Friday, December 10, 2010

Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

Don't you think that's sometimes true with crafting?  The longer you stay away from the craft room the stronger the urge or need to create gets.  Sorry for neglecting this blog  for a little while.  Found myself getting wrapped up in a 100 and 1 other things - mostly making a few special Christmas gifts for family.  I'll be posting pictures of those later as one of them is for my mother and since she's a member of this blog I can't let her see it quite yet :-)

So here's a clean and simple card I did for last week's family newsletter.  I just love that SU stamp set "A Flower for All Seasons".  I think it's probably one of the most used sets I have.

I know we haven't talked about our Gal Pal Sketch challenge in awhile.  Too many other pressures in our lives - we don't need one more.  But I was thinking about doing something a little fun to celebrate our friendship at this special time of the year.  I'll volunteer to put some little kits together and let's just make the cards for our sketch challenge together.  Maybe on Tuesday the 21st we could bring something Christmas-sy to the shop - ourselves dressed in a holiday sweater, music, cookies, jingle bells on our toes - whatever.  We can make our sketch card and celebrate another wonderful year of friendship and crafting.

Have a good weekend.

Monday, November 8, 2010

Poetry


Ever since I went to see Garrison Keillor at the Adams Center a few weeks ago and was completely entranced by his ability to recite poetry, I've been reading poems on a daily basis and listening to his Writer's Almanac each morning.  So last week for the family's newsletter card I incorporated a poem about Autumn.  I also played around with my new alcohol inks.  Created a piece of cardstock with the smoosh technique and then punched leaves which I adhered with a little foam tape to give them dimension.  I used one of my fourish stamps and colored it with 3 different shades of marker before stamping it.  I was pretty pleased with how it turned out.  Hope you like it too.  And here's the poem. . .

An Autumn Day

Pumpkins in the cornfield,

Gold among the brown,

Leaves of rust and scarlet

Trembling slowly down;

Birds that travel southward,

Lovely time to play;

Nothing is as pleasant

As an autumn day
-Carmen Lagos Signes

Friday, November 5, 2010

Falling Leaves

Hi My Friends,

All week long I've  been watching the leaves slowly fall off the trees in front of my office and around campus.  On my walks to the car at night I love watching them fall softly and slowly in the air - reminds me of that beautiful feather floating on the air in the movie Forest Gump.

So since it looks like the last days of Fall are upon us I thought I'd post a series of all our leaf cards.  We'll start with this beautiful one Mona made last year I think.  She's done some incredible things with this leaf die.

Happy Friday and have a great weekend!

Monday, November 1, 2010

Happy Halloween


Here's the Halloween card I made to send to family last week.  Pulled out the InkaDinkaDoo stamps from last year and my favorite pack of Debbie Mumm paper.  I thought it turned out pretty cute.  Only had 6 trick-or-treaters last night but it was still fun.  Hope your night was fun too.

Friday, October 29, 2010

GPS #3

I wasn't sure if we settled on a sketch for next month.  I voted for this one.  For some reason those 3 little squares just trigger all sorts of ideas about what to put on them.  But I'm open if you all  wan to pick the other one.  One thing you might want to check out if we do go with this sketch is the fantasticc samples of a similar card sketch over on the Clean and Simple blog.  It triggered even more ideas for those 3 little squares.  And as I wrote that it occurred to me that since this is the 3rd sketch maybe doing this one with the 3 squares is oh so appropriate!  Have I convinced you?  :-)

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

59 Days, 16 Hours & Counting


Can't believe how fast time is flying.  I've been wanting to use our Tuesday nights to make a few Christmas cards so I'd have a nice big stash when the time came to get them in the mail.  I've got about 12 done, 12 left from last year and need about 24 more with only 59 days, 16 hours counting (according to this cool Christmas Countdown web site I stumbled on: http://www.auburn.edu/~vestmon/xmas_cnt.htm).  I saw these 2 Mona made a couple of years ago from a stamp set we got as part of a card class we took.  I *Love* the one with the Santa button.  Cute, cute clean and simple design.  Will be using that for inspiration very soon! 

