Paper Piecing

I've got a fun paper pieced card for 2 different challenges- the Moxie Fab World and Lawnscaping- both paper piecing challenges.

I know Christmas is far off, but my only Lawn Fawn sets are "partly cloudy," "how delightful" (which can't really be paper pieced), and holiday themed stamps. So I went with the "winter bunny!"

I pieced the sled and the scarf on the bunny, and added trails of glitter from the sled. (I know- after my rant on glitter, you didn't think you'd ever see it here again! This glitter is chunky and wasn't too bad...)

The background paper was embossed with my swiss dots folder, and I hand-cut the cloud. I also put the cloud and snow layers on with foam tape to let them pop.

Oh yea- one more project. Yesterday I made this cute pincushion cuff following a tutorial I found here. The grey fabric was a scrap, the awesome yellow/white floral is from Joann Fabrics, and that button was from my stash.

Now I just need to do more sewing to put this to good use!!

OCC Distress to De-Stress!

Happy Saturday morning! Always one of my favorite times of the week. Even as a kid, I looked forward to Saturday morning cartoons!! :)

And now, Saturday mornings mean a new challenge at Our Creative Corner! Our host this week, Sarah Gough, designed an amazing sketch for us to use this week:

In addition to using the sketch as inspiration for your project, you must also include distressing. Distressing is a great way to get out frustration while paper crafting, and it also produces a great result!

I'm new to distressing, so it was fun to experiment on this week's card. I inked the edges and sponged brown ink onto 2 different patterned papers to age them. (See the striped paper in the background behind my card? That's how the the bottom paper looked when I started!). After I adhered them, I stitched around the border of my card, and pulled/rolled back some of the edges. My only wish is that I did more distressing! I think that since I was a first-timer, I held back.

I'm really looking forward to seeing everyone's distressed creations this week! Link 'em up at Our Creative Corner!

(don't you just love those buttons?)

Papertrey February Blog Hop Challenge

This morning I decided to participate with Papertrey Ink's Blog Hop. The challenge is to use scallops- I love scallops! I bought this really cute patterned cardstock a few weeks back, and was so excited to finally use it! (The pattern in the background is the other side of the paper) Here it is:

Don't forget to check out everyone else's creations on the hop!

A Jingle Belles Sketch

Hello! I can't believe my week off from work is coming to a close. I love my job, but I loooove having time to craft! I spent a bunch more time today organizing my craft room, and I hope to do some sewing tomorrow once everything is in its place.

Here's a card I made earlier today, for this week's Jingle Belles challenge. They joined forces with Sketchy Thursdays to include a sketch for the challenge. The white panel was embossed (I used the debossed side) and added some glitter in the indentations.

I had a really tough time photographing this card. First of all, one of my lightbulbs blew out that I use with my light box, so I replaced it with one that is sadly not bright enough.

In addition to my severe lighting issues, I also could not figure out how to take a picture of my card that doesn't include my hand. So there it is, in the picture....hah (I needed to hold the card closed so you could see the sentiment that is stamped on the inside!)

Thanks for visiting!

Masculine Thanks

Although the colors from the current Color Cue challenge appear feminine, I was able to get a more masculine result by keeping kraft the main color. The lilac and turquoise are only accents, and the white is gender-neutral.

Do you see the sentiment? It's on there with foam adhesive-not because I designed it that way, but because I first stamped the sentiment directly onto the card...then accidentally smudged it! I needed to cover up my careless error, hence the raised panel.

I actually like it better this way!

New Paintings

Hey, I'm back with a quick update. Today I did a few new paintings, and they are now up in my Etsy shop. Click on each picture for the link!

I hope to paint more soon because it's a lot of fun, plus with all of the Fall 2011 runway shows recently, I have a lot of inspiration!

I'll be back with more cards to share tomorrow :)

Make it Mondays Glitter Strip

Hi, I'm back again for this week's PTI Make it Mondays. I have been loving these new challenges!

The task this week is to make a glitter strip using Scor Tape. I usually avoid glitter at all costs. Unless it comes already stuck to something (ex patterned paper), I want nothing to do with it.

Yesterday I mustered up all of my courage, scrounged up some neglected glitter from my stash, and got to work. It wasn't the worst experience, but I sure did get glitter everywhere. I'm still finding bits in my hair, on my face, on my desk, and within the fibers of my carpet.

I needed a big focal point, so I made a flower that I saw on LollyChop's blog yesterday. You should go check it out- there's a video.

In the end, the mess with the glitter was all worth it, because I ended up with a card I really love!

OLW It's Christmas...

The One-Layer Wednesday challenge this week is to make a Christmas card using green and red, on cream or white cardstock.

This was a quick and fun card to make. I stamped the image and sentiment in one shot using my big acrylic block, then colored in the image using glitter pens. I quite enjoyed the coloring, but it's something that I rarely/never do on my cards...I don't think I could ever be one of those Copic fanatics, since I can't justify spending so much money on a marker. (Even though I know they are probably awesome, and if I only tried I would get hooked)

Here's the finished card:

PS If you are one of "those Copic fanatics," please don't take offense! :)

Soooo out of my comfort zone...

Last night while I was organizing my craft room (it's my big project while I'm home from work for February vacation), I came across some papers I bought a long time ago and never used. I'm not sure exactly why I purchased them, and I'm sure I never used them because they are not me. You know, my style (whatever that may be!)

It was time to challenge myself.

I made this card for this week's CASE Study challenge, which is teamed up with the Play Date Cafe. The colors are black, green, and red- although slightly hard to spot, there is some green in the bird, and the matting around the sentiment.

So do I like how it came out?

.....not sure.

It's just not me.

Flashback Friday 8.0

I always get a kick out of the Flashback Friday challenges. If you haven't played along yet, you certainly should join in on all the fun! For 8.0, the host is Karin, and the challenge is:

---post your first ever 3-D project---

The first 3-D paper project is from almost exactly one year ago. (my blog is so young!) It is a set of 3 boxes layered to be like a cake, and decorated with paper. I blogged about it here, and below is one of the pictures:

Now go upload yours!!

Floral Thanks!

Have you ever used decorative tape in your paper crafting? I have not, and was challenged to make a card for the Moxie Fab World's challenge, Get Daring with Decorative Tape.

I didn't have any decorative tape, so I made my own. I took a cute fabric I got yesterday and cut a small scrap. I ran it through my Xyron so it was lined with adhesive, then cut pieces of "tape."

Below is what it looked like after I ran it through the machine. I only wish that I had cut the fabric on the bias, so that fraying would be minimal. I'll make sure to do it next time!!

The card makes me think of spring because of all those colorful flowers, so I am also submitting it for the "Spring" challenge at Less is More. I have not played with them yet, but it seems perfect for me-you know how I love CAS!

Here's how my card turned out:
Super simple and fun!