with watercolour pencil crayons, and I put Glossy Accents on the balloons and the cake icing. I put on dimensionals and over a coordinating piece of paper. I put the whole circle on dimensionals again to mount it on the card. The bottom of the front of each card is finished in a different way with different scissors. Inside is a fairly typical "invitation" template I printed out on butter yellow paper.

Recipe:
Stamps: Fluffles Eat Cake by Stampendous
Ink: black by ColorBox, brown pigment stack by Colorbox, pastel chalk stack by ColorBox.
Papers: stack from Walmart (in previous post), butter yellow cardstock, white base cards, white cardstock
Other: Glossy Accents, watercolour pencil crayons, dimensionals, decorative scissors, Sakura Glaze pen in black.

new papers

2008-03-07T18:27:00.000-05:00

During my walk today to enjoy the nice weather before the snow hits I couldn't resist swinging by Walmart. And I found a pack of very pretty paper for very cheap! The pack is by Paperbilities, Printed Paper Designer. I also picked up some packs of cheap cardstock to help fill in some gaps I'd made. Ok, so my paper supply hasn't really dipped very much, but I couldn't resist!

I also pulled out a set of peel off's that I haven't used in far too long. I coloured in the cat to try to mimic my own little kitty, blending the watercolour pencil crayons a bit then adding in more on top. I put the kitty on brown cardstock, then used dimensionals to stick it onto blue paper. I also pulled out some Noteworthy decorations. So pretty!

Recipe:
Papers: coral floral stripe from Paperbilities, blue reversible solid from the same pack, brown cardstock
Other: Love & Cats peel off's, {note}worthy glitter diecut, brown ribbon, watercolour pencil crayons, dimensionals, edge scissors

I am tired of snow!

2008-03-07T14:57:00.001-05:00

As anyone in Eastern Canada and the North Eastern US knows, we have yet another stupid snowstorm on the way. We got a disgusting dump of snow Tuesday night/Wed and we have more on the way tonight and tomorrow. I am not impressed. I just couldn't face digging out my car to do it all over again, so it will be twice as bad when I get to it on Sunday or Monday. So I'm hoping I can curl up with a book, making cards, and doing homework. Hot chocolate and chai lattes will be my friends!
My empathy to anyone else who is getting this storm. I vote we send it all to the southern US. We should be nice and share!

Card box!

2008-03-05T19:17:00.001-05:00

I had bought an extra unfinished box from Omer DeSerres a while ago when they were on sale. I was sure I'd come up with a use for it sometime, and I did. I started to get a pile of finished cards, many that I had no destination for, so I needed somewhere to put them. And then, of course, I had to do something with the box!

I had bought this gorgeous paper a while back and had thought I might use it for a scrapbook page, but I got inspired to pull it out for this. I also pulled out a sheet of metallic dark brown. I loved the look of the chipboard box so I wanted to keep some of it visible. Very simple. The only thing that took time was to cut the pieces for the front. I might do more to the top sometime, but for the moment I like it plain like this.

On another note, the weather here is quite disgusting. It started to snow last night and we had awful wind today. And the snow is going to keep coming! We have a risk of even more snow on the weekend! I am so ready for winter to be over. Digging my car out has gotten very old. Thankfully I can get to school on public transit.

Variation on a Tag Card

2008-03-05T19:02:00.000-05:00

I got the idea the other night as I was trying to fall asleep: why not do a tag card as a folder instead of an accordian fold? I was excited and looking forward to having some time today to put it together.

I grabbed a bunch of papers in red, black and white as those are the colours of my friend's house. I used the Making Memories envelope template, leaving off the top flap, and made 5 envelopes. I put them together with the seams together. I used ribbon to lace the bottoms together and put eyelets in the tops. Ribbon was used as a closure. And then time to add all the fun stuff! The top corners were rounded with my corner punch.

I made the tags using the large tag card template from MM. I also used a small tag template to make small tags of contrasting paper to decorate one side. I used various stamps to decorate the plain cardstock under the decorated mini tags, all with white ink.

I also put a paperclip at the top of the tag, using both more regular design and square ones to make it easier to pull out the tags.

Recipe:
Stamps: Kelly Panaci flowers and swirls, All Night Media heart, paisley
Ink: Colorbox white
Papers: DCWV variety of black, white and grey designs, strawberry paper, red cardstock, white cardstock, black cardstock
Other: variety of paperclips, variety of brads, checked ribbon, black adhesive ribbon, red ribbon, dimensionals, "happy birthday" rubon set, MM flower with crystal brad

Clearly a CASE

2008-03-02T18:40:00.000-05:00

I have to say I had a really good day today. I woke up feeling rested, got at least some reading done (still a bit more to do for my class this week) and went for a walk over to Omer DeSerres. The only blot was that the sidewalks were more like slushy puddles today so my boots were rather soaked by the time I got home. But it was just too nice to stay inside!

I even got a card made! When I saw such a wonderful card on Thinking Inking I had to try it for myself. As I didn't have the stamp that was used I pulled out my Sharpie markers and gave it a shot. Sadly the brown is a bit too red for what I wanted, but it turned out ok. I also replaced the Liquid Applique with quilled circles. Overall I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. I put a small message on the back and now I can customize it whenever I want. Check out the original for instructions!

