Grandkids make life Grand!

Hello my crafty friends, Brenda here and today my challenge for Sweet Sassy Diva was the theme "Grandparents".  For my project I made a layout of our sweet grandkids.  We have 6 in all but don't get to see 2 of them but I was able to get a picture of the other 4 together.  We love having our grankids here but it doesn't happen very often to have them all together because of some living in different states.  But this evening we happened to have everyone at the house at the same time for a few minutes so we all grabbed our camera, put the kids on the sofa and started snapping away.  Those poor kids didn't know what was going on. lol  For my layout I started with a sketch as I really didn't have an mojo on how I was going to scrap this picture.  I use sketches as a jumping point when I really don't have a clue as to what I want to do-they are so great for that!!  Here's my inspiration sketch:

I got out my trusty Gypsy girl and layout it all in in her.  Here is how it looks on my Gypsy:

After designing my layout on my Gypsy, I choose my base paper from DCWV's Natural Stack.  I stayed with a neutral background to go with my picture.

My heart came from George and Basic Shapes and my banners came from Art Philosophy.  My circles I just used punches for.  I am using my Scrap N Easel to place my papers/picture on, it lets me dry fit everything and stand back to look at it.  Then when I have everything tweeked I can glue down. I inked all my die cuts with Tim Holtz Walnut Stain distress ink. Here what my layout looks like starting out:

The tiny heart are from an old punch. And here is my layout all done:

Some close ups:

I hope that you have been inspired to get your craft on and make something today.  Crafty hugs, Brenda

Gift Tag Box!

in July!! Yup, Christmas ideas are popping up all over blog land! All the design team gals are giving you some great Christmas stuff to start on now or store away for later.

My project comes from the late Katie Renz. She was on on the design team for Clearly iStamp. Sadly, Katie passed away in November of 2011. The original directions for the box I made can be found here. This is the 2nd time I have made this box, and I know I am going to making these for special gifts this year.

It goes together very easily... the hardest part of this project is picking out the papers and figuring how to decorate the tags ! So here we go... Using George and Basic Shapes....

After making the box, I laid out the tags on my Gypsy.

I cut 4 tags, 2 from each design at 4.25" on Shadow Blackout. These are for the outside ends.

The rest of the tags are cut at 3.75", layer and shadow.

I cut a strip using my Fiskars Border Punch and added a small piece of ribbon.

The stamps, ink and punches are all from Stampin UP.

The hardware and ribbons are from my stash as is the designer papers.

This really was a fun and simple project. I hope you will give it a try !

The Great Outdoors!

Good Morning!

This is Jen, from 3 Cats and a Bug.  This week here at SSD's our theme is Lazy Days of Summer and how we enjoy them.

For me, this was easy.  We spend every weekend possible at the lake.  While I enjoy fishing, I much prefer fishing when the sun is shining and I have my nook in my hand and the blue gills are biting.  :)  A few times a summer the kids will join us for the weekend and camp out.  It's so nice (now that they are all grown) to sit outside by the fire and talk most of the night!

For this layout I only used 2 cartridges, Campin Critters and George and Basic Shapes.  My daughter and I love to read, so I cut out the squirrel @ 4.5.  I added stickles and glossy accents to the squirrel and embossed the book.  I also used liquid pearls for the eyes and nose.

The porcupine was cut @ 4.  I used liquid pearls for his eyes and nose.  I used stickles for the marshmallow and topped it with glossy accents.  I also used glossy accents for the stick.  The fire was cut from the badge layer @ 4.5.  Of course I added stickles to that also.  :)

I made two photo mats using my gypsy.  I welded the deer behind the tree, cut @ 4.5 to a 4.25 x 5.5 rectangle and I also used the raccoon behind the tree, cut at 4.5 to the same size rectangle.   I used liquid pearls for the eyes and nose and glossy accents on the tree.

I cut the deer fishing @ 5.5 and instead of cutting one fish, I cut three of them.  Like the others, I used liquid pearls for the eyes and nose and I added glossy accent to the white "fur".  For the fish I used liquid pearls for the eyes and on one fish I used glossy accents on the head and tail and stickles on the body and tail.

 The left side...

The right side...

Both sides...

Thanks for looking!

Patriotic Wreath!

