The chainsaw is GONE!

I got home tonite and was prepped to chop down a dead lilac tree in our front yard. GASP! The chainsaw is missing from my garage! Stolen! Now the good thing about this is, that I'm a girl, so I didn't have to have the $700 dollar big-boy industrial size logger version of it. It was more like the Fischer-Price toy version, that only cost $35.00 bucks and has hamsters inside running the chain. So it's not a huge loss, but I think I'm sleeping with one eye open tonite just in case there's a chainsaw murderer running around my neighborhood. :)

I made this card a few weeks ago for a friend who unknowingly made my day. I used the Stampendous "Tiers of Treats" stamp that I got from Eclectic Paperie a while ago. The background paper is Daisy D's Cherry Tomato dots and Beacon Hill Scroll Parchment. I used red brads for the 'cherries' and watercolored it using Stampin Up Ink and an aquapainter. The flowers are from a Prima Bubble. Faux stitching done using Hero Art's Ribbons and stitches zigzag stamp.

So if you don't see me post for a while, call 9-1-1, OK? Gnite all !

L.

Coffee, Tea or Me?

I've had this card in my head for DAYS and finally got around to making it! I told you you'd be seeing a lot of the 'Coffee & Tea' set from Crafty Secrets! Eclectic Paperie has them in their store now, too!

I used the Marvy Giga Scallop punch and the Mega circle punch and stamped the coffee chickie in the center of it. I guess I overdid her face a little bit...she seems a little MAKEUPPY to me, but I guess it goes with the theme of the card! Julie Ebersole has a great post on how to create good skin tones on our chickie, to make her, errrr, a little less 'hussyish' (if you know what I mean)!

The coffee cup background is stamped with Stampin Up Certainly Celery ink on Certainly Celery cardstock. I improvised on the "or..." one of the sentiments in the set reads: "please come for....", so I just inked up the or.... to create the saying. Because it's acrylic stamps, it's SUPER easy to line up. More tomorrow!

L.

Get closer!

At first glance, these 2 cards are pretty much no big deal...you have to get close up to really see the glimmer from the swirl paper I glittered up. I made the card on the right to send to a friend, and was thinking it looked really plain. When all else fails, add GLITTAH!

The paper is from a K & Company Classic K Bailey 2-sided paper pad. I hated to coverup the swirls because they're so pretty and shabby. Both sentiments are from the Crafty Secrets "Card Sentiments" set. I love having 'elegant' vintage sayings on hand, because I love all the vintage floral papers that are out there right now.

The glitter flowers are 3-d K & Company stickers that coordinate with the cardstock.

B - 9! BINGO!

I made this about a month ago and forgot about it. I had meant to submit it for publication but it sounds like a lot of work to write up instructions, so I'm just gonna post it here! I was estate sale-ing a while back and got the great little bingo game set below for a dollar. It hit me. THE BINGO CARDS ARE CARDBOARD & CAN BE ATTACHED TO THE FRONT & BACK OF AN ACCORDIAN BOOK! I had a huge artist's watercolor paper pad from my drawing class so I cut a piece of the paper to fit the bingo cards and folded it into an accordian. All of the game images (Parcheesi, playing cards, chess) are from Crafty Secret's "Wacky and Wonderful" booklet.

The gingham papers are from Crafty's "Earthy" paper pads. I cut up some of the paper bingo cards and scattered them throughout the accordian book. I left little squares so that you could insert your family game night photos into the book. The small scrabble tiles are from Paper Bliss (Michaels).

So there you have it. The quick and dirty version of my instructions. Clear as mud, right?

Lotsa junk...

Ok girlfriends. I promise I'll keep the junkin pics but make sure to add card pics in with it, so that we can satisfy both the carders AND the junkers (did I use that right, Lisa Strahl? lol!). I did this card this weekend with a new pack of K & Company "K Bailey" paper pack (1/2 off at Mike's!) The flower is just a pre-packaged sticker that coordinates with the "Bailey" paper. It already has the rhinestone bling on it. The sentiment is from the Crafty Secrets "card sentiments" stamp set. The little sequins in the right corner are vintage..I loved the patina on them and just stuck brads through the center holes. Instead of paper piercing along the edges, I used my sewing machine and did a zigzag stitch along the edge of the pink & brown paper, but didn't thread the machine. Quick & easy!


Now for the junk. The pic to the above is of one of the sales at Pipe Lake. We didn't buy anything here, but I LOVED the shabby barn & silo. Look at this outbuilding below! I love anything chippy and white! That's my sister to the left. Doesn't she look happy happy happy, swinging her purse up the driveway? (she wasn't..."DON'T TAKE MY PICTURE", she's yelling. You can't see her mouth moving so it looks all happy, doesn't it?)

