The List, SOUS 12-24-2010

Well, can you believe it?! December 24th! Christmas is nearly here! And after that,  the beginning of another new year!  So, while many of you are busy for the next few days and maybe having a family vacation after that, Stuck on U Sketches is having our last reveal and challenge for 2010.

Our sketch today is done by the lovely "Charlotte" aka Suepup.  I have been saving this sketch since last year and am so glad to finally get a chance to use it! You can visit Charlotte's blog Here. 

This is a look at her gorgeous sketch:

Gorgeous, huh?

Okay, so my favorite part of this page is this cute photo of my dd Danielle posing for me while we were shopping on our annual Girl's Shopping Day with her sisters.  She is so patient (usually) to give me my much needed photo ops!  But here you can also see the crochet doily that I used. Picked it up at JoAnn's .. love those things!

My papers are a mix of Bo Bunny Noel and My Minds Eye Holly Jolly.  I love to layer pp so this was lots of fun. And of course, I really love using my Zutter Distress it all to distress my edges.  Those evergreen leaves you see are from a garland that I picked up at Michaels a few weeks ago. I thought they would look great on some packages or a scrapbook page ... I've done both and still have lots of it left.

The gorgeous velvet Poinsettias are Petaloo and came from Floren's store. She was so good to tell me the minute she loaded them so that I could snap them up quick!  

The round chipboard piece is from the Bo Bunny Noel collection and is also from Generations Crafting.

Almost forgot to mention the matching ribbon from the Bo Bunny Noel collection.  The berries and pearls are from my stash. Sorry for the shadows but there is so much dimension on this page that it was hard to not have shadows somewhere.  I have a great place in my sunroom to take photos but right now there is a humongous Christmas tree occupying that spot, so I've had to make-do in other locations.

Here I've used a diecut from Creative Imaginations IOD Night Divine. 

Just a last look at those scrumptious Christmas papers! I am such a sucker for Christmas paper.  Not even gonna tell you how many collections I have for this year!

That just about wraps it up for today! Hope you will find time to visit us at Stuck on u Sketches  and play along this time. You will have 2 weeks to upload your layouts.

I want to wish you all a wonderful holiday season!

Merry Christmas card

Thought I'd share a card I made using the Anna Griffin Calisto Christmas line for Generations Crafting. 

I had my brother and my sister-in-law in mind while I made this card (especially my SIL .. who is an awesome card maker) and sent it to them earlier this month. So, lots of love went into the making of this one!  

I'd like to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas.  Hope you can make it back here tomorrow for our Stuck on U Sketches reveal!

BB die cut challenge ~SOUS 12-10-2010

Happy Friday, everyone! If you have already visited the Stuck on U Sketches blog, then you know that we are having a Bo Bunny die cut challenge courtesy of Floren Boynton over at Generations Crafting. All the designers had 5 sheets of Bo Bunny die cut papers to choose from. The criteria being that they were to use at least one of the pieces that Floren sent us.

Well, I decided to try to go with 2 and it worked great! I have really been into purple the past few months, so those are the ones I went with. The cute photo is precious gd Marianne.

For embellishment, there is some Webster's Pages netting behind my photo, Petaloo flowers around the photo and K and Company butterflies across the page. The purple trim is from an older Swirlydoos kit. My title was cut using my Cricut but I have forgotten which cart I used as I did this project several weeks ago.

Anyway, I'm keeping this post kind of short and sweet! But want to say a big ole thank you to Floren for providing our papers. And am hoping she enjoys what everyone does with them.

Talk soon!

Kaiser Craft tree for Generations Crafting

Wow, wow, wow! I think this was one of the most fun projects that I have done all year!  A while back Floren from Generations Crafting sent me this wooden Kaiser Craft tree-shaped mini-album as one of my Design Team projects.  Since I haven't worked with alot of wood, this was really fun and different to do.

I decided to use my Anna Griffin Holiday Traditions paper to decorate it since they are so bright and cheery.  They are the seriously the kind of Christmas papers that I could use over and over again!

The first thing I did was to lightly sand and then paint the edges of the mini. Next I started designing which papers to use where and traced and cut them  .. easier than you would think! Then I adhered my papers to the album using a coat of Modge Podge.  After they were dry, I started cutting pockets and tabs. Then came the really fun part .. decorating! My product list is  here.  I have used some misc ribbon and bling from my stash.

