Stained Glass??

I found these stickers at my LSS and wanted to try them. They aren't really my style but I thought, hey let's give it a go!
Stained glass is yet another craft that I would LOVE to try and learn but is it ever expensive! My aunt does it and is absolutely amazing at it! I think I will just live vicariously through her. :)

Here's my paper version!

I couldn't find anywhere on the exterior that I liked a sentiment so I decided to leave it and put it on the inside.

I found these really easy to colour since, sort of like embossed images, the sticker keeps you inside the lines. I like that! A lot!
I just cut out around the sticker (i had stuck it to white cardstock) and pop-dotted it up. Oh and since I didn't have any ribbon to match I just coloured some white ribbon with the green copic I used to colour the stems. Love that!

Thank you for all of the Blog Birthday wishes! I hope veryone is having a great week. Thanks for stopping by. :)

ColourQ #78 & a few extra things

Stay tuned through the entire post if you can bear it, cause there is a little something special at the end of it!

Today is special for a few reasons, and number one is it's time for a new ColourQ colour challenge.

This week's colours are so pretty and Spring-like.

I found this paper in my stash, Basic Grey's Olivia collection. I guess I cheated a little bit since there are a couple of shades of the green and pink, but it was so pretty I couldn't resist! The butterfly is from a Unity Kit of the Month and the sentiment was made with Maya Road's Noah Alphabet stamps.

Please head over to the ColourQ blog and check out the wonderful cards and layouts the design team has created for your inspiration, and join in on the fun and fabulous colours this week.

I have something else to share. I was given the Cherry on Top blog award from a lady who really needs no introduction she is THAT fabulous, Emily Leiphart from Art From The Heart.
She is a wonderfully sweet, and kind woman who is extremely talented, and creates the most fabulous CAS cards. She also works magic with Unity Stamps and just finished up a week of being Unity's Growing in Unity girl. I have been lucky enough to get to know her a little better over the last month or so and am very grateful to have done so.
(Sorry I'm a little late with this Emily!) Thank you so very much!

So to follow up on the requirements:

1. Thank the person who gave it to you. - check!
2. Post this award on your blog. - check!
3. List 3 things that you love about yourself.
           a. I am passionate about the people and things I love.
           b. I am a bit of a closet adrenaline junkie!
           c. I am genuine a person.
4. Post a picture that you love.

This is a picture of me and my mom that I have in my craft room. It was given to me by my aunt who flew in from Ontario to come to my bridal shower and surprise me. It's a favourite, because my mom was not one to be photographed and to have one of us together, (as I suffer from the same problem!) is priceless. It is from her 50th Birthday, 7 years before she passed away.
5. tag 5 people to recieve this award.
Brandi
Jen
Ruth
Angela
Keva

Thank you again Emily!

My final bit of fun to share is that.............today is officially my Blogaversary! (that is such a funny word!!) If you are at all curious here is my first post!

It was year ago today that this adventure started, and I have one person to thank for that, Jen from Jen's Ink Spot. Check out her blog if you haven't already. She is a PTI master, makes the most adorable rings from buttons and is on the design team for the twinery.
Sometimes, you know you just need a little push. I remember getting a very sweet comment from her on my Flickr account, wondering if I had a blog and if not, I should start one. I had been thinking about it but a) didn't really know how and b) would anyone want to follow it! Then I decided I really didn't care if anyone followed it would just be a fun place to catalogue my creative expressions. It has turned into so much more than that. So, thank you Jen, and thank you everyone who has stopped by and followed my little blog over the past year.

As a special thank you I am giving away a $10 Gift Certificate to Papertrey Ink to one lucky follower. Just leave a comment by midnight MST, Friday, April 1st and I will pick a winner on Saturday.

Thank you everyone from the bottom of my heart. I have learned so much from all of you. Have a great day!

the SKY is the limit

Thank you so much to everyone who commented on my PTI blog hop post. There were some amazing creations, as always, & i have only made it part of the way through!

So my hubby had gotten me the copic airbsrush system for my birthday and I had yet to use it. (bad, bad wife!!) So I dug it out and attempted to use it but was unable to make it work well. The spray was variable in strength and actual output. So I went back to the old sponging technique.

I was going to spray the background but decided that would use up waaaaay to much ink and precious air! Forget the fact that I couldn't make it work! :)

This card came about because I had been looking through my wedding "bin" in the basement, leftovers from our wedding, and found a picture of the pinwheels I was going to make for the down the aisle. I never did make them so I wanted to make a mini version. So I googled it and man, they are either starting to be a trend, or were one, in the recent past. There are tons of pics and tutorials. This is my version, I hope you like it!

