Sunday, September 30, 2012

Elegant Wedding or Engagement Card

Who doesn't love a wedding?  Romance, emotion, Love, giggles, happiness.  My beautiful niece, Danielle will be married this week in Georgia.  I sadly cannot attend the wedding.  I wanted to send her a beautiful card to convey how very much I wish her and Charles a wonderful life full of all the good things.  I came up with this card.  (Hers is a little different...)  What is more elegant than black, white, cream and silver?  When making cards by hand, it always adds elegance and polish to "mat" your papers.  The front of this card has 7 paper layers and two ribbon layers.  Wow!  You don't really feel them when holding the card.  I started with a black card base, added a floral paper with a black mat and a white mat.  I adhered the wide black satin ribbon and the slim white satin ribbon to the floral cardstock (wrapped around and taped in the back) before adhering the floral to the black and white mat.  This "hides" your assembly and makes the card appear like it was "made" that way or "seamless".  Then I cut the shape under the heart out of a black on black baroque printed paper from my Cricut Cartridge and matted it with white again.  Finally I embossed a heart shaped stamp in silver on Colonial white cardstock with foam tape to make it stand out.  Then I used glitter glue to fill in the silver embossed "vines" on the heart.  The cream floral paper already had silver glitter in the center of the flowers, so again, adding it to the heart gave it a more polished look.
Inside I added a CTMH stamped sentiment, "Wishing you Peace, Love and Happiness" from the "Lovely Lily" stamp set (B1401) and then a French Bow from a NEW CTMH stamp set called "Jardin Flair" (D1528).  In the center of the ribbon I added an "Opaques light tan Adhesive Gem" (Z1333, $2.95).  What a beautiful and elegant sentiment for a gorgeous card!

Friday, September 28, 2012

Boo From The Crew!

It's that time of year when we start pulling out sweaters, showing off our fashionable scarves and getting ready for Halloween!  Halloween is actually my least favorite holiday.  I don't know if it is because my kids are grown, or if my optimistic attitude doesn't like the "dark" side of the ghoulish day, or if Orange and Green are just not my pick of colors.  However, one look at this cute stamp set from Close To My Heart put me in the mood for some Halloween card making!  I saw this little ghost and thought he could be made into something sweet and have the ability to put a smile on some one's face....And a SMILE?....yep, I'm all for that!  I went to my trusty box of premade cards and envelopes (they are a card maker's dream...especially if you find them half off or on clearance!) and picked out the bright yellow cards. Link to Example Box of Cards 
Then I searched for some coordinating paper and found the orange wiggly stripe that you see in the picture.  I always cut my background piece 1/4 " shorter than my base card.  Then I rounded the corners to give it a softer look....which works well because the ghost doesn't have hard edges!  Then I used CTMH Colonial White cardstock to cut a smaller piece to stamp my ghost onto.  Almost always, I ink all my edges...it puts polish on your project and really makes everything work well together!  I put "sunset" ink on the pumpkin and black on the rest of the stamp.  Then I added the sentiment in "sunset".  I saw it still needed something....so I added a black rat and a black bat.  I LOVE glitter, so I added some glitter glue to the bottom of the ghost.  
On the inside of the card, I used a piece of Olive cardstock, again cut down 1/4" from the size of the card and rounded the corners and inked the edges.  Then I used a colonial white piece cut from the "Art Philosophy" cricut cartridge (Z1686) and adhered a coordinating Dimensional Element (Z1685) that I had stamped in "Sunset" with one of the stamps that comes with the Cricut Cartridge kit.  This left room for writing a note and a signature.  You can purchase the solid cardstock, ink, stamps, and cricut cartridge and more in my CTMH shop to make your own "Boo from the Crew" card.  The "shop with me" link is on the right side of my blog!  Boo! from my crew!  Have a safe and Happy Halloween and fall season!  

Monday, September 24, 2012

Avonlea Photo Box

I realized today that I haven't shown you the Photo Box I made from the leftover paper in the Avonlea Workshop Kit!!!  It came out soooo cute!  I don't know about you, but I have seen this type of "altered" project before and thought, there's no way I can make it look that good!  Well this altered project was an exception!  I followed the instructions that were given to me and with a few minor adjustments finished up with this gorgeous box!  
It is covered with Avonlea paper on all four sides.  The only thing that I found I had to adjust was the template they gave for the front and top of the box.  It's a much better idea to just trace your empty box.  If you would like to make this box, go to my "shop with me" icon on the right of this blog and purchase the Avonlea Scrapbooking Workshop kit (pg 21 of catalog, #G1045, $29.95), a My Creations Photo Box (#Z1322, 6.95) and if you wish, a Color-Ready Canvas Alphabet (#Z1777, $6.95).  The canvas alpha was used to spell out "PHOTOS".  You could substitute with an alpha stamp set of your choice or the letters cut from cardstock with your Cricut.  Although, the texture and look of the canvas is a really nice addition to the project.
The box is plain white inside and comes with a magnetic closure.  This would be a lovely Christmas gift!  


