Vintage dancer

It's almost 11pm (which for anyone who knows me, knows is VERY late for me) but I really wanted to finish this card while the idea was in my head. I made this card for an 18-year old girl who recently discovered she has MS. McKenzie loves to dance and when I saw this vintage newspaper photo on The Graphics Fairy I just thought it would be ideal. This dancer's smile and attitude just shine, in much the same way that this modern girl shines (to hear more about McKenzie, check out Dustin Pike's blog).

I used my brand-new, delivered yesterday, Basic Grey "Cappella" papers & stickers. The photo is straight black & white but printed off with a bit of a sepia tone so the colours are just perfect. The sketch is from Midnight Madness and was a stretch for me - I don't usually do stitching on cards but I love how the laces echo the lacing of ballet slippers.

Recipe:

• Basic Grey "Capella" papers & stickers
• Fiber (DMC cross-stitch floss)

Challenges:

• Midnight Madness, sketch
• Create 4 Fun - make a vintage card
• Pile it On - out of the box (although I love vintage, using a photo and addingstitching is very "out of the box" for me
• Simon Says Stamps Challenge - pink, green, brown
• Polka Doodle - sew & sew
• ABC Challenge - "V" is for vintage
• Paper Play - "up in the air" (I'm probably stretching it, but I believe that ballerinas do fly through the air)
• The Crazy Challenge - girly

Special RAK Event

Lisa is a design team member for several of my favourite digital stamp designers and she recently posted the following:

I am having a special event for my sister Jayme. She is in her early 50's and has terminal lung cancer. To make it worse, her sweet dachshund Molly passed away a couple weeks ago. Today we learned her cancer has spread to several other areas and her time is running out. I am asking for all my card making friends to send her a fun card...not really get well cards obviously, but something pretty or funny that will make her smile. She is a frog collector so frog cards would be awesome!

I think its wonderful that all of us crafters are being given a chance to (hopefully) brighten someone's day by doing what we love. I made the following card for Jayme - I hope it makes her smile a little bit. If you want to make a card for Jayme too, check out Lisa's blog - she is also offering some great candy for everyone that participates.

About the card:
I went a little crazy mixing & matching designers for this card. The princess is from Mo's Digital Pencil, the sentiment ("I better get a new palace out of this") and frog are recent freebies from Tiddly Inks (PCP group only) and the mushroom is from Stretch 'n Bubbles. All are coloured with Copic markers, then liberally bling'd up with Stickles. I fussy-cut the frog and then attached him with pop-dots to the mushroom - it looks really 3-D in real life. I'm proud of myself for pulling out some unused stash, too - I used chalk pastels that I haven't touched in 6 mths around the edges of each shape. Finally, I couldn't decide which ribbon to use so I ended up using both. I think the double bow enclosure gives the card an interesting finish.

Recipe:

• Mo's Digital Pencil, "Kissy" digital stamp
• Stretch 'n Bubbles, "Mushroom" digital stamp
• Tiddly Inks, sentiment & "Prince Charming" digital stamps
• Cornish Heritage Farms, "the Kim Hughes collection - MochaChica" papers
• Ribbon, stash
• Copic markers
• Stickles glitter glue

Challenges:

• Mo's Digital Challenge - love
• Stamp Something - use two of something (2 main images; two-fold card; two ribbons)
• Totally Gorjuss - bling it up
• Paper Sundaes - favourite book, poem or fairy tale (princess & the frog)
• The Crazy Challenge - girly
• Digital Tuesday Challenge - cute people (how cute is this little girl?)
• Everybody Art Challenge - fairy tale (princess & the frog)
• Crafty Creations - use your favourite stamp (easy to see why I love Mo's little princess)
• Creative Card Crew - pink & green
• Crafty Ho's Challenge - photo inspiration (if anyone would wear this hat, it would be this girl)

Pretty in Pink

Every year while I was growing up my grandmother and/or great-aunt would make my sister & I matching outfits for pictures. As a result, I have a stack of photos of my little sister and I in outfits ranging from adorable to quite hideous (and I leave it to you to decide which end of the spectrum these land in). I am slowly starting to scrapbook the pictures and I'm really trying to do them justice.

I was 6 (& my sister 2 or 3) in this picture but I still remember loving this poncho - I would play with the pom pom constantly.  This picture was quite a challenge to scrapbook though because the photo itself is quite damaged. Aside from the scratches and dust, there is also quite a bit of discolouration on my sister's face (she's the one with the weird green blotch across her eye). I cleaned up the picture as much as I could using Photoshop but I just couldn't get rid of the green until I converted the picture to black & white. Unfortunately, that also meant that the wonderful pink of these hand-made ponchos was lost. In the end I added the colour back to the ponchos while leaving the rest of the picture black & white. I'm quite pleased with the result.

