Doodlebug Stamps by Hampton Art

There is a series of Doodlebug and Hampton Art give-away taking place on Doodlebug's blog this week.  Please stop by and enter to win some wonderful products by Doodlebug and Hampton Art!

I created a layout using the Hello Spring paper collection with a stamped title using the Simply Sweet Alphabet set. The light limeade green circle around the alpha letters is a stamp from the Party Time set.  It has a cupcake in the center of the circle which I masked so I could stamp the letters. I do love that Doodlebug font in the Simply Sweet set.  I need to expand my horizon and do more colored stamping.  Doodlebug has its flagship colors in ink pads and fellow DT members have created some eye-popping stamped projects and I must emulate!

I also was super excited to try out a few silhouette cuts on this layout.  I completely love everything in the Silhouette store designed by Loni Stevens.  The cuts on the page are sized for Project Life but they can be easily re-sized to be used for any project. My heart beats faster just thinking about these super cute and scrapper friendly cuts in the Silhouette store. Thank goodness I got a subscription on Mother's Day weekend!

Here is a collage of two close-up photos. You can see the stamped title with the circle outline.  I put some super cute Doodlebug buttons next to the title.  They are such great looking embellishments!  

This was a fun layout to create even though I've scrapped this event a few times already. I print my photos in advance and I was clearly over-zealous when I printed these bunny photos.  I realize not all photos have to be scrapped but there are still so many of them in that folder! I might as well use them!  

The weekend is almost upon us.  I wish you wonderful and relaxing summer days!  Here's to hobbies and crafts!

Country Boutique Cards

The first order of business... winner of the Graphic 45 give-away is Debbie!  Congrats!  Let's get in touch!

Country Boutique is Fancy Pants Designs' newest collection and it is a gorgeous collection for weddings and formal occassions.  I was inspired immediately and busted out my cricut cartridges to make cards.

This wedding dress is from the Everyday Pop-up Cards cartridge. The flower was cut from a sheet from the Country Boutique collection.  I think it dresses up this lovely dress nicely.

Here is another angle of the close-up of the the dress.

The next card's bride is cut from the Wrap It Up cartridge.  Isn't it fabulous? I can't tell you just how much I love playing with my electronic die-cutters. 

Here is another close-up photo of the lovely bride. I "converted" that flower bouquet into one single flower cut-out.  The sizing was just right!

Thanks for checking out my Country Boutique cards.  

Tulum Mini-Album and Graphic 45 Give-away

I adore mini-albums.  I enjoy the idea conception, process, and the end product immensely.  Believe me when I say I miss making them dearly but it has been six months since I made this one for Creating Keepsakes.  It was for a feature of the Graphic 45 metal film canister in the Latest and Greatest article. Now the magazine is out, I can share it on my blog.
I spent an enormous amount of time working on the exterior of the tin. I bought a jar of gesso and coated the tin a couple of times.  Then I used a jar of Shimmerz Pearlz in Tickle Me Turquoise and applied several coats.  After all that, the edges were lightly inked up with distressed ink.  This may not seem like a lot to some folks, but for this non-technique-y simple scrapper... oy vey... lol... coating and waiting for stuff to dry, several times! LOL.  But by golly that tin cover looks good to me!  This goes to show, if a simple scrapper like me can do it, so can anyone! 

Playing off the idea of a film canister, the mini-film strip die by My Favorite Things came in handy. I created three strips.  One was anchored onto the film canister and the other two were joined together and wrapped around the anchor. Two brads secured them all together.  


Here are a few pages from the interior of the mini-album that was in the magazine. The CK editors chose to show this mini-album by extending all the pages at once.  That would have been tricky for me to photograph even if I had thought of the idea.

We visited Tulum as a shore excursion on the cruise we took back in 2010.  A mini-album captures those eight hours perfectly.  The photos I used here are 4x6 and my trusted Creative Memories circle cutters trimmed them to fit just right for the pages inside the metal film canister mini-album. 

As seen in July/August 2012 issue of Creating Keepsakes magazine. Copyright Creative Crafts Group. Posted with prior permission from the publisher.

