Project Tuesday Notecard Box

I always have so much fun creating with the Project Tuesday challenge.(http://projecttuesday.blogspot.com/) The project is a 3" x 3" notecard box. They always have a link with directions for the project and they are always easy to understand and follow. I have to admit I took a little liberty with my design for the box by using my new Martha Stewart Heart Border Punch. Isn't it so pretty? I just love it. It's so dainty looking. I used my Cricut to create the flower for the top of the box. (Gypsy Wanderings) The little heart in the middle is from a button pack I found in the Valentine craft aisle at Hobby Lobby. I tied the box shut with pale pink satin ribbon.

For the lid of the box I used heart paper from DCWV Be Mine stack. The bottom of the box is pink cardstock and the band of heart paper on the bottom of the box is Little Yellow Bicycle Sweet Love Lots of Love. I made four note cards to put inside the box.

I used pink cardstock for the base of all the cards and cut a scalloped square from my Cricut Storybook cartridge at 2 3/4" to top them. I inked the edges of the scalloped squares with Colorbox Chalk Ink in Maroon. The Love Is In the Air clear stamp came from JoAnn's dollar bin. I stamped with more maroon ink. I colored in the large flower with Copic RV00 and added a few pink rhinestones. The card with the heart charm has a digital stamp from The Cutting Cafe's

(www.thecuttingcafe.typepad.com) Valentine Long Phrases stamp set. This is really a versatile set with ten different phrases. The dark pink paper on this card is also Little Yellow Bicycle. I added a little lace and ribbon for the charm to hang from. This charm has been in my stash for a long time so I don't really know where it came from. I'm doing great with my goal this year to use what I have. All these notecards were made with scraps and supplies I already had.

For the third notecard I used a heart stamp from Studio G (from Michael's $1 bin), again stamping with maroon ink. I also did a little flourish stamping on the pink card base on this one, although it is mostly covered up. I used a corner punch from Fiskars and added a little lace. Card four with the two birds is just a piece of Little Yellow Bicycle Love Birds paper. I added a little ribbon and another of the hearts from Hobby Lobby. I'm really happy with the way these little notecards turned out. I made envelopes for each card using my Cricut Wild Card cartridge but I forgot to take a picture of them. I will be sending this set to my Aunt as a thank you for letting me stay at her house over the weekend when I took my Copic class. We always have so much fun together crafting and shopping for supplies.

BBTB2 A Child's Year Valentine w/ Vinyl

The challenge this week at BBTB2 is to use the Valentine (shift) cut from A Child's Year and vinyl. For my project this week I made a Wall/Door hanging. I made a heart using chipboard, for sturdiness, from the Gypsy Font cartridge cut at 8 inches. Then I covered it with Little Yellow Bicycle Sweet Love collection Pink Gingham. I made two hearts cut at 6" from BoBunny Unforgettable and a piece of clear acetate which I edged with lace and mounted on the larger heart. My Valentine cut from A Child's Year is cut in pink vinyl at 4". I had never worked with vinyl before and was a little nervous but it was a breeze to work with, nothing to be afraid of.

I cut out and assembled my own flowers using the flower cut from my Gypsy and cutting them at 1 1/2", 1 1/4" and 1". I again used Little Yellow Bicycle papers for the flowers. I inked the edges with Colorbox Chalk Ink in Maroon. The little hearts that I used for the center came from Hobby Lobby's valentine section.

