Whimsically Special

Hello Crafty Friends,
I want to share something cutesy with you today, O how I wish I had a better camera, lighting and the skills to take good pictures...that will be my next skill to learn.  But until then, I would like to share with you a sweet little house I made.  This time I was inspired by Martha Stewart's Christmas paper, it is soooo me, very whimsical and sparkly.  Here it goes:

Whimsically winter house

Lastly I'd like to share that Jane with The Scrapbooking Factory is have a 25 Days of Christmas giveaways.  Daily she will be selecting winners for some fabulous prizes.  Just look "like" her on Face book and leave a comment and you will be automatically entered into the drawing!

 Ciao &  Blessings!

Happy Thanksgiving & Crafty Goings On!

First I wanted to wish everyone the most Blessed Thanksgiving of All!  I pray that everyone will have a moment to sit and relax and enjoy all the wonderful things that the LORD has blessed you with.  I am so grateful for a great many things and the most important blessing of all is my Salvation!! I praise the LORD for giving me a new life in HIM and a Beautiful family to share my life with. 

I have a few things to share today before I am off to start my Thanksgiving festivities...Cleaning, Cooking and Lot's of tasting!

This Week at Crafting by Designs I hosted the challenge.  The theme was love and I needed to come up with a sample that would include the word LOVE and or a heart.  Here's my sample:

My Love tag with a hint of Christmas, tag is green & white and the house has textured snow paint on the roof.

Next I have few kraft bags that I decorated using of course the MME paper that I adore so much!

Here is a pic of a painter's tray I am altering.  This is such a fun project and I don't know when I'll be finished with it, there is always more embellishing to be done, but I want to make sure I leave room for pictures.

Lastly I got a new Tim Holtz die and it is to die for!! For some reason I am really into seamstress body forms and I think you can do so much with these cuts...If you haven't seen it yet check this out?

Purchased at Joann's it was reg $19.99 they had 40% off dies and I used the Michael's 20% off disc on entire purchase. Woo Hoo!!!

Well that's it for now Ciao Bella's and have a very blessed Thanksgiving!!!

Altered Creations

Hello Crafty Folks!!

 One thing I really enjoy doing is taking ordinary things and altering them.  There are so many gorgeous designer papers out there to make it happen.  If you've followed my blog you've seen items that I've done like altering clipboard or clothespins, jars and I also really enjoy covering paper mache.  Today I want to show you one of the orders I'm working on for one of my Fav customers.  She gave me 8 composition books and 3 binders and wanted me to "do what I do" and so here is some of what I did and I'm totally night finished:

Plain ordinary 1 inch binder

Tada!! 

Ordinary composition book!

I'm not great at photography and my backgrounds lack some creativity but hopefully this will spark a little inspiration and you might want to try to.  I've also used the front of cereal boxes and the kids really like it.

Well that's it for now & Blessings to All

Getting In The Spirit

Hello Everyone!!  It took me quite awhile to get back here but I have been so busy it's amazing.  I don't see how other crafty bloggers do it.  They are able to keep up with their blogs consistently.  I had a good run there for awhile but then life happens!  Well, one of the most daunting things happened which really hampered my posting was loosing my I-phone.  It's sounds ridiculous but I had everything on that phone, it was like a mobile personal library of congress for me.  All of my pics for my postings and it was so easy to blog with that thing. I think I relied on it so much that when it was lost/stolen (because someone took it, started using it and didn't return i) it took away my drive to post and I suppose that's not a good thing.  I have probably lost lots of followers over this and well I guess I sorta deserve it.  Well for now I'm going to try to pick up the pieces and move on.

I am going to share one of my new creations for Christmas ( my FAV holiday) and one project that I am teaching:

I used 1x3 inch strips of the MME Lost & Found, adhere strips to a paper mache cone shape with Modgepodge, sprinkled on diamond dust for a little twinkle.

Next for one of my classes we made this neat Christmas Tree wood album by Kaiser Kraft and here are the pics:

 I truly enjoyed teaching this class!!

Well that's it for now I pray that you all have been Happy Crafters and I'll post again SOON!!  Blessings as Always :0)

Hello Everyone

Back In The Groove

Hello All

Just checking in to share some Love, Some Crafts & Some Findings

I have been Working Super hard trying to get my crafting juices flowing and it has been hard!  I feel sad for my family, especially my husband as I am encroaching upon everyone's space with all of my craft stuff!!  My DH is so sweet he won't say much of anything about all of my stuff being everywhere, but I know that it is beginning to work a nerve.  I told him he could easily solve that problem by getting me that red two story barn portable that they have displayed at Lowe's.  He just looks at me and smiles.  Well anyway here is what I've came up with so far...at least I have items to put in my space at the Alamo Craft Co.

