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Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Hats off to Everyone!

It’s been a while since I’ve blogged.  I’ve been super busy with Thanksgiving and getting my house cleaned and ready.  But today I was able to get back in my little pink studio and do some work with paper. Yippee, it was so much fun! 

I’ve been making these little hats for all the girls in my family.  I had 7 to make, and I’m almost done.  I’ve got one more to do and then one I am making one with a scarf to match for a girl at my work.  The hats certainly look like Christmas.  

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You can find the pattern for these hats here: Red Heart Yarn  The hats are easy and go pretty fast.  It’s a nice little project to make for someone you want to share Christmas joy with.  It’s inexpensive too!  I made three hats with one skein of red yarn and a little of the off white. 

I thought I’d give this last hat in a little gift bag.  The gift bag went together fast and turned out very festive.  I used the one of the purses from Forever Young and a swirl from Accent Essentials, added some Prima paper flowers, a jewel, some faux gold stitching and ta-da—a nice little gift bag. 

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The card stock is Core’dinations and the patterned paper is from one of the 2010 Premium Homemade Christmas Stack DCWV stacks. The gold paper is from the  DCWV Glitter stack

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Oh, I starting to feel soooooo . . . Christmassy!

Monday, November 22, 2010

An ornament and a pass

No, no one made a pass on me or my ornament. 

It’s been a very busy weekend with my next to oldest grandson.  We went to see Harry Potter 7 Part 1 and then to the local Christmas parade.  It was cold!  Brrr!  But not nearly as cold for us as it was for the belly dancers who shimmied down the street with bare midriffs! 

We took Cayden back home today and it was a 6 hour trip total so there’s hardly been any time for my little pink studio and all that paper. 

I do still have a couple of little projects for you.  One is another ornament for my little studio Christmas tree and the other is  a pass.  First the ornament:

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This fan is from Ashlyn’s Alphabet and is the second fan.  I used the shadow feature and cut a second fan that I flipped with my Gypsy.  The paper is Paper Studio from Hobby Lobby and the roses are ribbon roses I picked up from the bridal section at Hobby Lobby.  I have a little collections of these as I do so many things. The fan is also edged with Stickles.  It turned out very nice I think.  It’s cut at 3.5”.  I wrapped the handle with ribbon and punched the hole for the ribbon hanger on the side of the fan. 

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I am working on some other ornament ideas I hope to share later in the week. 

For my other little project I have some hall passes I made for a friend who teaches high school English.  Her passes have been walking away, so I made a couple of clearly identifiable hall passes.  They turned out cute and very clean looking I think! I laminated them for durability. 

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I gave them a little faux stitching to pull it all together.  I used the icon feature on the Mickey and Friends for the bomb and I used Base Camp for the letters and their shadow. I even used George for the base which is 3 x2”. On the back I used Cuttin UP for the lettering, and I welded all the lettering with my Gypsy.  Love my Gypsy!

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I’ll be giving Melissa her passes tomorrow and though I know it wasn’t a complicated project or very involved, I know Melissa will love them.  They cost me very little to make as I used scraps, but I know they will be appreciated.  I hope you all have a fabulous beginning to a new week! 

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Another ornament

 

This time it is a pink and black Christmas tree.  I cut 2 each of 6 layers of the scalloped circle on Mini Monograms starting with 1” and going up to about  2 1/2”.  I glued the scallops together back to back and on the edges both front and back I used some pink Stickles.  I threaded them on a 1/8 inch dowel separated by black wooden beads using one bead for the trunk and then using a hot glue gun to secure them in  place.  On the top I used two white star buttons.  The paper is from the All Dressed Up DCWV stack. P1070162

The real story here is those black wooden beads.  You see they weren’t always black!  In fact they were red, so in my typical “use what you have” philosophy, I pulled out my Bic Markits, got my black one and colored those red beads black.   They turned out fine! 

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Hope you are all having a wonderful weekend! 

Friday, November 19, 2010

A Change of Pace

Thanksgiving is next week and I’ve got so much to do.  I’m feeling a little panicked.  I’ve got less and less time to spend in my little studio creating so the projects I’m doing are tending to be less involved.  Right now I’m making ornaments for the little Christmas tree I’m putting in my studio.  The ornaments will all be in pink, turquoise and black. 

