Tim Holtz distress stained Happy Birthday!

A new card using Tim Holtz Ranger Distress Stain dobbers. For this flower, I used Walnut Stain and Broken China. The hemming lace is stained with Broken China. The frame is a Cricut die from the Cindy Loo cartridge. The yellowed ledger paper is from Stella Rose. The patterned paper is from my Cricut Imagine More cartridge. The rusty gold embossed paper is a piece I found at Hobby Lobby a few years ago. The music paper was from my stash, and I tore it and stained the edges with walnut stain. Used a rosette flower found at Michael's as the center of the TH flower. Happy Birthday sentiment is from Hampton Arts. I did stitch around the edges with my Janome Sew Mini. Card is for a very special person, my MIL!

A special Thanks!

This is a Thank-you card I made for a special friend! The designer paper is Citrus from K&G paper company. The image is a Studio G clear stamp I found at Michael's. I used copics to color in the image. I used scalloped Nesties to frame the image. I sponged orange die ink around the white scalloped frame, and them nested it inside the blue DP from the Citrus paper pack. I lifted the image with foam dots. I used paper flower punches and MS leaf frond punch for the flowers where I only glued the stem to the paper and let the flower tops rest on the lifted scallop frame. Each flower center has a mini brad. I then used jewels on the strip of striped designer paper. The card base is a bazil aqua plain cardstock. Simple but sweet!

Gruffies Birthday using Copics

This is a card I made for a certain little girl for her birthday. I am fairly new with Copics coloring. I do love to color with them! The ribbons were a little time consuming but fun. When I was done coloring in, I used Labels Eight to frame the image. Then I took the Terrifically Tacky Red tape and lined the edges of the back and then took this pale blue-green ribbon and tucked it and bunched it and made this ribbon ruffle around the frame. Then I simply used K&C designer papers as the background for her card. Fun and Sweet! Just love these Gruffies images! I got this one from my friend Julie from her online shop Scrapbook Store at your Door! Happy Birthday to my little someone special!

MIL Tray, Printers Tray altered for gift!

This is another view of the same tray. The first pic I took outside and this one I took inside.
Lots of fun! Details are in the post below this one!

For my Mother In Law on Mother's Day

I made this altered tray for my MIL on Mother's Day. It's a 7 Gypsies tray, that I did a quick white wash over. I selected several designer papers from 7 Gypsies, and several others. The trinkets I have been collecting awhile, but some are Tim Holtz, some are Bo Bunny, some are Making Memories, and some are from Red Lead, a specialty shop in Webster Groves, Mo. Some items are some things I had from my grandmother's sewing kit, like the white button where I put glitter in the middle. The spoon is one of my favorite items. I made this during a St Louis Splitcoast stamper's swap where our theme was altered items. I knew it would make a good feature on an altered tray! I also made the zipper roses, where I found the tutorial on one of the many blogs I visit, sorry I can't remember which one, but thanks for this cool idea! I also made the hemming lace flower by bunching up the lace in a gathering and stitching in place. I used some Tim Holtz bottles and typed Nehi Time in one and just the word Time in the other. I got this idea from the Tim Holtz website, when Tammy Tutterow showcased her beautiful tray. I simply had fun putting this together from finding the pictures of my Mother in law when she was young. Her sister helped by sending pictures to me in secret! So much fun to work with these fun photos! I wasn't afraid to cut the cute photo of my MIL when she was young in pigtails with a bottle of Nehi Orange Pop in her hand! I really liked putting all four pieces in each of those four frames. I also took another photo of her after she had her baby--now my hubby! The photo is cut in two pieces and centered in two frames. It contains her father and mother. The cute little framed picture of the four kids is my MIL second from the right, her sister and two brothers. I really love their wedding photo, they are still together after 55 years! Amazing! Still going strong! I had been thinking of doing this for quite awhile, and have gathered trinkets and collectables for a long time. These collage frames are really fun to do and the recipient was very happy with her Mother's Day gift!

Happy Mother's Day to all the wonderful hard working mothers out there! Hope your day was beautiful!

My First Award! from Julie at: http://designs-by-julie.blogspot.com/

 

 

 

The Liebster Blog award is given to bring newer blogs into the light. 
It's a great way to share blogs that might not otherwise have been noticed and should be! As recipient you must share the love and pass it along to others, as well as these four things:

1. You must post on your blog and tell a little about the award and
announce your 3-5 picks.
2. Let those know you have chosen them.
3. Copy and post the award on your blog for all to see.
4. Have fun and continue to inspire

The 5 recipients I have chosen for this award are, in no particular order...

1.  http://serenitylanedesigns.blogspot.com 

2. http://ariiaana.blogspot.com/

3. http://www.shareyourgifts.blogspot.com/

4. http://lastampers.blogspot.com/

5. http://ogilviesfollies.blogspot.com/

I chose these blogs because they are new, and they offer some great ideas, and have fun things to see. 

