Spring Inspiration

On Ranger's blog site they have a little challenge/inspiration Earthy palette going on.  Since the theme was Earth Day, I tried to upcycle for this project.

So to start, I had this piece of chipboard from the back of a paper pad, that through serendipity of paint on fabric, ended up with this great background.  What can't be seen from the photo is all the great texture.  Love lumpy bumpy!

 I used a piece to make a tag.

 I coloured the edges with Broken China Distress Ink

 I then took a white paper bag and used my distress marker on my mat, sprayed with water and created this background. After it dried, I used my punch to cut out flowers.

 Next, I then used alcohol inks on a piece of plastic packaging.

 And cut out a butterfly.

 I did the marker technique again on another scrap of paper bag but in green.

 I free hand cut out leaves.

 To complete, I used Tim's paper tape and folded it onto itself to make a paper ribbon.  I didn't think the butterfly was vibrant enough, so I added more dark blue alcohol ink. Very happy with the results, which I may use for a layout.   And so here is my finished tag!

Scrapfest Kitchener 2013

This past weekend, I had a fantastic time participating in Scrapfest in Kitchener.  I am lucky to join the team at Pointer Scrapbooking and we set up the booth on Friday afternoon.  After the mad frenzy of setting up the booth, I was up to do the first Make n' Take. This session I showcased this box and walked participants through using stencils, Distress Inks and the Scor-Pal tool.

Love this stencil I used from the Crafters's Workshop!

While at the show I shopped a little, I could not resist getting some of these paints from Ranger to play with soon!  Love all the properties and will report back what I've been up to shortly! I haven't even opened them and I know I NEED more colours!

Pinterest Inspired

Those who know me, know that I am addicted to the site Pinterest.  There is so much inspiration and tutorials for the crafters. Many recipes for the cook in me and so many handy tips.  Here are two things I recently did that I got off Pinterest.

This blanket is for my nephew, who's father is a huge football fan.  I had intended it for Christmas but as we all know that time of year just gets way too busy for everyone (in other words - what was I thinking!).  I now hope to give it to him for Easter. Anyhow I took the original pattern and increased it by about 15% using polar fleece instead of chenille.  There was no pattern for the white parts, so I winged it. I used satin stitch to attach the white stripes to the blanket and added a single crochet to the edges to "finish" the blanket.  I'm pretty happy with the end results.

One of my other addictions is washi tape and people have been pinning all sorts of great storage ideas. By far my favourite for my crazy stash has been the use of a pant hanger. Here is my crazy tape obsession. Top two tiers are washi and the others are either cellophane tape or fabric tape - which are just as yummy!  Now that I see them all layed out, I can play with them much easier 'cause I'm the kind of crafter that has to see it, to use it!

Super Hero Life

Well the munchkin man finally turned 6 and we celebrated with a Superhero themed party. I had so much fun, and Pinterest was a big player in all the planning.  I also was lucky to have a friend who provided me with all the comic books in digital format - loved decorating with them (and dear husband thinks it should be a permanent fixture now).

I even got into the groove of things and put on my handmade Wonder Woman tiara and t-shirt. I think every mom woman out there should be donning this glittery head-piece!

So was wandering Michaels trying to find yarn and look what I found - this paper pad! Which of course had to come home with me and my luck it was 40% off this week. Wahoooooo!

Will try and get the layouts done to share with you. I'm so inspired by this paper now!

Also thought I would share some of my layouts from my Rapid Fire Class I teach at Pointer Scrapbooking.  These are my layouts for January and February. |If you are ever in the area and have an incline to finish 6 layouts in about 2 hours, come join me. Love adding techniques in each layouts, so hopefully you will learn something new.   March and April's layouts are in the store now, and have a vintage feel to them. Come into the store to see it is something you'd like to do.

Made a pocket with 6x6 patterned paper and lots of stamping ont his LO

Inky splats and stamping

Stamping, stencils, glitter techniques

Masking, paint, stamps and stencils

Alcohol inks and punches

What's on the craft table?

I would not have guessed that my life would be so full of Superhero stuff when I was about to have a boy in  life. But here we are in full swing of planning a soon to be 6 year old party based on said theme! And you know what, it's pretty darn fun!

I finished sewing the boys felt masks, based on patterns I  found on Pinterest recently, from this blog. Next up are the Wonder Woman tiaras for the girls attending.  

The invite characters were from an Etsy vendor, Melon Headz Doodles. Pretty darn cute!  I imported the images into Photoshop Elements and did a simple design with for the invite.

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

I thought I could share with you the two cards I made, for the 2 guys I love with all my heart.   I love heart doillies and this was the perfect excuse to use them. Hubbies card features a journaling card from Jillibean soup. Son's card is showcasing a print from the superhero comics again. Those comics are one of the best gifts ever!

Playing in my art journal

Lately I've been playing in my art journal. I find it incredibly freeing to play with all sorts of media and allowing me to be expressive. What started out as an intro class I was teaching at Pointer scrapbooking, has become a recent passion in my creative journey. Here are some of pages and hopefully you are inspired to play also.  These first pages were about playing with technique. The later ones were also about play but had more thought put into them.

Cover with book pages, paint and stamping. Play with colour combo.

Painting, misting and stencils

Paint, drippage ala Donna Downey, stencils, glitter, Sharpie marker

Hidden journaling, gesso, paint, stamps, colour combos

Paint, gesso, glitter

Paint combo, paint pen, messy journaling, stamping

Paint, stamp, distress ink

Colour combo, ink and paint, stamping

Desparate times require creativity

So its Chinese new year and as a Girl Guide leader we are celebrating with our girls.  So here we are at 10pm, the night before the meeting and no red pockets to be found anywhere close to where I live!  Well I decided to make some! Using red card stock, my Martha Stewart scorer, a Bo Bunny and Hero Arts stamp set, I was good to go.  Not authentic but good enough I think!!!

Mixed Media Canvas

Thought I could share some Mixed Media canvas' I did as a fun class at Pointer Scrapbooking a couple of months ago.  I made these on 5x7"canvas board and thought that if you don't use them as canvas', then with your Crop-o-dile, you could easily make them into mini-album or art-journal covers. Just all around fun!  

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Teaching at Pointer Scrapbooking

This past weekend I was lucky enough to teach these lovely ladies at Pointer Scrapbooking the winter layouts using Little Yellow Bicycles Winterings collection.  If you get a chance, I will be teaching this one more time in February. Lots of stamping, glitter and bling to be had. Call the store for details if you'd like to join me.

Scrapping Mojo

Last weekend I went away with some of my Scrappy friends to a weekend long crop. It was the scrappy mojo I needed to kick start this year.
Here are two of the projects that I got done on the weekend. Thanks to my Superhero fanatic friend for the comic books, which provided the backgrounds for the banner and layouts. The comics were in PDF format and I printed them out onto cardstock. Easy peasy! These comics were originally for my big and little guy to peruse, but I've accosted them, and am very happy to use them for scrappy goodness! Definitely future projects with comics to come!
I also completed the current rapid fire class for Pointer Scrapbooking. No sneak peak photos but will try to post some soon.

Finally done

Happy New Year everyone. One of my goals this year is to make this blog seem more alive than it has this past year. So far I'm not doing so well but here it - my first post for the year.  So I finally finished that sweater for my dear son. Based on the fit, I think I just made it in time -phew!