Friday, October 22, 2010

The "Benign Essential Tremors" Technique :-)

Sometimes stamping with my shakey hands is quite fun.  I found this really cute one-layer card idea from my favorite blog Simplicity.  The challege was to use a border stamp.  I came up with this design:


Unfortunately I had 6 cards to make for my weekly family newsletter.  I thought the odds of getting 6 clean, crisp stamped images was not very high and I was right.  So rather than wasting paper, here's what I came up with to cover up the boo-boo's. 



Once again, the creative deviation is almost prettier than what I started out trying to do.  Have a good weekend.  Here's wishing that we all are able to find a little creative space among the chores and family obligations.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

GPS #2 - In Under the Wire

Well Val and I barely made the deadline for our 2nd sketch challenge.  But despite a crazy work schedule for Val and pure procrastination on my part we did manage to get our entries in. As a reminder, here's the link to the sketch.  Now check out what we made. . . .first the group shot and then the individual pics.  I'll have the next sketch posted tomorrow.

Mona's cards:




Val's card:


Julie's cards:




Tuesday, October 19, 2010

A Freebie - And It's Not Even Friday

Hi My Friends,

Found this fun freebie while surfing yesterday morning and wanted to share it.  It's a PDF fiile that has some really cute labels.  She shows them used for food gifts but I'm thinking that you could also use them on cards. 

Here's the web site:  http://www.scrapngal.com/ which has instructions on how to add text to the labels.  And here's the PDF.

I finally got my cards for the challlenge done last night with little time to spare.  Nothing like waiting until the last minute.  Actually I think the adrenaline of the fear of not getting them done really helped my creativity.  Looking forward to seeing the cards tonight.  And I've got 2 new sketches I'm bringing with me.  Thought we should have a little choice.

Monday, October 18, 2010

Thank You X 2

Thank You (part 1) Mona for jumping on our blog and posting one of your cool cards.   I loved it - both the blog entry and the card.  I was talking to my Mom on Thursday night and she was having problems getting to the blog.  So as I was walking her through it I said "What do you see" and she started reading about Megan's boyfriend.  I said "No, I don't think you're on the right site.  Let me get there with you" and then much to my surprise I saw our site with a card I didn't recognize.  I squeeled with delight!!!!  Mom was very impresed with the card.  And Val and I thought we detected a similarality to this month's card sketch??  I think we're in trouble if all of Mona's are this cute.

And the Thank You part 2 is another cute card Mona made me earlier this year.  I love the ribbon, button, border punch and simple sewing on the card.  She's also got such a way with combining color and pattern.

See you tomorrow night for the big reveal of GPS Sketch #2.  Is everyone ready?  We shall see !!!

Thursday, October 14, 2010

My first blog


this is a card for Maygan's boyfriend.  He rides a Harley so I just had to make a motorcycle themed card.  I've also been dying to use the metallic paper we made using Val's Cuttlebug embossing folder last year.  I found the ribbon at Scrapbook Hidaway - it was so perfect in color for card.  I've had the brads for quite a while and have used them on several masculine cards.

Monday, October 11, 2010

Serene Moments

This is the CAS (Clean And Simple) card I made for this week's family letter.  I broke in my Serene Serandade solutions cartridge.  What fun!  I have to admit though that this was the first time I've tried the layers and I was a little confused about how to cut out  the pieces.  And with it being a solutions cartridge it didn't have the nice little book that shows you how to press the combination of feature buttons with the key pad.  But after about 3 attempts I got it.  Would still like have more time to play around with options and explore all that's possible - maybe on our next holiday.  But overall I was happy with how it turned out.  Used a cute acrylic border stamp I got way back when we went to Ben Franklins and a new acrylic sentiment stamp I just got last week.  It was nice and convenient that they were both acrylic as I could mount them on the same block and make sure they lined up OK.  Looking forward to Tuesday night and trying to get a few more Christmas cards done.

