Shabby Journal

This is another project I did for the Crafty Secrets new release
"Sew special" stamp set. It's an altered composition (dollar store) book done with some soft blue papers from Crafty's "Classic" paper pad. I covered the journal with the floral papers first, and then set about attaching elements to the front of the journal. I used my new sizzix flower layers 3 die to cut flowers out of coordinating paper.

The new sewing set has some great garter belt snaps in it, so I decided to make them silver metallic and add some hardware elements from Crafty's hardware set. I stamped the garter snaps and some of the metal elements on silver metallic cardstock with versamark, and then covered them with silver (fine detail) embossing powder (Michaels).

When I do this, I try to fit a ton of them on the sheet and emboss them all at once. When there's downtime, I'll sit and watch t.v. and cut out the little locks and keys, etc. and put them in my embellishment organizer so I can grab them quickly when I'm creating.

I love the little hinge from this set. I cut it in half on the journal so I could use half of the hinge on either side of the sticker I used here.

The stickers are already die-cut and gorgeous, so it was easy to slap it on a mat and add it to the front. This one is from Crafty's "French Labels" sticker sheet. The garter snaps are holding vintage sheet music which has been cut to look like ribbon on the edges, and I added 2 buttons to the center of the snaps so it looks 3-d.

I used my tracing wheel again on the main image so it looks quilted...I ran the wheel on the diagonal. The dress form image is stamped on a frame cut out from the back of the classic pad, and then colored in with ink and an aquapen. Glitter is Martha Stewart white-gold.

Crafty Secrets Sewing Set

I'm out of Hanna cards now and onto the Crafty Secrets "Sew Special" stamp set that was just released Thursday. I went extra large with these cards so I could get a lot of elements onto them. The tall card fits into a legal size envelope, and the square card measures 5 1/4 x 5 1/4. The shabby floral paper is out of Crafty Secret's "Classic" paper pad. I thought it was perfect with the dress form stamp from this set because it looks so feminine. The 3-d flower on the tall card is from a new sizzix die that I got at Michael's. It's called "flower layers #3 and it actually has 3 flowers that you can layer on top of each other. The floral paper has been glimmer misted with "sugar cookie", and then sewn onto rose romance paper (Stampin up). The zipper is so fun to play with on this set...I just stamped it in black ink and then took a sakura gelly roll clear glitter pen and colored it in so it looks shiny and metallic. For the square card, I started with white cardstock, and then cut vellum to fit the front of the card. I stamped the bodice pattern stamp randomly on the vellum with pink ink to make it look as if it's the flimsy paper that real sewing patterns come on. I decided to use real pins in the pincushion, which are easily held in between the pincushion image and the scalloped mat behind the image. If you click on the close up of the dress form here, you can see that I've gone across the entire main image with a tracing wheel on the diagonal, so the paper actually looks quilted. I found a tracing wheel at a garage sale last summer for .25 cents...I love that Vicki Chrisman always finishes her cards and project edges with a tracing wheel so I grabbed it right away. Thank you, Vicki, for all of your incredible inspiration!

Hanna goes shabby.

I *HAD* to try a shabby card with the newly released Hanna "Sweet Celebrations" set. Valentines day is coming up and there's so many people to send love to, not just your sweetheart! I wanted to make some cards that would be more family appropriate, so I masked off the flower images and formed them into a "bouquet", to make a more elegant card that can coordinate with floral papers. This would also be a great "sympathy" or "thinking of you" card. I love the sentiment "I pick you" because it goes so well with floral images. The sentiment is from the "Things Hanna would Say" set.

Paper: Daisy D's "Beacon Street" floral & "Colonial Revival". Polka dot strip is from a Making Memories vintage hip paper pad.

Hanna Valentines

I'm combining 2 days of the Hanna-thon into one post tonite so that I can start posting my Crafty Sew Special samples this Sunday. Both cards sort of coordinate anyway, since I was playing with the fun little image stamps that came with the set. The Hanna valentine set, which is called "Sweet Celebrations", is now available for sale on the Hanna website HERE. I was so obsessed with the fun Cloud 9 papers that are out for Valentines day, that I just kept on cranking cards out with them. The floral card here was done using paper-piecing for the boxes of candy, so that the boxes would look festive and multi-color. I HAD to fun-flock the bear, of course, with brown fun flock. I kept it off of his face so that I didn't lose the detail on him, and just added it to his body and the brown stripe on his head. All of the images are outlined with a copic marker, warm grey #2.

This card was done by stamping random images all over white cardstock and then coloring them. I used a scallop scissors to cut the pink gingham, then used a hole punch in the center of each scallop. All images have been colored in with copics and the candy boxes were paper-pieced.

Happy Friday! L.

2 new release sets, Hanna & Crafty Secrets!

