Chemistry Card

I have decided to try to post a few of my projects with a few pictures of the process.  I know this is not as good as a video, but its a start.  Hopefully I will remember to take more pictures along the way.

This an anniversary card made with the stamp set Science of Love by Lawn Fawn.  I started by using a die from Pretty Pink Posh called Stiched Duo 2.  Then I laid the die over some white cardstock and then I placed to stamps where I wanted them to be in the circles....

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 After this step I inked up all the stamps and stamped them at once and this is how it looked on the cardstock.

Then I colored the images with my Copic markers and I would place the die over to make sure the colors were not covered up.  After I colored the images, I affixed the die on top of the images.  Then I made a nice watercolored background and added a sentiment on vellum with white embossing.

These are such cute images that it is impossible not to smile when you look at this card!
Enjoy! Until next time

An Anniversary card

I made this card for a very special couple... my son and daughter in law for their anniversary!

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This card was made using a white embossed background using various hearts from stamps sets from Simon Says stamp. Then a watercolor wash was used over the embossing.  I used a die cut heart to mount the rabbits from the Stampendous! stamp set, The rabbits were colored with distress markers.

Congrats to the love birds! 

Baby boy card

Here is a card I made for a friend of mine earlier this year that was having a boy.  The card was stamped with the Stampendous! Baby balloon stamp set and then colored with distress ink markers! 

Another Gelato Page from Art Class 2

Here is a gelato page from Art Class 2 but instead of using Gel Medium I used white embossing powder for the stamped image and then used gelatos with water over the top of the embossed image. The effect is so pretty that it really doesn't take much to finish the page.  Just a few embellishments and the page is complete.

Page 2 of Art Class 2

Here is the second page I created from Art Class 2 with Gelatos

This was a fun page to make and since I did not have the stencil that Wilna had, I just created one on my Silhouette Cameo with circles and then modified the shapes a little to keep it interesting. Then I embellished the page with color coordinating elements and voila!

Bandit in Gelatos

I bought the Art Class 2 from Wilna Furstenberg to "kick start" my scrapbooking. And I have to tell you it has been a wonderful adventure so far.  She inspires me a great deal so over the next few weeks you will see my renditions that very closely mimic her pages.  For the first page that is using Gelatos I did not have the frames that she used so I bought an oval frame from the silhouette Cameo store and then went from there.  I love how this page turned out!

Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

Here is another recipe I scraped from the Simon Says October card kit.  The frame cut around the picture is from iheartstudio. The recipe below is from Cook's Illustrated.  I highly recommend subscribing to their magazine and buying their books.  Everything that I have made from their recipes turns out really good.  They try all different ways to perfect a recipe and then tell you how to make it...all the homework is done for you, perfect!

Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

1 C. flour

1/2 C. unsweetened cocoa powder

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/2 C. packed brown sugar

3 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla

4 oz unsweetened chocolate, chopped

4 Tbsp butter

1/2 C. granulated sugar

1/2 C. powdered sugar

1. Heat oven to 325 and adjust oven rack to middle position. Whisk flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a bowl.
2. Whisk brown sugar, eggs, and vanilla in a bowl. Combine chocolate and butter in a bowl and microwave at 50 percent percent until melted, 2-3 minutes.
3. Whisk chocolate mixture into egg mixture. Fold in flour mixture until no dry streaks remain. Let dough sit at room temperature for 10 minutes
4. Place granulated sugar and powdered sugar into separate bowls. Scoop with small scoop cookie mixture form into ball and coat in granulated sugar then powdered sugar.
5. Bake cookies one sheet at a time about 12 minutes. Let cool completely on sheet before serving.

A Bandito Thanks

Hi everyone!
Today I have a fun card for you featuring my dog Bandit. He is a Australian Shepard with red-tri coloring.  He is a handsome dog, but not so easy to color.

I used the stamp set "dog treat" by Julie Nutting for Prima for the dog.  Then I turned to ears down and lopped off the tail since that is how my dog looks.  The tag and scalloped border are from Pretty Pink Posh.  The bow die is from Jillian Vance design.  Then I added some sequins and voila! A cute and easy card!