Friday, October 8, 2010

A Little Inspiration

October 19th is not that far away. . . .That's the date of our next Show & Tell for the Gal Pal Sketch Challenge #2.  Val and I were talking this week about maybe using part of the weekend to try to get our creative juices flowing for this challenge.  I understand that Mona - our super achiever :-) - already has one or two made with a few more designs rolling around in her head.  Since we can't see hers until the 19th, here's a little sample that might help get us started.  It's not my card - just one I found posted on the CPS site where the sketch came from.  Have a good weekend and Happy Papercrafting!!

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Fun Font

I'm not sure if you all are checking the Free Font Friday web site but last week there was a really cute one called "Card Starters 2".  It's basically a sentiment tied to each letter.  I used "Q" (Just a Note) on this week's letter to family.  Since I was in a hurry this week because of my trip to Yellowstone, it was a quick way to dress up the front of the cardstock.  Changed the color to something for fall and then surrounded it with a text box.  Kind of cute for 2 minutes of work, huh?!  Hope you check out the font if you already haven't.  It will be posted until Oct. 7th.

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Starting Time. . . .


Well today's the last day of September and for me that means it's time to start thinking about and planning for the holidays.  This is a card Mona made me for Christmas last year.  We all fell in love with the blue and red of the S.E.I papers.  And the reindeer stamp from Stampin' Up is SO cute.  I may have to do a few of these myself.  I started this Tuesday with the 1st of the Christmas card desgins.  My hope is that each week I'll make 10 of each of the designs I've picked out and by the 1st part of November I'll be done.  Yeah!  Have so many other ideas for handmade gifts this year.  We'll see how many I actually get done.  Maybe booking a couple of days of annual leave in the middle of the week will help. 

Talk to you all next week as I'm leaving for Yellowstone in the morning.  Take care.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Yet Another Creative Deviation (@#$%! Wheel)

Here's the card I made last week for the weekly letters to my family.  As I've mentioned in earlier posts, I've been trying to keep these cards to one-layer and quick and easy.  So I had this great idea of just running my "Great Outdoors" stamp wheel over the bottom and then stamping a sentiment above.  Sounds simple, right?!  WRONG!  I could  not for the life of me get the ink and the pressure even on the wheel to get a clean strip.  At first I was able to get a clean prototype and thought I knew just the right place to press on the wheel to make sure it was even.  But when I went to do the same thing on the cardstock that I had already printed the letters on I could not for the life of me get a consistent image.  Of the 6 I was trying to make I only had 2 that looked OK enough to send.  So. . . .time for a creative deviation!  I ran the wheel about 12  more times on another piece of cardstock and was able to get 4 more clean images.  I then mounted those on a strip of green cardstock to cover up the boo-boos.  And then since the strip was matted I decided to mat the sentiment as well.  I have to tell you, I actually like the 2nd version better than the 1st.  Maybe all the frustration was really divine intervention!  :-)  But next time I see Val I will be talking to her about how to unmount the wheels.  I think she did that and since I do more card making than scrapbooking I really don't need a stamped border longer than what the unmounted stamp wheel would be laying flat. 

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Feelin' Groovy


Hi my Gal Pals - Here's the card I was tellling you about last week.  I CASE'd the card from one that was on my new favorite "clean & simple" blog: Simplicity.  She does what she calls a "One Layer Wednesday" card challenge each week which is really great for the cards I've needed for my weekly family newsletters.  This one was really fun to make.  Used a masking technique and the new "groovy" font that was on Free Font Friday a couple of weeks ago. 

Had a great time at the pumpkin pin class today.  I'll bring it Tuesday night.  I ordered the stamp and an extra set of jewels.  Am hoping to get another made for my mother before Halloween gets here.

See you soon.

