Just Plain Pretty

Another one for my SIL's pack!

Happy Creative Wednesday!

Card Specs:

Cardstock: PTI - white, SU! Regal Rose and Brushed Silver
DP: The Paper Source
Stamps: PTI - Shapes By Design
Ink: Black Staz-on, SU! Regal Rose, Ink It Up pigment ink in Metallic Silver
Embellishments: Making Memory Brads, SU! Photo Corner Punch, Polka Dotted Ribbon - Michael's, SU! Slit Punch, Foam Adhesive Squares, Copic markers in Lipstick Red and Special Black

Being busy...

is SO good for me!! I love when I'm in a really inspired phase...you all know it. We go in and out of them and I'm in one at the moment and it's so nice because I've been kind of 'off' lately.

I hope that everyone is enjoying this lovely New England heat!!



Card Specs:

Cardstock: PTI - white, SU! Green Galore, Bashful Blue, Cameo Coral
DP: American Crafts - Spring & Summer line in - English Garden
Stamps: PTI - Butterfly Kisses
Ink: Brilliance in Pearlescent Sky Blue
Embellishments: Monochromatic stitched ribbon from ACM and pink/red polka dots from Michael's

'Tis The Season!

For weddings that is! Here's another from a batch that I'm making for my SIL!

Card Specs:

Cardstock: SU! Soft Sky, Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla
DP: Kaiser
Stamps: PTI Sweet Love
Ink: Brilliance Pearlescent Sky Blue and Color Box Brown Craft Ink
Embellishments: The Paper Source embossing powder, American Crafts ribbon, foam adhesive dots

I hope that everyone is having a very creative start to the week!!

To The Happy Couple

My darling SIL has placed an order with me and in that order was a request for a couple of wedding cards. I LOVE doing wedding cards. I find them fun and romantic. I rifled through my GIGANTIC stack of DP (to those of you who follow along...yes...I did manage to fill the awesome paper cart that went along with my room reno for my bday...and I filled it VERY fast - 1750 sheets of 12x12...and I'm quite positive that I've managed to STUFF more than that in the cart) but I digress!!!

I rifled through and found this BEAUTIFUL chocolate and vanilla swirly baroque looking paper and I knew that was what I wanted to work with. I used the long note size (9 1/4 x 4) because wedding cards are often kept so I really wanted it to have some presence. I chose Ruby Red to pair along with the 2 neutrals. I heat embossed the giant flower from the SU! set Fabulous Flowers using my Brilliance Ink pads in Pearlescent Poppy and Pearlescent Beige. I used a brad in the center of each flower to anchor them visually but wanted some kind of sentiment on the outside. I have heat embossed Congratulations in the Poppy on the inside but I still wanted something extra outside. I've been dying to use my new PTI Sweet Love set so I busted that out and mounted 5 of the tiny phrases on an acrylic block, inked it up with the Poppy ink and stamped them on SU! Very Vanilla cardstock. I grabbed a bookplate from my stash of goodies then decided to run SU! 5/8" chocolate grosgrain ribbon behind it and mounted it all together using Making Memory tiny silver brads. I tied the ribbon in a knot (a bow was too fussy). I adhered the flowers to the card using foam adhesive. I'm thrilled with how this came out!



Card Specs: Cardstock: SU! Rose Red, Chocolate Chip and Very Vanilla
Designer Paper: Kaiser Scrapbook - Elegance line - Victoria Stamps: PTI - Sweet Love, SU! Warmest Regards Ink: Brilliance Ink - Pearlescent Poppy and Pearlescent Beige Embellishments: Basic Grey Brads, Making Memory Brads, SU! 5/8" grosgrain ribbon - chocolate, bookplate - JoAnn's house brand, foam adhesive

Spectacular Tribute - Round 2!

Here is the next installment in the tribute album that I did that I went on and on and on about in this post. Pages 2 and 3 are a handwritten letter from Grandmother to Granddaughter about the Great-Grandmother. It's so lovely and touching. (and yes...I have permission to post this!)

I hope that everyone is having a very creative 4th!!

Father's Day II

My husband has always been romantic. So for Father's Day I wanted to make him something that reflected his personality. I gave him a 90 minute massage at a local spa as his gift and wanted to include it in the card somehow. I love the long cards so I started with that as a base. The red strip that you see inside was the 'holder' for the gift card. I used adhesive on the edges but also towards the middle - which I usually wouldn't do - but I wanted the gift card to fit snuggly without slipping out and flopping around in the envelope. It did the trick! He loved the card and the gift. =)

I hope that everyone has a very creative 4th!!!