This was a little hard to photograph but I hope you can get the general idea. It is so pretty IRL! I think I will give it to one of the daughters for Christmas.

So, here are the pix:

Many thanks to Floren for having me as part of her design team and providing such awesome product to work with. Hope you will visit her store often!

Can't wait to see what you think?!

Guest Designer for My Little Sketch Book 12-05-10

It has been a pleasure to guest design this year for Liz Qualman's My Little Sketch Book.  I have loved Liz's sketches from day one, so it has been an honor and a privilege to work with her this year.  This will be the end of this particular project but certainly not the end of using her sketches, that's for sure!

Here is Liz's sketch for this week:

Isn't it wonderful? So many possiblities with this one. Since I received  my sketch at a busy time of year, I was glad that it was fairly simple in design. I decided to go with one large photo instead of two because I had just printed out this awesome photo of darling granddaughter Marianne playing in the water.  To simplify even more, I used some Websters Pages Seaside Retreat papers to do some of my work for me! (These papers were a gift from Floren at Generations Crafting.  Thanks, Floren! And here is a link to those papers.)  

I love a page with lots of layers, so this was fun to do.  I did only a moderate amount of distressing and inking this time but did use a stamp in place of the journaling round.  (I have not yet circled the month .. have to check with my dd on the date.)

I had a Dusty Attic piece from one of my previous Swirldoos kits and used it in place of the narrow strip across the lower third of the layout.  I inked it with TH Vintage Photo and stickled it with the Distress Stickles of the same color. Then added 3 rosettes in place of buttons.  My flowers are a combination of Prima and Petaloo.

Of course, I had to bring in some Prima swirls! I've gotten very spoiled to my Prima florals and bling!

Just a close-up  of the Dusty Attic scroll.  I wanted to use it because it reminded me of wrought iron fencing around a back yard.

My title was a quick and easy use of American Crafts Nutmeg hickers.  Thought it was kind of fun to use a rosette to dot my "i."    Lastly, I took my photos and went back to cooking Thanksgiving pies!

Thanks for coming by! I hope you will visit Liz's blog and see what the other designers have done with this same sketch.  I hope you can join us and  use this sketch some time soon! Again, many thanks to Liz for having me as one of her designers this year!

Stuck on U Sketches DT reveal ~11-26-10~

Hi, fellow bloggers! This will be a very quick post for me . Today is reveal day at Stuck on U Sketches. Yes, I know it is Black Friday for many of you but the SOUS calender marches on. 

For our challenge this time we have another great sketch by Vanessa Waller (Ness.)  You can visit her HERE.  My layout is my very loose interpretation! I looked at the sketch and then started creating. When I was done, I looked at the sketch again and said "Oops, guess that really was just for inspiration."  Ness, my apologies.

Some of you may have already seen this page. I gave Floren at Generations Crafting my blessing to run it this past Monday on her blog along with my other Basic Grey Curio project. During these holiday times we sometimes have to do a little double duty with our projects, right?  But the good news is that I am now ahead and working on my mid-December projects! 

Anyway, this is another photo of my Mom that was new to me when going through her photos. She was 15 here .. I just love it! And I loved working with the BG Curio collection so much .. can't wait to do more! I used a large Prima flower and ribbon in place of the additional small photos.

One thing of note is the round backgroud where I used Lisa Gregory's corner punch tutorial over at Swirlydoos. If you've been seeing alot of decorative edge circles, she's the reason why.  THIS is the link to her video tutorial. Thanks, Lisa!

Lots of distressing on this one, a large Prima bloom and flourish, ribbon and butterflies from my stash.

If you haven't heard about the Black Friday sale at Generations Crafting , then scroll on down to my last post. Talk about great prices! And fabulous extras.

Thanks for coming by and hope those of you in the USA are having a great holiday!

Toot Toot!

I'm sure that many of you will remember this layout from earlier in the year.  It was highlighted in the Chirp newsletter Jan 5th, 2010 and runs all the time in my sidebar. I used the awesome Basic Grey Indian Summer collection for this project. (Be sure to check out the Super Value Sets at Generations Crafting if you've not had the opportunity to use these awesome papers.)  