Thursday, September 23, 2010

$2 Bucks Worth

Check out these great cards and the tag that Val made last weekend at Memory Lane's $2 Class Day.  This first one was done with flower soft.  I just love these little hedgehog images.  I wish so bad they came as stamps but I think the kit is a pre-printed image you just embellish with  the flower soft.

This next one used Fantasy Film.  I missed out on both the original demo of this and the class :-(  But the way Val and Mona explained it's a film that you layer filament in between, press all the layers together with an iron and then stamp your image on and cut it out.  Isn't that leaf spectacular!  *And a quick sidenote on the patterned paper. . . .it's a really cute paper like the bark of a birch tree.  There were only 3 sheets left in the whole store and the person whose New Year's resolution was "No More Patterned Paper" bought the last 3 sheets all for herself!  Val - how could you?!!!!  Boy, you should have heard me and Mona squeal when she told us that.  Thankfully Val was quick to explain that Memory Lane has more on order.

This tag was done with a masking technique.  It's a new product.  The mask has reuseable sticky on one side.  It was placed on just a regular tag from the office supply store and then I think they used glimmer mists to put on the color and some distress inks to blend it together.  Val, is that right?

Next class at Memory Lane is the paper & jeweled pumpkin pin on Sunday.  Really looking forward to that.  Unfortunately, Val's got to work and Mona will be with her Honey-Bunny so I'm going alone.  I'll miss my gal pals but it was just too cute of a pin to pass up the class. 

Have a good day everyone!

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Eye for Design

This is a card Mona made a couple of months ago.  I just LOVE IT!  She's got such an eye for design and color.  The things I love about it are:
  1. You guessed it. . . .Ric Rac!!  :-)
  2. The scalloped punch.
  3. The color combination.  I've been so drawn to the brown and blue this year.
  4. It highlights the wonderful patterned paper.  Great way to use paper with big patterns on a card.  Sometimes it's hard to do that if you're layering stamped images or sentiments on top of the patterned paper. 
  5. The way she took advantage of elements in the patterned for her embellishments.  Not sure if you can see if from the picture but there are jewel dots in the center of some of the designs.
I may have to  CASE her card and start digging in my paper stash looking for those big patterned papers and see where the inspiration takes me.  Ooooh! - kind of sounds like a "challenge", huh?! :-)

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Coffee Dazzles

After our discussion last Tuesday night about using some things from our stash and seeing Mona's fall cards, I really want to start exploring all the Dazzles I have.  Here's a card a made a few weeks ago.  Sent it to a friend I haven't seen in a long time with a plee for gettiing together for a cup of coffee and some talk time.  Kind of cute, although I really wish I had a stamp or rub ons that just said "Hi".  Had to improvise and use an alphabet stamp set.  I could have done it on the computer had a been thinking ahead  but I already had the card put together before I realized I didn't have a sentiment that would work.  Then stamped "How Ya' Bean?" on the inside with the same stamps.  Can't believe in all the stuff I've accumulated over the years that I'm missing something as basic as "Hi"!  Well I guess I'll just have to do something about that on my next visit to Memory Lane, JoAnne's or Michaels :-)

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Seeds of Friendship


Good Morning Gals,
Just wanted to show you the card I was trying to copy the other night.  Isn't it pretty - ric rac and all!  It was from the Clean and Simple Challege Gallery.
Have a nice day.
-J-

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

It was a success!!!

Last night was the "Big Reveal". . .the "Show & Tell" for the cards we made for the 1st ever Gal Pal Sketch Challenge.  I was just blown away by the cards.  And seeing them all lined up together was great fun.  Hopefully you won't mind if I steal a few of the designs. 

Click Here to see the post with the original sketch and details of the challenge.

Here's all the cards that came from that sketch. What fun!!!
Here's Mona's  cards:

Here's Val's cards:

 And those by yours truly:

Thanks my Gal Pals for playing along.  Here's the next sketch.  Let's pull out our eyelets and brads and see what we can come up with.  Next Show & Tell will be October 19th.  Hope that sounds OK.

