Caardvarks Challenge - Ravishing Ribbon part 4

I saw a tutorial on how to make ribbon flowers and that started me on a HUGE ribbon flower kick. It's basically all I've been crafting the past week. Lots of cards. Lots and lots and lots of cards going on in my craft room. Combine the new love for ribbon flowers with a new HS stamp, a new Sizzix embossing plate (that I learned works great in my Cuttlebug) and a few paper scraps and you get this card. I'm pretty happy with it and the kind folks at Caardvarks DID leave a comment saying I could enter as many cards as I wanted, so... I'm adding it to the line up!

Caardvarks Challenge - Ravishing Ribbon part 3

Inspiration struck last night, so I raced to the craft room to get my idea onto paper, er - cardstock. Another wedding / bridal shower card, but I love how it turned out. This ribbon challenge is great for getting my creative juices flowing!

The specifics:

This is a free form dress card cut from white cardstock. I sewed across the bottom of the neck/top of shoulders to form the card hinge. The dress has a silver embossed design, with an off-white script overlay (basic grey) over it. The ribbon ruffles at the bottom of the skirt are attached to the overlay, as is the stamped sentiment. The overlay seam is at the waist of the dress and is covered by a bow. The veil is made from a doubled over wide organdy ribbon gathered and sewn, and a scallop of lace for the top. I was trying to give the illusion of a bride walking down the aisle after the ceremony (thus the back of the dress...). I don't know if I succeeded in that, but I do like how the card turned out.

Here are pictures of the card:



I had some detail pics, too, but blogger seems to be having issues with my photo uploads, so I'll just have to post those a little later.

Caardvarks Challenge - Ravishing Ribbons part 2

Rumor has it you can submit more than one card for the Caardvarks challenges, so here's #2. Again, four different kinds of ribbon, but more traditional uses this time. Plus flowers, Quickutz letters and Purple Onion stamps. The "BABY" arrangement is one of my favorite new techniques... the letters and flowers are held together only with ribbon laced through the flower centers and around the stem of the letters. Pretty fun if you ask me! I adhered the word to the card using glue dots. Most everything else is attached with machine stitching, except the other words, which are embossed on acetate and attached with staples. Now... if only I knew someone who was having a baby girl...

Caardvarks Challenge - Ravishing Ribbon

Well, I decided to participate in this week's Caardvarks challenge. The challenge is to use ribbon on a card. I decided to try to use ribbon in a way that I hadn't before, and I ended up using it a few new ways! Here's the card...


... and a detail shot.


I used four different kinds of ribbon for this challenge. First, I used a narrow ribbon and eyelets to make a scalloped edge for the card. Then I used a wide, funky, sparkly ribbon as the background, over the white cardstock. I've had this wide ribbon for for-ever and I've never really known what to do with it, but I love it. Then I used some black grosgrain to transition from the ribbon background to the scalloped edge, and I stamped a (handcarved original!) swirl between the rhinestone eyelets. I used Staz-On to stamp the (Michael's $1 acrylic) sentiment on some gray organdy ribbon and I layered that over a square of Hambly. I finished off the card with a rhinestone-centered black flower and I love how it turned out! It's got character, it's got class... and it might just be perfect for Dara's wedding tomorrow!

Happy Birthday, Eliana!

My baby is a year old today. Happy birthday, Sweetie! Enjoy it while it lasts, because you won't get birthday cake for breakfast every day. I love you! Here's a card I made just for you, just for today:

(card made using Heidi Swapp and Rhonna Farrer stamps with miscellaneous cardstock)

New Layouts!!

I finally scanned in all of my new layouts, and I'm working on stitching them together. I posted a few of them to 2ps, but figured I'd post some of my favorites here, too. Enjoy!!

Updated Gallery

I now have over 300 layouts in my 2ps gallery!! No, none of them are the ones I worked on over the weekend, but they are some of the last batch I cooked up!

She's Baaaaa-aaaak!

My inner craft monster, that is! I'm so glad to have her back, too! I did a little bit of crafting this week, mostly making a weight loss mini album. I really like it. But still no actual scrapbooking.

... until yesterday. When I got home from the LSS open house (I'm teaching 3 card classes this summer, btw, but more on that later.) I went down to the craft room and played for a while. It was great! I got 5.5 LO done last night, and another 5.5 done today while Leif was out hiking with Ellie. That's right... in the last 24 hours I have done 11 scrapbook layouts. Most of them are single pagers, but two are double page spreads. Yipppppeeee!

I'll post pictures later, when I get the pages scanned and stitched, but I just wanted to share my excitement that the craft monster is back!!