In celebration of this labor of love, I am doing a give-away of Graphic 45 goodies including a metal film canister album!!  The paper collections are from the days when I served on G45's design team so they are older.  I sure hope these all fit into that medium flat rate box! I haven't tried yet!  So I will open this up for anyone with an U.S. address who leaves a comment in the next seven days.  No other strings attached, just a comment and hopefully that means I can access your blogger profile and get in touch with you. 
Thank you so much for stopping by and have a wonderful day wherever you are!

Fancy Pants - Time for Spring

I admit it... I am really tired... This working out every day thing gets exhausting.  I am also quite sick and tired of my clothes.  I am way to cheap to actually buy workout clothes, so it's in many ridiculous tech t-shirts, many of them way over-sized, that I jump around like a maniac. LOL.  I look upon my fellow classmates with a certain amount of envy.  They all look so good in their form fitting athletic wear. In contrast, I look pathetic!  It does motivate me to jump just a little higher: you can't judge the exerciser by her old t-shirts! LOL.

Now onto scrapbooking, a less physically demanding hobby...  Have you seen Fancy Pants Designs' newest collection: Time for Spring?  The floral, teacups, gingham are absolutely delightful! I think the modern design of this collection really appeals to me.  There's nothing shabby chic about it, nothing grunge about it, nothing antique about it, in other words, it's very much my style.

The frame for the photo is a die-cut in the collection.  It fits exactly for a 4x6 photo.  I needed something to pair with it, so I cut a a label using my cameo and used it for the title eventually.  Isn't it almost a perfect match for the Fancy Pants' die-cut?

I also love the new letter stickers that accompany this collection. They are smaller than the previous Fancy Pants' letter stickers, so I get a lot more letters!   

Here she is, looking so adorable in her red bandana.  Not much more I want to say about it.  Owl cute!

Making Cards

I have a few cards to share today.  The first one is made with Front Porch Kits' Sew Artsy kit.  I posted a peak a while ago and never showed the "full frontal view" if you will.  Obviously Mother's Day has passed, so can everyone just squint and pretend that it says "dad" instead?  Fathers sew too!  Mine does, much much better than my mother in fact.  Don't ask why I am completely inept in all these life/home economics department.  I had to study! 

The idea behind this card was to use all the elements in the Sew Artsy kit that are sewing themed.  I hung the little banners on the clothe hangers, used the wooden spools as dividers between the hangers, and the button pins to pin the clothe line onto the paper. It's a bulky little card but cute enough! 

Next I have a couple of cards using Doodlebug's new Fancy Frills and Teensy Type stickers. Here I just used a 1/3 sheet of the Teensy type stickers for the background on the card.  It does take some careful peeling and applying... You can sort of see at the bottom where some of the letters and numbers got out of place and had to be applied with tweezers :)

And one more card before I go.  In the spirit of the theme of "A to Z" I created this card.  I do love that adorable Doodlebug font. Of course it comes in all the doodlebug colors!  Way too cute, eh?  That is it from me and I hope you will have a wonderful Friday and weekend ahead of you!

Spring Planting

So far this year, I have not taken a single photo of our gardens, the gardeners or the gardening activities in the backyard.  Could it be that after so many years, the gardens are no longer a novelty and are beginning to look the same ol' same ol' to me? LOL.  I will make an effort in the near future to correct this "wrong."  Maybe the girls can pose with their peas tomorrow!
Meanwhile, I do have a layout to share with you that is published in Creating Keepsakes' Simple Scrapbooks.  The requirement for this layout was to use only cardstock and one other embellishment.  I chose chipboard.  All photos are 4x6 except the fourth one which is 3x4.  If it looks simple then the goal is achieved!

In these photos, they were working on our blueberry bushes.  They aren't turning out at all this year.  It doesn't look like we will be getting any berries this year.  DH thinks that the soil is just not acidic enough.  It's a little disappointing but just like everything else in life, you garden and you learn! 

Thank you so much for stopping by and have a wonderful day!  Tomorrow is the season finale of Game of Thrones on HBO.  Another obsession comes to an end for the year :)

As seen in special issue of Creating Keepsakes magazine: Simple Scrapbooks Sc. Copyright Creative Crafts Group. Posted with prior permission from the publisher.