Well, a few weeks ago Basic Grey held a contest on Facebook. They were giving away a collection pack a day for layouts chosen from their gallery.  So, on the morning of October 25, this is what I read:

"HUGE CONGRATULATIONS to SANDI CLARKSON, winner of today's (10/25) Collection Pack a Day Gallery Giveaway! Sandi's adorable layout was picked by our office admin, Kristin, who loved all the 3-D elements in this project that put it over the top! Thanks for sharing with us, Sandi!"

That certainly made my day! I got to select any collection pack that I wanted and I chose the new Marjolaine (below) since I haven't had the chance to work with that yet.

Doesn't that look yummy? Can't wait!  Many thanks to Basic Grey for my new goodies!

More Glitz Design!

Here are a couple of new layouts that I did quickly one evening to showcase the new Glitz Design Scarlett collection for Generations Crafting.

I wanted to see how these papers would look on an all boy layout. And was I pleased with this one! (This is dgs Christian.) I've been wanting to experiment with the "middle panel" design that seems to be so popular right now.  I really like how that turned out and plan to do another one sometime soon! I drew inspiration on this page from Lisa Valentine and her use of the Donna Salazer Twiggy stamp which I used across the bottom of the page. Love this stamp BTW!!! It really added character to the solid blue which is from the Scarlett collection as well. Then I layered a few papers, added some ribbon and buttons and was totally pleased. My title mat was cut with my Cricut and the verbage is from some chipboard that my dd gave me. I was so happy with my page that I didn't see the need to add anything else!

The next one is of my dgd Peyton in a rare quiet moment. Still wearing her big hair bows *wink*wink*

I did some distressing, some punchwork and made a handmade flower that is similar to the "fringe" flower. I did plan to curl it more but got in a bit of a hurry. That may be a re-do one evening soon. I also fussy cut the floral photo corner to eliminate a green dotted paper that I didn't want to mix in on this particular page.

While you're here, I'd like to give you a heads up on a Black Friday special that Floren will be running at Generations Crafting.  Floren has some awesome Grab Bags  (can I whisper Bo Bunny in your ear, shhhhh!) that she will have cheap, cheap, cheap with certain minimum orders. More on that next week. But be sure to check back here to get your "code" to get the special pricing. Her Black Friday will run from Wednesday Novemeber 24 through CyberMonday.

Thanks for coming by and I hope to post more inpairation soon!

Stuck on U Sketches 11-12-10

Happy Friday! What an exciting reveal day this is for Stuck on U Sketches. We have an original sketch designed especially for us by Vanessa (Ness) Waller of Crafty Ness.  Ness is the DIL of our very own Annette Gearside! Aaaaaaaannnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd! We have the very special Lisa Gregory of

What a Beautiful Mess  as our special Guest Designer.  I hope you will give her a warm welcome!

Anyway, I had lots of fun doing this page and let the sketch be my inspiration but I did not follow it as closely as I normally do. I went with how I wanted to use my papers. The papers are all My Minds Eye, So Sophie, as well as a Hambly overlyay for the doily.  The photo is of my dgd MacKenzie a few years ago. I did lots of distressing and some punchwork .. which is totally covered up by my siggy.

Here is copy of Ness's sketch. Isn't it gorgeous?

Here you can see some gorgoeus lace that I added along the bottom of the photo and going all the way across the page. There is another piece of teal lace on top of the beige which showa up better in another photo below. You can click on any of the photos to see an enlarged view. I cut up a Prima Swirl and use it here as well as higher on my page.  The title piece is elevated on foam squares.

More Prima.  And you can catch a glimpse of the Hambly overlay.

Along the left of the photo, I used a Prima butterfly stem in Autumn colors. Then added in some more Prima flowers as well as a Bo Bunny Noel Petal.  (All available at Generations Crafting.)  And of course, I added one of my Dusty Attic gates that I painted in turquiose and then inked with Vintage Photo. I later added on some Distress Stickles.

Many thanks to Ness for this gorgeous sketch which I plan to use many, many times! And thanks to Lisa Gregory for Guesting with us this week. Remember, you will have 2 weeks to complete your project and link it to SOUS. Hope to see you there!