Chippy and white! This needs to have a sign on the outside saying 'STAMP STUDIO'. ************* There was another sale in a barn, where we hit the MOTHERLOAD. Notice there are no pretty pictures of the outside of the sale? This is because we HIT THE GROUND RUNNING and were piling up loads of junk on the cashier's table. Never mess with a girl at a good junk sale. You might get injured. These pink shabby chenille bedspreads were CHEAP! But you have to make sure to look for holes and stains. One went home with my sis. The .25 cent shabby pink pillow came home with me.

What does this gumball machine remind you of? Hmm, there's a certain Stampin Up stamp set that looks like this! This machine has BIG MARBLES inside instead of gumballs! It almost went home with us but was too rickety and was $15 dollahs! The marble gumballs were probably worth more than the machine was! NO SALE!

Here's what I ended up with at the end of the day. The pink dish will probably decorate a wall, and the cute jar will hold bellies in my stamp area. The sugar dish with no lid will hold foam brushes.





This little guy came up to greet us as we were driving up the driveway to one of the sales. When we got to the sale, I told his owner that I loved his horses out front. He told me they weren't horses. I said "Well, I like your big dogs out front". Apparently they're mules. I explained to him that we were city girls and he told me that he never would have guessed. Anyway. That was our weekend. Beautiful and junk-i-ful.

Ok non-junkers.... I promise, the rest of the week I'll post cards. Gnite all!

L.

Hairspray Chickies

A quick post tonite...I'm sunburned and waaay behind on my housekeeping duties! Here are 2 more cards from the Coffee & Tea set from Crafty Secrets. I LOVE THIS SAYING! Although for me, it should be turned around into "Our friendship is as strong as MY hairspray and YOUR coffee."

I found some vintage buttons that a friend & co-worker had given me when I worked at Archivers a while back. I love that black & yellow button in the bottom left corner! TWO TONED!

I went junkin again this weekend, this time at a neighboring lake called "Pipe Lake". It's great when they have the "around the lake" garage sale weekends; you get to check out all the great views of the lake & the fun junk that lake people decide to dump!

I have more pics of this week's junkin' if you want me to post them. Let me know if it's too boring for you guys, I know you mainly come on here for CARDS & stamping stuff!

I'll post more tomorrow night when I unpack and get settled in!

Lisa :-)

Coffee Talk

CONGRATS to Susan in Wylie TX for winning the Crafty Secrets blog candy!

As soon as I found this little frame at the Target dollar spot, I knew exactly what I was going to do with it. The Crafty Secrets "Coffee & Tea" set chickie's mug shots just HAD to be on there! It just screams 50's diner to me!

I stamped the girls with Ranger black ink, and colored in their clothing with Stampin up markers. The stripes on their clothing are easy to color in with plain old marker; no aquapen required! The rick-rack is vintage. DID I MENTION THAT THIS IS MY OFFICIAL FAVORITE SET NOW!

I also wanted to show you this GREAT coffee idea from the Picket Fence Gal's sale. They took coffee cups, drilled a hole in them and put them on a metal rod. You can put birdseed in them and put them in your garden for the sweet little birdies to eat out of! HOW CUTE IS THAT? THEY SIT ON THE EDGE OF THE TEACUP!

I bet if you guys have husbands with 'skillz', they can probably make these for you with old cracked, chipped teacups or coffee cups! If you have them make one for you, PLEASE email me photos so I can post it here!

(I need to find a husband with skillz!) Hmm, it might just be cheaper to buy one of these from the Picket Fence girls, no?

HERE BIRDIE BIRDIE BIRDIE!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

BLOG CANDY WINNAH!

I'M A SPAZZ! Omg, I just ran 4 errands at lunch and forgot the most important one! THE CANDY WINNAH! I'm blaming this on PricewaterhouseCoopers, they didn't get me the secret number in time! Ok, I lied. My boss picked the winning number for me just now.

AND THE WINNAH IS! NUMBER 44!!!!!!

If spazz here is reading the numbers right, that would be Susan, from Wylie TX! Bevie Pearl/Miss America, sorry, no crown for you! Susan, my email address is on the right, if you could pop a message over to me with your address, I'll get the goodies sent out! YAY! I'll post more later! :)

Teapot girlies

Movin' on here! I've got more to show you so I'm going to keep posting even though it will bury my blog candy post.. If you didn't get a chance to enter your name for the Crafty Secrets blog candy, make sure to check yesterday's post and leave a comment with your name, city/state or country, and your favorite crafty set... I'll be drawing tomorrow at noon!

I also have to give you guys a heads up on a new blogger that's been using the Crafty Secrets stuff a lot! You are going to die when you see what she did! Check Pamela (bananacremepie on Splitcoast) out HERE!

