Happy New Year!!!!

I want to wish everyone a safe and Happy New Year!!!! 

I have some thoughts and ideas on what I will have to offer throughout the Year so be sure to check back. Thank you for being a follower if you are already and if not I would love to have you sign up. It is quick and easy to do and I don't think you will be disappointed. 

I will see you tomorrow with a small but cute little project.

A Circle Card

Here is a Circle card I made while crafting with my daughter's Mother -in-law, Rita. She wanted to try a Circle Card and needed a card to send to a friend. So together we choose papers and put this card together. I like the soft colors in it.

We did some distressing with ink to allow for each paper layer to show up.  This was an 8x8 paper pack I had and they were double sided papers which allowed for a good coordination of colors and designs. A little stamping for the message and flower on the center piece of paper.  A little twill ribbon was added too. To finish it off some pen stitching and a little bling.

I hope you enjoy it. 

Wishing You a Very Merry Christmas

I just wanted to stop by and wish you all a very Merry Christmas!! I will be back after the Holidays with some more projects to share with you. I meant to get some of the tags I got made but wow did time ever get away from me. So I will post them as soon as I can even though it will be after the fact but it is never to soon to start in on next year!! Did I say that???  I have been thinking and I have decided I am going to do at least one Christmas per month all year long. That way I will be ready for maybe the first Christmas ever!! That is of course if I am able to stick to this plan. But if you cheer me on along the way I will do my best to give you a nice variety of things to look at.

So Merry Christmas!! Have a wonderful day with family and friends.

Birthday Card for my Granddaughter

This is the card I made for my Granddaughter's 2nd Birthday. I did a little coloring with the Blender Pen and ink pad and some glitter of course. It's just a cute little animal card showing her the number 2 with the stacked pigs. She loves to count and is counting to 10 already!!! Just a proud Grandma talking lol. Anyway since she is so much into Mickey Mouse right now I am going to try and cut with the Cricut some Mickey figures for her. I thought I would cut some out of fabric to make her a top, and maybe out of vinyl so she could put it up on her wall and whatever else I can think of. Thanks fo rstopping by and taking a peek.

My Granddaughter's 2nd Birthday

My Granddaughter just celebrated her 2nd Birthday. She is really into Mickey Mouse right now. She just cam back from a trip to DisneyLand.

My daughter made her a Minnie Mouse Cake totally from scratch. I thought she did a Fantastic job and had to share this beautiful cake.

She has not had any formal training and this cake was out of this world cute!!! I don't know how well my picture will show but she filled in all the areas with tiny little stars in different colors.

It was a great party and she had lot's of fun with her Mickey themed party.

Stamp- A-Ma- Jig Tutorial

Step 1

This is the Stamp-A-Ma- Jig.
It comes with 2 parts.
The handle and the plastic sheet.






Step 2

You can use this tool with Wood rubber stamps and clear acrylic stamps. Here I am showing you a wood stamp first. Notice how I have the stamp at an angle on my card? You can place your stamp any direction you want. First line the plastic sheet up against the handle. Ink the stamp up and place against the handle tight up in the corner and stamp onto the plastic sheet.

Step 3
This is the stamped image on the plastic sheet. I have positioned the plastic sheet where I want my image on my card. Line up the tool against the plastic sheet again.

Step 4
 Remove the plastic sheet making sure you don't move your card. Bring in your stamp and place it right up against the tool and stamp.
Now I have my image.

Step 5

I want to add another stamp to my card front. This time I am using a clear acrylic stamp. The process is the same.  First take another corner of the plastic sheet and stamp my second image.

Step 6
Here you can see I now have a Merry Christmas stamped on my sheet.

Step 7

Now I am positioning where I want my saying on the card by moving the sheet around until I have found the right spot. Then take the tool and butt up against the sheet making sure you don't move the card below. You can put some dotto glue on the back of your card to help keep it in place while doing all of your stamping. Once you are happy with where you have the image remove the plastic sheet and bring in your stamp and place it up against the tool again and stamp.

Step 8

This is showing my stamp positioned up against the tool, inked and being stamped onto the card.

Step 9

Here is the card showing both images stamped.

Step 10

The finished card.

