Shabbychick Junk.

Happy Valentines Weekend!

2011-02-12T08:57:00.004-06:00

Happy Saturday morning, girlies! I'm so happy the weekend is finally here. Not much stamping going on around my house these days; I started running on the treadmill after work again, so my days have been spent working out instead of stamping. I think I will appreciate this choice when swimsuit season rolls around again! LOL! Unfortunately sometimes this means I'll be neglecting my blog. But in my search for balance, I'm trying to be okay with this!

Since it's Valentine's day on Monday, I wanted to show you a couple more vintage Valentines, and some of my creations from some cool Papertrey sets by PineFeather Press. Check out the shape on this great old victorian
valentine! Isn't it great?

And the penguins! How freakin cute are they?

Last month I got 2 of Heather Nichol's stamp sets, called "Warm Happiness Too", and "Little Bitty Bird". Both of these sets adapt easily to Valentines cards! On this one I tried using Kraft paper in honor of Heather, however I will never have the knack she has with using it! I tried to stamp red hearts on kraft and then brighten it up with my red polka dots. I showered this card with hearts and buttons and glittered the hearts up. Hmph. Not sure if I love it or not, but the birdies seem to be enjoying themselves!

Hope everyone enjoys their weekend and has a Happy V-day on Monday!

Hugs! Lisa

Day 6 - Project Animal Hearts

2011-02-03T07:25:00.002-06:00

These are my favorite cards from my most recent shelter batch. I used 2 of the dogs from Raisinboat's "Puppy Love" stamp set, and the heart from "Paws to Remember". These took a little more putzing, as I masked the heart off so that the dogs could be centered in the heart. I had fun doing them, so I really didn't mind the putziness so much.

I used up more old scraps of paper. I swear, I don't know how I ended up with this much paper! When I crank out multiple cards, I do the cards in stages - first I design the card in full. Then I pull out old scraps that match and add all the patterned paper backgrounds to the card. You'll notice I ran out of some of the paper, so I substituted green plaid, or brown polka dots. They are all the same, but a bit "different" because the patterned paper is different. Then I make all of the center images at once. Finally, I attach the main image to the cardstock and add the final embellishments.

I decided that since I dropped a batch of cards this week, I'd add valentines to the mix. I was careful not to stamp them with "valentines day" sentiments, so if they don't sell the cards in the next 2 weeks, they can be used for love cards anytime. So the center of the card just reads "I adore you".

Day 5 - Project Animal Hearts

2011-02-02T07:25:00.000-06:00

Sympathy card day - cat themed! This one was a stretch, but I did manage to use the goldfish/cat from Raisinboat's "Cattitude" stamp set to create sympathy cards. I thought it would be okay for a grieving pet owner to remember the good times too!

I also found this paw-themed EK Success punch at JoAnne Fabric for 40 percent off..I decided to splurge and grab it, because I know it will get used for shelter projects.

Using up old Crate paper, along with some more patterned paper from a block that was gifted to me. GIT R GONE! :)

Hugs, Lisa.

Day 4 - Project Animal Hearts

2011-02-01T07:25:00.002-06:00

Okay, moving on from dawgs to cats. I did cat-themed thank-you cards, also. These 2 cats are from a Raisinboat stamp rental set called "Cattitude". Check out the cards you can make from this set....birthday, thank you, and I even managed sympathy from this set! Sympathy to follow tomorrow.

Another hint - the beautiful thing about renting stamps is that it forces you to get them all done in your rental month. I tend to stamp a bunch of the sentiments off on paper for future use, so that I can use them at a later time with other animal sets! It's an easy way to get extra value from your $5.99 stamp rental!

Day 3 - Project Animal Hearts

2011-01-31T07:25:00.000-06:00

Aaack, Monday again! Well, I got a ton more animal cards done this weekend, so I'm cranking along here! Today I wanted to show you some of the animal sympathy cards I made for my shelter project. Animal sympathy cards are definitely the best sellers in my shelter basket. I believe it's because they are hard to find in a regular greeting card store anywhere! This is the little curled up dog stamp I was telling you about yesterday...he can be used for sympathy or 'sorry you're sick, or 'ruff day' cards. He's from Raisinboat's stamp set called "A Dog's Life"

These are super easy to color, so I can crank out a ton at once. The patterned paper is from a big block of scrapbooking paper that a friend gave me as a gift a MILLION years ago (USE IT UP!). The 3-d paw is a die-cut I found at Archivers - I cut a ton out of brown paper and added them as an embellishment. The sentiment is from a Raisinboat stamp set called "Paws to Remember".

More tomorrow!

Day 2 - Project Animal Hearts

2011-01-30T11:23:00.000-06:00

Good morning! Today is day (2) of showing you the samples I've been making for my "Project Animal Hearts" - making cards to benefit animal shelters and humane societies. My goal with these cards is not to reinvent the wheel or come up with a new technique, it is to create a large number of cute cards in a small amount of time. So I kept my layouts simple. I created a bunch of thank-you cards, meant to be given to an animal caretaker or friend...you know, the ones that let your dog out when you can't get home in time, or take your pet for the weekend when you're out of town?

These little barky yorkie cards were created with a stamp set from Raisinboat called "A dog's Life" - one of my favorite sets for making shelter cards with, because the other dog in the set (the one in bed) is PERFECT for pet sympathy cards. I'll show you sympathy samples tomorrow.

The patterned paper here is by Heidi Grace....I bought it at Michaels 2 weeks ago on CLEARANCE for .29 per sheet! I bought a ton of sheets because it was so cheap, and the opposite side of the paper is that green plaid, that mimics GRASS! QUICK! EASY! CHEAP!

The inside of the card has more "BARKING" and then a sentiment that says "THANK YOU, YOU'RE THE BEST".

I invite you to CASE any and/or ALL of my cards for this project - if you want to participate, please take whatever inspiration you need in any form. The goal here is to USE UP paper, create something from nothing and help raise money for shelter animals.

Tomorrow: Animal Sympathy

Animal Shelter Project - Need your help!

2011-01-29T10:55:00.004-06:00

Good morning, everyone! I'm finally ready to start posting pictures of my latest stamping project. First, a little background for you. Last year I had to put my pet to sleep, and while I was waiting in the vet's office, I noticed a donation box in the lobby, asking for help to build an animal shelter in my hometown. Recently there's been many stories on the news about animal shelters across the nation closing down, due to lack of donations with the recession. A light bulb went off in my head; I had a room full of patterned paper, cardstock, and embellishments just waiting to be used. What better way to use stuff up than to make cards to encourage donations. So I started cranking out pet-themed birthday, sympathy, thank-you and "Congratulations on your new pet" cards. I put about 40 cards in a basket with some envelopes and a sign that read: "Greeting cards $3.00 - put donation in animal shelter donation box". A few weeks later, I got a call from the vet telling me that the cards were ALMOST GONE! I did the math in my head; $3.00 x 40 cards = $120 toward the shelter. So I made 40 more cards and I was off and running. I'm telling you this story, not to toot my own horn, but to encourage you to sort through your old patterned paper & grab some stamps...each of us can make a small difference in the world, by using our stamping & scrapbooking talents to help worthy causes. So. Every day this week I will be posting different animal-themed cards, in hopes of inspiring you to pull out your animal stamps and start making a difference. Ask your vet if you can put a basket on their counter and a donation box...it's as simple as that. I have become bored with the few sets of animal stamps I own, so this month I rented a bunch of stamps from RAISINBOA T and started cranking out cards again! If you don't have animal stamps but would like to participate, I encourage you to go rent some from RAISINBOAT - get your stamping friends together and have a shelter party and crank some cards out. I will tell you this, you will feel good about doing it. And you will USE UP stuff from your CRAPFT supplies. So come with me on a little animal heart journey this week. More to follow! Hugs, Lisa.

Tea with Alice Stamp Set & Creative Scraps

2011-01-20T19:02:00.003-06:00

And she does it AGAIN! Just when I thought the last Alice in Wonderland set couldn't get any cuter, Sandy Redburn from Crafty Secrets rocks my world with MORE cool images like the mad hatter, a sweet little mouse, Alice, and blank teacups that can be stamped on patterned paper for fun shabby teacups!

This set is called Tea with Alice, and I'm absolutely MAD for it! There are also new creative scraps with tons of Alice images for you to use in scrapbook pages, layouts and cards!

Sandy will be releasing more sets this week on the Crafty Secrets blog HERE...make sure to stop by and check out all the new goodies!

Lisa

Crafty Secrets New Release Sets

2011-01-19T20:40:00.002-06:00

YAY! I can finally show you the new stamp sets I've been playing with for the past few weeks! I've been SO excited for this release! Sandy at Crafty Secrets just posted photos of 3 of her new stamp sets this week for CHA.

I have had the pleasure of playing with this new Wizard of OZ set for a few weeks now, and as I was coloring one image, card ideas just kept popping into my brain, so I KEPT MAKING THEM!! There are SO many ways to use the images in these sets!! I am always in AWE of the cool images Sandy finds... are you LOVING these as much as I do???!

Here are some of the samples that I made with the new sets. I'm a day behind the Crafty Secrets blog, so if you want more new releases & samples, check it out HERE. She has a new Alice in Wonderland set too, that I'll post tomorrow! Short but sweet tonite. Lots to upload! L.

This set is called "Wonderful Pig"...what a happy image!

Scoot over here

2011-01-15T08:00:00.001-06:00

Still "Rockin it Unity-Style" in St Paul! This time with a sweet little glittered scooter. Diggin my Martha Stewart lace punch, too! :)

The little 3-d felt hearts were from a kids package of valentine decor from Michaels. Makes it less putzy when they are pre-made, and the whole package was only $2.99! Enjoy your weekend, ladies!

L.

Vintage Valentines

2011-01-13T20:14:00.001-06:00

Hi again! I thought that today I'd post some more vintage valentine inspiration for you. Yesterday's valentines were more from the 50's era..these are definitely VICTORIAN and putzy!

I scored these last summer during a junking adventure. I love the multiple layers on them, and how lacy they are.

Enjoy!

L.

Life is Sweeter.

2011-01-12T16:45:00.002-06:00

Hi girlies! Life is crazy here in snowy MN...I'm a travel agent, so I'm fielding calls left and right for people whose flights have been cancelled from the snow! I just heard that out of the 48 continental US states, 47 have snow...the only exception is FLORIDA! Girls, let's all head to FLORIDA!

The good thing that happens when the weather is cold and snowy, is that I hit my stamp room after work and lose myself in creating cards. Last week I was busy creating valentines. Here is another Unity valentine, made with Unity's "Rockin It, Unity Style" stamp set. This fun little gumball machine is easy to color, and I can crank out about a million of these, easily.

I promised to show you some of my vintage valentine collection...I love how simple and sweet they all are!

Hope you are as inspired as I am by them!

Papa Z's Birthday.

2011-01-09T10:00:00.000-06:00

Wooooo HOOOO! On a roll with the blog posts! 2 in a row! I should get a silver star for that! My Dad (affectionately known as Papa Z) had a birthday last week, which we will be celebrating today. My Dad is KING OF SHORTCUTS. If there is a shortcut way to get there, he will find it. Sometimes the shortcuts involve dirt roads that dirty your car, complicated routes through foreign neighborhoods, or cutting through farm fields (kidding). But if there's a shorter way to get home, it's all worth it. SNICKER! I pulled out my Crafty Secrets Car Classics set to pull out a fun speedster car to make a birthday card with.

The base of my card is made with a vintage map that I scored at a sale for .75 cents. I pulled out the Wisconsin map and used my hometown section so that it reflects the actual area that Dad does all his "SHORTCUTS".

I also pulled out some vintage metal buttons, and found some really worn ones! The one on the top almost reminds me of some kind of wrench. I want to do a vintage button 101 class for you soon; I have lots of stuff up my sleeve but need to get organized!

I also framed the sentiment with some Crafty Secrets chipboard frames, covered in glitter. A tip for you when glittering; I colored the white chipboard with grey copic marker before I glittered, so that you don't see any white base peeking through the glitter. Gives it a more even effect. Also, I mod podge my glitter on, so the glitter sticks better & more evenly. Happy Sunday, all! L.

You rock my world.

2011-01-08T08:00:00.000-06:00

Morning girlies! Well, we made it through the first week of the year, and so far I'm optimistic that this year will go better than last! I've been working on Valentines again, and had ordered a kit of the month from Unity called "Rockin it, Unity Style". This kit is packed with fun images that are simple to color and have great sentiments! I'm always drawn to stamp companies that coordinate their images with great sentiments. I used some fun, bright papers from My Minds' Eye and Bo Bunny that have primarily red colors in them, and turned this little jukebox into a valentine card!

I glittered the jukebox up with some fun "pu nk" purple glitter from Our Craft Lounge. I'm sort of on a glitter kick this month with all my cards, so you'll be seeing sparkles on everything right now!

I've been trying to organize my stamps by putting them into jewel cd cases; I bought a whole box of empty cd cases in bulk from Uline. (Thanks for the tip, Carol!) Because this Unity kit had so many images, I had to use 4 cd boxes for this set~ so I figured out that you can use a big ribbon, threaded through the top case, to gather the boxes together.

Baby steps into the organization! My Mom found this great cd holder at a garage sale for a buck. It has handles on the top and bottom, so if I need to move this, I just tip it sideways and carry it as is! HANDLES! YAY! Yikes, I just noticed my ribbon holder needs some love. BIG SIGH~!

Happy weekend, everyone!

L.

Valentine Greetings

2011-01-05T20:16:00.008-06:00

Hi guys! I really am still here, even though I haven't been posting! Trust me, when I start getting the posting going again, you're going to be SO sick of me! I've been stamping up a storm and just finally got everything photographed, so I can start putting blog posts up. I finished a bunch of design work last weekend for Crafty Secrets, and started making my Valentine cards so that I'm done in time to mail them out!

