Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge #21

So this card came to thought at 3am this morning. I was thinking this was what I wanted to do for the Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge #21, but it wasn't until 3am that I really figured out how to do it. I was tempted to just get up right then and tackle the project, but I knew sleep was slightly more important then.

This is a card for a family member who recently had a birthday (yes, it's slightly late). But, hopefully its coolness factor will counter the lateness. Here's the sketch I followed:

And here's my take. I used Half Pint Heroes for this card, putting a little head that kinda looks like the recipient into the rocket ship. Then to make good use of that pocket I decided to have it take off! :) The sentiments are also from the same stamp set, although I had to get a little creative and use bits and pieces to make my "blast off!" one. Claire..."blast off" is missing! LOL!

And by the way, that grass is handmade...I might need to invest in some Martha Stewart fringe scissors! And my husband is already making a request for a card like this too...hee hee!

I hope you enjoyed your visit. And now to get this card in the mail!

Other challenges:

Cards for Men - Anything Goes

Tag! You're It! Post 2

So while the first tag had four Waltzingmouse Stamps sets used in its creation, this one only has one. And it's fairly simple too. This one doesn't even include paper. While I was finishing up the first I saw one of these glittery snowflakes I picked up at Target last year. I don't remember what I was going to do with these, but I have them, so there you go. I thought that maybe just attaching a sentiment on transparency might be a quick and easy way for some tags...since I did have fun with this challenge, I might try doing some more of my own tag making!

I went with a different sentiment from Compliments of the Season and stamped it on a transparency. I then embossed in silver ever so carefully. I then cut it out and attached with vellum adhesive. Using some of that darn ribbon I needed to get for tag one I attached this one to a bag all prettily. Cute huh?

Here's a close up too...

Be sure to check out the challenge over on Claire's Blog. There's still some time to enter!

Thanks for stopping by!

Tag! You're It! Post 1

Hello there! I was able to finish up a tag for Claire's Tag! You're It! contest going on right now. Claire and the Waltzingmouse Stamps design team want to see beautiful Christmas tags for the chance at winning an awesome prize. I thought it would be fun to participate and try something new. (I've never made my own tags before)

So here's my first tag (I have another up my sleeve to post too). This one uses 4, yes 4!, Waltzingmouse Stamp sets. I'm quite impressed with that feat. I wanted to try out my new Label 14, Compliments of the Season, and Text It stamps, but then I thought it was missing something so added in a tag shoulder from Labels 1. I went with a kraft, Broken China distress ink, and silver color scheme.

I got the tag part done fairly easily on the weekend, but it took finding just the right ribbon on a side trip to Michaels to finish it up. I then tried out some ribbon combinations on both ends of the tag, but eventually went with these fun snowflake brads. Aren't they fun?

Be sure to check out the challenge over on Claire's blog. There's plenty of time yet to play! Good luck!

Happy Halloween!

I don't have anything crafty for Halloween to share today, but I do have some pictures of my cat!

DH followed Hannah around the house taking pictures of her in her pirate costume this evening. Here's two pictures that I personally liked.

The Pirate Queen herself...

A worn out pirate...

Happy Halloween!

Scrap Our Stash: October Challenge

So the Scrap Our Stash October Challenge is to do "that" page, meaning a page you've been meaning to do but just haven't for whatever reason. It's been really interesting to see the design team's take on this challenge. A wide variety of topics!

For my challenge page, I did one from September 2009. Not terribly long ago, but one of the earlier pages I need to do to finish up 2009. I've had the memorabilia on my craft desk for quite some time, but yet still hadn't done the page yet. I finally got the needed photo printed and did the page!

It turned out fun to do. I took a page of patterned paper and first wanted to use some circles cut out from it, but then I tried using the negative spaces instead. I liked this technique a lot more and even added two more circles for the full effect. I don't think I would have paired purple with this on a normal day of scrapping, but it made the tickets, which I wanted to include fit in a bit better. :)

By the way, this is our trip to the San Jose theatre to see Spamalot. I was the luck recipient of the Best Peasant Award since I "helped" them find the grail. Going on stage was a different type of experience, to be sure. I've wanted to do this page for a while because it is such an interesting and unique experience.

