Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Gift Boxes... and some sewing!

So the last few days I've done very little crafting for me.. Got caught up with my babies and Christian Grey & Anastasia Steele... Yup, I like to read... and I can't put a book down once its started... even if its the second time reading it LOL I should know better than to pick it up even for a few minutes!!
But now that those are finished again I need to get the rest of Christmas ready!
Wanna see what I have completed the last few days?

My sis actually pinned this post on pinterest and I loved it so gave it a try for a couple quick little gifts for coworkers... Each box took alittle over an hour to finish.. a score in my book! And they are adorable!! Imagine if I took more time embellishing? I like the simple look for these gifts.. So shout out to"From my craft room" for this tutorial!!




Cute ey? I filled them with Chocolate, Treats for thier children, Treats for thier dogs, Tic Tacs and Home made beeswaz lip balm. I hope they like them!!

I am also entering one of these boxes into Fantabulous Cricut Challenge this week! Wish me luck!

Then I finished up a little throw quilt I made with scraps left over from a tree skirt I made back in October with a pattern from Nite Owl Quilting. The Grinch is hubbys favorite Christmas character and the girls seem thrilled to have a little kid in the christmas decor! 



And that's what I have been working on this week... What about you??

Now off to get started on those pjs!! Seriously!! 1 week to go and I'm just getting started!! And i have all the wrapping left!! Damn you Fifty Shades!!! ;)

Friday, December 12, 2014

My poor sewing machine...

Hello Again!

Today was a sewing kinda day! With Christmas just 2 weeks away I had a few quick little projects to finish up before getting ready and off to work. Wanna see? OK!!

First I put the binding on a quilt for my littlest one. The pattern is from a breast cancer quilt book... Forgive me I don't remember what its called.. I borrowed it from the library... But its pink! Lol!


Second I whipped up a quick bag for a coworkers gift. I used the pattern from Zaaberry.blogspot.ca. This is the 5th bag using this pattern and I love it!! Its quick, easy and soooo cute!!! Thanks Zaaberry!!!


These are the other ones I made:

And lastly I whipped up a cricut cover for my lil sis for her xmas present. I made myself one this summer with a pattern from Crafty Girls Workshop. My sis wanted one right away.. took me awhile but its done!! The best part is that I used Tim Holtz material and embellishments which just tickles my fancy lol. I love Tim Holtz, did I mention that?

First up my cover:

Now here is the new one for lil sis:

So thats what happened here today... Tomorrow.. maybe nothing lol... but Sunday we are making Frozen jammies for the littlest!!!

What are you working on?


Thursday, December 11, 2014

Xmas Door Decor

Last year my oldest and I made her a Christmas penguin sign for her door... which reappeared this year with much joy from her! So tonight while waiting for Jakobs Memorial Canvas to dry I whipped this up for the little one...
Pretty basic but so much fun! Can't wait to see if she is as excited about it as I think her sis will be!


Supplies:
Brown, light brown, beige and red cardstock for the reindeer
Background is a Mambi sheets specialty cardstock from a paper pack I picked up at Michaels (sadly just for this project... anyone need some specialty xmas paper?)
Red acrylic paint
Modge Podge
CTMH liquid glass
Winka Stella in clear
Stickles in Xmas Red
CTMH Chevron Ribbon in Ruby

Happy Creating friends!!

Jakobs Memorial Canvas

Sadly, today, I was given the challenge to step outside my comfort zone and try something new. A coworker and dear friends chihuahua, Jakob, passed away. As expected as it was, his momma is devastated. Her daughter and I have been talking since Jakob got sick of making a memorial canvas for her so she would always have something beautiful to remember him by.

I wanted to create something masculine but beautiful and simple for her. Now I usually am into bright beautiful shiny colors... That was not appropriate for this project.. enter the challenge!

I decided to go with a distressed brick look. I unfortunately do not own a brick stencil... or do I? I had a roll of Silhouette stencil material and the CTMH artiste cricut cartridge with a brick overlay. I get to create so I can create? Count me in!!! OK, I'm not a Silhouette user, I know NOTHING about them, but this stencil material is wicked!! I cut it into a 12x12 square with my paper trimmer, stuck it to my cricut mat, loaded it, cut it, and then proceeded to pick all the little brick peices out... what we learned.. when cutting stencil material: pressure medium, blade depth 4... at least I think... I used a blade depth of 3 and that was not enough. But once that was done that stencil rocked!! The Silhouette stencil material is sticky backed!!!!!!! Yup! Love that!!

So now we can actually start our project, LOL.

I did a base coat on the canvas of a grey and cream acrylic paint. I'm a cheap girl, raising to babies, the Michaels cheapy acrylic is all I use! Then I laid my stencil over the died paint and mixed me up some modeling paste. I mixed red, orange, and brown paint. My red and orange were RED and ORANGE so I mixed the brown in to kinda dirty them up a bit and give them a more brick look. I spread the modeling paste over the stencil kinda mixing the red and orange in some spots and leaving them separate in other spots.When I was happy with the coverage and the colors I took my scraper and tapped all over the top to create the rough look. I took the stencil off and baby wiped (I wasn't sure what washing in the sink would do to the sticky back) it to get it clean of the modeling paste.

