Wedding Sand Bottle

Hi

Okay, I apologize to all of you that look forward to my email or blog posts daily.  I assure you I have been crafting, just haven't had much computer time.  It seems that when I can actually get onto my computer someone is using it.  I know, you are probably saying "well, it's your computer, so use it".  Well, easier said than done...so, I finally have some computer time, so here is something I created. 

A friend of mine is in a wedding coming up and she is a bride's maid.  She wanted to get them something special and of course came to me.  At first we were going to etch some wine glasses like I did for my daughter's wedding.  The saying was a bit too much for the glasses though.  You know how much I love garage sales and I had gone with my daughter a couple of weeks ago and found these awesome wine carafs.  They were $1 a piece and I snagged 3 of them up.  I tried etching on them, but it wouldn't take.  I've ran into that a couple of times before.  I'm not sure why some glass takes, but others doesn't.?? so, vinyl to the rescue!!!  The wedding colors are hot pink and black and I love those colors together.  I used my SCAL to cut the letters using the Georgia font and made some letters bigger than others.  I really love the way it turned out.  My friend is going to buy some black and pink sand and then they can layer their love.  If and when I get a picture of it filled I will post it.

Let me know what you think and remember, I LOVE comments.  Good or bad.

Linky Party with K Andrew at Getting Cricky

Good evening,
.
So I wanted to let you in on a fabulous post by Kristal at Getting Cricky.  She is hosting a link party again and it's such a wonderful idea.  Not only do you get to showcase something you've made, but you get to find NEW blogs and make some great friends.

So there are some rules and here they are:

Link Up Love Party: How it Work:
*Link Up Party runs from Tuesday 5/17 to Tuesday 5/24. Winners announced 5/25

*Grab my blinkie and post on your blog

*Be a follower of this blog

*Create a new blog post that is titled Link Up Love Party with K Andrew. In your post, you must mention that the link up love party is a way to get to know each other and find new blog inspiration, mention my blog, with a link back to my blog .

*Post your favorite project that you've done in your blog post

*Copy and paste the link up code into your blog post so the Inlinkz will show up on your blog

*Spread the word so everyone can join in!

*You must visit, follow, and comment on the 5 people before you AND the 5 people after you in the Inlinkz. It would be fantastic if you would visit as many as you can--maybe everyone? If you are one of the first 5 then you will need to blog the ones before you and a few more after--as long as it's a minimum of 10 near you in the link up tool/gadget)

If you do not do the above your link will be deleted, because it's just not fair to those who work so hard linking up and showing love to the ones on the list. I have a moderator who will be checking this out to keep it awesome and fun!

Now onto a creation.  I made this container awhile back for some friends.  I love making containers and embellishing them with fun stuff.  They are both movie buffs so I created a movie containers and filled it with microwave popcorn, candy and a gift card for some movie rentals.

Hope you like it.

Now go and link yourself and leave comments for the previous 5 people and the next 5 people but most importantly, HAVE FUN with this.



 

Lasting Memories Challenge #38 "Sketch"

*** if you are looking for Getting Cricky's Simply Sundays, scroll down to next post please.

Good morning all,

Welcome to another Lasting Memories challenge.  This week Karen came up with a sketch challenge.  I really don't do so well on them.  Sketches are a bit intimidating to me, because I can't add or take anything away.  You get the sketch and that is what you HAVE to do ... but, it does get me thinking a bit outside of my safety zone.  I also don't do so well with different size pictures and this week's sketch has three different sizes.  I sure had to dig through a bunch of pictures and finally decided on my oldest son's graduation.  I've been meaning to scrap these anyway and this was just perfect timing.  Lately I think Karen is in my head because she seems to know what I need to scrap...hehehe  or maybe it's just coincidence...

This week's sketch is all about cirlces and here is what we had to work with

and this is what I came up with

I cut the circles at 8, 7.5, 4.5 and 2.5 inches.  This was the hardest part of the layout because I wasn't sure how big to make my circles, but I think it worked out perfect.  I did faux stitch around all the circles just to give them some pop.  I used the corresponding colors with each circle and then off layed the picture into the circles.

