More Christmas cards to enjoy!

Just thought I'd share the rest of my Christmas card designs, they're all going in the mail TODAY. I keep putting off going to the post office, but it's time!

And since it's my mother-in-law's birthday today, here's the card I made for her!

Mojo Monday #169

Can you believe I actually did a Mojo Monday card on.....a MONDAY!? Not just one but TWO! :D Enjoy!

Newest blanket!

I made this blanket for my sister's birthday! It's the same pattern as the yellow one I made for my friend's baby, just blue and white rugby stripes (she's going to BYU and those are the school colors)! I absolutely love the way it turned out.

No, I didn't fall off the face of the planet!

I really do have some fun things coming! I'm currently crocheting an AWESOME blanket, but I can't give any details yet since it's a gift! ;) I have been learning some mending and alterations skills in my free time as well, which has been a lot of fun. I'm becoming much more confident in my sewing skills, and hope to be able to make a few skirts for church in the near future!

I'll be going to my parents' the week of Thanksgiving, but after that the craft room will be occupied daily until Christmas! I'll have Christmas cards in the works very soon, as well as several gifts for family, including a super-sweet summer vacation mini-album and probably a few pieces of home decor! Stay tuned, and I promise you won't be disappointed! If anyone has any requests of things you would like to see, let me know. I'm always in need of good ideas for tutorials.

I am so sorry....

That I haven't posted in FOREVER!!! But never fear, great things are coming your way!!

I just spent the last 60 minutes of my life attempting to wake up with a mug of hot cider curled up with a faux-rabbit-fur throw and a knit shawl in front of my computer. In case you've never tried this, it's NOT the best way to wake up. Cold showers or going for a run in the 40 degree morning air work far better.

However, we'll count it as time well spent, because in my attempt to stay awake, I went snooping around Anthropologie's and Pottery Barn's websites. You want to know what I found?

A $10 PINECONE

Oh, this just will not do. Who pays $10 for a pine cone??? I think I probably have at least 10, maybe more, in my yard right now! Gee, at this rate, I could be a millionaire next week!

BUT...

Because I don't enjoy taking rich people's money for things they don't have time to create themselves for the holidays because they're so busy working to be rich, I've decided I must take it upon myself to show everyone else how to make some beautiful and expensive-looking CHEAP holiday decor! I'm up to my elbows in crafts......okay, so right now I'm up to my EARS in IDEAS. but keep your eyes peeled (could someone sometime fill me in on where that idiosyncrasy came from? kay thanks) because the holiday tutorials are coming, and they need YOU to comment on them so they can feel good about themselves! :D

Oh ya, and I know I only have but a couple followers, but if y'all or anyone else stumbling across my newborn blog would like to see a tutorial for something in particular, please just ask! While I ADORE crafting, my brain loves to tell me that the essay for psych class or the laundry or eating comes first...which they should, but I really need a good excuse to spend some quality time crafting, so let me know if there's something you'd like to try but maybe don't know how to totally design it, shop for it, or execute it, and I'll hook you up! I give myself a pretty hefty craft-store allowance each month, and lately it hasn't been spent!! :O My hubby would be so proud if he knew!!

He doesn't know, though. Honestly, I'm afraid if he knew I had started spending less on crafts....well, he might think that I have a new, reduced "necessary spending amount" and would find other uses for the leftover cash. Uh uh, nope, no way. That's a sacred "trust" (get it?) between myself and Hobby Lobby, and you can't take it away from me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mojo challenge done...I know, it's Thursday

So ya, it took me 4 whole days to get this challenge done. But that's only because yesterday I couldn't pick which card I liked best for it! I may still post the first attempt over the weekend, but this is the one my husband liked best, and I think I like it best too. It has already been stamped and tucked and is in the box headed for OWH. This week: 5 cards in 4 days. I'm getting into a nice rhythm of cranking cards out lately! Oh, and please excuse the pitiful image. Dumb camera couldn't get a decent shot without natural lighting at 7am, and the scanner must be mad at me!

Mojo Monday

It's Monday y'all! Time for a Mojo Monday sketch to get things rolling! I've been cranking out a couple simple designs this weekend, and I'm up to a whopping FIVE cards to ship in for OWH. Looks like someone needs to hop on the card-making train! So, without further ado, the new Mojo sketch and some much-needed inspiration!