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This first one is about 15 triangles shaped in a ball.  Does anyone know what this shape is called?  Any way, I got an email this week from Right AT Home with a link to the pattern for this little ball and several other shapes.  The site actually had printable patterns that already had Christmas designed paper you could choose from.  I didn’t really care for any of the patterns, so I just printed out a couple of the patterns and used them to do my own thing. 

I traced the pattern on the back of my own paper, cut it out and scored all the folds.  Then I started folding and gluing all the  tabs. The directions for both the patterns I used are not the greatest but they weren’t that hard to figure out.  When I was done I had a little ball made of triangles.  It came to me that each triangle needed a flower.  I cut out two of the daisy cut from Doodlecharms, one at 1” and one at 1 1/4  for each flower, bent the petals up and used my black Stickles to put a black center in each flower.  Then I glued a flower onto each triangle.  I had to hot glue the ribbon to the top for the hanger.  I love the way it turned out.  

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This star was on the Right AT Home site too.  The flourish is from Accent Essentials and I cut it in half.  Not so happy with this one but I’ve got some ideas on how to improve it.  Both papers are from last year’s DCWV’s regular Christmas stack.  I’ll have two more for you all Saturday! 

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Yeah, That Stack over There!

But before I talk about my project for the day, I want to encourage you to pop by http://www.passionatelyartistic.com/ and take a look at the wonderful work being done over there and join in on the Linky Party going on.  It’s a place I can always go to see fantastic projects and gain inspiration. 

Pumpkins—again!  I’m terrible about latching on to an idea and just doing it to death! But this time it’s a stack of pumpkins, and I’m using them for a table centerpiece on one of my tables at Thanksgiving.  I’ll be adding more to it—I think!  Anyway, I thought I’d share them with you now. 

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So how did I do it?  I used a dowel and glued the pumpkins pieces together around the dowel with a glue gun. The pumpkins are cut using a cut file I made using George and my Gypsy.  I adapted the file for the tall skinny pumpkin, but it’s essentially the same file. The bottom pumpkin is about 7” across so the piece is a good size.  There are a few more pieces to this that I haven’t finished yet.  I’ll post them all when I am done.  I had the ivy left over from doing the flowers at my son’s wedding , so I added it to give the pumpkins a lusher feeling.  Anyway here’s a few more shots of the stacked pumpkins. 

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The ivy is attached with a hot glue gun. 

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I hope you all have a productive day!  I think I’m going to make some pumpkin bread, and no, I won’t be using paper pumpkins. 

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Want some pie?

I love pie.  It’s one of my favorite desserts.  Given a choice between cake and pie, I’ll almost always pick pie!  So when I was contemplating my Thanksgiving invitations and I saw the pie cut on the Thanksgiving cart, I thought I’d try to build my card around it!  I think it turned out quite nice. 

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I used some cardstock in my stash for the base.  I have no idea where I got it.  The layers are cut from that same fall DCWV stack I’ve been using all fall.  The other bits of card stock are from my scrap drawers.  I love to see those scraps getting used up! 

All of the Cricut cuts come from the Thanksgiving cartridge.  I love that leaf motif.  It’s so elegant.  I cut the pie base twice, once in white and once in the burgundy that used for the card base and then trimmed the steam off. The crust was cut from a very light beige and I made it look brown with my trusty brown ink pad.  The sentiment is from one of my $1.00 stamps.  The edge punch is a Fiskars punch from several years ago and has served me well over the years.  I thought it added to the leaf motif I’d already started. 

Turn out pretty good.  I’m happy with it. 

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Now to get them in the mail! 

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Check out the give away over at Royal Things

Cindy Royal over at Royal things is giving away a brand new Winter Frolic Cricut cart!  Yeah!  Check it out!  You are one generous woman Cindy! 

Follow this link!

Royal Things

Blessings

We all have them and usually take so little time to think about how truly  blessed we are! As I was creating this banner I did take the time to think about how blessed I am .  That’s what Thanksgiving is about.  We come together in the abundance of our blessings to remember and possibly to think about where we would be without all the things every day that cushion our lives in some way. 

Here is my Blessings banner.  I really like the way it turned out.  However, it is long and was hard to get a whole picture of, so the first picture is just a picture of the whole thing. 

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Oh, I am going to have adjust that banner when I get home, and I am really not sure where I want to put it.  For now it hangs in my family room very lop sided.

Now here’s a close up!   

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EW!  Blurry!  That’s what I get for photographing it at night with no natural light and in a hurry.

