Spring!

Today really felt like spring here!  After a few days of muggy, warm weather and a big thunderstormy day yesterday, today was cool and sunny.  Jay and I went to an Orioles/Red Sox game and it was a beautiful day to watch a spring training game.

 

I’ve seen lots of spring wreaths and spring decor online and saw one that was easy to do.  Here it is:

 

 

I took two grapevine wreaths and set them on top of one another.  In the middle I placed some moss that I had on hand, set the bunny in the middle and cut up a couple artificial flower stems I had.  Then I added a few speckled eggs from my Easter things.  I think he’s cute!  

And here’s a banner I made to hang on the mantle in our family room:

 

This is a closeup of one of the letters.

 

The chipboard shapes were covered in dictionary pages and edged with ink.  Then I painted the letters, stamped lightly with a sanded look stamp, and painted the scalloped circle.  I got some little wooden half eggs from Michael’s and painted them, then stamped a flourish in gold on them.  I glued them on top of a bit of moss.  The little scalloped circles at the ends are stamped with a bird and a nest.  

 

 

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

My New Year’s resolution of posting to my blog on a regular basis has fallen by the wayside. . . Oh well, I am just going to post when I feel inspired!

Today I am inspired by the eighteen25 blog post about the American Crafts Dear Lizzy 5th & Frolic + Giveaway!  Visit eighteen25 and see what adorable projects you can make with these great products from American Crafts ‘ Dear Lizzy 5th & Frolic line.  While you’re there you’re going to want to enter the great giveaway!  These products are available at Jo-ann stores beginning TODAY – but why not try to get them for free?  Good luck to me – and you!

While I’m here I’m going to show you some tags I made for a swap for the Creative Block – Stamper’s Anonymous Yahoo group.   The requirements were to use the Tye-Die technique and only Stamper’s Anonymous stamps.  Fun tags to make!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ll have another project to post tomorrow.   I’ve made cards for Matt and Jen’s anniversary (April 9), Jen’s birthday (April 19) and Jackie’s wedding (April 20 -Jen’s sister) but I can’t post them until I present them!

 

Happy Birthday Jen

Today I want to share a card I made for Jen’s 2012 birthday.  Cupcakes are all the rage now and we had lots of them at Jen’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s wedding shower.  So when I saw this card on the internet I couldn’t resist CASEing it!

Isn’t it cute?  Lots of fun to make!

She Makes – She Sews

I’ve been busy working on some new Red Lead swaps.  The one I just finished is an ATC swap called “She Makes – She Sews”.  Red Lead has some awesome new sewing and stitching stamps and stuff.  Here’s my ATC:

 

 

The requirements were to use any Red Lead stamps and/or collage sheets and their new wood framettes which you can see here.  Aren’t they adorable?  They come with many different words on them, they’re so versatile.   I want them all!

Photos of my creation for the Red Lead “Sweet Friend” Shadowbox ATC swap coming soon!

Almost a New Year!

The year is almost over and I haven’t posted as often as I would have liked.  One of my resolutions that I hope to stick to is to post more often.  I certainly make enough stuff to be able to do that!

I know Christmas is over but I didn’t show off a couple things I made because I didn’t want my sisters peeking before they received their gifts!  Every year we choose a name and we have to make that person something hand-made and special.  For the other two sisters we can make something small if we want to.  This year I made an ornament for all three of my sisters:

 

I saw this in the Somerset Holidays & Celebrations and thought it was so cute!  Mine is a little different, but essentially the same.  The little bottlebrush tree is mounted on a small tart tin that has music score in the center and silver tinsel around the inside.  I decorated the tree with little glass beads, then brushed on some glue and sprinkled the tree with coarse glass glitter and mica.  The tree stand is a small wooden knob from Home Depot that I painted and distressed, then put a little bit of lace around it, tied a little red bow (mica on it also) and put it all together with hot glue.  The star is punched cardstock and glittered.  Lots of glitter – which I think makes everything look special!

I made this ornament for Matt and Jen:

 

 

 

 

 

I would like to make them an ornament every year.  I started out thinking that I would use the traditional anniversary gifts as a guideline so last year, their first married Christmas together, I made an ornament out of paper (you can see this in my post from last Christmas.)  This year the traditional gift is cotton.  I had fully intended to, and I did try to, transfer the photograph to a piece of muslin.  However, it was not looking like I had hoped so I gave up and just used the laser photo on the silver coaster.  I punched a hole in the top and the bottom of the coaster with the crop-a-dile, put a ribbon for hanging in the top and hung a Tim Holtz facet from the bottom.  Glitter, of course, was added around the photograph.  This photograph is of Matt and Jen on their first anniversary with a little cake Matt made for Jen.  They are so cute together!

Last project to show today.  The sister whose name I drew for this Christmas was Lesley.  This past summer she and Ernie got two Sheltie puppies, Mischief and Sassy.  Of course, their lives are now all about the dogs!  So I thought I would make her something with some photos she has taken of them:

 

I purchased the shadowbox frame this fall when we went to Archiver’s in Buford, GA on the way up to North Carolina.  (Don’t I wish we had one of those here!!)  I’ve had tons of dog stuff for years, fully intending to do some scrapbooking about my dogs, but haven’t quite gotten around to it yet!  Anyway, I thought it came out quite cute and Lesley really did like it.

Now – on to a new year, lots of projects, some home organization and a few more resolutions!

Happy New Year!

I can’t believe. . .

it’s almost  Christmas!  I apologize for not posting since late September.  I have been busy and will get some photos up but probably not until after the holidays.