Friday, September 21, 2012

One Fine Day

Close To My Heart has the BEST scrapbook kits!!  They put together the greatest paper packets with embellishments, stamps and great design.  I had the pleasure of working with the Typeset Workshop Kit this past week.  Typeset is no longer available, but I will show it to you so that you can see the amazing things you can do with a CTMH kit!  
My son Michael was lucky enough to visit with my Mom in Virginia every summer.  We lived in Georgia for many years, so he would come up and visit for several weeks.  In June of 2000, Hampton Roads had its first Opsail celebration.  Tall Ships from all over the world come to our area to visit.  Mom took him to Opsail that year and they had an incredible day.  That is the pictures I used for this layout and they came out amazing!  The kit came with specific instructions for cutting, preparing and laying out the pages.  I used the first CTMH cricut cartridge, Art Philosophy to cut out the large shape behind the pictures.  
The kit included an exclusive stamp set that had the "star" and "button" stamps and the "UR special" stamp.  The "FINE" I stamped was from one of my other CTMH stamp sets called "Token Alphabet".  It is still available for purchase (E1020, $29.95) in my CTMH shop.  The "cardboard" shapes I used are also still available (Milepost shapes, Z1464, $3.95) and come in a pkg of 48 pieces of arrows, circles, shapes, circles, ovals, etc.  
I'm not sure if you can tell in the picture, but the kit called for me to use my pearl paint to highlight the cardboard shapes.  That was fun!  There is also a little paint brushed directly on the page.  I love the texture in this layout!  The yellow (creme brulee) stars were cut out using the cricut cartridge and then I used my bone folder to score them on the back to make them pop up!  To bring this page altogether, I inked all of my edges with cocoa ink.  It was One Fine Day in my Scrap Loft!    
Then, I was able to make a SECOND layout on my own.  Bryan is my shining star.  I made this for him, but I do have ONE for sale on my Etsy shop, Kindness Paper.  You can find it at http://www.etsy.com/shop/KindnessPaper.  I used the paper left over when I cut out the background shape from the first layout for the top of this layout!  
The shape is echoed in the bracket on the right side of my son's photo and in the shape on the left side of the photo.  See how it makes the page visually appealing?  
I used the same alpha stamp again to stamp the "YOU" on the banner.  Then, I used my new CTMH crictut cartridge, Artiste, for the "shining STAR".  I used the same pearl paint to make the letters "shine".  The only thing that isn't CTMH on this page is the star punch I used above the "shining".   Keep in mind that you can use ANY Paper kit from CTMH to make this SAME layout!!!  Once you have the design, that's all you need!  Let me know if you try it on your own, I can send you some of the measurements I used.  What a great kit!!!

Monday, September 17, 2012

My Flirty Layout

Happy Monday everyone!  I finally finished MY Flirty Workshop (see yesterday's post!) layout this morning and can share it with you.  I added my own touch to the layout by taking out the Fall Elements that was instructed to use and switched them with the pretty roses.  In the left lower hand corner...you can see that these pictures were taken in May of 2006.  Bryan and Hunter were 10 years old and at such a FUN age!!

I love to play with embellishing my Titles by hand inking.  This time I decided to add chocolate ink to the right hand sides of all the letters...it really makes them "POP".  Then I decided to search for my old Close To My Heart rub-on's and added the "Memories" on the side of the "Family" title's "F" and "friends forever" between the two kids.  I also used the rub-on's to add "Bryan & Hunter" on my Journal spot.
Hand-writing your journaling even on the most put-together page can really make your page.  It brings that "homemade" warm feel to your most precious memories.  It will draw the person looking at your album into the story.  We are so blessed that Bryan & Hunter have become the greatest friends.  I hope their closeness will last their lifetimes!  I welcome your comments and suggestions on my artwork!  Just go to the bottom and click on "comment".  You can also subscribe to my blog at the bottom of the page.  Thank you for reading!

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Today I had the great pleasure of scrapbooking the Flirty Workshop (G1050, $29.95) with two of my good friends!!  "Flirty" has a GREAT color scheme!!  It came out in the catalog as a "FALL" kit, but the colors are so great and flexible, they can be used all year long!!!  The Workshop is a kit that gives you instructions and supplies to create FOUR two-page layouts.  With the purchase of two additional items, you have enough supplies left over to create 5 greeting cards as well (Z1738, Colonial White Die-Cut Cards & Z1749 Autumn Lane Assortment).  
The Workshop Kit comes with an exclusive stamp set that you can only get through buying the kit!!  It also comes with all of the paper you need, Dimensional Elements chipboard shapes (see the tree and the leaves in the picture), and a sparkles clear assortment (rhinestones).  All you need to purchase is the kit, an alphabet stamp set (or use one you already have or one of the "Cricut" cartridges if you own it), Cocoa and Goldrush ink pads, and a corner rounder.  If you are lucky enough to be in the Hampton Roads area, you don't need all the extras, you can just come scrap with ME!!  On the upper right hand side of my blog, you will see a link to "Kempsville Scraps Classes/Crops Calendar".  Click on "Meetup" and it will take you to the Meetup website.  Meetup is a place where an organizer (like me) can go to upload a calendar of  classes/dates or "Meetups" so that folks like you can find other like minded individuals who have the same hobbies as you do!  They have great tools for me to use to share my calendar with members of my local paper crafting/scrapbooking group.  Please join us if you can!