mod stationary & tote

Who else am I a fabualous fan of? Lauren Meader! She's always up to something creative. Her beautiful homemade stationary set posted here I knew I'd have to try. The perfect occasion - personalized stationary for the bride-to-be. The wedding colors are fuchsia and black, so this makes the perfect gift. There is a set of 6, half fuchsia & half black, with half Thank You stamped envelopes & half just plain image.

Inside of the tote is a little altered notepad with coordinating pen. Perfect for keeping track of gifts and thank you's when you're a busy wedding planner :)

SUPPLIES :
Papertrey ink Simply Stationary, Polkadot Basics, Fresh Alphabet, Borders & Corners Circles, Mixed Messages; black, stamper's select
white, and raspberry cardstock; Black & White Basics patterned paper; raspberry and avocado inks; raspberry ribbons. Making Memories grommets, pad & pen from Michael's $1 bin, black cord, foam dimensionals. Tools: Marvy super jumbo scalloped circle punch, EX Success extra jumbo circle punch, corner rounder punch, Provocraft scalloped scissors, large scallop stencil, tag punch (large)

vibrations top ten

This is summarized from an email (source unknown; message on Yahoo group AwakeningCosmicConsciousness): ten things you can do to raise your vibration. Fun, right? Of course, use personal discernment and take just what jives with you:

1. Take responsibility (actions, thoughts, emotions, all that stuff)
   
2. Express gratitude (we have a lot to be thankful for)
3. Trust (yourself - you are perfect)
4. Suspend Judgment (let's try to stop the judging, people!)
5. Meditate (okay, I only do this sometimes really)
   
6. Honor your emotions
7. Know that you are loved
8. Forgive yourself & others
9. Have fun!
10. Love, love, love.
    

cards for guys & boys

Making masculine cards can be a challenge. One thing to do for inspiration is find a suitable feminine design and adapt it. Here are two examples. The first is a dude's birthday card, with homemade background papers. This is an adaptation from an original by Nichole Heady, Papertrey Ink co-founder. You can see her card here. (it's the second card down, with a pattern adapted from the third card down). I showed the 'first draft' to the two guys I work with and they suggested some metal - so I added the grommets. This was also my first attempt at distressing edges. Fun!

The second is a belated birthday card and gift of cookies, perfected by Betsy Veldman. She has an incredible, colorful style. This ensemble knocked my socks off - see it here. My version used boy colors, and one of Lauren Meader's My Timeless Templates downloads. I really enjoyed making this. I hear the cookies were good, but if I had time I would have re-done them because they 'poofed' too much. For the card, I boffed using a knitting needle and metal ruler straight-edge to make embossed lines. So, I added a few more which actually turned out okay! The polka dots on the card are heat embossed but it's hard to tell from the picture.

SUPPLIES:
Masculine card: PTI Guidelines, Paper Tray, and Around & About Sentiments stamps; chocolate & white cardstock; chocolate & spring moss ink and ribbons. Making Memories silver grommets.

Belated bday gift: PTI Forest Friends, Polka Dot Basics and Borders & Corners Circle; summer sunrise, spring moss, ocean tides & stamper's select white cardstock; Polka Dot Parade patterned paper; summer sunrise, spring moss & ocean tides ink; summer sunrise & ocean tides ribbon; Rounded Wrap Up template. Also some jute (love it). Tools: EK Success slim profile edge punch, Marvy extra jumbo circle punch, regular hole punch, kintting needle & metal ruler (for embossed lines), sponge dauber (for edging).

i love love

My long distance and mobile phone carrier CREDO has some really cool, free bumper stickers you can get right now here

In honor of the occasion… loooove that is, here are two simple and fun cards you can make for the special guy or gal in your life :)

SUPPLIES
Papertrey Ink Sweet Love, Around & About Sentiments stamps; poppy, raspberry, white cardstock; Black & White Basics patterned paper; poppy & raspberry ink & ribbon. Other supples are black ink, Making Memories grommets, Michael's ribbon and bling (studs & gems). Tools: Marvy giga oval, mega star, extra jumbo scalloped star, jumbo circle; Provo Craft scalloped scissors and Fiskars small hole punch.

thank you cards

I love following Michelle Wooderson (Mish Mash - listed on the side). It's always the first blog I check in the morning :) I groove on her layouts, borders and fun patterns. Perfect example: the Thank You cards (6) for Caitlyn's b'day were reproductions of Mish designs found here. Even rocked the messy stitches :)