I hit the after xmas clearance sales at Michaels last week and ended up getting this cute set by Inkadinkado, called Animal Hearts. All of these valentines were done with the set; there are SO many cute images to play with in here!

I started by choosing some Anna Griffin bright paisley paper, and then paired it up with some fun My Minds Eye pink polka dots. After I had chosen my paper, I pulled the colors from the papers into my images, to make sure they coordinate perfectly.

The fun thing that runs throughout my Valentines this year, are these candy-coated little "Luv Ya" hearts, that I embossed with Versamark and red embossing powder. I love the shiny texture that it gives to the cards. I also went crazy with the Martha Stewart Doily Lace Trim punch that I splurged on for 50 percent off. I love that it looks just like vintage lace, but is FLAT and doesn't give bulk to the cards!

I'm always inspired by vintage valentines, and usually when I pull out my collection, it gets my mojo going. I'll be posting some of my vintage valentines thoughout this month, so you can see what inspires me.
Here are some closeups of my valentines if you want a better look. It's not too early to start spreading some love!

Talk to you soon!

L.

Berry sweet Thank-You Cards

2011-01-01T16:49:00.003-06:00

Happy new year, everyone! I have to say I'm glad 2010 is over, and I'm MORE THAN READY to start a fresh year. I have lofty goals this year, but the main one I want to remember every day is to keep my BALANCE in all things. I've promised myself that this year I will not take too much on, I will have a positive attitude, be thankful for everything I have, and try to live SIMPLY. Unfortunately, this will be a challenge for me, as I LOVE old stuff and I LOVE craft supplies. So maybe I need to add ORGANIZING to my list, too! One of my goals before the new year was to get thank-you cards out right away, for all of the xmas gifts I received. I met some friends at Archivers and made about 20 of these mousey thank-you's last week. Now I need to actually SEND them! I've also been working on Crafty Secrets new release projects this week, so when I get the go-ahead, I'll be posting lots of new stuff for you to check out. Hope you had a happy New Year's Eve, and I hope all your 2011 goals are within reach! L.

Supplies: Penny Black Micey Day Stamp Set

Pinefeather Press/Papertrey Library Card

Martha Stewart Doily Lace Trim Punch

Patterned Paper by October Afternoon

Your friendship warms my heart~

2010-12-29T17:45:00.004-06:00

I almost forgot to post this last card I made for my guest designer gig with Crafty Secrets this month! Nothing like waiting until the 11th hour!The holidays wouldn't be complete without making a million thank you cards for the awesome gifts I received! I had a ton of leftover transparency snowflakes from xmas projects, and didn't want to put them away just yet. So I decided to do a winter-themed friendship thank you. I used this snowy friend image from Crafty's "Seasonal Friends" stamp set, and glittered the entire snowscape to make the image cool and snowy! I also glued white fun flock on the coatsleeves & bottom of the little fashionista's coat, to mimic white fur.

I think you can see the details better on this closeup- in real life the card is snowy and sparkly! I just wanted to give HEARTFELT thanks to Sandy Redburn for letting me dip my toes back into the design waters this month. I had a GREAT TIME reconnecting with my vintage self, and enjoyed every minute of playing with Crafty Secrets' new stamp sets and goodies!

Farm Chicks Cards

2010-12-28T08:42:00.003-06:00

Top of the morning to you! I just realized I forgot to post 2 more Crafty Secrets Chicken cards I made last week from the newly released set called "Farm Chicks". I think all the holiday merriment has made me lose my mind! (What was left of it, anyway.) I have the day off, so I'm meeting friends at Archivers to make thank-you cards for all of the lovely gifts I received this holiday season! I have one gift in particular that I want to show you, but I need to photograph it. This card was made with the thought that you would send it as a congratulations card....this rooster is crowing his lungs out over SOMETHING exciting! I wanted to make him really colorful because the rest of the card is done with muted tones. Sandy added some little chicken track feet to the stamp set, which is great for making backgrounds or running them across the paper for a fun touch.

Sandy always adds such fun sentiments with her stamp sets...I'm sure she added this "Spring Chicken" stamp with me in mind. ;)

Happy Tuesday, all~ I hope to have more blog posts lined up soon~!

P.S. I almost forgot....there is a Crafty Secrets Shop Hop sale going on at Splitcoast Stampers. I think there's free shipping and free stamp sets, too! Check it out if you're interested!

More Stampin Up Vintage Cards

2010-12-23T20:05:00.000-06:00

More sweet images from Stampin Up's Retired "Winter is Calling" stamp set. This time I paired it with vintagey paper from Graphic 45.

More transparency snowflakes of course! I also have been really loving this Spellbinders die that looks like you've used a pinking shears around your image. Gives it that extra vintage touch!

Speaking of vintage; I scored this fun coffee can at Friday's estate sale too...I loved that it's tag line is "THE HAPPY BLEND COFFEE!" I think it looks super xmassy in my kitchen, with some happy yellow flowers from a sweet friend. Hope you have the HAPPY BLEND coffee this weekend at your family gatherings! Happy Holidays, all!

My Christmas Cards

2010-12-22T19:54:00.000-06:00

There's very few vintage sets that I'm enamored with, outside of all things Crafty Secrets ...but this year I couldn't resist the sweet little skater girl on a retired Stampin Up set called "Winter is Calling". I picked it up this summer at a garage sale, and finally got to putz around with it. Don't tell Sandy from Crafty Secrets that I cheated on her this year with my Xmas cards! (Just kidding...she knows I used this set & she also knows I love her best, because she is THE vintage queen! )

I'm not sure if you can see it or not, but I used a bunch of the fluffy Melissa Frances Mica flakes to imitate white, fluffy snow on the lake! I also created another card with this set that I'll show you tomorrow. I get sort of bored doing a ton of the same cards, so I split them up a bit. Some friends will get the skater, some will get tomorrow's card.

ARE YOU READY FOR XMAS? It's almost here! See you tomorrow!

L.

Reindeer Gift Card Holders

2010-12-21T19:19:00.007-06:00

Hi friends! More putzing around going on tonite; I needed a couple of money/giftcard holders for my friend's daughters, so I whipped these up using some red paper lunch bags I scored at Target this summer. Our Craft Lounge came out with these fun little decorated reindeer from the "Reindeer Games" set, and they have a coordinating set called "Reindeer Puns" that I had a hand in creating for OCL. I thought it would be fun to pair up some kids jokes with these cartooney little guys!

What do reindeer use to decorate their Xmas trees? HORNAMENTS. And, which of Santa's reindeer has the cleanest antlers? COMET of course.
I think the girls will love these. (Especially since there will be money in the little open flap inside.) I used red glitter for the reindeer nose, and my transparency snowflakes to make the holder merry.

Here's what the inside looks like...I just folded the bag into a triple fold, and glued the inside of the bag down in the middle. The open slot is where you place a giftcard or money. I put my punchline, in the center of the trifold. EASY!

I also have to show you a fun little box of HORNaments I scored while junking last Friday. I love leaving them in the boxes under the tree, for them to sparkle under the lights!

AND I finished my Christmas cards yesterday! I'll have 2 more blog posts before I leave for the holiday~ stay tuned for my Christmas card photos!

Merry Merry!

L.

Farm Chicks New Release Set

2010-12-20T08:04:00.004-06:00

Good morning everyone! Crafty Secrets is getting ready to release some of their new CHA sets, and since I was guest designing this month, I got to play with the design team girlies and play with some of the new sets! Sandy has lots of fun stuff in store for you guys; she's on a roll (as usual) with her new, jam-pecked, ERR, I MEAN PACKED stamp sets!

The set I got to play with is called FARM CHICKS! The chicken images in this set are SO COOL! And the chickens have PARTY HATS that you can add to their little chicken heads! I had some old raffia off of a gift in my ribbon supply, so I cut it up into smaller pieces and used it for straw on these cards. I wanted to give them a country feel. I love doing little unexpected details on my cards. Best of all, it didn't cost a dime!

More samples coming up this week!

Tiny Tags

2010-12-14T20:41:00.006-06:00

Hi everyone! I'm just putzing around tonite, procrastinating wrapping my Christmas gifts. I was telling a friend the other day that I LOVE the shopping for the gifts, but HATE the wrapping of the gifts, because I always turn a simple thing into a big production. Sometimes my gift wrapping is better than the gift inside!

Some of you may know that I've been painting my living room and dining room. I've spent so much time at Menards, I think the clerks all know my name. I had a frenzied moment on my last trip there, because I wandered past the Christmas gift wrap and gasped when I saw my FAVORITE red polka dot (ala Daisy D's) paper there! And on sale for $1.39 a roll! OMG! 4 rolls later, I have enough wrap to polka dot everyone's birthday, Christmas, Mothers Day, Anniversary, Wedding, (you get the picture) gifts. I might just wrap my couch in it too, if I have time.

ANYWAY, I had some smaller gifts to wrap, so I putzed with Crafty Secret's Christmas Mail Stamp set, and came up with these little plaid tags to match my polka dot wrap. I used some Melissa Frances Mica flakes to glue snow under Santa's little butt.

Now if I could get my self to wrap some more gifts instead of blogging, I'd be in business. .

Pottery Barn inspired Crafty Secrets Table Setting

2010-12-11T12:20:00.012-06:00

Happy Snowy Saturday, girlies! I want to show you another Crafty Secrets project that I made after I was inspired by these cool Pottery Barn ornaments! I loved the look of these ornaments but was thinking there was NO WAY I'd pay that price for them unless they were on clearance. Then the lightbulb went on in my head, that I own a FEW Crafty Secrets stamps and I could possibly recreate these myself! So I want to show you where I went with these ornaments as my inspiration!

I started with a blank sheet of cardstock, and stamped music notes all over my paper (music notes from Crafty's Artsy Banner stamp set). Then I stamped birdcages, postmarks and birds (from Crafty's "Birdies" set) all over the sheet and colored them in with copic markers. This became the basis for my ornaments.

I used my Spellbinders Circle dies to cut a bunch of circles out of it. Then I covered the circles with Versamark clear ink, and then dumped UTEE clear embossing powder all over them. Once you heat up the Utee, the powder melts and creates a clear plastic sheen over the top of the ornaments.

Then I just matted them with a scallop circle that had been covered in Martha Stewart white-gold glitter. I also repurposed some old ugly buttons I had, by dipping them in mod-podge and smothering them with glitter! Punch a hole in them, add ribbon, and you have cute little individual ornaments for gifting!

I also thought it would be fun to give these as favors for a holiday party, so I folded some embossed cardstock in half, and took a 'bite' out of them with a Nestabilities scallop circle. I used vintage sheet music and stamped names on them, and added them to the front. The ornaments sit right in the little holder, and the guest can remove the ornament and take it home with them! I also repurposed some old ugly buttons and covered them in mod podge and glitter, and hot glued them to the front of the ornaments for extra sparkle.

After I was done, I found an old cylinder vase and covered it in sheet music to make a candle holder for the center of the table. I used a medallion pinwheel for the center, and hot glued one of the ornaments to the middle.

So there you have it; a cheap and fun alternative to going out and spending money on holiday decor!

Little St Nick Bingo Card, Tags and Transparency Flakes

2010-12-08T07:41:00.016-06:00

Good morning everyone! I have the day off and am snuggled in my craft room with coffee today, so I thought I'd start the day off with a blog post.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I stamped off a bunch of Crafty Secret's "Little St Nick" images to use in Christmas projects, and colored them in.

I started out making Christmas tags with the colored images, and then used one in my traditional bingo card ornament, for my bingo card tree!

I stamped off a bunch of snowflakes on transparency sheets and embossed them..they've become the main theme running through all of my Christmas projects this year. I thought I'd give a short tutorial today and show you how to make transparency snowflakes! I've been going crazy adding these snowflakes to my projects this month...they are so EASY.

Here's what you'll need:

Transparency sheets

White detail embossing powder
Embossing Buddy
Versamark

Old buttons

Spellbinders dies

Snowflake stamps (I used Crafty Secrets "Christmas Joy" set and Pinefeather Press/Papertrey "Snowfall Additions"

Rub your embossing buddy over the transparency sheet. This will reduce static and help the embossing powder to only stick onto the stamped image instead of the area surrounding it.

Stamp your snowflakes on the transparency (with the versamark ink) and then dump white detail embossing powder on the flakes.

Dump off the excess embossing powder and snap the back of the sheet a few times with your finger, to make sure the powder is just on the snowflakes, not the surrounding area. Then take your heat gun and run it over the flakes until the powder melts & becomes shiny.

Then punch your flakes out with a spellbinders scallop or circle die, and glue buttons to the centers. Easy~! Hope you all can take some time this season to sit down and indulge your creative side! I'll have another tutorial this weekend for you and more Crafty Secrets inspiration soon!

Lisa

Crafty Secrets December Guest Designer

2010-12-01T10:00:00.001-06:00

Hi friends!

Hope everyone is having a cheery holiday season and is snuggled in for for some December crafting and holiday merriment! I've been asked by Sandy Redburn at Crafty Secrets to be a guest designer for her for the month of December, so I'll be posting some fun inspiration and projects this month and am contemplating blogging occasionally again! So put me on your favorites list and stop back for some tutorials and merriment!

A few weeks ago I had met a friend at Archivers and they showed us how to make some cool pinwheel medallions with a scor-pal. My inspiration fires were LIT and I came home and started making medallions like a crazy-girl. I decided to do a tutorial for you, since a lot of the projects I've done for December involve the medallions in varying sizes.

Sandy had sent me a few sheets of her Christmas images, so I decided I'd make a medallion banner for her to hang in the booth. I cut them all up, matted them with red paper and glittered the edges. I also added some homemade transparency snowflakes all over to make them snowy and festive. (I'll be showing you how to do the snowflakes in an upcoming post).

Each medallion has it's own little unique doo-dads (technical term) attached, but I kept them simple so I could crank out a bunch at once. Try one yourself at home...I think you'll find tons of uses for them! Here's how to make them!

