Thinking Highly

I can't believe the weekend's gone already! I hope you all had a crafty weekend. I had a fun time teaching a class at my LSS on Saturday. Sunday we went to see Playhouse Disney Live. I took some great photos of my boys that I can't wait to scrap. Today I thought I'd play along with Moxie Fab World's Tuesday Trigger. Here's the picture they posted to get your creative juices flowing:Here's what I came up with:As you can see, I was inspired by the colors of this week's Trigger. I had some leftover 7 Gypsies paper from my November Scraptiv!ty kit that was just perfect. I also had some Core'dinations paper left over from that same kit. I ran it through my Big Shot with a Quickutz embossing folder, and then sanded the design to make it pop. The stamp is from Lizzie Anne Designs. I just picked it up from A Walk Down Memory Lane last week. Any excuse to use a new stamp, right?
If you want to play along with the Trigger too, you have today still to play.

3 Random Projects

Here are 3 random projects I've done recently for you viewing entertainment.
Random project 1:This is a charm and chain from Stampin' Up. The 1" x 1 1/4" charm plus chain cost just under $30 total, and I have to tell you, I'm really pleased with the quality. It opens like a locket. There's glass on both sides, so you could make this a double-sided charm if you wanted too. The glass on the front is beveled and the glass on the back is flat. The beveled glass also gives you a little room for layers and embellishments. I used My Mind's Eye's Ooh La La paper on the inside and added a Kaiser Craft Rhinestone for a little pizazz. I just put it together quickly to match an outfit I was going to wear. What I love the most, is that I can change it up as I please. So easy!

Random Project 2:
This is a frame I did for my sister who works for Make-A-Wish. I think I've mentioned before how much I love that organization and all the people who make MAW such a success. Just a little something for her office. Do you see those little half pearls inside the stars in the background? Well those (and the big pearls) are actually on top of the glass to add a little dimension to the project. The paper is from DCWV's Luxury Stack. "Wish" was cut from vinyl with my Silhouette SD. The star background was also cut with my Silhouette. It's hard to tell, but the layer under the stars is actually a pale shade of blue, not white. Oh, and that frame (mat and all) cost me a whopping $3 at Walmart.

Random project #3:
Did you know Scraptiv!ty post a new sketch on their website every month with 3 different layouts examples? I was one of the layout creators this month, and the above is what I came up with. Are you curious now about what the sketch looks like? Click here and you'll be sent straight to this month's sketch and examples. The paper and buttons are from Fancy Pants. I picked it up at A Walk Down Memory Lane, which just happens to have everything by Fancy Pants on sale this month for 25% off. Oh, and they also have Hero Arts Stamps on sale for 25% off too! Woo, hoo! Those artists at work are my boys, painting away on a canvas.

Sketch Time Again with My Mind's Eye

My Mind's Eye has posted another fabulous Sketch Challenge. These sketches are too pretty to not play along. This month in honor of Valentine's Day, there is the additional challenge of using red or pink or both on your page. Here's the sketch:

Now, this may be cheating, or maybe we can call it thinking outside the box, but instead of a Valentine inspired layout, I decided to do a Christmas layout. You see, I just happen to have a few The Merry Days Of Christmas Paper Kits that I won from MME back in December during MME's 12 Days of Christmas. Here's my take on the sketch, I rotated it counter-clockwise 90 degrees.

Here are a couple close ups. I went outside to take these pictures, and just as I was taking them it started snowing, so those little flakes of white you see are actually snow flakes!

A few details, the stitching is done by hand. I free-handed the dashed stitching, but the stitched snowflakes were done with the help of a Bazzill In Stitch Template. The punched border was done with Fiskars' Upper Crest Border Punch. The largest snowflakes around the photo were cut from The Merry Days of Christmas Holiday Shimmer paper. The only non MME products are the pearls, which are from Basic Grey.

If this looks like fun to you and you'd like to play along, you have until Thursday. You can find the contest and all the info on MME's blog here. Hope you're having a scrappy weekend!

I-top Punch Flower Tutorial

Here are the instructions for the I-top punch flowers that I made on this project posted on my blog yesterday.
You will need paper (I'm using Imaginisce's Teacher's Pet), at least 1 Imaginisce I-top punch, brads, and a paper piercer (or something to punch a hole with). You'll start by punching out your shapes (for the tutorial's sake we'll call them flowers) with your Imaginisce I-top punch. If you use the 28 or 22 mm punches, you'll need 8 flowers. If you use the 16 mm punch you'll need 6 flowers. Here's the fun part: scrunch all your flowers up, no need to be gentle. You want them good and creased up. Don't worry if they even tear a little. When you're done, you'll have a pile that looks something like this.Now, unfold them all, and then stack all 8 on top of each other.
Next you need to make a hole in the center of the flower stack all the way through to the bottom. I used my paper piercer for this.
Now insert a brad all the way through the hole. The color of the brad doesn't matter, it will be covered up by the flower petals. The brad is just the means of keeping the flower together.
Next, you get to scrunch all those petals, one layer at a time, back towards the center of the flower.When you're all done you'll have a flower that looks like this:Here's all 3 sizes next to each other (looking at your screen the 28 mm is on the left, 22 mm is in the center, and the 16 mm is on the right):
If you're like me, and a bit of an I-top-aholic (yeah, that's a word), and you have all 3 punches, you can make this variation. You'll need to punch out 2 - 16mm flowers, 3 - 22mm flowers, and 3 - 28mm flowers. You'll do the same process as above, stacking the 16mm flowers on top, 22mm flowers in the middle, and 28mm flowers on the bottom. When you're done you'll get less of a dome shaped flower and more a a flat flower. Here's a side view (the multi-sized flower is on the left, the 28mm flower is on the right):Finally, if you missed my post yesterday, here's a project I made using my I-top flowers:
I hope you enjoyed this tutorial. These flowers a pretty, fun, and go together fast! If you try these out, I'd love to see what you make. Just link up a picture in the comments. Happy scrapping!

