Mount St. Helens

What vacation would be good without a drive out to see something that blew up 20 years ago? Apparently not ours! We drove 6 hours out of the way to see Mount St. Helens with the in-laws. Thankfully, the exhibit for the volcano was sort of awesome, they had the geographical impact of the Mount St. Helens explosion in a scale model with lights showing the impacts of the blast, ash, lava, etc. Pretty cool.

American Crafts Campy Trails paper, stickers, button
American Crafts Amy Tangerine Thickers
Silhouette Cameo/Studio (tree trunk, bracket)
tooth picks and jewelry cord
Ranger Distress Ink walnut stain
Paper Studios Affinity brown polka dot paper
Stash: solid brown and blue card stock and button brads

This is probably one of the busiest pages I have made in a long time. I really wanted to pack in the pictures on this one so I made them a variety of sizes, based on importance of the photo. My favorite thing? The tiny erupting volcano that I made with scraps and glitter glue. 

Project Goal 100

To date: 33

It's a vintage card soiree

When I was beginning my scrapbooking journey, I was all about the bright colorful papers that were out there. Then I discovered a love for My Mind's Eye, something anyone who's read this blog for more than a week probably isn't surprised about. That love brought me out of the world of cheap paper packs and into using "good paper" for everything. Eventually turning my style into a (hopefully) shabby chic sort of look. But I have always adored a certain look that I could never bring myself to attempt. Until today.

The vintage. Gorgeous. I love it. Lace. Graphics. *swoon* One of my favorite bloggers, Charity Becker, epitomizes this look for me. I adore her work, and (long pause) she probably gets tired of me idolizing it.

A couple of months ago she was the guest blogger when Graphic 45 made their Scrapbooksteals.com debut. Oh wow. I caved and bought paper that I wasn't certain I'd ever, ever use. Then I found some on clearance on a rare trip to a craft store. And bought two more lines.

So now I have three sets of paper that I gush over but don't touch. I'm not a hoarder by nature so they begin taunting me. Taunting I tell you! And that brings us to today. I made my first two cards out of Graphic 45 paper.

Both use their Communique line for the papers. The flowers and crochet ribbon are G45 Staples. I also used Ranger Distress Inks - walnut stain and fired brick, Crackle Accents, and Studio G glitter glue on both. The top card also has two brads from stash. The large center flower brad is Paper Studios Affinity.

Hopefully I did them justice, because that first cut was torture.

Project Goal 100

To date: 32

Digital scrapbooking

When I was pregnant with Squirrel I *really* wanted to digitally scrapbook. For some reason it appealed to me more than the traditional books my mom would work on. I never really got into it. I have a disk with a few baby-ish files and the album that came with it. I think I looked at it twice. I didn't like being in front of the computer that much, and the software that came with that disk, to put it mildly STUNK.

So, here I am 3 years into papercrafting and I've spent the better part of the week researching digital books. Why? Well, my in-laws want me to create a scrapbook of the reunion we went to this summer. Now their idea of a scrapbook is probably to slap pics on a page with a note about who is in the pictures, but since they asked me to do it this thing is gonna look a little more artsy. Okay, a lot more artsy.

I'm looking to go digital with it to save money, and preserve my scrap stash for, uh, me, since most of them aren't dying to have Prima flowers or Authentique paper or BoBunny ribbons or Thickers or, you get the idea.

I'd sort of like to still share my work here, but am a little confused as to how to give resource credit. Do any of you digitally scrap? How do you keep track of which products you are using so that you can post it online? I've already created a couple of pages toward that book, but I'm not used to that stash enough yet to look at pages and know which random blog that had a freebie I pulled it from.

In the meantime, I'll share a picture of Squirrel testing out his photography skills while I was crafting today. This camera already has a scratch on the lens, making it perfect for a 3.5 year old.