Since 4th of July is right around the corner our talented DT sister had issued the challenge of making any project with the Patriotic theme using any cart we like.  I kinda knew in my mind what I wanted to do, but didn't have the details worked out until I dozed off one day and this is what came into my mind.  I took 4 stars from George and Basic Shapes cut at 8", 6", and 4" in red, white and blue paper.  I scored my stars and folded them so they were 3D and then stacked them on top of each other with hot glue.  Then I attached my star to a stryoform wreath.  I then wrapped blue ribbon in each section of the wreath, not the hole thing-just in each middle seconds of the star.  After that I cut flowers from the Flower Shoppe in red, white and blue at 3".  I rolled and glued my flowers ontop the open parts of the wreath form leaving the ribbon showing in the middle.  Then on the top of the wreath only I glued flat back pearls onto each flower in the middle.  Added my hanger and now it is ready to hang.  I hope that you will stop in and see what my other design team sisters have in store for you, you won't be sorry.  Then go and make something patriotic and link it up at BBTB2 or Sweet Sassy Diva!  Can't wait to see what you make!

Dad!

This week at Sweetsassydiva we are celebrating Dads. I'm very blessed to have such a wonderful man to be the "Dad" of my kids. He is amazing and I literally thank God for him every day. Making cards, layouts, or anything basically with a masculine feel is a challenge for me. It may have something to do with the fact that I have 5 daughters, and 1 poor boy surrounded by us. Pink and flowery just comes more natural. So for this card I started scouring magazines, websites and so on looking for something to scraplift. I mainly lifted the colors more so than anything. I chose blues, and stripes. They seemed "manly" enough ;) I layed everything out with my gypsy and got it all cut at one time. I used the calligraphy collection cartridge for my tags and for the "Happy Father's Day" and I used George and Basic Shapes for the "DAD" I used DCWV neutral stack (gray) for the card base, and the smaller tags (1 1/2 in), Latte stack for the striped frame,and white and black misc. scraps for the larger tag (1 3/4 in) I inked all edges of the base, striped paper and tags in dark blue. I layered my tags and centered the letters on them. I used small brads at the top for some extra color. (I don't have a paper piercing tool so I used my cricut tools...they work great) I used foam dots to raise the tags just a bit for added dimension. Then to finish the card I added my greeting on the inside. and the finished project looks like.............

Thanks for stopping by. Make sure that you give all of the "Dad's" in your life a huge hug. They deserve them!

Angie

Freedom!

Hi my crafty friends, Brenda here from Friends Craftin with Friends.  We were asked to make something patriotic in honor of our soldiers and veterans this week at Sweet Sassy Diva.  I have two sons that serve in the Army, one is full time Army and has deployed 5 times thus far and one son that was in the Army Reserves who just came home from Afghan in Dec. of 2011 so this was an easy one for me. 

I decided to make a 9" rosette.  I started out picking out my papers.  One of which I wish I hadn't chosen but too late now! lol You will need three 12 x 12 papers. 

Next you need to cut your papers down to 9.5" x 12". I scored on the 12" side every 1.5" on each paper.   I then punched a border on each 12" side.  You don't have to do this if you don't want to. This is a good time to ink the edges of your paper if you wish.  I chose to ink with Tim Holtz Black Walnut distress ink. 

Next you want to fold your paper mountain/valley folds.  Re-inforce your fold with your bone folder.  Then you are going to fold each one in half and re-inforce that fold too.

Now you are going to glue the fold onto itself with either wet glue-like Scotch Quick Dry, hot glue or score/red liner tape.  I used hot glue. This is what it will look like once glue onto itself.

After you have all three papers folded and glue onto themselves you are going to glue them all together. Continue to glue all three together to get your rosette form. Here all three are glue together, I just need to glue those last two sides together and I will have my rosette form.

Next I cut 3 stars.  One in Blue at 8", White at 6" and Red at 4" using George and Basic Shapes.  Score each point of the star like this:

When you have all the scoring done your star should look like this:

Now you are ready to fold your star to make it a 3D "barn" star.  The star points are folded mountain style while the other line is folded valley style.  Here is what your star should look like and you can now ink it.  I did with the Black Walnut distress ink.

Next I cut and inked my yellow ribbon.  I pop dotted the pieced to give it more depth.  I did the same with the banner, I cut it in white with the layers and pop dotted the layers up as well as inked with the Black Walnut distress ink.  I cut out the letter for FREEDOM using Don Juan in black.  Added them to my banner.  This is what the end product looks like.  I am thinking of adding "isn't free" to the ribbon tales, if I do I will use the same font as I used for "freedom".  I stacked my stars together and glued them to a piece of twine which also is glued to the rosette.

I re-inforced my holes for my hanger.  I didn't want it to rip out after only hanging for a while. 

 I hope this inspires you to make something patriotic in honor of our veterans and soldiers.  I think I will give this to my DIL to hang in her home, after all she deserves it for holding down the fort while DS is deployed all the time.  Crafty hugs to all....Brenda