You can have up to 4 images on your sheet at a time. Stamp something different in each corner if you have a number of stamps that you are using. It is a very useful tool and inexpensive to buy too. Perfect stamping every time.

A Birthday Card

This is a Magical Marquis Card

It is a fun card to make and give to a special person. In my case I made this for a friend who recently had a birthday.

Happy Birthday Jeanne!!

I have also put on another one of those Rub Ons with glitter added on the left panel.  On the right panel I used the stamp ma jig and stamped Happy Birthday. ( I will be back with the tutorial for the Stamp Ma Jig tomorrow)

Here is a view of the Marquis just starting to open.

Here is a view of it fully open. In my case revealing a cupcake inside complete with glitter.

I used CTMH papers, Fiskars Scalloped circle punch, 1 3/8" circle punch by EK Success, Martha Stewart glitter, CTMH markers, flowers from stash and a glittered brad from CTMH.

Because this is a bit involved in how to write you directions and have them make sense I am instead going to include the video from the person I watched to make my card. 

Video below thank you to Jan Tinklenberg.


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Have fun making your own Magical Marquis Card.

Day 6 of Christmas Projects

Today I wanted to tell you about the card I showed in the Part 2 of the Bow Easy post.
Here is the card

This is a 6 x 6 card. I used a number of techniques and that is why I thought I would give it it's own posting. The techniques I did are stitching with floss, rub on stitching, Cuttlebug dry embossing, Metallic Rub Ons, Bow Easy, UTEE & Glitter embossing, white Uniball signo pen, scalloped scissors and ink distressing.




This picture shows a close up of the ornament where I used the Utee. I took some red glitter and mixed it in with some of the clear Utee. Then heat gun and repeat. You end up with a clear dome but with glitter added. You can also do this with regular Clear embossing powder. It is a fun and cool looking little trick.

In this picture I am hoping to show you the Cuttlebug design on the Cranberry CS. After I did the embossing I took my Metallic Rub Ons and using the Gold went over the raised area giving it some highlights. Also you can see the zigzag rub on stitching, and the "Merry" done using a CTMH alphabet stamp and floss.

This is the Metallic Rub On product. I have had this for sometime originally buying it at a local Stamp store. I am not sure if it is still around but I thought if I showed you what it looks like you might be able to find it. It is a fun product to use.










Now for the directions in case you want to make your own Merry Christmas card. All CTMH products except where stated.

6 x 12 Colonial White CS for card base
6 x 6 New England Ivy CS
5 3/4 x 5 3/4 Bamboo CS
3 x 5 3/4 Cranberry CS
4 x 4 NewEngland Ivy CS
3 1/4 x 3 1/4 Cranberry
3 x 3 Colonial White
E1008 X Stitch Alpha (1") in size I stamped using a light ink color just enough to see the letters. I used Grey Flannel.
DMC Floss #347
1 3/4" Cranberry circle
1/4"  hand punch for New England Ivy circles
Utee clear with MS Red Glitter added
K & Co. rub ons
Sheer ribbon misc.
New England Ivy brads (3)
1/2" Col. White squares
New England Ivy ink
Gold cord
Cranberry ribbon
Bow Easy tool
Uniball Signo White pen
Scalloped scissors
Metallic Rub Ons

I know it seems like a long list and many techniques but it really goes together quickly. I hope you give some of these things a try.
Thanks for stopping by. Leave me a comment if you like what I do. I love to hear from you.

Bow Easy Part 2

I am going to include a video today that I found on You Tube. Her name is Jerri and she does a very good job of showing how easy it is to make perfect bows every time.




Now that you see how to make the bows here is that trick I mentioned in Part 1.   The trick is to show that the bow looks like it was tied onto the ribbon on the card when it really is attached with a glue dot.

See the sheer ribbon on the left side of the card? I have placed this here and taped it on the back of the bamboo colored cardstock. Do this all before attaching to the green card.

Here is the trick. You take a piece of thread and tie it around the ribbon where you are going to place your bow. See how it crunches up? That is what gives the illusion that the bow has been tied onto the flat ribbon piece. You would trim the threads and then......

Add the bow with a glue dot. Of course I made the Bow with the Bow Easy too!!!

A very quick and easy trick but very effective I think.

