Joyful Holiday Wishes

Hello Crafty Friends and Welcome to my Blog.  It's been quite a while since I've posted and I decided to take the opportunity of Papertrey Ink rebooting one of their challenges to jump back into it.  It's been a busy year of working on our Arizona house to sell it and move back to Wisconsin.  We're still working on getting the new place to feel like home but we are so glad to be back.

I made this card for the PTI challenge, "Melissa's Fab Friday Feature".  The challenge is to "recreate Melissa's card with your own personality" using Papertrey Ink products.  

So here is my spin on it, using the same color pallet and papers that I've been using to make this year's Christmas Cards.  This year I'm all about the pinks, bluey greens and gold with lots of shine and sparkle.

PTI products used: 

Dies - Border Bling: Snowflakes, Joyful Florals, Love To Layer: Torn Edges, Snowfall Style, Words To Live By: Joyful

Stamps - Joyful Florals, Words To Live By: Joyful

Inks - Harvest Gold, Lovely Lady, Ocean Tides, Scarlet Jewel

TE 13th Birthday Challenge

Good Morning My Creative Friends and HAPPY FRIDAY!  Welcome to my little corner of the crafting universe, I hope you've had a great week.

HAPPY 13th BIRTHDAY TAYLORED EXPRESSIONS!

Today I'm sharing my entry for the Taylored Expressions 13th Birthday challenge.  Of the four challenges taking place, I chose to enter challenge #1 which is a Toffee (kraft) & Rainbow combo.  I know that most people will go with the ROYGBP, bright and cheery colors (which I LOVE) but I decided to change it up a little and include the toffee color in my rainbow.

I started out with the TE Over The Rainbow dies, choosing a pallet of soothing colors that I would like to use for a future baby card.

With the TE Over The Rainbow sentiments stamps, I added "You make me happy when skies are grey" to the edge of the sun and heat embossed with white powder.

The sentiment "Hello, friend" is from the TE  Butterfly Sweet Sentiments set.  For some simple finishing touches, I sewed around the card edges and added Star Dust Stickles to the edges of the white clouds.  I had thought about adding sequins or raindrops but after playing with them for a while, it took away from the sweet simplicity I was looking for.  Oh well...

Thank You so much for stopping by and taking a look.  I hope you have a fantastic weekend and I look forward to our next visit.

♥ Laura

Taylored Expressions: 13th Birthday FB Entry

Winter Fox Canning Jar Snow Globe

 Hello There My Crafty Friends!  Happy Friday and Welcome to my little corner of the crafting world!

Tomorrow the hubster leaves for his annual finishing trip.  What's a girl to do for an entire week all by herself?  Absolutely anything and nothing she feels like doing.  I'm starting out by stopping by my favorite country goodies store, The Rustic Hutch.  They're having a sale and I'll be going there directly after dropping the guys at the airport.  :D  I also plan to work on cards.  I'm late in starting my Christmas cards this year, so it's time to get a move-on.

For today's project, I knew I was going to create a snow globe and for some reason just felt it had to be a jar design.  Must be that country/farmhouse style, I love so much, just coming out of me.  For that, I turned to my Cricut.  I used the negative cut for the jar itself and the positive cut for the lid.  I used my scoring board for the lines in the lid and an embossing folder for the wood grain around the jar cut.

The sweet fox, trees and words are a set from Papertrey Ink called Winter Fox and the snowflake is Snowfall Style 1 dies, also by Papertrey Ink.  The swirly background is a very pretty die by Ellen Hutson called Twirling Flurries.

Don't know if you noticed in the first picture, that my jar panel is down and to the right side of the card base.  This caused me a lot of stress because, even though I like how it looked, it wasn't centered.  I spent way too much time obsessing over this but decided it's about time I step out of a few of my comfort zones.

Here you can see some of my snowy, glittery shaker bits.  I used 5 different sparkly things; little clay snowflakes, fine white glitter, shaved ice, clear sequins and glass glitter.

What do you think?  Please let me know in the comments section and, while you're there, any photography tips you'd be willing to give are greatly appreciated.  Especially when it comes to brightening up my photos.