The Score

Inspiration: 10
Motivation: 0

Yep, I've got inspiration galore - projects to do, ideas to pursue, mini albums to make, gifts to prepare... I'm 100% inspired. And ZERO percent motivated. Every time I think about going down to my craft room I think, "Nah." and I don't go. It's even mostly clean and ready to craft in. But I just don't feel like it.

OH - and 2ps changed their format. How dare they take my uber-happy place and change it. Wah.

A New CJ!!

I got a new circle journal in the mail this week! It was Michelle's "Hold Dear" album. I've had a plan for many of the journals - what I wanted to do my LO on, which pictures I would use, etc. But I didn't know what I would do for this one.

For those of you who don't read our family blog or haven't heard yet, last week we discovered an ectopic pregnancy and went through the miscarriage and surgery that accompanied it. I had a few days of reflection, and some of what I realized inspired this LO.

We were supposed to do a LO about what we hold dear. I chose LIFE. The block journaling on the bottom of the second page reads "Each day is a gift; Use it well - you are not guaranteed another." There are two journaling tags under the photo that read... "This week I was reminded of just how precious life is. It is a gift from God and not my own. In the wake of a miscarriage I am more thankful for the daughter I have and the life she has been given. I hold dear my own life, for I am but a steward of it while I am on this earth. My life is HIS and I cherish this gift."

National Scrapbooking Day

Do you know how MUCH scrapbooking I have done today, on this great holiday?

NONE.

nope. none. I haven't scrapped one bit today. It's sort of sad, really. I've talked to my best friend and my mom on the phone, I went to the library and park with Catherine and Tjabe, I went garage sale-ing with Taylor, but NO SCRAPPING.

*pout*

... and I wanted to. I really did. I might have to go to the scraproom and make something now before Leif comes home from study group. But there's this pile o' laundry that needs to be put away.

Life. You want to scrapbook it, but it keeps getting in the way of scrapbooking.

Clutch

One of the things I taught the girls for Protocol was that you shouldn't carry a full-blown purse to a fancy event. The proper place for your purse at the dinner table is on your lap, under your napkin. Most purses are too bulky for that. Thus, the evening bag, or clutch. I realized sometime during my research for Protocol that I didn't own a clutch. I borrowed one from my mom to use as an example in class, but it didn't match my black dress. So... I dug around in my fabric scraps and found some stiff-back velvet, satin, and cording I had been given. I did a little playing on my sewing machine and... voila! A clutch. Since the material was given to me, it was basically free. It took about 30 min to make, start to finish (I probably would have spent more time than that shopping for one) and it matched my dress nicely. It's a trifold design, so it essentially has two compartments, which was sort of nice. I promised Robert I'd put up a picture, so here it is. My one-of-a-kind masterpiece.

2 Peas Update

I updated my 2ps gallery with about 10 more LO today. Yippeee!
(go to my gallery to see the journaling for this LO.)

My Favorite Card

This is currently my favorite card. I scraplifted the idea from 2ps, but I really like it.

Michael's $1 Acrylic Stamps

I have a love for acrylic stamps. And though I can't say I'm terribly fond of Michael's, I do like that they have a WHOLE lot of acrylic stamp sets for $1. Yep. I like that. They had about 20 different sets, and I bought 16 of them. So last night I sat down and made a few cards with them and some of my scraps.

HS Mask Cards

A few weeks ago I bought a Heidi Swapp alphabet mask set. I haven't had much time lately for crafting, with Protocol and all, but I did get some cards made. And last night I managed to scan in a bunch of layouts I'd done earlier, plus a couple I did yesterday. So MIM is back at last.

Sheer Brilliance!

I got this in my email this morning. It made me laugh - I'd never thought to get Ellie to do my housework for me!

Jealousy.

I know we should be thankful for what we have. And I am. But seriously... I want one. There are more pictures here and here.

Chocolate Party!

Tomorrow we are going to a chocolate party. Woohoo!! Our friends Doug and Michael have one pretty much every year and they're a lot of fun. Not too healthy, but a lot of fun. Now... what to bring this year....

Last year I brought cappuccino truffles... they're a hard act to follow. I might have to make some again this year. I might also do white chocolate covered pretzels. Hmmm... what other goodness can I concoct? I believe that's what I'll be spending my day doing today. Helllllllooooo Inner Martha!

Snowy days are even more grosser.

Rainy days are gross, but snowy days are even more grosser. At least I get stuff done on rainy days. But seriously... who wants to go sit in a cold basement craft room and scrap on a cold, snowy Spring day? Not me.

Another one bites the dust...

