Customizing a Background

Today I wanted to share a card I made using nesting dies in an unusual way. If you're like me, you own quite a few punches and dies. Often we use the punched/cut out image and toss the negative image. Today I made a card using that negative image as a mask for crating a background on my card.

I created a video so you can see exactly how I did it.





Keep in mind, if you're careful you can use your mask a few times. I used mine a second time to make this card:

A few other things to think about:
I used a stamped image and sponged on ink to create my background, but this type of mask will work just as well with ink mists and sprays.
I centered a single image, but you'll get an entirely different look if you did multiple images along an edge. For example, a mask with 3 circles along the bottom edge would look cool.


Please feel free to leave any questions you may have in the comment section. Thanks for stopping by!

In my {felt} heart

Yesterday I blogged about this card over at Stamp School.

I am absolutely in love with the ease of cutting Stamp School Felt (colors here are Cotton Candy, Razzleberry, and Wild Cherry). It may be more expensive than acrylic blend felt, but once you go 100% wool felt, you'll never go back. I used the Sophia Heart die from Memory Box to cut this heart. I did use a metal shim to get the die's intricate patterns to cut crisply into the felt. I have a little step-by-step on stamping just part of the words from a larger word stamp (here I'm using Stamp School's Easter Blessings) without having to tape your stamp off over on my Stamp School blog post.  You can head on over there if you'd like to learn more about that.

Moxie Fab World also has a Die Cutting challenge going on until the 13th, so if you love die cutting felt like I do (or even just die cutting paper), head on over there for a fun challenge.

Thanks for stopping by!

Together Is The Best Place To Be

Today's project is a bit of a bundle project. Glue Dots® challenged its designers this month to make a wedding project, and Moxie Fab World is having a Punches Challenge. I thought I'd combine the 2 and make some framed art with my Fiskars Heart Squeeze Punch that would also make a lovely wedding gift.

I know you've probably seen a lot of this kind of framed art. This one's a bit more personalized because you use a map of a location that is special to the couple that will be receiving the gift to add an additional personalized touch. For example, this one is made from multiple maps of different locations that are special to my husband and me (where we met, where we married, where we owned our first home). If you are attending a destination wedding you could make the hearts from the map of that destination (i.e. Jamaica, Hawaii, Mexico).

Here's what I used to make my frame:

The background piece is a sheet of Jillibean Soup Kraft card stock. I cut it down to fit the frame and ran it through my printer to created the border and text. You could easily do this part with a black fine point pen and a ruler. I just have really, really bad handwriting so I decided to print the text instead.


Here's a close up of the text:

I attached my hearts with Mini Glue Dots®, but the Ultra Thin Glue Dots® would work equally as well here. Whenever I arrange something in a grid pattern, I lay one row across and one down to get the spacing right, then I work out in rows from there.

In the bottom right hand corner, I created a heart with our wedding date on it instead of creating a heart out of a map piece. Instead of using flat adhesive for this heart, I attached it with a Pop Up Glue Dot®

...and there you have it! just pop your creation in a frame and you're all set!

Thanks for stopping by!

*I created this post while participating on the Glue Dots® Design Team

Fabulous Felt

Moxie Fab World is having a Fabulous Felt challenge. I ended up with 2 cards for this challenge. When the felt challenge was announced, I immediately thought of making a mustache card with a felt mustache. The card came together quite easily, the hardest part was finding the right greeting. I've seen "I mustache you a question" and "I hate to leave, but I mustache", so I was trying to come up with something else. I finally landed on "mustache-ulations".


This second card came about when I was pricing some new arrivals at A Walk Down Memory Lane this past Saturday, and came across the coolest felt embellishments from Basic Grey. They come in a 6 pack of multiple colors. For some reason my mind decided this yellow and purple one would look really pretty with grey as an accent color. It's a different color combo, but I like how it turned out.


Thanks for stopping by!

Tuesday Trigger

It's been a while since I've played a long with a Moxie Fab World Tuesday Trigger. I often see the trigger and think, "Wow, that's gorgeous!", but I always seem to find myself running out of time to play along. Well, not this week! I saw this trigger and I made time to play along.

Pintrest

My first impulse was to create a dress card and just lift the picture as is. I'm sure it would have been cool, but I decided to try to push my creative juices a little further. Well...even though it's only August, I had this crazy idea that that pattern would make a lovely Christmas Tree.


I not only was inspired by the shape of the layers, but the mix of colors and patterns on the dress. I also loved that the whole dress seemed to be tied together into a cohesive unit by burgundy edging, so I tried to mirror that in my card as well. For my patterned paper, I used Fancy Pants' Tradition Collection. The trunk of the tree is an SRM sticker from Fancy Sticker Sentiments Christmas. I found it easiest to use a bunch of Mini Glue Dots®to adhere all my layers together. If you want to see what other people did with this cool Trigger, you can check out the Moxie Fab World Tuesday Trigger here.