For the larger pinwheels, I used a 6 x 12 sheet of paper. Lay it on the scor-pal and score lines all the way down at 1/2 inch intervals. To add the little border strip of paper, I added a 1 inch strip to the center of the paper before scoring.

After scoring, cut the paper in half, cutting directly down the center of the paper. You will end up with (2) 3" strips. Then fold the strips at the scores, to make accordian strips.

Hot glue the tails together on both ends. Helpful hint: fold one strip with the tail end facing up, and one with the tail end facing down, so that they clasp together.

You will end up with accordian circles that look like this.

Now press down on the center of the circle forming sort of a 'jello mold' shape. The circle will pop all the way down when you press down on it.

Now gather the loop together tightly, and put hot glue in the center of the medallion. Hold it together while the glue dries. (Do this on a craft mat so you don't ruin your table with hot glue!)

Try experimenting with different size strips...I used 3", 2" and 1.5 inch medallions for my banner. Stop back soon, as I'll have more projects to show you and ways to use these fun little decorations!!!! They are so EASY!!!

Ch-ch-ch-CHANGES.

2009-08-17T17:30:00.002-05:00

Hi everyone!

I'm so sorry I've been missing for so long. I just wanted to stop back on and let you know that I've decided to stop blogging & will no longer be doing design work. I have some areas of my life that I want to focus on, and as you know, blogging and stamping require a lot of my time and attention, which I don't feel like I have right now!

I personally want to thank all of the wonderful stamp companies who have put their faith in my stamping abilities and have shared their incredible products with me. Most of all, I want to thank you, my faithful readers, for always being here to support and encourage me through my paper journey. All good things must come to an end, and I feel like this is the perfect timing for me right now.

Who knows, someday you may see me back, once I've gotten things in order and have more time to devote. Maybe when I'm 80 and finally can retire (grrrrr), I'll be a stamping machine again!

I wish everyone endless creativity and happiness!

Lisa Z.

Special thanks to:

Crafty Secrets (The incredible Sandy Redburn and team)
Pink Persimmon (Thanks, Darcy and Judy!)
Our Craft Lounge (Joy and Cams, you are the BOMBS)
Eclectic Paperie (Joy and Daisy and CEO Sam, you rock!)
Whippersnapper (Anna & Lisa B)
Splitcoaststampers (Daven, Jenn, Lori, HUGE HUGS!)
Tattered Angels
Spellbinders
Hanna Stamps (Thank you, Kristi Ferro!)

Stampendous & Smirk

2009-08-09T19:21:00.009-05:00

Hi everyone! Hope you had a great weekend! Today I'm posting those blurry Stampendous photos I promised...just when I thought the Changitos couldn't get any cuter, Stampendous goes and changes the game and introduces these sweet little funny RACCOONS! Oh I love them! Look at the cute samples that were hanging up in the booth!

Could they get any CUTER?

They also had a line of woodland stamps with these sweet little animals and tall birch trees! WAY TO GO, STAMPENDOUS!

I also found this cute line of stamps by a new vendor called "Smirk"! Since these came out unbelievably blurry too, I thought I'd post a website where you can see them more clearly! Sorry for the bad photos, guys!

Smirk Clear Stamps Link HERE.

More blurry CHA!

2009-08-06T17:22:00.007-05:00

Oh man, I don't know WHAT setting I had my camera on when I was flying through the booths at CHA taking photos, but many of them are BLURRIER than a white squirrel in a snowstorm. Dang. At least I've never claimed to be good at photography, so you guys don't expect much at this point.

Maya Road BLEW me away with their chipboard albums, banners and vintage trims!

SCRUMPTIOUS, I tell you!

I wish I was a scrapbooker, because these albums are adorable.

Oh well, at least with the blurry photography you get the full glitter effect when you click on the closeups!

LOOK AT ALL THE COLORS OF POMPOM TRIM! GASP! (VICKI CHRISMAN, DO NOT LOOk!)

I'm so glad to be ------->

We need one of these for the cabin.

Tattered Angels has done it again. Look at their (blurry) bingo cards (SORRY, IT'S NOT YOUR EYES, ITS MY PHOTOGRAPHY. GEEZ LOUISE.)

Back with more tomorrow. (Blurry Stampendous, anyone?) I'm a putz.

L.

My shabby CHA picks!

2009-08-05T17:42:00.008-05:00

Okay guys, I'm back from Orlando and finally have recovered enough to sit down and go through my CHA photos and pick favorites! The retail part of the show was a complete success, and Crafty Secrets was a HUGE hit! Anything that was not nailed down in the booth sold QUICKLY! I hope this signals that the economy is recovering and people are happily going back about their business of stamping and scrapbooking! I thought tonite I'd show you some CHA eye candy. If you have been following the trends, you know that vintage is HOT right now! We had the pleasure of having a booth right across from Melissa Frances, and I got to meet her cute little survivor (breast cancer) self in person!
Melissa's line got me STRAIGHT in the heart. I WAS VERCLEMPT, I tell you, when I saw the cool BINGO cards she's selling! HEART PALPITATIONS!

These cool bottle-brush xmas trees that she had on the bingo card came in soft pink and cream! SO YUMMY!

She also is selling vintagey-looking crepe paper, and the coolest MICA flakes in shabby blue and pink! (I GOT ME SOME OF THESE...YAAAAHOO!)
Cool vintagey hardware for your projects, in shabby white...be STILL my heart! Okay, enough gushing over Melissa. On to Making Memories. The Making Memories booth resembled a cool, old-timey sewing goods shop! I had heart palpitations here, too! Check out the chippy paint on this chair. Heaven, I tell ya!

Enjoy peeks at the vintage findings! MM has always carried vintagey-looking lines, but this one blew me away! So much yumminess!

Back with more tomorrow!

Crafty Secrets Postcards Make & Take

2009-07-24T17:01:00.002-05:00

Tonite I'm posting the last of my Crafty Secrets Halloween postcards, that will debut at CHA next week. I hope that you all will be in Orlando for the consumer part of the show! I'll be doing a make and take with these little postcards at the Splitcoast booth from 9-11am on Saturday at the show, so if you want to come and play, I'd LOVE to see you there!

I think Sandy already showed these on the Crafty blog, so you may have already seen them. But I thought I'd post them here for those that didn't link over.

I love how vintage Halloween decorations always have some form of fine antique glass glitter on them, so I decided to add glitter around the edges of the postcards for sparkle. I always use the Martha Stewart glitter from Michael's; it truly gives a vintage look to everything.

Here's the back of the postcard. Each kit comes with little postmark stamps and fun little seasonal images to color in!

For this cat image, I attached a chipboard star so that it dangles from the bottom of the postcard. The image sheets come with fun Halloween words that work great for doing collage on the front!

So I'm off to CHA, so I'll be missing in action for a week in Orlando. Hope to see you there!

Lisa

Crafty Secrets Xmas Postcards

2009-07-22T17:05:00.003-05:00

Hey everyone! Can you believe it, 2 posts in one week for me! And I'm aiming for a third also! How lame am I? LOL!

My family was shopping in one of our favorite boutique stores and saw a sign that said "Go sell CRAZY somewhere else, we're all stocked up here!". That pretty much sums up my life lately. I'm in prep-mode for CHA, and since I've done CHA for the last few years, my feet are already screaming, thinking about the trauma of standing for days on bad shoes. I thought I'd try to plan ahead this time and find some cute, comfy shoes that won't make my feet scream. Unfortunately, I wear a size 5, which is not plentiful, if shoe companies make them at all. So I ended up with these Clarks "Navan" casual sandals, and got them 1/2 off! We'll see if they work; I usually end up in flip flops on like, DAY 2. WHY don't they make cute shoes with like an inch of padding in them for trade shows? LOL!

Okay, so you could care less about my shoes, lets get to the goodies, right? This is one of the new Postcard Kits that Crafty Secrets will debut next week. I played with some of the Xmas themed ones; I decided I'm having more fun making them into decorative hangings, vs. actually sending a postcard! I glued a glittered chipboard swirl to the bottom of this one, then hung the chipboard images to the swirl with wire! All of these cute little images and heart shaped chipboard come with the kit!

Here's another snowman image from the kit. I used my chipboard swirls again and glued it to the front to get some dimension, then added a chipboard star on top of the swirl. I took clear glitter and glittered some of the snow on the hanging, so everything is sparkly.

I know you actually can send these in the mail, I think you'd just want to not add the extra layers and try to keep things flat. My sister already called dibs on the first image, she wants to use it for xmas decorations, so I guess mailing it is a moot point anyway!
Don't forget to go to the Crafty Blog and enter the give-away for postcard kits HERE!

Hope you're having a good week, everyone!

L.

Crafty Secrets Vintage Postcard Kits

2009-07-20T07:09:00.003-05:00

Morning everyone! I'm sneaking in an early post because we can now show you a new product that Crafty Secrets is debuting at CHA next week! Sandy came up with cool vintage postcard kits that you can create postcards with, or doorknob hangings, or mini albums, or garlands! The design team girlies have been busy all weekend creating postcards, so stop by and check them out on the Crafty Blog HERE! I'm amazed at the creativity that this design team cranks out~ every single one has unique and fun details!

I've been having so much fun playing with the kits & making samples for the trade show booth; I'll have more samples to show you all week! I lucked out and got a ton of the Halloween images (MY FAVE!) For this one, I cut out some of the typed words that came on the image sheets to add a sentiment to the front. The little wooden scrabble letters are old, but come on a sheet and are self-adhesive. I used them to spell 'eek' out on the front of my postcard. I also used silver pipecleaners for the handle on this hanging; I just wound 2 pipecleaners together and then spiraled them around my finger to get the corkscrews.

For this little hanging, I used some gold wired tinsel I had from Christmas trims, and added orange bows to the top. I also used Tim Holtz Linen crackle paint to paint the edges of the postcard, and sprinkled in a little black glitter for shimmer. I also used black glitter on the pompoms, and the cat's body. The kits come with little stamps that you can use to stamp the postcard back. All of the little chipboard embellishments come with the kit, like these little 2.cent stamp images hanging off the bottom. I hope you'll all be in Orlando next week, I'd LOVE to show these off to you in person! I'll have more of my creations this week, but in the meantime, make sure to stop by the Crafty Blog, as they are doing a give-away for postcard kits!

Crafty Secrets CHA Release - Thanksgiving Set

2009-07-17T07:16:00.004-05:00

Marnin, all! I'm back and I'm a stamping machine this week! I got one of the new release CHA Crafty Secrets stamp sets in the mail, and finally had a chance to play with it! Too bad I had to get sick to get some much-needed time in my stamp room! I'm a snotty, hacking mess right now, but hey, I STAMPED! I gotta tell you, it was a challenge to get into fall mode with Thanksgiving stamps in JULY, but I got-r-done! Except the colors on this card don't seem very thanksgiving-ish, do they? This cool turkey-guy is from a new release Crafty Secrets Thanksgiving set. Crafty has lots of fun stuff coming out for fall, and a NEW product, on top of it all! The design team is working on samples right now and when we get the go-ahead, we'll show you peeks of the new stuff!

Sandy always finds such fun sentiments to pair up with her cool vintage images. Check out the closeup of this one to see the cute little greeting for the turkey! I used a Spellbinders deckle-edge nestabilities die to cut out my main image, then took my sewing machine and sewed a little 'deckle' edged border with black thread. I think it turned out kind of whimsical!
I'll have more sneak peeks for you with this set, but in the meantime, check out the other design team girlies blogs; I know sweet Pam Hooten has some yummy eye candy already on hers! Happy weekend, everyone!

L.

Shabby Cabin Cards

2009-07-10T17:08:00.001-05:00

Hi everyone! Not much new to report on the stamping front here. Still running around like a chicken, and still no stamping this week! I did find some shabby butterfly cards that I did at the cabin a few weeks ago and forgot to post. These were more quick cards done with some shabby K & Company papers and chipboard butterflies.

I added rhinestones to the butterfly bodies to bling the cards up a bit. There's shimmery glitter on the butterfly wings too, that I added for effect.

I thought I'd post these shamelessly cute chipmunk photos from the cabin over the 4th, too! These little guys are so tame, they've run over our feet if we happen to get in their way. I grabbed my camera and a coffee cup full of sunflower seeds, and sat on the cement and waited for them to dig into the seeds. I was less than a foot away from these little guys! The grapes didn't go over as big as the sunflower seeds did; they stuffed their cheeks full and took off! Enjoy your weekend, everyone!

Flash Card Photo Album Tutorial - Crafty Secrets

2009-07-06T07:15:00.005-05:00

Good Monday morning, everyone! Today is posting day for our Crafty Secrets Design team challenge this month! This month, we were challenged to do a tutorial for you on anything we wanted! I've been stressing about this project all week, because I feel like I've done everything there is to do, tutorial-wise (plus my mojo has been MIA)! So it surprised me when I locked myself in my stamp room yesterday and I was able to come up with this kid's school photo album, that holds the mini-wallet size school friend photos. I had a box of school flash cards sitting on my desk, that my sweet friend Bevie Barton had sent me, so I decided to do a flash card photo album with Crafty's new Mice Party stamp set, based on the little photographer mouse in this set!

I tend to save odd-shaped boxes, just in case I can alter them in some way, and it was a serendipitous coincidence that the flashcards fit perfectly in these sudoko puzzle boxes that I had in my cupboard from last xmas.

Aren't these the coolest flashcards? Bevie Pearl works in a school, and I was tickled pink when she sent me these for my birthday in March! See Bevie, I do get around to using stuff eventually! It just took me a while!

The sudoku box was so easy to alter; first, I cut the top flap & the side flaps off of the top of the box, leaving the bottom flap of the box intact.

Then I cut some memo/library card patterned paper to fit the box; this school-themed paper is from Crafty's "Earthy" Paper pad. Since the paper didn't fit completely around the box, I cut a separate piece to go on the backside of the box. I measured the front of the box, and then marked the 2 spots on the paper where I'd need to score it to make a crisp corner. I then stamped "School Photos '09" on the front, and then used a glue stick to adhere the paper to the box front.