There are pairs of cards in colors coordinating with a basic blue tone: more blue, green and pink. The sweet cards were the least I could do for the thoughtful gifts. Caitlyn loved the party, presents and friends. My folks commented that all the children were so nice and well-behaved. Must be some good parents there ;)

SUPPLIES:
Papertrey Ink Forest Friends, Around & About Sentiments, and Polka Dot stamps; stamper's select white, kraft, avocado, ocean tides & raspberry fizz paper, ink & ribbon; Polka Dot Parade paper. Also, Basic Grey 'Urban Prairie' patterned paper, antique linen distress ink, random black ink & buttons from my stash. Tools: ProvoCraft scalloped scissors & Fiskars small hole punch

birthday party

The holidays in this house start with Halloween and slowly gain speed until February, when things really get going. We had three expected family birthdays, then another one came along out of the blue! In planning Caitlyn's 3rd, I came across Cathy Gaubert's blog with some super cute ideas here

The invites use Papertrey Ink Forest Friends stamps, and Nana's Nursery patterned papers from DCWV. For party favors and cake/cupcake toppers, I found a set of unfinished wooden people from A Toy Garden here. They're painted with watercolors and finished with acrylic glaze. The Forest Prince, Red Riding Hood and Little Gnome all have cute felt hats sewed from a template I made. There's also a mushroom and a bowling ball tied off with a tag in lollipop bags. The mushroom toppers are shaker pegs from the wood area at Michaels - just trim and file the end of the mushrooms in the favor bags so they will stand up like bowling pins. The ones on the cake were left as-is. I adore the green sprinkles - like shredded Easter grass!

With homemade food, decor, and all, I thought a boxed organic cake was more than justified. But halfway into the recipe I realized it was for ONE cake round - and I needed to fill a Bundt! There was no time for the store so I whipped up another round of Amy Sedaris cupcakes (recipe here - love her!) (Fact - she and Stephen Colbert co-wrote the TV show Strangers with Candy.)

I had no idea how long to bake the combo-batter, so the cake turned out pretty dry. It's totally humbling to serve a non-delicious cake :) But Caitlyn LOVED it - despite the goofy picture. And the party was all about her so that's all that really matters.

yum yum dinner

Tonight I had a goal to get a photo of dinner and post it up on the night it was eaten. I had no idea what we'd eat at 3pm, then remembered a good recipe from the paper (apple, almond, cheddar & dill stuffed chicken breasts. I scrounged up currant-pineapple couscous, broccoli & limes fresh from our tree, wheat flat bread, summer berry salad and Chardonnay.

cards

These are total reproductions, but I LOVE them. Fun cards for a very good friend with an engagement and a birthday around the holidays. The originals are from Nichole Heady here (scroll down over 3/4 of the way - you can't miss the bee bling), and Debbie Olson at the Papertrey Ink gallery here.

I loved these designs so much that I did an adaptation of the bee card as a thank you, and will be doing a version of the engagement card soon!

SUPPLIES:
Bee Card - Papertrey Ink Honey Bees & Around and About Sentiments stamps; Raspberry Fizz Mix & Black and White Basics patterned paper; raspberry, black and white cardstock; and raspberry grosgrain ribbon. Black Color Box ink, bling is from Michaels and the punch is a Marvy extra jumbo circle.

Engagement Card - Papertrey Ink Sweet Love stamps. Paper is 12x12 ivory, black and grey (I didn't know about card-maker quaity paper - the card was already buckling!) from Michaels. Black Color Box ink is heat embossed with Creative Beginnings embossing powder. Other inks are Silver Color Box and Niagara Mist VersaMagic. Bling and grey satin ribbon from Michaels. Ivory stain ribbon is from my stash. I didn't have a ticket corner punch, so I created a template to make the corner cuts - and they are oh so icky when you zoom in! Hey, it's all about the process, people.

my first 2 cards

Hi - welcome to my blog :)

I got into a homemade kick over the holidays, and here are my first cards.They use supplies left over from my Altered Books phase and some new goodies from Papertrey Ink.

There were about 60 Xmas cards and six thank you cards. The stamping quality isn't very good - I mailed 'em all and only had left-overs for photos.

SUPPLIES: PTI - 2008 Holiday Tag Collection & Warm Hospitality stamps, Holiday Vintage Prints & kraft paper, avocado/poppy ribbons, and avocado ink. Red paper is left over from wedding crafts, and red and white inks are Color Box. Tools are a Marvy Super Jumbo scallop circle punch, Provocraft scalloped scissors and a Making Memories paper piercer.