I started this page with a raspberry Bazzil cardstock, then overlaid a white eyelet cut-out paper to mirror the crochet pattern of the ponchos. I then triple-matted the photo with subtle patterned paper. The sentiment was designed using SCAL and then cut on the Cricut. I added some gems to the "i" for a bit of shine. The flower was made from a disassembled cardstock flower (the first layer was the wrong colour so I replaced it with one I made using a spellbinders die). I also added gems to the cardstock sticker borders to add shine.

Recipe:

• Bazzil cardstock
• Making Memories white diecut eyelet paper
• Basic Grey patterned papers & cardstock border stickers, "Bittersweet" collection
• Cricut (to cut out sentiment)
• Gems (stash)
• Spellbinders nestabilities
• K & Company chipboard flower & hearts

  Challenges:

• Scrapbook Challenges, recipe (4 DP, 3 letter/word title, 2 chipboard accents)
• Scrapbook Challenges, colour (pink, light blue, light brown) (pink is the dominant colour but there is lgt blue and brown in the accents)
• Midnight Madness, sketch
• A Spoon Full of Sugar, cute & girly
• Incy Wincy, blast from the past (it doesn't get more retro than these ponchos from the 70's)

You rock!

Another quick card for a couple of challenges that are ending today. The picture isn't very good (there is no natural light today, at all, due to the heavy rain) and hopefully I can remember to replace it with a better one soon.

I made this card with a bunch of freebies. The background paper was created in Photoshop using a Polka Doodles download pack, and the image is a freebie from Tiddly Inks (her PCP group members only, so join if you haven't already). The Polka Doodles challenge was to add texture/dimension so I layered the paper, popped up the sentiment and stamp image and finally added some buttons. I wish I had some flat rocks to add (wouldn't that have been the perfect touch?) but I figured these buttons were sort of suggestive of rock.

Recipe:

• 
  
  Tiddly Inks, digital stamp
• 
  
  Polka Doodles, digital pack
• 
  
  Buttons (stash)
• 
  
  Bazzil cardstock
• 
  
  Copic markers
• 
  
  Adobe Photoshop

Challenges:

• 
  
  Polka Doodles - add texture dimension
• 
  
  Tiddly Inks - don't use designer paper (so I made my own!)
• 
  
  Totally Gorjuss - round & round; use circles
• 
  
  Crazy 4 Challenges - must have a pocket (his shorts' have pockets and I also found one of the buttons in the pocket of my son's pants!)
• 
  
  Our Creative Corner - masculine birthday
• 
  
  Stamp, Scrap & Doodle - masculine
• 
  
  Charisma Cardz - 3D

Phindy's "Christmas in Spring" challenge

Just a quick post today and no, I haven't missed the fact that Spring is here (although it's kind of hard to believe considering the rain that's been falling). Today's card is in answer to a challenge from Phindy's Place - to make a Christmas card.

I had lots of fun pulling out the Christmas papers and looking through the winter images. I decided on this one of a boy sledding as he reminds me of my kids when they were sledding this past winter. I created the snowy hills by tearing and inking (with Copic BG0000) the edges of some sparkly paper recovered from last Christmas' crackers. I love how it looks like he's flying over the top of the snow!

Recipe:

• 
  
  Basic Grey "Eskimo Kisses" patterned paper
• 
  
  Sparkly card (stash, old Christmas crackers)
• 
  
  Brad (stash)
• 
  
  Phindy's Place, digital stamp
• 
  
  Copic markers

Challenges:

• 
  
  Phindy's Place Challenge - Christmas in Spring
• 
  
  Corrosive Challenges - easel card


• 
  
  Paper Sundaes - easel card

Generations

When my Dad came to visit over the winter he brought a folder of photos and notes from his genealogy research. I spent some time scanning photos and now need to get them scrapbooked. I just love old family photos - they can tell us so much about our history and where we came from.

This page has a photo of my great-grandmother and grandmother. The photo would be early 1920's. My grandma would have been 3 or 4 years old at the time - isn't she adorable? I find it amazing how similar my sister looked at the same age, although it might just be the pageboy haircut.

I wanted to draw the eye to Gramma so I added some colour to her sweater (using Photoshop). This is the first time I've tried this and I'm quite pleased with the result. To embellish the page, I made my own flower embellishments by fussy-cutting some of the flowers out of the patterned paper. There weren't enough flowers on the sheet so I scanned it, used Photoshop to isolate the flowers, adjusted their size and then printed them off. I added some fabric leaves from my stash and then layered everything onto the page using pop-dots. I finished off with a few green pearls to add a bit of bling (everything needs bling) and then a raised journaling square.

