That's what it's all about...

Valentines Day is all about glittered  hearts, bouquets flowers and white dove. Exchanging Valentine cards with friends and love ones and that very special someone. Getting all dressed up for a night out with a romantic dinner and some dancing. A gift of jewelry is always nice a nice touch

Oh yes...and chocolate, lots of chocolate!

Pointy Hat, Butterfly Wings and a Black Dress

So if witches a wear pointy hat and a black dress all year round, how do they dress up for Halloween?

Butterfly Wings, Beads and Glitter!

This gal has it all going on...from the tilt of her hat, to the Stickle embellished butterfly wings, she is ready to party all night!

Shamrocks, Glitter and Faeries

Here we are  already into March...have you gotten use to writing 2012 yet?

It is rapidly approaching "WEARING O' THE GREEN" day...yes you may decorate your house with shamrocks, Irish lace and leprechauns and pour green food coloring into all your baking.   

In honor of St. Patrick's Day  I have created three new tags:

Talk about "bling"... this GLITTER LACE tag is  covered entirely  with extra fine glitter using a resist technique. Embellished with a large glitter covered shamrock, green Stickles and green rhinestones.

 The background of this tag is patterned paper that has the appearance of Celtic Knots.The vintage image of this little Irish Lass is embellished with flowers, distress ink and green Stickles to give her a bit of sparkle.

Ireland folklore is full of faeries of all kinds. The faerie on this tag has butterfly wings, embellished with black, crystal and blue Stickles,  green rhinestones, gold braid and flowers.

You want to come play "tags" with me? I will be teaching these St. Patrick's Day tags this week at Scrapbook Barn. Friday March 9th  10:30am to 12:00 noon and  5:00pm to 6:30pm. You can call the store and sign up for either class.

Exhausting Work

I have been creating!

In case you haven't heard Scrapbook Barn now has a Boutique. Just as you walk in the door there is a display of wonderful one of a kind projects designed by local crafters and artist. I brought in some of my cards and a couple of mini album to sell.

Which brings me back to...I'VE BEEN CREATING! I locked myself in my wizards room and pulled out a few of my "someday" projects to add to the boutique.

Remember the "head" for my shopping trip to Savers a while back?

It was transformed into this wild woman...

A rhinestone and glittered scrapbookers treasure chest to store supplies, sewing notions, old photos or a stash of chocolate.

Ooh-la-la...a girly girl pink and green mini album.

And of course a few more cards.

Who would have thought all this designing could be so exhausting!?!

#3...Ooooo CHOCOLATE!

After covering the 8 tags of LOVE with the K&Company embossed paper...Cut and Paste Chocolate Lovers...I had the decadent chocolate desserts remaining. What was I going to do with those? Now if it had been the actual desserts there would be no question...I firmly believe life is short...eat dessert first! But when they are about one inch square, and made of paper...I had to come up with another idea...a card...how about a collage...yea, that's the ticket...a chocolate collage card! I started with the Pink Pasilee "Love Potion" tiny white hearts patterned paper...then added a layer of the reverse side, red with the lacy print. The edges were distressed with "Tattered Rose" ink. I played around with the placement of the chocolate images until I found the right "look"...the dessert dishes were embellished with the MAGIC PEN. I used one of the Crafty Secrets Heartwarming Vintage Cut...Pink Pasilee green glitter brad...the red flower is cut from Mystic Paper lace.

That's my 3 design team projects...now for the big question...which is your favorite...dark chocolate OR milk chocolate?

The 8 tags of LOVE

Tim Holtz has his 12 Tags of Christmas...I have my 8 tags of LOVE!
For my second Mystic Paper Design Team Project I covered shipping tags with the K andCompany "Cut and Paste Chocolate Lovers" paper. The pattern on this paper has kind of a Shabby Chic vintage look to it...

all the tags were distressed with Ranger "Tattered Rose" ink and then spritz with "Vintage Pink" Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist...

each tag has a Crafty Secrets Heartwarming Vintage Cut...embellished with a "Clear Star" Sakura Jelly Roll pen...better know as the MAGIC PEN.

wooden hearts are covered in "Fruit Punch" Stickels...the ribbons, lace and braid come from Mystic...

A 12x12 piece of mat board was covered with the Pink Pasilee "Bow and Arrow" blue with tiny white hearts patterned paper...sanded a bit around the edges...distressed with ink...springy green lace was added to the top and bottom of the paper... pink lace flowers...with Kaiser Scrapbook blue rhinestones in the center.

The 8 LOVE shipping tags were mounted to the background.

When I turned the project in, I was awarded with a "stinkin' cute" by Jennifer!

Two projects down...one more to show...

Here comes the Bride

Have you been wondering what I created for my Mystic Paper Design Team project...?
All that luscious Cosmo Cricket "Everafter" patterned paper and stickers became a bride mini book...

Using a handmade book, I added the paper...

remember it's double sided so the possibilities are just about endless.

I used vintage bride and wedding party images...

and made about a half dozen different kinds of flowers to embellish the pages...
along with the stickers I added a tag, buttons, ribbon, lace, jewelry, rhinestones, Stickles glitter, beads, distress ink and a dove...

After all June is the traditional month for weddings!

Yasu is traveling, but have you taken a look at what Lindsey and Sheri created?