The paper I used is Crate Paper's Brook line and the "handle" is a toothpick that I sponged.

I hope everyone had a fantastic weekend! Thanks for stopping by. :)

PTI - Blog Hop - all about floss!

Hey everyone! I have another super quick post to share a card I made for the PTI blog hop. My hubby and I are going away for a romantic weekend in Banff! Yaaaaaay mountains! It's kind of an anniversary celebration/getaway. It's a long story, but we sort of have two wedding anniversaries to celebrate! I'll explain some other time. :) I'm ok to celebrate twice!

"For the March Blog Hop we are challenging you to use embroidery floss in a fun and inventive way on your project. This could include stitching, wrapping it around and tying it like ribbon, braiding, accenting tags, embroidered patterns or anything else you can dream up!"

Really, really, super simple card. Nothing fancy here folks! I love this set so I had to use it. I wanted to make the "warm" a dark pink using markers to colour it but..........I forgot! And then I was too lazy to make a new card. (hee hee!) Maybe next time.

I hope everyone has a fabulous weekend. I appologize now I may be late blog hopping but I am VERY excited to see what everyone comes up with. :)

B is for Baby!

I just have a quick post for today. I noticed the Papercrafts Connection March Gallery Challenge is "baby". I remembered a card I had made for my friend and her baby, for her baby shower.

All products are Papertrey Ink. It's difficult to tell but I put some glossy accents onto the pea pod. O really like this monochromatic look.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I am off to derby practice then work for 2 more shifts. Hopefully I will have some time to catch up on my blog surfing. Have a great day! :)

reverse image stamping

I thought that since I had a few people ask how I reversed the monster image on this card, I would do a little "tutorial" and compare two different methods of mirroring your images.

First of all I have a block that was my Mom's that was made specifically for this. It is just like a woodblock stamp but with a flat piece of rubber on the stamping side. The one I have is called "the artful stamper's reversing block". I believe The Artful Stamper was/is a company out of London, ON.

Ink up your stamp and stamp it onto the rubber side of the reversing block.

You then use the reversing block to stamp onto your paper.
I also heard somewhere that you could do this with EZ Mount cling foam. So I decided to try it out and compare the two.

I cut out a piece of EZ Mount and stuck it to one of my acrylic blocks, with the cling side as my stamping surface.

I made a little chart comparing the images produced by both methods. Double click on the image to see a larger version.

The reason I added the second generation stamped image was because the reversed image will not be as crisp as the original. So if you second generation stamp the original image, the result will be closer to the reversed image.

Looking at my little comparison, the cling mount stamped image is a bit lighter than the image reversed with the stamping block. The cling mount one absorbed a little bit of the ink, but i found the image less smudged. When I stamp onto the block it's really easy to slide around. So I would say if you have a really steady hand it shouldn't be a problem.

I hope that all made sense.

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day! :)

Happy Birthday!

*this is my second post of the day. Please scroll down for ColourQ challenge #77*

I have a few cards to share to day all with same same theme......Birthdays!
Apparently I was on a birthday kick for a while and since I had a few I hadn't posted, I thought why not share them all at once!

Paper: PTI (kraft), My Minds Eye (fine & dandy true blue coll.) Stamps: Hero Arts (balloon, monster fun set), PTI (sentiment, birthday basics set) Ink: CTMH (black, lagoon) Other: PTI impression plate (by the numbers), Basic Grey (fibers, ?? coll.)

This one was made with last week's PTI's Make it Monday technique in mind.

Paper: PTI (smoky shadow, melon berry, white) Stamps: PTI (giga guidelines, birthday basics) Ink: versamark, CTMH (white) Other: American Crafts (Zing white embossing powder)

This one was inspired by a colour combo. I was rummaging through my scrap bin and honestly some melon berry fell onto some smokey shadow and voila! I know in the picture it looks black but I promise it's grey.

Paper: Basic Grey (?? collection), PTI (white) Stamps: ?? (elephants), ?? (speech bubble), Unity (sentiment, Mar '09 KOM) Ink: Memento (tuxedo black), Copics  Other: ?? (gingham ribbon)

I am sorry I have no clue where half of the stuff I used for this one came from. Before I started blogging and keeping track I had put all of my clear stamps into Stampendous stufftainers willy nilly with no labels. I have since smartened up! But my older stuff (really my mom's stuff) is not labeled.

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day!

ColourQ Challenge #77

It's Tuesday, which means a fabulous colour challenge from Arielle at ColourQ. Can you believe 77 weeks of colour inspiration?