Card Specs:

Cardstock: Paper Source - chocolate, SU! Real Red
Designer Paper: SEI - Jolie Chocolate and Rubber Soul - Garden Variety Collection
Stamps: Amuse
Ink: Brilliance - Coffee Bean
Embellishments: Tab - SU! Rose Cottage Simply Scrappin' Kit, Basic Grey Brad, Doodlebug Sugar Coating Glitter in Bon Bon, clear embossing powder

Darling Girl

Today one of my best friends daughters, who coincidentally happens to be one of my daughters best friends, turns 4. We've known each other since our babies were literally babies of all of 5 and 8 months respectively. It's amazing to think that they are growing so fast and have turned into amazing, beautiful, confident, and darling girls.

I wish all the happiness, fairy dust, sparkly wands, love and wonder that the world has to offer to our darling friend Rio. Happy Birthday fabulous girl!!

Card Details:

Measurements: 6 1/4 x 4 1/2
Cardstock: SU! Groovy Guava, Barely Banana, Tempting Turquoise, Rose Red
DP: Imaginisce - Shore Thing in Sunripe Stripe
Stamps: Amuse acrylic - Celebration Kids
Ink: Brilliance - Pearlescent Orange
Accessories: Acrylic blocks, SU! slit punch (for scalloping), SU! Groovy Guava double stitch ribbon

I hope that everyone is having a very creative week!

A Spectacular Tribute - Part One

It is amazing how time starts to fly as summer kicks into full swing. Between being outdoors and on a little vacation it feels like summer is already half way over. I've been working on a few long term projects so between those and life I've had little time for anything else! Which is why my newly redesigned blog has been a bit sadly neglected.

But I finally have new stuff to show!!

My biggest long term project as of late has been a memory album for a spectacular lady. A grandmother contacted me to create an album for her granddaughter of her great grandmother. Follow? So the album is for a small child to have of her great grandmother who just passed a little more than a year and a half ago.

The woman who the album is about was a classic and simple woman. No frills, no pretenses, no fluff. My instructions were to keep everything very simple and not fussy. I received 16 photos and some memorabilia. I knew that since this is a gift for a child that I didn't want a huge album that would be cumbersome to handle or pull off of the bookshelf. But I also didn't want it to be too small as the life of this woman was wonderful and I wanted the album to have presence to reflect that.

I decided that 8x8 was the perfect size. After receiving the photos and sitting with them for a bit to think about the theme I was drawn to the SU! Rose Cottage Simply Scrappin' kit. I find it elegant, both in color scheme and accent paper design. It's elegant without being fussy, classic without being pretentious. Purely Pomegranate, Soft Sky, River Rock and Chocolate Chip...how could I go wrong? I picked up the kit plus a pack of each of the complementing colors. Then I went to purchase the album that would hold all of this loveliness. Do you know how difficult it is to find an 8x8, simple, brown leather, post-bound album? Seriously? ACM, Michaels, and Joann's...none of them had anything that I could use. It shouldn't be that hard! And I'm a little OCD in the way that I can't start a project like this until I have every piece. So that even though I knew I had decided on 8x8 layout size, I couldn't start until I had the actual album in hand. Because in my experience, all insert pages are different. And knowing that the album came with only 10 pages, I purchased an extra pack so I wanted to make sure that those fit correctly, that they were the correct ones...etc..etc. I wanted to make sure that when I cut the 8x8 base page for my layout that it fit perfectly into the top loading page and wasn't "a bit" too small and would slip around in the sleeve or "a bit" too big and be too crunched in the sleeve. (I tend to be a bit verbose at 3:53 am when insomnia sets in...bear with me)

So...I purchased the album on line at www.scrapbook.com. They had a great selection. I like the We R Memory Keepers line so I went with that. It arrived quickly and I got to work. I did not have a deadline for this project so I did take my time with each layout...sitting with the photos and supplies reflecting on the material as well as the child (and her family) for whom I was making it.

And after I figured out the very first page, the rest just flowed. I got into a vibe for a few weeks and before I knew it, I was photographing it and packing it up for delivery. I will be posting pictures of each page individually because even though my layouts are simple I want to give each page it's due.

So without further delay...here is the album cover and page one.

I hope that everyone is having a very creative week!

The Room

So I've been holding off posting pictures of my newly redone studio. My amazing husband redid the room for me ON HIS OWN for my 35th birthday which was in May. I'm still working on small decorating touches, final organizational issues, cleaning up etc, etc but it's mostly done! I don't want to wait any longer before showing it off!! So I'm just going to upload a ton of pictures!! I hope that you enjoy!!

Happy Friday! I hope that everyone has a very creative weekend!