Clothespin Photo Holders

I think Imaginisce has a style uniquely it's own. As implied by it's name, it's lines are some of the most imaginative I've ever seen. I can always pick Imaginisce's paper out of a line-up. I needed to do a few "congrats your pregnant" gifts, and just knew the Wild Things line by them would be perfect. I also knew it would give me a chance to use my I-top again. Well, not quite my I-top, but the punches for the I-top, I've been dying to show you all these great I-top punch flowers. Alright, so on to the photos. These are giant clothespins made by Creative Imaginations. They make great photo holders.
Here's the front and back side of 1:This second one uses the medium I-top punch on the front side and the small I-top punch on the back side.Let me know if you'd like a tutorial on these flowers, and I'll be happy to provide it. Happy crafting!

More Fun Playing Along

I've found that the best way to challenge myself to try something new, is to play along with other crafty challenges. Currently, Moxie Fab World is having a Taintor-tude challenge. Anne Taintor is responsible for pairing 50's advertising with sassy sayings like this:The challenge is to create your own Taintor-tude cards. Now, I think these are brilliant, but I doubted my ability to come up with something clever AND make it into an appealing card. Vintage isn't truly my style, but hey, I thought I'd give it a try. It's always fun to stretch your style. Well, I found myself having a BLAST and making some esthetically pleasing cards too! I used sticky-back canvas to print all of my 50's add images on, which I think gives the cards a really nice textured feel. The rest of the details can be found after the pictures.

Those who say diamonds are a girls best friend haven't met my friend, Jack:
Perhaps she could sell the children on eBay:

I'm the girl your mother warned you about:

She could resist everything... except temptation:
As mentioned the images are printed on Sticky Back Canvas. It can be run directly through your printer, and as the name implies, the backing is adhesive. Really cool stuff, you'll definitely be seeing more of it around here. I also used The Boyfriend and Earth Love papers from Cosmo Cricket. The colors in these lines are unique, gorgeous, and perfect for these cards. The corduroy buttons are from Stampin' Up!, as is the green ribbon. The lace and the blue/brown ribbon is from Making Memories. The pearls are Basic Grey, and the red button is Autumn Leaves.

If you decide to try out this challenge yourself, you have until February 15, and make sure to let me know, so I can check out your fab creation!

Scraptiv!ty February Kit Part Deux

As promised, today I have the second part of my Scraptiv!ty February Kit creations. First up is a pic of the kit contents. This kit has sooo much stuff, lace, glitter, rub-ons, stamps, and ooh the beautiful papers!

I made the background of this layout with the large stamp in the kit and a little bleach.This layout uses a technique for creating a lace look from glitter. All the instructions for this technique are found in this month's kit.

This final one is a card. Please believe me when I tell you it's very cool in person, but the sparkle just doesn't translate well in the photo. Glitter Lace flower is also popped out away from the card with pop dots. I hope you enjoyed this month's kit release, I know I had a blast creating with it!

Scraptiv!ty February Kit

That's right, the Scraptiv!ty February Kit is unveiled today! I have had so much fun creating with this kit, and I have so much to share with you that I'm going to show you half today and half tomorrow. When you come back tomorrow, I'll also have a picture of everything this month's kit contains.

This layout is my favorite.
This has always been my favorite photo of my Grandma and Grandpa Sasman, however, I don't know a lot about the photo. I left some blank space in the upper left corner to add some journaling once I find out a bit more. This month's technique is creating lace out of glitter. On this page I used a Double sided ornate border sticker to achieve that look. I mixed a little glitter and embossing powder together, sprinkled it on the sticker and heat to set. You could also get a similar effect by just adding glitter to the sticker, and no heat setting.

My second project is a St. Patty's day card. I'm Irish on my mom's side, so we always celebrate St. Patty's Day. Erin go bragh roughly translates to Ireland Forever. The shamrock center is made completely from glitter. It's especially cool in person.

My final project today is a purse gift bag made from 1 sheet of 12 x 12 paper, and a few extra paper scraps.
I'll be back tomorrow with 3 more pretty and very glittery projects made from this kit, but if you can't wait until then, head over to Scraptiv!ty's gallery to see what the other designers have done.