And then I went to bed.

This morning the modeling paste was dry and we were ready to roll! I took a foam brush and some black paint and just dabbed it all over the tops of the bricks. Then I got out the Tim Holtz distress inks. I used aged mahogany, black soot, and walnut stain. I used my distress tool to rub the inks in between the bricks to give it a more aged look and less like a brand new brick wall. I also did some along the edges and sides of the canvas as I didn't want to have to paint them.

Next, I picked out my CTMH chipboard peices. The picture frame, film strip and name arrow are all CTMH dimensional elements that coordinate with the artiste cartridge, So then I distress all those peices too. I added some red inka gold, blue inka gold and gold inka gold to the peices for just alittle shine.

Then I took a peice of white cardstock and rolled it one way, unrolled, rerolled another way, unrolled, rerolled, unrolled, rerolled... you get the idea. I used an antique linen Tim Holtz distress ink to color it as well as the previously mentioned colors along the edges.

The sentiments are CTMH Big Hug stamp set and I hope they fit perfectly for what this canvas is for!! Jakob is stamped with CTMH small chocolate alphabets.

When I had all those peices put together I started on the roses, which I am assured are her favorite. I used my CTMH art philosophy cartridge to cut the roses in CTMH lagoon, CTMH juniper and CTMH glacier cardstock. The orange and yellow flowers are Heidi Swapp sprayed with Heidi Swapp mustard mist and Color Bloom gilded mist.  The rose metal embelishment is Tim Holtz. And I needed something puppy for this peice for sure so off to Michaels the babies and I went... and in the jewelry making supplies we found the puppy paw print charm.. I think its perfect!!

I then glued everything down. Spray sealed it. I used CTMH liquid glass to get the gloss on Jakob and "cry.laugh.remember."

I mounted Jakobs picture to the center of the chipboard frame (this pops out if you don't want to use it) and covered it in liquid glass as well. I wanted not only to give the picture the most protection I could but to really make it stand out.

And that's what I did. I think I stepped outta my box fairly well and I hope that she loves it!! I need to give a super shout out to my bestie Wanda over at Wanderful Creations, who does love distress teals!!,  for helping me all morning with the fine details!! A milllion text message pictures later and we got it just the way we like it!! Every girl needs a little back up right?

And that's all... here's my creation:



Let me know what you think!!

Tuesday, December 9, 2014

Fantabulous Cricut Blogspot Challenge

So I recently stumbled upon fantabulouscricut.blogspot.com. I love the idea of challenge Mondays!! And I want to start challenging myself to maybe step outside my comfort zone and learn new things to do with my favorite machine in the house... My cricut!!
So this week their challenge is to create something that's not a card... And last week it was a Christmas project without green or red.
I created this project the last week of November for my daughters. Advent calendars filled with craft supplies for my little artists! And everyday we make a little peice of art with thier new supplies!
So here they are:

To create these projects I used: 2 CTMH My creations Cubbies (discontinued), theCTMH  Frosted paper pack (discontinued), CTMH Frosted Complements (discontinued),  CTMH shimmer trim, glitter duck tape, CTMH Frosted assortment (discontinued), CTMH sparkle flourishes, Reflections flourishes, silver IncaGold, CTMH blush ink (discontinued), CTMH juniper ink, CTMH crystal blue ink, CTMH glacier ink, CTMH Art Philosophy cricut cartridge, CTMH Artiste cricut cartridge, and CTMH Magical Day stamp set.

I had so much fun making these for my babies!! And they adore opening them everyday for a little crafting inspiration!!

Maybe I gave you some ideas too? Happy Crafting!!

Monday, December 8, 2014

Hello world!

This is brand new to me... My first ever blog post... Not sure what to do with this so....
A plan?
Here's my plan for my blog... I think...
A journal... Of my paper creations... Quite regularly my fabric creations... And quite possibly my mommy learning.. Lol... So a journal... For me... Get my creations out there whether it's paper, material or words. Just out there in the world. A little peice of me floating around in cyber space and if no one sees at least I know it's out there.

I love to create with paper and mixed media. It's fun!!! My two little ones love to see what mommy has made!! Quite frequently these creations are for them or thier friends or our family and it tickles my oldest that "mommy made something for you!!"
Fabric is a new addiction... Well returned. My gramma is amazing with a sewing machine and although I'm still learning I hope one day to be as good as her!! My fabric creations are more functional than pretty works of art but I'm always to impressed with the way they turn out! Again, I'm still learning!
Words... I've always been good at getting my thoughts on paper.. Maybe because my moms an English teacher. Please do not expect proper grammar, spelling, punctuation or anything of the sort from me. I'm not good at it but I can usually take my thoughts and make sense of them on a peice of paper. I'm raising to two little ones and so quite likely some days my creations will be word vomit from mommy hood maybe you will be going through similar things,maybe you already have, maybe you care not to look that day. That's cool it's me getting it out there.

Let's have some fun and share some creative ideas in whatever form it may come in today!!