Loads of idea-neurons are firing away up there, time to get to work!

Remember THESE???

TA DA!

Once I began re-organizing my craft room, I discovered that all my rubber stamps are huge, except these handfuls of little ones. The larger stamps fit perfectly into one of my black cube drawers, but those little guys above got lost in the back of the drawer, and they're actually the ones I end up using the most I think. I knew I couldn't leave them floating at the back of a foot-long drawer, so I decided to try them in these little shelves. Voila!

I'll be hanging them up on the wall as soon as I can find a small plaque of some sort to hang between the two. (I absolutely cannot hang a grouping of TWO on a wall, has to be 3)

I just painted these with white craft paint, then cut pieces of white, black and hot pink (remember the filing cabinet?) paper to fit inside the cubbies. I cut the paper just the tiniest bit bigger than the space they were to fit into, so I could just push the paper to the back and use a bone folding tool to push the edges in nice and tight. No glue needed!! Now that's MY kind of wall art. :D

Baby blanket is finally done!

I finally finished the baby blanket I'd spent the last month or more crocheting for my friend Sara's baby shower! The shower was yesterday at 2pm, and I was just pulling it out of the dryer at 1:45! But hey, it was finished and I am so incredibly proud of myself! I have started many, many crochet projects but never actually finished one! So, for your viewing pleasure, here are a few pictures of the blanket. It is a soft baby yellow and very soft yarn!

This first picture shows how I wrapped it all up for her. I folded it, tied with a silky pink ribbon and placed a hand-made card inside the ribbon. Of course, I still have that terrible habit of making cute on-the-fly cards and sealing them up before I remember I should take a picture of them! The tiny little striped tag opens up to say "I am machine washable! Wash me in warm water and add fabric softener if you'd like. I can even go in the dryer! Just keep the heat nice and low, I only take about 20 minutes to dry completely. :) " I think a lot of people expect a handmade item to be too fragile to wash, but not this one! I washed and dried it myself just to be sure, and it held up beautifully.

Just to show a little detail on the rippled design. It has a divine texture!

This blanket ended up about 52 inches long! I wanted to keep it for myself!

Plenty more crochet projects to come in the future, but to avoid arthritis in my 22-year-old wrists, I am turning my attention to an important sewing project and more wood painting later this week. Keep checking back for new updates, which I had better remember to post!

Learning to paint

As you can see from pictures in past posts, my craft room is mostly white, the hardwood floors and sewing table are a darker wood stain, and I use hot pink, black and Tiffany blue as accents. So what would you do with a $5 corner shelf and two $1 unfinished divided shelves (these are small and are meant to hang on a wall) like these? They definitely don't match the decor but for $7, I have to use them! Well keep your socks on, they are currently in the process of an overhaul. I can't wait to show you what I've done with them!

Hooray for Friday!

It's Friday! Last day to run errands and get MY stuff accomplished without the "help" of my husband! I know we're about due for some pictures here, I promise they're coming tomorrow. Here's what I'm up to today, I need to finish a couple of items before the hubs gets home from work, or he'll try to lend a "helping" hand and just end up doing it himself. It's not going to happen this time though! I really do want to do these, all by myself!

Alright, so remember the white filing cabinet I adhered hot pink and black papers to? So I guess my room is white, hot pink and black now! That $5 corner shelf I got has been sanded down and I'm on coat 2 of 4 of white paint. After that I'm stenciling a pretty flower design in -yep- hot pink and black. I also had some unfinished, divided wood shelves I was laying flat in my dresser drawer and using for jewelry. Well I de-cluttered and got rid of a lot of ugly, cheap-o jewelry, so I painted those shelves white last night as well. I have big plans for them, but I can't tell you what they are...it's a surprise! Hopefully I can get them finished and post pics tomorrow!

I'm also about 1/3 done crocheting my friend's baby blanket. I only have 5 real days left to work on it before the shower, because I start school on Tuesday. It's pretty cool that I set up my school schedule this fall so all my classes are earlier in the day, and only on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, meaning we could leave town on a Thursday night and take a long weekend through Monday night, anytime we want! :P I know, I'm a pretty lucky chick.