Thanks for stopping by!

Taking Some time to Stamp

It's been a long time since I sat down with some stamps just for fun. Lately it seems like I've only been using my stamps for greetings on cards. Since stamping is what originally introduced me to the world of paper crafting, it seems a bit of a shame that I've been neglecting my stamps. Moxie Fab World has a Stamp It! challenge, and it just felt right to play along. I've got a card and a tag today.


Lawn Fawn is hands down one of my favorite stamp companies. It's a good thing I have at least a little self control, or I would own every one of their stamp sets. This adorable bike is from a set called Cruising Through Life. I'm a Copic novice, but I LOVE coloring on kraft card stock with my Copics.
I stamped the "hi" greeting on another one of my faves, stick pin flags. The paper, flags, and flower brads are all from The Girls' Paperie Jubilee collection.


I've made a very similar tag to this before. However, this time I just had to try out covering that pear with my new Glitter Ritz warm highlights glitter. Gotta love a glitter that doesn't rub off easily.

The background is a tag, covered in ripped and layered masking tape. I sponged brown ink onto the tape, stamped it with a Glitz Designs word background stamp, and then sealed the whole thing with a thick coat of Glossy Glaze. When that was dry I stamped "We make a fine Pear" with staz-on ink directly onto the tag. The pear was stamped, colored in, covered in glitter, cut out, and adhered to the tag. The pear stamp is from Mark's Finest Papers.

It was fun to get a little inky, but tomorrow I'm going to switch things up with some cards made using SRM Stickers.

I Believe

I've been meaning to post this card for a while now. I made it all the way back in August for A Walk Down Memory Lane's CHA preview event. Now Moxie Fab World is having a Jolly Holiday Greetings contest, so I figured why not post it finally. The patterned paper, stamps, and ribbon are all from My Mind's Eye's really beautiful and fun new Christmas line called I Believe. That's it for me today, short and sweet!

Okay, I know it's a little early...

I'm sure it's a little early to be thinking about Christmas, but A Walk Down Memory Lane just got their CHA Fancy Pants order in, and I'm in love. I was able to play with some of the Tradition line that Lisa brought back with her, but now that she has her order I have access to the whole line!!! I just had to make this:

I don't normally do shabby chic, but as I started to put this together, it just seemed to lean that direction, so I went with it. The paper is from Fancy Pants Tradition. I cut the ornament shapes with my Silhouette, then I pieced patterned paper behind the ornaments to give a multi-colored look to them. The frame is from IKEA and is a shadowbox style frame that measures 5 1/2" x 5 1/2". I used Glue Dots® glue lines to attach the ribbon. This adhesive did an amazing job of attaching ribbon to ribbon, ribbon to the wood frame, and ribbon to paper. The green satin ribbon and the red velvet ribbon are from Fancy Pants Tradition. The green pleated ribbon is from Maya Road. It's a bit hard to tell, but the green ribbons are attached to the frame and the red ribbon is attached to the paper inside the frame. In person, it gives the project some nice dimension. If this inspires you to get in the Christmas crafting mood, check out Moxie Fab world. Last week they celebrated the release of Holiday Cards & More. They have a number of Christmas themed contests going on...I think I might just enter this in "The decor to make the season bright" challenge.

I wrote this blog post while participating on the Glue Dots® design team.

Monday Sunshine

I thought I bring you a little sunshine to brighten your Monday.


I love this line from Bo Bunny. It's called Sun Kissed. At first I didn't really think I needed a lot of this paper, so I just bought a few pieces...the first time. It so bright, bold, and fun that I ended up heading back to my LSS (A Walk Down Memory Lane) almost immediately for more. The buttons and brads on this card are also from the Sun Kissed Collection. I cut the sun and the orange layer using my Silhouette. To help the sun stand out, I stitched an orange border around it. The greeting is from a new stamp company called Lawn Fawn and the set is called Partly Cloudy. The greeting was stamped with Versamark and embossed with American Craft's Embossing Powder (color Cricket).
Wishing you a sunny week!