The base of this banner started with a tag from Gypsy Wanderings cut at 6.75 and 4.75”.  Since I got my Gypsy, I’ve used the designer tag feature so many times I can not count.  It’s got great tags and in so many shapes.  I also used Sports Mania for the pennant shape at 5”x 3“, and because I don’t have Tie the Knot, I took the scalloped border from Accent Essentials and used two for each side at 3.45 x .45,  and welded it to the sides of the pennant. Then I cut a regular pennant out just a smidge smaller.  The scalloped circle cut at 2.91 x3.22 is from Mini Monograms, and I can’t remember where I got the leaf swirl.  The fonts used are Cuttin Up and Blackletter.  I used pop dots between the layers. 

The patterned paper is from a fall stack of DCWV from several years ago and the card stock is a mixture of Bazzill and Core’dinations.  I used some Stickles on the leaves and the ribbon is Hobby Lobby from their fall collection a couple of years ago.  I love the colors and think it turned out quite striking in appearance. 

OK, on with some more close ups.

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I counting my blessings because this been a hard year, and I need to remember just how blessed I really am.

Friday, November 12, 2010

Big Give Away over at Going Buggy

Envfys over at Going Buggy is giving away a 140 piece set of Pro Markers.  So hop on over and get all the details. 

Just a Note

I’m in the middle of a bigger project and I thought I’d have it done by today.  Unfortunately, regular things have gotten in the way and it’s just not done. 

I didn’t want to leave you without a project for today, so I whipped up this little note pad holder.  My friend Marleah had asked me earlier in the week if I would make her another note pad holder since the one I ‘d given her last spring was looking rather ratty.  Oh, goody!  Another excuse to play with paper.  Like I need an excuse.

I wanted to make this one more durable so I made it with a study book like cover and I made a sturdy pocket to slip the note pad into instead of gluing it to the cover.  She asked for bling so I glued some jewels and several Prima flowers, with a rhinestone flower and a tiny green pearl in the center.  I added three big rhinestones at the top and bottom for symmetry.  Sorry the photos are so bad. 

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I cute two pieces of chipboard at 8 1/4” x 11 1/4” and one at 1/4” x 11 1/4 and laid them on a 12x 12 sheet of paper so that there was a space the width of the chipboard between each piece and glued them down.  I then trimmed the 12x12 paper so that there was 1/4” all the way the chipboard and then cut the corners diagonally at about the width of the chipboard to the chipboard.  Then I turned the edge onto the back side of the chipboard and glued a 8 x11 piece of paper over the edges of the paper.  Ta da! I had a nice sturdy cover to which I added a pocket to hold the note pad. I promise I’ll show you with pictures soon. 

I used my Threading Water Fiskars edge punch and the paper is Hobby Lobby.  The ribbon is also Hobby Lobby. 

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For a quick project I think it turned out quite nice.  Hmmm. I think I go back and add a cute pocket on the other side too.

Marleah!  I hope you like this!

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Giving Thanks

Today is Veteran's Day, and I for one am grateful for all those families who make the sacrifices that come when a family member joins one of our armed forces and serves our country.  It is a huge sacrifice and one without which we couldn’t enjoy the freedoms we now have.  Thank you, all of you, who served and those who endure long periods of time without your loved ones and who sometimes endure the loss of that loved one.  Thanks YOU!

What are you thankful for?  That’s the question I asked myself when I started this project. I wanted to create a project that put all those things I hold dear together and expressed my feelings.  My husband jumped in when he saw what I was doing and added his own thoughts.  It turned out great except for the couple of words that I got crooked and I didn’t catch it until it was too late to change it. 

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For this project you’ll need:

One sheet of solid colored card stock

One sheet of background paper

one small scrap of contrasting paper

One 12x12 artist canvas

Paint to cover the edges of the canvas

Mod Podge

Glue

Tools:

Gypsy

Several Cricut Font Cartridges.

paint brush

craft knife

This project started with my Gypsy and really was pretty easy because of the Gypsy.  I used just about every font I have, and I threw in a few graphics in to fill some holes and to add interest to the canvas.  P1070105

Before I cut the words out, I took my 12x12 canvas and painted the edges with black paint.  It took at 3 coats to sufficiently cover the canvas.  Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of this process as well as all the other steps.  After the sides dried, I liberally painted the canvas with Mod Podge and added a sheet of paper on top of the canvas from the Old World stack from DCWV and then liberally spread a coat of Mod Podge over the paper. 

