Do You Like a Challenge? How About a Prize?

Wow, I can't believe I haven't posted here in over a week! I was on a roll, but then got a bit busy and time flew by!

I'm not posting a card or project right now, I want to tell you about something else. I want to give you a little information first, but then I'll be telling you about a challenge with a PRIZE!

I am a member of a great little scrapbooking (and stamping, and cardmaking and other paper crafts) message board. I've been chatting with some of these ladies for years now. It's a much smaller board than most of the "well known" ones out there, but that's exactly why I like it. I have to say, that the big boards intimidate me. And while I like to browse them for inspiration, I never have felt comfortable chatting in the forums.

And I know there are others like me out there who would love a board to get some inspiration and to talk about scrapbooking, stamping and other things, but aren't crazy about the bigger boards. If you are one of those like me, then Paper Petal Memories may be right up your alley!

I have truly made friends on this board and have even had the opportunity to meet 4 of them in person! And yet another, I talk to on the phone every chance I get. These ladies are great. If you're looking for some fellow scrapbookers to chat with, then come check out the board! However, we talk about much more than scrapbooking!

Now for the challenge.....

Things have been a little slower on the board lately so we are trying to come up with some challenges to get the scrapping flowing again! Our wonderful site hostess, Kelly has put out a great challenge that includes a prize. I love this challenge, and am just a little partial to it since a while back when we did this before, I actually won! Go me! LOL!

Here is the challenge:

This challenge is for designer/patterned paper challenge, although you can create your own OSW (one sheet wonder). PLEASE READ ALL OF THE DIRECTIONS. I wouldn't want anyone to be disqualified from being a finalist for not following the guidelines.

You must use only one sheet of designer paper - you must use it all to create anywhere from 4-12 projects. At least 2 items must be non-card projects and at least 2 items must be cards (any size). Think you are up for it, I do!

You must use the following in your projects:
Stamp sets - any
Designer paper - 1 sheet - use it all
Cardstock - any
Ink - any
Embellishments - any

Important uploading guidelines: You must photograph the group together. These group photos will be the ones that are judged. You must list your items used, especially your patterned paper. Please forward your entry to me via email at paperpetalmemories(at)gmail(dot)com. This is going to be exciting to see what all of you can create with one sheet of paper!.

Judging:

You will have until Monday, June 24th at 8:00 PM CST to email your entry. I am giving you a month to put your minds to work for some fabulous creations! At around 12:00AM CST, I will post a new thread with a poll of all the finalists. You will vote on the grand prize winner! I will leave the polls open for 3 days.

Are you ready to know what the prize will be?? Are you?? Well, since the site has been dragging a bit recently, I decided to toss a good prize out there to see if that would get your creative juices flowing. I am going to send out a $25 gift card to either Hobby Lobby or Michael's your choice!

So does this sound like a fun challenge? Anyone can play along...so feel free to pass this information on or share on your blog. Who couldn't use an extra $25 to spend on this wonderful habit hobby we have?

Be sure to check out our other challenges as well. We have a layout sketch challenge and a card challenge (almost) every week. Be sure to check out the gallery as well!

Mother's Day Cards

My neighbor ordered two Mother's Day cards from me. She didn't give me any specifications, just as long as they were Mother's Day-ish!

So I made four cards and let her pick which two she wanted. I saved the other two for my Mom and MIL.

These are the two my neighbor chose:



After making the pink one, I liked the way it turned out, so I decided to recreate it in the blue. I was happy with the way they came out.
My neighbor liked them, and more importantly, so did the Mom's who received them!

A Couple of Layouts

I still have more auction things to post, but I thought I'd break away and post a couple of recent layouts.

Both of these were inspired by sketches at PageMaps.com. I love the sketches there!

This was the first sketch I used (this one is from May sketches):


And here is my layout - "Sweet & Sour"

Sorry about the shadow - I guess I was between the light and the layout!

Here's a close up of the journaling:


Here is the second sketch (From February sketches)


I flipped the sketch for my layout. I also added a pull-out tag behind the picture for the journaling.