MCM 94

Sometimes crafting with a sketch "clicks" sometimes it doesn't. Know the feeling? Well, this week's sketch never clicked. Maybe because I was trying to make masculine/not frilly cards. Boo, because her cards were super cute! Anyway, I tried a couple of different variations of Kristy's MCM 94 and this was the best of the bunch. 

American Crafts Campy Trails -paper and dimensional sticker
Black ink
Button brads, stash

Project Goal 100

To Date: 30

MWM Pearl 3

Wow! I can't believe that I managed to crank out a Mid-Week Mojo on the day it was posted. Awesome-sauce. Today's MWM featured a sketch from the lovely Kristy Lee using Kiwi Lane Templates. Now I sort of own some, they live at my mom's, I use them there and she uses them when I'm not. So to work on the page *today* I had to improvise, because if you've never seen them they're pretty cool. Basically, they're a border stencil and the next best thing to tracing and cutting is to use a kit that has die cut borders in it! Right?!  Or pull out your die cutting machine, but I chose option "A" because I was lazy.

3 Bugs in a Rug Blast Off papers and die cuts
3 Bugs in a Rug Chaos and Confusion Chipboard alphas
Bo Bunny Wraps ribbon
Color Box Chalk Ink, Olive
Green brads, stash

So this is it. My first time using papers from 3 Bugs in a Rug. I'm stinkin' in love with this kit. Blast Off is so much fun. My favorite thing in the whole kit is the little sticker on the bottom left page that says you make my whole face smile, or something to that end.

Project Goal 100

To Date: 29

More Cards for OWH

The OWH ladies talk frequently on their Facebook page about how the Heroes want general cards so I've taken to using the title stickers from the American Crafts Campy Trails to make some non-traditionally sentimented cards. It's been fun to come up with paper and layout ideas based off a sticker instead of sitting down to make a birthday card and just doing a bunch of balloons all the time! This should really help me kick through some stuff that would have been hard for me to use in my normal scrapping style.

This one's eye "catching"

AC Campy Trails
Tooth pick
Jewelry braiding cord
Ranger Distress Ink, walnut stain

AC Campy Trails
Ranger Distress Ink, Walnut Stain
Studio G gold glitter glue

This one made me sing "home on the range" and if I'd felt up to typing out it the card would have had it scribbled somewhere on it!

AC Campy Trails
Paper Studios eyelet
Ranger Distress Ink Walnut Stain, Fine China
Jewelry braiding cord

Project Goal 100

To Date: 28

Dads' Birthdays

Our dad's birthdays are about 2 weeks apart so when I make cards for mine I have typically made my father-in-law's at the same time. 

Neither card is fabulous, but the one for my dad is funny to me. The boys call him Papa. I was rearranging some scrap stash and found these old rub-ons (K and Company, I think) and they matched some American Crafts Campy Trails that was hanging out on the desk so I set to work to put the two together for a card for Pawpawpawpawpaw. Bwahahaha. He would hate if I pronounced it that way, but it was a fun play on words and a simple card to make. 

AC Campy Trails
Rub-on
Teresa Collins stamp
Ranger Distress Inks, fired brick

For my FIL, I gave a "wilderness" badge. They went on vacation with us, well for part of our trip. Before joining us in Seattle they visited the Sequioas, Yosemite, went with us to Mount St. Helens, on a whale watching trip, a jet boat trip through Hell's Canyon, ID, and were talking about driving up to Yellowstone when we left. A lot of wilderness watching, right?

AC Campy Trails
Rub-on (K&Co., I think)
Ranger Distress Ink, walnut stain

Project Goal 100
To Date: 25

Half-baked Wednesday: Quinoa and mango

With trying to eat cleaner and finding ways to save money I had to consider finding some decent vegetarian dishes that the Carnivores in my life will eat. I capitalized it because they are that into their meat! 

This is a quinoa burger that I made, I used a recipe from Dish on Delish. They really were that yellow (grains meet white beans meet carrots, no surprise) and the only reason these two stayed together is that I allowed the bottom to char on them and create a permanent shape. They were served with a pita and yogurt sauce, pretty tasty even if they were UGLY and very much a first attempt at "burgers."

