It's Spring Finally...

The snow is pretty much gone finally and the birds are singing... not too much longer than there should be lilacs in bloom (ok, at least a month, but a girl can hope!)

Colour Inspiration #49 ...AND ...Weekend Sketch #76

I combined Kristina's Colour Inspiration with this weekend's sketch and this is the birthday card I came up with:)

This Week's Splitcoast Tutorial - Post-It notes....

So, by now, you know my love for school/office supplies:) ...and you've probably seen me make a post-it note holder or two as well! So you know I couldn't resist trying out this week's Splitcoast tutorial, right?

I made this one for my mother-in-law. Her birthday is on Monday, and purples are her favourite colours. Of course, we've got all her gifts ready, but I thought I'd throw this in with her card for fun too:) Unfortunately, she had a fall yesterday when she was out for a walk and is in quite a bit of pain right now. I'm praying her ankle will be better soon!

Colour Inspiration 48; Mojo Monday 81

I made a quick card after work tonight for this week's colour inspiration and mojo monday sketch. I loved the K&Co paper that I used, so this card is mostly about the paper:)

Birthday Card for a Friend

One of my oldest friends (well, not that she's old, although she is older than me, but more that we've been friends the longest, you know!) is having a birthday this week, so this is the card I made this morning:)

Whew, what a busy week it has been...today has been my first moment to craft, can you believe it?!!

Birthday Card for my MIL

I made this card this morning for my MIL. I was playing a bit with texture on the edges of the oval pieces and distressed and inked them. I'm not sure that I like how it turned out...I'll have to give it some time and come back and see, you know?!

And here's one for Amanda...

This is the Card File that I made for my daughter! See my last post for the details on how to make these. (Paper is from Basic Grey:))

Magazine Holder, no - Magazine File, no - CARD FILE

I love this idea! I originally saw it on Jen's blog. Jen bought a template from Papertrey that I had on my list to look at, but then I saw another version on Dannie's blog and she linked Rubber Room Stampin' with the instructions. Now, I didn't follow these instructions exactly. There were a few things that weren't totally clear to me (that's probably just a me thing! - and I send a BIG thanks out to Blythe for posting her instructions and all those pictures!!), but I went ahead and I played with it and I made this little magazine holder, but instead of magazines it's for cards! It fits a standard sized cards (5.5" x 4.1/2") perfectly. This one is for my hubby, so he has a better place to put all the cards I make him after he's done displaying them! I think I'm going to go make one for my daughter too - she has a lot of cards to store as well;) ...and then I was thinking I might make a few for my craft area to store cards I'm working on:)

Matching Gift Bag

I made a little matching gift bag to go with the birthday card I made here. It's nothing fancy - just some DP on a brown paper bag, an oval punch for a handle and some ribbon, but I thought I would post it as I've been asked how I make these. I vary the heights depending on the size of what I'm trying to wrap, but in the end, it's just a brown paper bag:)

Great Ideas from Shawna

Last night I went to Shawna's for a stamp night and these are the projects we made! Shawna has the butterfly bigz die and so we played with that a lot! I think the butterflies are absolutely adorable~! I also really liked the idea for a top note pocket card:)

Colour Inspiration #47 and Weekend Sketch Challenge #74

Kristina's colour inspiration this week was really tough for me - I'm just not a brown and orange and yellow kind of girl, you know?! But that is what makes it a challenge. So I combined this week's colour challenge with the weekend sketch challenge (#74) and made this birthday card for my daughter's friend:)

Top note, quilted, basket...

I took inspiration for this little top note basket from this post on Angie's blog. I had just received my free stuff from the workshop I hosted last month and so was able to use the free new DSP and one of my new square punches. Once I made the quilted sheets, I ran them through my Big Shot using the top note die. The actual basket part is taken my making a bagalope out of half of a mid-sized envelope (scored at 1 " on 3 sides). The ribbon at the top was some grosgrain that again was free this month:)

Colour Inspiration

Here's my card for Kwerner's colour inspiration... I made it for a very accomplished young woman whom I was priviledged enough to attend the a violin recital of this week. While others were working away in the concrete jungle on Wednesday afternoon, I was listening to this sparkling beauty play Mozart and Vivaldi delightfully!! So this card is my way of throwing flowers:)

Scallop Envelope Treat Box

I made this one almost exactly like the tutorial I found for a couple of reasons... the main reason though was that Patti had some clever ideas in there and I didn't want to miss a step! The neatest tip that I learned was that when you want to colour a stamp 2 toned, you can stamp the stamp into the ink pad that will be most of the colour and then REMOVE the ink on the words you want to colour differently with your BLENDER pen and then colour them in with either a marker or your blender pen and an ink pad! Isn't that clever? I've never thought of removing the ink with the blender pen...I've tried using a baby wipe (which isn't so good for detailed work)...I've also tried using a piece of tape over the words when I first stamp the image...I've also tried using a marker on the whole image...BUT this is the best way I've tried by far! Use a blender pen!! - ingenious Patti!!

On my next box, I indend to stamp the background of the cardstock first, but other than that, I don't think I'd change much...this little treat box is adorable!

Scallop Envelope Purse

I love learning how to use what I have to make new things. This little purse/basket was made out of 2 scallop envelopes cutout with my big shot. Here's a link to the instructions.