Oh ya, and I have that gift scrapbook album I was making for someone who is very special to me. Just in case, I can't tell you about it till it has made it into the recipient's hands. We've all become such online stalkers these days, you never know who could read your blog at any moment!

Wow, after typing all that out I just grabbed my "fall project list" notebook, and I've barely skimmed the surface! So much to do, and so VERY LITTLE TIME!!!!

It's time

It's time to "forget [my]self, and go to work." Too many hours spent lounging in front of the television (only acceptable if there's a crochet project in my hands), too much money spent out of sheer boredom, the list could go on and on, but I don't have time to come up with more! The point is, enough time has been wasted, and it ends now. Time to go to work, being an influence for good.

Blogging to pass the time...

I got a ton of great storage (mostly wood 3-tier shelf-type stuff) for my craft room yesterday at a yard sale. Now it's all sitting, back to back, in the center of my room with heaps of yarn, paper and fabric in bags and laid out all over the floor. I can't even get into my own hobby room! (Much less walk around in it!)

So I'm sitting on the chaise, hoping to put the mess that cannot be avoided out of my mind. My fave blog at the moment is Craftaholics Anonymous. I mean this girl is just fabulous! But in my attempt to procrastinate, I found myself reading an article titled "you know you're a craftaholic when..." and I just HAD to share a few that seemed to apply readily to me!

1. Whenever you go shopping you end up buying nothing because you think you can make everything yourself!

2. You pass the craft store and have to tell yourself out loud: No. Groceries first!

3. Your guests have to sleep on the couch because you have a craft room instead of a guest room.

4. You would rather spend the day at a craft store than at the mall.

5. Your walk in closet has more craft supplies than clothes.

6. Your husband asks you if he still needs to save the empty paper towel rolls and then, eventually does it without asking.

7. You collect things your friends throw away. Recycling!

8. To take #7 further, I posted a list by two friends' kitchen garbage of things they are NOT ALLOWED to throw away, gave them each a plastic tub in which to collect these items, and I pick them up. They think I'm crazy but they always have fun making the crafts with me later!!

9. When you own at least 20 types of glue.

10. You blow the budget on fabric because there was a good sale.

11. Your husband drives 20 miles an hour over the speed limit on trash days, in fear you might find something in other's trash you want to "alter."

12. You hardly ever buy new clothes because it cuts into your crafting money.

I will admit I do all the financial stuff in our household, and my hubby really doesn't have much to do with it, other than telling me if he wants a little extra budgeted for something he wants this month. So I'm the one who sits down with the bills and calculator and makes the budget for the month....on my computer. Which he doesn't use. So he never actually SEES the budget.....I honestly can't tell you what he must think, because he has nooooo idea how much I spend on crafty things! I won't say numbers, but let's just say our monthly "crafting/hobbies" category on the budget usually outweighs the water, gas, electricity, cable, internet, cell phones and medical bills, all rolled into one "bills" category. YIKES! Well, he doesn't have to know. I usually get food on the table no matter what....unless Hobby Lobby has paper and ribbon half-off. What's a good side dish for paper a la king?? Grosgrain ribbon perhaps? LOL

and sew it begins...

I have slowly begun tackling the pile of air force uniform pants on the floor next to my sewing desk. Boy are they tough! First of all, the thread used in the pants from the factory is IMPOSSIBLE to find a match for - I went to both Hobby Lobby and Wal-Mart and couldn't find a thread that comes anywhere close to the original stuff. So I erred on the side of too dark and got a nice manatee grey. Spooled it up, threaded everything, put a new (tougher) needle in, pinned the first pair of pants together and...... stared at the machine and the pants for a good 30 minutes without even moving! I just realized, I don't know how to sew! :O Well, I finally sucked it up and wedged the pants over the NOT-free-arm of the machine, put a couple stitches in by hand, backstitched a few times, and just went for it. The result? Not a terrible job, till I realized I had stitched both back pockets to the backside of the pants! So I had to spend a good hour slowly ripping out the double seam (which is, by the way, entirely visible to the naked eye, so no room for mistakes! AHH!).

I finally finished the first pair of pants, 5 more to go. I lost interest and moved on to working on crocheting a baby blanket for my friend who is 6 months pregnant (she's having a girl). Can I finish it in just 3 more months?? Maybe if I don't let the ADHD get the best of me...oh wait, I was in the process of making a senior memories scrapbook for my little sister and designing my Christmas cards, and I need to take some of the length off two of my "prairie" skirts, and organize my craft room, and......sheesh. I should probably get off the computer and get to work.