Last week while I was planning the menu I also came across a great deal on mango so I bought a lot. A LOT. Like more than 10. We love mango around here, and the guys would eat dried mango all day every day if I were willing to buy enough. Dried mango is pricey and saturated in sugars. So I bought a dehydrator and set to work to make my own. 

Still working out the kinks regarding how long to leave them drying, how thin to cut, etc. But they don't seem to mind. I dried 10 of the mangoes in two days and two days later all of it's gone! Yep, they ate all of it. Good thing I have some more to dry still...

Cards for Heroes

I posted yesterday about how a friend and I had made red shirts for her to wear to support her family. Well, while everyone I knew was out being patriotic and supporting the community in the heat my little guys were napping. I was doing what I could to support our heroes too - I made three more cards to send to OWH. Simple, funny, quirky. I love them and hopefully someone else does too. 

We'll start with my favorite: 

Fancy Pants Designs Like Father Like Son
Fancy Pants Designs Kraft Kuts (star fussy cut)
MME Good Day Sunshine guitar die cut
MME Follow Your Heart yellow twine 

And then I really really love what the Crackle Accents did for this one:

Fancy Pants Designs Lilac House
Fancy Pants Designs Like Father Like Son (angel fussy cut)
MME Pretty Please die cut
MME Laundry Line crushed velvet ribbon
Authentique Uncommon die cut
Helmar Zapdots
Ranger Distress Ink, Walnut Stain
Ranger Crackle Accents

And this one is just plain funny to me. Nice Ride with a bicycle on it. I'm a dork. Sorry.

Fancy Pants Designs Lilac House
MME Good Day Sunshine bicycle die cut
MME Abbey Road nice ride die cut (and then cut so it wasn't large and oval!)
MME Abbey Road paper "clip" die cut
MME ribbon (it was on the Lost and Found chipboard mini album package)
MME Abbey Road scalloped die cut, stamped with a Tim Holtz stamp on the back
Ranger Distress Ink, Walnut Stain, Fine China

Project Goal 100

To date: 23

Beep vrooom

Mmmm, I love when MME comes up with a random extra sketch to follow. Especially on a day when I was feeling the need to scrap but soooooo wasn't feeling ready to jump in and design my own page! I'm so lazy sometimes. LOL

Anyway, this sketch isn't part of their normal challenge rotation, but there is a prize that I'd love! Printed tapes/Washi/Designer Tapes - whatever you call them I have this obsession with having them and *need* more. 

I started by flipping the sketch for horizontal pics because that one in the center with the car is a huge part of the story I wanted to tell. Squirrel loved this day of vacation - the Aquarium and vintage race cars! He's still asking to go back to both and it's worse when he sees pictures of them. Then I pulled out every die cut from MME that I had that went with these pages from Good Day Sunshine and sort of dumped them on the page with the actual event tickets and sorted them until I liked how it looked. 

MME Good Day Sunshine papers
MME Good Day Sunshine chipboard and die cuts
MME Abbey Road die cuts
MME Follow Your Heart chipboard hexagon and blue twine
MME Fine and Dandy ric rac ribbon
Silhouette Studio "Traffic Callouts"
Paper Studios Button brads
Ranger Distress Ink walnut stain
Silhouette Cameo
Sewing machine, white thread
Mesh

I am also entering this page into The Paper Girls Challenge Blog - Challenge 12 - use some mesh on your project. My mesh came from a bag of marbles and was just the perfect size to stretch across the page as a ribbon. I then sewed it down with the ric rac. 

Project Goal 100

To date: 20

MCM 93

Scrapbooksteals Monday Card Madness is always a starting point for me in my crafting week. Unless I have a challenge I'm specifically following these sketches are the basis of my weekly card evolution. Sometimes it's a graphic element that I carry on, sometimes it's the paper's "look."