I set about decorating each of the flash cards. I cut 6 mats for our little wallet-sized kid photos, and used these as my focal point so that when the kiddos trade photos at school, all you have to do is glue the photo onto the mat. I also had some gold-yellow patterned scrap paper from the earthy pad that I thought would work great for cheese, so I stamped a bunch of cheese wedges on it and cut them out to use on the pages.

I stamped mice and cameras, and the sentiment "Say cheese" over everything, and then added buttons and rickrack as I putzed along.

After I finished the flashcards, I worked on the front of the box. I stamped a photographer mouse scene, and used a Spellbinders deckle-edged nestabilities rectangle die to cut the image out for the front of the box. I stamped "School Photos" with Crafty's "Top Hat" alphabet set, and then colored in the letters & the scene with copic markers.

The other talented design team chickies will all have fun tutorials on their blogs today, so make sure to stop by and check them out!

Vicki Chrisman Team Leader
Anna Wight
Pam Hooten
Heidi Blankenship
Marisa Grosson
Vivian Peters
Michele Kovack
Linda Duke
Melissa Phillips
Michelle Van Etten

Have a great week, everyone! L.

A shabby attempt at stamping~!

2009-06-30T19:38:00.003-05:00

AAACK, I've definitely fallen and I can't get up. I have NO mojo, no desire to stamp. What is WRONG with me? I used to be able to crank stuff out whether I wanted to stamp or NOT! These days, I run quickly past my stamping desk and try not to feel guilty for all of the mindless purchases I've made, and not focus on the piles of paper and stamps that are sitting there untouched! I don't want to stamp! My life has gotten crazy; full of summer projects and friend get-togethers, and *GASP* dates! Confession time. I've entered the dating world again. I can't believe I said that out loud.

Anyway, here's my pitiful attempt at trying to throw some cards together tonite. I need just about every type of card occasion now for my non-existent, dwindling work-stash, so birthday will have to do for this attempt. I used scraps of My Mind's eye polka dot papers, and some Bo-Bunny flowery Allissa-Twirls pattern. Bird stamp is Inkadinkadoo from Michaels. I discovered that the fun Pink Persimmon flower greetings stamps are great to use as sentiments! So I stamped, at least! PROGRESS!

May your mojo be plentiful today, everyone!

L.

Basic Grey Marrakech

2009-06-23T21:52:00.002-05:00

I swear, if I don't get some uninterrupted stamping time in soon, I'm probably going to BURST. Tonite I snuck in an hour of putzing and decided to make some simple thank-you cards with a little Basic Grey flower stamp that I bought at Archivers a few months ago. They have the cutest single Basic Grey stamps in their hotspot area for $1.99, and this little flower and ladybug stamp set was one of them!

I had a bright, flowery Basic Grey "Marrakech" mini 6x6 paper pad that was gifted to me, so I paired it up with the flower stamp. I love that the patterns are tiny on this paper! I colored in the flower with Copic Markers (Ice ocean, spring dim green, pale olive, cobalt blue & prawn).

I need to make birthday cards soon, so I need to start CRANKING soon!

Happy Tuesday, all!

L.

The Mouse Party Continues!

2009-06-18T19:20:00.005-05:00

Tonite I have another little party mouse sample, done with a new Crafty Secrets medium stamp set called "Mouse Party". This set has not been released yet, but it is one of the new releases that will be offered at the CHA July show in Orlando.

Here I used some crackly wood paper along with a blue harlequin pattern from Crafty's "Pastel" paper pad, and stamped a mouse in the corner, as if he's coming out of the woodwork.

I used a Spellbinders Nestabilities "Pinking' circles die to create a fun little spiky mat for my main image. I also glued balloons to the edges of the image so that it seems like the MEECE are watching them float off!

Hope you have a wonderful Father's day this weekend...it's time to appreciate those hard-working Dads!

L.

Crafty Secrets Mouse Party Stamp set!

2009-06-16T20:25:00.004-05:00

YIPPIE! The Crafty Secrets new release CHA stamp sets are getting sent to the design team! I got my first set in the mail today, and it's a CUTE one! This set is called "Mouse Party" and is a medium set that will retail for $14.99! I sat down tonite and started playing with all the cute little MEECE (that's mice, plural) and was dying from the cuteness!

The cool thing about this set is that you can create fun little detailed scenes, or keep it simple and stamp a row of MEECE and color them in!

Here I went simple and just stamped 5 mice in a row, stamped a horn in one of their hands, and then just colored them in easily with a "Sand" colored Copic marker. Their ears and tails are Copic "Baby Skin Pink", and the horn is Cadmium Red. SO QUICK to make, in fact I'm going to get back in there tonite and start cranking out more of these little guys. The cards are gonna multiply like, errr...MICE.

Here I went more detailed and created a little scene with the photographer mouse taking a birthday photo of the birthday rodent! I had to use some vintage sheet music with this because it ties in with the mousie's little song book!

I LOVE THESE MEECES TO PIECES!

LZ

Birthday Card Catch-up

2009-06-14T12:01:00.002-05:00

Good morning! I'm home today, getting ready to head outside and enjoy some rare Minnesota sunshine in my back yard! This morning I got up and started digging into my to-do list. I'm REALLY low on birthday cards so it's time to build my stash back up again by doing multiples of cards! I scored this cute Stampendous Changito Bubble birthday stamp at Archivers a month or so ago, and am just getting around to inking it up.

I'm getting back into use-it-up mode because I have SO much patterned paper, I'm feeling the need to PURGE and get rid of it. I had bought a set of cuttlebug flower dies at Michaels a while back, and thought it would be fun to use up paper by cutting out coordinating patterned paper flowers to match my Die Cuts with a View Citrus stack paper.

I LOVE the changitos! Don't they look like they're having so much FUN at their bubbly little monkey party?!

Happy Sunday, all!

LZ

Happy Birthday, Taylor VanBruggen!

2009-06-12T07:15:00.003-05:00

I wanted to wish sweet Taylor VanBruggen a HAPPY HAPPY birthday today, on cupcake Friday! A bunch of talented bloggers came together today to celebrate her birthday in grand BLOGGER style, by playing in Taylor's sketch challenge and linking our blogs to Taylor's HERE!

If you feel like playing along and want to wish Taylor a happy birthday, check out her blog for the challenge and then link your card up through Mister Linky! There should be some AWESOME eye candy to check out!

I don't have a TON of cupcake stamps, but since I was already playing with Pink Persimmon's new release "Vintage Cupcake" stamps, I thought I'd do another card with the circus stamps! I used baby boy blue sparkly fluff for the cupcake topping...ooh, wouldn't it be cool if you had a cotton candy stamp and could use blue fluff for the cotton candy?

The blue patterned paper is My Mind's Eye Chloe Lynn/Penny Lane paper , and the striped patterned paper is Bo Bunny. I cut circles out of the red paper strip and then stamped my circus characters inside the circles and colored them in.

Happy Birthday, sweet Taylor, I hope you have a cupcake-filled day!

L.

Pink Persimmon Circus Birthday!

2009-06-10T19:29:00.010-05:00

Tonite I thought I'd post a birthday party ensemble I created for Pink Persimmon's new release "Vintage Cupcake" stamp set. I thought I was going to have a coronary when I first laid eyes on this set! I had to pop an email off to Darcy and tell her about the cool vintage clown cupcake picks that I had PASSED up at a junk sale up by my cabin! I was so sad that I didn't buy the jar of cupcake picks, because at the time, I thought, WHAT am I ever going to do with these and why would I buy them? So I put a call in to my Aunt Jackie up in Cumberland, WI and asked her if she could track down those picks from their friends, who are local antiques dealers. SHE SAVED THE DAY! I GOT MY CLOWN PICKS! They even came with little circus figures! So I modeled the invitations after the cupcake picks, and created these simple invites by paper piecing with various scraps of fun paper. I used light walnut copic to color in the chocolate frosting on the cupcakes.

I thought it would be fun to create these little paper throw-away cupcake toppers; I found the little toothpick pinwheels at Macy's; they are by Martha Stewart and come in an assorted color pack. I simply punched out circles with my nestabilities dies, and then stamped Pink Persimmon clowns, balloons & tents on them.

I created a birthday card for the lucky birthday kiddo, and made it extra tall and large, so I could add a cupcake with a pick on top to match the cupcakes. I used Our Craft Lounge Sparkly fluff for the cupcakes, to create soft, 3-d frosting with sprinkles in it!

I also discovered a cool thing; if you use the banner/awning stamp from this set, you can punch out the scallops with your Stampin Up 1/2 circle slit punch. It works PERFECTLY!

I used the patterned paper scallops to decorate my clown card.

My desk pretty much looked like the circus had hit town by the time I was done with my ensemble!

I BAKED these beautiful sprinkly cupcakes and then just PUT them in the Target plastic container to make sure they didn't get ruined. Okay I lied. Target made the cupcakes.

I'll have a another fun card for you on Friday that I did with this set!

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

L.

Fashionably Late to the Party!

2009-06-08T19:19:00.003-05:00

OOOH I'm SO late to the party, Crafty Secrets should be giving me demerit points! AAAACK! I'm blaming this one on the bad party girls that camped out at my house this weekend and dragged me kicking and screaming (NOT) to Grand Old Day in St Paul for live music and AHEM, merriment. It's certainly what inspired these three cards tonite. The Crafty Secrets design team challenge this week was to create BIRTHDAY cards. I pulled my Crafty Secrets "Glamour Girls" stamp set, specifically for the cool martini glass in it! I paired the martini stamp up with some fun vintage images from Crafty's "Girlfriends" creative scraps.

For this card I HAD to use this funky purple paisley paper, and cut out a circle with my Nestabilities dies. I just got my large round pinking nestability dies in the mail from Spellbinders, and HAD to use it to mat my paisley paper!

I LOVE this little housewife chickie, kicking up her heels and sipping on a green martini! (We didn't have any green martini's this weekend, thankfully.)

The talented design team chickies have outdone themselves on this challenge, so be sure to check out all their EYE candy on the links below! Anna is having a gift certificate drawing too, so you're gonna want to ENTER!

Anna Wight – Party Girl Card

Vicki Chrisman – Cupcake Box & Party Crown

Pam Hooten – Pretty Gift Box & Card

Heidi Blankenship – Birthday Girl Card

Marisa Grosson - Happy Birthday Garland

Vivian Peters - Girlfriend Birthday Card

Michele Kovack – Martini Magnet Set & Chandelier Card

Linda Duke – Birthday Flower Girl Card

Melissa Philips – Birthday Gift Tags

Michelle van Etten – Birthday Layout

Pink Persimmon - Flower Greetings Sneak Peek!

2009-06-06T16:58:00.005-05:00

It's a rainy Saturday here in St Paul, and while I'm sitting here waiting for my girlfriends to get here, I thought I'd post another sneak peek of a new Pink Persimmon stamp set, that will be released June 8th! This set is called "Flower Greetings". The set comes with 4 cute little flowers that say 'thank you', happy birthday,"for you" and "a little note"~! Because I'm a notorious stamp killer, I took one of the flowers and cut the sentiment out of the middle so that I could use the outside of the flower for paper piecing.

Using my Stampin Up rubber scissors, I carefully cut "for you" out of the middle of one of the flowers. I stamped the flower around the centers of some My Mind's Eye Penny Lane "Graceful circles" paper, and then cut the flowers out with my Nestabilities circle dies.

Fun, eh? And QUICK!

After I cut them out, I stamped stems and then added buttons and ribbons below the flowers to add some whimsy!

Here's a blurred out photo of the stamp set, just to give you an idea of the sheer cuteness! Don't forget to make your orange and pink challenge card this week and enter the contest for a Pink Persimmon gift certificate, HERE!

Happy Saturday!

Pink Persimmon $25 Gift Certificate Challenge!

2009-06-04T19:42:00.003-05:00

HEY GIRLIES! I'm in a MAD hurry tonite because I've got a bunch of the bad girls coming over this weekend for a weekend girls get-together. I'm trying to whip my house into shape tonite, but I wanted to do another quick post to tell you guys that PINK PERSIMMON stamps just turned 1 year old! For their birthday celebration, they are hosting a series of weekly challenges with PRIZES, including a $25.00 gift certificate! The challenge this week is to make ANY CARD with ANY STAMPS or ANY CRAFT PROJECT using the colors pink and orange, as in my card here! Pink and orange are Pink Persimmon's signature colors, so if you want to get inspired, check out their home page for the details, ideas & the colors to use. There will be prizes each week, and it's EASY to enter! Just leave a link to your card on the Pink Persimmon blog HERE

I needed to take a little vacation from my life tonite, so I decided to sit down and get creative and see if I could stamp out some stress by doing the pink & orange challenge. Except it didn't work so well because I ended up fighting with my sewing machine, which was not so pleased that I was using SILK thread in it, and kept jamming up on me. So don't look too closely at the sewing job on this one; mistakes were made, swear words were uttered. But I GOT R DONE! This little 3-tiered cake plate stack is a Pink Persimmon set that will be released June 8th called "Tea and Cake". The flowers come separately from the teapot & teacup, so you can stamp flowers on the cake plates, or on the cups or teapots! I took glimmer-misted crepe paper (Tattered Angels Vintage Pink) and ruffled them behind the teapot and cups to look sort of napkin-ish. OMG I need to go clean! Kick me off of this blog post! Happy Thursday, all!

L.

Pink Persimmon New Release Dove

2009-06-03T07:04:00.010-05:00

Good Morning, everyone! I'm popping on to sneak in an early morning post! I got the go-ahead to show you some brand new release Pink Persimmon stamps that you'll be seeing go up for sale on June 8th! OOOH you are going to DIE when you see all the yummy stamp sets they are coming out with for this release! These are some of the cards I worked on this weekend with their new stamp called "Love Dove". The sweet little whimsical dove has FLOWERS on it, that can be colored in and glittered or prima'd!