I wish to thank Julie who visited my blog and simply offered this neat award! I hope to post a new project soon!

Fun shadow box project!

I have always wanted to do one of these! I plan to do a few more! I found this frame/tray made out of wood fibers at Archivers. I took some old yellowed book pages from an old paperback novel and wrapped strips of book paper around the frame. I used an old fashioned glue to make the paper more pliable so I could easily wrap it around each little rectangle in the frame. I used flour and water ala paper mache. Once I wrapped the frame, I let it dry over night. The next day I wrapped a few more pieces around the corners and tiny spots. Again I let this dry a few hours. Then I took some Ranger Distress Walnut Stain ink and sponged around the entire frame to age it. I simply then used Modge Podge over the entire surface and again let dry overnight. Then I traced the back board frames and used coordinating papers on the rectangles. From there I had fun adding Tim Holtz gears, light bulbs, pocket watch, and other fun masculine embellishments I had in my hoard of embellishments. This shadow box project was made for a retiring co-worker. I had quite a lot of fun putting it together. The silver numbers are also fro the Tim Holtz collection of items. This shadow box pretty much explains the type of person is was made for. He is not only a maintenance person, he also has a Navy and medical supply background. He helped set up many Physician's offices with new equipment and the installation of new electrical diagnostic instruments and power examination tables. I thought this tray was very fitting!

Cricut Imagine More Birthday card

I used the Cricut Imagine cartridge Imagine More and loved the printed papers that coordinate together!

I chose a bonus image for the center of the card of the Rooster and the chick with umbrella. I thoughtthis was so cute to use for a Birthday card from "All of Us" ---a group of people at work.
The Happy Birthday sentiment is from Beyond Birthdays but I chose coordinating solid colors from the Imagine More cartridge to fill in the letters with color.  The --"From All of Us" sentiment is just letters I chose from the Alphalicious cartridge and filled in with Imagine More designer paper patterns. All of the colors and patterns coordinate so nicely!  I simply sponged around some of the letters to bring them out a little more since all the colors and patterns coordinated so well and just wanted to pop out certain words. This was certainly fun, and loved using the Cricut Imagine to make such a fun card! This machine is amazing to print and then cut all at one time! I sewed around two of the panels just to provide more texture and accent.

Butterfly card using SCS Sketch SC325

This is a sketch layout from Splitcoast Stampers. Roxy71 posts a new sketch every week! I liked this one, so I tried it. This is sketch challenge 325 or SC325. I also had the SCS Inspiration Challenge in mind for this card. I viewed IC277 from the online store Ruche. I liked the photograph here that inspired me to make this card.

I had fun with this one. I used a home made embossing folder that I made with jute twine. I simply laid pieces of jute twine on a piece of cereal box cardboard, and glued then in place with very tacky glue-I used Scoth brand white liquid glue, it is one of my favorites. I used nitrile gloves for this so I could lay glue all through the twine so it would stick well to the cardboard in straight lines. They weren't perfect straight lines and that's ok because this was the look I was trying to achieve. Then when  the pieces of jute were dry, I brushed Modge Podge over the entire surface and let dry again. I let it set overnite to cure. When I made this card, in order to get the embossing to work I slightly dampened the green cardstock with a water mister and spritzed the triangle pieces, and put it through my Cuttlebug. It's a plain texture, but it worked nicely. I like the color combination inspired by the mosaic paper, and colored the butterfly with my Copics. I used Spellbinders Labels Eight nestie for the die-cut of the butterfly.

Josh's BD Card

This is a card I made for Josh's Birthday. I used a sponging technique on the background, where I had three stamp pad inks ready. First, I took my Versamark embossing pad and smeared a few streaks on plain white cardstock. Then over that, I sprinkled some clear embossing powder and heat treated it. Then I took some Post-It notes and tore off pieces and then sponged over it. Then I lifted the post-it and placed it higher on the paper and sponged with a different color. I lifted the post it one more time and sponged yet a different color. Then I wiped off the clear embossed spot with a cloth to take off any color. This method is called emboss resist. One of my favorite techniques. This idea and technique I learned by watching Michele Zindorf blog: Freedom in Creating.
I then used my Cricut Imagine to cut out the Happy Birthday sentiment and the Skateboarder and the word Skate. The Skateboarder and the word Skate came from a Cricut Lite Cartridge by the name of "DUDE". The star and the flourish came from my Cricut Imagine Cartridge by the name of JT Art . It has a steampunk feel to it, and it looks great to use for teens and young adults. My son has been a skateboarder since he was a pre-teen. Now he gives lessons to pre-teens he has been at it so long.  The background star paper I found at Hobby Lobby. I used some black square brads in the corners and just lifted the image on three layers of cardstock to bring out colors.