This {nest} is blessed!

Hi crafters,

Merry Christmas!  I hope you've had a lovely holiday season with your family!

Today my husband and I are celebrating 5 blessed years as husband and wife!  It's so hard to believe it's been 5 years!  This time 5 years ago it was about 60 degrees outside and just perfect.

I thought this bird couple in their sweet nest was a perfect way to reflect on this past year.  My sweet husband built me a beautiful nest for us to share the rest of our lives in together.  This couple is from Sweethearts.

While I am bragging on him let me show off the latest in the craft loft.  My counters have been installed, the cabinets have been stained, and the sink is in place and ready to roll! 

It was looking much cleaner before I got in the loft this morning to work on the anniversary card and on projects for my nephew's upcoming baby shower!  He used a minwax water-base color tinted stain on the cabinets the color is winter moss.  I like that you can still see the wood grain through it all.

Enjoy your weekend!

Happy Crafting,

{Sailboat} nursery decor

Hi crafters,

Here's a follow up from the baby shower sailboat invites I posted a few weeks ago.

The boat is from B is for Boy.  

I used Lyrical Letters for the monogram and the name.  This is just card stock that I used my ATG, zig 2 way glue, and xyron to adhere to the painted canvas.  I used markers to outline the monogram to define it a bit more.

The sails and flag are embossed with the cuttlebug.  I used glue dots to attach the buttons.

Happy Crafting,

Sparkly {Pregnancy} :Gift: Ornaments

Hi Crafters,

I am surrounded by lovely glowing pregnant women this Christmas season.

I've seen many "baby's first Christmas" ornaments but I haven't seen many to commemorate the pregnancy itself.  I know these ladies are so excited to welcome these sweet babies (so far all boys, the yellow ornament finds out right after Christmas what their sweet pea will be).  I topped these guys off with a bit of raffia and bakers twine.  I hope the ornaments bring them happy memories for years to come.  The glitter is adhered to the inside using pledge floorwax.

The pregnant lady came from New Arrival.  The text 2012 is from Lyrical Letters.

Happy Crafting,

Ornament exchange

Hi crafters,
I was lucky to participate in an ornament exchange with a group if talented crafters. My elf made me an adorable snow man and heart ornament. They look great on my tree.

I made a crayon melt ornament and a glitter ornament both adorned with vinyl for my elf.

It's so much fun to create and send mail .
Looking forward to seeing the rest of the group's creations.
Happy crafting

:gobble gobble: crafters!

Hi Crafters,

I am hosting my husband's family for Thanksgiving on Friday.  I'm excited to be able to pull out all the china and fun wedding gifts.  I had also seen a few versions of these turkey place cards floating around the internet so I whipped up a few of my own.

The turkey is from Wildlife lite.  I trimmed off his little turkey legs so he could sit flat.  I then cut out several scalloped circles from mini monograms.

I embossed each layer with a different folder. Do you like my gaggle of turkeys? 

Happy Thanksgiving Crafters!!

Sailboat Baby Shower Invite

Hi Crafters,
I would like to take a moment to recognize one of my long-time craft tools that gets little recognition from me.  It has survived 4 years of college, my wedding (save the dates, invites, programs), the bffs wedding (programs, place cards, and guest book), and countless baby and bridal showers.  It is my beloved printer.  My HP all in one ink jet printer, it was a birthday gift my senior year of high school, and was supposed to carry me through my college career.  I have put it through the ringer!  I have gotten my $100.00 out of it, that's for sure!

This shower invite though put it through a whole new experience!  Cut and print with the cricut.

I knew the triangles would be tricky to print then cut out.  I have done the print and cut before and it's a pretty tedious task needless to say.  I had also seen bloggers run their cricut cuts through their printer.  I have to say that I always thought I wouldn't be able to do this with my trusty old printer because it was bottom feeding (the paper sits in the bottom tray and it pulls it up through the rollers flips it over and prints).  Ye of little faith--I should have believed it was up for the task!  

I first printed the information on a piece of regular computer paper.  I took the cricut cut outs (in my case the sails) and using ATG adhesive attached them over the sentiment that was printed on the computer paper.  Make sure to line everything up carefully and nice and straight.  I am also planning on investing in some re-positional  adhesive for the next time I do this project, the ATG tape was a wee bit strong.  I used my multi-purpose tool from Creative Memories to carefully remove the sails once they were printed.  This was not full proof and I did have several  I had to throw away because the rollers bent them or printed incorrectly.

Here's a few sails once the information was printed on them prior to removing them for the final placement.  I did have to put a fresh layer of adhesive on them when attaching them to the boat.  The sailboat is from B is for Boy.

Thanks for stopping by!

Happy Crafting,

{Hats & Mustaches 12x12 double layout}

Hi Crafters,

Here's a project from my scrapbooking weekend a few weekends ago.  I finally got pictures ordered and got around to working on my personal album.

The text is from Lyrical Letters.  The mustache is from Paper Doll Dress Up.  Poor little girl wasn't impressed with our singing abilities during the birthday song.

Happy Crafting,

:Alligator Baby Shower Full Review:

Hi Crafters,
Here's an update from the shower this past weekend.  We had a great time! It's always lovely to see the co-worker fam outside of school.