MCM 93

I'm really trying to get through some of the stuff that I bought in my early scrap days (so things before I discovered that I can always scrap with the good paper and the random stuff that I bought while I was deciding my style preferences). Out came the stash of Fancy Pants - I'd purchased a Scrapbooksteals Mega Paper Kit (one of my first dozen steals) and am very very slowly making my way through it.

This card features paper from Like Father Like Son line as well as piece from Kraft Kuts. The sentiment is Pebbles. I inked the card and embellishments using Ranger Distress Ink in Walnut Stain.

As a side note, this is the first card in my next stash for Operation Write Home. YAY! 

Project Goal 100

To date: 18

Hero

When a friend lost a distant cousin who'd been in the armed forces at first I didn't think to much of it, I just said a prayer for the family and went on with my day. A few days later she told me that the funeral was getting a little negative attention and the community was engaging to create a human wall - wearing red. I've been to a funeral where that group was present and they make me ill - I was now a little more emotionally involved. No one needs those guys around!

This friend happens to be the one who got me involved in Pinterest, so she saw this as an opportunity to  test out a project idea. She wanted to bleach t-shirts with some text/graphic for her and a mutual friend to wear to the wall. We ended up cutting a file from the Silhouette store and set to work bleaching over the die cut. The darker red shirt was the first we did, as a "tester" and turned out AWESOME. I love how the dog tags just pops off the shirt. The true red shirts she'd bought didn't absorb the bleach as well so we used some spray ink to help the tag pop out a bit. That ink took a seriously long time to dry but looks pretty cool. 

Some two thousand people from our community (and some neighboring ones!) went to stand in support of family and country. I ended up staying home with the kiddos while Scientist stood in the heat for hours. I'm glad I was able to do something to help, even if it was just a silly shirt. 

MWM Pearl 2 - Potato Cheese

This week's Scrapbooksteals.com Mid Week Mojo was by one of the design team, Katrina Hunt. I love this sketch! It's got a lot of fun potential but still a fairly clean sketch. 

For my interpretation I used pics of Squishy and American Crafts Campy Trails. The colors worked perfectly with his shirt, plus there were all those fab little banners that I could fussy cut instead of trying to make them on my own or pull out the Cameo. 

I did pull out a machine though - my sewing machine and stitched the banner into place. I also sewed on two other embelly pieces just to accent them a little bit. 

Also, really fun on this one is the addition of the DIY Thickers. Eek! How crazy fun. I used the new green Pop! beads. I love how they look but they kept flaking off and rolling all over my desk, which was ever so slightly annoying. To solve the problem for this page, I just coated them in glossy accents. So in the pic they look really solid and thick, but in person you can see the texture, but you can't get to the beads. Perfect. 

American Crafts Campy Trails
American Crafts DIY Thickers
American Crafts Pop! beads
Glitz Designs mini alphas
Blue Toothpicks
Sewing Machine, white thread
Ranger Distress Ink, fine china
October Afternoon All Aboard Sprinkler

Project Goal 100

To date: 19

Authentique - July Color Challenge - Pieces of my heart

I do love a good challenge. Add Authentique into the mix and I'm there! This month's Color Challenge  was an extra stretch for me though. I only have two lines of their papers and a few of the 6x6 pads and extra goodies from 2 more. That's not a lot of options when you don't generally buy pink and two of four colors are pinks! 

The July Color Challenge

But I made it work in the end. I remembered that Stephanie, one of the girls who is also frequently a part of the Scrapbooksteals Facebook community, had posted a page using 6x6 pieces in a swirl, showing just part of each paper. Perfect since most of my pink and all of my green papers were in tiny size.

I inked up all the edges with Ranger Distress Inks, fussy cut out the doilies, slapped on the Prima ribbon, folded up some Imaginesce flowers into clusters and adhered them, then added some extra flair with $1 bin gemstones. It wasn't quite enough though. I kept feeling like something was missing and realized I'd forgotten a space for journaling (very important to me) so I created a border around the page with the text and it was just. right. Go back and say that again in the voice you use when reading Goldilocks and the Three Bears because that's how I felt about it. 

