Very Mary

A quick holiday card...

Hope you all had a Happy Thanksgiving! We celebrated in style here with a big dinner for the three of us! (Less pressure to be a perfect chef if there are no guests involved.) Besides the fact that the pumpkin pie required an extra 40 minutes in the oven and totally screwed up my timetable causing me to delay dinner by an hour and subsequently burn the bottom of my homemade rolls, all went well. And was very enjoyable. Enjoyable enough that I have volunteered my culinary services to make a turkey dinner for Christmas Day. Wish me luck!

I have some photos from the big day, but like the majority of my photos, I have not edited them, and if I'm honest, I'll admit that I probably won't even look at them until after Christmas. Such is my busy life. :)

But not so busy that I can't stop and make a quick holiday card to share:

Supplies:

• Bo Bunny Chocolate Double Dot patterned paper
  
• American Crafts Boarding Pass patterned paper
  
• Hero Arts Houndstooth rubber stamp
• Hero Arts ClearDesign Frames and Messages stamp set
• Versamark watermark ink
• American Crafts white embossing powder
• American Crafts silver mini brads
• Doodlebug Designs Lily White Flocking Powder
• Provo Craft Cricut diecutting machine
• Provo Craft Accent Essentials cartridge

A few things to note:

• This is a lift of one of Kristina Werner's cards from her class A Year in Cards: November 2009, which details three great ideas for simple, easy to make holiday cards.
• With the exception of the silver brads, the entire card is made with scraps!
• The snowflake is a diecut from the Accent Essentials cartridge. I inked it up with liquid glue and covered it with white flocking powder.

And now....to work on our family Christmas card...

World Card Making Day (and a RAK from Banana Frog)

Are you making cards this Saturday? Well, you should! It's World Card Making Day or WCMD to the paper junkies of the world.

Here's my contribution to the celebration:

Supplies: Patterned Paper: October Afternoon, Scenic Route Paper Co., Stamps: Raindrop Background, Thinking of You Makes Me Smile by Hero Arts; Ink: Colorbox; Ribbon: American Crafts; Stickpin: Making Memories; Die-cut: Home Decor Solutions by Provo Craft

I bought that stamp from Hero Arts specifically so that I could color it! I used colored pencils, but you could easily use watercolors or copic markers. The possibilities!

You can find more fabulous cards and great ideas for how to celebrate WCMD on the WCMD blog and the Moxie Fab World blog. And while you're there, be sure to leave a comment so that you have a chance to win some scrappy goodness!

And right here on my blog, I'll be giving away a set of Banana Frog stamps perfect for using on your next card! Beverley - the owner of Banana Frog - has generously given me several sets to share, and today, I'm going to be giving away It's All About...Arrows:

This is only open to North American residents. Leave a comment here (by Sunday midnight MST) and I will draw a name on Monday, October 5th.

Happy cardmaking! :)

Good Things Come in Threes...

Isn't that what they always say? So true.

Check it out right here: Write.Click.Scrapbook.

I'm joining the inspiration collective! Seriously fabulous group of ladies. So many of whom I have admired for a long time.

So that translates into more scrapbooking right here. (Possibly a little less blogging, but still...more scrapbooking! Yay!) And that's always a good thing, right? :)

The Write.Click.Scrapbook. theme for October is Eye on Design. A few of my favorites:

• The Last Quiz (I love the journaling in quiz format, and those snippets of photos are a great way to include multiple photos and still keep the design clean.)
• Fun at King's Island (Cool, linear design, and I Iove the stars.)
• Finding Fall (Leaf prints...great accent! All the fall photos are making me want to get out and document before the season is gone!)

For my page, I mixed some old and new patterned papers with digi paper and frames to create a Halloween layout. I finally documented some of my snapshots from last year:

You can find more details about the design here, but I wanted to show you a few detail shots of the little butterfly. I stamped him in black ink, colored with colored pencils, and then overstamped with glue, so I could apply velvet flock. He's attached with foam adhesive because I love the added dimension:

The entire center of my layout is also popped up with foam adhesive:

I'm officially in Halloween mode, and as you can see, it's seeped right into my scrap studio. Fitting, though, since it's October 1st and all. I'm ok with that. I have a few more pumpkin photos from last year to scrap. What are you scrappin' these days?