Canvas/ time clock project ~ Bo Bunny Noel

Well, it's time to share another DT project for Floren at Generations Crafting. When I received these yummy Bo Bunny Noel papers from Floren a couple of months ago, I was ecstatic! They are absolutely gorgeous! I can just picture my Christmas album in nothing but these! But on the other hand, I wanted to do something a little different this time around and remembered a gorgeous canvas project done by the lovely Sandy Windsor some time last year. You can visit her at http://detailsbysandy.blogspot.com/. Just know that she hasn't been posting much of late. But you can still see her gorgeous work anyway! (Thanks for the inspiration, Sandy!)

This was so hard to photograph but I hope you will get the general idea.  (There is an outside photo below.)  This is a 16x20 canvas that I purchased at M's on sale. I painted it a warm winter white. The sides of the canvas are done in a medium brown color. After that dried, I applied all my papers with Mod Podge.  After those dried really well, I punched a hole in the canvas where the stem of the clock workings go through. I assembled the pieces of the clock and then went to town on decorating the canvas.

I used 3 photographs of different Christmas decorations that I enjoy, cutting my photo mats from ACY. My title was cut using my Heritage cart.

My flowers are a mix of Bo Bunny Cranberry Trim and Webster's Pages Bloomers in dark green. For leaves, I used some holly and berries that I had on hand for decorating.  I also used some gorgeous flowers from my DT package, along with some older Prima bling in red.

In the upper left corner, I added a crochet doily for texture and just love it!  I finished things up with some flowers and butterflies that I had on my stash! (I know .. butterflies at Christmas?  But you see them in the stores with the ornaments, so.....

Here is a close-up of the clock and of the title.

And another close-up showing the Bloomers.

Because this project was so difficult to photograph indoors,  I took it outside and snapped a photo yesterday. So, at least there is no flash on this pic but there are shadows. LOL Hopefully, this will give you a general idea of how it looks. Now I can't wait to hang it!

I hope this will inspire you to create some Christmas decorations of your own. Be sure to check out Bo Bunny when you visit Floren's store! It goes really, really fast! Thanks for coming by.

Mystery Solved ~ DT LO for Generations Crafting ~

I always enjoy the opportunity to share my DT work for Generations Crafting and this is no exception.  This time Floren sent me the new Glitz Designs Scarlett collection. These are great for a variety of projects as you shall see over the next couple of weeks. 

Firstly, I thought they were perfect for this photo of my mother, taken when she was 12 years old.  I really don't have too many childhood photos of my Mom .. or even as an adult for that matter. She was good at dodging the camera! But I really love this one because she looks so much like one of my granddaughters. 

I used 2 pieces of the Scarlett Bouquet paper on this project and did my normal distressing and punchwork. Love my deep edged MS daisy punch!  

Here is a close-up of the punchwork as well as some of the blooms I used. Two different colors of Webster's Pages bloomers as well as some aqua Prima roses.  I also used some black beading that I had on hand to wrap around my blooms and then use to frame my photo.

This was a Glitz what-not that I for my journaling card. And that adorable little bird is part of a Prima Say it in Crystals - Vintage Frame.

Don't you love this?!! It is a new cut from my Cricut Reminisce cartridge.  I thought it was perfect for this page!

Here I used some the Glitz Paper Layers behind my photo. It is so popular right now to use book pages on your LOs ... but in this case you don't have to sacrifice an old book!

Well, this shall be a quick post this time. Hope to visit your blogs soon!

"Share Croppers" ~ Stuck on U Sketches 10-29 Halloween challenge

It's woo-hoo Friday and I couldn't be more excited! I just love Fridays because it's the beginning of a new weekend .. time to refresh and be renewed. And this week it is time for another reveal at Stuck on U Sketches .  

Nanne is our hostess this month and for today she chose a Halloween theme along with a 2 page sketch. We were to make a spooky (or fun) Halloween page or just use Halloween colors.  Good thing she threw in that last part for those who don't celebrate the event.   We don't do much here anymore now that our kids are grown.

So, I decided to just go for the colors .. and then realized that last year I had been to a scrapbook retreat the weekend of Halloween.  One of the gals brought her really cool witch's hat and did some posing for the camera! Since I didn't have many photos, I decided to make the 2 page sketch a one page.