Be sure to check out the design team's take on the October challenge. There's still plenty of time to head over to Scrap Our Stash to play too!

Waltzingmouse Stamps October Blog Waltz: Fall

Welcome to my little blog. I hope you're enjoying the Friends of Waltzingmouse Stamps Blog Waltz featuring Fall themed cards. I love blog waltz days and even though my little blog hasn't been as productive since I started back at school, I just couldn't miss the October waltz. Of course, this was helped by my new stamps arriving just in time for me to play this weekend!

I pulled out Frame It for all of the stamps used on this card today. That little leaf is just too cute and I can't wait to try other stamps in the little lined square and rectangle. Such a simple concept but by having it as a stamp, it's just so much easier. For this card I also tried the trick Claire featured on her blog during the release peeks with offsetting the frame a few times for a fun effect. :) A quick and easy CAS card technique I think I might just use again and again.

Well, thanks for stopping by my little neck of the woods. Be sure to check out the WMS Forum to see all the other waltzers today!

I'm here, really!

I know it has been quite a while since my last post. Not to say things haven't been happening, but sitting at my craft desk took a back seat to it all...

Today I had a little time (even though I should be doing homework) to get a few projects I wanted to do done. Of course, DH wanted some scrapbook pages, so happily I got two of those done. The first one you'll see below. The other, you'll see soon. :) And, as was the cause of my great want to get to my craft table...I got my new WMS stamps! I went a little crazy with Claire's latest release and many sets came to my little home this time. (In celebration of my new job starting Monday!)

AND...I got a card finished for the Waltzingmouse Stamps Blog Waltz taking place tomorrow! So woot! Two posts right in succession from me!

This layout I want to share today is another from June 2009. I'm getting ever closer to finishing 2009! This was our trip to Alcatraz. The great thing about taking the tour of Alcatraz is that it also includes a ferry ride so you get to see SF from the bay too. For this layout I focused on the pictures from the prison island.

This great paper was a find on a different trip to SF. I cut up the 12x12 sheet so that it would better fit in placement with my pictures. I kept to the yellow-tan tones, but brightened it a little since our pictures were not completely dreary. I had our tickets and the brochure too, but for this page, I thought it was better to let the pictures do the talking. I always stick the brochures behind the page at the very least for safe keeping.

Thanks for stopping by! Remember to come by tomorrow for my card for the WMS blog waltz!

Muir Woods and Running!

Sorry about the delay in getting this page put up. If you frequent the Scrap Our Stash challenge blog (which of course you should!), you have seen this page already. This page uses border punches, which was the September challenge. Be sure to go there now to learn about the great October challenge.

I decided to actually put my border punched borders actually on the border of the pages instead of as accents in the center like I usually do. I like how they ground the page. Another cool trick on this page was using the Muir Woods maps as my main accent and title with the help of an invisible pocket courtesy of a transparency. :)

And yesterday marked a fun accomplishment! I have now been running for a year! And here's the proof:

That's September 30, 2009, when I started the C25K program on the left and yesterday's run on the right. So nice to have it recorded on RunMonster too, eh? :) I remember last year being very proud with being about to do that first day of C25K! Here's to more running!

A scrappy page - San Francisco

My latest scrapbook page is one from June 2009. My DH has challenged me to try and finish up 2009 so I have taken him up on the challenge by heading back to June of that year. His mom and brother were in town for DH's graduation, so naturally we had to take them to San Francisco too. We hit up many of the usual tourist spots and if you ever come to visit us, we'll take you to these too. :)

This page mostly focuses on the fun of the cable car (a must do in SF!) and Fisherman's Wharf. In a recent trip this year I found some scrapbook pages at Fisherman's Wharf and that is where my title comes from. It's a page full of fun accents. I have Alcatraz yet to do from June 2009 so I'll also get to use that paper included in the pack. Stay tuned!