Not bad for someone who gravitates to blues...

Authentique Product List:
Free Bird Series One: Familiar
Free Bird Series One: Delight
Free Bird: Poised and Warmth
Gathering Foundations Bi-fold Solid
Uncommon Original
Splendid Icons and
Splendid Tabloids

Other Products:
Ranger Distress Ink, Walnut Stain
Prima ribbon
Imaginesce flowers
Michael's $1 bin gems
American Crafts Metallic Marker

Project Goal 100

To date: 18

Half way Challenge

Because this year is a leap year the exact half way through 2012 hit while we were on vacation - July 1st. Which is pretty much perfect for me since MME issued a challenge to scrap that halfway point in some way - the previous 6 months, the month, the day. I chose pictures of Squirrel enjoying the Seattle Aquarium on the first. This was definitely one of the highlights of vacation. He loved it and has asked several times for us to take him back!

As the starting point of my page I used the scrapbooksteals.com MWM sketch of the week, Pearl 2. I took it to the next level by expanding it out into a double page layout. Which is something I don't normally worry about doing, but when you have to get in all those vacation pics it is a handy trick and a good personal challenge. Nine pics on two pages is pretty good given how often I do a single picture per page. 

Paper, brads, jute and ribbon are all various MME collections: The Good Life, Lush, Laundry Line, Abbey Road, and Follow your Heart. The starfish border is from the Silhouette store. All the paper was inked with Distress Inks - Broken China and/or Walnut Stain. I also did a little machine stitching. Ribbon flowers were adhered using Scotch Quick Dry Adhesive and then have a Studio G glitter glue center.

Project Goal 100

To date: 17

Buggy Business

Squishy's birthday party is about two weeks away which means lots of crafting flurry for it! On the agenda:

1. Mailing invitations (see below, with coordinating thank you card!)
2. Create a buggy chandelier to hang over the food table
3. Buggy vinyl for the walls - needs to be cut and weeded until it's time to hang
4. Stick "fly" stickers to the red and white checked tablecloth. 
5. Buy party favors 
6. Plan menu (ants on a log and bug juice anyone?)
7. Creative food labels

Cardstock - stash
Stickers - Target $1 bin
Pebbles - Thank you rub-on
Silhouette and Sketch pens
Font Amy Lou
WRMK Sew Stamper

Does anyone else get teased for doing "big" parties for little kids? Ummm, I make the stuff because it's more fun for me that way and at least if I go overboard it really just means I was busy having fun!!!

Project Goal 100

To date: 15

Renewed Challenge

Things have been crazy at work and the Scientist is really needing to finish up his PhD which led me to make a tough family choice - continuing being a huge stress ball and rarely see my hubby -or- make a change. Considering we couldn't afford for me to quit, I chose to demote myself within the company and work fewer hours so he can work more. While not common, this does happen at times (IMO, more people just quit but benefits are good). For the first time in over 6 years I am no longer a manager of any kind. I worked three shifts as just an employee last week and it was so weird, novel, refreshing. I'm sure at some point the joys of it will unnerve me, but for now I'll revel in it's glory.

I'm not already reveling in is the $$$ part. Demotion = pay cut = less money for scrappy fun.

The bonus of "less money for scrappy fun" = a new challenge. There just isn't money to buy a lot of gifts and things so I'm going to be making as many Christmas presents, home decor items, birthday party decorations (you get the idea), the big challenge being that I need to figure out how to customize it to the individual/event from my current stash.

I've known for a month that this was coming and sort of loaded up while I could! LOL. The only thing I didn't buy that I know I need is some black vinyl for redecorating the boys' room. Their Christmas and birthday from us (unless grandparents chip in!) is a bunk bed, bedding, and theme change. Right now it is mostly decorated with leftover decorations from Squirrel's Cars party last year, some of those will stay as I'm switching it to a Toy Themed room (sort of Toy Story-esque, but less focus on just those guys and more just on toys). Hence the vinyl, I want to do large silhouettes of some recognizable toys to hang on the wall. Hoping to see some on SS before November so I can whip them up in time for a birthday party with the same theme (and just relocate as I did last year).