It's rainy and nasty outside and I feel blah. Sounds like a scrappin' day to me. Ellie's been fussy and clingy (more teeth?) but during her morning nap I managed to crank out two baby gift albums start to finish - one 8x8 and one 6x6. I'm pretty happy with how they turned out. I'm working on a 3rd right now, but Ellie's actually drinking her bottle without getting distracted, so there's no WAY I'm going to move her to the basement right now. So I'll just wait. She'll be ready for another nap in not too long. I might take one then, too. We'll just see.

Rainy days are gross. :(

Good Day

8 single page LO

That's what I call a good day.

10 single page and 2 double page layouts. That's my total for the weekend. Woohoo!

Ideas...

It's been weeks now since I've had a CJ to work on. I hope they didn't just get lost in the mail... I still have those same two LO done that I've had done for forever and no books yet to put them in. *sigh*

In the meantime, I've got an idea for a mini book I'd like to do for Ellie. I'd love to create an album for her of my favorite songs to sing to her. It'd be like a little lullaby songbook and scrapbook in one. I've got so many great pictures of her that remind me of songs (when you wish upon a star, you are my sunshine, twinkle twinkle little star, etc.) that I want to do this. I don't know what size to do it yet... still working on that.

I'd also like to do an "abc" album/storybook. Both of these are ones that I'd like to make "Ellie proof" so she can actually look at/ play with them. I don't know if it will happen, at least with the "abc" one, though. My ideas so far are not babyproof, LOL! =)

I got a mini album and a half finished in Texas, though, so that was good. And I did a LO today of Ellie with some pictures from way back when. (Can you say that about someone who hasn't even had her first birthday yet?) So at least I'm doing a little scrapbooking in my spare time. And just now, in the middle of posting this, I got distracted and did two more two-page layouts. I guess I'd better publish this post and get back to my craft room while the juices are flowing. Happy crafting!

CJ Progress

I've been missing seeing how the progress is coming on my 5 senses CJ, but now Andrea has posted pictures of her LO on her blog! Woohoo! I just have to say that I cannot WAIT to get this back in a few weeks! It's so exciting and after taking a week off to catch up, I'm looking forward to getting the next few in the mail so I can work on more LO! I think my next one to do is "Quotes". I'm trying to figure out exactly what I want to do for that so that it's original, but at the same time, I'm really looking forward to the challenge. I've got a couple ideas, so we'll see what I end up with. In the meantime, though, I'm here, in Texas, having fun away from home. Yippee! So the CJing will just have to wait until I go back home.

Hambly Class

Tomorrow night I get to teach a class on using Hambly papers and overlays. I'm pretty excited about getting other Bozeman scrapbookers interested in Hambly products, mostly because I love them so much!!

In the class we're going to do a resist technique using the Hambly craft papers. We'll be making a one page LO and two cards. The background paper on the LO is Foofala, but everything else is Hambly. The class description from the Keepsakes blog can be found here.

CJ Entry: Music **SPOILER ALERT**

We took a little break from the CJ rotation to let people catch up, but I am going to be out of town, so I worked on the next LO anyway. Andrea's theme is MUSIC and I did something VERY different from what I normally do, but I LOVE how it turned out!

The explanation/journaling is behind the CD (which, btw, does have a song on it, though it might have to be played on a computer and not a CD player... didn't check on that one.) and basically explains the connection I have between the song "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" and Picasso's Guernica, which is pictured on the right page. I had a ton of fun doing this LO and, again, wish I were keeping this one for myself. I think I'm going to print out color copies of all of the LO I did for these journals and put them in a book for myself. It won't be as cool as the real LO, but it will help me remember some of my favorite LO. Things I like best about this LO:
Picasso's Guernica and U2 "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" theme - it's like a trip in a time machine for me.

• The real CD integrated into the LO.
• Hambly
• Purple Onion (the Art and Music stamps were ones I got in a random "grab bag" a while back - PERFECT for this LO!)
• The quotes.
• The sheet music paper - comes from a book my dear friend Jodi Mae got me back when we were in college... A few of the songs I've written are in this book and I absolutely LOVE the way it's set up. So I cannibalized a sheet for this project.

I hope you like it, Andrea - I had a ton of fun working on this one! My next CJ entry will be "Quotes" - I'd like to get that done before I leave, too, but this week will be busy, so we'll just have to see how it goes.

Lately

There has been a serious dearth of postage from me lately. Sorry about that. I've been doing some scrapping, but haven't been in the mood to scan and stitch LO to get them posted. I finally scanned a bunch of stuff the other day, and I've worked on stitching a few one-page LO, but I haven't posted anything. Sorry. I'll get to that one of these days.