Sweet Little house using my My Minds Eye Lost & Found paper.

 The Neat thing about this sweet little paper mache house is that it is also a box and can be used to package a gift or to store things...endless possibilities.  I really enjoyed making this house, it took me several days because I continued to add something and then something else.  I'm pretty satisfied with it, but I haven't taken it to the store yet so there may be more possibilities that await this little house.

Recipe: Paper mache house - Hobby Lobby, MME- Lost & Found,  rosettes-Recollections-Michael's, heart shaped keyhole-Tim Holtz, Cricut Banner- Birthday Bash, Prima lace...an assortment of buttons, organza ribbon, other embellishments and glitter.

Next "It's In The BAG"  One of my favorite Items to create is the ordinary paper sandwich bags.  There are so many different styles that you can make with these bags and I really enjoy embellishing them to my hearts content.  Sometimes it is necessary for me to get out of my comfort zones of the pinks & whites and try something a little different.  I totally fell for a wonderful alternative with the Echo Park line called "For The Record"  This is an amazing ensemble of Red, yellow, greens, blues & white.  There's even red and white polka dots!  My Favorite design! I have chosen a few of the pages to share with you, but each page is generously decorated with fun embellies.  I even used grunge paper ( Tim Holtz) and die cut a butterfly and crackle painted it white (4th pic.)  This line also has some great die cuts which I have used throughout.

              
Here are a few cards that I also created this week, which I will be adding to my card collection at the craft mall.  I am hoping that they don't stick around long...maybe someone might want to bless someone special with them...

DP Fancy Pants line called The Girl's Paperie & $1 stamp from Michael's, corrugated heart w/crackled paint

DP - MME-Lost & Found

DP - Echo Park- For The Record

I'm so glad to be finally getting out of my drought.  It's pretty intense when you have all that you need to craft with and can't produce any work.  I think sometimes you may have too much and your brain gets a bit overwhelmed.  At any rate I'm slowly working myself back.  Also being involved with challenges can be an encouragement, so if you haven't joined a site that has weekly or monthly challenges, I think you should.  You can learn so much from others as well as throwing in your creativity into the pot.

Just a quick update on my class last Saturday....


I had a great time at The Scrapbooking Factory monthly retreat located in the Marriott at the RIM.  I went in only expecting a class of two and ended up teaching a class of 9.  I had a great time! Jane ( the owner) is expecting the new line of My Minds Eye (Lost & Found 2) Echo Park papers and more to come in soon.  I Can't Wait!!!  I am so excited, she knows that when that paper comes in and it's time to stock it in the store I am there!  Take a peak at some of this paper she's expecting, it is absolutely GORGEOUS!!!

MY MINDS EYE BIRTHDAY BLOG HOP

LASTLY just wanted to let you know that My Minds Eye is having a fabulous Birthday Blog Hop Celebration with the opportunity to win one of each line of their paper and the new lines are gorgeous.  I took about 30 to 45 minutes of my time today to play along.  It wasn't time wasted I got an opportunity to visit 7 of their designers blogs and see the new lines of paper in action. You can check the details here but you only have until July 31st to play along...YOU CAN DO IT!!!

Well I'm signing off and I pray that each new day will bring an abundance of Blessings from the LORD above!!   

Pardon Me But Has Anyone Seen MAY!!

This is absolutely crazy I looked at my last blog post and it was last updated May 1st.  I almost panicked, I couldn't believe that it had been that long since I posted.  This has been an extremely busy month as is most months, but being a homeschool mom I have really had to batten down the hatches with my children to finish up for Summer.  I'm sure this year we'll have to do some classes through the Summer to catch up.  But no worries it keeps them engaged and their young minds from being idol.

Simply Scrapping Crafts News

I have a couple of things to share today as well as some crafts I'd like to post.  As I told you earlier this month I am on the design team with Simply Scrapping Crafts and there's a lot going on with updating the site and it looks great!  This site is packed with so much information and Judy Law ( site owner) who is also a very godly woman desires to make this site a "Stop, Crop & Shop."  It's really great and the other design team ladies are wonderful.  My group is still a work in progress but my first Card Workshop is scheduled for June 5th.  I will be posting Greeting Card Workshops every Sunday and I hope that you'll stop by, join the site and participate.  I'll post more information soon!!

