dad's day and fwf

Howdy and happy Friday!
Today's the hubster's last day of school (finally) so summer really feels like it's about to begin.

Plus, this Sunday is Father's Day...though my dad is out of town and my FIL will be recovering from a serious case of jet lag, so it's doubtful that we'll actually celebrate on the day itself. The cards, however, will be more or less on time -- and here's one of them:

 no, that is absolutely NOT a pizza box behind my card.... ;)

I love a good pun, don't you? The plaid background is actually hand-stamped using a Papertrey Ink set (love those colors - grey, gold, rust, ocean blue), die-cut and popped up on the card base, but that focal point is all Unity, baby.

I combined the chair and "you rock" sentiment from this set, and the "dad" from this set to make a cute little 4-bar dad card (would be good for a bday too, don't you think?).

Since it's Friends with Flair Friday, you know there are some great deals to be had over on the Unity site, so check 'em out!

In other Unity news, I'll be your Growing in Unity gal all next week, so if you like what you see, be sure to check back M-F next week for cards and layouts using Unity stamps...plus, you could win some free stamps for yourself! Yay!

FWF and a layout.

Good (cold) morning!

If it's Friday, it must be time for some Flair. Be sure to check out the Unity blog to see what the big deal is today. In the meantime, how about a little stamp action on a layout?

Aww, ain't we at least a little cute? This photo was taken right after the one in this layout, so of course we look happy ;). I love simple designs like this one -- easy to use over and over again, changing the feel by changing the supplies used.

Speaking of supplies, check out the Unity goodness there near the bottom!

Before I adhered the block of heart-print paper, I sketched a quick line at the bottom, moved it out of the way, and then used the line as a guide to stamp the dashed scallop repeatedly, masking the side edges and offsetting the rows (did it freehand, even. imperfections are fine with me!). The sentiment makes perfect sense, seeing as this photo is from midnight on New Year's Eve.

A glittery button-twine star, stitching around the border and around the photo, and some various tapes and stickers and such, and all is well.

Hope you enjoy the rest of the Unity goodness out there. Have a lovely day!

other supplies: Crate Paper (Paper Heart, Random) papers and border sticker, AC Thickers and tape, Hambly and Tim Holtz tapes, Best Creations glitter paper, October Afternoon button, Twinery twine, Tim Holtz tiny attacher, Stampin' Up punch and ink, and Colorbox ink.

Sure could use a little...

...Peace, that is.

Man, is it busy around here! The usual holiday bustle, plus some non-holiday bustle, plus plenty of school bustle (the end-of-semester grading binge is officially underway).

So, for a moment, peace:

This was my "personal challenge" line from my Scrappy Chic kit - it's BoBunny and absolutely lovely, but also very busy and glittery...plus the kraft-brown-blue-snowflake combo was a bit perplexing. I tried to find some peace in all that busyness, and I'm pretty pleased with the result. The tree stamp above the title is the same one I used on the ornament in the photo (shall I call it craft continuity? I think I just created a new concept).

It's a little hard to see, but some of the trees have distress stickles on them -- the subtlest of all glitters, in my book. I love those letters -- they're from Pebbles and are perfectly matte.

I kept the busiest patterns to smaller accents, but the glitter definitely still stands out -- in a good way, though. A twine bow finishes it off.

Here's to peace. Have a lovely day!

CFC29 = Super-Quick Holiday Cards!

Well hello there! I took a little blogging break for Thanksgiving (and the shopping, leftover-eating, and gutter-cleaning that followed), but today I'm back with a quick batch of holiday cards that just happen to use this week's CAS-ual Fridays sketch:

Clean and Simple, indeed. I grabbed some of my recent holiday acquisitions, as well as some stamps from the stash, and whipped up four cards in about twenty minutes!

When I'm pressed for time (or mojo), I don't fuss with the sketch -- I run with it! Here, the upper two cards use paper from the Simple Stories Christmas line (the 6x6 pad), while the bottom two use the same North Country collection from this post (but the 6x6 pad instead). All the papers came from Scrappy Chic (where else?).

Besides the top-right card, which uses a quick bit of stamping (an older SU set) and paper-piecing, I let the papers stand on their own and just stamped the sentiments (all from Papertrey Ink). It's a little hard to see, but I also pierced lines around the sentiments too.

Quick, easy -- and I can cross four more cards off the list. Hooray!

I'll see you again soon -- have a lovely day!

Happy (almost) Thanksgiving!

Whether you're in the US or not, it's always nice to pause and think about all the good things to be thankful for. And if you ARE in the US, well...why not stuff yourself silly too? That's right, tomorrow is Thanksgiving here, and besides the thankfulness and all the great chow in store for me tomorrow, Thanksgiving is also prime crafting time.

For most big holidays, I make tags for my family. This year, I got all Tim Holtz-happy and broke out my underutilized TH embossing folders, along with about 5 different colors of Glimmer Mist, three styles of 7gypsies tape, and some Prima leaves to make these:

Ooh, pretty. :)

After the mist dried, I hit each tag with some Distress Ink (using one of the foam applicator thingies) to catch the highlights of the embossed designs.

All the ribbons were pulled sort of randomly from my stash -- I just picked fall-appropriate colors.

Those flowers look like the ubiquitous rolled-ribbon flowers, but I actually made them with strips of vintage pattern tissue - it works the same as ribbon, I just had to be a little more delicate as I twisted to keep the paper from tearing.  The stamps are from Waltzingmouse, and they're conveniently placed to disguise the seam in the embossing (my tags were bigger than my folders, so I flipped them around and embossed the bottom inch or so separately).