Mediterranean chicken recipe

So, awhile ago I decided that I wanted some more practice with scrapbooking.  I decided to make a custom recipe book for myself and scrap my favorite recipes.  I work on it off and on but I try to also get more mileage from my Simon Says Card Kits and scrap a recipe with those also.  Here is one I used with the October kit.

For those of you who like to cook this is a Weight Watchers recipe that my mom gave me and it is very good! Enjoy!

MEDITERRANEAN CHICKEN CASSEROLE

This is a Weight Watchers recipe from mom. 

8 Skinless chicken thighs

1-14 oz can quartered artichoke hearts, drained

3/4 cup chopped pitted dates

1/4 cup raisins

12 pimento-stuffed green olives, halved

2 Tbsp packed brown sugar

2 Tbsp balsamic vinegar

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 Tbsp dried basil

1 Tbsp drained capers

1 Tbsp olive oil

2 tsp. dried oregano

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1/2 cup chicken broth

Marinate chicken with all ingredients except chicken broth in a ziploc bag for 8 hours or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350. Remove chicken from marinated and arrange in a single layer in a large roasting pan. Pour marinade over chicken, add broth. Bake until chicken is cooked through 35-45 minutes.

Friend scrapbook page

I have a 7X9 binder scrapbook from Basic Grey that I have been using for this year.  It's similar to a Project Life type of format. I have been working on our trip to Oregon to add to the album.  So I made a page inspired  Vilma Furstenberg and Irit Landgraf.

I started by cutting out some "frames" from my square and rectangle dies.  Then I cut out some leaves from iheartstudio on my silhouette.  Then I started mixing some paint and painted the frames and leaves. When the leaves were dry I added some gold accents with my gold Signo uniball pen.  Then I started playing around with the layout.  When the frame and leaves were all in position, I decided it needed more GOLD! So back the silhouette I went and cut out the word "friends" twice and glued it together.  Then I added some versamark and gold embossing powder. Before placing the word I decided to add some paint splatters.  Then I mounted the whole page on a Basic Grey paper from the Knee Highs collection.

A simple card...Sending happy mail

Here is a fun little card! I love this cute little hedgehog from the Bubbly stamp set by Penny Black,
and the sentiment is from the Simon Says Stamp Happy Thoughts stamp set.  I used some sparkly black embossing powder by Judikins called black opal. It's a favorite of mine because well, a girl can never have too many sparkles if you ask me!

Another October SSS card

Getting ready for a winter that looks like I might need a few more get well cards. So, I made another card from the Simon Says Stamp October 2014 kit.  I kept it simple so that it could be for a man or woman.

More project life cards from July Simon Says Card Kit

For these project life cards I copied the bigger cards from some of my favorite card crafters.  They look great in my project life album, its one of my favorite spreads.  I have put the original card creators name after each card. Enjoy!

 This one is based on a card by Shari Carroll

 This project life card is a "mini" version of one made by Sarah Moerman.

This one is from Shari Carroll as well

A colorful scrapbook page

Today I wanted to share with you a scrapbook page I made inspired by Wilna Furstenberg.  I love her style and her shop has beautiful cutouts for the silhouette.  If you have never been to her blog I recommend it for so much inspiration!

September 2014 Simon Says Card Kit

Here are a couple of cards I made using the September Simon Says Card Kit.

This card was made with a white embossed background, then it was watercolored over the top of the embossing. The sentiment was stamped and then placed on foam dots, and some squiggly black lines were drawn on the outer edge.

This card was made from a layout from Kristina Werner.  The stamped birds are from Hero Arts.

A Fall Quilt

Here is another quilt that I made.  For this quilt, I did thread play for the leaves before I quilted it.  The quilting lines are made to look like wind blowing the leaves across the quilt.  I love the hand dyed leaf batik and the colors in this quilt.  The actual colors are closer to the two pictures of the detail.  In the picture of the whole quilt the colors seem a little too yellow compared to the actual quilt. But, you get the idea.

The colors below are true to the colors of the actual quilt.

August 2014 Simon Says Card Kit

Here are a couple of things I made with the August Simon Says Card Kit.

 For these two cards I used the same layout and a tag die from PaperTrey Ink. But I wanted to experiment with a black versus white embossed tag. I love this black sparkly embossing powder called black opal from JudiKins.