The plain cardstock behind the title looks almost white, but it is actually grey.
I didn't take a pic of the journaling. But it basically explains the title. I call my hubby, "My Love". When I was trying to come up with a title for this page, it was he who suggested, "My {little} Love" since CJ is a "mini-Chip". And he is my little love, so it's perfect. Though, he's not so little anymore - he's only 1/2 inch shorter than me!!! This picture was actually taken in December 2005.

For this one, I used some chipboard letters from Cloud 9. I inked the tops with black. They were originally a beige color. I only inked the tops though, I left the edges the natural color. You can't really tell in the pic, but it makes them have even more of a dimensional look. For the brackets, I actually used a chipboard piece as the stencil, traced it and colored it in. I stamped the word 'little' on red cardstock. I can't remember the name of the stamp set, but each letter is a different font. The 'e' is a negative image, but is a little hard to see in the photo. You can click it to make it larger if you want to see it better. The heart if by Heidi Swapp, I believe. And the little circle with the date on it is a chipboard circle. I covered it with the red cardstock and punched a hole with my Crop-a-dile.

More Auction Pieces

I will eventually get through all these...I promise! Not too many more to go. (Hey...at least it's giving me something to post!)

There was a camping themed basket. Not a very easy one to come up with a paper crafting idea for. I was browsing Split Coast Stampers and got inspired.

First, I came across this. It is Jiffy Pop popcorn. I thought that would be cute. Then I saw somewhere on there something about S'mores Trail Mix. So I googled it to see what was in it. I found out it was Honey Graham's cereal, chocolate chips and marshmallows. But I thought I remembered someone using Teddy Graham's instead of the cereal, so that's what I did.

So this is what I came up with:


Just like the school paper in my last post, I've had this paper forever too. Probably from the same pack! I just covered the popcorn with it and made a tag using a scallop punch.

The trail mix is in an old peanut butter jar I had been saving. (I have lots of jars saved and stashed everywhere!) It was big enough that it held enough of the trail mix for a whole family to share.

I just used some of the paper to make a band and finished it off with a scalloped label. I decided the red lid worked just fine, so I just wrapped a green ribbon around it.
For a little more fun on the top, I did this:


And as a side note - that trail mix? Oh my word, is it so yummy! But I'll NEVER tell how much of it I ate!

Oh, and I used the mini chocolate chips instead of the regular ones. I think they were perfect.


Also, there was a "kitty" basket. And by kitty, I mean there was to be a real live kitten in that basket to be auctioned! I thought the kitty would need some treats, so I made this:

That's a Starbucks Frappuccino bottle. I made the label on my computer and attached it to the black card stock band. A paw print on the top and some cute paw print ribbon. Pretty cute, I think!

Oh - and if you live close to me and happen to be reading this....AND you happen to drink Frappuccino's - could you do me a huge favor and save me your bottles? I'll even come get them from you! And you don't even have to wash them out. Just toss them (gently) in a box or bag and I'll wash them myself! Thanks to anyone who's willing to help!
I have lots of projects I need these for, and if I drink that many of them, I'll never get the weight off that I'm trying to!

Back to School

I did this for the 'School Supply' basket, again, for the silent auction.

I have had this paper forever - it's from an old Slab stack of paper from Michael's, I think. Anyway, it was perfect for this project.

I used Mod Podge to adhere it to the clipboard. I used my Fiskars shape cutter to make the lettering in red. I adhered it to a piece of yellow, and then just cut around it. I then used the Mod Podge to adhere it and the red strip in the middle to the clipboard. I used red line tape to adhere the ribbon in the middle.

Then I attached some cork board and a stack of post it notes. I picked up the push pins at the Dollar Tree. They had a different color design on them. I removed it and added red cardstock. Then I coated it with Aleene's Paper Glaze to make the resemble the original glassy look they had.

I used the same paper to cover the notebook and to make the beaded pen. I attached the pen with some red ribbon and then tied a couple of red and yellow ribbons to the top of the clipboard.
And you can't really see it, but if you look super close, you might notice a binder clip in the top right corner, that is covered with the same paper as well.