For these cards, I paper pieced the dove by stamping it on fun polka dot paper, and then used a purple copic marker to color in the flowers. Think of the possibilities for flower centers on these doves! Here I used buttons with a single olive colored rhinestone in the center of the flowers.

The set also comes with a separate little flower stamp, so here I took some My Mind's Eye Penny lane Maggie May circles patterned paper and stamped the flower inside the fun purple circles for my background paper.

I dumped out a bunch of my vintage white buttons (to pick out little ones) that I bought on my last trip to Haupt Antiek market, and then glued a little row of buttons at the bottom of the card.

Sending you love today; have a sunny Wednesday!

L.

Love and Laughter Served to Guests

2009-05-30T17:08:00.006-05:00

Whatcha all doin' today? I hope you're out junkin or doing something fun, because I've been stuck upstairs on paint project #2 all week! I'm also working on stamping some brand new release eye candy that I'll be showing soon, but in the meantime, I thought I'd share a fun project that I did while I was on the Dirty Dozen (Splitcoaststampers). I used a bunch of Crafty Secrets products for this little vintage kitchen frame, including their Cooking Cotton scraps & their "Kitchen Classics" stamp set. I used silver detail embossing powder on the fork, knife and spoon, so that they look 3-d and dimensional!

I love to score dirt cheap little frames at garage and estate sales.... I scored this frame for .10 cents. To make the wall hanging, I cut some scrap cardboard to fit the frame, altered the front of the cardboard, and then after I was done, I glued a large strip of magnet to the back to hold it to the fridge. The large red pom poms are another score of a deal I got, from a sweet little older lady's garage sale up at the lake last year. She sold me a whole slew of vintage pompom trim for $1.00. I have to credit Vicki Chrisman for starting me on that addiction! THANKS VICK!

Here is the fridge magnet on my fridge! So note to self, score more cheap-o frames on next junkin trip!

Hope your weekend is lovely and sunny!

L.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Joyful one!~

2009-05-28T01:00:00.004-05:00

I am SO excited! I actually sat down and STAMPED something! I couldn't miss out on an important BIRTHDAY celebration for my cutest, sweetest friend, Joy Kennedy, from Eclectic Paperie!!

Today is Joy's birthday, and in honor of her birthday, Our Craft Lounge is releasing a brand new exclusive set for E.P. called "Hangin Loose with Kona"! Kona is this fun little TURTLE DUDE that comes with cool sentiments like DUDE, RIDE THE WAVE and COWABUNGA!

I pulled out my pink sand (stolen from a beach in Bermuda...don't tell!) and glued sand underneath his little turtle feet. To make things extra sandy, I took zip dry glue and coated the corners of the card, and ran it through the sand also, so it looks like the card has been hanging out at the beach with KONA! I also used some swirly Making Memories chipboard, colored it green, and then used Appletini Green Glitter from OCL.

Hope you have a HAPPY BIRTHDAY, sweet Joyful one! L.

Pink Persimmon Best Friend Dog Plaque

2009-05-25T16:10:00.004-05:00

YIPPIE! I can finally post this project for you guys to check out! Today is my last day as a guest designer for Pink Persimmon Stamps, and I wanted to share this fun little $1.00 plaque I found from Dollar Tree! Dollar Tree has a ton of different shaped plaques (oval, square, round, etc) in their craft section, so I went and hounded my sister Gina (GET IT, HOUNDED? OOH BAD.) for a photo of her dog Kira so that I could use Pink Persimmon's Scottie Dog stamps with it.

Here's what the $1.00 plaque looked like before I covered it with some fun stripey My Mind's Eye patterned paper.

I also pumped up the cute factor by using black FUN FLOCK on the sweet little DOGGIES, to make them fuzzy and touchable! You can see a full tutorial on how I created this plaque on the Pink Persimmon blog HERE.

I ended up giving this plaque to Gina, since her dog Kira so graciously helped me by posing for my project! Happy Monday, all!

L.

Kitchen Inspired Pink Persimmon Scotties

2009-05-23T20:42:00.002-05:00

So one night last week, while I still had RED KITCHEN on the brain, I decided to run with my kitchen as inspiration and sit down to test drive the mojo with my Pink Persimmon Scottie dogs & a Die Cuts with a View paper pack called "Nana's Kitchen". I wanted to start cranking out a bunch of generic greeting cards so that I can slap a sentiment inside if I'm pressed for time. I thought I could stamp birthday, thank you, hello or WHATEVER in these little notes, because the front sentiment is all-purpose!

I only got 3 cranked out before I was on to the next project, but I know I need to sit down and play with these more! I'm hoping for an uninterrupted flow of stamping mojo to hit me next week because I have NO appointments and NO projects, any of the weekdays next week! I want to be a STAMPING machine! I MISS my stamp room!

Happy Saturday!

L.

I am DONE! YIPPIE!

2009-05-21T20:16:00.004-05:00

Can I hear a WOOOO HOO OUT THERE? I'm done with the KITCHEN, and I couldn't be HAPPIER that it's finally done! I tried to get good random pics of it to show you but my photos are sort of dark. I'm in a hurry to get upstairs and start taping for another painting adventure this weekend. Here it is, all finished in it's RED glory! (And actually CLEAN, believe it or not!)

Here's a shot of the sink and counters. I cheaped out and left the original cabinets in the kitchen; I just freshened them up a bit with brushed nickel knobs and drawer pulls (under $50). My Keurig machine is verrrrry happy in it's new spot, front and center. (I RUN ON PURE CAFFEINE)

This cool shabby cabinet was a $5.00 steal of a deal that my Mom found at a garage sale. It got prettied up with all of my red aprons, and a red memo board, also from a garage sale that I paid $1.00 for.

When I use the TV, I re-hang the memo board directly below it on 2 nails. My brilliant sister Gina had the idea of putting the TV in the middle shelf to free up counter space and hide it. She suggested curtains on the 3rd shelf. SOMEDAY! For now, the memo board will hold up just fine.

I got a not-too shabby deal on this skinny desk at Haupt Antiek market last weekend. It fits perfectly in this cubby so people can walk through comfortably.

Here's Isabella, staking out her new shabby red painted stool & table. This used to be hunter green. My Mom sewed covers for the cushions out of some vintage yellow fabric (the curtains are from the same fabric). THANKS MOM!

This cute plate holder was an expensive kitchen-warming gift from Mom. FIFTY CENTS! She finds the best deals. She also discovered that you can lean things up against the top of my door and window trims, on the ledge.

Thanks everyone, for being patient with me during my kitchen remodel adventure!

K & Co. Shabby Butterfly

2009-05-19T07:15:00.000-05:00

Morning, everyone!

I thought I'd pop on and do a quick post this morning with a shabby butterfly card I made at the cabin a few weekends ago. I bought a new K & Co shabby paper pack at Michael's and the chipboard butterfly accents that matched it. I wanted to try to use some of the cool junk jewelry that I found at an estate sale.

I don't know if you can see it well or not, but I had some little round blingy spacers from a broken necklace, so I ruffled some velvet ribbon and slipped the spacer into the middle of the ribbon for a fun, blingy bow. I also added rhinestones to the butterfly to match my spacer. The cool framed accent behind the butterfly is stamped on a piece of patterned paper with green Tim Holtz ink. The frame stamp is from a Tim Holtz collage set.

Haupt Antiek Market - Rosemount, MN

2009-05-16T17:42:00.010-05:00

OH MAN. I am on a JUNKIN high today. My Mom, sister & I took a field trip over to my absolute FAVE FAVE FAVE occasional sale, Haupt Antiek Market in Rosemount, MN. We were on a hunt for the perfect size little table for my new red kitchen, and BOY did we find the cuteness at Haupt today! This month's theme was "GOT GARDEN", and I walked around the place stunned and in cute junk OVERLOAD!

I always get home and start looking through my photos and see all this stuff I didn't see the first time around. I want to go back again tomorrow for the last day of the sale and buy EVERYTHING! I did get my table, fed my button habit, and we came back home & my expert decorator Mom has been helping me pull my kitchen together today! There was something for just about everyone, and let me tell you, the Haupt ladies are CREATIVELY BRILLIANT at putting things together!!

OH THE SHABBINESS!

Green junk.

Flower junk.

Robot junk?

Hope you are having a junkiful weekend!

Lisa

Playing Catch-up.

2009-05-13T20:03:00.011-05:00

Okay. Super long post tonite. Lots to update! I'm not really sure what day it is because I'm still seeing red paint spots from the kitchen and have been smelling paint fumes for so long I'm dazed and confused. I finished the last of the touch-up paint on the kitchen last night, took down the tape, painted the window trim and cleaned my kitchen windows to remove the filthy dust layers! I am TAKING THE NIGHT OFF & locking myself in my stamp room to try to learn to stamp again! I SWEAR, I'm not quite sure how to do it anymore, it's been so long! I headed straight to the Crafty Secrets forum at Splitcoast tonite to see what fun challenge I could jump in on for inspiration. The challenge theme this week is FLOUR or FLOWER, so I headed to my stamp room and pulled Crafty's "Sweet Stuff stamp set for my favorite birdie/mixing bowl image! Oops, I think I stamped it crooked. Baby steps back into the stamping, it's been a while. The layout was inspired by some basic grey ruffled ribbon that was gifted to me. I took vintage crepe paper and ruffled it to the back of some polka dot patterned paper for the middle of my layout.

I also snapped some pics this weekend at the cabin from Mother's day; I thought I'd show you the goodies I was able to score for my Mom in my 4 day mad dash for gifts!

I made a stop at a fun store in St Paul called "Gypsy Moon" and scored this cool vintage Mother's Day cardboard wall hanging. Loved the basket of pink roses! I also scored 2 cool iron towel hangers with birds on them. Vintage inspired hand towels from Martha Stewart @ Macy's.

THANK GOD for Amazon.com & free 2-day shipping. They saved my butt. My Mom loves Country Living Magazine and cooking...both books were cheap (18.95 ea) and have fun recipes and craft ideas! FARM CHICKS ROCK!

These Cath Kidston notes & envelopes were a last minute impulse buy at Amazon and turned out to be the cutest ever! $10.95 for 24 note cards and envies! Wouldn't they be cute with Pink Persimmon Scottie Dog images attached to the front? (I'm ordering another box for myself if this no-stamping thing continues!)

Outside cabin pics. The grass is greening up and the birds are here in full force! Dreary but warm! It was a beautiful weekend!

Cabin real-estate. These properties are unoccupied.

I'm off to try stamping again! See ya!

L.

Happy Mother's Day!

2009-05-09T23:59:00.002-05:00

Hope everyone has a LOVELY day! Lisa

Dull women have immaculate houses.

2009-05-07T20:15:00.003-05:00

Oh man. This kitchen project has definitely knocked me down and taken my lunch money. I cannot catch up with stamping, and the painting just doesn't seem to END! I finally got to sit down and stamp while waiting for paint coats to dry and this card took me 2 days to finish! I can't concentrate on stamping when my kitchen is a disaster area!

I thought I'd sit down and play with the Crafty Secrets "Domestic Goddess" Creative scraps because they seem to fit my current mood PERFECTLY! "Dull women have immaculate houses"! Okay, NOT REALLY, but it's my motto this week because of the disaster zone! I thought I'd give you more peeks of the kitchen taking shape. The beadboard is finally UP (*$&#*@$$@!!) and painting is close to finished!

All except for this green little table and stools which will get a leg makeover with the leftover red paint! OH OH OH! And I GOT THE MOM'S DAY GIFTS DONE & WRAPPED! Progress, people, PROGRESS!

Happy Friday!

L.

Pink Persimmon - May Guest Designer!

2009-05-04T19:59:00.005-05:00

HIYA and happy MONDAY everyone! I'm excited to announce that I've been chosen to be the May guest designer for Pink Persimmon stamps! I fell in LOVE with their sweet vintage-style images last fall, and am DELIGHTED that they chose to feature me this month on their blog and in their upcoming newsletter! You can see some of the projects I created with their Scottie Dog & Little Red Wagon stamps on the Pink Persimmon website HERE; I created a fun tutorial for you on how I turned a plain candy box into a "billboard box"! Some of the projects were originally featured in the Splitcoast Dirty Dozen gallery, so you're welcome to take a peek on the Pink Persimmon website and try them out!

The Little Red Wagon girl just BEGS to be paper-pieced; I used some K & Company Berry Sweet paper to create her vintage sweet dress.

I created this bingo card for my Mom for Mother's day, since she's the one that got me started on my bingo card obsession! Speaking of Mother's day, I'm having a gift meltdown because I've been to 10 stores and can't find that PERFECT gift to say I LOVE YOU, MOM! Not to fear, I still have 4 days left to shop!

I'm behind on my sample cards!

2009-04-27T20:23:00.004-05:00

This weekend I finally got a chance to sit down and stamp a card! It feels like ages since I've stamped, even though it's been only about a week or so! I'm still trying to motor through all of the Crafty Secrets stamp sets, making 25 samples of each for Crafty to send out to stores that carry their product. This little scene was done with Crafty's Bird Lovers stamp set, and nestabilities oval die cuts. The Crafty Secrets website just got a cool new facelift! Stop by and check it out when you have a chance! It looks FABULOUS!

I wanted to do these bird cards in springy colors, so I opted for light blues, celery greens, light yellow and pink. I met a bunch of fun girlies Friday night at Archivers, so I worked on 25 of these cards and finally finished them yesterday.

When I got to Archivers, there were beautiful surprises waiting for me from friends Chris Fuhs and Kristina Lewis....Chris gifted me with these bright, fun BINGO cards to feed my addiction, and Kristina found this gorgeous teacup for me! THANK you, girls, you made my night!

Marnin all!

2009-04-25T10:05:00.006-05:00

Marnin girls! It's Saturday and I'm all caffeined up, waiting for Steve-O to get here to install my beadboard paneling. Still no stamping to show, but I thought I'd show you the progress on the red kitchen. It's coming along nicely!