I usually don't like using stickers, but I think "graduate" was also a great addition as they were also circles.  I added some red glitter glue to the top of the stickers to make it look like they were pinned to the wall...I really love this paper and think it matched great with the background of DS's biggest picture.  It all kinda blends in...

My journaling just says:  Carl graduated in May of 2010.  His pictures were taken at the Falls, in an alley downtown and at the Japanese Gardens.  I can't believe how fast time went by!!!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to see you again soon.

Simply Sundays "Retro Daddy"

Good morning fellow cricky friends,

Welcome to another Simply Sunday at Getting Cricky.  I just love Sundays...first it's my only scheduled day off of work and second I get to post, post, post.  Ha.  Seriously...I love Sundays...sleep in, go to church, eat lunch, play in my craft room, aaaahhh, Sundays are the best...

So...Miss Kristal had me going on this week's challenge...She told us "Retro Daddy"....huh?  After much deliberation I finally emailed her and told her I had no idea what that meant or what to do.  She emailed me back and told me I could make anything with a "retro" theme or a Father's Day card...aaaah.  So here is my card:

Kristal had mentioned the Wrap It Up cart a while back and when Michaels had a cricut cart sale about a month ago I splurged on it and I LOVE IT.  It really has some very cool cuts on it and it had an old time car.  I love old time cars...and so does my dad, so this will be his Father's day card this year.  I hope you like it:

I cut the car at 4.25 inches...this is a very simple cut file actually.  It does has some teeny tiny pieces, but the layering is very simple.  I added some gold glitter glue to the yellow pieces for some glitz and also two blue buttons with some yellow embroidery floss to match.

I simply printed "Happy Father's Day" on my computer on white card stock.  Then I distressed it with black, blue, red, and yellow ink.  I sprayed some pinkish "glimmer mist" and "rubbed" it in.  I attached some twine to the label and adhered it to my background paper.  I have no idea where the background paper is from because it was in my stash, but it matched the cut perfectly.  I sprayed it with the the pinkish "glimmer mist" and then crumpled it up.  The cut file and the label are pop dotted on the background paper.  Oh and I am sure you all know this, but when you crumple paper it actually shrinks a little...ha.

Let's see what you have now...remember this challenge is open until the 28th of May so you have plenty of time to get those creative juices flowing and there is no limit on how many items you can submit.  Hurry over Getting Cricky and link, link, link.  Thanks for stopping by this challenge Sunday and I hope to see you again soon.  Remember also, I love comments and if you are a new follower, I will surely follow you back.  Just let me know in the comments section and I will be over to check out your blog as soon as possible.

Festive Friday 5-13

Hello All –


WELL - blogger sure was a bugger for the last couple of days, huh?  I am so sorry that you couldn't view my Festive Friday card this morning, but there were alot of us in the same boat, nevertheless, thank you for being patient and coming to view it now.

Welcome to another edition of Festive Fridays. If you are new to us, sit back, grab a cup of coffee, relax and enjoy some wonderful Christmas Cards. Yes, I did say Christmas...Festive Fridays will be every other Friday with samples of Christmas cards. This way, you can be making your cards all year long and you will avoid the mad rush when you could be enjoying the Christmas Season. You should have just come from Debbie. If you stumbled upon this post you can go back to Terri and start at the beginning. There is also a complete list of the Festive Friday hop on the left sidebar under the Festive Fridays blinkie in case you get lost along the way.

Today's card is something a bit different.  I have been making a few of these stair step cards and love them.  This one is a different version of the first one I made.  I hope you enjoy looking at it as much as I did making it.  I am also including a template of how I created the card base:

The base is 10 x 5

The tree was cut at 5 inches and adorned with rhinestones and a clear star that I colored yellow with my Bic markers.  The packages were cut from Christmas scrapbook paper and I glued ribbons on them.

The sleigh was cut at 3 inches from the Winterwoodland Cart.  This was one of my first Christmassy carts and I absolutely love it.  All the different cuts are wonderful and very easy to assemble.  I faux stitched around the sleigh for some dimension.  I also added some more presents to the top of the sleigh also cut from Christmas scrapbook paper.

The little boy was cut at 3 inches from the Paperdoll Cartridge.  I really am enjoying making these paperdolls and using my Peachy Keen face stamps.  I think he is so cute and adding little touches like the stocking cap with a little bit of cottonball  and his striped pajamas just makes him so much cuter.  The stocking was cut using my SCAL program and I also faux stitched around it.  I also cut the little teadybear from the Child's Year Cartridge. 