I will be back tomorrow with all the details on how to make this card. I have another little trick in the making of this card.

 Hint: It has something to do with the ornament.

See you then.

Have you heard of the Bow Easy???

I don't have a project today for you but I do have a fantastic tool to tell you about. I am going to do it 2 parts. So today will be Part 1 and tomorrow I will be back with Part 2.
It is called the Bow Easy.
It is a small plastic tool that makes perfect bows every time. You can make 7 different sizes too!!! The sizes are 3/4", 1", 1 1/4", 1 3/8", 1 3/4", 2 3/8"2 3/4". Come back tomorrow with  a video for you to watch I found on You Tube and a little trick for my Part 2.
First here is the Bow Easy

I have the smallest size bow shown here. Let's face it trying to tie a bow this small by hand is not the easist to do. But with this little tool it is a breeze!!

Here is an example of all 7 sizes in order from the top down. I made a double looped bow for the largest size. I also used a variety of types of ribbons such as satin, sheer, and grosgrain.

Come back tomorrow for Part 2.

What a Surprise!!!!

I don't have my usual project post for today because I just had to show you a surprise visitor we have had for 2 days in a row now.  Here are some clues.  It is a creature of nature. It flies. It is quite large. Can you guess what it could be?

A Hawk!!!!!

Look him standing so regal on the edge of our (unfinished yet) pond.

Here is another look. My husband has done a good job on our backyard with this pond being his last project to complete. So please excuse the surrounding scenery but I just had to show you this Hawk. He wasn't at all disturbed by our 2 dogs walking around the yard either. He stuck around and proceeded to -----

 

Take a bath!! Can you believe it???

 

Here is another view with him in the pond.

                                He is done with his bath now and this  is just before he got out of the pond. He has visited us the last 2 days so I am curious to see if he will be back tomorrow. I mentioned my 2 dogs in the yard---one is a Maltese and one is a Sheltie. I was worried the Maltese would be carried away as he is quite small. But for some reason this appears to be a very docile Hawk. I just  had to share this with all of you.
I will be back to crafting with my next post.

(click on the pictures to enlarge)

Day 5 of Christmas Projects

As promised I am back with another project today. This is a really fun Card/drawer project. You can fill the drawer with a number of things. A set of cards, candy, jewelry and a gift card are a few suggestions. This is my take from what I saw from Andrea's site. She is a very talented crafter. Be sure and stop by her site and take a look around.

This is the top of the project. The center area with the ornaments on it is a 3x3 card that is held closed by that large pewter brad but is easily opened as well.  I used Diamond Glaze and glitter to decorate my ornaments. It gave them a raised glittered appearance. Using my Stamp-a- ma Jig I was able to stamp the Merry Christmas in the bottom left corner. I will come back later with a little tutorial on using a Stamp-a- ma Jig if it is new to you. It can be used with both rubber wood mount stamps and clear acrylic stamps.

Here is a view with the drawer pulled out slightly. I inserted a brad through 2 pieces of ribbon for the drawer pull.

This last picture shows a better view of the drawer pull and drawer. I don't own the Big Shot or the die that cuts a scalloped square so I calculated a size to cut the top and bottom scalloped pieces with my Cricut Expressions and Mini Monograms.I'm happy with how it looks and had so much fun making this. I could see this made for a variety of occasions and in any number of papers.

Hope you enjoyed it!!! 

My Day got Away from Me

Well I am just now getting on the computer so I won't have my project entry for today. But I will be back tomorrow with one and hope you stop by again then. It was one of those days where so much to do and not enough time to do it all. The day came and went in a blink for me today. Have you ever had that same feeling??? Anyway I am off to get some rest and will post tomorrow. See you then.

Day 4 of Christmas Projects

Today I have a really small little project but I think it is too darn cute!!!
It is a little purse that holds a Hershey Nugget size candy bar. Mine have Hershey with Almond in them. I played around with a few different techniques in making different textures on the strip of cardstock that is used to make the purse. I made some with just stamping and some with stamping and adding clear embossing powder for a patent leather look. I also added glitter to some. Some have bigger polka dots and others tiny polka dots. Even a patterned paper made a cute purse.  I hope you enjoy them.