Garden Inspired

This was another contribution to the silent auction baskets. There was a garden themed basket. I couldn't come up with much, but this is what I did.

I picked up this little notebook at the Dollar Tree. I took it apart and covered it then reassembled it.


Then I made a set of 3x3 note cards. Very simple, but I think they came out pretty cute.


I picked up a set of garden gloves (that happened to match the pinkish cards perfectly) at the Dollar Tree as well, I placed them in a small flower pot with a ribbon tied around it. I tied the cards with some ribbon and placed them in the center of the gloves. I didn't think to get a picture of it all ready to go. Too bad, because I think it looked quite cute all packaged together!

Inspirational Set

Our Homeschool group purchased a house a few years ago for holding co-op classes. They are now busting at the seams and raising funds to build a new facility. This weekend, they are holding a dinner theater and a silent auction.

For the auction, they have quite a few themed baskets. I decided to contribute by making some things for a few of the baskets.

I made this set for the Inspirational basket. I wanted to incorporate a verse and image on all the pieces. I chose the verse Philippians 4:13: I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

I found the image in MSWord and typed the verse right over the top of it.

First is a set of 5 note cards:


And a candle:


I picked up this little wood frame at Michaels. I painted the edges and back the same color as the main color in the paper. Then mod podged the paper on. Then I printed the image/verse on cardstock and slipped it in.


A quick and easy bookmark:


And a set of coasters:


And here is almost everything together. I forgot to put the coasters in before I took the picture.

Thank You Set

I made this set of cards for my shop. I really love the color combo, it is one of my favorites. (I think I love pink and brown even more though.)

The main image stamps in the first two are Rhona Farrer stamps. For the third card, I used a chipboard piece from TLC as a template. I traced the image and colored it in. The sentiments are all from the $1 Studio G stamp sets. The ribbon is from Michaels.

Personally, the middle card is my favorite of the three.

Monogrammed Note Cards

I made sets of monogrammed note cards for Christmas gifts for family and friends.

One of my friends used hers and needed some more, so she ordered a set of 12. I decided to use the same layout, but this time, I used summery colors. I didn't have enough of the paper to make all 12 the same, so I made 4 each of 3 designs.





The stamps are from Oriental Trading.

Simple, but fun. And she loved them, which is really what matters!

Welcome Baby Cards

Today I have two more cards that sold out of my Etsy shop. I definitely need to get busy making more baby/pregnancy cards!

I love how this one turned out - so pink, girly and sweet.
I Cuttlebugged the background, then matted it. The sentiment is a Studio G stamp, and I split the words up to make it fit the way I wanted. The bow is a pre-made one I had in my stash, and I just attached it to the ribbon.



I'm also pleased with the way this one came out. I used green for a gender-neutral card. "Welcome" is from the same stamp I used in the first card. I made the little bow, and was pretty happy with the way it came out.

I Really Am Back!

It's been WAY too long since I've posted regularly here. But I really am back. I'm back into the groove of making things. I've been quite busy and have lots of things to share, and I plan to stay busy making lots more!

A big reason I've been busy is I've finally gotten up the nerve to open an Etsy shop. I really hope I can do well with it. I need to get even busier making more things to put in there, as the pickings are quite slim at the moment. I've been busy with so many other things too, including catering a wedding reception last weekend. Now that that's behind me, I can focus on my business.

I've even gotten a couple of orders from friends, so I'm hoping word of mouth is going to work well for me!

Anyway, the cards I'm sharing are two that sold from my Etsy shop. I'll be back with much more in the coming days!!

I really love these two cards, and apparently I need to make some more like them since they were snatched up pretty quickly!

The stamp is one from the $1 bin at Michael's. I had been trying to get my hands on one for a very long time, but my store never had any. I wanted one so badly, I couldn't stand it. Then one day I just happened to check EBay at the right time and there was one on there about to expire. I got it just in time! Made my day that day!

In the first card, I paper pieced her dress, hat, purse and shoes. (Cutting out the tiny bit for the shoes was not the easiest thing in the world - my fingers are much too big for such tiny work!) The dress is the same patterned paper that is on the card, and the hat, shoes and purse use the same pink cardstock that the image is matted in.
The congratulations stamp is by Stampendous.