Picture Time

Alright, so I finally dug the camera out of the piles of junk in my hobby room this morning to take a couple pictures. I'm so insanely proud of my $35 Brother sewing machine! And my hubby is proud of the job I did on the white filing cabinet - every time he's come into the craft room this week, he tells me how great it looks! Aww, thanks babe!

I now have a pile of 5 or 6 ABU air force uniform pants from my husband and his friends. Each pair seems to have the "reinforced backside" flapping freely in the wind, as well as broken belt loops, pockets that are falling out, missing buttons etc. Guess that'll keep me busy for a while!

I had to take my 6' white craft table (which was my scrapping space) out Saturday afternoon to use as a buffet for our friend's birthday barbecue - which was held in our garage and driveway, since we don't have a back patio! It was a lot of fun, but I just finished cleaning all the mustard and bbq sauce off it, and now comes the task of returning it to the place it was originally. In order to get the table out, I had to remove everything that was on top of it. Well, now all those tools and supplies are in little piles all over the crafty room floor! It's going to take HOURS to reorganize everything just so, since I don't even have any pictures of the new table set-up!

Ah, it's so great to be a full-time "homemaker"!! Before, I probably would have locked the hobby room door from the inside and just never stepped back into it because with work and everything, I would never have found time to accomplish all the stuff I'm getting into now, and keep it all clean at the same time! :D

Making the old new

WOW I STINK at keeping up with my blog! Life has been so crazy lately I haven't had two seconds to myself to be inspired it seems! However, inspiration has finally come in the form of "reuse and recycle." My sweet hubby actually LOVES to go to the farmer's market, flea market, antique shops and yard sales with me - can you believe that?? So we got up at the crack of dawn Saturday morning (no easy feat!) and hit up around 10-12 yard sales! My new treasures:

-Dresser with matching mirror: now I really only wanted the mirror. It's HUGE! And we all know how expensive a brand new, large wall mirror is! Even on sale the ones at the home decor store are over $120. I asked if I could take just the mirror and offered $10 (a large sum at a yard sale, right?) for it. Well the guy's wife said "how COULD you? They go together, we're selling them together!" Alright, but the dresser was $50. I looked at the guy, one eyebrow raised and said "is it really $50?" He peeled the sticker off and said "it's however much you want it to be." I told him we'd take the set for $20 and he gladly accepted. I gave the dresser (which isn't much to look at, but large and fully functional) to our friends, who just moved from dorm rooms into a large house together, as a house-warming present. And yes, I'm still planning on hanging the mirror on my wall, after some sanding and such!

-4 drawer filing cabinet: this I got at a different yard sale for $5!! It's a nice, clean white and in overall fantastic condition...except for a large scrape down the right side. I brought it home and it just so happens that the damaged side can be up against the wall so you can't even see it, and it fits PERFECTLY next to my scrap desk! Now I finally have somewhere to not only keep our household filing system, but I have a way to organize all the pretty paper scraps from projects past that I just can't bear to throw away. My plan for it? (Of course I have a plan!!) I'm going to my LSS today for Mod-Podge and a brayer. I've already removed the sleek brushed nickel knobs, and picked out pretty pink and black coordinating papers and trimmed them to size. I'm going to cover the inside of the front of each drawer with a pretty paper, then reattach the knobs over the top. YES pictures will be posted when I am finished!

-2 chipboard children's books: I plan on turning them horizontal and covering with paper for mini-albums as gifts. 2 books for $0.50.

-Napa Valley cassette tape holder: This one I actually got free - she had said $0.50, but then didn't want the coins after all! It is ALMOST the perfect size for my stamping ink pads...my husband just needs to remove a couple pieces so it will fit the larger pads. It even has holes in the back already so it'll be a quick hang job!

