First Tri-Shutter Card & More

Well, since my last post, here’s what I’ve been up to:

Left to Right:

A) Sympathy Card

B) Sympathy Card detail

C) Grunge Valentine

D) Welcome Baby Boy Card

E) My first tri-shutter card! (Birthday)

F) “A note of Thanks”

(Click on hyperlinks to view in my Scrapbook.com gallery and for specifics)

Thanks so much for looking and for your comments!

New Year Crafting Resolutions!

Ok, so it is no secret that I have all but disappeared off the crafting radar screen.  I hate that.  I love my job, but I don’t love that it does not afford me time to craft or cook. SO, for the New Year, I am going to try the following: for ever two hours (minimum) of work I do on the weekend, I can craft for an hour.  This doesn’t mean that if I do four hours of work I’ll automatically spend two hours crafting, but I have to do at least two hours of work to earn my hour of crafting time. I think 1-2 hours per weekend is all I can afford, but we’ll see.

For Christmas I received a Cuttlebug from a dear friend!  I was so excited.  And as you can see below, I’ve already put it to good use.  I wanted it mostly for dry embossing, but now I think I’m going to be very into die cuts too! I love it.  I only have the die cuts and embossing folders it came with and the Winter Bundle embossing pack, so I’m clearly going to have to expand my collection.

Anyway, here are four thank you cards–the fruit of Saturday’s labors.

light blue cardstock; “Winter Woods” embossing folder (Provo); Pearls by Mark Richards (Crystal Stickers); letterpress tag (Paper Source)

lavender cardstock; white cardstock; Wisteria Paper Collection (BasicGrey); “Celebration Stamps” Embossing/Die set (Provo Crafts); “Salutation Phrases” MiniMarks Rub-ons (American Crafts); Quickie Glue Pen; Baby Pink ultrafine glitter (Barbara Trombley)

TECHNIQUE:  here I filled in the indented part of the embossed heart stamp image with my glue pen and sprinkled it with ultra-fine glitter for a little extra bling

white cardstock; “Phoenix Dotted Swiss” cardstock (Bazzill); “Christmas Wreath” embossing folder (Provo Crafts); white gel pen (Sakura); Accessories Book 2 MiniMarks Rub-ons (American Crafts)

TECHNIQUE: I liked the embossed image on the textured paper.  I decided to bring it out by outlining particular parts of the wreath with a white gel pen.  If I had all the colors I want, I would have outlined the image using various colors…but I think the white and red keeps it simple.

“Chicken Pox” June Bug Collection PP (BasicGrey); stash items; Sticker (Target)

I’m not a “bright color” person, typically, but every once in awhile a project calls for it and then I’m left with scraps! So, in an effort to use up these scraps I made this card.  I’m actually quite pleased with it. I apologize for my finger in the shot, but I couldn’t get the colors/light right otherwise.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!

Almost there…

Well, I’m ALMOST on break.  But it looks like this is going to constitute my Christmas crafting this year:

I heard about them over at Going Green Crafters and Artists which re-blogged the tutorial from How About Orange?

They are really fun to make and super easy and a great way to use up old magazines.  I think they can lend a modern look to a package as well. As mentioned at GGCA, maps would also work. As would scraps of wrapping paper.  The possibilities are endless!

Magazine Gift Bows

I learned about the magazine gift bow tutorial at All About Orange, via Going Green Crafters and Artists, a wonderful new blog focusing on eco-crafting (and to which I OCCASIONALLY contribute!)

This idea isn’t just neat because it is a great way to re-use paper, but the bows themselves can really make a package unique.  Check it out!

Yep…still here. Barely.

Well, tonight, out of necessity, I made the time to make some cards!!  One is a belated birthday card for my father, and the other is for my godson/nephew.  I also made one for my MIL, but on the chance she checks out this blog, I won’t post it until AFTER her birthday.

I’m busier than I’ve ever been before in my life.  I wish that was an overstatement. I miss my crafting friends and my crafting time, but at least I am happy professionally (something new).

I’ll be here when I can!

This card (for my dad) reuses some “junk” mail.  I say this as I don’t mean ANY disrespect to the organization that keeps sending me these paper Tibetan prayer flags.  I just don’t have use for a lot of them, so I’ve decided to incorporate them into some craft projects.  Here I’ve used two “flags” against BasicGrey Marrakech line paper with a letterpress tag from Paper Source.  I also inked/distressed the edges of one of the flags with “Dark Moss” Chalk Ink (ColorBox).

This card uses double sided cardstock (#NT104-Far Out) from The Paper Loft, a letterpress tag (Paper Source), Hero Arts “Printers Type Alphabet” lettering stamps,  “Penguin with Presents” stamp from Savvy Stamps and I embossed with “Rainbow Sparkle Lite” ep and Color box brown pigment ink.

Sunday Scrappin’ July 26, 2009

Please join us over at Sunday Scrappin’! All you have to do is post your papercrafting “ta-da”s and “to-do”s for the week and participate in the optional challenges!