Directions:
1. Cut a 1 1/2" x 5" piece of card stock
2. Score at 1 1/2, 2 1/2, 4"  fold on each line.
3. The end with the 4" score line is the flap (the shorter end)  use a 1/4" corner rounder to round those two edges.
4. Decorate your card stock strip anyway you want.
5. Punch a 1/8" hole right on the 4" score line close to the edge on both sides. This is to make your purse handle.
6. Take a piece of  ribbon and place an end in each hole. Tie a knot on the inside and trim close to knot. Make your handle so it stands up. Not to long not to short.
7. Cut a 1/4" x 5 1/8" strip and start at one end and fold it at each of the  folds of the purse. Glue down the center of your strip. I don't pre score because it doesn't exactly line up.
8. I used a flower and brad for my purse closure. Use a piercer and poke a hole throgh both layers and insert your flower and brad.
9. Take a nugget size candy bar and place a glue dot on the bottom and place centered inside the purse.

 Have fun making some of your own.

Day 3 of Christmas Projects

Today I have a cute little Ghirardelli chocolate bar holder. It is a Matchbook style holder. Another quick and easy project to make. I love making fun and cute little things once in a while. It is a good feeling completely something in a short period of time if you know what I mean.

Here is the Matchbook outside closed view. I matted some layers of paper, inked the edges, embossed the word in the corner and stamped and colored with a blending pen the little owl on a branch. I cut him out and pop dotted him in place. I used 2 small rhinestone brads for the closure.

The inside is decorated also and has the container that holds the Ghiraddelli chocolate bar.  I matted some layers of paper again and inked the edges. I stamped and embossed Merry Christmas in Gold.

It works best to fold down one edge of the chocolate wrapper when placing it in the holder. Wouldn't a bowl of these be cute on your Christmas table? Or as a stocking gift?

Supplies:

Cardstock

paper trimmer

adhesive

Scor-Pal

Brads- two

Stamps

Directions:

1. cut one 5 3/4" x 2 3/8" cardstock

2. cut one 7 3/8" x 2 3/4" cardstock.

3. score the 5 3/4 x 2 3/8 piece at 2 1/4, 2 1/2, 2 3/4, 5,5 1/4, 5 1/2 this will make the inner pocket for the chocolate piece. Fold the score lines in mountain and valley folds and adhere closed with Scor Tape or Red line tape When positioned inside the matchbook the folds will be to the outside

4.Score the other cardstock piece at 3, 3 1/2, and 6 3/4

5. Add a narrow piece of tape to the 1/2" edge. Place the pocket against this edge and adhere. 

6. Place the 2 brads in this 1/2" strip and through the pocket. 

7. Turn over and spread the prongs. Place a strip of tape over the prongs and then press into place.

8. Add paper layers and stamped images. For the outside your bottom layer is 2 1/2 x 2 1/2, then 2 1/4 x 2 1/4, and 2 1 /8 x 2 1/8On top of that put your cutout stamped image or other embellishment.

9. For the inside pocket cut layers at 2 x 1 3/4,  1 3/4 x 1 1/2 and 1 1/2 x 1/12Again decorate as you would like.

I saw this over at Splitcoaststampers. You can check it out there if you need more explanation.

Hope you enjoy giving this one a try .

Day 2 of Christmas Projects

Today I have a cute little stocking that doubles as a gift card holder and a decoration on the tree. Again this is my take on a project I found in my collection of saved projects.  It is quick and easy to make. I used my Cuttlebug to give the stocking some texture. I also did some inking, pen stitching and stamping. The top hinges open to reveal the gift card inside. The loop is added so you can hang it on the tree.  Hope you like it.

 

 

Have a Great day!! See you again tomorrow with another project to show you.

Day 1 of Christmas projects

Well I know it has been a few days that I haven't been around but I am hoping to make up for that over the coming days. I am going to post a small project each day until I have each of them shown. I have been busy working not only on gift items but decorative items, cards  and even some sewing. There are some I will have to wait a bit to show so I don't give it away for the recipients though. shhhh don't tell.  lol

So here goes with Day 1 of my projects.I found a similar idea on the internet and thought how cute to make something like it. It is like a little mini piece of luggage.