I have been taking pictures of my wee one. Target had flower headbands in the $pot (haha! looks like dollar-pot! Okay... I'm tired.), so I took a few fun pictures of her in that. Silly girl - I'd put it on and she got all cute and charming as if she KNEW I wanted adorable for the camera! I've even got a photo-less LO done for a picture of her in it, just waiting for me to print the picture. And best of all, most of the items for my LO were RAKs! (Random Acts of Kindness, for those not in the know...)

I joined a RAK group on 2ps and have been having fun sending off stuff for others to use that I didn't particularly care for. You know - the few papers out of the stack that weren't my style. Or the leftover embellishments from projects I'm finished with. The cool thing is that I've also been getting RAKs from people, so I'm getting new things to play with! YAY!

Mostly I've been working on stuff for my classes at the LSS, working on updating the blog for the LSS (but really... getting paid to combine my love for blogging with my love for scrapbooking?? It's great. Kind of like getting paid to combine my love of teaching with my love of scrapbooking, really....), attempting to clean up my craft room (unsuccessfully, I might add...), planning Protocol for Petra, and getting ready to go to Texas in a week. So things have been crazy. But I will post new things soon, I promise.

CJ Entry **Love Is...**

**SPOILER ALERT**

I think this is my favorite LO so far for these CJs. I'm not sure I want to send it on. *sigh* But I will. This one goes to Jenna. I titled it "So this is Love..."

CJ Recipes

I finally got the next CJs in the mail today! Yippee!! I'm so excited about getting them and sending them on. Anyway- as requested, here are the recipes from my Comfort Food LO.

CJ Entry "Happiness is..."

**SPOILER ALERT**

**SPOILER ALERT**

My CJ this week is Sheila's "Happiness is..."


I love this picture of Leif and Eliana taken this summer. I titled the LO "This is happiness" and the journaling reads: "Happiness is watching him go from husband to father." I got to use a bunch of stuff from my stash, plus my Purple Onion swirlies. One of these days I will lay off the swirlies. Maybe.

CJ LO "Let's Eat" Entry

**SPOILER WARNING** Iffen you don't be want'n to see the page, you'd best be avert'n yer eyes real quick like. **/SPOILER WARNING**

Well, I'm still waiting for the CJ to arrive in the mail, but I decided to go ahead and get the LO done now so I can get it in the mail as soon as I get the book. Actually, I went sort of crazy and have finished this AND the next two LO, so I should probably pick up some other project to work on now that I'm oodles ahead. But I've got stuff for the LSS coming up in the next couple weeks, so I wanted to make sure I worked on my CJ entries while the inspiration was there. Okay... without further ado, here is my recipe LO:

... and a detail shot of the innards of my "recipe box" on pg 2. I was pretty proud of that li'l 3D goodie. Plus it allowed me to cheat and include more than one recipe since I couldn't narrow it down to my favorite.

HAPPY NATIONAL SCRAPBOOKING DAY!

Errr.... Scratch that. National Scrapbooking day isn't until May 5. My bad.

CJ round 2 **MY LO**

I'm the 2nd entry in Samantha's CJ. Her theme is "This Circle Journal Brought To You By The Letter C" and our entry had to do something with C. So this is my take on it...

I used DCWV pp, Li'l Davis alpha stamps, DCWV alpha rubons, Dymo label maker, and a handcarved swirly stamp.

Recently....

I've actually been doing LO again lately. It's been great. Some of the LO I really really like. Others I'm just glad to have done. I haven't finished stitching them all together yet, but here are a few of the one pagers I like.

Ready to take on the world.

Well, my circle journal is ready to head out into the great wide world. Today I finished the sign in page and did my layout. The official mail date is Monday, but I'm going to be out of town Monday (yippee!) so I will hopefully get mine in the mail tomorrow.

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for....

The cover. My favorite thing about the cover is that I incorporated one of those wheels you turn for different words to appear in the window. It's been on my "someday I want to use this on a LO" list for forever, and now I've actually done it! So the title of the book is "can you {sense/see/hear/smell/taste/feel} it?" I thought it was fitting for the 5 senses theme.

I'm also loving the Hambly and Purple Onion stamps on this journal. I'm getting good mileage out of both on this project! (Oh yeah - and the ribbon looks really bad in the picture because I had it flat on the scanner, but there is brown, pink, and green ribbon tied down the spiral album edge.)


This is my intro page. It's pretty self explanatory. Again, love the Purple Onion!