Recipe:
Papers: blue cardstock, Chenille by BG, white cardstock
Other: blue button brads, brown and green sharpies, white quilling paper, flowered ribbon from Michael's, sentiment sticker

CASEs

2008-03-01T18:53:00.000-05:00

So I have found a few more cards that I just had to try in my trips through blogs and galleries. The first one is this criss cross card by Stampin' with Sugar. I loved the little details she added with the faux lace edging. I wanted to use it as an insert for a present for my friend Rhonda. I decorated a box for her and have found various little things to put in it. Each little present is individually wrapped so I wanted a little card "explaining" each present. (The first present is a set of 3 coasters I made to "protect" her tables.)

The card also gave me a chance to play more with my new set of clear flower stamps by Kelly Panacci. I just love the set.

Recipe:
Stamps: Kelly Panacci flowers and swirls
Ink: merlot by ColorBox
Paper: Red cardstock, black and white swirl and floral, white cardstock, black cardstock
Other: crystal brad, black polkadot ribbon, edge scissors

My other CASE comes from Nichole Heady. She had CASEd a card she received and I loved the idea. I've seen a few other cards done with squares of different papers and I just liked the idea of using small pieces since I usually use large chunks of designer paper. I also had a great excuse to dig into my packs of Japanese paper scraps that I adore but don't use nearly enough. I looked to find some papers that would go well together and pulled out these 4 different pieces. And tada! I am not quite sure what sentiment to put on the card yet but I'll figure it out. I'm also waiting until I can buy new pale yellow and white gel pens. All the ones I used to have disappeared or died of old age! But this design is just so easy, just like Ms. Heady said! Done in minutes and the thing that took longest was my inability to draw and cut a flower that looked less squished.

Recipe:
Paper: variety of Japanese scrap papers from Paper Umbrella and a store in Ohio, pale yellow cardstock, brown cardstock
Other: antique bronze eyelets, small flower punch, crystal brad, dimensional squares for under the flower, black fine tip sharpie.

Easter card!

2008-03-01T18:39:00.000-05:00

Well, today has not been particularly productive unfortunately. One of those nights when I just did not sleep well and got to pay for it. But I have new cards!

This is the Easter card I made for my grandmother. I built it around the basket and egg stickers, a Jolees for You kit I bought specifically for this. I started looking at all my papers trying to find bright and fun papers. I love the glitter paper from my DCWV stack. Fun new ribbon also added a good twist.

Recipe:

Stamps: small flower

Paper: stripes from DCWV stack, pink cardstock, blue cardstock, yellow cardstock, white base card

Other: green ribbon, Jolees By You Easter stickers, glittery brads, Making Memories ribbon, black Sakura glaze pen

The only thing I really did today so far was to finally work on my carousel box again. I bought a fab set of 3 nesting containers from Omer DeSerres a while back and finished the smaller two but had kept the biggest for myself. I decided I wanted to decorate it like a carousel since I love them. I used to demand I get to ride on them as a kid (especially since I am not a "ride" person). I picked out some wonderful papers, chose coordinating paint, got the bottom done and some of the lid, then nothing happened. I also found a cute carousel horse colouring page online and printed it out and coloured it in with watercolour pencil crayons. Once it was colour-photocopied onto acetate and traced the outlines with Crystal Effects, I cut out the horses but wasn't quite sure where to go from there. Today I got the horses mounted on white cardstock, got gold stick and peel bars put on for the poles, and got the horses stuck on the box. Then I put more paper on the lid and stared at it. Now I'm stuck. I need ribbon for finishing up the lid, possibly some flowers, not quite sure, but my next trip to Scrapbook Centrale is weeks away! Their wall 'o ribbon is so nice I want to pick something from there. Oh well. The box will just have to wait a while longer. I'll post photos when I get it done.

Wishlist added

2008-02-29T16:22:00.000-05:00

I thought it might be fun to keep track of just what new stuff I'm lusting after (at least for craft projects), so I added a wishlist to my blog. I know that my top 5 (paper trimmer and Bella stamps) are going to be my Easter treat, and Easter can't come soon enough! The usual thing seems to be showing off what you just got, but I'd love to see what other people wish they had too! Afterall, we can't always have everything all at once, can we? I get jealous seeing some of the amazing materials other people have, so this gives me a way to keep track of what I really would like after I discover something amazing. And hopefully a way to keep myself from quite so much impulse buying!

Birthday card for a little cutie!

2008-02-29T15:47:00.000-05:00

With being rather far from home for school (5 days of not too strenuous driving) I have some excuse for getting my projects done early, but it sure means I miss out on the fun stuff. My friend's daughter turns 2 in March so I had to make a card (they already have the birthday gift). I got inspired from an older issue of a card magazine that gave some ideas about using clear or translucent materials. I had to CASE a card they had done making a window/pouch on acetate, but I wanted my pouch on patterend paper. So I pulled out embroidery thread and my paper piercing tool and went to work. Needless to say I figured out the deal by the time I was most of the way done. That's right, I do not own a sewing machine and therefore had to do all that stitching by hand! Worth it, but rather time consuming. I filled the pouch with some buttons, velum rectangles on which I wrote Happy Birthday with my Sakura glaze pens, and a little paper daisy by Making Memories. Then I just had to finish things up! As my friend adores pink there was no choice, at least until her daughter gets older and the cards are really for her. hehe.