Thanks everyone for your kind comments about my 12 Tags of Christmas with a Feminine Twist!  You can imagine how shocked I was when I realized that Tim mentioned me on his blog! Such an honor!  I too love that reindeer tag – so I decided to do this year’s Christmas card using that reindeer in a similar design:

The reindeer, from Tim’s “Reindeer Flight” die, is cut from brown suede paper.  He is standing on “snow”  (a Martha Stewart border punch) which of course I had to “glitter up” a bit, and the background is Stampin’ Up Crumb Cake embossed with a snowflake Sizzix embossing folder which I swiped with a white craft ink pad.  I cut out the banner manually and stamped Merry Christmas in Stampin’  Up Chocolate Chip.  The holly on the reindeer’s neck is a Martha Stewart punch.  I used Michael’s rhinestones for the eyes and the holly berries are Swarovski coral pearl flatbacks from http://www.artbeads.com.  I don’t usually use the standard red/green theme on my Christmas cards and I liked using the browns and whites for this one because I thought they conveyed a “woodland” theme.  I like the way it turned out and I’m now in the process of addressing them and hopefully will get them in the mail by the middle of next week!

This weekend we are back in NC getting Christmas trees!  No snow this year, in fact it is pretty mild and has been in the low 50′s all day today.  Nine trees are in the truck waiting to go back to Florida.  Here’s a photo of Rylee and Cody before we left on Friday and one of the guys baling the trees.

We are so happy we’ve made this a yearly tradition to go back and cut trees.  We never know what kind of weather we’ll be in and we’re glad to be able to get back to the house again.

It’s been awhile……

but I  have been busy!  Back and forth from NC to FL since my last post – back here for a Labor Day Weekend with Matt and Adam – two sisters  here for a visit – and crafting in between!

As promised, here are a few photos of our new outdoor patio/kitchen which we have hardly used this summer because of rain!  These photos were taken on Labor Day Weekend when we had one beautiful night.

Yes, that is the moon!

Two of my sisters, Lesley and Diane, were  here this past week for some girl time.  We had a good time shopping, eating, hiking and crafting!

Diane, Lesley and I on the trail…

Lesley, me, Diane and our instructor, Sally, after our landscape felting class

We also made some Halloween Chunkies!  Here are mine:

So – it has been awhile but things have been going on!  I’m looking forward to one more month in NC before we have to leave for the winter, which already makes me feel sad.  I’m hoping to get my Christmas cards started and I’m attending two workshops with Bonnie at The Art Room in Franklin – can’t wait!

Our Life in the Mountains

It has been so hard to get involved in working on anything since we’ve been here!  Life is different here in Western NC for me, I feel like I’m on vacation every day but there are still lots of things to be doing around the house and yard.  The first week we were here my son Adam visited and we had lots of fun on Lake Glenville tubing and skiing.  Adam and Jay also played lots of golf.  Here’s Adam, the expert water skiier:

My sister, April, was here last week and we had fun kayaking, hanging out and even washing windows!

Our kayaks at rest on the Tuckaseegee River

Two nights ago I was out on the deck, looked down at the front yard and saw two bears crossing the lawn!  I was so surprised and of course I only had my cell phone and not the camera so the photo isn’t the greatest.  I’m alone here now with the two dogs so it was a little creepy going out later in the dark to let the dogs out!

We have several bird feeders and see lots of different birds while we’re here.  Here are a couple, a hummingbird and a little pine siskin:

And this is the view we wake up to every morning:

Who can blame me for not wanting to be holed up in my little craft loft every day?  Anyway, I did work on a swap for Alpha Stamps.  The theme was “Birds in Hats” and from what I see in the gallery everyone did a beautiful job!  We were to decorate three 4×4 coasters and use Alpha Stamps rubber stamps and/or collage sheets.  Here are mine:

The text on the front of the robin one above alludes to a little poem I put on the back

by William Wordsworth:

Stay, little cheerful Robin!  stay,

And at my easement sing,

Though it should prove a farewell lay

And this our parting spring. . . .

Then, little Bird, this boon confer,

Come, and my requiem sing,

Nor fail to be the harbinger

Of everlasting spring.”

Ok, that’s my post for today – a long one for me!  I’m still struggling with learning how to blog on WordPress, actually asked a question about posting today on the WordPress support forum and got my answer!  Amazing….well, they’re tearing up our roof today in preparation for a new metal roof to match our new outdoor kitchen area….I’ll post photos of that project soon!

By the sea, by the sea……..

I’ve been working on another swap for Red Lead called the Secrets of the Sea Tall Tags Swap.  Requirements are that you use their new sea-themed rubber stamps and their large, tall tags that are for sale at their shop.  Here are my tags:

As you can see I used tons of beads and glitter which is definitely my MO!  They went off in today’s mail, just in time for us to leave for the mountains on Friday!  I’m looking forward to much cooler weather – we have been inundated with rain from TS Debby and today is the first time the sun has shown for 5 days.  It’s like a steambath out there!  Fine if you like that sort of thing but I’ll take the cooler mountains any time!

We have been working on an outdoor project at our mountain home and I will post a few photos after we get back up there.

Artful Spring Collages

Red Lead has a new swap!  Decorate one of their 5″ square chipboards with everything spring – bunnies, birds,flowers, eggs, chicks, you name it!  Here are mine:

Interested in Red Lead’s swaps?  Join the Yahoo Group!  Wonderful artists and lots of fun.  Their blog is also fun to follow – great giveaways and lots of cute, vintage ideas.  I’m off to the post office!