For this challenge the rules are:

• Goal Completion Date of Dec. 31, 2012
• Spend no more than $15 per boy birthday party on decorations/flair (August and December birthdays), excluding vinyl
• Spend no more than $20 per month on other crafty fun, not including adhesive
• Spend no more than $40 while at Scrapbooksteals warehouse while there in October
• Create 100 projects: Pages = 1, Cards = 1, duplicated cards of 3 or more = 2 per set
• Continue creating cards for OWH

Notice I'm not trying to spend "no money until ## done." That didn't work so well, and this is really about correcting a spending habit as much as about using up hoarded materials. :)

To get the crafting party started off right, here's my first set of projects. These are the last of the cards I could make before needing to ship off a box for the We Are Memory Keepers card drive for Operation Write Home. All of these cards feature American Crafts Campy Trail papers and Ranger Ink Distress Inks - Walnut Stain and/or Broken China, additional products used are in captions.

Studio G Green Glitter Glue
Brilliance Black Ink
Stamp - stash

Paper Studios Square Eyelets
Jewelry Cord

Jewelry cord
Jenni Bowlin mini alphas

Crackle Accents (on "Christmas" shaped tree)
Machine stitching

Jewelry Cord
Glossy Accents on "Christmas" tree
Paper Studios White Eyelets

WRMK Sew Stamper
Machine stitching
Glossy Accents on patch

BasicGrey Blue Brads
WRMK Sew Stamper
Stamp - unknown

Project Goal 100
To date: 7

Authentique July Sketch - Magic Moments

We happened to be at my mom's house on Palm Sunday when I got a call from my sister saying they were coming for a visit the following weekend. They live 17 hours away (longer with kids!) and since the last time I'd seen her we'd both had babies so we quickly changed our Easter plans in order to make the trip again the following weekend. We were all so busy socializing that I forgot to take a lot of pictures of the four cousins playing together, there's a couple more but these are the best of the bunch, and two of them were taken at The Magic House (hence the title)! I'm thinking I'll do a couple more pages and then pick one to frame as a Christmas present for my sister and her hubs.


The sketch I used was from Authentique's July Sketch Challenge. I did flip the sketch to use horizontal pictures but tried to stay true to the feeling. ;)

Authentique Product List:
Gathering Tabloids
Gathering Grow 12x12
Gathering Together 12x12
Petite Type Circle Blue
Blissful Pleasant 12x12
Blissful 6x6 pad

Other Products:
Jenni Bowlin Dimensional Butterflies
Paper Studios Affinity Ribbon
Studio G Glitter Glue
American Crafts Amy Tangerine Thickers - Lovely
Distress Ink - broken china and walnut stain
October Afternoon Sprinklers - Set Sail
BasicGrey Paper Ribbon Doilies - Kioshi
Prima Say It in Pearls - Vintage Branch

Homemade Monday: Counting the days

Do you remember as a child, the looooooong wait until something special. You'd nag your mom about how many more days until it was supposed to happen? Yep, she'd get tired of it, then bust out the scissors and a stapler and make a countdown chain. As a kid, mom normally made mine out of construction paper in a color scheme appropriate for the event - Christmas, the team colors, etc.

Well, I'm pretty excited about the Scrapbooksteals.com Crop in October. Right. October. So very far away! I know. But I had a little free time between loads of vacation laundry and set to work using papers that while pretty in this picture I'd never use on a layout about my guys (Princess!).