Recipe:
Papers: pink and white heart stripe, pink cardstock, acetate
Other: flocked pink alphabet stickers, embroidery floss, buttons, star brads (or maybe they're flowers!), black Sakura glaze pen, black finetip marker, star shaped stick on rhinestones

More quilling!

2008-02-29T15:37:00.000-05:00

Needless to say, quilling is rather addicting. Anyone who ever sat in class as a kid and rolled paper will understand. I haven't had much time lately what with assignments and classes and baking cookies (who could resist sugar cookies, spring icing, and the shapes of ducks, frogs and owls?!), but this is one quilling project I did manage to get done.

I got the inspiration from the March issue of CardMaker magazine, which I bought precisely because it gave quilling instructions. The original that I cased was an ATC with quilled stickers, but I did this all myself. I had to add in a second colour on the flower on the top left (because I ran out of pink!) so that decided me on making a blue heart. The corner rounder was a must just because!

Recipe:

Paper: large herringbone print in pinks, blue cardstock

Other: glittery start brads, birthday rubons, flower and fairy alphabet rubons, magenta, green and blue quilling paper, Elmer's glue, corner punch, scallop scissors.

Hopefully this weekend I can get some inspiration and fit in some new cards or finish up a box project I've had on the go for a while. I just need more excuses to make and send cards so I use up my stock pile!

So I discovered quilling...

2008-02-25T20:19:00.001-05:00

I kept seeing stuff on quilling in DeSerres and I kept thinking that it might be fun to try. So when I saw a card magazine with instructions and realized it wasn't that hard I just had to test it out. And it's fun! I also realized that my family has quilled snowflakes included in our Christmas decorations, so now I have something new to add to my glass ornaments for Christmas!

This is the Easter card for my Mum this year and I'm quite happy with it. The bunny, duck and flower were from the Little Critters kit from Lake City Craft Co. and the egg was my own idea.

Recipe

Paper: embossed white cardstock, aqua cardstock, light blue vellum

Other: blue and purple ribbon, white glue, quilling paper

Still settling in

2008-02-25T10:51:00.000-05:00

Well, it will take me a bit to get settled in with a better banner and making a watermark and all that jazz, but at least it's a start.

First post!

2008-02-24T19:19:00.000-05:00

Welcome to my Blog!

After seeing all the fab blogs out there done by fellow card-making addicts, I thought I'd give it a shot, especially considering how inspired I am after seeing so many wonderful cards, recipes, sketches, and just committed crafters! So it's time to throw up some of my previous ideas just to share a bit!

Brown Fairy

This card was inspired by Stamp a Little Love Baby! by Cambria Turnbow. Her brown fairy card made me want to do my own! Especially when I remembered I had some fabulous fairytale paper! I absolutely love fairy tales, always have. The story on the right is the beginning of The Frog Prince.
The words on the little tags are "dream" "wish" "hope" as are on the original card by Cambria that inspired me. I just loved the sentiment.

Recipe
Stamp: really old fairy stamp I got as a kid
Papers: Once Upon a Time small and 8x8 stacks, light brown, tan, and brown cardstock
Ink: Brown stack from ColorBox, Black from ColorBox
Other: antique brass brads, brown ribbon, dimensional squares, spiral paperclip, detail clear embossing powder, watercolour pencil crayons, brown pen

Green Fairy

This is another variation I've done on the same card. This time I used some greens for variation. It seemed like an obvious choice to me and I love it almost as much as the original one I made. I also changed the words on the tags to "dreams" "come" "true." I thought that seemed to fit well with the fairytale theme. The brads are antique gold as well.

What's Mew?

I had seen a layout similar to this on the Lizzie Anne Designs sketchbook. The pun is from the SU! animal pun set and I thought it was cute so I kept it in mind. I pulled out an adorable little kitten which looks far too much like my own darling Book.
If I do this design again, however, I would definitely find ribon that contrasted more with the main designer paper.

Recipe

Stamps: kitten by All Night Media, alphabet from Walmart
Papers: white, pink and brown cardstock, red paper with swirls (any designer paper would be great)
Ink: black from ColorBox
Other: heart brad, pink and white stripe ribbon, detail clear embossing powder

Over the Moon!

I also pulled out another old stamp that made me think of another little saying. Cheesey, but I thought it was rather sweet.

I've recently rediscovered the joy of colouring and treated myself to a big set of watercolour pencil crayons for Valentine's Day (thanks mum and dad!). So now I've been trying to make sure I use them! They just go on so smoothly and there's the option of blending them if I want.

Recipe
Stamps: On the Moon by All Night Media
Paper: blue cardstock, white cardstock, rectangles with gold dots
Ink: black by ColorBox
Other: green ribbon from Michael's, dimensional squares, silver pen