Play Day

Last Friday Becky from Whymsical Musings shared a collage sheet on her blog. She hoped we could find a bit of time to create and enjoy, while remembering those we love and those who serve our country. I printed off the collage sheet and on Monday I played all day.

Did I have a million other things to do ...yes.

But it was sooooo nice to just play. And isn't that what ATCs are all about?

Thanks Becky!

better hide the toys

There was a crop at my house yesterday. My granddaughter came over for the day...pulled out her scrapbook supplies and started in designing cards for her friends. I brought a project I was working on in to the dining room and joined her. Her favorite supply is pink glitter glue...everything has to have glitter on it and it has to be pink.

I had brought in my Distress Ink...Tattered Rose, to add to my project, and DGD decided she needed some on her cards also. I asked her if she wanted me to show her how to use it...."no, I know how".

Before we were finished, she had tried the paper cutter too, using scissors just takes too long.

...and the winner is...

Last week the very creative Becky posted a give away on her blog. She had wonderful ephemera sheets and bits & pieces. Becky was also giving away a fantastic ATC and bookmark she designed. The only rule for the give away is you had to leave a comment on that post. The name of the winner would be picked by a "random name selector". I drop by Becky's blog often to see what spectacular creations she has come up with. I left a short comment letting her know how much I enjoyed her blog. To my surprise the name selector chose my name to win the give away. True to her word, I came home from work to find a package from Becky full of all kinds of charming "toys"...

The ATC and bookmark Becky made are very impressive.

Lots of texture, glitter, stars, butterflies, rhinestones, flowers and vivid colors.

I am a big ephemera fan...the sheets and the bits & pieces Becky sent are too fun.

Butterflies, labels, and Victorian clip art.

Thank you Becky so much for a lovely give away...you made my day. As soon as I get a chance to play with all these new "toys", I will post the finished design.

Merry Christmas, Ho Ho Ho, and all that Jazz

To say I "scrap swiped" this idea for my 2008 Christmas card would be an understatement.When I saw the November/December Somerset Studio magazine cover, I knew I had to find a way to make Rachel Killpack's fabulous "Christmas Star" in to a card.

I wasn't sure if I could pull it off, slowly the pieces came together. Without looking to hard I found the patterned paper. Bo-Bunny Press (Jan Lanoy) "Winter Whisper Swirl". The music patterned paper is K&Company, "Life's Journey Music". I had the white feathers left over from a long ago project and bought the silver star garland at Joann's. Then the search got a bit harder. What the heck was I going to use for the flourish in the center of the angels? I ended up getting a wooden applique, which I dry brushed with white paint and highlighted with distress ink. When it dried, I scanned the wooden applique, then printed it using the wallet size layout to get the size I needed. I cutout the scanned flourish, highlighted it with a white gel pen and covered with Crystal Stickle glitter. I went through all my old photos looking for an image I could use for the angels. I couldn't find any picture that would work. I check the Internet, nothing. I finally got on Flickr and found the exact image Rachel had used. It had been posted by Suzee Que. After printing and cutting out the angels, I used a opalescence eyeshadow and tinted the angels so they would have a bit of a shimmer. The angels and the flourish were backed with chipboard to give the card some dimension.

As my husband and I were addressing the envelopes for the card, he asked me if I had made this card before, I told him this was the first time. He said he had seen this someplace before. I told him he had...it was on the front cover of Somerset Studio I had sitting out for the last month. Yep... it was a total scrap swipe!

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!

Post Thanksgiving

Last night after all the Thanksgiving company was gone and I was done cleaning for the evening. I cut a slice of pumpkin pie, loaded it up with whip cream, and by the glow of the computer monitor, I put my feet up and listened to
"Alice's Restaurant Massacre" on Mike Putman
(aka jack and cat curio) blog play list.
The perfect end to a Thanksgiving day, thanks Mike!

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

This morning I do believe I finally got the last of Thanksgiving paraphernalia put back where it belongs. All the "stuff" you only pull out once or twice a year, so you have to get down on your hands and knees to put it away. We had such a house full for dinner, a lot of the furniture had to be moved. Of course that leads to a cleaning while you are at it. I have started bringing out Christmas decorations and trying to remember how I displayed them last year.

Now it's time to get back to making my Christmas cards...yes I do know I'm cutting it kind of close!

The cat beat me to my table... she is right on top of the glitter!

THINK PINK!

Got the new monitor up and running, we're back in business!

We were talking about my Mystic Paper Design Team project for November. The paper in my kit was all soft pastels, perfect for all the spring, baby and wedding ideas. But I went way out of the box and came up with a Christmas album. That's right PINK for Christmas. Before you say "she has really gone too far with this idea"... have you seen the front cover of Scrapbook Etc. for November/December. The Christmas layout is in PINK and green.

The front cover of Romantic Homes magazine...PINK for Christmas. So we are going PINK! And who doesn't love all the sparkly glitter this time of year?
Yes, the album is loaded with glitter. I know what you are thinking...wouldn't this be a great gift for your aunt-cousin-secret sister-coworker-neighbor. And you are right, it would be! Heck it would look wonderful sitting on your coffee table for your friends and family to woo and aah over while they are visiting during the holiday season. Come on! You can do this...just think PINK