Love Multiplied

Say the words lace to me, and I immediately think of heirloom children's clothing made of Swiss Batiste, French Cotton Laces and double face satin ribbon. This week on the Phindy's Place Challenge Blog, the challenge was to create a card or project using lace and pearls. Add to this the fact that Phindy's children's images remind me of some real little boys and girls I've known, and I knew just what I wanted to do with the lace part. You really need to check out all the cuties at the Phindy's Place Store.

When making a heirloom creation, strips of lace are butted up against each other and zigzagged together to make panels. Needless to say that when I finish a project if there are any left over pieces of panels, I never throw them away. So I went to my "lace" box and dug around. When DD was starting her senior year of high school, I made a Heirloom Skirt and blouse for her. When she was in college, I added to the length of it to make it tea length for a garden party. It sat in the closet in the guest room for a lot of years. After MonkeyMoo was born, she wanted to have him baptized in our church, and I knew I would be making a christening gown. Fortunately for me, she had the same idea I did. I took the skirt and blouse and used to create MonkeyMoo's gown, so it is truly an heirloom. In the process there were lots of parts left over, and I saved everyone of them.

This is a picture of the first card base I made using blue papers and blue ribbon and part of the skirt(panel of lace and beading). I had picked out an image to use for my blue card, and then Phindy said that her DD was supposed to find out the sex of Phindy's first grandchild. I decided that I would wait for the news and make a special card for the new Grandmother. I have to tell you that after Phindy posted the image "Spring Boquet", I was really hoping for a girl, so I could use that adorable little girl. Well it's a girl, so I was back in the box for another panel of lace and beading. This time, it's on a pink card base with pink ribbon. The image is colored with Copics. I actually designed the lacy scalloped circle using my MTC software and my Cricut.

Now the second part of the challenge was pearls. Well, I have to say I went a bit over the top with the pearls, but just having them around the image wasn't enough, so I came back and added them on the scallops.

The final part of the card is the sentiment. I have to say that my grandchildren have proved that there is no end to the love I feel for them, it is only multiplied.

I'm so glad you decided to stop by to see my card.

Buttons and Bows

Are you old enough to remember that song from the old Bob Hope movie "Son of a Paleface"? If not do a google, and you'll have your earwig for the day. I have to say Roy Rogers was my hero growing up, and he looks darned good in the clip I watched. Jane Russell was looks pretty darn good herself, and Bob Hope is just Bob Hope.(You know being old isn't such a bad thing with memories like these). Okay so what does this particular song have to do with a card? It's simple. This week's challenge on Sassy Cheryl's Challenge Blog was to create a card using Buttons and Bows, set by Sassy Ann, who while not quite as old as me, I think might remember this song. I, of course, had to use a recent purchase I made at Sassy Cheryls Store(I need at least a weekly fix). This image is appropriately named "Bee Mine", and I'm going to be sending this to my BFF. Her family owned and operated an apiary. She now has a guest house that's full of Bee Memorabilia and is named appropriately enough The Honey House(converted from a concrete building they used to store sugar in for feeding the bees). I've colored her with Copics, and I love the rich deep reds. Coloring with them is a bit tricky though.

The papers are from Sharia Braxton's Shapes of Love kit(she's no longer blogging and designing kits). I unfortunately didn't have any red buttons in the shapes of hearts, and the challenge was going to be over before I could get to Hobby Lobby or Michaels. Instead, I decided to make my own buttons, by cutting some of the hearts out of the DP paper and punching a double hole in them and popping them up. Works for me. Sure hope it works with the DT.

So glad to see you stopping by, and I love comments.

I Am WHO I Am

Talk about your challenges, this week over on the Tiddly Inks Challenge Blog, they laid down what for me was the challenge of all challenges - create a project that is "Just Be Me." I've seen Scrapbook Challenges do an "all about me" challenge, and that was the approach I took. Rather than a scrapbook page using pictures, I chose to create a wall hanging using Tiddly Inks images. It was no surprise to me that there were more than enough images in the Tiddly Inks Store to cover a 12 x 12 page with some images that I felt were indicative of me. In fact there were more images I could of used, I just couldn't find enough space for them. It also didn't surprise me that I already owned most of them. Hey you buy what you like.

I used my MTC software and my Cricut to create the I Am WHO I Am and shadow it. I also used my MTC software, the Scalloped Circle Shapely from Penny Duncan, and the word to path option that is available in MTC to create my label wheel. I knew I didn't want to "label" each image, but I also knew I wanted a descriptor for them and this worked out better than I could have hoped.