-Sewing machine: Last but not least - in fact, the most important I think! - is my new sewing machine! It's a Brother, and actually really nice! Seems to be fully functional, except for the fact that it's missing the Brother-specific bobbins (because they just HAD to make theirs different and therefore more expensive) and the presser foot. It's okay though, because I have coupons for Hobby Lobby! I downloaded the user manual for it online, printed it and put it in a binder under my sewing desk. My first project? Fixing my poor hubby's uniform pants for work! He's a crew chief, and definitely wears right through the "reinforced" backside and knees constantly! Up until now it's meant a new pair of $50 uniform bottoms every other month, but now I can patch the holes, reattach belt loops, re-stitch pockets, and basically save us a ton of money!

BEST PART??? The sewing machine cost.....(drumroll)......$35.

I can't wait till the Saturday after next when we can do it all again! I just have to get all my current projects done first! :P

I purchased an E-book on Scrapbook.com this morning called UR2 Cre8ive by Stacy Julian. It is WONDERFUL!! She has some unique ideas about how to change your outlook on life and open your mind to new possibilities. She presents a series of "projects" you can try, and they will help you gain the confidence to do things YOUR (-creative-) way, instead of the way the world has conditioned you to think they should be done. I love it and I'm recommending it to ANYONE who has ever felt inadequate in the creative fields of life.

PS: It's only 24 pages long, so it's a quick read too! Good for those of us (a.k.a. ME) with short attention spans.

I'm a favorite!

Quick update - I'm listed on the second page of favorite scraprooms on www.scrapbook.com! I had a happy happy joy joy moment and had to share. :D Guess the girl can decorate!

10 minute card!

I literally made this card for my aunt in just 10 minutes! I was so proud. :) The pink pp is My Mind's Eye and the daisy embellishment is K & Company.

2 Operation Write Home cards

If you don't know what Operation Write Home is, go Here. This has been my focus for the week! I made these two cards as part of my plan to make 50 this summer to send in for the organization. "Thinking of You" was my first, just a very simple graphic design for those who like that style. The green swiss dot embossed paper is AC cardstock, the blue and tan strips are Bazzill, the corner rounder I use is from EK Success and the arch lattice punch (that I seem to be using on just about everything!) is Martha Stewart.

The "Miss You" card includes SEVEN different patterned papers from the My Mind's Eye Delightful stack. I was trying to challenge myself to use more than 1 or 2 pp's on a card, and I actually really like how it turned out! I used a Fiskars punch for the scalloped pieces and completely hand stitched all the way around the entire card...which only took, oh, maybe 3 hours total? It took me an entire week to finish it because I got real tired of the stitching about 2 inches in LOL.

Anyway, loads more to come, TFL!

My first two-page layout

I just did my first ever two-page scrapbook layout last week of our move from the Emerald Coast of Florida to Middle of Nowhere, New Mexico. That was a whole year ago! Gee, I should probably stop shopping for new goodies and get to work already!

Anyway, this first photo is a close-up of the flower embellishment I made by hand. I simply traced and cut out 7 petals from S.E.I.'s Dill Blossom collection, then dampened and crumpled each petal. I then used Tim Holtz Distress ink in walnut stain to ink the edges of each petal and then glued them all together. While the glue was drying I threaded the button and glued that on as well. I pulled up on the petals a bit to give it more dimension. I LOVE how it turned out!! :D

All the papers I used are from the S.E.I. Dill Blossom collection. The chipboard letters are from Paper Studio. I used Tim Holtz' Distress crackle paint in Antique Linen on them and it gave them a super cool crackled effect, which is hard to see in the photo. We move so often I thought I should write the address down, because I'll never remember all the addresses we've had!! The punched border on the photo was done with the MS arch lattice punch, my fave punch of ALL TIME! I thought it kind of looked like a little fence for the photo.

Here's the full two-pages. I carried the piece of striped pp across both layouts for continuity. Ha ha see my toes??

I just love this page because it's pretty special to me. I kept it very simple on purpose. I wasn't able to get many good pictures of our cross-country move, mostly because I was too lazy to dig the GOOD camera out of the moving truck! But I did get 4 decent snapshots to illustrate our journey. The importance of this page to me is the journaling. We had such a tough trip, made a lot of mover-mistakes that we'll never make again, and gained a lot of memories from the move that I want to remember forever. They're still not funny stories to me yet, but they will be in a few years. I typed and printed it out on a sheet of vellum which I layered over green distressed paper - I mention this because it's impossible to see the layers in the photo. I've never found a glue that dries clear enough to use under vellum yet, so I just attached the two papers with some tarnished copper brads. The letters are chipboard and the flower is actually punched from a cereal box - I'm RESOURCEFUL!! LOL I covered them in patterned paper and sanded the edges down smooth. TFL!