On this card, I colored in the image with colored pencils. The congrats stamp on this one is also from the $1 bin. The ribbon that is tied to the polka dot ribbon appears green in the photo, but it is actually brown.

That's all for now - I'll be back tomorrow with two more cards.

Have a fantastic week!

First Birthday

Yes, I realize it's been well over a month since I've posted here. This poor blog has been very neglected. But honestly, I just haven't done much in the way of creating lately. I've just been quite busy around here and haven't made much time for crafting. Hopefully now that I seem to be getting back to my routines, I'll have more time and will be able to give this blog a bit more attention.

For today, this isn't paper crafting, but it's the latest thing I've accomplished. My friend's little girl turned one last week and had her first birthday party on Sunday. She asked me to do the cake, and I gladly did.

First, here is the invitation she sent out:


She wanted the cake to reflect the invitation. This is what I came up with:

This was only my second time ever working with fondant. And the first time was years ago on a plain round cake. I HATE the taste of fondant. However, I found a recipe online for marshmallow fondant and decided to give it a try. It was so yummy, so I used it. I really like how this turned out. And everyone seemed to like the way the fondant tasted too!

I also made a small cake for the birthday girl. I didn't want to use fondant on it, because it would hinder her from digging in. I wish though that I had had the forethought to mix up some green icing and I would have iced the small cake in green instead of purple. Then it would have looked opposite of the large cake, and that would have been cute! Though, I don't think Hannah cared one bit, as she dug right in.

Here's the little one next to the big one:



And here is the birthday girl. Do you think she likes her cake?

Rain

Yes, we got some MUCH needed rain over the weekend, but that's not what I'm talking about.

It would be the title of the layout I'm about to show you. When I participated in the Superbowl Challenge at Paper Petal Memories on Superbowl weekend, the few layouts I managed to get done fell under some of the challenges we were given.

We had one challenge in which we were paired with someone else. My partner looked through my gallery and found some things to challenge me on, to push me outside of my box a little. She decided my recent layouts had been on the neutral side and challenged me to use LOTS of color. And lots of flowers.

So that's what I did.

I pulled out the colors from Ruthi's dress. It was a VERY colorful dress, so it was easy to use lots of color here!

I used my Cricut to cut the flowers.
The quote says,
"Let me play in the sunshine, let me sing for joy. Let me grow in the light, let me splash in the rain, and remember the days of childhood forever."
I painted the chipboard (Rain). It started out a pale pink color which didn't match, so I changed it to yellow. That was another of the challenges as well - to use paint somewhere on a layout.

Valentine's Day

Wow - I can't believe it's been almost a month since I've posted here! I was fighting sinus junk for a while and just didn't feel much like blogging, and then I got really busy.

Oh well. I promised myself I wasn't going to feel guilty if I didn't post daily (or even weekly!) I'm going to post when I can, and hopefully at least some of you will keep coming back!

Here are a couple of quick and easy things I did for Valentine's.

I made this adorable little "flower" pot. I saw the idea here. I thought it was so adorable, I had to try it. Mine isn't quite as cute, as I didn't have the same punches or the embellishments, but I still like the way it turned out. I used Tootsie Pops and adhered them to the flowers with a glue dot.


And I made these quick little Valentine's for Ruthi to give to her friends. I opted for goldfish to curb the candy monster just a little!

Christmas Hug

I know I've been sporadic with my blogging. I have aspirations to be a daily blogger, but that's probably never going to happen. I'm ok with that. I hope you are too!

Anyway, here's another layout I did. This one is super simple. The challenge (at PPM) was to use a large photo, covering at least 2/3 of your layout.

This is one of my favorite pictures I took at Christmas. I printed it in 8x10 - that took up plenty of space for the challenge.

And I just wanted to keep the rest simple so the picture would be the focus. Yes, that is our little tree in the background. We opted to just put up a small one again this year for several reasons. But I'm looking forward to having a real tree again next Christmas. I miss the smell!