 This card is made with a watercolor background that I love.  I made this card for a co-worker that was leaving so I used a Simon Says Card stamp that said "You will be missed" and then I added the "more than ice cream. That's a lot"

This is another project life card I made with a bright watercolor background!  For those of you not familiar with Project Life I will post a few example pages that I made so it makes more sense. 

Simon says October card kit

This card was fun to make and the patterned papers in this kit have the feeling of a Moroccan Bazaar to me. So, I have a couple of ideas in mind for that theme as well but for this card I stuck to the Java theme and well I need some Anniversary cards so that seemed to just fall in place.

March Simon Says Card Kit

I've been going through some of my old photos of cards I have made.   I don't think that I have posted this one from the March Simon Says Card Kit.

 I love this stamp set from Avery Elle called Bon Jour.  The macarons are stamped with Hero Arts Pale Tomato, Soft Cantaloupe, Butter Bar, Tide Pool and Soft Lilac Inks and then die cut out. 

Project life

When my son was born, I received a camera and took a roll of pictures, and then would I would get them developed and add them to a photo album.  Over the years, the photo albums started falling apart.  So, I ended up taking all of the pictures out of the albums and rubber banding them all together by year. Then I put them into a box with the intention of scrapbooking them, or something I thought would be more suitable.  Well, long story short I lost the box.  Then a few months ago I was moving my brother, and the house was almost empty.  I took one last look around and found my box of photos in a spare closet!

Now with 20 years of photos (that's A LOT of photos) I needed to think of something and scrapbooking them all would probably take me another 20 years!  Then I thought of project life.  I have never made a project life album, but I bought some supplies and went to work.

Then the thought occurred to me, that cards are very similar to project life cards.  So, I decided that I would make "mini" cards for my project life from my Simon Says Card Kits!!!!

So.... Here are a few of the cards.  These are so fun to make, watch out because it can be addictive!

All of these project life cards were made from the June 2014 Simon Says Stamp card kit.

Some quilts

I wanted to post some pictures of a few of the quilts I have made.  I really did not have good photos of my quilts so my dad came over and took some more professional photos for me.  I am so happy and thankful for his work. So here they are...

 This quilt is a small quilt made from a technique by Melinda Bula. The technique uses small pieces of fabric to mimic a painting style. Then quilting is added on top for dimension and later I took a class from Judy Dains and decided to add some crystals.

 This quilt uses hand dyed batiks in mouth watering colors.  Then it is quilted in many different colored and some sparkly threads.  To finish the quilt I made beaded swirls for the centers.  It is so fun to use other hobbies such as beading and painting on the quilts. The skies the limit as they say.

This sunshine was made by first making a basket weave fabric from the hand died strips, the strips were embellished with thread and decorative sticking. Then the sunshine was reverse appliquéd to reveal the beautiful fabric underneath. The border uses the strips to finish off the quilt in a piano key fashion.

Thanks for taking a look!

June SSS card kit

Here are a couple of cards I made using the June SSS card kit. I love the flowers in this kit!!!

 For this card I just used the stamps and make a little arrangement. Super easy, but pretty!

On this card I used a background stamp that has a definition of love that my daughter in law bought for me as an anniversary gift. The stamp is a wood mounted stamp from the Tim Holtz and it was stamped in Bubble gum ink by Hero Arts.  The die is Die-Versions "Cut the Cake"

May Simon Says Card kit

Here are a couple of cards I made with the SSS card kit, for May 2014

 For this card I used a Daisy reverse pattern background stamp and inked it up with Hero Arts Pale Tomato, Soft Cantaloupe and Butter Bar inks. Then I embossed the sentiment on a banner and mounted it with foam dots. Easy!

For this next card I used the stencil from the kit for the stars and background papers. And a wood tag I believe from Basic Grey.

April Simon Says Card Kit cards

All of these cards are from the Simon Says Stamp April card kit:

 For the dog on this card I used the image from Penny Black Mimi in Paris. The flower is from Papertrey Ink button stacks die cut.

The tag is from Papertrey Ink, tag 2

The girl image is from Penny Black Mimi in Paris and the small Eiffel Tower is from Cottage Cutz mini Eiffel Tower die.

The stamped flowers and dies are from Papertrey Ink. I didn't put a sentiment on this card for now but when I need one then I plan to put a banner on the bottom right with a embossed sentiment.