I stamped Merry Christmas to the front of the first panel and there you have it.  I'm not sure who I am going to give this card to yet, but it will definately be for someone very special.

Here are some side views:

Remember, I love comments and also hope you come back in two weeks for some more ideas, but until then go check out Angela's blog. I know she made quite a few and they are gorgeous.

Rose

Good Morning all -

Today is my first day over at Creative Paperclay and I am so excited to share my rose tutorial with you.  I am mostly going to be featuring my clay projects for my cards and or scrapbook pages, but today I wanted to see if I could actually make a 3D rose.  I've been making these roses out of scrap paper and love the way they turn out, so I thought I'd probably be able to make them out of the paper clay also.  I am using this rose for a project for my mom, it was supposed to be for Mother's day but I was running a bit behind and somethings were taking longer than others so I will be at least sharing the tutorial with you.  Once the project is complete I will share it also.  So let's start:

First I rolled out my paper clay with my acrylic roller.  I purchased a package of plastic mats (2 per pack) at the Dollar Tree to use for my paperclay.  Depending on how big or thick you want your rose is what determines the thickness of your clay.  I rolled it to 1/4" thick and used a 6 petal flower cookie cutter and cut 3 flowers.

Then you cut 1 petal out of one of the flowers, then 2 petals out of another flower and then cut the next flower in half.

Take the 5 petal flower and mold the seems together, careful as not to distort the petals though.  Next take your 4 petal flower and do the same, the 3 petal flower the same, 2 petal the same and cut most of the tip off the end;

and the single petal kinda just squish it and form a ball with a center hole.  The second 3 piece petal is discarded, and I used it to form the leaves freehand.  Just roll a bit between your fingers forming a teardrop.  I then used a toothpick and added some veins in it.

Then layer the pieces together.  I did use a bit of white glue to attach them, but if your clay is pretty moist yet it will adhere together nicely by itself by smooshing it a bit, but I just always use a bit of white glue as an extra precaution.  Then adhere the petals to the side of the flower, also using a bit of white glue and smoothing out the back. 

It really doesn't need to be perfect, especially if you will be adhering it to another project (like I will be doing in the near future).

I then set the paperclay aside and let it dry.  My clay actually needed a couple of days and that might be because of all the moisture in the air right now.  You do really want it to be perfectly dry though before you paint it. 

I painted the rose with Rose Bouquet Acrylic and the leaves with Leaf Green Acrylic by Anita's All Purpose.  The highlights of the rose were made with Bronze 3D Paint and the leaves were highlighted with Metalic Green 3D Paint, but sponged on. 

You can really see how it shimmers.

I am very happy with my first real 3D project with paperclay and can't wait to show you how I used this fabulous flower on a project coming soon.

Lasting Memories Challenge #37 "Inspirational Photo"

Good Morning all and to all you MOM'S - Happy Mother's Day.

Welcome to another Lasting Memories Challenge.  This week's challenge is all about this "Inspirational Photo".  I really do love the color scheme and didn't have a hard time with this one at all and it all happened by mistake...hehehehe.  Don't you just love it when something finally goes your way???

When I got home from work the other day Miss Bella was in the yard with her daddy.  They were commenting on my tulips.  This is the first year since we've lived in our house (10 years this June) that I've had more than a handful of tulips.  Every year I get 2 or 3 here or there and this year I actually have a cluster of them...hahahaha.  I ran into the house to get the camera because Miss Bella was trying to smell them.  She would sniff and look at me like "they don't smell!".  She had such a confused look on her face.  I did restage her smelling them, however I couldn't stage the confused look. 

The very next day I found out what this week's challenge was going to be and check out the colors...Karen couldn't have picked a better pallette to work with.  YEAH me.  Even Miss Bella's spring jacket fits the color scheme.  I immediately went to work and this is what I came up with:

I have no idea what the background papers are...they are from my stash...(personal goal again, hahaha).  I loved the orangish paper because it has words like, flowers, sunshine, blooming, happiness, etc.  LOVE IT.  I then tore this pinkish paper that had some orangish color in it also.  I did faux stitch with my white gel pen around that piece, but it's kinda hard to see in the photo. 