I have been busy working on different projects to go in the store and I actually finished some UnFinished projects that I had been working on for a while so I felt pretty good.  The first thing I want to share with you is a cute little brag book.  If you know anything about me I really like making little things and brag books especially because you get to decorate them continually adding a little bit of this and a little bit of that until you just have to say FINISHED!! 

 

Inside Pages



Inside Pages





Inside pages



Next I'd like to share a few other designs.  Simply Scrapping Crafts recently had card challenge using buttons and bows which inspired me to make this card.  I didn't submit this card but I'll also post the one card that I made for the Challenge: ( which I entered "just for fun & inspiration").  I also created a flowerpot bookmark and next some framed art which I used an embroidery hoop as the frame.  This was such a neat idea that I got out of a craft magazine.

I recycled the button packaging for an embellishment for my card.

When you pull the flower out it is a bookmark.  Sorry I didn't show it :-(

The background paper is from The Girls Paperie, "Cute" banner from Lost & Found

Lastly I'd like to share a few of my creations for my Sew Cute line.  A Silly overstuffed Strawberry, A lovely little pillow using lace and one snippets of a fabric floral trim and lastly my favorite an overly stuffed Simply Plump Heart with beautiful layers of fabric floral petals.

 

Very Silly Strawberry

Little laced pillow

Lovely plump heart.  I LOVE THIS!

Well that about does it for me today, I have been sitting at this computer since I came home from church at 8:30pm ish and it's 12:45am now.  I need to get up and stretch.

Blessings ALL!!







I'm OOBER Excited!!

"OOBER" meaning extremely excited, which is the vernacular of my 25 year old daughter, who is visiting me along with her hubby and new born baby Israel. I'm oober excited about two things, the visit of my oldest daughter and her sweet little family and the fact that I still have some creativity left in me.  It has been such a world wind for me these last couple of months, I find myself trying to come up for air to breath.  I have been so busy with special orders and the new baby that my creative juices haven't been flowing lately, but alas on last Saturday, the day before my daughter arrived, the creative bug hit me and I was on a crafting rampage.  I was working on two and three projects simultaneously and literally turning around in circles trying to figure out what to do next.  My mind was racing 100 miles per hour as I could not keep up with myself.  With beautiful soothing Christian classics playing and a mess of crafting supplies and embellishments just calling my name, I set out on a journey and here's what I came up with:

Bliss Banner



I made this banner with my Birthday Bash Cricut cartridge and embellished with coffee stained lace.  Each banner has a  piece of the organza rose trim Fleurette's, the bows are seam binding and the letters that spell BLISS were also cut out using the same cartridge.  The letters are glittered with chocolate glitter and I mixed in a little bit of gold glitter to give it a rich look. 




heart in nest basket

 This little beauty is actually and altered project, I found this cute basket in the shape of a nest and their were two eggs in it.  I removed the egg and added this papermache heart, which I painted with a mint green and lightly dusted with stardust glitter.  This glitter is gorgeous it actually looks like chips of crystals and it is very sparkly.  I added a butterfly which many of my friends know I am terribly afraid of and this butterfly was so life-like I was actually afraid to touch it, so I put a rose in the center of it.  I used one of my favorite scriptures to finish it off, "Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding," Proverbs 3:5.

Birdcage with eggs & scripture

close up of tag & eggs

Closer look inside the nest, a few gems, pearls & feathers

I was really proud of this birdcage because I bought it last year and new that one day I would do something with it, I just didn't know what.  I knew I wanted to make a nest and I made one several weeks ago and it just sat on my craft shelf waiting to be put somewhere and this is what happened when fate met fate.  Remember those eggs I told you were in the nest basket?  Well here they are!  The scripture I used for this project was Psalms 84:2, "Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O LORD of hosts, my King, and my God." This is such a beautiful Psalms, King David truly was envious of the birds who were able to be so close to GOD and dwell near to Him and that was also his desire. 

Little glass jar



semi side view

 This was pretty quick to make but I really like jars, so I altered this a bit by adding ribbon, a mulberry rose, leaf and lace around the top base of the jar.  I like the little birdie on top.

Deco wall hanging

I thought this was a pretty sweet wall hanging for a little girls picture.  It is loaded with embellishments. The mat itself is cut from chipboard and a cricut die cut (can't remember which one.) Distressed & Shabby, just the way I like it!




Cutesy little pincushion

 This is probably by far the funnest thing I like to make.  It's small, It's super cute and useful.  It is so easy to make using a yo yo template.  I topped it off with a very blingy button that I layer on top of another button and then put that on top of a tiny yo yo.  Pretty sweet!
 
Well that's it for now and  hope I inspired someone else today!  Until next time,
 
Blessings,
Tammy