JustBuggin,FlutterbyWed,DivaCB,ABC,ColorThrow,Belli

I spent my day blog hopping and boy was it fun. I saw so many wonderful creations and got so much inspiration. Flutter By Wednesday (http://flutterbywednesdays.blogspot.com/) is celebrating their new blog with a hop. What great designers. This is my first time entering one of their challenges because my stash has limited butterflies, fairies and angels. I plan on fixing that shortage this year. I used my Cricut to make some butterflies and used some DCWV butterfly paper. Hope that works. The other challenges for this card are:

• ABC challenge(http://abc-challenge.blogspot.com/) -L is for Layering
• Color Throwdown (http://colorthrowdown.blogspot.com/) -Regal Rose, Chocolate Chip, Dusty Durango
• Belli Challenge (http://bellichallenge.blogspot.com/) -Glitter
• JustBuggin' (http://justbugginchallenges.blogspot.com/search/label/Challenges - Stamp on a Cricut cut
• Diva Coffee Break (http://www.divacoffeebreakdesigns.blogspot.com/ )-Sketch

When I saw the sketch at Diva Coffee Break Designs Challenge today I knew I had to use it for my butterfly card. I used one of my favorite DCWV stacks, Whimsy, for my patterned paper (it has lots of glitter), brown kraft for my base card and a little dark brown for shadowing. My butterflies are cut twice (for layering) from Gypsy Wanderings at 2", 1 1/2", and 1". I used a flourish stamp from Studio G to stamp on my top layer of butterflies in dark brown chalk ink. I did add a little bit of Stickles on my top layer, too. My ribbon is a light orange polka dot and I added a couple orange rhinestones for that final bit of bling.

Cricut Cardz Challenge #7

For those of you who got a Gypsy for Christmas you're going to love the simplicity of this card. I'm madly in love with my Gypsy. In fact sometimes I call it Bugsy. I know, I'm a little bit weird, some might say a lot weird. LOL! One of my daughters called me yesterday and asked me what I was doing. I said the same thing I'm always doing working in my studio, I never grow tired of it. She replied, Mom get a life. This is my life since retiring and you better believe I'm enjoying every second of it. I'm having the time of my life designing cards for the Cricut Cardz Challenge and Bitten By the Bug 2. There isn't anything else I'd rather be doing. Anyway, for this card I'm trying to live up to one of my goals for the year. That's to use what I already have in my supply stash. Not to say I won't buy more things (especially Cricut cartridges). But I'm going to try using up all the scraps of paper I have laying around. I found this white card base while reorganizing and used it for a long card. I really enjoy making long cards so that started the card out. I found the background paper in my scrap file and liked the color so cut it for the front of the card. The Thank You cut came from Gypsy Wanderings. I cut it at 8 inches from a light blue scrap and shadowed with a darker blue. I also cut the butterfly in the corner from the same cartridge at 2 1/2 inches from the print paper. I did a little embellishing on the butterflies by adding Stickles and pearls. Very quick and easy. The worst part of this card was trying to be careful I didn't smudge the Stickles. I wish that stuff dried quicker. I hope I've inspired you to get that Gypsy going and join our challenge this week. I'll be traveling with mine this weekend while I go to attend a Copic class. I want to be able to use my markers as well as some other designers do. I'll be waiting anxiously to see what everyone's thank you cards look like. It's so much fun to visit all your blogs.

2Sketches4You,Allsorts,SatChallenge,Papertake,CardsForMen,CCC

I just loved this digital image the moment I saw it on the 2 Sketches 4 You blog challenge. I was needing an image for a guy in a new home. I thought this image had presence and wasn't too frilly. I'm using this card for a bunch of challenges today:

• 2 Sketches 4 You (http://2sketches4you.blogspot.com/)- Sketch
• Saturday Challenge (http://thesecretcraftersaturdaychallenge.blogspot.com/)-"New"
• Papertake Weekly (http://papertakeweekly.blogspot.com/)- New Beginnings
• Cards For Men (http://cardsformen.blogspot.com/)- New Beginnings
• Creative Card Crew (http://creativecardcrew.blogspot.com/)- Distressing
• Pile It On(http://pileitonchallenge.blogspot.com/)- Anything Digital #29

The 2 Sketches 4 You sketch this week was perfect for my "New" home card. I knew I needed to use guy colors so went with beiges and browns. My small piece of print paper is a scrap from the DCWV Green Stack. I don't really make New Year resolutions but I sometimes set goals. One of my goals this year is to use what I already have in my craft studio. (Mostly to please hubby who can't fathom my need for more paper). Every piece of paper on this card is a scrap. The only new thing I used on this card is my Fiskars punch I got for Christmas. I used chalk ink in Chestnut Roan to ink and distress the edges of my papers. My sentiment is computer generated. The only item in the way of embellishing is the small piece of ribbon from my stash. Guys don't usually go for much in the way of bling. I used Copics to color my image.