Baby Whale Card

So it was my hope to show some weekend pictures, because DH and I went to the SF Zoo, but they are still on his phone so you'll just have to do with a crafty post instead. :)

I did get this little baby whale card done over the weekend. I thought it would be fun to go along with the gift that we found to send along to my two friends expecting their first (and recently found out it was a boy). I find baby stuff fun right now probably because I'm not the one that is going through it. I'll live through my friends' experiences for now.

I wanted to ink up my Lawn Fawn Critters in the Sea set that has been neglected until now. The little whale just fit the bill for the type of card I wanted to do. And I had a little background whale I could use from a Martha Stewart baby stamp set (a Big Lots find for $1! woot!) just finished the deal for this card's theme. The sentiment is part of two sentiments in the Martha Stewart set as well.

A fun card to make and even more fun to send it off, which I did this morning. :) I hope my friends like it.

Thanks for stopping by. I'll try to get some zoo pictures up soon.

WMS September Waltz - Halloween!

I was stumped at first on what I could do for the September WMS Waltz with its theme as Halloween. I need to remedy my lack of Halloween stamps! Then, I knew I had a page from last year's pumpkin carving party yet to scrap. So armed with my trusty Waltzingmouse Stamps Off Beat Backgrounds I tackled a Halloween page!

I stamped the checkered background stamp all over my purple cardstock. I tried the measured grid trick Claire shared with the WMS fans a little while back to help me with aligning my stamp. Things went pretty well as I practiced stamping, but I kept the rougher stamped images too cause I think it adds character to my page. I kept that distressed look to the photos too by matting them on black but then distressing all the edges. Distressing is also on the patterned paper edges. Finally, I added some Halloween ribbon I had picked up at Target last year and some fun lime green Thickers!

Thanks for stopping by. I can't wait to see what all the friends of WMS make for this waltz. Be sure to visit the WMS Forum for more information and the links to all the waltzers.

A wedding card

Hello, faithful followers! Sorry for the lack of posts on this little blog of late. With school starting and a job interview this week my craft time, which is now more or less limited to the weekend, has been non-existent.

I did make this little wedding card the other day in a free moment as DH said he needed one for a family friend in the near future. I pulled out my trusty Waltzingmouse Stamps for this one. The polka dot background is from Off Beat Backgrounds and the sentiment is from Fancy Phrases. My main focal point is a recovered chipboard element. I personally like the simplicity and I got to try out matting the layers in black. I've seen it around my travels to other blogs and have wanted to try it. So I kept to a simple cream, black and teal color scheme.

Thanks for stopping by! Now wish me luck on my interview! :)

Weekend Snapshots - Labor Day Weekend

In lieu of my 10 year high school reunion I went to the Lake Tahoe area for some much needed R&R. My bestest friend Susie was in town to see me since Friday, and after the boys finished up work for the week, we all headed East.

We set up a little camping area at one of the resorts. Not completely roughing it, but enough for my taste. :) Nice to find a campground that had walk-in tent sites so there wasn't constant cars going through the area. A nice meal of hotdogs, potato salad, watermelon, baked beans and s'mores was enjoyed by all. We spent the days hiking: the first around Spooner Lake and the second around Tahoe itself on the Rubicon Trail. I recommend the Rubicon...great views!

Now it's back to reality with friends gone to their respective places and school days tomorrow and Wednesday. I have a feeling I'll get some homework this week.

Bay To Breakers 12K

Happy Monday everyone! I have a two-pager about the 12K that I ran in May of this year to share today.

I finished this page over the weekend, having started it on Thursday conceptually. It uses 5x7's, a size I don't normally try to use in multiples on a page. These were the pro photos taken at the race. I also have some huge bib numbers to deal with. Taking those things into account this had to be a two page spread!

I enjoy the puzzle piece look of a stripe of photos/memorabilia on pages so I took that as my challenge to fit everything on. Adding in some photos we took ourselves, the course information from the race guide, DH's timing chip and some journaling the puzzle came together pretty nicely! Then...a title/embellishments....