Starting at the top center the image is called "Ticket to Life Girl". Christy created this image and one with a little boy in honor of my grandson, Monkey Moo, who told his mother when he was 2 1/2 and she had corrected him, "U need to wisten to me. I a person! I got a life and a ticket!" I've taken that message to heart and I hope I embrace life to the fullest. I do try. Clockwise the next image is "Carpenter Joe" and is a reminder of the wonderfully handy man that I am married to. After all, he and I did build Tazmania. Bottom right corner is "Computer Freak" and boy is that ever me. I don't even want to think about life without my computer. I even understand the 1's and 0's. The bottom center image is called "Whatchadoin" and again an image that is so me. I put inquisitive, but that's just a nice way of saying I'm just downright nosy. If you ever saw me in action, you'd be amazed at the amount of information I can get out of a person. "Schoolgirl" is in the bottom left position and that's me with books. I'm a more than avid reader. I'm as addicted to books as I am my computer. If you could see my bedside table, you'd know of which I speak. I even read books over again. In the 9 o'clock position is an image called "Lullaby". I am a mother and a grandmother, but besides those children I absolutely adore babies. I've even been known to borrow my friend's children and grandchildren and this week, I'm driving 60 miles one way for the opportunity to babysit a great nephew. Finally the last image isn't a digital Tiddly Inks image, but rather a rubber TI image that I got from Stamping Bella and is appropriately called "best friends forevah". All of the images were colored with Copics.

I started this wall hanging with a 12x12 piece of chipboard, on which I added a lime green sheet of scrapbook paper. I overlayed it with Floral Die Cut-Pink from The Paper Studio. I then used different Spellbinders to cut my images and frame them and finished off with some ribbons, flowers and bling. I definitely could win the prize for the person taking the most time to create a project, that's for sure.

Thanks for stopping by. Now you all have some of the low down on me, but I can promise you not near about all. I've already got it hung on the wall of TM.

Show Me Thursday #9

Well aren't you surprised to see me posting my entry one day after the start of the challenge instead of mere hours before the deadline? I'm trying to prioritize a little better. I'm sure it will be short lived, so don't go getting all impressed on me.

I love being nosy, so the Show Me Thursdays on Sassy Cheryl's Blog are perfect for me. I absolutely adore getting the scoop on what folks are working on and what tools they might have, but that I don't have and might need to get. I get my nosiness from my Mother. She never met a stranger and neither do I. It's one of the benefits of blogging and this particular challenge. Every week I'm getting a little more insight into the regular posters, and we're even exchanging e-mails afterwards.

The last of my DH's nieces and nephews(26 of the including our two) is getting married in March. We all just found out at Christmas. They live in Colorado Springs and are getting married here, which means much of the details are falling to my SIL. No way could I turn her down(after all this is one of my favorite nieces and she grew up right down the road) when she called to ask if I could address the envelopes for the Wedding Invitations and create an invitation for the Rehearsal dinner. With the wedding planned for March 12, the invitations have to be mailed 4 weeks prior to the event(see I know my wedding etiquette) and so will the Rehearsal Dinner invitations. It wouldn't be a problem, except that DH and I are leaving a week from today for Colorado for our annual ski vacation and won't be back until the night of February 6th. That's calling it a bit too close for comfort for me. So instead of my Crafting Area, today you're seeing my office and MOI working on getting the outside envelopes addressed. I had a minor problem to start with on trying to figure out how to make my new office printer print envelopes. Thank goodness as, you can see, I figured it out.

OK, I've rambled enough and by now you're more than bored to tears. Have a wonderful day and do some crafting why don't you.

I Love You Valentine!

This week the Phindy's Place Challenge Blog is all about creating a project that is about Valentines or Love. When every image that Phindy has in her store screams love in some form or another, this is really not a challenge. This image called Summer Blossom looks like she's playing "He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not(minus the NOT of course). Of course, you're all surprised to know that I colored her with my Copics.

Don't you love these papers? I fell in love with them when I found them in the Create with TLC store. Most folks don't realize the products Paulette has in her store and at a very reasonable price. I love green and purple together. They just are such a rich combination.

I used Penny Duncan's free Scalloped Heart Shapely to cut the open hearts using my MTC software with my Cricut. Penny is so generous with her talents so be sure to check out her blog not just for free svg files, but also for some fabulous tutorials. Do you all realize how wonderful it is to cut a shape any size you need rather than the "packaged" size? I then sort of wove the hearts around the card, topped it off with a solid heart that is raised and my cutout image. I finished it off with a white heart(inside and backside of the remnant of one of the open hearts) with a hand written sentiment. I hit with green and lavender stamp pads and a bit of looped ribbon.

Thank you so much for stopping in. I've fortunately made the challenge again by the skin of my teeth.