This week the colours are rich and gorgeous, don't you think?

Paper: PTI, (white, royal velvet). Stamps: PTI, (life). Ink: CTMH, (lagoon, sky, pansy purple). Ribbon: May Arts. Other: PTI Impression plate (linen & canvas), Spellbinders Labels #2.


I know, I know ANOTHER thank you card. But I was recently perusing my stash and quickly realized that my supply of thank you cards was pretty much non-existant. Which is terrible! I have tons and tons of "thinking of you" and "welcome baby" cards, but zero thank yous. So my mission is to correct that, which means you all have to endure many a thank you card post. :)

I was trying to get away from my cutesy cards as of late. I tend to lean towards the cute CAS rather than elegant and soft. Which really just gives me something to work towards, right? And this card is what was born. 

The green ribbon is May Arts that I picked up from this fabulous stationary shop (can't for the life of me remember the name though, sorry!) on Granville Island. I just love the look of it. I have it in black as well and have had a heck of a time trying to use it. (and not even because I'm hoarding!)

Please head over to the ColourQ blog and check out what Arielle and the rest of the incredible design team has come up with. Then break out the paper, stamps and ink and whip up something to share.

Have a great day. Thanks for stopping by! :)

Another thank you!

This is a really quick post to share a card I whipped up for a co-worker. She needed a thank you for her son's hockey coach. I tried really hard to make it masculine, but man is that hard. I figured the plaid, the black, no bows or flowers, but it still feels kinda feminine. Maybe it's the image on the circle!

What do you think? She said she liked it of course but I'm not convinced. :D

Hope everyone had a great weekend. I'm on my last night shift for the weekend. Yay!!!!

Thanks!

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

To Kim and the Paper Smooches DT, for picking me to be next month's guest designer and to everyone for the sweet comments and encouragement you left on my and the Paper Smooches blog. My heart is warmed!

This is such a wonderful, inviting and supportive community to be a part of. I am very grateful.

The card was made using patterned paper from Basic Grey's "Max & Whiskers" line. The woodgrain was done using the "letterpress" technique I saw Laurie do here. I used white pigment ink on my PTI woodgrain impression plate then ran it through my Cuttlebug. I like how it lightly emphasizes the woodgrain. I just recieved my Twinery sampler pack in the mail, so i used the mandarin colour.

I hope everyone has a fantastic weekend! Thanks for stopping by. :)

Seriously??

Edited to Add: A couple of people have asked how I flipped the monster. I have a "reversing block" which is almost really just a flat rubber block. You stamp your image onto it, like kissing, and then stamp the image using the flat block. It's not the greatest result so I had to go back over the lines with a black fine marker. I have heard you can also use an eraser, or Ezmount on an acrylic block!

So I have one last card that I have been trying to make for a while. I've had an idea for the "theme" of the card but didn't know how I was going to lay it out. I hope that it makes sense........

 I imagined they are at some monster party! How faux pas right?

The monsters are, of course, from the Papersmooches "falling for you" set. The speech bubbles and words are from October Afternoon's "comic bubbles" set. There are some really cute & funny sentiments on it.

Thanks for stopping by! I'm off to bed after a fabulous 2 nights at work. Just had to create this before I nod off. :)

True Friend CQC #76 and photos of my baby!

Good morning and happy Tuesday!
Which means............another wonderful ColourQ challenge colour combo!

Green is one of my favourite colours and yet I had the darndest time trying to figure out what to do for this weeks card.
I was cleaning up my craft room and stumbled across my PTI set "butterfly dreams and came up with this card.

Super simple. I used the PTI die that matches the set to cut out the butterflies, cuttlebug houndstooth EF and coloured some rhinestones with copics to match.

Head on over to the ColourQ blog and check out all of the design team's wonderful creations then get into your crafty space and link up your own creation!

I also wanted to share a couple of fabulous pics I took of my baby, Stella.
I don't know if you can see the attitude but I sure can!

These two are recent, she's just over 2 years old.

This last one is from when she was about 4 or 5 months old. Now can you see it?

Thanks for stopping by today. Have a great day! :)

You're The Best

Hello!
Quick post of a card I made last week, and no, there are no Papersmooches stamps in sight. :)

The doily is Martha Stewart, I sprayed it with Tattered Angels to change to colour. The circle image is one from the Papertrey Anniversary download. I coloured the pearls with copics to match.

Hope everyone's week gets off to a good start. Thanks for stopping by! :)

It's official.....I'm addicted!