Thank you so much for stopping by.  I hope you have a great weekend.

♥ Laura

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges.  Please click the links.

Papertrey Ink: Fab Friday, Snow Globe

Simon Says Stamp Wednesdays: Stamp It

Double D: Anything With A Tail

Happy Little Stampers: Watercolor AG

Thinking Of You Bouquet

 Happy Wednesday and, while we're at it, Happy September 1st. my Crafty Friends!  Welcome to my little corner of the crafting world.

Remember in my last post how I said I love this time of year?  Well, I do but the reality is setting in and things are already getting hectic.  I've started making some of my holiday gifts, creating a new crochet pattern for the sweetest candy cane pillows, stitching glass beads on felt pine trees which will be car air fresheners/scented ornaments, I have yet to decide on a design for my Christmas cards and I have less than three months to get it all done.  Yes, I celebrate Thanksmas.  My family converges on my home from various states as far away as Pennsylvania.  This way, there is no argument or tug of war with the in-law families about who's going to which house on Christmas.  Thanksmas is mine.

So with all of that going on, I still have to do the normal day to day stuff; clean the house, make dinner, do dishes, laundry and make cards for all of the rest of the celebrations of life.  You know how it is.

For this card I couldn't wait to try out some of my new goodies from the Papertrey Ink sale.  I finally got the Birthday Bouquet set that I've had my eye on FOREVER along with the Skinny Diagonal Frames which I have impressed into the panel.

I first inked up the flowers with Distress Inks using the color scheme from the MFT color challenge.  After much hemming and hawing, I decided to make the leaves and stems grey and I actually love this look.  I'm so traditional, it's tragic so I'm really glad I jumped out of my comfort zone for a change.

I then die cut everything with the coordinating dies and then distress spattered with white and black acrylics.  On the impressed panel, I used the three dot stamp from PTI's Winter Fox collection to surround the bouquet.

After adhering everything else down, I stamped the sentiment and then die cut it with the MFT Stitched Sentiment Banner Die and then finished it all off by adding Star Dust Stickles.

What do you think?  Please let me know in the comments section, and while you're there, let me know if you've started getting ready for the holiday season yet.

Thank you so much for stopping by.  I hope you have the best day!

♥ Laura

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges.  Please click on the links.

Papertrey Ink: The Great Cover-Up - Impress A Die Into The Background

My Favorite Things: Color Challenge

Funkie Junkie: Distressing

Simon Says Stamp Monday: Glimmer and Sparkle

Make It Market - Autumn

Hello My Crafty Friends!  Welcome!  Welcome!  Welcome!

Welcome to my little corner of the crafting world.  I hope you're enjoying every minute of summer as we're coming into the home stretch of August with less than a month until the official flip into Fall.

I LOVE this time of year!  All of my crafty neighbors are switching gears and starting to make holiday cards and I get so excited to see the fall colors and the new lineup of seasonal eye candy all over the internet and social media.

With that being said, I have this Autumn make to show you, inspired by some of my favorite things from Papertrey Ink.  Melissa Phillips of PTI did a live zoom class a few weeks ago featuring this awesome little stamp, die and stencil set called "Make It Market Mini Kit - Color Pop Autumn".

As Melissa was creating some beautiful examples, I jumped on the PTI website and ordered the kit along with their "Shape Up Series - Pumpkin" set that I've had my eye on for a while.  I had this brilliant idea to combine the two and make a card featuring both sets.

I first stenciled and then stamped the gorgeous leaves, stems and berries.  Then I die cut that piece using the Pumpkin Sections die.  I wanted to keep the sections separated, so I used the same die to cut kraft cardstock, using the negative to outline around the cuts and using those extra positive pieces to raise up my stamped sections.

And, of course, I had to add a tag but didn't want it to intrude on the design, so I tucked it behind and used the stem as the pull.

What do you think?  Please let me know in the comments section below and, while you're there, I would love to hear about your favorite time of the year.

I hope you have the best day!

