crafting this and that

Hi!  Grrr!--is that what Frankenstein says?  I'm not too sure.  Anyway, I made a second card for Lily Pad Cards sketch challenge sponsored by The Greeting Farm .  My first entry is HERE if you're interested.  Remember the sketch?  When I first saw this sketch I totally saw a face.  Those knobby things on the side look like ears to me.  But I didn't really think drawing a huge face on a card would look that cute until I thought of Halloween.  And that brings me to my card for today. Hehehe.  Is he not cute?!  I mean for a monster, he's kind of cute.  But I'm really proud of myself cause I made him with my dies and a couple of punches.  No stamps except for that scar above his eye which is from the mouth of a skeleton face in PTI's Halloween Treats and Sweets set.  His face uses Spellbinders reverse wonky rectangles, and I used my corner punch to round the bottom of his face.  His hair (PTI felt) is made with ...

Hi!  I decided at the last minute to make something for TGF's Farm Fashionista Challenge .  I wasn't really planning to participate because I'm not really the fashionable person.  I'd much rather buy $100 worth of stamps than designer clothes or shoes.  And I pretty much wear the same style of clothing everyday!  Anyway, I made a little closet.    The closet is empty except for some paper clip hangers.  I tried to make hangers out of thin jewelry wire but that was too malleable and wasn't looking so pretty.  So I looked at some paper clips on my desk and turned them into hangers with my jewelry pliers.  The closet rod is a skewer I cut to size and wrapped in washi tape.  I didn't even glue the ends.  Here is Miss Anya standing in horror at her empty closet.  What is a fashionista's worst nightmare?  An empty closet.  Hahaha.  'Kay, only I might find this humorous.  The sentiment is half of th...

Hi!  I made a card to enter into a couple of challenges-- Lily Pad Cards and the first challenge over at Young Crafters Unite !   It's the first time I'm entering their challenges.  So YCU's first challenge is to color a stamped image.  I used my Copics to color in my image.  It's a month long challenge so still lots of time to enter. Lily Pad Cards has a sketch challenge sponsored by The Greeting Farm so I had to participate since I love TGF stamps. My card features TGF's Blush Babette.  I love her long, flowy hair.  Though if I had hair like that I'd probably wanna chop it off.  I haven't had long hair since I had my daughter and sometimes I miss it but I don't have the patience to grow it out.  The sentiment comes with the stamp though the banner is from Lawn Fawn.  I also used TGF's Blush Hello for the background on the lacey oval behind Babette.  I love the paper from Authentique.  I kind of splurged and got a whole...

Hi!  Wow, it's time for week 6 of TGF's Heart Journal !  This week is Text Me!--using lots of text and the tip is to cut up pages from old books or children's books.  Now I can't bring myself to cut up books even if it may be an old one cause it's a book!  So we used stamps for this assignment instead. My daughter's fun and colorful page!  She used Crayola paints and I love the color combo even though she didn't really know what she wanted to do.  She actually did some finger painting too after she saw me do that on my layout.  She waited for the paint to dry and then stamped some sentiments from Paper Smooches. My layout.  Truthfully, I never know what I'm doing when I start doing the assignment each week.  I kind of just wing it, I suppose.  I used watercolors and didn't want to use blue or green so started with red then some yellow and orange and added white too.  I had the bubble wrap still on my table so added that too....

Hi!  Made a card for TGF's Mystery Monday Challenge with Tracey P.  I really liked her bright summer card and the circle so I went with that as my inspiration for my card. I've been wanting to use TGF's Summer Fun stamp set for a while.  I thought it was so cute when it was released.  And I finally got Spellbinders lacey circles.  I just can't keep up with all those Spellbinders but every one is so fun and neat and I want them all but realistically can't buy every one. I feel overwhelmed with all my kids' school stuff.  My desk is covered with school papers and homework to look over.  Thank goodness tomorrow is Saturday.  And I didn't realize how difficult it would become when all 3 of my kids start after school activities.  I'm definitely the chauffeur.  Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!

Hi!  Seems like I've been making lots of baby and wedding cards lately.  I made this card for the Fabulous Felt Challenge in the Moxie Fab World (there's still time to play, challenge ends September 5th!) and for TGF's Farm Fresh Friday--Button it up! I used some of the clothes from TGF's Wardrobe sets.  I stamped them onto some PTI felt and cut them out.  I added some tiny buttons (click to enlarge photo) onto the clothes.  I also added some die cut buttons (from PTI) with twine and the sentiment is from Paper Smooches.  I finally also bought a grass die from My Favorite Things.  It's so much easier than cutting grass out with scissors.  I layered 2 rows of grass. Pretty simple but it actually took me some time to pick papers!  I think sometimes I tend to over think things.  I need to follow the KISS motto.  I still need to get into a routine now that all 3 kids are in school.  But mostly I think I need to stop feeling ...

And here's my 2nd card.  I actually didn't follow any sketch this time since the image was so huge!  I got this Milton stamp from the recent All That Scraps sale.  Now I'm thinking I should have gotten more while they were on sale! Anyhow, I mostly just spent all my time coloring.  The image fit nicely within the largest lattice rectangle.  I just had to trim the card base down to 5.25 inches and rounded all the corners.  The sentiment is from a Borders and Corners set from Papertrey Ink, punched with a Marvy punch (yes, I actually bought the matching punch just so I could use it with these rectangle stamps so I guess I should make things more often!).  The red ink is from Technique Tuesday that I got during a class that I took at a Creating Keepsakes convention a few years ago.  It stamped pretty nicely.  I'm still looking for a nice brand of ink that has a nice range of colors.  I'm thinking at some point I may try the new Ranger Archi...