As I'm just getting into using my little Silhouette machine again due to its easier accessibility, I searched for a SVG file of the Golden Gate. Turned out to be super easy to find and a few unsuccessful attempts at getting the cutting right had the third attempt being what you see here. I'm pretty proud of that title work! Overall, I'm really pleased with how this spread turned out. I hope you do too.

Now the next running spread will hopefully be a successful Half Marathon race. I'm doing the training now. My (targeted) race is in November.

Thanks for stopping by!

Flower Challenge - Scrap Our Stash

The August challenge over at Scrap Our Stash is to use flowers in a layout or card, with preference to homemade. I took this challenge as a means to try out a new (to me) tutorial in making paper flowers. I used the tutorial found here.

I'm not one that does a lot of flowers on my layouts, but doing this challenge made me realize its potential. I did then do another one on the Grad Formal layout I already shared. So, try it out even if you're skeptical is my advice cause you never know, you might just start thinking about incorporating them more.

Oh, and this layout is from a visit to Muir Woods (think big redwoods) not too far away from San Francisco. We found this hollowed out trunk and we each had to take a picture in it. :)

WMSC11 & Color Throwdown 107 - Thanks for being my friend

Over at the Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge there's an interesting scalloped circle sketch this week. And my color inspiration was from the Color Throwdown challenge. I'm intimidated by circle cards, I'll admit it. But I was up for a challenge today (what's one more today...as today also starts graduate school! YIKES!). So here's the sketch:

And here's my take:

The scalloped circle edge made me think of flowers once I had my two scalloped circles, one red, one yellow cut out. I used my Silhouette....DH will be proud I put it to good use today! I offset the two circles and then I thought I had a pretty fun flower. I made the center with more red and a circle stitched stamp from the Waltzingmouse Stamps set Faux Fun Circles. And what's a flower without a butterfly? So I pulled out Waltzingmouse Stamps Earth Angel to create my own pink and green butterfly and sentiment. :) It's a little bit of a stretch on the sketch, I'll admit, but it got me to think outside my nice square-card box!

Thanks for stopping by!

Grad Formal 2009

I'm catching up on a 2009 layout today. The event was the Stanford Grad Student Formal. As there were many of the gang that were attending Stanford at the time the girls convinced the guys that we all should go. I don't remember who it was that decided we should all dress up fancily, but it was fun to do so, although not required. Held at the Mountain View Computer History Museum, it was an evening of dancing, music and fun. Before the dance we all went to a little diner in downtown Palo Alto in our fanciness...a thing that caused a little confusion to the other patrons there as we show up in dresses and tuxes yet we were not of the high schooler age.

For this layout I decided to use more of the formal pictures. I didn't go to Homecoming or Prom so I guess that's why I wanted to finally be able to do one of those types of layouts. (The formal pic of DH and myself was a student group providing "prom pics" for a small donation.) The other two pictures are out on the dance floor and at the diner.

I just love the font of these American Crafts Thickers, don't you? I'm a Thicker fanatic, but these have to be one of my favorites and I'm so happy to have gotten to use them! I had the layout about complete yesterday but it was definitely missing something in the top left. I'm not one that puts big embellishments on my pages, but after doing the Scrap Our Stash August challenge earlier in the week (that page will be shown soon) I was all into the make-your-own flower mode and tried this one with my crepe paper. It's a modified version of a tissue paper flower tutorial I found in an old issue of Creating Keepsakes. I distressed the flower with my distress ink and pulled the layers apart, finishing it off with a few pearls.

As I didn't think journaling fit too well, I decided to journal on the back so to remember the fun of the evening. I also taped up some of the funnier pictures on the back cause they were already printed out anyway but not enough for another full page layout. It will just be a hidden surprise later! :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Polson Memories

It's become a tradition since I've met DH to take a trip to Polson, Montana, every year. It was the first place he took me during the July 4th holiday in 2005 and would be the eventual location of our wedding in 2009. This year we went back with nothing but relaxation in mind. I made this layout with many of the pictures from our time there...there were just too many not to include them all!