It's hard to tell, but the punched flowers at the bottom were punched from the same patterned paper. Simple, but I like it

Baby Love

OK Christy - I'm back! You crack me up!!

And for the rest of you - so you won't be in the dark, Christy wrote:

Okay, it is officially now OVER a week since you blogged on here. Get busy girl!
You sick?
Your kiddos sick?
Too involved in all the politics on TV?
Wondering if John will be released from Stefano's hold? (I don't watch, but saw the commercial)
Worried about the writers strike?

No, I'm not sick, but I have had a sick kiddo. Definitely not too involved in the politics. A little behind on Day's so not too worried about John at the moment. And although I'm annoyed at the writer's strike, that's not what has kept me away either. Nope, I've been at my parent's house, and though I intended to blog from there, it just didn't happen. If you really want the details, you can read them here.

I think I have finally shared all my Christmas stuff and I honestly haven't done much this year yet. I'm hoping to change that soon though. I have gotten a couple layouts done, however. I'm trying to keep up with the challenges at Paper Petal Memories - the message board I'm a part of. It is a much smaller board - nothing like Split Coast Stampers. But I think that's why I love it. We are kind of a close-knit group of gals and have formed some wonderful friendships. I even got to meet up with 3 of the girls a couple summer's ago for a weekend of scrapping. Well, we didn't actually accomplish that much scrapping. But we did lots of shopping, eating, laughing and having a good time. And one of the other ladies on the board, I have formed a wonderful friendship with. We talk on the phone pretty regularly, and even though we haven't met "face to face" she has become a great friend. It's amazing that you can form friendships like this. Anyway, we have some challenges going on over there, and I'm trying keep up and do them this year in an effort to get more scrapbook pages done.

The layout I'm posting today was a sketch challenge. The sketch came from Page Maps. I LOVE the sketches from there!

So the sketch was my starting point. Then I chose the pictures. Then I chose the colors and went from there. And I used my brand new toy I got for Christmas to make the title. My parents got me the Cricut Expression - what an awesome surprise! And I'm having fun figuring out how to work it!

Anyway, here's the layout:



It's funny, I actually had a completely different picture in my head of the outcome of this layout. But it changed as I went. But I'm happy with the end result.

I'll be back to share the other 2, plus hopefully more that I'll be getting done.

I Hope My Computer Doesn't Explode

It just might because of what I'm about to post.

Let me explain.....My husband is a DIE HARD Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets fan. He's also a fan of any team who plays AGAINST the Georgia Bulldogs.

I'm talking serious stuff.

However, we do have friends and even some family who are fans of the Dawg. We love them in spite of it.

What's this got to do with anything?

Well, as I posted earlier, I made monogram cards for friends and family. For our family, I make these for the couples and single adults. For years, I've done one gift for this group and a different gift for the "younger" crowd who might not appreciate such a "grown up" gift.

Chip's (my hubby)cousin Nathan is a UGA graduate. Up until last Christmas, I still grouped him with the "younger" crowd. His younger sister had already moved into the "adult" crowd because she got married.

Last Christmas he made the comment, "When do I get to graduate to the adult gifts?" I felt stupid! It's not that I didn't consider him and adult, but that he's well, a guy and all, and I didn't figure he'd appreciate the gift I had made for the "adult" crowd!

So this Christmas, he "graduated". However, I still felt the cards I made were a little on the "frilly" side for him. So I made him a special set.

All that to show you this:



I knew my husband would eventually find out I had tainted our house with this image. I didn't know how he'd take it. He caught a glimpse of these on my screen recently and wanted to know what they were doing there and who they were for. He was very forgiving...considering! But he did make the comment that my computer was now probably going to explode. I hope not!

Oh, and I'm pretty happy with the way these came out. I found the image online and printed it on cardstock and then used a circle punch to punch them out. I had planned to use my multi-letter stamp for the words. But I didn't like how far spaced apart it was, and I was having trouble stamping evenly. If I had not already assembled the cards, I would have run them through my printer and printed it directly on the cards. But it was too late for that, so I just printed it on the red cardstock, cut it out and adhered. Not exactly the way I had it pictured in my head, but it works.