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I cut the words from a sheet of black Core’dinations paper and then left them on the mat until I was ready to glue them on.

When the canvas and paper was dry, I trimmed the edges of the paper that over lapped the edges of the canvas, and sanded off the rough edges.  This meant that I had to go back and touch up the black paint on the edges, but I didn’t do that at this point. I began gluing the words on the canvas using the negative images left in the paper as a guide.  I actually laid the 12x12 negative image of the words on the canvas and began gluing the words on according to the outlines of the words.  I did cut one of the graphics in a deep autumn orange to give a little pop of color and to add interest.

Once all the words and graphics were glued on and dry, I went back and repainted the edges pulling some of the paint onto the edges of the paper.  I like the look this added to the canvas.  Sorry for the glare on this picture.  Pulling the black paint onto the top of the canvas covered the edges of the paper which has a white core.  P1070122

At this point it was time for a top coat of Mod Podge, and I was careful to make paint brush strokes as though there were actual paint strokes on the canvas. 

And I was done.  I hung it on my family room wall to show you my work. 

One more look:

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That crooked “friends” is really bugging me!  Oh, well!  I like how it turned over all. 

My final words for you all today are be thankful for the freedoms we have and the people who have made it possible.!

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Hey, where do I sit?

Well, you sit over there by that pumpkin!  He he he! 

OK, OK, I will cut the cuttin up!  No I didn’t use Cuttin’ Up for this project.  I used my pumpkin cut file from my wreath, made it smaller and made place cards for my Thanksgiving table. 

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How did I do that! I am going to tell you.  I started with my pumpkin file made with George and cut 105!  I have 15 people sitting at my table this Thanksgiving and for each place card I need 7 pumpkins.  P1070103

Yeah! My expression hummed along for quite a long time.  Once they were all cut, I dragged out my Cuttlebug and embossed each one of all 105 pumpkins with my Dotted Swiss A2 folder. Sigh!  Yes, my arm did get tired!  OK you’re right. Not really! 

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After embossing I folded each of the 105 pumpkins in half.  I know I keep saying 105!  I can’t help it!  That’s a lot of pumpkins!  After folding I trimmed the bottom of each pumpkin so that each pumpkin would sit even.  Can you see the trim? I had originally intended to ink these with gold ink, but I changed my mind.  I mean, come on . . . 105!  P1070117

At this point I glued them together and added a green stem to each pumpkin. 

I also cut three of each parts of the actual name plates. This cut came from Gypsy Wanderings and was cut at 3x2”. The leaf paper is the back and the green the front with the beige name plate.  P1070112Then I stamped the name plate with a Basic Grey $1 stamp, wrote each person’s name on the name plate, and added faux stitching.   The name plate is attached with a paper clip. 

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Turned out sort of cute!  Now to finish all of them! 

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Need a Little Christmas

I happen to love December. From December 1st to the 31st, I love the hub-bub and celebration of the birth of Christ.  All the trappings and ceremony make me look forward with anticipation.  So last Saturday, I whipped up these tags just to tease my anticipation of Christmas. 

I know there are paper crafters out there who have created much more elaborate tags, but these are simple and easy to make.  I’ve got some more elaborate ones in mind and will share them over the next few weeks, but I’ll share these today.

I make all my tags for our Christmas gifts, and with our large family, it takes many tags, so the creation of tags makes it expedient that I be able to do so quickly.  So here are the tags I’m sharing today.  P1070097

See, simple.  I used cuts from Joys of the Season, the ornament and gifts, and from Winter Woodland for the poinsettia.  The tags came from Tags, Bags and Boxes, and the rectangle from George.  I embossed the rectangles with the Christmas Ornaments A2 embossing folder and gave them and the tags gold faux stitching.  I used my fanciest hand lettering to write the “to” and “From,” and popped the Circuit cuts off the tags.  P1070098

On this poinsettia I detailed the flower and leaves with metallic gel pen, used Stickles on the yellow center and then because I wanted more dimension, I used a yellow tri cornered bead in the center.  You can’t really see it in this photo. 

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I used Stickles on the the swirly bits and tip of the ornament and cut the hanging thing on the ornament out some gold holographic paper I had in my stash.  Nice! 

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For this tag, I welded the shadow of the gifts in the three different sizes together with my gypsy and then added the gifts with their Stickled ribbons.  The paper is from last year’s Christmas stack.  Fun! 

Now go! Create some thing today!