I doubled backed the photos of Miss Bella with the colors in the pictures.  That paper was from DCWV Scrapbook Kit in a Stack - Birthday Textured.  I think that really popped the pictures.  I then cut "stop to smell the" using my SCAL in the CK Kiddo font. 

The tulip came from the Cricut/Card swap that I belong to over at FB and it was the perfect color combo, thanks so much Felisa.  She stamped the face with the Peachy Keen "Laughy Taffy Face", hmmm maybe I need this set now too.  Isn't that face just the cutest? 

This whole page came together beautifully. I added a sheer ribbon to the neck of the tulips and also on the left border and some bling to the top right.

I hope I've inspired you to do a layout with this "Inspirational Photo" color pallette and hope to see you enter the challenge over at Lasting Memories.  Who knows, you might be in the Top 3...I look forward to seeing some of your creations.

Again, I am wishing all the Mom's out there a Happy Mother's Day and hope you have a beautiful one.

Announcements

I have a couple announcements
first -  http://gettingcricky.com is having a DT call.  Please run (don't walk) over there and check out the rules to submit.  She is adding 4 designers to our little group and we can't wait to see who would like to join us.

second - http://kcclayoutchallenges.blogspot.com Lasting Memories has 3000 hits and they have extra candy to giveaway.  There is a little catch though...you have to play along with the current challenge which is all about "ME", well-actually "YOU".  hehehehe  Anyway, this is the perfect chance to scrap about yourself and challenge your creativity.  I can't wait to see what you come up with.

Good luck with either or both adventures
~~Brenda

Waterbottle - Teacher Appreciation Gift

Good morning guys -

Just wanted to share a quick vinyl project with you.  I have been trying to layer vinyl now and when it works it's sooooo cool.  Hahahaha.  Layering vinyl is a bit trickier, but once you get the hang of it, it works pretty cool.  I will tell you though, if you are going to attempt it, use up some of your scraps first to practise on.  Also, use clear contact paper so you can see where you need to layer it on. 

I downloaded the flamingo in SCAL from DtsArt.  She has some pretty awesome files and most of them are for free.  I then cut the base of the flamingo at 3 inches wide, and the rest appropriate to size and layered all the pieces directly on my cutting mat.  It worked like a charm.  I then lifted the whole thing up as one layer and viola...attached it to the water bottle and it's perfect.  Austyn's teacher collects anything to do with flamingos and this will be perfect.

Hope you enjoyed my project and hope to see you next time.

Lasting Memories Challenge #36 "It's All About Me"

Good morning all,


So today is my first day being featured over at Lasting Memories as one of the newest members of the Design Team. I am pretty excited about this new adventure that I am participating in, BUT, I have to admit that when I got this week's assignment I asked myself, "Self, what did you get into?" Oh yes, I do talk to myself quite a bit. My mom always says though, as long as I don't answer myself I'm okay, but I do think I've done that a time or two, hehehe.

This week's challenge is all about "ME" and I don't do well with me. hehehehe. I am very self-conscious if you can believe that.? I am always looking for a fault in ME, and I never think too highly of myself. When I got picked as a Design Team member it really lifted something in ME, but nevertheless I really had to dig deep down into myself and tell myself there is nothing wrong with ME and that if I wasn't good enough I wouldn't be where I am today...So ME is just fine. This isn't exactly where I wanted to go, but it's a part of ME. I am usually the one behind the camera, so there aren't very many pictures of ME either. In fact, this is a staged one for my Blog bio, bwwwaaaahh.

My favorite color is Purple, I love making paper roses, I love buttons (and you can find at least one button on most of my layouts), one of my favorite phrases is Live, Laugh, Love. My all-time favorite flower is the Lily of the Valley, I love elephants (and am wearing them in this picture), I love bling and of course the most important thing in my life is my FAMILY. My 3 favorite craftings are Scrapbooking, Cardmaking and glass etching. So there's a little bit about ME. After looking this layout over and over I am actually pretty happy with it and I hope you enjoyed a little bit about ME.

I hope you join us over at Lasting Memories and challenge yourself to make a layout about "YOU", you might be surprised what you learn about yourself.