A Few Challenges

It's summer, and I know you're busy so here are a few things to get your creative juices flowing.
This example has a few purposes. First, if you take my Basic Grey Card Class at A Walk Down Memory Lane on July 24 (details in the right hand column), you'll get to make this card. It's also an entry for Moxi Fab's Clean and Simple Card Challenge. All week Moxie Fab is having card style challenges. Click here to check them out and play along.
The papers and buttons are from Basic Grey and the stamp is from Technique Tuesday (which just happens to be 25% off this month at AWDML).
Up next is a little layout inspiration. On the 15th of the Month Scraptiv!ty posts a layout sketch on-line with 3 examples. 1 example was made by me: You can check out the sketch and the other examples by clicking here. This was a bit of a step outside my comfort zone. I don't usually do shabby chic layouts, but I think this one turned out well. All of the paper, ribbon, buttons, journaling stickers, and miscellaneous accessories are from Chatter Box. I used a gold gel pen to journal and to outline the edges of my patterned papers. Thanks for stopping by for a little inspiration.

Handmade Fabric Flowers and Homemade T-Shirts

I've been having a blast playing with fabric this weekend. I have so many projects to show you that I'm just going to jump right into it.
First up is a card with a hand sewn fabric flower. I don't have a sewing machine right now, so you read that right - I was crazy enough to sew it by hand. I saw these flowers on the amazingly talented Carina Gardner's site. You can snag the template for them free on her sight by clicking here. They're really easy to make and so, so pretty! I just knew this card would be perfect for the current challenge going on at the Moxie Fab World Blog. All you have to do to play along is make a card that uses fabric. Mission accomplished!

I just got some heat transfer and the rhinestone starter kit from Silhouette. Here's what I've done this weekend with it. I'll share a few tips and tricks at the end of the pictures.
A shirt for my dear husband who loves snowmobiling (the SCSC on the front pocket stands for Sioux County Snowmobile Club):
A Tank-top for me:
Baby boy gifts:Baby girl gift:
and a gift for twins (I got this super cute idea from the3littlelonis):A few tips and tricks:
The heat transfer~
will take on texture of any cloth put over it during the ironing process if the plastic transfer material isn't cover it. Why this matters? When doing a small layer over a big image (like the SCSC over the snowmobile on the pocket) you must have a big piece of transfer plastic to cover the whole image, not just the piece being transferred. I saved the large piece of plastic that was left over after transferring the snowmobile onto the back of the shirt and used that as a 2nd layer. I did the same thing when adding the rhinestones over the heat transfer material on the tank top.

The rhinestones~
I reused my transfer tape. It's sticky enough to be used 2-3 times before throwing out. This should save a little $
You can use the template shape (that you cut with your silhouette into template material) over and over again. For example, if you want to make 3 of the same onesies with a flower on them, you can use the same template 3 times, you don't need to cut 3 separate flowers. Again, this should save you a little $

Whew...I think you've made it to the end, of my really long post. Hope you enjoyed it!

Relax...

Moxie Fab World is having a 3 Cheers for Chairs contest, click here to learn more about it. I thought I'd combine it with a Mother's Day card this year.
The paper is all from Pink Paislee's Queen Bee line. The lamp is from Unity Co. Comfy Cozy set and was stamped in gray ink on Queen Bee paper and then cut out. I cut the chair with my Silhouette SD.

The second project I have today is a fast board book. It took me about 1 1/2 hrs to put this together from start to finish, including finding quotes on the internet for the book. The trick is using pages that are the same size as your photos (for me that means 4x6):The paper is from Pink Paislee's 365 Degrees Collection. Various Fiskars Border punches were used to make the edge detail. Sweet and simple, and a perfect Mother's Day gift for my mom!

Moxie Mother's Day

This is Moxie Fab World's Tuesday Trigger this week:I think I need that bag!

I decided to use the color inspiration here to make a Mother's Day card, since we all know what Sunday is!I'm sighing a little because this picture just doesn't do this card justice. I've been having a blast playing with these beautiful butterflies from Jenni Bowlin. All Jeni Bowlin stuff is on sale 25% off at A Walk Down Memory Lane this month (woo hoo!). The paper (isn't it gorgeous???) is October Afternoon Fly a Kite and Thrift Shop. The stamp is from Stampin' Up! and the border is done with Fiskar's Apron Lace punch.
If you want to play along in the Moxie Fab world details be found here.

Thanks to our Soldiers

This year I headed up the service project for our local MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group, because it's something I'm very passionate about. We collected items and letters of support to send to our soldiers overseas. There's a great website called anysoldier.com that we're using for contact info for those brave men and women who put themselves in harm's way. Most of the soldiers enjoy getting care packages, but what they seem to love the most are the letters and cards, so we're making sure there are plenty of those in the boxes. Here are 2 cards I mad for just that purpose:
They are based off of this card sketch from Paper Crafts Go To Sketches:
There is a fun card contest going on over at Moxie Fab World using the above sketch. If you want to play along, you can find all the details here.
Just a quick note on the products used; the paper is Pink Paislee's 365 Degrees. My local scrap store (A Walk Down Memory Lane) got it in and I just *had* to have the 6 x 6 pad. I also picked up a set of the Queen Bee Cork Buttons, as you can see above. I've just started playing around with them, and oh my are they fun! So far I've stamped on them (which works well), used them plain, and put a brad through them. The cork held up really well when I punched it with my crop-a-dile. I've found that a strong liquid glue (Scrappy Glue, Tombow Multi, etc.) secures these nice and snug to your paper. Just a quick little review there, for those of you wondering about this new and unique product.