Have I told you lately that I love Kim Hughes' stamps??!!
OK so I may be a little bit addicted, but at least I'm admitting it right?

I have one more card to share that I made using one of the templates that she offers, the cloud template. Now I dont have Makes the Cut program so I did cut this out by hand but it wasn't a problem. I'm sure there is a way to do it in the Silhouette software I'm just not techy enough to figure it out!

The sentiment is from an older set of Kim's from Cornish Heritage Farms.

Just one more little thing I am addicted to, Adele! Thanks to Keva I can't get enough of this woman! Her voice is phenominal! Her single Rolling in the Deep is unreal. I normally love my punk rock but I do have a soft spot for a few other genres. :D

Thanks for stopping by today. Have a fantastic weekend!

babbling post - reader beware!

I'm going to share a few things with you today. I started cardmaking because of my mom. She was THE most crafty person I know. She really could do it all. Papercrafting, sewing, knitting, crocheting, cross-stitching, dollmaking, ceramics, painting, diy @ home. She really was/is my idol. 

My parents divorced when I was about 13 but my dad is a pilot so wasn't around much at all. My mom did just about everything, except anything to do with technology, that may have been her limit. Although, I will say that in the months before she passed away she was definately getting the hang of the internet and I bet would have been blogging up a storm by now! She would have really enjoyed all of the inspiration that is to be had here.

I guess the reason for the back story is just to share that crafting is close to my heart and is a way to feel close to her. I have gotten so into cardmaking, i think for the instant gratification, that I have neglected the other ways I enjoy being crafty. So occasionally there might be a few other posts here sharing some other things I have made.

Another love of mine is photography, especially close-up or macro shots of random everyday things. I need to take some more classes. My husband and I have made a "pact" that we will only put up artwork of our own creation. Which has unfortunately resulted in bare walls because neither of us has had the time to create anything. (He is a welder/bicycle mechanic by trade but is a fantastic artist.)

I wanted to share two non-card projects with you today. The first being a super super simple notebook. I love notebooks. I don't do anything with them, but I LOVE them. I am a hoarder of paper & pens, always have been!

I found these fantastic 3" x 5" sketchbooks at my local office supply store. So I created a cover out of white carstock and then searched through my massive collection of patterned papers and adhered it to the front. I used my Hero Arts typewriter letters set to stamp the "notes!".

The second thing I made recently was inspired by a picture from a CB2 catalogue. Now theirs are frames and I have no way of geting them since I live in Canada, so I decided to improvise.

I found some flat 11" x 14" canvases at Michaels (3 for $10, i think). Mixed some acrylic paint to the shade of grey I wanted, then painted them with a foam roller.

I think they turned out OK. The pictures are some of our engagement photos that I had blown up into various sizes and printed at Costco. Super cheap. I do plan on putting above the bed on a art self from IKEA once we figure out how we are going to decorate!

Thanks for putting up with such a long post! Have a great day!

So excited!!

Yee-Haw!!
I'm so excited, my card was featured today over on the Papersmooches blog.




Thanks for sharing in my excitement! Have a great day!

one more.....thanks bunches

I am quickly posting this card as I had forgotten to tag it onto my post from the other day.

Yet another card made with Papersmooches stamps. :)

Made using both the "friendly flowers" set and the "vegtastic" set (sentiment). I paper pieced it with some older Basic Grey paper. I think it's from their eskimo kisses line.

This cold sure is kicking my butt. Maybe when you haven't had one in a couple of years you have to make up for it!
Hope everyone's having a good Wednesday! Thanks for stopping by!

the HUGEST of thank yous!

I was lounging on the couch tonight, feeling whiny, the cold I have been working on for a while now hit in full force today. So I pulled myself off of it (the couch!) and sank into my chair at the computer to blog surf. ( I really need to get a laptop so I dont have to move.)  :D

To my happy surprise, the adorable and fabulously talented Brandi from Yankee Belle Stamper was sweet enough to honour me with the Leibster Blog Award. Check out her blog for some wonderful inspiration. She is always positive and has nothing but kind things to say. I'm so happy to know her.

As I was following up on another blog, My Paper Secret hosted by another extremely talented & sweet lady, Cristina, I discovered she too gave me a nod with the same award.

I just have to say, you wonderfully sweet ladies totally made my day and gave me a much needed pick-me-up. I am so grateful to have met such lovely people.

I'm going to keep in the spirit in which this award was given and give a shout out, and the spotlight to, a few blogs I visit regularly. And who have fewer than 100 followers. Please check them out as they are super talented!