Supplies: Cardstock, Patterned Paper: Making Memories, Little Yellow Bicycle, Digital Paper: Spooky Scary Kit by Jen Allyson, Roll With the Punches Kit by Michelle Underwood, Digital Frames: Curled White Photo Frames by Mary Ann Wise, Stamp: Hero Arts, Versamark: Tsukineko, Flocking Powder: Doodlebug Designs, Clear Frame: Little Yellow Bicycle, Gemstones: Hero Arts

Today (a layout)

The American Crafts Studio Blog challenge for last week:

Here's mine (sorry for the yuck photo...it's late and dark outside...I'll update this tomorrow with a nicer photo):

I used a whole sheet of stickers from American Crafts' Moda Bella line. I didn't even peel them off the clear backing, just attached it to a piece of white cardstock and stitched it to my layout. Wish I'd thought of it sooner because I really like the burst of color and up 'til now, I had a hard time using these stickers...just couldn't commit! ;)

 You can see that I inserted a little photo into the sticker frame:

The journaling is a combination from two sources:

• The "Slice of Life" quiz from Simple Scrapbooks Scrapbook Shortcuts with Quizzes and Questions
• An inspiring set of prompts called "For Today" that my friend Heather posts every so often (I really love when she posts them, and I've been wanting to do the same on my blog

It's not too clear in the photos, but I used Hero Arts Houndstooth to stamp the turquoise paper.

Okay, that's it for me this evening. Good night, y'all!

Supplies: Stickers, patterned paper, ribbon: American Crafts; Punch: Fiskars; Stamp: Hero Arts; Buttons: Basic Grey

Paolo (a layout)

I have a little music crush. Maybe I've mentioned him before? Mr. Paolo Nutini? Yes, maybe once or twice. I just can't help my fan-girl tendencies. (Never mind the fact that I'm a good 15 years beyond the age of your typical fan-girl.)

I love Paolo. I love scrapbooking. It was only a matter of time...

We can blame the American Crafts Studio Blog:

And as Derrick says, "Paolo is just going to LOVE this."

The super-size star, which is very similar to Paolo's tattoo, is from Provo Craft's new Hannah Montana cartridge. (Tell me, do you think Paolo would love to be linked in any way to Miley Cyrus?)

Did you notice anything very "un-Mary" about this layout? *GASP* I used paint! Shocking, no? It made a great foundation for the photos (btw: from Paolo's website) and journaling, and it wasn't nearly as messy as I anticipated, so I think I just might be a convert. After all, I need to get in touch with my artsy self.

After painting, I stamped with Hero Arts Dots and then stitched a frame around the edge of the cardstock. The title letters are vinyl Thickers that I backed with cardstock, and the cool little spiral is a rub-on from the Rock-star accents MiniMarks.

I accented the main photo with a pink flourish die-cut from the Hannah Montana cartridge and embellished with a Precision Pen.

And there you have it, one of the first pages for my new "There's Something About Mary" album. And do you suppose that with all this free advertising, I should petition for a few concert tickets?

Supplies: Patternd Paper, Flair, Rub-on, Thickers, Pen: American Crafts; Stamp: Hero Arts; Die-cuts: Provo Craft; Paint: Folk Art

Hero Arts!

I've been on an involuntary stamping hiatus this summer, but I think Monday will bring the cure for my current case of stamper's block...did you know that Hero Arts is launching a new website??! The celebration begins on Monday with lots of creative ideas (as usual) and lots of prizes (can I get a Woooo-hooooo??!), so be sure to tune in for the big surprise! Here's a little hint just for you:

Happy Friday!

Dream Big (a layout)

As promised, how ever many days ago...