I took advantage of the Walgreens week of sales in their photo printing to get a bunch of collage prints done this week. I find this is a great way to get many different sizes of pictures and makes me think differently than just in 4x6. Cutting up all of these prints then let me group them in various ways until I came out with something I liked and simply started gluing them down.

The journaling for this page consists of words from some travel stickers I've had in my stash for quite some time. They originally make travel phrases but I just took out the words that worked with my journaling to highlight key words instead. To finish off the page I used some of my trusty Thickers from American Crafts and a Martha Stewart border punch with some patterned paper.

Lawn Fawn {Hearts} Cards For Kids Blog Hop

"Hello and welcome to the Lawn Fawn Hearts Cards for Kids Blog Hop! We have all come together today to make cards for a wonderful cause, Cards for Kids! We hope to encourage you to also make cards for this great cause and have fun along the way, too! So please hop along with us, and make sure to leave comments as there will be prizes for commenters and participants! So let's get going! Also, if you are lost in the hop, you can always start at the beginning at the Lawn Fawn blog. Thank you so much for hopping along with us today!"


You should have come from Hannah's Blog. Your next stop will be Terri.


When I saw this on the Lawn Fawn blog I knew that I wanted to participate. It was also a great way to get out my Lawn Fawn Stamps. For this card I chose Critters In the Burbs. The little animals in this set are just so, so cute. I kept the card simple and decided to use the little snail stamp.

Inside:

Thanks for visiting my little blog. Remember, your blog hop continues by heading over to Terri's Blog next!

Friends of Waltzingmouse Stamps August Waltz

Being that it is the 17th of the month it's time for another Waltzingmouse Stamps blog waltz! After missing last month's waltz due to vacations, I knew I wanted to jump right back in and make sure that I made it for August. Then, I hear about the theme: Shabby and Vintage....

Not exactly my go-to style but I thought I would give it a go. For one, Claire's stamps fit into so many themes, but vintage and shabby are definitely what they excel at. Second, I remembered Paper Crafts just came out with their Card Styles issue about all of the different crafting styles. So set with great stamps and a little research, I embarked on my quest to try something new. Here's my final result (a little on the simpler side, but I think it has the necessary elements):

If you can believe it I did have lace in my stash but this is the first time I've used it. I then figured going with Fancy Phrases and Say It With Style were good choices that wouldn't let me down. I went with a feminine approach in my color choices. Finally, I thought some distress inking and sewing was just what this card needed. I was pleasantly surprised to find I actually liked the result when it was complete and I hope you do too. :)

So thanks for stopping by on my shabby and vintage adventure. Be sure to check out the rest of the ladies participating in the blog hop by checking out the Waltzingmouse Stamps Forum.

DETAILS:

Paper - Solids (Martha Stewart, DCWV)

Stamps - Say It With Style Flower & Sentiment, Fancy Phrases Label (Waltzingmouse Stamps)

Embellishements - Lace (JoAnns), Ribbon (Stash), Ink (Colorbox), Distress Ink - Antique Linen (Tim Holtz), Sewing

Wicked Inspired

So over on the Waltzingmouse Stamps blog there's this little competition going on to use one of Claire's cute (and free!) templates. I viewed all of the templates available in the store and couldn't think of which one I wanted to use for the longest time. Then I became inspired by the music playing while I was scrapbooking yesterday. This music was from the soundtrack of Wicked. Teaming that with the little witch head template and I had a project idea!

I present Glinda and Elphaba!

I did take a little liberty with the template and cut out the top square so that these could be little candy holders! (I had to go to the store specifically to get some candy to fill these up with even! Not that DH minded getting our candy bowl refilled in the process.) Together, I think these make a cute little pair. They were fun to make, especially the easy way to do fun "hair."

So now it's your turn! :) Thanks for stopping by!