We did the food on the island.  A few of the highlights were a cheese ball, BLT bites, and spinach/artichoke dip.

I made little alligator tents to label the food. Here's a snap shot of the dessert bar.  This alligator is the same one from the invites and came from Create a Critter.

We had cupcakes, lemon cake, s'more dippers, and brownies.  I made the chandelier decorations with Mini-monograms and New Arrival.

The diaper cake used mini monograms, new arrival, and opposites attract for the accents.

The banner pieces came from Teresa Collin's Chic and Scary.  I custom cut the white strips with an exacto knife.  The font is from Opposites attract and outlined with the markers.

I used blue tulle as the string to hold everything together.

 Here's the whole shot of her gift.  Burp cloths, name canvas, and memory book (below). "Drew" is cut out with a shadow and regular font from Designer Calendar.  The canvas measures 8x23.

The mom-to-be is also a crafter so instead of making her a scrapbook I came up with this memory record book.  Each page has a monthly calendar and a space for notes on the opposite page

I used my bind it all to bind everything together.  She seemed to really enjoy the shower.  Baby Drew got a lot of great goodies!  Can't wait to meet him!

Happy Crafting,

Alligator Shower Sneak Peak

Hi Crafters,

Remember this adorable alligator invitation I made a few weeks ago?  We had the shower this past weekend.  I'm struggling a bit with our internet and doing the final edit of my photos.

I made these burp cloths as part of the gift for the mama and baby.  I cut out the alligator with the Create a Critter cartridge and heat and bond lite (so I could appliqué it on the sewing machine).  I used embroidery thread and a cutaway soft backing then I did 2 eyelets for the eyes so there wouldn't be buttons.  I finished it off with a ric-rack before sewing it onto the diaper.

You can see a snippet of the name canvas in the background.

More to come soon!

Happy Crafting,

Polka-Dotted Swirls Wedding Card

Hi Crafters,

I can't tell you how much I'm enjoying being able to run up to the craft loft and whip up a project.  There's nothing like having everything out and ready to go.

I found out recently that a new co-worker is getting married in a few weeks.  I created this for our group gift from the team.

I used this Taylored Expressions sketch for my inspiration. 

The triple accent are 3 little sewn hearts from my machine.  The rings are cut from Sweethearts cricut cartridge.  I embossed the small white square with the the textile cuttlebug folder.  I used the Martha Stewart scoreboard to make an envelope to fit the A7 sized card.

Thanks for stopping by!  Ya'll East Coasters stay safe this weekend! The hurricane Sandy is late to the hurricane season party.

Happy Crafting,

Fall {wedding} love card

Hi Crafters,

The leaves were at their peak this weekend here in the mountains. It's a beautiful day for a vineyard wedding.

I made this card for them using the sketch from the previous post for inspiration.  I also sliced up their wedding invitation and made it into a Christmas ornament for their tree.  I hope you are enjoying your week!

I had the best weekend up in the craft loft with my friends and niece.  We enjoyed being able to spread out (and make a mess)!

Lots of autumn love and blessings,

Layers of Fun {and Birthdays}

Hi Crafters,
I creaeted this birthday card using a sketch from Taylored Expressions by Jen Shults

I must admit (and if you're a follower, this is probably not a surprise) but I am normally a very clean and simple 1 or 2 layers kind of girl.  This card really stretched me and I have to say I'm pleased with how it turned out.

The colors and pattern really cam together in the end.  It was great to spend some time with the birthday girl at dinner tonight!   I'm looking forward to a fun filled weekend!

Happy Crafting,

[Alligator Baby Shower Invititation]

Hi Crafters,

I created a variation of this baby shower invitation this past weekend.   I embossed the background paper with the argyle cuttlebug folder.  This handsome alligator is from Create a Critter.  I printed out the wording on white card stock and used my ATG gun to attach it to the background.  The alligator is adhered with a pop dot.

*The names have been changed to protect the guilty :wink:

 

 

Thanks for stopping by...

Happy Crafting,

 

.--Happy Birthday Cupcake--.

Hi Crafters,

Let the birthday celebrations continue!  I made this side step birthday card for my baby (I say this loosely, she's in her mid twenties) sister who celebrated a birthday this past weekend.

I used this Side Step Card Tutorial from Split Coast Stampers for the pattern.   The frame cut is from Gypsy Wanderings. 

Happy Crafting,

Gender Reveal Banner

Hi Crafters,

This is an exciting week for a co-worker.  She finds out on Tuesday the gender of her sweet baby.  I made her a banner for her classroom but since I don't know either I made it reversible. I used gender neutral colors for the ribbon and background.

The banner pieces are from Teresa Collin's Chic and Scary cart.

The font is from Opposites Attract.  A word to the wise... (you probably already thought about this but it took me a minute to figure all of it out) when you are making a reversible banner you need to reverse the word on the other side so it will read correctly.  The B is on the L, the O is on the R, the Y is on the I, and the ! is on the G.  I hope that makes sense.

Her students are so excited to find out what it is so this will be a fun way to add to the celebration.

Happy Crafting,