BTW - it's much cuter in person - the pink pirouette floral print on the inside of the envelope flap almost photographs as white and in real life, the colours on this candy cane lane DP are really darling with the ribbon and flowers:)

Flower Card

I'm still not feeling well, but I was bound and determined to make something this morning... I took my inspiration from Kristina's Finally Friday post for this... She had made a flower card using circle punches. I decided to try with my oval punch...

Easter Basket

This is one of the projects we made at my workshop! Isn't Nicole so clever! I've wanted to make one of these but the paper bags I have were too wide for the top notch diecuts, but alas Nicole came up with the best idea... You make a bagalope out of half of a 5 x 7 ish envelope and voila!

On another note - I'm still under the weather... But I did make it through another hectic day at work yesterday - and you would not believe what my sweet husband had for me when I came home!

I'm sorry it's been so long since I posted - work has been super hectic and I haven't had much time to create. That being said, I did have a workshop last weekend and we made a couple of super cute projects that I'll try to post in the next few days. I'm feeling really uggy today, but am trying to push through and head to work. Hopefully once I have more sleep I'll be able to find more time to craft later this week:)

Club Night

So Wednesday was my club night and this month we covered our chipboard technique books. I like the idea of having a technique book where on each page I display an example of a technique with the instructions on the back. We covered these books much differently than I would have on my own. We kind of wrapped the box like a present. I'm partial to cutting pieces for each of the sections and using some ink direct to paper for corners and edges, but it's always good to try something new!

Kristina's Colour Inspiration #44

Here's my card for this week's colour challenge. It's fairly simple, but I love the ribbon so much that I didn't want to overdo it, you know?!

A few treats

I used these instructions again to make these treat holders. I like finding new ways to use what I have and this was a new way to use my scallop envelope die:)

Spiral Notebook

A couple more prizes for something I'm doing this week...

Scallop Envelope Treat Holder

This was made with these instructions from Nutz About Stamping. She has a lot of ideas on her blog about using the Big Shot in new ways:)

Another bookmark

Here's another bookmark I made this weekend - it's a prize for something I'm doing later this week... Details and links are found here.

Bookmark

I loved the bookmarks that people made at the SU Convention, but I didn't have the same chipboard to work with, so I made my own version...

Here's a link to Angie's video on how to make the one from convention.

Cinema Saturday #21

It was fun to have time to play with the Cinema Saturday Challenge this morning, but now I have to clean up my craft area and get on to the housework!

This week's movie was 'Bride & Prejudice' which is one I haven't actually seen, but it's based on my favourite movie 'Pride & Prejudice'. P&P was the first Cinema challenge I participated in and I made Gratitude Journals. Well, that was back in October and my journal is almost full now, so I thought this challenge was the perfect opportunity to make a new one. The colours and patterns were inspired by things I saw when I looked up this movie and I thought the gold hodgepodge fit the culture of it too - overall I just wanted a pretty, romantic feel to match the feeling I got about the movie. I will use one of these as my next Gratitude Journal and I will be giving one as a prize at something I'm doing later this week:)

(Some have asked what I do with my Gratitude Journal - well, everyday I try to write down at least 5 things I'm grateful for... Pretty simple, huh! That's it. It's been a good way for me to reflect at the end of each day on God's blessings:)

Thanks Brooke & Sankari for another great challenge and for helping me find another movie to add to my list for when we have a date night at home:) ...and you simply must go and check out both of their projects - they are both beautiful - and Sankari's is absolutely breathtaking and she has photographed it on top of her wedding dress even!!

Gift Box

I used these instructions for a card box to make a little box for the jewelery part of our daughter's birthday gift. The lighting isn't the best in these pictures, but you get the idea;)

It's my dolly's birthday!

Happy Birthday, Amanda!

We love you very much!!

Mom & Dad

A notebook of another 'kind'

I've gotten a lot of interesting questions about the spiral notebook I posted earlier this week here and on Splitcoast. I also posted one I made for my hubby a few months ago. The original idea came from the awesome Angie at Chic n' Scratch, and each time I've posted I've linked to her tutorial. Given the messages I've gotten this week I thought I'd post another notebook with a little bit of a description of what you do...

I made this little notepad for my desk and the inspiration came from the fact that I got a new embossing folder this week (half price at Michaels!) - so you know I had to play! I have a Big Shot and I'm awaiting my order of a set of texture plates for it from Stampin' Up. The embossing folder I used on this notebook is from Cuttlebug and can easily be used on the Big Shot with the multi-purpose platform (you do not need any special mats for this). Overall I'm really happy with how well these embossing folders work; however they aren't very large, so if you want to emboss a larger surface, you will still need a texture plate and the related mats. (Angie also has a great video on using texture plates in your Big Shot here.)

Also, that little green diamond/square shape on my notepad is a Cuttlebug mini embossing folder too. I thought I'd try a set of these too since at half price it was about $4 for four:)

As for the spiral notebook itself, as shown in Angie's tutorial, what you do is make a template first on some scratch paper (lay it out over your notebook and mark off where the holes for the spirals will need to go; then you punch them on with a hole punch and then you lay this on your measured and cut cardstock and use it as a template to punch the holes on it. You then cut little slits up to each hole so you can attach the spiral part to your notepad and decorate as you choose:) ...oh and use a corner rounder on the bottom two corners - and voila!

Pillow Box Chocolate

Another project from this month's club! This little pillow box is made out of acetate and filled with dark chocolate:)