My first tag and charm combo

I just started getting into making the dangle charms. They have become somewhat of an addiction for me. I love making them. I have never made the tag/card that a lot of other crafters make to go along with the charm. This is my first attempt at the tag process and I have to say that I like the way it turned out.

I started with a plain large tag in an off white color.

I then inked the tag with 3 different Tim Holtz distress inks. After I had inked to my liking I stamped with some flourishes, a fairy and the word Magic...all of these stamps were Michael's brand recollection stamps from different sets.

I then sprayed the tag with glimmer mist. as you can see it made the stamp images "run" a little. So maybe next time I will spray with the glimmer mist before I stamp with an image. I must admit though, I like the "run" effect that it made on this tag. 

I added my charm to the tag with some strands of ribbon and you have the finished product! I hope you enjoyed looking at my project today. I hope to be back real soon with some more projects to share with you. 

Altering those mini comp books...just the right size to put in your purse!

I recently participated in a color combo swap on the cricut message boards. The ladies there are just wonderful and so fun to swap with. I had Rhonda (Heart2Hand on the message boards) as a partner. The colors for October were Chocolate brown and blue. The rules are to purchase at least $20 worth of scrappin' items for your partner and then there is a twist to the rules. The twist this month was to make an item for your partner. I decided to make two items....the box I posted about a while back and this book.

I covered the book with a single sheet (trimmed down to size) of blue and white paper. The paper kind of had a distressed look already. After I attached it I ink the edges in brown and heavly inked the binding of the book (forgot to take a picture of the binding). The front was stamped with a decorative edge for the top and bottom and lined. I cut the R from Happy Hauntings cartridge (I love that cartridge). I added a Tim Holtz Button to create a "knob" that the thread tie could wrap around to hold the book shut.

The inside covers were done the same way the outside was. Covered with blue and white paper then inked with brown. The back inside cover I stamped with my personalized stamp (from Paperangel.com)...I love it!

The back cover was kept simple to...didn't want to add to much bulk to the book because I wanted it to be able to fit in her purse and write on it with no issues. 

Thank you for stopping by and I'm off to create the next thing to share with you. 

All those cartridge boxes and nothing to do with them....or is there?

I have so many cartridge boxes that take up so much space and they are just storing the look book and the key pad overlay. All of my cartridges are in a cgull tote. So it was time to do something with those boxes...I needed to downsize and create space for other things. One by one I think I'm going to alter them and send them as gifts to people. The lucky person that gets one can store whatever they wish in them. I have found they are good for small embellies, pens and/or markers, flowers....kids can use them for their stuff as well....my son needs one for his money. Here are a few that I have done already: 

Thank you for stopping by today. I hope to be back soon with more crafty items to share with you. 

Planner/Scrapbook

I was in an all handmade swap recently on the cricut message boards. The lady I was creating for (Sherrie..nice gal) wanted a planner. No problem I've made my own planners before...but I wanted to do something different. Something she wasn't just going to toss at the end of the year which happens to a lot of planners. I wanted to create a dual purpose planner. A planner to start turned scrapbook when the year is over. Below is the cover of the planner. I'm not the greatest when it comes to making vintage looking items but the cover looks good.

Each month had a tab divider. On each divider page I created a little layout. Sherrie can add pictures as she goes. I did a page for each month leaving the tabs for November and December open for her to design. Below are a few of the pages that I designed in the book 

Thank you for stopping by and checking my blog out. I'm trying to get better at this posting thing. I will have tomorrow.

1000 paper giveaway

Ok...it's not me I confess but this awesome lady is giving away awesome stuff on her blog. Do you ever get stuck in a creative rut and look for ideas/inspiration. I like to do google searches and I happened to come across this blog. Check out her giveaway. The link is below.

http://www.creationswithkathryn.com/2011/08/1000-sheets-for-thousand-sheets.html

My first handmade flower

Just a short post today. I'm trying my hand at the handmade flowers. I bought the art philosophy cricut cartridge (exclusive to CTMH) but before I tried those flowers I wanted to give it a go with just layering the petals you can get on a number of cartridges. I have to give credit where credit is due. While trying to figure out how I was going to do this handmade flower stuff I "googled" handmade paper flowers and came across a wonderful blog. Simply paper is ran by an amazing woman who is also very kind in sharing her "how to" tutorials. She has many tutorials showing how to make many different types of flowers.

This is my attempt at what she calls a sweet rose. It's not as good as hers but I think for a first try they turned out nice.

Here is the link for this specific rose tutorial http://simplypaperandcreativity.blogspot.com/2010/09/sweet-rose-tutorial.html but be sure to check out the rest of the things that this lady can do.

A card for a new friend......

Today's post is in conjunction with yesterdays post. It's about the same wonderful gal from the same wonderful cricut message boards. That's the great thing about the message boards. You meet new people and build friendships that could last a long time.

In the swap that I'm in the leader (awesome lady Heart2Hand) gives us 20 days worth of words (a different word/phrase for each day). One of the days stated that we had to make a handmade centerstep card. Now I'm not a card "maker" by any means but I do admit it as caught my eye. I like learning new things and I LOVE all things handmade. So, needless to say I'm a scrapper with a card making ability now...lol.

For my first centerstep card ever I have to say I'm pretty proud of myself. Now I recycled the stamp image that is in the center of the card. I'm all about re-using when I can to do my part to help keep the world we live in as clean. I'm trying to do my part to "be green"!

I apologize for the terrible glare....my camera was not working with me. My partner is again...very found of brown but she did mention that she like the combo of brown and silver together. I had plain white flowers that I inked with a little brown and put a white brad in the center of each flower. I look at it now and think that it's too simple but I didn't want to add too much and make it look strange with all the elements. I hope my partner (CricutJunky) likes her card. 

The side view is really terrible...the glare is just awful. I just posted it to show the details of the "centerstep" design. I like this design and plan to start making my own cards instead of buying them. I'll work on my method...polish up my designing techniques and I should have really good cards to show (eventually). Well...I hope you enjoyed the post today and I hope to be back soon with more posts.