Celebrate In Style

This card put me way outside my comfort zone. I had to think long and hard how to use this "In Style" cut from Graphically Speaking. I finally settled on an idea for my granddaughter's 16th birthday card. Both her brothers received handmade cards from me for their birthdays so I couldn't do less for Brytnie. I can hardly believe she will be 16. Where have all the years gone? We don't get to see these three grandkids as often as we'd like because they live about a 3 hour drive from here. We had the opportunity to visit them for the holidays. Brytnie is currently taking driver's ed. She had class the day we visited so my husband let her drive our car and accompanied her. He is a brave man. Glad our insurance was paid up. LOL Anyway, for this card my base is purple and I used Cricut's Wild Card cartridge to cut the circular card at 5 1/4". The "In Style" circle is cut at 5" from Moxxie's Just A Girl line of paper. It's called Girl Swirl. It's two-sided so I cut the Style part from the pink back. I also cut the "Celebrate" from Wild Card. I added Sweet 16 to the inside of the card. The "sweet" came from Paisley and "16" came from Designer's Calendar.

I embellished the front with a little purple Stickles to outline the word "in". I added a pink polka dot ribbon with a purple button for the center. I put pink rhinestones around the inner circle.

I popped the word "Celebrate" with foam dots. I designed this card with my Gypsy during the drive home from their house. We will be putting a gift card for some stylin' shopping inside when we give her this card. We plan on taking her out for a special dinner by herself and then letting her shop after. What more could a Sweet Sixteen girl ask for?

Project Tuesday Mini Album

I needed a project to take me into a creative zone and Project Tuesday's Mini Album was just the thing. While most of the world was preparing for and celebrating the holidays I was in a construction zone. Oh, how I long to be back into a routine. My house has been torn up for over a month now. How dumb to start a project with the holidays coming, but alas, that is what we did. Our entire second floor is getting painted and new carpeting (five bedrooms, hallway and stairs). This had to be done in two installations because where in the world could we put five bedrooms worth of furniture and 36 years of accumulation. All the carpet is installed and two rooms are painted, three bedrooms, the hallway and stairs still need paint. Of course, the first room my husband chose to paint was my studio. The room I have been using for about 13 years is no longer my studio. It has become the guest room and I've been relegated to a smaller room and I hate it. I had a large room on the south side of the house painted a nice cheery yellow. Now I'm in a beige cave. I'm going to have to find some way to make this room brighter and cheerier or I'm going to go crazy (or should I say crazier). All of this in preparation for trying to sell the house this spring. We are empty nesters and do not need a five bedroom house anymore. I hope some nice large family will come along and want it. What a disaster, trying to get all my stuff in a smaller room. I'm still trying to unpack and put stuff in it's new location. I got enough unpacked to get this project put together.

I used a Cosmo Cricket Gal Friday paper pack for this project. They are double-sided papers making it easy to coordinate multiple pages and it came with a page of journaling tags and assorted images. Now, I know the front of the album says My Best Friend, at the moment that happens to be my three year old granddaughter. We had a big discussion on her last sleepover about best friends and she told me I was her best friend. I know that will change in a few years, but I'm happy to be loved and so important in her life right now. We have such a good time together.

I will be adding pictures of the two of us in various assorted activities. I just haven't had time to get them printed up yet.

This was really a fun little album to put together and I enjoyed making it knowing that it was for Payton. The online directions from Project Tuesday were easy to understand and follow. It really only took me about an hour to put it together. Now I guess I have to go back to the drudgery of organizing. On the bright side, I've managed to find some supplies that I have forgotten and I'm looking forward to using some of them.