Edit/Update:  Sketch came from THIS cool web site


Sunday, September 12, 2010

A "Natural" Embellishment

This is a card I made this weekend to send to my family along with our weekly newsletter.  When Allan and I were out hiking in the hills behind the house we passed a nine bark bush that had some really pretty color leaves.  I was hoping I could capture and preserve the beauty of their color by pressing them and covering them with Crystal Effects.  But they lost a lot of the color as they dried and even though the Crystal Effects gave them a nice shiney look and made them safe for using as an embellishment I wish the color was till as vivid as when we picked them.  I did make a 2nd attempt and picked a fresh leaf and put the Crystal Effects on it right away (rather than pressing it first).  The color was better but the leaf wasn't as flat.  Not sure it would make it in the mail.  Maybe I should mail it to myself and see :-)

Looking forward to the Big Reveal Tuesday night.

Friday, September 10, 2010


This was my mom's birthday card this April. It was a cute pattern I found on SplitCoast and just had to try it out. Except for figuring out the size of the flowers and leaves which I cut on my Cricut, it was really easy to put together. I'm thinking it might be cute for a Christmas and Winter card. You could use presents or pointsettias for the Christmas topper and maybe snowflakes for the Winter topper. Geez - even a Halloween or Fall theme with pumkins and apples for the toppers. I'll get right on that! :-)

Also wanted to let you know I made 3 more cards for our sketch challenge. One is not so good - had to do a "creative deviation" to try to save it. But the other 2 aren't bad. Val - the heat is on!

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Uh Oh! I'm in Trouble!!!

During my morning web surfing I stumbled across these stamps:
Just Rite Stamps for Christmas


Have been thinking about Christmas cards in the back of my mind for a couple of weeks now.  Forever thinking I'll get an early start and not be so whacked out when the holidays arrive.  Also want some ideas that are flat for mailing since I send so many cards out to family and friends.  I know we don't need one more order to try to fit into our budgets but I think I'm just going to have to break down and do it.  Will justify it by noting that a box of really pretty Christmas cards with the quantity I need would about $25.  So doesn't that all even out? :-)  [Mom - if you're reading this. . .Did I do that rationalization OK?  You taught me well!!! ]

Happy surfing!

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

"Hi"

Hope everyone had a good Labor Day.  Mine was nice and relaxing.  Got to spend a little time in the craft room on Saturday.  I've started sending weekly notes to my parents, Allan's parents and my Aunt Hazel.  Allan's father had a stroke a year or so ago and it's been hard on him to lose some of his mobility.  He says sometimes to Allan when asked how he is. . ."I'm still sitting here doing nothing".  Kind of sad.  And although my Aunt Hazel is pretty active, she's been so lonely since Uncle Bob died last year.  So we thought maybe a piece of  mail (other than a bill) might be a nice treat.  It's a great reason to make quick clean and simple cards like this one.  I just love this punch.  Not sure if you can tell from the picture but it punches and embosses.  One piece of patterned paper, a little ribbon and a scallop to highlight the punch was all it took to throw this one together. 

I also was able to get a card made for our 1st Gal Pal Sketch challenge.  Can't post it though until next week's Big Reveal.  Since Mona and Val voted last week to extend our deadline to next Tuesday, hopefully I'll get a couple more made between now and then.  Lots of ideas swimming in my head but just haven't spent the time putting them together.  How 'bout you girls? - any progress yet? :-)

Friday, September 3, 2010

Last but Certainly not Least

Had a chance Tuesday night to get pictures of Mona's alcohol ink cards from the class we took a couple of weeks ago.  Her "smoosh" sample was over-the-top gorgeous.  In fact she used our time at Memory Lane to work on a card design.  Can't wait until next week to see what she ended up with.  We all agreed that it was too pretty to give away.  So maybe we'll see it on her desk sometime in the future with a beautiful inspirational quote - although it's inspirational all on its own. 

Hope everyone has a good 3 day weekend and gets some wonderful craft time squeezed in!