Recipe:

• 
  
  Bazzill cardstock
• 
  
  Imaginisce "Scratched" rub-ons
• 
  
  Fancy Pants Designs "Pansy" patterned paper
• 
  
  Fabric leaves (stash)
• 
  
  Pearls (stash)

Challenges:

• 
  
  Fab n' Funky - make your own embellishments
• 
  
  Practical Scrappers - use patterned paper (used for background and to make embellishments)
• 
  
  The Pink Elephant - use pink (pink for embellishments & matting)

Encouragement card for a stranger

I love making cards but just don't have that many people to give them to, so when I read in her blog that, Phindy's Place designer, Philomena's sister was very ill and needed some encouragement I decided this would be a perfect opportunity to make a card that would actually be sent to someone.

I used a crocus image from Paper Garden which I coloured with Copic markers. The sentiment is from a Melissa Frances sentiment set. I didn't have anything of the appropriate size/dimension so I just stamped the image repeatedly over the 2 squares which I think ends up looking quite nice. The final touch were border strips along the side and bottom. I decorated the envelope with a third copy of the crocus image.

Recipe:

• Paper Garden, digital stamp
• Melissa Frances, sentiment
• Martha Stewart, border punches
• Copic markers
• Basic Grey, patterned paper

Challenges:

• Crafty Ho's, sketch

Prison baby and a special request

I'm posting two projects today so make sure to keep scrolling down!

Prison Baby:

My cousin is expecting a baby any day now and I wanted to send her a pre-birth congratulation card. I bought this Bugaboo stamp image months ago but haven't used it, but this seemed like the perfect occasion. She doesn't know if she is having a girl or boy so the fact that the image is more boyish shouldn't matter (all the babies born lately have been girls).

I cut an opening in the yellow card using my Quickutz Nesting Label CC 6-027. Next step was to emboss the front with a Sizzix Textured Impressions Embossing Folder from the Birthday Surprise Set. I had the idea of presenting the baby as being in jail so I made some prison bars out of scraps and then adhered to a raised frame cut with 2 sizes of the Quickutz Label 6-027. A bit of glitter and some colourful buttons finished up the front.

The image is coloured with Copic markers. And I added some twists of paper (to match the prison bars) on either side of the sentiment. I had to make this pretty quickly as my mom will be hand-delivering it to my cousin today so there are a few rough edges (figurative and literal) but all-in-all I'm pretty happy with the card. I hope it gives my cousin a chuckle!

Challenges:

• Digital Tuesday Challenge - make us laugh (scroll down for a second card for this challenge)
• ABC Challenge - "U" is for unused stash
• The Pink Elephant Challenge - use yellow, DP & buttons

A Special Request:

While my mom was visiting this weekend she asked for a card to thank her neighbour for looking after her house. But she didn't want a standard "thank you", she wanted something funny. I showed her a few images and she selected a Squigglefly image "Shady Lady". This was another rushed project (one evening to make both these cards) but luckily I'd already coloured the image.

The sentiment on the front reads "Did you party while I was away?" and then inside it reads "Thanks for hiding all the evidence before I got back".

Challenges:

• Digital Tuesday Challenge - make us laugh
• Charisma Cardz - something sweet (note the Appletini she is spilling)
• Cute Card Thursday - someone special (this is for my Mom's BFF)

Stationery set & box for Mom

My mom's birthday is coming up and I wanted to make her something special, yet practical. She loves all things handmade (although she won't try crafting herself) so I ended up making her a stationery box along with a set of personalized stationery.

I found this 7-1/2"x7-1/2" wooden box at Michaels. I covered the top and bottom with this pretty paper from My Mind's Eye (thanks to Photo Express who gave the paper as part of a National Scrapbook Day free with purchase page kit). I used Spellbinders "Fleur de Lis" pendant to make the 3-D flower on top (another thanks to Scrap & Stamp for their great online tutorial). I lined the inside of the box with more of the My Mind's Eye papers (don't you just love double-sided papers!!!) and created a little divider to hold the pens separately. The pens were an incredible find at Staples. Mom is left-handed (like me) so tends to get ink smeared on her hand. These pens are ultra-fine tip so no smearing, AND they are in colours that perfectly match the stationery. How cool!

The stationery is kept simple. I used a Tiddly Inks digital stamp (available as a freebie to members of her PCP group) which I coloured in Photoshop (hand-colouring bled through the paper). I used a couple of border punches for interest (Martha Stewart for the letterhead and EK Success for the cards) then added some Stickles glitter glue and Glossy Accents for dimension and shine. Overall, I made 5 sheets of letterhead, 5 "hello" note cards, and 10 envelopes. Everything is personalized, of course.