DETAILS:

Paper - Solids (Martha Stewart), Shimmer Black (Stash), Swiss Dot Green (Bazzill)

Embellishments - Lips (Cut from a chipboard label by Making Memories), Chipboard Buckles (Stash), Circle Punch (EKSuccess)

Template - Witch Template (Waltzingmouse Stamps), Hat Directions (Waltzingmouse Stamps)

Key West Revisited

I previously posted some pages on our trip to Key West and southern Florida. Here's yet another about visiting the shipwreck museum. This was actually one of the great highlights of the trip as it was interesting to just hear about Key West's fortune-laden past from collecting from the various shipwrecks along the islands. The museum is housed in the original lookout tower and is full of things that were salvaged. I highly recommend visiting it if you are ever in the area. Then, on the top is the bell to signal if you've seen a shipwreck. None on our watch though....

I tried a new technique on this page. Instead of just a solid paper or a patterned paper as my background I decided to cut up a patterned paper in triangles on my page. I glued the down but then did some sewing around each piece with my trusty sewing machine in a zig-zag stitch. For the first time attempting this, I'm pretty impressed with the result! I think it gives the page a little more personality, don't you think? Then I thought my color palate went perfectly with these fun cursive letters by Colorbok. I have been meaning to use them for a while. Some accents with some more Colorbok chipboard and the layout was deemed finished!

Thanks for stopping by!

You're My Star

Following the latest Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge, I created this fun little card with the star stamp from the Sewing Box Christmas set. The sentiment then comes from the Seasons of Love Tags set.

Here's the sketch:

Here's my take:

Thanks for stopping by!

DETAILS:

Paper - Georgia Pacific

Stamps - Sewing Box Christmas Star, Seasons of Love Tags Sentiment (Waltzingmouse Stamps)

Ink - Colorbox

Santa Cruz Boardwalk

Here are two layouts I haven't shared yet but were finished before I went to Las Vegas. These pictures are about a year old and when we met up with DH's cousins for some fun on the Santa Cruz Boardwalk. I took the liberty to use some more outlandish colors and these bold stripes to go along with the fun of the place.

The log ride photo is one of those that you buy after the ride. One of the cool things is that the photo comes in a fancy little photo holder and by cutting it up a bit, I had the "Santa Cruz Boardwalk" wording on my page! It was also some of the inspiration for the colors in the layout papers.

The second page is of a photo DH took of one of the rides. I just really like this picture and wanted it to be the focus yet still match with the other page to make a set. I included punched circles glued at different levels to add some interest and then some fun chipboard elements from my stash. I also tried out layering border punch borders and I'm really liking the look! Finally, I had a little fun with my white gel pen and added lots of dots to many of the red layers. :)

Thanks for stopping by!

DETAILS:
Paper - Blue Swiss Dot (Bazzill), Solid and Patterned (Crate Paper)
Embellishments - Border Punch (Fiskers), Circle Punch (EKSuccess), Chipboard circles (Colorbok), Chipboard butterfly (Making Memories), Enjoy Chipboard (Making Memories), Labels 1 Die-cuts (Spellbinders), White Gel Pen (Sakura)

Vegas Weekend

No craft projects for this post and sorry for the sporadic posting of something crafty lately. This past weekend I actually had an excuse though since I was in Vegas with my two best friends. I hadn't seen either of them since my wedding last July so it was good to be able to catch up. Here's a few snapshots of our adventures.

Susie sported her RunMonster support on her way to Vegas (she is head of Midwest marketing, you know). We did lots of exploring in the casinos and shops, including M&M World. Saturday marked our trip to the Hoover Dam. A pretty nice picture of the Vegas sign if I do say so myself! (that picture was taken from our bus) Then a night out that included a trip up the elevator of the Eiffel Tower at the Paris Hotel and a great view of the strip. Finally, SF is never too far away as we checked out the Fremont Street Experience and the Golden Gate Casino. (I highly recommend the restaurant there!)

So that's what I've been up to. I hope to get back to posting some craft projects soon. Thanks for stopping by!