New Blog Award!

Pin It Thanks so much to Dana at Dana's Crafty Corner for this great blog award! 

I am supposed to post 7 things about myself and pass this along to 7 bloggers. 

7 things about myself:
1. I was a drama major in college.
2. I love watching Masterpiece Theater movies, especially British ones.
3. My favorite thing to bake is chocolate chip cookies.
4. If I had unlimited resources, I would go to college forever and just keep studying new things.
5. My favorite ice creams are Ben & Jerry's Phish Food and Chocolate Therapy (sadly Chocolate Therapy is only available in their stores, but you can buy it there by the pint and bring it home.)
6. I played field hockey when I was growing up.
7. I love making jewelry, but very rarely wear it.

7 bloggers you should check out:

1. http://deannescreativejuice.blogspot.com/ (She's having a great giveaway for 500 followers!)
2. http://www.scrappinwithcricut.com/ (such cute cards)
3. http://christiescardscraftsandmusings.blogspot.com/ (Love her mini album!)
4. http://www.scratchycatcrafter.blogspot.com/ (check out her purple sock monkey)
5. http://especiallymade.blogspot.com/ (love her ribbon background and great projects for a beginning blogger)
6. http://missypolyclay.blogspot.com/ (wish I did stuff with clay- her projects are sooo cute)
7. http://www.scrappingmamahen.blogspot.com/ (love the tie dye card)

Baby Welcome J

Pin It We have a new baby in the neighborhood!  I was so excited to find out that a family down the street had a baby girl, so I immediately got to crafting and baking and made some cute things for them.  I made some J cupcakes (don't you love the edible pearls!) and a J onesie (one of the ones I dyed here) and some cute baby hairclips of course (click here to see my tutorial on these).  There's nothing like a new baby to inspire crafting.  :)

Some closeups

Hydrangeas

Pin It One of my favorite things about summer is hydrangeas.  My mom has always loved them and years ago when she was in her old house I bought her one from the garden center where I used to work.  They also remind me of my wedding, since they were one of the flowers that we chose.  A lot of my neighbors have some beautiful, monstrous bushes on the sides of their houses.  Luckily one of my neighbors was kind enough to give me a few.  I was sad that I got them from her after my old camera died and before I got my new one, but they are still alive and beautiful!  Enjoy!

Scrabble Tiles!

Pin It I have been wanting to make scrabble tile necklaces FOREVER.  I've had a package of scrabble tiles hanging around for years since I made this (craft fail) door hanger for my husband's office years ago.  (Sweet guy- he used it anyway!)  I figured this project would be the perfect way to use up the extra - as well as some of my super cute papers!  I found a tutorial here and I had some glossy accents and mod podge, so I had everything I needed except... bails.

In my opinion, bails are ridiculously overpriced.  I looked for them EVERYWHERE.  I figured at $1 each at my local bead store was a bit much, but I was wrong.  Even Oriental Trading (remember when they used to be cheaper than other places?) let me down.  I finally bought some at my local craft store using a coupon so that I could finally make some of these. 

A quick note about pricing.  DO NOT buy scrabble tiles on Amazon.  I checked out Amazon thinking I might buy some more, but they are crazy overpriced there!  They want 20 dollars for 100 tiles.  This is more expensive than the entire game!  I saw a comment that suggested buying them directly from Hasbro.  You can get replacement parts for many of their games HERE.  The cost of 100 tiles on their site?  $6.50!!  Plus you get 4 racks and a tile pouch in case you want to craft something with those too.  :)  BTW- I totally am trying to think up some other crafts I can make with board game pieces.  Monopoly money origami maybe?

The fun part of this project was picking out papers.  I found most of the the papers I used in my Christmas/holiday stacks, but there were a few cute finds in the American Girl paper pack as well.  The tutorial tip about making a template card is really helpful & makes the process of picking out papers lots of fun.  I also used the template to trace out the piece I wanted on the back of the patterned paper and then glued the scrabble tile where I had drawn the outline.  That helped me to line up the pictures a lot more accurately.

This was an easy project to do in stages (10 minutes here, 10 minutes there- perfect for toddler watching) but I'd definitely recommend making them in bulk. Don't expect perfection, though.  As with any project, there is a bit of a learning curve.   Several of my tiles have bubbles or mistakes, as you'll see. Anyway, enough talk- here are my finished scrabble tiles!

 Some closeups

 Slightly misaligned- this was before I tried the template technique

 Love this one

 Some mistakes- didn't get the glossy accents right on the top of the polar bear

 Too bad about the bubbles on the owl.  I tried to fix it, but too late.  Too bad, because I love owls.

Family Photo Charm Bracelet

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I've been wanting to have some kind of special jewelry related to my daughter since she was born.  I thought about a locket where I could keep a picture of my daughter and my husband, but thought it might be a little cheesy.  When I saw these cute picture charms I knew they would be perfect and decided to make a charm bracelet.  I bought some butterfly charms as well and some purple beads and made this at the latest neighborhood jewelry making party. 

A few closeups: 

 

Now I just need to print up some tiny pics to put in.  I know my daughter will LOVE it when I wear this!