The back features my favorite tiny gnome (and an appropriate sentiment) from this Unity stamp set (their big sale ends today, in case you were looking to spend some dough). The papers on the back are all from We R Memory Keepers' Autumn Splendor collection.

Everything you see here (except the Waltzingmouse stamps) came from Scrappy Chic -- some recently, some from days past. Their big sale starts Friday, in case you were looking to spend some MORE dough (and at a locally-owned small business, natch).

I had fun getting all misty and inky and stuff making these, and I hope the fam digs them, too!

Time to get back to the oven -- one more dessert to go, and my contributions to the feast will be complete. Yum. I'll get photos, don't you worry.

Have a lovely day, and have a great Thanksgiving, wherever you may roam.

SiSiS: Stuff I Scrapped in September, part two

Hiya and happy Friday!

Today I have three holiday layouts for you -- two Christmas, one Halloween. And since I don't have a ton of recent holiday photos (especially Halloween), I decided to make some more mini-me layouts with the three holiday lines that were part of my September kit from Scrappy Chic, which is where you can find all of my supplies. Check it:

as always, click a photo to see it bigger.

Halloween's up first. I know I have a shortage of Halloween photos for scrapping purposes, but I still went through five years' worth in one layout! These are my first five Halloween costumes -- all homemade, all well-loved (even the crazy-looking clown makeup!). My grandma can sew like crazy; she made all the clothes for her kids for years (that's five kids, people), and when I was little she made most of my special-occasion outfits, too -- Halloween, yes, but also Easter and Christmas dresses, first-day-of-school ensembles, etc. She can still sew, but these days readymade clothes cost quite a bit less than homemade for the most part -- plus she's moved on to (many) other hobbies. But I digress. The page uses Echo Park's Halloween line plus some ribbons from my stash. Aside from photo editing and printing, the whole thing took about 20 minutes. Works for me! Oh, and that princess costume in '81? cut down from a bridesmaid's dress from (I think) my aunt's wedding. And I thought modern bridesmaid's dresses could be crazy looking! Big floral flouncy border, anyone? Oy. Next:

A jolly old elf, indeed. What else could I use with that adorable elfin print (plus plaid, plus snowflakes) from American Crafts? The Thickers are a reflective shiny silver, which is why they look a little odd in the photo -- they sure gleam in person, though! In the 1981 Santa photo (on the left), you will see one of my favorite childhood fabrics: velour. Spiffy! On the right (1982), I'm wearing one of my home-sewn ensembles -- I loved that jumper. Another super-quick page, too. One more? Ok!:

I admit, this one's my favorite. The little photos are from '81, and the papers and die-cuts are all from the Teresa Collins Christmas line (except the big kraft snowflakes -- those are Maya Rd). The paper started out with a white background. Really white. Too white. Mists to the rescue! Some olive, some krafty tan, and I get shimmer, color, and less white. Since you can't see the photos, really, here's a closeup:

The same sewing grandma made me the stocking that year -- it would have lasted nearly forever, except one of my parents' dogs chewed it up pretty well when I was in college :(. On the right, you can see our family's extensive collection of macrame plant hangers in the front window, plus the toboggan that got a lot of use in Hines Park for years (Dead Man's Hill, anyone else?). Let's check out the cluster at the bottom:

More die-cuts (the cream phrase stickers are Cosmo Cricket's new Tiny Type words). That cluster is not hiding a mistake -- I hid my journaling behind it :).

Whoa -- that's a lot of photos! I do have a few more goodies to share with you (the boy pages). Last post, I'd mentioned that I hadn't scrapped much in October. In the past few days, I've made a half dozen layouts plus a couple cards! Whoa! The reason? Partly because I have a new kit to use, but mostly because of an online class I decided to sign up for from Shimelle Laine's website -- it's called Pretty Paper Party (how could I resist?), and it's really inspired me to break into my stash of new and old papers and create away! Thanks to Sue for recommending it -- it is pretty awesome.

All right then, have a lovely Friday!

Easter...plus a week!

Hi there!
In the midst of my last batches of essay-grading, exam-planning, pie-making, laundry-doing, yard-working and roller-derby-bout-preparing (!), I managed to make some Easter tags for my family -- and yes, I really did make them LAST week! Blogging just fell to the bottom of my list, so they're going up here a little late :)

Here's my last-minute, throw-'em-all-on-the-floor pic:

(click for a closer look)

Grabbed a bunch of Honey Pie scraps (a three-year-old Cosmo Cricket collection that I still think is really cute), die-cut some cardstock tags (spring moss and aqua mist from pti - yum), added a paper rosette (Tim Holtz die), die-cut border (new pti die), and buttons to each, along with some super-quick stamping (spring jar fillers and retro bkgds -- also pti).  Ribbon, twine, and I called it good. And quick.

Oh, and in the centers of each rosette I added either an epoxy shape or button made with my new button and shape-making tools from Epiphany -- won 'em on the CK blog. They are fun, and even more fun, they were free!

I have a stack of other projects to post...and I will, soon. Soon-ish.

In the meantime, I'll also be prepping for the big ol' Mega Meet next weekend -- look for me and my projects at (who else?) Scrappy Chic's booth! I'll be there Friday and Saturday -- if you are, too, stop over and say hello!

Have a lovely Sunday.