Inside you can put a variety of things like, candy, small note cards, tags, etc. I don't have my inside done yet. The next picture will show it partially opened.

Isn't this a cute little idea? You could even make these for Thanksgiving and place what you are thankful for inside and the name of each person on the front.

Come on back tomorrow for Day #2's project!! See you then. I'd love for you to leave me a comment too.

Cupcakes Galore

I want to give a BIG Thank you to Tresa Black for the how to on making these beautiful and fun cupcake gift card holders. Some friends and I got together and made these one afternoon. We all chose different papers, ribbons, flowers etc. Look how cute each one turned out!!

As you can see  we have a Christmas themed one, and two that are Birthday oriented. Although the Christmas one would work for a Christmas birthday as well. The one on the right has birthday candles in the accordion folded paper.  Really cute. The middle one uses CTMH Emporium paper and the left one is CTMH Evensong paper. We used the Nestibilities scalloped circles for the bottom. You pull up on the Cherry and a gift card is attached to it. I will add a picture of that tomorrow. Sorry I forgot to take that picture. We didn't have time to add the finishing touches when we were together so

here is a close up of mine the Christmas one with the finishing touches of a tag, glitter, brads and bling.

Thanks again Tresa!!!! 

Homemade Glue Dots

Check out this video from Crafty Chica

It is so easy to do and very cost effective. Plus they work like a charm. Thank you very much for making this video.

Apples, Apples and more Apples

Our weather took a sudden cool down. Now you all might laugh because we dropped to 59 during the day and just shy of freezing at night. But here in southern Arizona that is very unusual. So baking with apples sounded like a perfect thing to do. So I don't have a craft project for today but instead I started baking with apples and it got out of control!!!  I started my day with  making some
Homemade Chunky Cinnamon Applesauce.
Here is a picture with me taking a taste and the recipe so you can give it a try. lol

Recipe for Homemade  Chunky Cinnamon Applesauce:
8 med Granny Smith apples, peeled and cut into fourths. You can also use a mixture of apples such as adding Gala's.
2/3 c. sugar
3/4 c. apple juice
2 Tablespoons margarine or butter, melted
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Mix all ingredients together in a Crock Pot. Cover and cook on high 1 1/2 -2 hours. Although I find with my Crock Pot that it takes much longer than this. So watch and adjust time as necessary. The apples will begin to break up. Stir well to help break up the apple chunks. Depending on how chunky or smooth you want your end result will also determine amount of time you simmer this. Use a potato masher to help get the consistency you want.Cool and refrigerate to store it. Can be served warm or cold. Add ice cream or whip cream for a real treat.

Remember when I said I started with making applesauce but it got out of control? Well I peeled to many apples for the applesauce so I decided to make apple crisp. I made the recipe I talked about in a earlier post that came from a small town in  New York newspaper. Here is a picture for that although I don't think the picture does it justice. It is very hard to get a picture to match the taste isn't it? Anyway here goes:

Then as you can probably guess I still had an excess of apples. I over estimated again!! So I peeled a few more apples to make my final and I mean final apple item. Can you guess what I made? drum roll please.... tada

A very full  Apple Pie

So after many apples later I have 3 wonderful choices to choose from if I want a taste for apples.  Did I make you hungry? I wish I could send you all a taste. I guess you will have to get busy yourself and do some apple baking.

Oh by the way I added pictures of my Poor Man Turtle post so you can see those little gems. Check it out.

Rub On with Glitter

I had a package from K & Co. that is Rub on's but with an adhesive side to add Glitter. So with all the fun in adding glitter, bling, gems etc to our projects I thought I would give this a try. It is fun and easy to do. Here is my little example.

I sprinkled the green glitter first on the butterfly trail and then finished by removing the remaining  covering and put on the purple for the butterfly. I patted it down in place before dumping the excess off and used a soft brush to finish getting any extra off.

Here is a picture of the package.

It comes with 4 vials of glitter too.

The technique is to cut out the rub on you want to use with the backing sheet. Then take the backing sheet off and place your rub on on your project. Using a craft stick or rub on tool rub all over the design until you see it release from the top sheet. Slowly peel back the top sheet checking to be sure it is totally on the paper. If not put the sheet back down and rub some more. This is one more way of adding some glitter to your crafting.