I was going to go all GIRLY on the chandelier, but decided on a brushed nickel kitchen-y look instead. I resisted the temptation to go all roses & shabby-chic to help the resale value of the house!

All of my red stuff is sitting around patiently waiting to be put back in it's place.

I was excited to see in Country Living that the hot new collectible is kitchen dishtowels. You can usually get them for under $10.00. (.50 cents if you're me!) I've collected these for years and always keep my eye open for the red ones!

My favorite one is this sweet cherry towel!

My everyday china is this vintage restaurant-wear. The dishes are indestructible and RED of course! I got the whole stack of plates, bowls and cups & saucers for $15.00 at a garage sale up by the cabin years ago.

These sweet aprons have been hanging around my kitchen for years. I wear them. NOT!!! I would wear them if I actually knew how to cook. Really! (okay, NOT)

Have a cherry weekend, everyone!

Things that make you go OOOOOH!

2009-04-22T17:15:00.006-05:00

Okay, I'm not gonna lie. Today didn't start out so hot. I got to work today and while reading my emails was startled by a LARGE 2 inch cockroach staring down at me from my cubicle wall. After the first one was disposed of, I screamed like a girl after moving some papers and discovering his brother. Just so you know, I eat lunch at home, so it was NOT my fault, I do not have food at or in my desk! So today I had a parade of people stopping by my cube asking about my new pets. But I had a GREAT lunch hour! I LOVE the start of junking season! I hit a cool estate sale and scored some great treasures for my almost RED kitchen! I found this MINT stepstool for $12.50 and it is EXACTLY like the one I remember from my Grammie's kitchen (hers was yellow)! There is not a DING on this thing!

I couldn't resist these sweet little stripey pot-holders, which were never used! I may want to hang them up somewhere and not use them because the lacey crocheted edges are just the sweetest. I also scored a bag of interesting kitschy buttons (also some are mother of pearl).

I also picked up a bag of broken junk costume jewelry on the cheap. These will find their way onto my cards for one-of-a-kind embellishments!

Look at these sweet red floral buttons. I'm hoping I can find some fun fabric and have my Mom make some pillows for me with these buttons in the center. I walked away after paying $15.50 for the whole adventure! YIPPIE! It was a good JUNKIN day, in SPITE of the cockroach meeting at 8am! Hope you have a bug-free Thursday!

L.

Under construction.

2009-04-19T19:37:00.007-05:00

I am seriously stamping challenged this weekend! I did manage to stamp out some simple thank-you cards, but I'm mojo-less in a big way right now! It may have something to do with the state of chaos that my kitchen is in! I pulled out my trusty Die Cuts with a View Citrus stack this weekend and hoped the fun paper could carry my cards this time, as I was was not in a putzy mood; I wanted simple an quick!

I pulled out a new Inkadinkado set I got at Michaels called 'Birds Galore', and then stamped the simple bird and vine image for my focal point. I stamped the blue birds separately so that I could cut them out and pop them off the cards for more dimension. The floral paper is glittery in real life!

Just so you know what's sucking the mojo out of me, I thought I'd post a photo of my dilapidated kitchen that I've been living with for 10 years. My house was built in 1909 and parts of it are in desperate need of remodeling. My kitchen project is going to be done on the CHEAP. I hired a guy to skimcoat my kitchen walls & ceiling so I can paint it and update it.

Plaster chunks are missing & the kitchen was painted a horrendous light mauvy pink color. Soon it will be replaced with my favorite color, red!

The demolition of the ceiling is now finished, and I spent today painting primer on the walls and ceilings. I'll definitely show you the 'after' photos when all is complete!

Hope your weekend was uhm, cleaner than mine!

L.

Home Sweet Home

2009-04-16T17:20:00.005-05:00

Tonite I thought I'd post some sample cards I made for Crafty Secrets to send out to scrapbook stores. I've been putzing on these for the last 2 weeks, doing bits and pieces of them here and there whenever I have free time. I'm having my kitchen walls re-done, so this week has been a flurry of moving stuff out of the kitchen, and shopping for light fixtures and building supplies. I can't WAIT to get back to cardmaking and creating!

These cards were done with Crafty's "Home Sweet Home" stamp set. I colored exactly 25 of these sweet little home scenes, including all of the little flowers on the tree! I plopped a Kaiser white paper flower off to the side to make this card extra flowery.

The card inside reads: Accept this little greeting, on it's happy way with very best wishes for you today. I wish you happy weekend greetings! I'm going to make one of these for myself that says "HOME DUSTY HOME", since the wall sanding will begin on Friday! Happy weekend, all!

L.

Easy Easter Plant Picks

2009-04-10T18:39:00.007-05:00

Procrastinator girl here again, with a quickie Easter gift idea for you! I threw these together tonite after work. I grabbed a couple of these beautiful potted flowers at the grocery store, (Kowalski's if you live in the Twin Cities.. $7.99 each!) and I wanted to dress them up with a cute pick so that they'd look a bit fancier than, uhm, grocery store plants!

I dug into my sheets of Crafty Secrets Easter-themed Creative Scraps and ran a glue pen's width of glue around the edge of the cut-out image. Then I dumped Martha Stewart white-gold glitter to the edges to give it sparkle.

I cut a backing-sheet out of cardstock to fit the image, and had some skewers in my craft cabinet that I got at the grocery store a while ago (barbeque/shish-kebob aisle). All I did was take zip-dry paper glue and run it around the edge of the backing and stuck the vintage image over the top! (Run a line of glue on the top of the wooden stick too, before you stick the image down.)

Next, I took some wide organdy ribbon scraps (these were from Michaels' $1.00 spot) and tied the organdy to the skewer. I quickly ran my heat gun along the edges of the ribbon, which melts the ribbon and makes it ruffly! That's IT! DONE! 10 minutes each; 15 if you're screaming at the kids or hubby at the same time! I also took a silver gel pen and outlined the bunnies for extra shimmer, but this step is optional! Keep it easy!

Here's what they looked like after I was done with them. They look like they took forever, but seriously, I did them all so quickly, Mom and Grams will NEVER know how LITTLE time I put into these!

Except if my Mom reads this blog post. DON'T LOOK, MOM! :)

Hope you have a peaceful, happy Easter full of friends and family!

Peace, out!

L.

It's a whopper of an Easter!

2009-04-08T20:54:00.003-05:00

Hi everyone! Checking in tonite to show you what I'm up to tonite. The procrastinator here finally ran to Wal-Mart to pick up the little milk cartons of flavored Whoppers candy that I'm going to bring to my family's Easter gathering on Sunday. I love candy that comes in boxes because they can easily be altered by slapping some cardstock or patterned paper on them!

Did you guys know that Whoppers come in yummy new flavors like blueberry, vanilla, strawberry and ORANGE CREME? YUM! It made me happy that these boxes were bright and fun colors, which inspired me to pair this Doodlebug sparkly polka dot paper with it. I found my Crafty Secrets Easter Joy stamp set that has been buried in a pile since CHA and pulled it out. Each box has a different little scene on it!

I chose the copic colors for the little bunny images based on the polka dot colors in the patterned paper, and then started cutting out circles and ovals with my Nestabilities dies.

I am well on my way to finishing 15 of these babies; I'm done covering the boxes and am going to sit in front of the TV and color in my bunny images now.

Easter greetings, everyone; have a whopper of a week!!

J's Birthday Card

2009-04-04T11:20:00.010-05:00

Happy Saturday morning, everyone! I'm happy to be home today, putzing around cleaning and getting ready for a birthday celebration at my house for my BFF Janine! J. and I have always been a week apart for birthdays, so we combine the 2 and celebrate them together. Tonite we're having a low calorie FIESTA that will include tacos, skinny margaritas & Hungry Girl low-calorie 8 layer dip. I'm prepping all the food today and my house smells like a big ONION! I whipped together a fun card for her this morning; I got my shipment of Crafty's new "Creative Scraps" a while ago and just haven't dug into them yet like I'd like to!

I used an image from the "Domestic Goddess" Scraps to create this card. I can't believe how cheap these are; they are retailing for $3.50! You can totally CRANK out 10-15 cards for the price of ONE! I reached for these first because they are so quick to slap a card together with. On this card I also used the little mixer image from Crafty's "Sweet Stuff" stamp set for a little round corner embellishment. I had to use the sentiment "If we are what we eat, I'm fast, easy and cheap"! You can mix and match any of the sentiments to create your own personal sassy card!

The scraps come on a double sheet folded in half, so the front of the scraps is the image above, and the back of the scraps has more images! I'm counting 14 cards out of these now! DUH!

So I'm off to finish cleaning up after THIS

<------

He leaves big fuzzy cotton-ball dust bunnies for me to clean up. YUCKO.

Happy Saturday!

L.

Spring Birthday Birds

2009-04-01T19:32:00.003-05:00

I was on a Unity roll last weekend so I thought I'd post more cards I did using the spring flower birdie from Unity's "Birds of a Feather" stamp set. After coloring a bunch of these in, I figured out that the green loops under the yellow birdie are probably supposed to be Easter eggs, for Easter cards! Oopsie, I colored them in green thinking they were twirly vines! Dual purpose, right?

I think it's so much fun that on each of the birds in this set, there are always 2 or3 little whimsical dots above their heads or on the flowers. I've been adding tiny rhinestones to them to make them sparkle and add whimsy to these sweet images!

Has spring sprung in your town yet? We're getting snow here but it is GOING AWAY AND MELTING! Yay!

Happy Wednesday!

L.

Crank 'Em Out Unity Birds

2009-03-29T19:44:00.004-05:00

I could hardly wait for cardmaking to turn to spring and summer themes, because I bought the cutest little Unity "Birds of a Feather" stamp set last winter. Finally I am cranking out flowery cards with these sweet little birdies!

This weekend I came up with this layout because I only had 1 sheet each of this Basic Grey "Bittersweet" Hand Dipped & "Praline" paper. I was on a mission to see how many cards I could get off of 2 sheets of patterned paper! I reversed my scallop circles on this one to give a different look for the focal point image. I sort of like the scallop on the white paper for a change, instead of always using it for the mat!

I pulled out my FAVORITE circle sentiment set from Papertrey/Pinefeather Press (Around & About Sentiments), and then used it to stamp thank you, happy birthday and get-well soon! So now I have all-occasion cards, from the same batch of bird cards! I also used Pine's "Beyond Basic Borders" to stamp a faint pink vine in the background going down the edge of the paper.

I cranked out close to 16 of these cards with 2 sheets of 12 x 12 patterned paper! Man, I'm a thrifty girl, eh?

Happy Sunday!
L.

Colored, Glimmered Bingo Cards!

2009-03-27T16:52:00.004-05:00

Oh man, those Tattered Angels girlies have created a monster here. While I was experimenting with different ways to use Tattered Angels Glimmer mist, I decided I wanted to try it on my favorite cardboard BINGO cards! And not just the CLEAR glimmer mist, the COLORED stuff! I had some vintage bingo cards that were cardboard with BLACK numbers, and decided I could spice them up a bit with Vintage PINK glimmer mist! I gave the card a few sweeping spritzes with the pink mist, let it dry and then gave a few more spritzes, and a FEW MORE! And I got this gorgeous deep pink glimmery color from it!

Then I added some seed packet and floral images from Crafty Secret's new "Garden" Scraps. I coated the seed packet with Ranger Crackle glaze so it has a shiny, crackly texture to it.

Here's a close up of the shimmer! I also took distress ink and went around the edges of the Garden Scraps to dirty them up a bit.

Hope everyone has a great weekend! YAY FRIDAY!

Lisa

Glimmer Mist & Crafty Secrets Scraps

2009-03-25T16:45:00.004-05:00

Tonite I have another project that I did for the Crafty Secrets/Tattered Angels "March Mix" challenge. I found this unfinished wood mirror at Michaels or Crafts Direct for a dollar or so, and had it in my project cabinet. I pulled it out and was going to paint it, and then I thought, HEY! I wonder what glimmer mist would look like on the raw wood!

I laid the mirror down on some cardboard and spritzed away with Tattered Angels "Patina" colored glimmer mist. I was SO thrilled that the glimmer mist covered beautifully, and brought out the woodgrain! Because it's water-based, the color soaked right into the wood and left a cool shimmery coating!

Click on the close-up here, to see the wood frame up close. Look at the shimmer it left!

Then I took images from Crafty's new "Garden Scraps" (these images are printed on a heavy cardstock), and glued them to the front of the frame with mod-podge. After everything was dry, I gave it another coat of a clear 'pearl' colored glimmer mist.

I also had some white Bazzil stitched ribbon that I had bought at Archivers in their $1.99 section, and spritzed the ribbon with the glimmer mist too! The color soaked into the ribbon, so now my ribbon color matches my frame perfectly!

Here's a close-up of some of the cool images from Crafty's Garden Scraps sheets.

I have one more project I couldn't resist doing; I made a BINGO card! More to follow!

Crafty Secrets and Tattered Angels March Mix

2009-03-23T10:00:00.006-05:00

Happy MONDAY morning to everyone! Today is my birthday and I have the DAY OFF! No one should have to work on their birthday, so I took a day of vacation! YIPPIE! Today I have a tutorial for you for the Crafty Secrets/Tattered Angels March Mix challenge, that has been going on all month. We have teamed up with the Tattered Angels design team to create some fun projects with Crafty Secrets and Tattered Angels products!

I first have to tell you that I was COMPLETELY inspired by Anna Wight's card HERE; her beautiful watercoloring inspired me to pull out Crafty Secret's "Garden Girls" set and try my hand at coloring these beautiful spring girl images. Anna is a master at watercoloring, so I'm not even going to ATTEMPT to copy her, because I do not have the skills! But I wanted to show you guys a cool, easy technique to get a great 'expressionistic watercolor' type background, that is easy and simple for a beginner or novice to accomplish.

