3 Gypsies on Portobello Road

A few years ago...now that I think about it MORE than a few years ago, mom and I flew over to London...met up with mom's sister Mary for a grand adventure. When we returned, I had all kinds of plans for a fantastic scrapbook of the trip. Of course life got in the way...the trip... photos, journal and all the trip ephemera are still sitting in a box, waiting for me to find the time to create the fantastic scrapbook.
You can imagine my excitement when the new 7 Gypsies Lillie paper came out and I was asked if I wanted to create a design using "Adventure and Elen" paper, the paper tape and a 7 Gypsies Shadow Box tray.

Finally I would have a chance to get a bit of the London trip archived. I sanded the edges of the tray to give it a well traveled look...the outside of the tray and the sides of the little ledges inside of the tray were covered with all three of the paper tapes. The Shadow Box tray has a brass handle with "7 Gypsies" stamped on it...I covered the 7 over with a large 3...because after all there were three of us on this adventure.

While we were in London we took the Eurostar through the Chunnel for a day trip to Paris. Of course we visited the Eiffell Tower.

Back in London we did all the touristy things...the British Museum, Harrods, Westminster Abby and the Tower of London with it's huge black ravens.

I had never heard of London's Portobello Road... Aunt Mary had found us this adventure.

It is the home of the Portobello Market. On Saturday the street is full of people exploring the antique stores, sidewalk flower shops, pubs and wonderful bakeries.

The ideas for the scrapbook are still sitting in the box with the photos and travel journal...but I'm glad a little bit of it is seeing the light of day after all this time.

Going GREEN!

I have been creating Heirloom Tags again, this time they are all GREEN.
St Patrick's Day is on the 17th of March...I'm sure it's not too early to decorate your house from top to bottom in GREEN.
I will be teaching these festive tags at Scrapbook Barn this Thursday March 10th 10:00 am to 11:30 am and again Tuesday March 15th 5:30pm to 7:00pm.

We will be playing with GREEN distress ink, lace, Stickles, gold embossing powder, vintage images (Thanks to Suzee Que at Flickr and Karen at Graphics Fairy for sharing) GREEN butterflys and glittered shamrocks.

Could it be any easier to go GREEN?

Now for something really different

This is what you get when you combine Graphic 45 Steampunk Debutante patterned paper, some copper Stickles, a few layered Tim Holtz Gadget Gears...

Wild Honey Distress ink, Kaisercraft Turquoise Acrylic Paint and Shadowbox frame, and a handful of amber rhinestones...

It was fun to design...but I don' think it will go with the decor in the living room!

Happy Valentines Day

Thank you Graphics Fairy for sharing this fun image!

Exchanging Valentines

When we were kids my mom taught us how to make home made valentines. She would bring out the glue and scissors, lacey doilies, Dennison brand stickers...the kind you had to lick the back to make them sticky, gold Dresden scraps and old magazines to cut out pictures.

My sisters and I are still making home made (now we call it handcrafted) Valentines to exchange with each other and to send to mom.

My Flagstaff sister made this lacey one...
and the one with the embossed mulberry paper hearts and the lady bug was made by my Tucson Sister.

As you can see we each have our own unique styles...I'll post mine tomorrow.

Cow Girl Up!

I have been wanting to design a "Cow Girl" card for a while, I just couldn't find an image that I liked. This Cow Girl image is from Graphics Fairy...Karen shares such wonderful images.
I tea dyed the lace on the bottom of the card and frayed the edged. The flowers are made from a organza ribbon with cool frayed edges...but they weren't quite the right color...I sprayed them with diluted Bundled Sage re-inker.

Here comes the Bride

I have been designing cards again...
The image for this bridal shower card is from Suezz Que...I love the cloche veil...very big in the 1920's and 30's. I used Star Dust Stickles to add a bit of bling .
The paper is Basic Gray Wisteria, inked with Crushed Olive Distress Ink...one of my new favorites. I also used the Crushed Olive ink to stamp on the background.
The flowers are cut from organza lace...they were too white so I spritzed them with some diluted Crushed Olive re-inker and added rhinestones in the center.