So I'll be showing you quite a few cards with the new coffee/tea set from Crafty Secrets. When I love a set, I don't put it down until I exhaust all my ideas for it! This is *SO* becoming a favorite of mine! FAVORITE! These little teapot girlies are pretty easy to color. I used an aquapainter to color in lightly first with a diluted amount of ink, and then took my marker and gave it full-on color on the teapot lid and the base. I then filled in with more of the darker yellow around the edges of the teapot. The black gingham paper is from the Crafty Secrets Earthy paper pad, and the red polka dotted paper is, (OH MAN I USE A LOTTA it) DAISY D'S Cherry Tomato again. The words on the background are from the coffee/tea set. I think they look kind of cute as patterned paper. Rickrack is vintage. More tomorrow.

Crafty Secrets Blog Candy!

Ok, to celebrate the new stamp sets & chipboard that Crafty Secrets is coming out with for the July CHA show, I'm going to do a blog candy giveaway! See bottom of this post for details!

I got my Coffee & Tea set in the mail from Crafty Secrets...let me tell you how much fun I'm having with these 50's chickies! The little crowns on the coffee queens' heads are from their "Radiant" Paper pad. In the back of the pad are all kinds of little crowns to cut out and glue onto your photos or stamped images!

The coffee mugs in this set are SUPER easy to stamp and color. They also are big enough for even an impatient girl like me to cut out. I don't mind being putzy with these cups because they're quick and easy to color & cut out for 3-d embellishments. Here I've used them as a border going across the paper also.

In true Java queen style, I've taken Hero Arts gemstones and stickles glitter to "bling" up the crowns and the jewelry on the chickie's diamond studded bracelet!

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Ok, here's your chance to get the goods early! I'm giving away the blog candy to the left! Sandy from Crafty Secrets has generously donated a pair of the brand spankin new "Sweet Chips" chipboard outfits (one boy and one girl outfit). You can't even buy these outfits yet, they're so new!!!!! Also included is a full pad of the Crafty Secrets Pastel Papers (THIS IS THE ONE WITH THE CHENILLE PAPER! YIPPIE!) I've also included some embellishments from my stash, which includes vintage rickrack, lace, and some baby-themed dress-it ups.

I wanna find out where you guys are from! To enter the drawing, leave me a comment on this post with your name, your city & state, and your FAVORITE CRAFTY SECRETS STAMP SET! I'll do the drawing at noon on Friday!

Storage, Storage and more storage.

I thought I was going to have a coronary when I saw this cupboard at the Picket Fence Gals' sale. It's made from old apple crates and has lots of shelving inside! The little curtains are made from a vintage tablecloth, and are strung on elastic. My first thoughts were STAMP SETS! I CAN STORE STAMP SETS IN IT! But when I got it home, I decided it's going to hold paper, so that I can get my paper off the top of my desk. I bought the 2 all-wire locker baskets there also.

I also bought this great white chippy window screen for $6.00. Why would you buy a screen? Well for cards of course. The picket fence gals are BRILLIANT, I tell ya! Look what they did with their screens! They sewed POCKETS in them, and stuck flowers in the pockets. I'm going to alter my 6.00 white screen and put.......CARDS in them! YIPPIE FOR CARD STORAGE~!

I'm a huge fan of re-use, recycle. Look what you can do with an old bedspring! Here they've hung garden tools from it. I would take clothespins and hang cards from it! Ok, so tomorrow night I promise I'll get back to showing cards and papercrafts. And I promise, we'll get to a drawing too! For Crafty Secrets stuff!

Junkin' 101!

We're BAAAA-ACK! I have so many pics to show you guys I don't know where to begin! We started out our junk weekend at the bright and early hour of....uhm, noon on Friday. Ok, so we're not early birds. We piled in the van and went merrily on our way. Fortunately there is a Starbucks on the way, so we decided to hit it for coffee before we left civilization. As we were pulling into the Starbucks, there was a sign for an Estate sale...we got our coffee and decided to investigate. We went up the road a piece and found this glaring bright sign... I was a little skeptical about this one...who uses "MONGO" when describing an estate sale? But we were pleasantly surprised, driving up to this sweet little celery green cupboard. HMMM, things are lookin' up!


The lady running the estate sale was into shabby....how cute is this creamer and sugar set? The creamer was cracked, though. No sale.


This celery green & red sled did come home with us, though. $3.00! This will find a home on our front porch this winter, probably with greenery hanging from it. And I am a sucker for rhinestone pins...the triple flower came home with me for $2.00. I'll wear it to work on a blazer or throw it on my jean jacket!

And we're off to Flapper Jane's, with the adrenaline going from hitting a fun estate sale.

Here's the Junk-iful front yard of the store. Favorite saying: OK GIRLS, LETS HIT THE GROUND RUNNING!