My little paradise

So I thought I'd share what my scraproom looks like! This first picture is the right side of my work space. The wall behind me here has two closets full of clothes and office supplies. See one of my kitties on the printer? I love my printer, it's older and slow, but it prints amazing photos. The filing cabinet below it holds copy paper and photo papers. The corkboard on the wall holds all my stickers except the ones about to fall off their sheets, those are in the plastic drawers to the left of the filing cabinet. I don't use stickers a lot, so I don't have very many. I need to come up with something else to fill the board up with, or just take it down - it was free anyway! The tool carousel on the table holds my scissors, rulers, small paper trimmer, x-acto knives, superglue and all my pens.

This is the left wall of my scrap space. The blue accent color reminded me of Tiffany & Co. which is why I fell in love with it. The top row of boxes have my old decorative edge scissors for which there is no longer a need. I want to find like a kindergarten class or something that could use them. I also store instruction manuals up on that top shelf. The second shelf of boxes is where I keep my photos and spools of thread. My darling husband installed the floating shelves for me, and then added the ribbon rack underneath! I keep a measuring tape on the rack with all the ribbon so I can easily pull out, measure and cut off exactly the right amount. Then on top of the bookshelves is my Xyron and Crop-a-Dile Big Bite. The little jars hold all my flowers. The plastic drawers contain tools, paint brushes, Q-tips, emery boards, adhesives, envelope seals, different rotary blades for my Cutterpede, a couple of wood handle stamps, and ribbon scraps. The blue bins hold my cardstock scraps organized by color, upper and lower case chipboard alphas, chipboard accents and mesh and tulle. The pink file organizes any holiday-specific items, then my scrapbooks are next to it, and the white binders are full of inspiration I've pulled out of magazines.

Last but not least here's my work space. I just upgraded from a teeny tiny student desk to this awesome craft table, and it's STILL not enough space! I get pretty messy. :D My paper rack is to the left of my desk, and holds ALL the cardstock organized by color and then by texture. The top few shelves of the rack have the huge patterned paper stacks from My Mind's Eye, which I am totally addicted to. The Cropper Hoppers on the floor have my Basic Grey and S.E.I. collections. The clear plastic drawers under the table that I like to stub my toes on hold all my blank cards, envelopes, kraft paper, vellum and stationary. The little tray on the table holds a few punches, the rest get scattered all over the place. The little black binder has my clear acrylic stamps, and the green cd holder to the right has my Stampin' Up! inks. To the right of that is another little stamp ink shelf just for all my Tim Holtz Distress inks, which I am also addicted to. Then there's my heat tool and the blue embellishment center where I keep all my brads, buttons, eyelets, metal accents, etc. I keep my Cutterpede trimmer, my Martha Stewart cutting mat and clear ruler, and my nonstick craft mat from Ranger on the table at all times. Oh ya - and this is actually decently clean for me! LOL

Yellowstone layout

This is of our trip last summer to Yellowstone. We had such fun spending quality time with my family and each other!

I tried to use up a bunch of random pieces I had laying around, so I don't know any brands except the title lettering and flourish, which are stickers from the Basic Grey Periphery collection; the silk flowers and brads are Paper Studio, and the polka dot pp is My Mind's Eye Wild Asparagus collection.

Mother's Day cards

One of the cards I made for mother's day! I used pre-made white cards and envelopes and added my favorite girly pp's from My Mind's Eye. I used the Fiskars funky love punch for the heart and adhered it with a 3D dot. I tied a piece of sheer, shimmery AC ribbon around one of the squares of paper. The edge on the beige Bazzill Bling cs was made with the Martha Stewart arch lattice punch. The punch is Stampabilities with hot pink pigment ink. TFL!

Sister-in-law birthday card

I just made this card last week for my sister-in-law's birthday. Sweet and simple, just the way I like my cards!

Brand New Blog!!

I'm starting a fresh new blog for all my adventures, specifically those related to scrapbooking and cardmaking. My goal is to update at least weekly with all my creations. Enjoy!