Here's the original sketch:

And here's my version:

I used some awesome black trim beneath my photo and added some pearls accents. Then I used these really cool "bats" that I bought at Michael's.  (That's about as Halloween-y as I got. LOL) I cut my title using the Cricut Blackletter font cartridge.  This close-up also shows the Creative Imaginations doily that I used in place of the circle.  The doily was a brown-patterned one that I painted black to suit my page.  How fun is that? On the far left you can see just a bit of the Prima bling I used throughout.

Some more black trim above the photo as well as some black glitter paper by Doodlebug (?)  I think .. it was a scrap and I can't recall for sure who made it.  (I bet Fern will know!) Loved these black roses that came in one of my Swirlydoos kits. Finally got a chance to use them! They are pretty bulky though, so I actually stepped on them to squash them a bit before putting this page in an album.  Crazy, huh? There's a bit more of that Prima bling here as well.

Well, of course because it's Halloween, I thought the chandelier from French Manor would be perfect! I first cut it from chipboard, then from cardstock.  Added a few rhinestones for glimmer as well as Black Diamond Stickles.

This is the upper left corner which I felt needed a little something to balance the page. So I used more black trim and a rose.  This is also a great close-up of one of those bats that I just had to have!! I was actually kind of sick the day I went and got these .. and nearly passed out in the store.  Oh, the craziness of hunting for the perfect scrappy supplies!  

So, I think that is about it. I apologize for the glare on the photo but I photographed this page multiple times on multiple days and never got a really great shot. I decided to go with this one because it was relatively straight and you could see the trim more distinctly. The colors were also fairly true.  (That's me, second from the right.)

I wish you a happy and safe weekend. And I hope that you will join the challenge this time and link up your layout. Can't wait to see your ghosts and goblins! Or your "Halloween colors" page!

Birthday cards and a pretty Corsage embellishment

So sorry I have not been posting more to my blog but I HAVE been busy .. just working on DT stuff and trying to stay ahead a litle bit. As soon as the holiday season starts, my crafting time drops to nada, so a head start is almost imperative.  However, I did have to stop and take time to make a birthday card for my sweet SIL Susanna, who actually got me started with this crazy hobby/passion of mine. She is a fantastic card maker, so I wanted it to be pretty! But you all know my cardmaking skills are not top-notch. But there is lots of love for her in this one anyway.

I used Bo Bunny's Olivia papers for Susanna's card, as well as the BB Olivia cut-outs and the matching chocolate ribbon trim that matches the collection. I did a little punchwork on one of the layers and embossing the Happy Birthday sentiment with  a Cuttleug folder, then sanded it a bit to make the white more dominant.  I added 2 Prima Faience blooms, one is Emily, the other is Bradstreet. I also made one flower with a Creative Memories punch because Suz was a consultant for them at one time.  Thought that just personalized it more!

The inside sentiment is computer generated

 and of course expressed my well wishes!

Just s side view to show you how fluffy but soft the fabric flowers are.  I love those things!

Well, after I made the first one .. which took some time (for me),  I decided to whip together a couple more  very simple cards ..   like 5 minute cards .. seriously. But now I have them on hand for some other birthday folks.

Again, some more enbossing on one of the cutouts.  And another Prima bloom.

Sideview

Last card  .. this one is not my fave but oh, well! 

So, then I decided to make one of those floral corsages that everyone is wearing. I took some old lace and re-purposed it to be the base. I then made a gold ribbon flower and put 3 flowers on the corsage piece.  Added in a broach from my jewelry box and I have something really cool to wear on my denim jacket or whatever! Super easy and saves a bunch of money if you go price these things in the stores.

Anyway, Floren from Generations Crafting.  asked if I would work with these Prima Faience blooms and I jumped at the chance! And I am so glad I did! They are fabulous. And because they are soft, you can use them in your albums without excess bulk.

Now for the really good news. On Thursday, Floren will be running a flower give-away, so be sure to check her BLOG on Thursday of this week for the details.  Free flowers! Gotta love that!

Hope you will check back here on Friday for my Stuck on U Sketches post. We are featuring something kind of "spooky"  this week. You won't want to miss it!