Hi!  It's week 5 of TGF's Heart Journaling .  I'm amazed that I'm still keeping up with this art journal.  This week's theme is called Pieces of Me (layers and paper piecing).  The tip is to make texture with bubble wrap, old fabric and scrunched up paper. My daughter's layout.  She used some of my old scraps to create her background and then paper pieced TGF's Princess #3 and the castle from Lizzie Anne stamps.  It was her first time paper piecing and I think she did a great job. This is my layout.  Sorry for the junk-y picture.  I took it at night but you get the idea.  I used bubble wrap to create the circles in the background.  I pleated some ribbon on the top and bottom, and added a ribbon flower in the corner.  And at first, I asked each of my kids to pick a stamp that they liked to represent themselves but then I remembered I had this Wild Things set.  I thought my kids' personalities fit some of the animals pret...

Hello...I'm back with some cards.  Finally got a chance for some "me" time this past weekend.  And I actually made some random card this time without really thinking of an occasion.  I mostly wanted to use my new stamp, thanks Eva! I thought the sketch this week at CPS kind of went with a zen, minimalist, Japanese style :-) Anyhow, pretty basic, just Papertrey Ink cardstock and stamps.  The stamp is Kiyomi from Sister Stamps , so cute!  I forgot where Eva got it from, but sounds like they only sell it locally in Hawaii.  Kiyomi is colored with pencils, (still debating about going the marker route, especially now that I see Promarkers all over the place and Copics at Hobby Lobby and Aaron Brothers).  But at least pencils seem pretty forgiving, just blend away or layer another color over.  I ended up cutting the antennae off the butterfly.  Anyhow, I also wanted to use my Spellbinder Lattice rectangles, finally got that from Hobby Lobby afte...

Hi!  It's week 4 of TGF's Heart Journaling .  This week's theme is the girl in me and we had to draw!  Pretty scary trying to draw so I tried to think of a way to not put so much details into drawing a girl.  Hehe, maybe it's cheating?  And the tip was to try using a medium we've never used before.    My daughter's layout.  While I was out shopping for extra school supplies, I saw a Crayola painting set and thought we could try those.  So my daughter used paints to make a rainbow and then she drew some girls (her friends?) on paper and cut them out.  I think it looks happy and bright. Okay, here's mine.  I don't know who thought of the rainbow idea first but some how we ended up with similar backgrounds!  Maybe cause there were so many different colored paints, it reminded both of us of rainbows.  My 2 boys painted their own rainbows too!  See, I told you I didn't want to draw detailed girls.  I used bla...

Hi!  Since my brother's getting married, I thought I'd try making another card for my parents to give to him and his future wife.  I still can't believe he's getting married.  But what really bugs me is that we don't really know who she is.  I haven't even had a single conversation with her and yet she will be in this family within a matter of days.  Like, really?!  Like no invitation to visit their place or have a cozy dinner, and let me ask you a million questions cause I'm dying to know how it can be that you are marrying my brother when I didn't even know you existed a month ago?!  How does that happen?  Moving on ...  I used the photo from Paper Smooches August Sparks Challenge . Just a simple card.  Woodgrain impression (PTI), doily with Congratulations from Paper Smooches Sentiment Sampler, and lots of fuchsia and clear rhinestones.  i wasn't too sure about this card when I first made it but it's growing on me the mor...

Hi!  My brother's getting married.  Finally.  It was a bit of a surprise to say the least and the day is quickly approaching.  So I thought I'd actually make him a wedding card.  You know, I don't think I've ever given him a card, even a store bought card.  I found some inspiration at Paper Smooches August Sparks Challenge . The challenge is to use the photo as inspiration.  It kind of reminded me of weddings.  Only after I saved the photo, did I realize it was a garter, like the kind you toss at weddings. Here's my little Paper Smooches card.  I paper pieced the bunny from A Little Lovin to make a boy and a girl bunny.  I also changed up their eyes so they are looking at each other.  Hehe.  I think that makes them look super cute!  The sentiment is a mix of 2 separate stamps from A Little Lovin.  The heart and grass is also from the same set.  The kraft heart is impressed with PTI's woodgrain impression ...

Hi!  It's week 3 of TGF's Heart Journaling .  I hope I can keep up with this weekly journaling.  The assignment this week is to create a 1 or 2 page spread using the concept of gratitude.  The tip of the week is trying to add lots of layers.  My daughter and I decided to make a one page layout since we have the binding in the middle of our books. My daughter's layout using pastels.  I think she was kind of stuck with the concept of gratitude.  She didn't know quite how to express it on paper.  She added some beads for the sun and a flower in the middle of the TGF stamps. My layout.  I think I kind of went crazy this week.  I layered on lots of my scraps and didn't really even bother to glue everything down.  I used washi tape to hold most of the papers and used my kids' glue stick for the parts that still stuck up.  Then I used my kids' water colors to paint over some of the papers, mostly shades of green and blue.  I ...

Hi!  One more for Paper Smooches July Sparks Challenge .  Still using the free digi bee and bee happy sentiment from Paper Smooches .  I used the sketch in the middle again.  I really like the scalloped top.  I also tried to keep with white, pink, sunshine, chocolate color combo with a few splashes of some other colors. I went with a bee-lated birthday card!  I printed the bee a bit smaller and at an angle.  I popped up its body. I also paper pieced the candle and cupcake from Sugar Rush.  Added some bling for sprinkles on top and around cause I know it can get messy. Look!  A pun within a pun!  The carrot (for proofreading symbol ^, caret) is from A Little Lovin.  The happy birthday sentiment is from the Sentiment Sampler.  I stamped each letter of lated using PTI's Simple Alphabet. Okay, that is it for today.  I get to actually craft in quiet now. Thanks for reading!