Thank You #2

I received a number of new Sizzix folders for Christmas and decided to try out some of them for my next thank you card, however, I found that I was pulling out old ones I've had for a while and found to be tried and true. This fun thank you card was built with Coordinations Black Magic cardstock using the Thanks folder. I then added a flower built from the Vine, Swirly die (the only new one used in this project) along with both a large and small flower from the Asterisks dies from Provo Craft. I colored the larger flower with Coffee Shop Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist and topped the whole thing off with a Darice stud using my IRock tool. It was quick and easy, but looks pretty cute in person.

No camping, but big fun anyhow

So camping didn't happen after all. Despite leaving early for the weekend, it apparently wasn't early enough and every single camping spot in the 'non-reserved, first-come, first-served" portions of all three parks we went to were full. Well after getting over my disappointment (and unpacking the RV and truck), we "camped" at home. Now we've had wine, frozen lemonade, margaritas, more wine, smores and truckload of camping snacks, ate dinner out with the family on Friday night, watched 8 hours of Real Housewives, two hours of Intervention, four hours of Hell's Kitchen, two hours of Master Chef and three hours of Glee, shopped at Michael's, Craft Warehouse and Jo-Ann's, picked up gorgeous flower baskets at the nursery, saw Cowboys and Aliens, oh, and made a new cork board for my sister (something we couldn't have done camping since the one thing I didn't pack was my Cricut). It turned out so adorable that I just had to post photos even though she's concerned that someone will copy it so it won't be one of kind. Personally, I know it will be one of kind because even if someone else tries to make it, they won't pick the same paper, cut it at exactly the same dimensions or place the houses in exactly the same way. So we found an image on Google image that she liked, traced it in SCAL, then moved the window to a place that she liked better, then cut them out of two colors of glitter card stock, then found a font she liked and welded the words and cut them in SCAL on the Cricut. So then it was just a process of taking out the backing and glass from the frame, inserting the cork board and putting the backing back on the frame, then gluing down the cuts we made. So here's a shot of it all put together (we left the corner protectors on so that it will transport safely back to her house): She bought the paper at Craft Warehouse. She carefully picked out cute glitter paper and found some coordinating card stock for the words. What she didn't know was the card stock she carefully picked out for the bluish gray color on the back was Black Magic card stock by Coordinations. So when she pulled it out today, I explained to her what she had bought and that changed the title all around. Instead of being the solid blueish gray, we ran it through the Sizzix with Script Texture embossing folder then sanded over the raised texture to bring out the blue text. You can see some of that dimension in this close-up:

So I had forgotten to turn off the layer with the house in it when I cut the words and ended up with this extra house. We used it as a test for the texture. The house turned out so cute that I had to use it somewhere, so I made this simple little card using some scraps from my scrap bin of Orbit paper from the Cosmic paper line I got from the Paper Loft. I have no idea what the striped paper is called, but I'm pretty sure it's from the same line at the Paper Loft. I just used some plain paper I bought in a ream at Paper Zone called Nekoosa Linen to make the card base and also to cut with my Sizzix Bigz Top Note die. I used a little bit of Offray gros grain ribbon and some pop dots to finish it off. A simple little card, but it was loads of fun to make.

Anyhow, now I'm going to finish watching this last episode of Glee with her. She had never seen it before and now I have her totally hooked on it with just the first episode. I knew she would love it. I'll make a Gleek out of her yet.

Mojo Monday Sketch 200!

Last night I was trolling the blogs, catching up on my reading, when I ended up on You Tube to watch a video posted on Creations with Christina's blog. One of the video choices following that one was this "black magic" technique shown here, which then led me to here. The technique looked easy to do and I actually had all the supplies so I gave it a try, going for something simple with this flower stamp. I use one main color of yellow and a slightly darker color in a few places. I added a little bit of white at the tips and a little bit of brown at the base of each petal and drew in the dark lines that give each petal it's distinct shape.
When I was done, I had this yellow flower, which seemed perfect to use on Mojo Monday's sketch this week (it's the 200th sketch - whoo hoo!). All the paper came from my scraps container, so apparently spending all last weekend cleaning, sorting and organizing my craft room paid off because I can actually find my scraps. This time, I actually do know where the paper came from. The solid orangy-yellow is from DCWV. The orange dotted paper is from My Mind's Eye All Twinkle, Twinkle Little Boy stack, the white and black are Georgia Pacific card stock. I used cinnamon Stickles to give the center of the flower a little bling. I have no idea where the flower stamp came from but the word "cherish" is from Stampin' Up's Warm Words collection.

Well, that's it for today. The day just flew by and now I had better get everything put away, finish that last load of laundry and get ready for work tomorrow. It may be a short week for me but that just means I have to pack a normal week's worth of work into a short period of time and will have to work hard the following week to get caught back up. Maybe that's why I never use my vacation time and always am trying to figure out how to use it before I lose it. But it will all be worth it since I'll have a long weekend to crank out some cards. Believe it or not, my stash is already starting to dwindle.