This was quite a fun little project. I particularly enjoyed being able to make a matched set because of the use of digital images.

Recipe:

• Michaels, wooden box
• My Minds Eye "Mother" set of patterned paper
• Gems (stash)
• Martha Stewart, "scallop dot" border punch
• EK Success, "dotted scallop" border punch

Challenges:

• Stamp Something, birthday somethings
• Totally Gorjuss, pink & green (lavendar counts as pink, doesn't it?)
• Everybody Art Challenge, make a gift
• Bee Crafty, something new (Mom can use this to keep in touch with new friends)
• By the Cute & Girly, celebrations
• Polka Doodle, summer flowers
• C.R.A.F.T., weddings or birthdays
• Scrap, Stamp & Doodle, anything but a card

It's all about the bling, exploding box

I decided to get my friend Jacqui a gift card for her birthday (I know, tres boring, but what else can you get for the girl who has everything?) but I had to make up for the dull gift with some fabulous wrapping. I saw a class being advertised for an exploding box but since I couldn't attend, I decided to make up my own template and give it a try. I'm very, very, very pleased with the result.

I used a black cardstock base along with several papers from the DCWV Glittered "All Dressed Up" stack. The papers are all embossed, glittered and (of course) coordinating which made the choices much simpler. I decorated each side of the box with a mix of flowers created using Peel-Off outline stickers (placed on black card and then cut out).

The lid of the box is decorated with a 3-D medallion created using Spellbinders "Fleur-de-lis" pendant shapes (it looks much better in real life). When the lid is lifted off, the box explodes outwards revealing the gift card holder. Again, I used the DCWV paper along with Stella, who is a Bugaboo digital stamp image. I just love the Bugaboo character images as they range from sassy to sarcastic. Stella is coloured using Copic markers and then liberally embellished with Stickles glitter glue. The sentiment is from another Peel-Off outline sticker pack. The top of the card holder is punched with an EZ Success punch.

In keeping with the theme of glitter & bling, the gift card is for Claire's (which specializes in accesories). Anyway, hope you enjoy reading about this project. I completely enjoyed making it!

Recipe:

• Bugaboo Stamps - "Stella" image
• Peel-Off Outline Stickers
• DCWV glittered "All Dressed Up" stack - patterned paper
• Copic markers
• Stickles glitter glue
• Spellbinders pendant - Fleur de lis

Challenges:

• Crazy Challenge - bling 
• Fab N Funky - show us your fancy edges
• C.R.A.F.T. - birthdays or weddings
• Stamp Something - birthday something
• Stamp, Scrap & Doodle - anything but a card
• Catch the Bug - flower power (note the flowers on the box sides)
• Simon Says Stamps - birthday celebrations

Mother's Day flowers

Second post today but this card is so different from the one I posted earlier (the sick pig card) that I wanted to have it separately. I made this one for my mom (who hopefully hasn't started reading my blog) for Mother's Day this weekend. Mom is always impressed by cards that open a bit differently so I decided to convert the Crazy 4 Challenges card sketch into a gatefold. The papers are from Basic Grey (my absolute favourite company for papers) and the image is a freebie from Tiddly Inks - PCP group. If you haven't joined the Tiddly Inks group on Paper Craft Planet then hurry over and sign up as Christy rewards followers with a freebie every week.

I added some glossy accents and Stickles glitter glue to the flowers & vases to give the card a bit more "zip" and then finished it off with some crystal flowers I had floating around my desk.

Recipe:

• Basic Grey, patterned paper
• Tiddly Inks, digital stamp
• Glossy accents
• Stickles
• Spellbinders
• Crystal flowers (stash)

Challenges:

• Crazy 4 Challenges, sketch
• The Pink Elephant, mommy I love you
• CCEE Stampers - Mother's Day card
• Simon Says Stamp (PCP group) - bling, bling, bling
• Crazy Challenge - bling
• Copics Colour Challenge - BG02, BG11, R20
• Creative Card Crew - April showers bring flowers
• Paper Play Challenges - stamp/digi and bling

You cured yet?

I've been suffering a bit from a cold which is probably why this image tickled me so very much. I found the sentiment somewhere (on another card?) but can't for the life of me remember where. If I stole it from you please let me know!

Front of card:

Inside of card:

This was a really quick card to put together - thanks to my husband for his help picking the bathrobe colour.