Lots of stuff to post tonite! First off, I'd like to pat myself on the back for getting my arse on a treadmill tonite and walking *2*.... (count 'em) *2* miles! (Very slowly and with a lot of heavy breathing... but I walked!) I hope this is a start of some good habits for me this year. My friend Jill, who just finished breast cancer treatments is nudging me to do the breast cancer 3 day with her in August. I'M SKEEERED JILLIE! Enough about that...we'll see how I'm doing a month from now. (insert quick subject change here)


So coincidentally, there are *2*.....(count 'em),*2* new stamp sets being released tonite also! The newest Hanna Valentine set goes on sale at midnight on the Hanna Stamps website. This is another card I did for my week long Hanna-thon with the champagne glasses from the new set. I wanted to do a simpler card without Hanna, that you could give to a boyfriend or hubby without it looking too girly. Although the paper is still a little girly, isn't it. Hmm..I should do one with masculine paper! I masked off the wine stems again in this one by laying a skinny strip of paper on my cardstock, then stamping the champagne glasses over the top of it so that it left a space to stamp my sentiment. The papers are by Cloud 9..."Sparkle he loves me" and "Sparkle crazy for you". The border was done with a scrap strip of kraft paper. I cut the edges with a scalloped scissors, then took a hole punch and punched holes in the scallop.

The other new set that's being released is a new Crafty Secrets set called "Sew Special", with 30 sewing-related stamps in it! Sandy just added the set to the website & her blog and is doing a shipping special for $4.95 if you order it through HERE. The design team members are all in the process of uploading all of our samples to Splitcoast, but you can see all of them right now at the Crafty Gallery . This is one of the samples I did Friday night. I am trying to get my Grammie to let me dig in her photo albums & take photos out so that I can start doing a little scrapbooking & altering with photos. This photo was taken of my Grammie (center) , Mom (left) and Auntie Jan (right). Back in the day when they had very little money, my Grandma would take women's clothing hand-me-downs and create childrens clothing out of them.

Here's a close up of the pincushion stamp from this set...I actually added real pins to it in between the main image and the scalloped mat. The lace was done by embossing the lace stamp around the photo with white embossing powder. The velvet rick-rack is from Starlitstudio's ebay store. Although you can't see it, the scissors has been colored in with a sakura gelly roll glitter pen to make it shiny & silver. I also love the little pin stamp in this set..you can use it to connect the torn papers, so it looks like you've hemmed them! I stamped on the little patterned paper "frames" that came in the back of the "Classic" and "Pastel" pads. The thread stamp is separate from the 'spools', so you can stamp the thread in ANY COLOR you want! SO COOL!






Here is my journaling. I need to re-do it so that the top is not cut off but didn't have time before this release to fix it. I did the journaling on my computer but left a blank to stamp "Sew Special" so that the title matches the rest of the fonts on the paper.

Hanna frame.

Running late tonite...had my car into the shop because the 'service engine light' went on over the weekend. Thankfully it was just the gas cap, so I got my oil changed, a new gas cap & I'm good to go!

We're on night 3 of the Hanna-thon this week! I thought it would be fun to use Hanna to frame a special sweetheart photo. I bought a bunch of these frames at the dollar store and am sad that they are out of them because they showcase patterned paper so well. If I find something comparable for a buck, I'll let you know, because these were such cheap, fun gifts to make & give! The paper is old SEI pink stripes & squares from 2 years ago...it was from my scrap bin so I don't have the paper name for you. I cut an oval out of white paper with the oval nestabilities dies, and then stamped the champagne glass image in the center. I masked the stems of the champagne glasses with a small strip of paper, so that I could stamp the sentiment through the middle of the stems. The cute 3-d flowers are from K & Company (Michaels) from their "Grand Adhesions line, called "Glitter blossoms". Hanna's dress was cut out of K & Company "Smitten" paisley glitter paper. Ribbon is from May Arts from Starlit Studio's ebay store. Sentiment is from "Things Hanna would Say" set. This is an exciting week...there will be a Crafty Secrets stamp set unveiled tomorrow on Splitcoast, and a Hanna stamp new Valentine set release on Friday!

Happy 2008! Day one of the new year! It's freezing cold outside and I just tried to go for a walk today, as one of my New Year's resolutions is to be more active & get more walking in. Apparently I should have worn sunglasses because the wind is so cold I have mascara running down my face from my eyes tearing up! Ok, so I'll do laps around my dining room table.

Today's Hanna post is an altered heart candy box from last year, done with the soon to be released Hanna Valentine set. I'm one of those crazy people that saves pretty packaging just in case I can use it again. This heart shaped candy box is from Valentine's day last year, from Target. I loved that the edge of the box was a pretty toile print. Rather than try to cover the print up, I just chose patterned paper that would work with it. So the top of the box has been covered with Cloud 9 "Sparkle he loves Me" paper from their "Be Loved" collection (Archivers). I mod podged the paper to the top of the box and then used a flouncy pink ribbon around the edge. Hanna is colored in with a lipstick red Copic Marker, Then red fun flock was added to her dress. The "I pick you" sentiment is from the "Things Hanna Would Say" set. I stamped the sentiment on white paper, then snipped the edges to look like ribbon & ran Martha Stewart gold glitter around the edges. I also have to show you this picture from when I was making all of the Hanna samples a few weeks ago. I stayed up late and was making tons of samples, and drinking LOTS of diet coke. I was trying to take a photo of my process making this box, but it ended up just being a blurry mess...sort of like my brain at the time!