Thursday, March 17, 2011

Honored Recipient of a Blog Award and a little Share

The other day, when checking comments (which I do not do every day to be honest), I saw a little comment by Emily Leiphart.  I stumbled across Emily as part of a Unity Stamp Company Friends with Flair blog hop.  I was inspired by her work, it is always so beautiful, clean, and just inspiring.  Truly a very talented and creative woman.  Well Emily, left a comment letting me know that I had won a Blog award.  (Emily, you taught me what Blog Awards are!)  She named me as a recipient of the Liebster Blog Award.
The purpose of this award?  To identify other bloggers in the blogging community who may not have very many followers, but have inspiring work.  In honor of that, I will pass this on.

1. Debbie Tehrani.  She designs for Color Combos Galore, and her work is just AMAZING, I love all her texture, layers, colors, everything.  Not to mention she is just wonderful!
2.  Fi.  I know her just as Fi, and her work is also gorgeous.  Lots of texture, color, flair, pizzaz! 
3.  Nora.  I have been internet scrap buddies with Nora for ages now.  And recently she sent me a beautiful card.  She makes beautiful cards and I love looking at her works of art!

Take a gander at these lovely ladies work, I promise you it will be well worth it and result in your going back again and again!

__________________________________________________________________________________

And my share for today....


I completed this layout for a challenge over at Scrapjazz.com.  The challenge was to create a layout in which you use stitching in part of your title.  I wasn't sure what to do, then one night while trying to fall asleep, the phrase "Let Them Eat Cake" popped into my head, and I knew EXACLTY what I was going to do.  I am very happy with the turn out! 
And for those that like a little bit of story picture background......
My husband had NO idea I was gonna shove the cake in his face.  We never talked about it before we got married (to be honest there was a week between proposal and marriage), so he was more than shocked when he opened his mouth to be fed some cake and got a face and nose full of it.  His only comment later was that his head hurt because of cake in his sinuses!  poor guy, he married........

Supplies: Cardstock (Bazzill), Patterned Paper (Unknown - left over bits from other layouts), Flower (Prima), Flourishes (Basic Grey, Me and My Big Ideas, American Crafts), Journaling block (Pink Paislee), Letters (American Crafts), Font (Bickham Script Pro), Paint (Delta), Spray (Tattered Angels)

Friday, March 11, 2011

Friends With Flair (FWF) March 11, 2011

Hello,

I am very excited as this is my first time ever participating in the Unity FWF Blog Hop.  I have to admit that I am a long time follower of the hop and have even been a blessed patron of their blog candy blinkie thing (you know what I am talking about)!  Well in an effort to expand my own creativity, challenge myself, and use all the beautiful rubber I have been collecting, I decided to join in on the fun!  One thing before I share my lovely card.

1.  Unity has an awesome Kit of the Month club.  And I mean awesome.  When you join their kit of the month club, you get a full 8.5x11 sheet of precut and mounted rubber stamps.  Not only that, but you also get some awesome benefits.  Every month you will receive a little sheet of paper with discount codes a) free single stamp set of your choice when you purchase $35 worth of stamps and b) 25% off all other Unity stamp purchases for the rest of the month.  Not only that, but sometimes they throw in other goodies from other co-branded manufacturers.  The Unity Kit of Month Club is just AWESOME.  I say that as a starting cardmaker and a scrapbooker!  You can see the kit on their website along with additional information about their Kit of the Month club here.  (There is also an image of the current kit below)
 Okay, and if you are still with me...... after that rambling, my card

Supplies: Cardstock (Bazzill), Patterned paper (Unknown, scraps from other projects), Ink (Tsukineko), Stamps (Unity KOM August 2010, Unity KOM December 2010), Buttons (Garage Sale Find)
In an effort to use up ALL of my scraps since I have a major problem with throwing away any of my paper crafting stuff, this entire card was made with scraps in my scrapbox.  Makes me love it even more!  Also, my card is based off the current Hip Hop Sketch (Hip Hop Sketch #48) posted over at Split Coast Stampers and can be found here. Thanks for looking all!  And to make your hopping more user friendly, I believe your next stop is Patricia at Crafty Creations.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

A monogramed gift, gift bag, and why my husband rocks.

One of two besties turns 26 this Friday.  We generally do not exchange gifts for anything, just never really have.  However, I wanted to get something for her this year, it's been a tough year for her, but I have been at a loss on what to get her.  I know she would appreciate everything and anything that I gift her with, I just didn't know what.  That is when I decided to make these.

Supplies:  Tiles (Lowes), Ink (Tsukineko StazOn), Stamps (Unity Create Today and Insightful Meadows), Letter (ProvoCraft Blackletter Cartridge, Gypsy)

And a close-up

They were so easy to make!  I made all four in the matter of an hour or so from start to finish.  Each is backed with adhesive backed cork to make sur ethey do not scratch any surfaces.  The monogram was created using a stencil I created using my Gypsy, Cricut, and Blackletter font cartridge.  The idea came from this tutorial by Gina K and found on StampTV.ning.  If you would like a tutorial on how I made the monogramed coaster tiles, please let me know, as I plan on making more for myself!