Show Me Thursday #8

Well it's almost time for Show Me Thursday #9, clean mine up too. Every week Sassy Cheryl offers us a chance at a free Sassy Cheryl image and all you have to do is enter a picture of your workspace on Sassy Cheryls Blog. Of course, since that picture was made I've made two sets of OWH cards, and it's quite a bit messier. Oh well I work best that way.

I want you to all notice that I have cleaned off the back half of the table, so that my neighbor actually has a space to work when she's finally feeling like getting back to scrapbooking. I forgot to take a picture of my new wide format printer. You'll just have to come back next week to get a glimpse. I guess I didn't do much to satisfy you nosy parkers since there doesn't appear to be a lot going on.

Refresh Me

That's the theme this week for the Tiddly Inks Challenge Blog, and it's to be done by creating an all white card except for the image. Well it just so happens that white on white is one of my favorite things, so this was a fun challenge for me.

The image I picked from the Tiddly Ink Store is called Tiny Dancer. I colored her with Copics, and then colored her tutu and her headband with my Spicas. The glitter sheen doesn't show up in the picture, but it's there. I used my Martha Stewart ScorBoard to score the card front, and then the Martha Stewart Deep Lattice Edge Punch to punch a band to go across the card.

Before I took up card making, one of my favorite things to do was to create children's Heirloom clothing, using Swiss Batiste(think tissue paper thin fabric), French cotton laces and satin ribbons. That's the approach I took with this challenge. I have a smocking plate called Party Ribbons. The smocking on the dress is nothing more than row on row of wave stitch(basic smocking stitch), but what makes the dress is when you come back and weave ribbon through the waves. Well when I looked at the lattice, I thought why not weave the ribbon here. Then of course, I had to add some lace around the scalloped image. My sentiment was created simply in Word and says it all - Dance(another favorite thing of mine), so you see this was an all about me card.

Thanks for stopping in, and I love getting feedback.

No More Snow!

I've always said the only place I want to see snow is in Colorado during our ski vacation, and then I don't want it to snow while I'm skiing, just at night. Let's face it I'm a fair weather girl. Having said that the challenge over on the Sassy Cheryl's Challenge blog this week is Snow. Well living in Mississippi we rarely see snow and when it does snow, it's very short lived. How ironic that this challenge came right after two days of snow followed by days of temps that didn't get above freezing. In fact, we still have snow in the woods surrounding the house. I know I've never seen snow last a week in Mississippi. I promised myself I wouldn't complain about cold weather after the summer we had, but girls, I've got to tell you, I'm hanging on to that promise by a thread.

At any rate, since the challenge was snow, and I've had enough of it, I decided to take a bit of a snarky approach to the challenge. I've loved this image since I first bought it. She's the Sassy Cheryl Winter stamp. Knowing that Sassy Cheryl is feeling the same way I am about snow, I have her being pommelled by snow and cheering "No More Snow!" She's colored with Copics.

The paper is Snowy Background from Stamping All Day. I sprayed it with my Tattered Angels glimmer mist to give it some sparkle. I used my Cuttlebug and my Spellbinders snowflake dies to cut the snowflakes. I sprayed them with Quilters Baste and sprinkled on super fine glitter. Since I make cards for OWH and glitter is a no-no, it was fun to let glow with the glitz.

I'm glad you stopped by and I love hearing from you.

Stressed or Distressed or Both

Well, I'm definitely feeling the stress of being down to the wire on getting my challenge card posted to the Phindy's Place Challenge blog. The theme this week is to distress you card. Fortunately, distressed isn't also stressing me, but the fact that I'm a week late with a birthday card is. Guess where this card is going?

For my card I chose this image called Beary Beautiful. Isn't she lovely. I colored her with my Copics, and I think I can feel the breeze blowing her dress. Can't you? I have to tell you I CASED the card from Loupy Lou. Thank you Lou. I loved the torn section, and it screamed Distressed to me. Not sure where the paper is from, but I think it came out of a pad. It already looked distressed, I just used my deckle blade on my rotary cutter to make the edges look torn. I wove a piece of the same DP through a Martha Stewart Punched piece of cardstock, and then hitting them both with a Tim Holtz distressed ink pad. Finally I ran two lengths of narrow ribbon through the punched piece and tied a bow. I waited to the end to stamp my sentiment, and that was almost a bad mistake. It didn't stamp as dark as I wanted, so I took a Copic and CAREFULLY went over the letters.

Off to get it posted on the challenge blog before time runs out

I'm So Blue

The challenge courtesy of Sassy Ann on the Sassy Cheryls Challenge Blog for this week was to create a card that was all about blue. Well when she said all about blue, I took her at her word. Not only is my image blue, but so are my papers, my bling and I even have a blue sentiment that's all about blue.