Have a Funshine Day!

My daughter LOVES the Care Bears. She watches the "Big Wish" movie ALL the time. Her absolute favorite is Funshine Bear.

So for her birthday, it was only fitting to make her a Funshine Bear card. So I found an image of Funshine online. I printed it out on cardstock and him out.

I stamped the party hat, cut it out and placed it on Funshine's head. Then I stamped the balloons, cut them out and put them in place. I attatched some floss from the balloons to the hand. I cut the 3 with my Fiskars Shape Cutter and added a little pen stitching.

I think it turned out pretty cute. It's not very girly, but Funshine bear is a boy, and yellow, so I couldn't really "girl it up" too much. I chose a blue background to make it feel like the sky was in the background. She loved it, and that's all that REALLY matters!



And no birthday is complete without the cake! We had been talking about having a "Tea Party Birthday" and a "Tea Party Cake" for WEEKS. About a week before her birthday, she totally changed her mind and insisted she wanted a Care Bear Birthday. So she did.

I planned to do a more elaborate cake... a sheet cake with clouds and a big rainbow in the background and Funshine bear frolicking around. Well, I kind of ran out of time, seeing how I would have had to make some of the parts at least a couple days in advance. So I took the easy way out (for me.) I went and bought the character pan and just did it that way. I stayed up most of the night before her party baking and decorating it. But she LOVED it.



And here's the Birthday Girl!

My Favorite Gift

OK, so now I will post the gift I had the most fun making this year. It is actually a set of things. I forgot to take a picture of them all together, so I will have to post each picture seperately.

My Mom is in the process of redoing her kitchen with the Italian Chef theme. I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

I got these ideas from all the wonderfully talented ladies at SplitCoast Stampers.

First up: Recipe Tin



I love how this turned out. I was trying to match the colors in her kitchen. When she opened it, that was one of the first things she said was that the colors matched! I included dividers inside and a bunch of my favorite recipes. I still have more to add to her collection, but I ran out of time before Christmas!

Next: Coasters



I'm really happy with the way these came out too. I used the unglazed tumbled tiles. Then I colored them in with sharpies. I tested these, and they didn't leave a water ring, but if I spilled something like coke or coffee on them, they stained. So I sprayed them with a sealer to prevent that. I used thin sheets of cork, cut to size on the bottom of them.

Refrigerator magnet/post it note holder & beaded pen.



I used one of the acrylic frames and turned it around so the "foot" was in the front. Then I adhered magnets to the back (front!) I did this so it would hang on the refrigerator and have a little shelf for the pen. It is pictured hanging on my fridge.

Dry Erase Tile:



I used one of the ceramic tiles for this. What makes it so easy, is if you mess up, you can wipe it right off and try again. After stamping the image, I heat set it with my heat tool. Then I colored in with sharpies and heat set again. I read on SCS that to keep this image "in place" that they covered it with Crystal Effects. I didn't have any but I had some Liquid Embossing by All Night Media, and from what I can tell, it does the same thing. So I used it, and it worked perfectly.

And Next: Menu Board



I picked up this little chalkboard at Michaels. I painted the edges to match everything else. Then I stamped right on it. The image was a little too faint for my liking, so I outlined it with a silver sharpie. It made the image not be quite as crisp, but it still works. Then I attached a piece of ribbon tied to a stick of chalk. (Hey Mom, I forgot to give you the box of chalk! I'll bring it next week!)

And lastly. A Birthday Card
Her birthday was a week before Christmas. I have to admit, I pretty much copied this card exactly from a SCS'r. You can see her original card here. I just loved it so much and knew it was the perfect card.



And there are actually a couple more things that were supposed to go with this set, but time just got the best of me, and I ran out of it! So once she has the other things, I'll post them here too.

This was absolutely the gift I enjoyed making the most. I couldn't wait for her to get it. And she loved it. At least, I'm pretty sure she did. After all, she is my Mom, and she'd NEVER tell me if she didn't like something. But I can read her pretty well, and she really did seem to love it!

And hey Mom - I LOVE YOU!!!