Supplies:  Patterned Paper (Imagination Project, Left over scraps); Tag (Unknown), Stamps (Unity August 2010 KOM, Unity September 2010 KOM), Eyelets (Unknown Company); Ink (Tsukineko, Ranger Distress); Ribbon (Unknown); Die (Spellbinders); Cardstock (Bazzill)
And because it is my friend's birthday, I wanted to wrap them.  Who doesn't like unwrapping a present?  I got the tutorial on making the bag from a single piece of 12x12 paper at ScrapWhispers and can be found here.

And this is why my hubby rocks.  The tag was his idea.  I was not sure how to decorate the bag, or if I should just leave it plan.  His suggestion "I think that a vintage tag would go with the bag, you should make  vintage tag."  And thus the gift tag was born!

Small Little Card Share

I have taken a small break from my stamp organizing..... primarily because after a week or stamping and cataloging I'm sick of it!  However, I will say that I *heart* my new system.  It makes it much easier to stamp, which means more stamping is in my future.  I am saying this eventhough I have yet to finish cataloging all my stamps!  Okay, moving on..... I'm taking a break from the cataloging to finish up some other projects that I started ages ago and just never really felt the inspiration to finish.  To be honest, I do not have a new found love for the Tri-Shutter Card.  I thought it would be a fun new way to fold cards..... but I never know how to decorate the rest of the panels.  Thus, I have simply decorated the fronts of most of the many that I made.  However, I can say that it is a good way to use up all those precious pieces of patterned paper I do not want to part with!  With all this said,  a share.


Supplies: Cardstock (Michael's, Making Memories); Stamps (Unity January 2010 KOM); Embossing (Provo Craft Cuttlebug Houndstooth); Patterned Paper (Basic Grey); Inks (Ranger Distress Inks, Tsukineko); Embellishmets (Flowersoft, Unknown Ribbon)
I love how the front of this card turned out.  Eventhough I am at a loss on what to do with the rest of the panels, I just love how this turned out!  Thanks for looking all my lovelies!

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Ramblings, Updates, and a Card

Hello all my lovelies,

I know that I have been slacking in my blogging lately.  I have been very busy and not tinkering much - I guess I am having another uneventful paper crafting burnout.  Do you ever get those?  I have been crafting like a maniac, and then *POOF* I want to do everything else in the world but play with paper.  As that is the case, I have been working on other projects.....

1. I made a small little fabric box to hold all of my cuttlebug plates, Fiskars texture plates, and Sizzix texture plates.

 I'm not a great sewer, to be honest, I just don't sew.  Thus, believe me when I say, this little 8x4x7 box took me all day and has some of my own blood mixed in!

2.  Created a stamp catalogue... I am not even done with it.  I have 8 of these binders filled with stamps, mostly Unity, but some other stamps as well.  Needless to say, it has been a chore.  I will post pictures soon of my accomplishment.
My stamp boxes

3.  I made placemats.  Hubby has been asking for some more placemats in ease the use of our only set.  So I made one set from very old fabric, I think it is as old, maybe even older than me!  I have another set planned that will be made this week.  I will be using my Cricut to cut some of the fabric.  I will also be posting about this, as it's always fun to see other crafty fun right?  Sorry no pictures for this part.  For whatever reason I am incredibly tired today and it took too much effort to walk to the kitchen take pictures, and then walk back to my little crafting hole.

I guess my paper crafting frenzy has been replaced by a sewing frenzy, not that I know how to sew - only what Youtube and the internet teach me.  Oh wise and mighty youtube and google.  With that, I will leave you all with a little bit of paper crafty fun of a card I made a little while ago.



Everything on the card was made using left over scraps from other stuff.  The sketch is Unity's Hip Hop Sketch #45 found here at Splitcoaststampers.com.

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

CPS Sketches and Cards Galore

Hello all my lovely ladies (and possibly the occasional gent!),

So sorry it has been so long since my last post (nearly two weeks!!).  My lack of posting is not an indication of not fun paper crafting adventures..... I have been working on a family album for my mother.  Basically I am scrapping the 35+ years worth of family photos that she has been keeping stacked in boxes in a cupboard.  The only reason I have not shared them is out of respect for my dear family, who is unaware of my blogging efforts - thus they would not be aware of their faces on my blog!  However, I do have a small share for you today.  Some cards.

Supplies:  Unity (stamps), Bazzill (cardstock, flowers), Dies (Fiskars Circle Cutter, Spellbinders), Ink (Tusineko, Prisma)
I created these using CPS Sketch #206.  I made several as you can tell.  I'm not much of a circle person so I decided that I should make a challenge of it and really practice using circles!   Also, I have so much scrap paper which has grown since my post here, that I have been trying to use them up!  After reading the most recent issue of Scrapbooks Etc., which has a feature on using up scraps, I decided to challenge myself.  Use as many scraps as possible on all cards, layouts, projects, before breaking out the new, unadulterated stuff. 

Thanks for stopping by and as always, comments are appreciated!