Week in Review!

It feels like I've been up to so much over the last 10 days! I'm really focusing on getting ready for Christmas and have also been trying to get as much crafting time in as possible before baby arrives! Counting down to 6 weeks :)

 From the December 2010 Create and Decorate magazine I stitched up these cute felt bells with appliqued details.  The felt flowers were cut freehand from felt and layered 2 together with a brad in the center.

 I used the Gypsy and Cricut with the Wall Decor and More cartridge to  make these two cards.  The top was for a little girl's birthday and the bottom was for Thank You cards for a baby shower (which my awesome sister and oldest daughter surprised me with!!) I was able to easily make 10 cards assembly style this way.

inside sentiment

As always Scrapbooker's Paradise had another awesome Toonie Thursday project- they made a really beautiful, super easy Christmas card with Smooch ink spread on a tree stamp, an embossed image at the top of the card and some cool Shimmer spray along with an envelope cut from 1/2 of a regular, long envelope with a piece of coordinating paper glued on the edge.

I made one with a 'Smooch' stamped flower image on brown cardstock, which I embossed with a sentiment and sprayed with Shimmer spray.

I also finished a pair of mittens for Amie from the Crochet World Babies and Kids issue.  They were super easy and are going to be really warm!

Also wanted to share a crafty website: http://www.wileycraft.com/
and a really good scalloped potato recipe: http://www.canadianliving.com/food/classic_scalloped_potatoes.php

Well, tomorrow's a scrapbooking day and then I've got a few more projects to finish up (and maybe address my Christmas cards!)

Linked up to Creation Corner's Friday Link Party, Simply Designing Simply Link Party, and My Romantic Home Show and Tell Friday!

Tags, Tags, Tags!

For last Toonie Thursday and on Tag Tuesday this week, Scrapbooker's Paradise has focused on tags... Fun!!

Dianne's Tag last week was so cool! We sprayed the tag with glimmer sprays after embossing gold snowflakes in the background.  We then stamped a great window stamp from Inkadinkado and covered it with Sookwang tape and then micro glitter to make it all sparkly and popped it up with foam dots over some sprayed leaves, fun twisted wire and fuzzy rickrack.

Below, are my two versions of this tag using some different colored glimmer sprays and silver embossed snowflakes on the yellow/pink tag.  Can't wait to dress up my Christmas packages with these!

Yesterday for Tag Tuesday we were shown how to make these awesome tags.  The snowflakes are punched from Spellbinders Dies, layered over some neat embossed paper (sold in a 12x12 sheet) which we used Distress Inks on.  We added a sentiment, torn around the edges and highlighed with some white ink and some rhinestones.

The Dream tag is layered over a plain black tag, then we added a die cut butterfly, some twine, a silhouette and a sentiment and tied a ribbon around the bottom.

Great tags! I'm going to see what I can do with the Cricut to make these :)

Scrapbooker's has some amazing tags featuring the Tim Holtz techniques starting next week!

Hobby Dough

My mother recently sent my daughter a 'Robin Hood' Hobby Dough book with a recipe for salt dough and instructions to make several different ornaments and gifts.  I actually remember this book and making these dough ornaments with my sister when I was younger!  We had lots of fun molding the dough and then baking it or air drying and painting our masterpieces.  Funny, some of the cheapest crafts provide the most memorable entertainment!

One of the best parts - mixing the dough with your hands!

Ready to bake

The finished product!

Recipe for salt dough:

2 1/2 cups All Purpose Flour
1 cup Salt
4 tablespoons Vegetable Oil
1 cup Water

Mix dry ingredients, add vegetable oil and stir in.  Add water a little at a time and stir until it holds together.  Knead 5-10 min's until dough feels smooth.

Store in airtight container or ziploc bag to prevent drying out leftovers.

You can air dry for 48 hours or until dough is hard and white in appearance or bake at 325 degrees or lower (if pieces are thinner than 1/4") on a cookie sheet, allowing 1/2 hour baking time per 1/4" of dough.

You can varnish or use acrylic sealer on both sides after painting to protect dough from absorbing moisture.

This post was shared with Tip Me Tuesday, Made for you Mondays, Get Your Craft on Tuesday, Too Cute Tuesday, and Tuesday Time Out.

Sketchy Thursdays 11.3 Challenge

Can't believe we're into November already! So, I'm working on getting my Christmas projects done, one of which is working on scrapbooking pages of my older daughter.  This Sketchy Thursday sketch challenge was perfect for this 8th Birthday layout. 

I used a pink color scheme and embossed the cardstock behind the clown cake with a Tim Holtz Sizzix folder.  Then I used the Bloom Cricut Lite cartridge to cut the flower and the flower shape, which I stamped with a CTMH 'party' stamp.  I also cut the flower shape out of Sookwang tape and applied it over the stamp and then applied microfine glitter over the tape to make it nice and sparkly! I used some great pink glittery cardstock cut into a circle behind the pics (and used this cardstock for one of the strips along the base and part of the flower).  I gave the left upper corner a spray with some Glimmer Mist and used my Distress Inks to highlight the edges of my paper.

Playing in Paradise #39

Whenever I think of making a masculine card the Tim Holtz Distress Inks and sanded Core'dinations paper come to mind! For this week's Playing in Paradise challenge the request was to create a masculine card or project. 

I inked the edges of the card with green Distress Ink and embossed the top Core'dinations paper layer with a winter folder, which I think could have many uses! Then I placed it on top of another Core'dinations paper embossed with a circle folder and layered this on top of some Tim Holtz music paper.  Below I added a strip of edged paper, which I sanded, and topped it off with a metal key.

Supplies: Sizzix embossing folder, Winter Botanical set: Botanical Patch; Cuttlebug embossing folder, Spots and Dots; Core'dinations cardstock; Tim Holz seasonal paper stash; Fiskars edge punch