I asked permission to take a photo of the lemonade salesgirl...how cute is she? She was very concerned that she had food in her braces. I assured her the camera wouldn't pick it up.

CUTE AS CAN BE!

We're off to the Picket Fence gals, which is 5 blocks down from Flapper Janes!

I'll leave you with a front view of Picket Fence...HERE I SCORED BIG!

Tomorrow night I'll show you my scores...I'm off to unpack it and get it set up in my stamp room. I only spent 1/2 of my coffee money, which means I'll save it for new stamps when the Stampin Up catty comes out! Tomorrow night: how a junker stores paper. :)

Father's Day Junkin!

I'm BOUNCING off the walls here, I'm FREE AT LAST, FREE AT LAST! I have tomorrow off of work and am heading to the cabin for Father's Day weekend!

Just about the best gift we can give my Dad is a day off without my Mom, sister and I bugging him... sad, but true~! Tomorrow he's dropping my Mom off (ALONG WITH THE VAN, JUST IN CASE WE MAKE A MAJOR HAUL), and we're heading north to go junking, and then meeting him back at the cabin Friday night. There's 2 awesome junk/antique sales in a small town called "Lindstrom" Minnesota. We're hitting the "Picket Fence" gals sale and "Flapper Jane's". They are only open on certain weekends, and vendors drag all of their wares outdoors on the lawn and it's a JUNK HEYDAY! YIPPIEE! I decided I'd take you guys along junking with us this weekend. I'm revving up my camera, and will take photos of the fun junk we see, so you can share in the madness when I get back on Sunday!

I also have some more stuff to show you when I get back, I have another idea for the little crafty outfits in the works but need to put the finishing touches on it this weekend. And I got a package from Crafty Secrets with the "Coffee and Tea" set in it, so I'm REVVED UP to stamp some hairspray chickies for you guys!

DOES IT GET ANY BETTER THAN THIS????!!!!!!!!!!! OMG!!!!!! OH OH! YES IT DOES, I HAVE $100 SCHMACK in my hot little hands to spend this weekend, from doing a focus group tonite on coffee. I LOVE THAT MY SCHEDULE HAS SLOWED DOWN AND I HAVE TIME TO STAAAAAAMP!!!!!!!!!!!

OK, OK, I'M CALMING DOWN NOW. The card above is going to my poor Dad this weekend, who will probably get stuck hauling crap out of the van for us, or making fixes to any 'less than perfect' bargains that we come back with. Oh, and the card will accompany a new CHAINSAW! Heh heh. (He wanted to borrow mine but I said no way. ) *giggle*

HAVE A HAPPY FATHER'S DAY WEEKEND EVERYONE!

OH OH OH! One more thing! Next week there will be blog candy given away here, courtesy of Sandy at Crafty Secrets! I CAN'T WAIT!

Ok. Is that it? OH MAN, HOW AM I GONNA SLEEP TONITE??!!!!

Sunday's Peonies

Just a few photos from Sunday that I wanted to show you guys. I have a soft spot for chintz teapots and teacups, even though I rarely drink tea or have people over for tea parties. There's something so romantic and comforting about them. We had brunch on Sunday for my parent's anniversary, so we cut the peonies from our back yard that were on their last leg. Because we were sitting out on the front porch (UGH DON'T MAKE ME LOOK AT THOSE SPINDLES ANYMORE!), I wanted a shorter arrangement so we could see each other over the top of the flowers. It dawned on me that my teapots are SUPER short, and if I cut the stems way down, it would be a fun arrangement. Here's a pic for you to enjoy. They were gorgeous, and we had a beautiful (although hot) day!

Ok, the other thing I wanted to post was this post-it notepad I found at Michael's for .50. Ok, I don't "LOVE" what I did with it, but I wanted to show you anyway, because it was such a GREAT deal. They came on a cardstock sheet, which I folded over to make a double note pad. I covered it with vintage harlequin paper from Crafty Secret's "Classic" paper pad. The image is from the "Wacky and Wonderful" Booklet (my fave) s, and the stamps are from the "Kewpies" and "Cherubs" sets.

Here's a closeup so you can see the little notewriter at her desk!

Sleepytime Onesie

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I played with the chipboard outfits again tonite....this time I decided it needed to be a pajama onesie. The Pastel paper pad from Crafty Secrets comes with this great chenille bedspread paper, in both yellow and green. I used the green paper here to make the chipboard look soft and cuddly!

The bedtime story image is from the "Wacky and Wonderful" vintage cuts booklet. I cut it out and made a small little 'storybook' to go with the pajamas. You can write a sentiment inside the book or put little baby photos or memorabilia in it.

Of course, the rear of the pajamas had to be a flap bottom, like vintage PJ's used to have! They make adult pajamas with the flap bottom still! AYE CARAMBA!