A Little Bit of the Things I Enjoy - by Stella, she does wonders with vintage.
Damask Love - by Amber, bold, beautiful & simple style
Paper & Ice - by Noelle, scrapbooker extraordinaire

a couple that have more than 100 followers but are too fabulous not to share!
(although I'm sure you've heard of them already!)

Jen's Ink Spot - by Jenn, fabulous papercrafter and ringmaker
Art From the Heart - by Emily, just all round fabulous

Thank you again to the two kind-hearted ladies who gave me the award and to all of you who take the time to visit my little ol' blog and leave such sweet, uplifting comments. :)

Woo Hoo! CQC challenge #75

Fabulous colours right? I thought you would agree with me. :)
Holy Cow are these ever bright and cheerful!

Since it's common knowledge how much I LOOOOOOVE Kim Hughes' stamps, I thought I might as well continue to use them. I think it's going to be neck & neck between Papersmooches and Papertrey Ink in the battle for favourite. (to be honest they will be forever tied as I love them both for different reasons......shhhhh!)

When I saw the colours Arielle had picked out for this weeks ColourQ challenge I squealed in delight! I know I may not be known for my bold use of colour, but I knew exactly what I wanted to do with them.

I adore this scooter. I mean, how cute is it?
I have a lot to learn when it comes to colouring with copics. I was one of those kids that loved to colour but the extent of my ability was to outline (darkly) in the colour I was using then lightly shade inside. I have no concept of real shading or the ability to envision where the light is coming from. But I do love to colour.

The scooter is from Papersmooches March release - "spiffy scooters", and the sentiment from "vegtastic". That lovely grid background is from my other new favourite background stamp, by Hero Arts "envelope pattern".

As always the rest of the fabulous design team has some yummy creations for you to check out over at the ColourQ blog. Head over and peruse, then show us what you've got.

Thanks for stopping by! Have a fantastic Tuesday. :)

Reject Blog Hop!

I was blog surfing yesterday and saw Char from Willow & Paisley's post. (Check out her card here, she had one accepted too, i can't wait to see what it looks like!)
The title was "reject blog hop" so I had to check it out. Turns out she was posting along with an idea started by Amber from Damask Love to link up our creations that were passed on by Papercrafts' last submission call Go-To Sketches. With almost 2800 submissions and only 288 spots  there were bound to be a few they couldn't take. :)

So I thought I would play along too. I submitted 4 and none were accepted. Maybe next time! Of course I think i picked all of the popular ones!

You can find all 84 sketches here to download.

 The other thing was I guess I didn't really think too outside the box on these sketches either!

I was inspired to make these last 2 by a starbucks gift card. I guess I CASE'd it a little too closely! :)

Be sure to check out Amber's blog and link up your own creations too.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend. Thanks for stopping by!

In honour of......

Since today was the day of Papercrafts Submission acceptance I thought I would post some I made that didn't get picked up.

These are ones from previous calls that didn't get picked up:

All products are PTI.

Sending out a HUGE congratulations to all those that had submissions picked up! It's so super exciting to get that little email! Have a fabulous weekend everyone. :)

Papersmooches! Papersmooches!

Well i finally got my stamps in the mail and I was so excited to use them. I LOVE Kim Hughes' stamps. Have I mentioned that before? :)
So much that I, of course, immediately signed up for ther 12 month club. Automatically every month I will get sent to me the 3 new releases. I'm not even the slightest bit concerned I won't like them, they are all so adorable. Check them out here.

I was looking through all of my digital papers because I wanted to play around and found this background paper in one of PTI's colour couture downloads. I thought it kind of looked like spiders. I know maybe a bit of a stretch but still!

I can't wait to use them all.
Thanks for stopping by! have a great day. :)

Journey - ColourQ Challenge #74

March 1st huh? Crazy!! This weeks ColourQ colours had me going for a little bit. I like the colours individually, but I wasn't seeing them come together. Then I saw this little bike on a new Hero Arts set I just bought and Voila!, this patterned paper was born. Then I had to figure out how to use it! My blue did turn out to be a little more turquoise and a little less sky blue. Ooops.

The sentiment is actually a corner stamp that I just decided to use part of, and unfortunately I can't remember who it is by. Also, I didn't have any blue buttons so I figured if people can colour rhinestones, ribbon and pearls to match, why not buttons? So out came the closest Copic marker I had to match and this marbled looking button is the end result. I kinda like it though. :)

Please check out the most wondrous creations the rest of the design team are showcasing and play long with us. Thanks for stopping by. Happy Tuesday! :)