My sign in page. Each spot is marked with the initial of a participant, in the order that the journal will progress. The tags are actually three tags fastened together with ribbon - one each for signature, picture, and the date. Another interactive page. =)


And this is my 5 senses layout. It's about Alloway, NJ, where I spent my summers growing up. I finally used my Hambly rubons on this LO for the first time! Also used Hambly pp and overlay, as well as Purple Onion stamps and DCWV background pp. Oh yeah - my favorite thing about this LO? After I printed the journaling on vellum, while it was still wet, I sprinkled it with clear embossing powder and set it. I love the result. Embossed, computer generated type. Yeah, I'll be doing more of this in the future. Very cool.


I'm getting very excited about this project and can't wait until I get the next book to work on! I've already got ideas for some of the themes coming my way. This is going to be a lot of fun.

CJ Route

Seriously. It's pretty cool that our little circle journals will make this trek around the U.S. Thanks for posting the route, Andrea.

eta: You'll have to click the empty picture box above to see the picture. I don't know what Blogger's issue is, but I'm going to leave it as is.

CJ Theme!

Drum roll please....

the 5 senses.

That's my theme. I worked on the cover tonight, so I should be able to post a picture of my journal in the next few days. I'm pretty excited about how my cover is coming together. I think this is going to be a lot of fun and can't wait to see what everyone else is doing.

Circle Journal

I am going to do a circle journal group this winter/spring. It's been on my list of things to do and I've never done one, so I think it will be fun. And I'll get one more thing on my "to do before I die" list checked off.

Now, for a theme. This is where you guys come in. I need some help deciding, so please add a comment to vote for the theme you think I should choose!

1) The five senses (you know - taste, smell, touch, sight, and hearing)
2) Favorite games
3) My purse (what people would learn about you if they went through the contents of your purse)

OR - does anyone have any other awesome circle journal theme they wouldn't mind me stealing?

I'd like to get this nailed down asap, so vote already!

2007 Scrap Resolution

While I am not making any personal resolutions this year, I am making a scrapbooking resolution. I wasn't planning on making any, but then Memory Makers magazine was asking people to email in their scrapbooking resolutions. I thought to myself... "If I really want to accomplish something in my scrapbooking this year, what is it?" And this is what I came up with:

“

In 2007 I resolve to scrap my heart. I want people browsing my albums to see ME - —to know my passions, to feel the love I have for my family, to cry at my pain and to overflow with my joy. I want to convey emotion in my pages— - sometimes with words, but more often by my color choices, layout design, photo content and titles.

That's what I want to do this year. I will be doing plenty of pages for the LSS, but I don't want my work to become mundane. So I resolve to scrap my heart out. =)

What's even more exciting to me is that the new Memory Makers email newsletter came today and they quoted my resolution in their "From the Editor" section. It's not quite the same as having my work published, but it's enough to make me excited today.

jacob's ladder

A while back I planned to do a class on making a jacob's ladder mini scrapbook. We postponed the idea until later, and now the time has come! Here's the album I'm doing for the class.


It uses Foofala and Daisy D's papers, and Foofala rub-ons. The "technique" for the class is using rub-ons on ribbon. I like these jacob's ladder albums because there are four different ways you can look at them, and because of the ribbon placement, each one is different. I also like that they actually work! You can see the rest of the album at twopeas. Here is the video:

First DT Meeting

Well, we had our first DT meeting at the LSS today. I met a bunch of new people, got some inspiration, and picked up materials for my upcoming projects. I'm very much looking forward to being part of a design team and hope I have something to contribute. I know I have something to learn from it. We get "paid" for the DT position in free product for our projects, plus being paid for the classes we teach.

I haven't been motivated to scrap lately. I think it's mostly been due to the mess I've made in my scraproom. I know that when I'm down there I ought to be cleaning up (Craft night here on Monday!! Eeek!) instead of playing. Now I've got new projects to work on, though, so we'll see if I manage to get everything cleaned up over the weekend or not.

And speaking of playing.... I got my Purple Onion stamps yesterday!!! They're all cut out and stickified now, too, so I'm ready to play with them! I got a ton of stuff, including some freebies! I love that they always send a couple little freebies. I also love that I got stuff on sale. I'm such a sucker for a sale.

And speaking of a sale.... Hambly's got a coupon for 10% off an internet order if you check out their blog. Look! Buy! Craft! I found more Hambly at the LSS today when I was browsing around. Mmmmm.... LOVE Hambly.

Okay. I've rambled. I'll try to post pictures and cards once I get them done and scanned. Happy crafting in 2007!

Bless this Chick...

Blessthischick has this cool emporium where you can make your own little icon chicks. They're adorable! I went playing with them this morning and made these three... Which do you like best? Try it. It's therapeutic, I tell ya.