Moxie Fab, Fab Friends, and Some Upcoming Fun

You know I love playing along with the challenges and Tuesday Triggers over at Moxie Fab World, well click here to check out this week's Tuesday Trigger creator at the Moxie Fab World. You might just see a project by someone you know (me!!!).

I just got done creating a layout that will be part of a gift scrapbook. The scrapbook chronicles this past year of MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers), and will be given as a thank you gift to this year's coordinator. This page is of our steering team:
I used some of my favorite papers from Cosmo Cricket Earth Love. These papers are soft, pretty, and subtly girlie. I love them! I added some stitching around the edges using a Bazzill in stitch template. I used a scallop punch and a small hole punch to make the flowers. The letters are Thickers from American Crafts.
One more fun, and hidden, detail:
That little tag behind the photo pulls out for journaling. We're going to write a very heartfelt, very sappy thank you note to our coordinator on it and slip it back behind the photo.
I've made a companion page to this layout, but you'll have to wait until May 1 to see it. In case you didn't know May 1 is national scrapbooking day. There are lots of fun activities going on all over the paper crafting world. I'll be hosting a challenge over at Scraptiv!ty that uses that companion page. If you're in the northwest Iowa region that day you'll want to swing by A Walk Down Memory Lane where they have classes, crops, and a make and take (made by yours truly). Remember, friends don't let friends craft alone! I'd love to have you join me on-line or in person for some fun May 1.

A tale of 2 cards

Well, I know I've said it before, but I do like stepping out of my comfort zone to make cards. It helps me grow as a paper crafter, but it's not always ad successful as I'd like it to be. I have 2 cards today. 1 is 100% in my comfort zone and the other is way outside it. 1st up is the not so comfortable card.

This is for Moxie Fab World's Doilies and Lace challenge. Vintage, shabby chic, or whatever you want to call it isn't really my style, but hey, it was fun to give it a try. Most of what you see up there is from my February Scraptiv!ty kit. I cut some of the lace into strips and twisted it up to make the lace flower. Then I used some brown ink to dirty it up a bit. All of my non-kit items came from A Walk Down Memory Lane (AWDML) and include the journaling tag from My Mind's Eye, the pretty stick pins from Jenni Bowlin, the i love you stamp from Heidi Grace, and the Sunburst border punch from Fiskars.

Now up is a card that's 100% in my comfort zone.
This card uses paper from My Mind's Eye Andrea Victoria Collection. The border punch is one of my favorites, Apron Lace by Fiskars. The Happy Birthday stamp is by Cornish Heritage Farms. The rhinestone brads and ribbon are from Stampin' Up!

Erin go Bragh!

A happy St. Patty's Day to you all. I'm and Irish girl through and through (at least on my mom's side), so I wanted to make sure to stop in and wish you all a Happy St. Patty's. This is a repeat card for 2 reasons. 1. It's one of my favorites and is perfect for St. Patty's Day (Erin go bragh translates to Ireland Forever). 2. Moxie Fab World is having a lace and doilies contest. You can find the details here. That lace made from glitter is perfect for the contest. If you haven't already, you can get this lace and doily kit (full of gorgeous paper, too) from Scraptiv!ty.

Stamping Olympics Birthday, and a Perfect Picture

First up is an all stamped birthday card. This is another new set from Unity Stamp Co. that I picked up at A Walk Down Memory Lane this weekend.I have to apologize for all of the bling, but I just couldn't help myself. Plum is such a perfectly girlie color, that I just had to add the Kaisercraft rhinestones. The couch stamp and sentiment are Unity Stamp Co. Comfy Cozy. The couch and background are stamped using stamps from Technique Tuesday's Casablanca set. The card stock is Bazzill Kraft. The ribbon is SU! Elegant Eggplant. The purple inks are SU! Perfect Plum and Pale Plum. The watermark ink is Versamark.
I also had to share with you this great picture from this weekend. I was trying to take a picture of my youngest looking at the ducks at the zoo. My oldest walked in front of the camera right as I was taking the picture. I went to delete the picture thinking it was just going to be of my oldest's jacket, and was happy to find this instead:
I feel a layout in it's future!