♥ Laura

PS: I would like to enter my card into the challenges listed below, just click on the links.

Papertrey Ink: Color Pop Autumn w/ Melissa Phillips

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday: Add a Sentiment

Double D: Fruits & Vegetables

Happy Little Stampers: Stencil Challenge August

Products I used                                                                                                                                                

Stamps, Dies & Stencils: Papertrey Ink, Magnolia

Inks: Distress Oxides - Antique Linen, Brushed Corduroy, Bundled Sage, Chipped Sapphire, Dusty Concord, Forest Moss, Peeled Paint, Scattered Straw, Seedless Preserves, Stormy Sky, Tea Dye, Vintage Photo

Prismacolor Pencils

Get Well Soon My Friend

 Hello My Crafty Friends!

I made this card for my dear friend who is recuperating nicely after having his leg amputated.  The dear man wowed the doctors and nurses by keeping a positive attitude throughout his ordeal.  I believe it's why he was able to go home so soon afterward.  He's already shooting for a date to get back out on the golf course.

I have, once again, dove into my Papertrey Ink supplies to create this card.  These stamps and dies are so fun to work with and made short work of this card that I created using nothing but white cardstock and inks.

These beautiful roses are made with the PTI Effortless Beauties stamps and dies.  Love these layering stamps!  I cut the oval using the PTI Pierced Feature Frames: Ovals.  The shiplap background was made using dies from The Greetery called Shiplap Builder.

Distress Inks: Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry, Spun Sugar, Aged Mahogany, Seedless Preserves, Fossilized Amber, Scattered Straw, Gathered Twigs, Tea Die, Tumbled Glass, Broken China, Chipped Sapphire, Antique Linen, Frayed Burlap, Old Paper, Forest Moss and Forest Moss Oxide.

Thank You So Much for stopping by today.  I hope you have a most wonderful week and hope to see you again soon.

♥ Laura

I would like to enter my card into these challenges.  Please click on the links.

Papertrey Ink: The Great Cover-Up (Create A Card Using Just White Cardstock)

Thoughts Of You

Hello My Creative Friends!

I hope what they say is true, that absence makes the heart grow fonder.  I cannot believe this many months have gone by since my last post.  Not that I haven't been making cards, I just haven't posted them.  Sure, I take photos of them most of the time, but taking the time to post them has been beyond my scope for a while.  While editing these photos and just logging into this website, I have felt like a duck out of water.

I hope all of you are good and that you have all gotten through this past year without issue.  My job at UPS pretty much pounded me into the dirt.  We thought that with the lifting of restrictions and everyone able to go back out into the world and shop in physical stores like they did before, we would slow down and go back to normal.  Well, that hasn't happened yet.  Maybe this is the new normal.  I know I'm not out there like I used to be...

So without further ado, I have my latest make that I would like to share.

I have fallen in love with layered stamps and stencils with coordinating dies, especially since it seems I have more and more cards that I need to make.

The majority of my supplies are by Papertrey Ink.  They have this gorgeous collection of bird stamps and dies that are irresistible.  This sweet little one is Feathered Friends Mini 8 which I've paired it up with some of the Effortless Beauties florals.  I stamped the sentiment from the same set onto a Shape Shifters Oval 1.  The teacup is a Merry Mug die that I dry embossed with a Cuttlebug folder.

That really awesome background paper is from Nitwit Designs from their Harmony collection.  Everything is inked with Tim Holtz Distress Inks and Oxides and  I'll put a more detailed list of those below.

Thank You so much for stopping by and taking a look.  Your comments are always very much appreciated.  Have a most wonderful day and a fantastic weekend!

♥ Laura

Distress Inks and Oxides - Tumbled Glass, Broken China, Salty Ocean, Shabby Shutters, Mowed Lawn, Rustic Wilderness, Dried Marigold, Mustard Seed, Fossilized Amber, Spun Sugar, Worn Lipstick, Aged Mahogany, Antique Linen, Frayed Burlap, Hickory Smoke

I would like to enter my card into the following challenges.  Please click on the links.

Papertrey Ink: What Do I Do With This