Recipe:

• Mo's Digital Pencil, "Swine Flu" digital stamp
• Copic markers
• Spellbinders
• EK Success border punch
• Ribbon, brads (stash)
• Kraft cardstock (stash)

Challenges:

• Bee-Crafty - holes
• Cute Card Thursday - boyz to men (this is just perfect for a sick guy)
• Hand Full of Stamps - just a little dotty (dots in the ribbon, holes inside look like dots too)
• Colour Create - khaki, brown, aqua & cream (kraft card has khaki tones, ribbon is brown/aqua, kleenexes are cream)
• Stampin' for the Weekend - card for a male

Dancing stars

I'm making an effort to complete scrapbooking pages, and not just make cards. It's hard as cards can be so quick and satisfying. But then this was actually a very quick page to pull together.  The picture is from last summer and is one of my favourites - the boys were doing a "booty" dance and just having the time of their lives.

I used coordinating papers from Reminesce, a sketch from Totally Papercrafts, and a quote that I had written in my "quotes to use sometime" list.

Recipe:

• Reminisce, "Monster Parade" paper collection
• Totally Papercrafts sketch

Challenges:

• Totally Papercrafts - sketch
• One Stop Craft Challenge - anything but a card

Retirement card & supporting a good cause

My uncle has recently retired and when I saw this digital stamp (Ronnie Relaxing) at Pollycraft, I just knew that it would be perfect. I also love that the purchase of this stamp supports a worthy charity - the image was drawn specifically for, and all of the proceeds are being donated to, the Yorkshire Air Ambulance service (go here to read the full story). The image is coloured with Copic markers and then matched with Basic Grey patterned papers. I used a Just Us Girls sketch.

In regards to colouring, I wanted to show you a visual of why paper choice is so important with Copics. Take a look at the two coloured images below - can you believe that they are both coloured using the exact same copic markers/colours? The one on the right is coloured on Epson Premium Presentation Paper Matte and the one on the right is coloured on Cornish Heritage Farms Simply Smooth. I knew intellectually that paper mattered to colour but the significance of the difference surprised me. So, what did I learn from this experiment? Always print off my colour chart onto the same type of paper I plan to use for my stamping.

Recipe:

• Basic Grey "Granola" patterned papers
• Tales from Pollycraft "Ronnie Relaxing" digital stamp
• Copic markers
• Brads (stash)

Challenges:

• Just Us Girls, sketch
• Digital Tuesday, "a toast to you" (include food or drink in your project)
• Play Date Cafe, use light blue, light green & off-white (I also picked up the greys of the antique'd birdhouses in the photo)
• All Sorts Challenge, animals
• Pile it On, boyish colours 
• Crafty Emma Charity Challenge - use Ronnie Relaxing
• Creative Cottage - use circles
• Creative Inspirations - celebration

Treasure Hunters

We had a wonderful day at the beach a couple of weeks ago - lots of sun (especially for early April!) and interesting sights. There were big windstorms a couple of days prior and quite a few boats were blown onto shore as a result. There were 3 wrecked on just our stretch of sand. The kids thought it was pretty cool and we all decided to play the parts of old-time pirates & beachcombers and search the beach for treasures. All we found were shells, seaweed and bits of wood but the boys figured they had discovered treasure anyhow. I created this layout to remember the day.

The pirates are digital stamp images from Mo's Digital Pencil. The sitting pirate is actually a girl but I trimmed off her pigtails and now I think it looks more like a cute boy. The barrell is a free digital stamp from Dustin Pike. The images are coloured with Copics. I created the chain by cutting apart a border strip, colouring it with Copics and then linking the pieces together again. The pirate-themed stamps are from Inkadinkado and I used Distressing Ink to give a weathered look. And in honour of the recent Earth Day, I made the shaker box (holding some of the boys' treasures) from packaging on its way to the garbage!

Recipe:

• 
  
  Reminisce "Lighthouse" patterned paper
• 
  
  Captain Hugh digital stamp, Mo's Digital Pencil
• 
  
  First Mate Kate digital stamp, Mo's Digital Pencil
• 
  
  Barrell digital stamp, Dustin Pike
• 
  
  Copic markers
• 
  
  Border strip, stash
• 
  
  Inkadinkado, miscellaneous stamps

I'm submitting this layout for a few challenges, as follows:

• Digital Tuesday Challenge - anything but a card
• Mo's Digital Challenge - masculine image
• Hand Full of Stamps - look what I got (show off something bought in the last wk - PP and the Inkadinkado stamps yesterday)
• Cute Card Thursday - make your own (the chain and the shaker box)
• One Stop Craft Challenge - anything but a card
• Oh, Alice - little people, big wonderland (create for a child)