Nature Pics

Pin It I absolutely love taking pictures of nature, although I still tend to focus more on the obvious- flowers, insects, etc.  I love flowers because they stay still long enough for me to get the picture I want (unless it's windy!), but I love the challenge of trying to get a butterfly with his tongue sticking out like this one.

 But seriously, how can you resist these colors?

 Or these dew drops?

 Doesn't this look soft?  If I were a bug, I would totally pick this flower to sleep on.  :)

Hope you enjoy these!  If you want a copy in higher resolution, I'd be happy to send you one.

Need More Father's Day Ideas?

Pin It Thanks to Dusti for letting me know about this great Father's Day Link Up party on Scrappin With Cricut!  Check out some of the links- there are some great projects!!

Father's Day Card

Pin It My hubby is really into maps, so I was thrilled to find some really great map wrapping paper for his Father's Day present at the Container Store, as well as some map paper at the craft store to make his Father's Day card.  The first version of this card that I made was not so good.  I liked the idea I came up with, I was happy with the font I chose (Treasure Map Deadhand), but the other papers and design just wasn't working.  So I switched from navy blue to brown and revamped the card a bit.  Perhaps I was a bit too inspired by the Lego Indiana Jones wii game we've been playing lately, but I'm soooo happy with Version 2.0 of his Father's Day card.  I really like the way this turned out and I think he'll like it as well. 

Believe it or not, I used the New Arrival cartridge to make the airplane and banner.  I cut it in plain brown cardstock to make it a little more masculine and a little less baby.  I used an old Martha Stewart Christmas trian punch for the border at the bottom.  Hope you enjoy this!  Drop me a comment with a link to any Father's Day cards you've been working on.  I still have a few more to make and I could use a little more inspiration.  :)

Father's Day Freebies

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I've been scouring the web for some great ideas for Father's Day and I came across some Father's Day freebies I thought I'd share with all of you. 

Father's Day Scrapbooking Printables

Father's Day Subway Art Printable

Definitely the inspiration for one of the Father's Day cards I need to make:


Father's Day Hershey Wrapper Printable

And one more smile for you, in case you have a slightly twisted sense of humor....

A few birthday cards

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June is a huge month for birthdays in my family. That, along with Father's Day, has had me busy making cards! Two of my sisters and one of my nieces all have birthdays this month, so these are the cards I made for them.

I used the cricut and the Simply Charmed cartridge to make the balloons on the card above.  I've been working on making "kits" for myself with papers that go well together.  I love the pre-made kits for scrapbooking that you can buy and it makes it SO much easier to begin a project.  I feel like sometimes I spend so much time just picking out paper and embellishments that I don't get around to making anything with them!  I've read that after you finish a scrapbook layout you should keep all of you scraps together as a card-making kit, so I've been putting coordinating papers into 2 gallon ziploc bags I got from the dollar store.  The nice thing is that I can just grab one of these and bring it downstairs to work on while baby is happily playing with her toys.  I may have to find a container to keep my most-used tools in as well so that it's easier to craft on the go.  Now that my 16 month old can sit still and practice using a buckle for 20 minutes at a time, I figured I could at least put a couple of those minutes to good use.  Card making, along with my new card kits, seem to be a great option for something I can start and stop with minimal mess.  Any ideas for other crafts that can be done between book reading and rough housing with a little one? 

Panda Engagement Card

Pin It My little sister just got engaged!  I'm so excited about it, because she swore up and down that she'd never get married and have kids, etc.  While I haven't met her boyfriend yet, he seems like a fantastic guy & he seems just right for her. 

So when I decided to make her an engagement card, I wanted to think a little outside of the box.  I just didn't think a cliche engagement card would be as well received as something a bit more personal.  I have this great picture that my dad took of them standing on a rock overlooking the ocean when he was out visiting them in California that I really like, which helped to inspire the card. 

Among her friends, my sister is sometimes referred to as "Panda", which helped to inspire the card as well.  I went craft store hunting for some panda stickers and found these great dimensional felt ones which I thought would work perfectly.  Then I went about recreating the beach scene.  I used plain gray paper which I distressed by crinkling, inking, and chalking to make the rocks.  I had this fantastic wave paper by Paper Pizazz that I used for the front and inside.  I wanted the front to look like she was alone on a rock in the ocean, then when you open it up, she's actually not alone- she's with him on the beach.  I made a sunshine using my Simply Charmed cricut cartridge to complete the scene, then printed up the saying "We're so glad you found your mate!" 

Hope she enjoys it & hope you do as well.  :)

What I Didn't Buy My Daughter at the Flea Market

Pin It I've never really been to a hard core flea market until a couple of weeks ago.  I took some pictures with my old, now broken camera that I planned on uploading to the blog, but I got a bit distracted.  While I'm waiting for the new camera, I thought I'd show you some of the pictures I took at the flea market of things I decided not to buy my daughter.  Enjoy!

 Chainsaw Art - cool but a little too big

Waches.  As a former English teacher this really bothered me.  I would have told him he was missing a "t" in order to help him improve sales, but he was too busy texting.  Figures.

CREEPY DOLLS!