Here's what you'll need:

A grass colored & sky colored ink (I used Stampin Up Certainly Celery & Soft Sky)

A solid background stamp (I used Hero Arts Aged Background Block)

Tattered Angels Honey Dew & Patina colored glimmer mist

Stamp off your images onto white cardstock. I always use Neenah Solar White now, for everything I do. I used Brilliance Black Ink and then heat-set the ink with my heat gun. (Brilliance is a waterproof ink...important because we don't want the black ink to bleed.) I also stamped off another image on copy paper for my 'mask' & cut it out. I'm not going to worry about the trees or the rest of the images, just my focal point, which is the girl. Place your mask over the girl. This will protect her from getting waterlogged.

Let's start with the sky. Take your blue ink (SU soft sky) and ink up part of the background block.

Now lightly 'spritz' the Patina-blue colored glimmer mist across the block.

Stamp the block across the top of your image. Your paper will curl slightly; take your heat gun and run it across the paper until the glimmer mist dries.

Now do the same thing with the celery green ink. Ink up the block, then spritz Honey dew-green colored glimmer mist. Stamp it onto the bottom half of your image.

Take the heat gun and run it across your image again. Your sky and grass will have a cool shimmer to it! I think you may be able to see it if you click onto the next photo and look at the close-up (you can see the glimmer and how Copics will cover over the top of the glimmer misted bench and pots.

Now take your Copic markers and color your images in! I used "Sand" color for the potting bench and brown (E08) for the clay pots.

Continue coloring your images until a bright and beautiful scene evolves! My favorite dark brown Copic for trees is "Light Walnut", and leaves are done in Spring Dim Green. Dress colors are "Buttercup Yellow & Golden Yellow".

I have another project for this challenge that I'll post soon. In the meantime, check out more new projects on the following design team blogs:

Linda Duke
Lauren Ferguson
Tricia Ladouceur

Plus, there are grand finale give-aways on the Crafty Secrets and Tattered Angels blogs! Stop over and get entered to win some great products!

Crafty Secrets Blog
Tattered Angels Blog

Happy Monday!

L.

Sample Queen.

2009-03-21T21:24:00.004-05:00

Today I finally finished another huge box of samples that I'll be sending off to Crafty Secrets for scrapbook store samples! These are based on a card I made a while ago when the Crafty Secrets Glamour Girl set first came out. I used a yellow rose-patterned paper from Crafty's Radiant Paper pad, to make the card summery and bright!

It was beautiful here in Minnesota again, so I spent a lot of time outside today, enjoying the warm weather! I feel the spring cleaning urge coming on; I want to clean my house from top to bottom! WHY does that happen? It's been a crazy busy winter and I feel like I want to take a breather, re-group, and go into the spring with a fresh start!

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

L.

Treat Yourself - Life is Sweet!

2009-03-18T19:44:00.002-05:00

Oh man, I cannot WAIT for summer! It's been so so nice here, I can't help but think that it's a big joke and we're going to get 72 inches of snow soon. I have SPRING fever in a BIG way! I went out walking again tonite and then came home and got a craving for ice cream. It may be because I colored 10 of these Our Craft Lounge ice cream sundaes! I headed to Aldi because they have a great selection of low-calorie ice cream bars called "fit and active". I got 110 calorie orange dreamcicles and some 50 calorie fudge bars & dove into one tonite. Craving averted!

I paired the ice cream sundaes up with some new Die Cuts with a View patterned paper from a "kitchen" paper pack that I got on my last paper binge from girls scrapbooking weekend. These papers are glittery too! If you click on the close ups you can see the shimmer!

The cute stamp is from a OCL set called "Life is Sweet". I cranked out shimmery birthday cards for my stash and just finished them last night.

Hope you're having a SWEET week!

Lisa

Hats off to you, Father!

2009-03-16T20:29:00.006-05:00

Well, we made it through another Monday, and here in Minnesota it was 67 degrees! It feels like SUMMER here! I had to get outside and do a 3-mile walk because it was so beautiful out! Here's another project I worked on this weekend; I made 25 sample cards for Father's day using the Crafty Secrets "Favorite Fella's" stamp set. These samples will probably go out to stores that sell Crafty Secrets products, for display with Crafty's stamps. I paper-pieced some funky ties from patterned paper from Crafty's paper pads. I also fun-flocked the hat in brown so it looks like felt and has a great texture!

Also, Crafty Secrets has teamed up with Tattered Angels this month and the design team is pairing up products from both companies to create shimmery eye candy! Check out these blogs for the latest projects posted for this fun March challenge!

Happy Monday, all!

Marisa Grosson Crafty Secrets Design Team member
Anna Wight Crafty Secrets Design Team member
Elizabeth Hicks Tattered Angels Design Team Member
Cheryl McAdam Tattered Angels Design Team Member
Michelle Jackson Tattered Angels Design Team Member

You rock!

2009-03-15T19:44:00.004-05:00

I just have to thank you guys for sticking with me the last 6 months, while I've been uploading everything to the Dirty Dozen gallery and neglecting my blog here! I'm happy (and sad) to say that my 6 month gig with the DD is finally over at the end of this month! It was so much fun; but all good things must eventually end. I feel a big pressure off my shoulders; it's hard to try to keep up with the talented girls over there! So my focus now is going to be back on my blog, and replenishing my neglected card stash.

I have been dying to play with this Inkadinkado Rock Star stamp set that I bought at Michaels um, approximately 6 months ago? I used it in a dirty dozen gallery but wanted to make a ton of rockstar cards to have in my stash. FINALLY I got to crank some out this weekend. I got into trouble at Archivers with the girls a few weeks ago and bought this funky My Mind's Eye Penny Lane "Feeling Groovy" patterned paper that felt perfect for this guitar. I added an orange gemstone in the "O" to add some rockstar bling to the card.

Hope everyone had a great weekend; spring is on it's way! YIPPIE!

My brain is on overload!

2009-03-13T17:03:00.003-05:00

I'm back from Indianapolis and FINALLY blogging again. My brain has been on overload for the last 2 weeks; I guess that's what happens when you work 12 days in a row without a day off! I have been stamping this week, but all of my energy went into finishing up my Dirty Dozen projects and I am finally DONE!

In between my Dirty Dozen projects, I putzed on these simple "thinking of you" and birthday cards, done with Our Craft Lounge's "Flowers for You" stamp set. The layout is nothing fancy or elaborate, but the simple background papers draw your eye to the big vase of flowers. I finally got to use my large rectangle nestabilities dies, because the flower arrangement fit just perfectly on it!

I pulled out some old favorite sentiment stamps from Hero Arts and Papertrey (faux ribbon set) for the sentiments to coordinate with this vase. The papers are my new favorite DCWV Citrus stack again.

Hope you all are having a great week...let's celebrate, it's the WEEKEND!

Lisa

Feeling Yucky?

2009-03-06T07:09:00.002-06:00

I *know* I've been a slacker blogger lately but I'm having a major crunch time again right now, so I don't have a lot to show you! Last weekend we had a girls get-together at Archivers, and I spent most of the evening chatting with the girlies and cranking out these Crafty Secrets "Feeling Yucky" cards. I cranked out 25 of them, which will eventually be sent to Crafty Secrets to use as store samples for the new Feeling Yucky stamp set that was just released at CHA. The little ducky on the front carrying the flowers is cut out by hand! AYE CARAMBA!

I also cut out tiny bandaids to paste on the edge of the image for an accent. I used the chenille paper from Crafty's Pastel paper pad to make the card look cozy and snuggly, to comfort our poor sick ducky! The inside reads "Hope you're soon feeling just ducky"!

I am heading out to Indianapolis for work this weekend, so I probably won't be able to post again until next week. Hope you have a great week and are feeling just 'ducky'!

Just helping the economy.

2009-03-03T18:27:00.006-06:00

I've been so GOOD lately. I know the economy is in rough shape and my 401K is in the toilet. I've cut back unnecessary purchases, put money in savings, eaten lunch at home every day and skipped the girls trip to Puerto Vallarta. And this weekend I fell off the wagon; foiled by the Citrus Stack by Die Cuts with a View. I couldn't help it; we were in JoAnn Fabric and it was a girls stamping weekend, and all the paper pads were 50 percent off! You can't blame me, right? I guess I just needed something fun and bright to cheer me up. I fell in complete love with these bright, glitterfied papers!
I came home and paired the papers up with the new "Just Bugz" spring set by Our Craft Lounge. I stamped off a bunch of flowers on different patterned papers from the paper pad, and cut them out for little embellishments for my cards. The paper is glittery, so I took the opportunity to bling up the flower centers with orange rhinestones, lest they be left out of the glitter celebration! I used Pinefeather Press's (Papertrey) Around and About sentiments to circle the bee and ran a Happy Birthday sentiment across the bottom.

So my 401K is still tanking and Puerto Vallarta is a distant memory, but at least it's sunny in my stamp room!

Happy Tuesday!

L.

My first ATC.

2009-02-28T09:06:00.002-06:00

OH OH OH~ I forgot, I have one more thing I can post this weekend! I made my FIRST EVER ATC, at the request of a friend! I was seriously worried about how I was going to work with such a tiny piece of cardstock, but once I got going, it worked out just fine! I was able to part with a tiny sheet of my favorite Daisy D's red polka dot paper that I had left from an 8 x 8 pad. I wanted my ATC to reflect me personally and all my favorite things; Crafty Secrets stamps (Garden Girl set), flowers, the color red, and Daisy D's *SNIFF* red polka dot paper.

Have you tried an ATC yet? Just in case you haven't; the measurements of these cards are 3.5 x 2.5. I challenge you to pick up your favorite things today and try your hand at one!

Happy Saturday!

LZ

Chocolate Birthdays.

2009-02-26T07:13:00.002-06:00

I haven't been designing much this week; I'm in crank-em-out sample mode, so not a whole lot to show you right now. I did manage to finish a bunch of these masculine birthday cards for my work card stash this week using Our Craft Lounge's "Life is Sweet" stamp set. I wanted the cards to look 'chocolately', so I used up old paper that had brown and burgundy colors in it, and colored the ice cream and cupcakes so they looked 'chocolatey' to match the paper!

Have a sweet Thursday, everyone!

L.

Two more Anna Cards~

2009-02-22T18:02:00.000-06:00

Oh man, once I started playing with Anna's new Whippersnapper Wildflower Silhouette set, I was just on a roll, and started trying lots of different techniques with it. This is a big sprig of flowers from her new set, and I used a technique I haven't really ever used much, and found out it's pretty fun to do! I used the "poppin pastels" technique. I stamped with Versamark & then took make up applicators and my SU chalks, and dabbed chalk all over the versamark. Of course, I LOVE color, so I went HEAVY with the chalk, so that my image came out VIVID! I then took and spritzed the image with Victorian Pink Glimmer Mist, which sort of sealed the chalk into the image! I also took a flower and butterfly from Anna's Blossoms & Butterflies set, stamped and colored them (Cool shadow and carmine Copics), cut them out and layered them in the lower corner of the image. The sentiment is from Whippersnapper's Blooming Expressions set.

The flowers in this card are from the same 2 sets. I used a Hero Arts Square distressed background block, inked it up with Certainly Celery ink, and stamped my tulips over the top of the square.

Hope you're having a great Sunday; I'm trying to work on my final Dirty Dozen projects for my last Dirty Girl release in March!

L.

Basket of Blooms - Inspiration Challenge

2009-02-21T18:10:00.001-06:00

Today I'm knee deep in Dirty Dozen projects, and thought I'd take a break and play in the Splitcoaststampers Inspiration Challenge. Today's challenge uses the website "Flutter" to jump start your brain; we were to use any object we liked from the website to start our cards with. OH MAN, I could get LOST in that store for HOURS! I used this "Posie" bouquet pillow for my inspiration. I started with red cardstock for my border, and embossed Autumn Leaves Swirls all over the edge of the card, to simulate the lace from the pillow. Then I borrowed an Anna Wight Whippersnapper stamp from a friend, called "Basket of Blooms" for the focal image. You can see all of the creations for this challenge HERE at Splitcoast. Lots of cool cards! I have to go back to FLUTTER and play again this weekend. WHAT FUN!

Supplies: Basket of Blooms (Whippersnapper) October Afternoon Hometown polka dot paper, Copics: Dark Pink, Robins Egg Blue, Pale Sepia, Golden Yellow, Lipstick Red, Warm grey 2, cyanine blue, pale olive, spring dim green, Bazzill & May Arts brown gingham ribbon, black brilliance ink.

Earth Laughs in Flowers

2009-02-20T17:29:00.002-06:00

Tonite I have another Anna Wight for Whippersnapper new release card! This card combines the new Wildflower Silhouette stamp set with an older set of Anna's called "Blossoms and Butterflies". I immediately noticed that Anna has a preference for these cool Mexican Hat flowers, since she has a silhouette in her new set PLUS a cartooney image in her older set. I had to go online and check out the flower, since they are not native to MN. You can see a real Mexican hat flower HERE. Looks like they grow in different colors, orange and black or yellow and orange! ANYWAY, I wanted to use the silhouette stamp in my background, for a soft 'shadow' type image, and then use the clearer, cartooney flower for the focal point of my main image. I used a hero arts distress block to stamp the background with a rock & roll technique, and then used used the 'Expressionistic watercolor technique" to stamp my flower shadows. Basically, I colored the solid mexican hat stamp in with a rust and yellow marker, then spritzed water directly onto the rubber to make the color 'bleed' a bit, then stamped. Then I cut out and colored the cartooney mexican hat and popped it up on dimensionals for the foreground. Sentiment is from Whipper's
"Blooming Expressions" set. The whole thing is "Glimmer Misted" in Tattered Angels "Pearl" color.

Anna Wight's Wildflower Silhouettes

2009-02-18T21:28:00.002-06:00

Another Anna card tonite, done with Anna Wight's new Whippersnapper cling set release, called "Wildflower Silhouette". I toned down the colors a bit and went more elegant with the paper, using a scrolly damask patterned paper by Fancy Pants. I used my Stampin Up Watercolor markers to color directly onto the rubber, starting with some simple celery green ink for the greenery for my background. Then I went bolder with blues, yellows and bursts of red, stamping various flowers from Anna's set. I just kept adding flowers until it seemed balanced to me, and meadow-y. I glimmer misted over the entire image again, using "Pearl" color glimmer mist, lightly spritzing using wide quick sprays across the paper. The sentiment is from Whipper's "Blooming Expressions" set.

