Birds

Since it is officially spring, I thought I'd do a little spring crafting and decorating! I have had decoupage glue in my craft cupboard for a while now... but I finally found a use for it!  After looking at the latest Canadian Scrapbooker spring issue, I got some ideas about how to decorate a little wooden birdhouse I purchased at Michaels.  I also got a plain wooden frame and dressed it up too. I can almost hear the birds singing :)

 I used a bird-themed scrapbook paper from 7-gypsies and decoupaged it onto the house after cutting each piece out and shading the edges with Distress Ink.  I also used the Ranger foam pad to apply ink to the parts I didn't cover with paper; the base, perch and trim. (I did that prior to gluing my paper on). Then I painted a layer of clear varnish on and let dry.

 I painted the wood frame with brown acrylic paint, then a layer of crackle medium, and a top coat of white acrylic paint.  After drying I decoupaged the birds and word LOVE onto the frame.  The birds are from the Heritage Cricut cartridge.  I used the same 7-gypsies paper to cut a square of paper from to put in the frame.

Happy Spring!

Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge 110

Yesterday really, truly felt like spring! Sun shining, snow melting, children playing.... Thank goodness!

Today is my oldest daughter's birthday :) My baby is turning 23! I can't believe it. I used Karen Giron's Sweet Sunday Sketch for her card and a CC Designs stamp, which I watercolored with Tombow markers.

inside view

Steph opens her card at lunch today



http://kgiron.blogspot.com/2011/03/sweet-sunday-sketch-challenge-110.html



Spring is on the way...I think! Die Cuttin` Divas` Challenge #7

Die Cuttin Divas` spring challenge this week was to make a die cut spring card with a gardening cut.  I wanted to use my new!!! cartridge (see previous post :) and found what I was looking for in the Just Cards Cricut cartridge.  While it still doesn`t look like spring outside, it feels more like it inside now!

inside view

Oh My Crafts order

I am so excited!! I have been really wanting to get some more cartridges for my Cricut, but have not been able to bring myself to spend even the sale price of $49.99 each for cartridges. Well, I found an awesome site to buy cartridges!!! Oh My Crafts has cartridges for $24.99 and I actually got a sale for $17 each.  Plus I found a 10% off code which gave me a further discount.  In total, I got 5 new cartridges for $80 plus $22 shipping/handling.  I went for the 1st class since I was shipping to Canada and I wanted to be able to track it.  From order to delivery it was 2 weeks total.

I ordered Simply Sweet, Heritage, Once Upon a Princess, Just Because Cards and Mini Monsters.

(I linked them to the Cricut website to view the images)

Even Amie is excited!

 I also had to share this very cute dress... Amie was in ballet class until they shut the door and wouldn't allow parents in the class.  After that, she did not want to go anymore, but we had already paid for the recital dress.... Anyway, it came in today and is totally cute.  I guess it's just one of those things.

She calls it her waterlily dress

Springtime at Glenmore Park

Glenmore Park is one of our favorite places to walk and have a play.  Unfortunately, it is definitely not springlike here in Calgary yet, but scrapbooking some spring pics helps!

I used Penny Black Tiny Wishes stamps and colored them with Tombows on watercolor paper and added them to some bright spring papers.

Vintage Clip Art

Found this cool site by googling 'free vintage Easter images'!

http://vintageholidaycrafts.com/

Check it out for some beautiful images....

Image courtesy of Vintage Holiday Crafts

Framed Birthday Card

Amie got a cute little elephant card from her big sis, Steph, for her birthday.  Of course, I keep all her cards, but I wanted to frame this one and put it on her wall.

I picked up a wooden frame from Michaels ($1.50) and coated it with pink paint, then a crackle medium, then a coat of white paint.  I cut the card on the fold and turned the sentiment inside around so it could be seen from the back.

Another project: I bought a lamp from Homesense, which had a little crack around the base.  I tied a ribbon around the bottom and stuck in a butterfly and hot glued a pink ribbon with dangly beads.  Perfect for a princess :)

Fairmont, BC

Well, we've just returned from a trip to Fairmont, BC.  The mountains are so amazing each time I see them! They are definitely not the ocean (I'm originally from Nova Scotia), but are a close second for sure.

The weather was around +6 and even though it wasn't warm it was a nice change from the frigid temps we had been getting in Calgary lately.  We went in the Fairmont Hot Springs pools this visit and drove up to the ski hill.  Next year for sure we'll be trying skiing!

There was a little bit of snow that fell last night so driving home was absolutely gorgeous! The sun was shining and the trees and mountains were outlined in snow - so beautiful.

A home in Fairmont

A home in Fairmont

The view from our deck

View coming down from the ski hill

Amie's finger painting

Crafty girl

Driving through Radium, BC

Almost Spring

Ok, it seems like spring is coming... There's still snow on the ground, but it is melting and the sun is shining!

In the spirit of spring I've finished some pages with bright colors. Amie actually picked out the plaid chipboard accents to use on these pages! I cut the title with the Cricut and I watercolored the window box and flowers with Tombows. 

Happy Birthday Cards

I picked up this cute birthday boy and girl stamp a couple weeks ago and colored it with markers and pencils.  I needed to make a birthday card and thought it would look cute on the front of a card.  I saw more matching stamps and coordinating papers at Scrapbooker's Paradise, but I restrained myself.... for now :)

I stamped a border stamp along the horizontal strip of paper
and I colored the flowers, which were white, with distress ink.

I also needed a male birthday card, which for some reason always seems so daunting! I found some 'male' papers in my stash and went to town.  I used Close to My Heart stamps for the green outline around the words and the horizontal strip across the bottom part and inside of the card.



Envelope and inside view



Scrapbook Night

Over the weekend a friend and my sister came over and we had a girls' scrapbook evening, with some wine and food, of course!

I always feel like I just figure out what I'm doing and then the night is over, so during the week prior to our night I picked photos and decided on layouts and papers and stacked them together so that I would be ready to start.  Of course, I never get as much done as I think I will! but I was happy with my accomplishments.

I had some random photos of Amie and some from a friend's birthday party that I didn't want to scrap as a party, so I decided to focus on her playing and how much that means to me to be part of that.

These cute stamps are from Close To My Heart and I colored them in with markers and cut them out.  I had a lot of pics from our day at the Zoo, but I didn't want to do a 4 page layout so I combined them in a photo editing program and printed them out as 4x6's.

Spring!

Ok, spring isn't quite here yet... but I'm trying to hurry it along!

I thought I'd join in on the Die Cuttin' Divas Challenge and make a Spring card!

  

I used the Stretch Your Imagination Cricut cartridge.

http://diecuttindivas.blogspot.com/2011/03/challenge-5-time-for-sketch.html

Come on already... enough cold and snow!

Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge 106

I just love these Sweet Sunday challenges! I'm really happy with how this one turned out.  You know, you make a card and other people say it's beautiful, but you feel it's just not perfect... but this one went together so quickly and just turned out right!

I used a new Penny Black stamp and water-colored it with Tombow markers.  She's so cute and the flowers feel like spring. (I'm so totally finished with winter!) I spritzed a white paper flower with Glimmer Mist and then added a tad bit more color with some Distress Ink.  Of course, I had to add a little bling inside the flower and along the left side.

Scrapbooker's

I needed a Scrapbooker's Paradise fix today, so I went in for their Twoonie Thursday card, which turned out so cute.  They are so nice there!  Amie came with and I can proudly say was very good... and they let her draw on a large paper pad while I made the card, which was so nice of them.

My purchases today!
Alphabet stamps - on sale
Distress Ink - on sale
CC Design stamp - picked by Amie :)