This sweet image from Sassy Cheryl's Store is called Missing You. It's going to be perfect for my OWH box, as they're always looking for cards with general sentiments like Missing You or Thinking of You. She's colored with Copics. The papers are from a huge collection of scrapbook paper I bought at Sam's more years ago than I can remember. The flourishes were cut with my latest Sissix purchase. I had to purchase the flourishes so I could use my I-Rock tool to add bling, and don't you know that flourishes just call for bling. The top layer of DP is embossed with D'vine Swirls and then sanded to give it a little distressed look. I took my blue stamp pad and dabbed on anything that was white to give it a blue feel. Finally instead of using Photoshop Elements to create my Sentiment, I did it with my Make-the-Cut software and then printed it to my printer(actually my neighbor's printer since mine is dead).

I think I got the challenge rules met, and I loved making the card. Just need to get a wee bit faster. Now I better get back to organizing before my neighbor decides she wants her half of the table. I've completely taken over the room. I definitely have to clean before Show Me Thursday.

Show Me Thursday #7

It's been a couple of weeks since I did a Sassy Cheryl Show Me Thursday. I missed some, and Cheryl cancelled one, since I think she figured none of us had time for crafting over Christmas. Instead of making a New Year's Resolution, I'm making daily resolutions. So far they've been about purging and reorganizing in my house.

Well this week, I decided that I needed to redo my Spellbinders organization. I'd been using the DVD cases with the magnetic strips inside, but I have some that wouldn't fit in the the case. A couple of months ago I downloaded a SVG cut file for folders for storing your Embossing folders from Creations by Christy. She's a master of organization, and I loved what she did with the (She's since reorganized them again, but I don't have a Clip It Up). I converted the SVG using my Make-the-Cut software, and I've loved the storage, since I found a perfect container for holding them.

Recently Christy redid her Spellbinders storing them in a notebook. That wasn't the way I wanted to go, since I don't want to be hauling out the notebook to grab one Spellbinder, but I loved her idea of putting it on chipboard. So with that thought in mind, I lengthened the folder file that I had created for the embossing folders and decided to just go with the left/right. My way of organizing this time was to alpabetize first by type e.g. circle, frame, oval, etc. and then by style of each type. Once I had my organization done, I cut pockets made using cheap transparencies and taped them to the outside of the folder front with the folder in the correct position(left or right). I cut a piece of heavy chipboard smaller than my folder, added magnetic tape. I labeled the folder and the chipboard. Add the Spellbinders to the magnet strip and then slip the chipboard into the folder.

This is a picture of the Spellbinder folders. By leaving out the center folder and organizing them by type, I've found it's easier to find them.

This might not work for you, but it's working great for me. Oh and do you see my new purple carrying case behind my Copics. My neighbor's DD's family gave it to me for Christmas. It folds flat and stores great.

Thank You

Thank you Phindy's Place Challenge Blog DT for two weeks on this challenge. Thank you also happens to be the theme of the challenge on the Challenge blog this week. Also this week for the first time, images don't have to be a Phindy's Place image, although I can't imagine entering the challenge without it being a Phindy's Place image.

I am so over Christmas, so I knew this card had to be be some other colors besides Christmas green and red. I'm also taking a coloring class, trying to get more proficient with my Copics. Our last lesson was to color an image of our choice and use it in a card challenge, so I knew A Phindy's Cutie was just the image to use. This image is called Little Swinger, and I absolutely love her. The papers are some I printed from ComputerScrapbook.com and are from the Corinne Silke's Another Tea Party kit.

Do you remember swinging as a child and feeling the sun on your face as you flew to the sky? Oh what joy that was. Phindy has captured so many of my childhood memories in her image. Be sure to go check all of her cutie images out at her Store.

I'm BAAAACCCCCCCKKKKKKKKK!

It's been so long since I blogged, it may take me a while to get back into it, even though I now have 2 challenge cards to blog along with some OWH cards. The past weeks have been a blur and unfortunately crafting WASN'T in the mix, but I'm BAAAAACKKKKKKK!

This card is not the first card I've done since my daughter and her family went home, and I got my house back together. However, it is the first one in terms of making a challenge date. The image is called Birthday Cake Desire, and it meets the theme of Teddy Bears set by Sassy Judy on the Sassy Cheryls Challenge blog this week. One thing that there are plenty of images of over in Sassy Cheryls Store. I do want to thank you all for letting it be a two week challenge, so that I could participate.

My image is colored with Copics, and the paper is from The Paper Studio I think. I got it out of my scrap box. This card is for my cousin's birthday tomorrow. The Birthday Stamp is from the $1 bin at Michaels, and I had a little fun playing with my I-Roc.

It's good to be back.