Here is my other layout for my friend Heather's album:

Jonathan asked us to create a page with a photo of ourselves and some words of wisdom or encouragement for Heather. I chose to journal about how she inspires me. She is always challenging herself. Always. Heather just isn't a person who sits back and lets things happen, and frankly, she doesn't give herself enough credit for that. She works very hard at life. Sometimes even (most of the time, if I'm feeling honest here), she makes me feel downright lazy. I could do without that part, but if nothing else, she certainly inspires me to get moving. :)

I went very clean and simple on this layout. So much so that I skipped my trademark stitching, but added dimension by popping up the middle portion of the layout with foam adhesive. "Dream big" is from the Graphically Speaking cartridge, and I used one of my favorite Hero Arts stamp sets: Thank You Flourishes.

I like it. I might have to recreate something similar for my own book. You know what they say...no sense reinventing the wheel and all that.

Oh, and someone else likes it too...

Scrapbooker- in-training? Yes, yes I think so.

Supplies: Die-cut cartridge: Provo Craft; Butterflies: American Crafts; Stamps, gems: Hero Arts

Back in action...

Did y'all miss me? I'm going to ease back into this whole blogging thing. Honestly though, right about now, scrapbooking seems really boring to me, and I feel really boring, and life feels really boring. Boring. Boring. Boring. I think they call that a Twilight hangover?

But in any case...I DID promise something scrappy, didn't I?

Here's a card from the March issue of Cards magazine:

This card was created specifically to use up those Chatterbox flowers because, you know, I simply can't tolerate flowers cluttering up my scrap space. The stamps are Hero Arts Fancy Flourishes and From the Heart Greetings.

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Scenic Route Paper Co., Flowers, Buttons, Gems: Chatterbox Inc. Stamps: Hero Arts; Paper Frills: Doodlebug Designs; Colored Pencils: Crayola

Butterfly Thanks (a card)

Too busy to get overly sidetracked by bloggin', so just a quick card share and a promise to be back later this week with (hopefully) more exciting things!

I made a card almost exactly like this for my friend Laura, so while I had all the supplies out, I made a few copies. One of them was picked up for publication in Cards magazine!

I added the American Crafts butterfly rub-on to vellum, trimmed it out and attached it to a stamped tag (Hero Arts Circle Tag), which fits perfectly in the Stampin' Up scallop punch! The stamp underneath the sentiment is from the Hero Arts Fancy Flourishes set.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Supplies: Patterned Paper: Making Memories; Stamps: Hero Arts; Rub-on: American Crafts; Punch; Stampin' Up; Sticker: Creative Imaginations; Buttons: The Paper Studio

You Make Me Smile (a card)

During the majority of my scraptime (Sadie's sleep time) this weekend, I worked on my Italy album. When I started to feel less creative and more like an assembly line, I took a break to make a card for the Hero Arts Club blog challenge. Last week's challenge was to create a card using one-layer. Meaning no cute patterned paper strips, no scallop strips, no matting. No glue, even. Right down to the nitty gritty of stamping with lots of masking and colored pencils. Here's what I came up with:

1. I stamped the elephant (from the ClearDesign: Elephants set) on the card. And again on scratch paper to use as a mask.
2. I used the negative image from the image stamped onto scratch paper to mask around the elephant so I could stamp him with Scattered Flowers Design Block.
3. I masked a small circle and inked with yellow for the sentiment (from the ClearDesign: Thinking of You Messages set).
4. I masked the yellow circle and the elephant and used a large circle mask so I could ink a green circle around the elephant.
5. I colored several circles on the card background using masking. You could also use a set of circle stamps. I stamped each circle with the Scattered Flowers stamp.
6. I masked each circle and the elephant and stamped the card with Raindrop Background Design Block.
7. Added a stamped scallop (from the ClearDesign: Scallop Borders set) along the top.
8. Colored everything with pencils, and added a little bowtie (I couldn't resist - it was hard enough scrapping without patterned paper).
 
Phew! So much planning for one little card, no? It was challenge for sure, but I am really good at masking now. Well, at least I think so. :)