I just got back from vacation so I don’t have much to show. I did make a card for my grandmother’s 80th birthday before I left and I don’t think I posted it, so here ya go:

She likes country decor, so I kept that in mind when making this card.   I used this “Country Hearts” stamp kit (RubberStampede) that I don’t use very often due to the fact they are foam stamps and I don’t like foam stamps. But the little squares make up a nice quilt look. I stamped on Martha Stewart PP instead of directly on the cardstock. One of the stamps had an extraneous ink mark, so that is how the photo corners came to be on the card, LOL. I actually like how it looks. I colored in the squares with colored pencils, and then added eyelets and ribbon (“pool” from Paper Source), and used some Martha Stewart jewel embellishments but stuck them to the ribbon so they’d look like charms (they don’t show that well in the photo, for some reason).

In addition, I am now a contributor at Going Green Greetings! Check it out for ideas on how to be a little more environmentally sound when it comes to papercrafting!

TO-DOs:

I’m getting caught up on work.  But I need to make a birthday card for my stepfather, so I’ll try to get that done this week.

Sunday Scrappin’ July 12, 2009

TA-DAs

• I’ll include THIS because it is a paper craft, kinda.
• I also managed this little card for some friends who are getting married on Saturday. I quilled the flowers and the pp is BasicGrey’s Wisteria line:

• I also managed an anniversary card for my husband (we celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary with a lovely day and a half in the Berkshires…Tanglewood, Hancock Shaker Village (my new favorite place) and the Norman Rockwell Museum) but I wasn’t absolutely thrilled with the results. The pp is BasicGrey’s Wisteria line, the swirl stamps are Rhonna Farrer, and the letterpress tag is from Paper Source.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to do Christine’s red, white and blue challenge.

TO-DOs:

I’ll be surprised if I get any crafting done in the next 10 days because I am going on VACATION!  To the other side of the country, in fact. I’m very thrilled about this, but will miss crafting while I’m gone..especially since Amy’s challenge for this week is so enticing:

…pull something out of your “someday” file and give it a try. Always wanted to try a certain technique? Been thinking about experimenting with a new layout or embellishment? Let’s get one of those things crossed off our list this week!

But I hope everyone else has a stellar crafting week!

Experiments in Window Treatments, Part I

Hmm.  Well our little venture in DIY home improvement meets crafting went OK.  About a month ago, husband and I decided we would try to make our own paper window shades a la Apartment Therapy.  In the instructions over at AT, they DO say, “You need rice paper sold by the yard on a roll.”  True, that.  However, I was reticent to order rice paper online without being able to touch and see it.  So, we headed to Paper Source, and fell in love with this chiyogamish paper that matches our green color on the bedroom walls.

EXHIBIT A

The only problem is that said paper is not sold by the roll, but instead in 25 1/2″ x 19″ half-sheets.  Hmm.  No worries, we thought…we’ll bind them together.

Approximately an hour of trimming and experimenting with different adhesives later (finally decided scrapbooking tape was the way to go!) we got this:

We gave up on matching the pattern and just made sure the center seam (where we had to join the panels of paper) matched all the way down. Then came the easy part…affixing it to the roller mechanism.  We ordered ours here and cut them to size.

Success, almost!  In all honesty, rolling them up is just slightly wonky and requires that you keep a close eye on the roller to make sure the paper stays aligned.  Below is sort of an eerie photo of the finished shade with the sun beating through.  We were surprised at how much heat it actually did block!!  I’ll post a picture of the shade without light shining through it so you can see that too.

I’m very much hoping that I can order the same paper directly from Paper Source without the precut.  We had to use six panels, whereas using rice paper by the yard would have saved at least an hour’s worth of time.

Sunday Scrappin’ July 5, 2009

TA-DAs

• Birthday card for a friend, based on SK011009 (sketch at Paper Craft Planet, original attributed to Becky Fleck). I love the Wisteria line from BasicGrey. The beads were threaded on to craft wire, and the base (which you can’t see), is lavender cardstock. The letterpress tag is from Paper Source.

• I bought these beautiful letterpress tags from Paper Source and they are true inspiration for cardmaking. This follows a sketch by Melanie Muenchinger (SK120608 at Paper Craft Planet). All materials are from Paper Source except the PP which is from Making Memories Travel Collection.
• I also worked on my altered book.
• And, because I hate to miss a challenge, I did this little tag to fulfill the “Summer” challenge from last week’s Sunday Scrappin’.  All materials are from Target, except the cute epoxy flip-flops.

TO-DOs

• fix anniversary card for husband (oops)
• buy some graph paper

I probably won’t  do next week’s challenge, which is “and the 4th of July is all about red, white and blue, let’s create a page using those colors. It doesn’t have to be a 4th of July layout just use the patriotic colors.” I’m on deadline for some projects, so I’d best deal with some non-crafting stuff before I go on VACATION!!!

übercandy alert!!

Ok, if I come across any more great stuff today, I’m going to update this post, but let’s start with Tammy over at “Hopelessly” Addicted to Paper.  Amazing offering of tons of different brands…go check it out.