New Anna Wight Whippersnapper Cling Set

2009-02-17T22:03:00.003-06:00

Guys, THANK you for all of the sweet comments you left on my blog yesterday, you absolutely MADE my week! I wanted to respond back to each and every one of them, but tonite I'm nose to the grindstone cranking out more sample cards. So I'll keep it short and show you one of the cards I made with Anna Wight's newest Whippersnapper cling mount set, "Wildflower Silhouette". The stamps were made from some of Anna's photos of wildflowers ...I think that's SO cool! It gave me a chance to pull out my neglected Stampin Up water-based markers. This card was QUICK and EASY! I used a patterned paper background (We R Memory Keepers White Out Frenzy Burst), and then set about making the 'clean and simple' main image. I colored directly on the rubber of both the large and small mexican-hat flower stamps with only orange, black and old olive markers, and then stamped them onto Neenah solar white cardstock at various angles. The sentiment, which is from Whipper's "Blooming Expression" sentiment set, went across the stems in black brilliance ink. After it dried, I spritzed "Pearl" color Tattered Angels glimmer mist across the entire image. Go ahead, click on the close-up, I think you can see the glimmer! You can see both of Anna's new sets HERE on her blog.

Spring has sprung. In my head anyway.

2009-02-16T09:23:00.004-06:00

Oh man, it's been a LONG weekend of stamping. I've been sick since Thursday and since I've been stuck inside with my snotty little self, I thought I may as well stamp through it. I sound like a frog on helium. Rumor has it that this crud lasts 4 weeks; to quote that infamous line, I ain't got time to sneeze. Err, bleed, whatever. I DON'T HAVE TIME TO BE SICK!

These projects were on my stampin to-do list this weekend; our fearless leader Vicki Chrisman challenged the Crafty Secrets design team girlies to make Spring-themed cards. I started playing with the stinkin cute bunnies from Crafty's new Easter Joy set & felt a LITTLE better. I would not handle these cards if you don't want to get sick. Seriously. I suggest you wash your hands after reading this post, even.

I also started doing some simple samples that will probably be sent to scrapbook stores that carry Crafty Secrets products. I finally have the 'touch' now with glimmer mist...thanks to Vicki and the class we taught at CHA, I'm no longer a glimmer mist OVER-SPRAYER! YEEEE-HAW, I GOT ER DONE, VICK!

For more fun samples from this challenge, check out these fabulous blogs:

Anna Wight
Pam Hooten
Heidi Blankenship
Marisa Grosson
Vivian Peters
Michele Kovack
Linda Duke
Vicki Chrisman

P.S. I'll have Anna Wight New Whipper release sets tomorrow & posts ALL WEEK with her new set!

Our Craft Lounge, Blog Winner & Drake the Dragon!

2009-02-15T14:00:00.002-06:00

Yippie! I love giving away blog candy! I'll announce the winner right away because, well, I know that's what everyone is WAITING for, right?! Look at this; Random.org picked a LOW LOW number for this blog candy winner...here it is, lucky number: FIVE!

True Random Number Generator Min: Max: Result: 5
Powered by RANDOM.ORG

Wendalyn, send your snail mail address to my email account at shabbychickjunk@hotmail.com, and we'll get your Boys Toys set sent out to you! Thanks everyone, for participating! It was fun to see everyone's favorite sets!

Today I'm posting more OCL samples from CHA; these were done with the newly released "Drake the Dragon" stamp set! This set is a clear set, which is good because there are lots of little fun things that Drake can hold, like a flower, the bird, his sign, etc! Gotta love clear sets when you're masking objects; it makes it easy to see where you're placing it!

I had to do a sample invitation so that you can see what fun birthday invitations this set makes!

Hope everyone is having a good weekend; stop back this week, I'll have new posts every day with new Whippersnapper releases and a Crafty Secrets challenge card tomorrow morning!

Happy Sunday, all!

Our Craft Lounge - Boy Cards

2009-02-13T07:23:00.001-06:00

Our Craft Lounge is releasing *28*, count 'em *28* new stamp sets today! In honor of their new release, they are giving away one of each stamp set on 28 different blogs! I'll be giving away this sweet little boy set called 'Boys Toys'! I made these 3 samples for the CHA booth last month. A friend from work gave me the cute little scrabble letters, so I thought they would be cute on this card! I used a studio G dollar alphabet stamp set to stamp the phrase "Boy: A noise with dirt on it".

This set makes FUN boy birthday cards! And how about sending a card to set up a PLAY DATE?

I'll be drawing a name for this set on Sunday, Feb 15th at 2pm central time! To enter, leave a comment here with your favorite new stamp set from the OCL new release sets HERE!

Make sure to check out these blogs to enter their drawings too! You have 28 chances to win!

Our Craft Lounge, Baked with Love

2009-02-12T07:30:00.001-06:00

Ok, I am RARING to go now with samples; I uploaded a bunch of my pre-CHA samples from Our Craft Lounge and will have Our Craft Lounge posts next week, plus an OCL BLOG CANDY drawing on Friday! This set is called "Baked with Love", and has tons of fun little accessories INCLUDING A BAG OF CHOCOLATE CHIPS! The spilled flour on this set closely resembles my baking style. Just sayin.

You can see all the new release OCL sets on the Eclectic Paperie website HERE; they are not up on the OCL website yet, but EP has them! I was pressed for time when I was making these, so I thought a fun little quickie tag would be easy to crank out for show samples.

The set also has a birthday cake, so it works for both recipe cards, tags AND a birthday cards! Hey, does anyone have a favorite PINK copic marker color? I need a pink that is not so PINK and in your face! What's your favorite PINK COPIC color?

Cherish.

2009-02-10T20:43:00.003-06:00

I am STILL alive and kicking guys; so sorry for the houdini disappearing act this week! I needed a little break from stamping, and spent some much-needed time this weekend with friends and family. I can tell I haven't stamped in a few weeks; I am RUSTY with a capital R! Tonite I finally sat down and started with a Valentine-themed bingo card for the 'Show us your love' challenge over at the Splitcoast Stampers Crafty Secrets forum. Darlene has posted a fun challenge.... if you have some time this week and want to play along, you can read all about the challenge HERE. I've had it in my head that I wanted to do a Valentine-themed bingo card hanging with Crafty's Cherish stamp set, and finally sat down tonite to do it. Although my buttons are nekkid...I ran out of linen thread and decided to just glue the suckers on. I have more on order though, so not to worry, my buttons will be g-rated again once I get my Stampin Up order! L.

Flying felt hearts!

2009-02-06T17:42:00.002-06:00

I've been trying to finish these Valentine cards for about a MONTH; I started them sometime in January and then craziness hit and I just never went back to them! So this week I settled in after I finished my taxes and FINISHED THE SUCKERS! I have been eyeing the felt embellishments in Archivers for a while now, but refused to pay the price for them; I mean, it's FELT, people! So I created my own heart embellishments with a cuttlebug heart die and a .29 cent piece of red felt that I bought at Joanne Fabrics.

I added my little Making Memories chipboard swirls, which I colored in with a pink copic marker (RV19 Red Violet) and then glittered up with Martha Stewart hot pink glitter. The wing stamp is from an Autumn Leaves valentine stamp set that I bought on clearance last fall called "Love with a Flourish". I stamped the wings, then added the felt heart on top, and then added a pin and embellishments (tickets!) on the card front.

It is FRIDAY, hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

L.

Our Craft Lounge - Slumber Party

2009-02-04T07:10:00.001-06:00

It's a quick morning post here today; I'm knee deep in taxes right now so my nights are filled with receipts and paperwork! UGH! I have a ton of samples to show you from the new sets from Our Craft Lounge that were released at CHA. This set is called "Star's Slumber Party", and she's the same cute boinky-haired chicky that was rockin' on in the last samples I showed you! This set is slumber-party themed. LOOK AT HER CUTE LITTLE SUITCASE & matching PILLOW!

I love how Starr can hold up lots of different little items in her hands! Here I did a best friend card; wouldn't it be cute for invites or birthday cards?

Papers: My Mind's Eye & Making Memories.

Stamps: Our Craft Lounge Star's Slumber Party

The last of the CHA photos.

2009-02-03T07:10:00.004-06:00

So I think I'm done with the CHA photos now; today's post will be a mixture of all the remaining good photos I was able to snag. The line of papers above are by Imaginice, from their Twitterpated line. You can see close-ups of these cute little bird stamps and the *GASP* red polka dot paper on the imaginice site HERE. The little birdie stamp in this line sucked me RIGHT in!

Stampendous is ROCKIN the Changitos again! Oh man, they have such cute themes for the new wood stamps!

They are also going to be selling cling stamps; I'm guessing these will be at a cheaper price point. I want to say they said they'd retail at around $2.99 each? Someone correct me if I'm wrong! Look at Changito in his cute little car!

More clingy Changitos!

I was on a sugar high after visiting Doodlebug!!! Look at the yummy, sugary glittered display!

I WANTED this pink cake stand/table! I'll hunt around for one this summer & find PINK paint! Wouldn't it be cute in a stamp room, holding...say, STAMPS?

Someone forgot to use her flash on the Doodlebug papers. BAD LISA, BAD! But I wanted to show them to you anyway, because these paper lines are a MUST HAVE! Strawberries and cherries and yummy sweets!

Okay, whew. All photos have been edited and posted. Aren't you glad I didn't get around to more booths? You'd be looking at CHA photos for WEEKS!

Enjoy!

L.

Can I just lay down and die right here?

2009-02-01T19:31:00.004-06:00

So I'm not gonna lie. Sometimes I can be a bit ...errr....dramatic. I walked into the Webster's pages booth and let out a huge gasp when I saw this sweet garden arbor set up with the Webster's pages papers as the backdrop.

I dragged Vicki Chrisman over to see it and as we were standing there sighing, I asked one of the Webster's pages reps if I could just lay down on the floor and die right there.

I believe Vicki agreed with me...I'm not sure, because the room went fuzzy and I must have passed out from the sheer beauty of these papers!

And check out the Clip-it-up booth! They have wall-mounted paper hangers now, ribbon holders, and SHELVES!

Graphic 45

2009-01-31T20:53:00.000-06:00

I had too many photos of the Graphic 45 booth, so I had to split up my posts and I'll show you Webster's pages tomorrow! The Graphic 45 booth BLEW ME AWAY! This beautiful blue floral paper is from their new 'Fashionista' line. SERIOUSLY GASP-WORTHY!

Go Vintage!

2009-01-30T20:18:00.006-06:00

So you know how partial I am to vintage, right? No tour of CHA would be complete without a stroll through all of the fun CHA vintage-loving booths! Today and tomorrow we'll get our 'vintage' on and take a tour through Crafty Secrets, Jenny Bowlin, Graphic 45 and Webster's pages. Utterly heartstopping!

Here's Sandy Redburn, the talented owner of Crafty Secrets, and the person with the best eye for sweet vintage images that I've ever known! Sandy released 11 stamp sets at CHA; you can see close-ups of all of the sets on the Crafty Blog HERE.

Sandy is also coming out with a new product for us cardmakers, called 'Vintage Scraps'. You can mat them and use them on cards or put them on your scrapbook pages. They are printed beautifully on a matte cardstock, and they are absolutely GORGEOUS & bright! I cannot wait to get them in my hands and start playing with them!

Here's more samples from the booth!

The Jenny Bowlin booth was as GORGEOUS as ever! She has a new line of sweet vintage buttons on cute little vintage cards. I wanted to go junking in her booth!

The new Jenny Bowlin paper lines are cheery and bright and my FAVORITE color, RED! I'll be getting the smaller patterned ones for sure!

RED GINGHAM! GASP!

Jenny Bowlin also has a new product out, that looks like little pearl flowers in different colors! Look how cute they are, paired up with the patterned papers!

Chipboard BUTTONS! SO STINKIN CUTE!

Tomorrow: Graphics 45 & Webster's pages.

OCL - Our Craft Lounge at CHA

2009-01-29T17:59:00.007-06:00

Hiya! I'm BACK and I'm multi-tasking tonite; I'm washing clothes & trying to upload & edit CHA photos! I spent most of my time working at the Crafty Secrets booth, so I don't have the MOTHERLOAD of photos this year, but trust me, I did get to sneak away and will have plenty to show you in the next few days! I tried to pop in to all of my favorite booths, and will show you the select highlights of what WOWED me this year!

Here are the talented girlies from Our Craft Lounge, in their first-EVER CHA booth! I had no idea what to expect when I heard they were having a booth; but they BLEW me away with the cuteness of it all! The booth looked bright & LOUNGY, with retro bar-stools and a cute pink & orange bar to sit at while you did make & takes!

OCL is releasing over 20 brand spanking new stamp sets that will be hitting the stores mid-February, and I have samples to show you as well, since I helped do trade show samples for the booth!

The OCL girls have a brand new product out, called "Sparklefluff", that is a mixture of glitter & flock! They had it in a big martini glass and it looked like fluffy ice cream (with no calories, of course)! They also have some cool new colors of flock.

Here's a sneak peek of a new set that will be in the next release, called "Star Rocks"! This little boinky-curled chickie's name is Star, and she 'STARS' in at least 2 new sets! She's friends with Anna Mae and the other girlies from last release!

Star comes with lots of fun little accessories that you can mask off and put in her hands, like a guitar, a lava lamp and a stereo!

I don't think you can see it in this photo, but I used hot pink & orange flock to make her outfit fuzzy.

So I'm off to edit more photos; I have Graphix 44, Websters Pages, Doodlebug & Clip-it-Up booth photos to post soon!

Happy Thursday!

Lisa