I had the Scientist help me string it up using holes already in our bedroom. And then I attached this sign to it:

All of the paper in the chain is from MME Lost and Found (I bought one of those HUGE paper packs before discovering Scrapbooksteals). Most of the other pink papers are various other MME collections, I do think a Fancy Pants scrap slipped into the mix too. The alphas are an assortment of PiggyTales Twinkle Twinkle, BasicGrey Oliver and some Target $1 bin. I don't remember where the brads came from, but I do remember they were one of my first SS steals!

Upcycled Tea Tins

While catching up on some of my favorite manufacturer blogs I stumbled across a post on Authentique where the blogger had repurposed tea tins as pen cups by redecorating them.

Now I don't know if you realize this, but as a Barista I get a pound of coffee or a tin of tea every week. Free.  That's a lot of potential waste! I've held onto several of the actual tins since we switched from cardboard boxes, most have been donated to charities or to other Baristas with projects. I finally found a project I wanted to use mine to do.

Container of Crayola Glitter Glue (I like to use these instead of Stickles for cards I'll give away. Stickles are just so expensive, though I do prefer their quality for my pages.)

This one got all my Snake Tape runners. 

I love having these little extras more accessible, plus it freed up space in my Silhouette Advent Calendar for some of my Washi obsession. 

Both tins have MME Lost and Found Union Square bases, with Authentique die cuts. The top tin has two buttons from Paper Studios Affinity and some MME Lush Brown ribbon and generic floss. The bottom tin has some Michael's $1 bin Rhinestone clusters (broken up to fit the space) and the scalloped papers have Crackle Accents. I used a Quickdry liquid adhesive to get them really stuck in place.

Fairly simple, this project took less than 20 minutes. I foresee a lot of tea in my future because these would make awesome packages for Christmas cookies for our neighbors!

Now to find a use for all those coffee bags.

vacation cards

Here are two cards I made while on vacation. I sure am glad that I brought scrappy supplies since I'm not a huge TV person and when you're trying to give little guys a break from sight seeing there's not much to do in a hotel room. I had tons of FUN!

Both cards use MME Miss Caroline Dilly Dally and Fiddlesticks. The bottom card also has a Follow Your Heart Be Amazing dimensional sticker and twine.

Vacation pages

In addition to the MWM and a page that I made for the MME July challenge that I completed while on vacation I also made did these two pages following older "gem stone" MWM sketches. I think I probably already used one of these because working with it seemed familiar but it's amazing how even two pages based on the same sketch don't turn out the same!

MWM #8

Can I just say that threading that twine through the #1 card was very difficult since I left my piercer at home on accident? Sooooo time consuming!

MWM #9

Both pages use MME Miss Caroline Dilly Dally - papers, brads, twine, die cuts. The double pager background is Echo Park This and That Charming cardstock.

PGC - I love you

Pretty much all about the challenge these days, so when the Paper Girls Challenge Blog issued up using some of my rub-ons I was game. Instead of creating a page I decided to make a card that I can replicate easily using scraps and add to my pile of cards for Operation Write Home. And those cards need to get done, STAT, so I can get them into the mail.

I have a few other sentiments that are the same size so I should be able to make a bunch of these in no time to give the Heros a little variety.

Papers: Echo Park This and That Charming Cardstock

Paper Studios Affinity Cream print

MME Miss Caroline Fiddlesticks 6x6

Brad: MME Follow Your Heart Be Amazing

Rub-on: Pebbles

ColorBox Chestnut Roan 

monochromatic challenge

Designing in monochrome is a challenge enough but when MME published that the first July challenge was going to be monochrome my heart sunk a bit. I'd brought some paper with me on vacation in hopes of doing the challenge but it was all fairly colorful. Necessity is the mother of invention, so with a little tweaking/modifying/altering items in my stash I managed to pull this page off!

Pattern papers are MME Miss Caroline Dilly Dally and Fiddlesticks

Cream paper is stash

Hexagon die cuts are MME Follow Your Heart Be Amazing

Thickers are American Crafts Amy Tangerine

Mini Alphas are Echo Park This and That

Colorbox Chestnut Roan for inking

Studio G Black glitter glue

Black pen for faux stitching