Happy Birthday Mom!

Thursday was my Mom's birthday! I brought breakfast to work, we ordered pizza for lunch, and afterwards the family took her to Movie Tavern for dinner and a 'private' viewing of Where The Wild Things Are. We got lucky, and no one else was in the theater :)

For her girft, I made her a chip board initial wall hanging for her office and a matching card.

For the wall decor, I decoupaged a large chipboard letter with two coordinating papers from the K&Company Classic K Margo Designer paper pack. For embellishments, I adhered three prima flowers and pearls to the top, and created matching buttons using three of the Autumn Leaves clear buttons for the bottom to balance it. On the back, I attached coordinating ribbon with two more matching buttons.

For her card, I used the same two pieces of patterned paper and embellishments, and hand cut a small tag. On the tag, I stamped a small flourish from the American Crafts Lavish stamp collection in Chestnut Roan Chalk Ink. I handwrote the sentiment. On the petals of the prima flower, I used Stickles in Platinum. I inked all of the edges with Tea Dye Distress Ink.

Mother Daughter Craft Night!!!

As mentioned in my previous post, my mom and I had a girls craft night on Saturday. We made some cool stuff and had a great time! I didn't take as many pictures as I wish I had, but I got enough :)

Mom started on her vacation album. She applied a clear 12x12 sheet that says Seaside to the cover. She's going to eventually replace the random wedding couple on the front with a photo of her and my step dad. Her first page says 'beach', and has cute little squares for photos that she cut out, distressed the edges and then inked them with Tim Holtz Distress ink. The bottom of the page really looks like sand! She used a piece of bazzil, crumpled it, then applied more distress ink over the wrinkles. She then applied cute little starfish stickers! Isn't it great?!?!

The second page that she started was for her photos from New Orleans. She cut out maroon and blue pieces of bazzil, rounded the corners, inked the edges with distress ink, and stamped a beautiful fleur d'lis with her new acrylic stamp set! I thought those were beautiful!

Great job mom! I really can't wait to do that again!

My main focus of the night was to make a welcome card for baby boy, L.J., born 14 weeks early on Friday to two wonderful new parents, and friends of mine. It took me a while to get started and develop an idea, but eventually, I came up with this idea! I used blue bazzill, and cut it to a 6x6 card. I stamped, and clear embossed, polka dots across the top. I stamped 'Welcome John' with the American Crafts Rue Stamp Set on white, shimmery, diamond patterned paper that I stole from some old wedding invitation supplies we had lying around. I also stamped, on the same paper, two giraffes from a collection that I can't seem to remember... After inking some edges and distressing some edges, I glued everything together (duh). Finally, I used two clear buttons from Autumn Leaves to make custom buttons to match the design in the corner of the card. I used diamond glaze glue to attack them to the paper, and cut them out after they dried. I used pop dots to adhere them to the card. Easy peasy :)

My final project of the night, as I nearly fell asleep at the table, was three Thanks for Coming tags to give to my Mary Kay Spa retreat guests the next day. I trimmed a piece of white orange peel bazzil to 2x4 pieces and distressed them with Worn Lipstick, Tattered Rose, and Black Soot. I stamped the letters with pink chalk ink from Color Box, and used my Big Bite to put a small eyelet in the top.

Looking forward to have another craft day with mom...maybe tomorrow???

Early Birthday Surprise!

My sweet, wonderful mother has a birthday coming up on the 22nd of this month. I worked on her birthday present for a few days, and had no problem keeping it a secret. After finishing it, keeping it a secret was not so easy. If you know me at all, I don't keep secrets like this very well at all :)

I had blocked off a whole afternoon on my schedule for my mom and I to do crafts together at her house. I walk into her house with my new craft tote full of my artsy fartsy stuff, and set it on the table. What came next was perfect! Mom looks at it and says, "Why didn't you call me to go with you and get one? You always get stuff by yourself!" I responded with something along the lines of, "Sorry. I just happen to be in the store the other day and picked it up so I could bring all my stuff over :("

I stalled for a little while by chatting and eating some lunch, while my husband was on his way over with my mom's present. I could have waited until her birthday, but then she would have thought I felt bad, and bought her one afterwards. When I walked in the door with this, she was SO excited!

I bought the plain tote at Walmart, and tied a thousand pieces of pink, brown, and white ribbon to the handle. I stuffed it full of all of the things Mom needed to really start enjoying scrapbooking and crafting :) I am SO happy that she liked it.

I'll post another entry to show everyone what we made! Happy early birthday Mama!

My First Tag!

I'm hoping that I'm posting this late enough that my mom won't see until I give this too her, buuuut, I couldn't wait to show everyone :)

I used my Quickutz Silhouette to cut out a tag, and a set of cute little flowers. I then used my Tim Holtz Distress Inks in Tattered Rose, Worn Lipstick, Tea Dye, and Black Soot to distress the tag. A few times, while buffing on the color, I accidently bent the paper and it actually made it look even better!

After applying the base color to the front and back, I stamped a polka dot stamp, partially inked with Worn Lipstick Distress Ink, across a section on the top. I then glued several of those cute little flowers to the bottom, and one to the back.

Love it? I do. I hope my mom does too :)

Distress Inks

Tim Holtz Distress Inks are amazing! If you haven't used them, step away from the computer, grab your keys and RUN to the nearest scrapbooking store and pick up your favorite shade in the Tim Holtz Distress Inks!
They are so versatile and unique!

This video shows a few of the uses, demonstrated by Tim Holtz himself.

I recently bought the Tim Holtz Ink Blending Tool, and LOVE IT! The tool itself comes with two foam applicators, and the refill pack has ten. Below is a photo of my personal collection of inks, as well as how I label each foam applicator so I don't mix colors, or have to throw them away constantly because they're getting nasty :)

I use a black permanent marker to label the BLUE side of the foam applicators with the name of the Distress Ink assigned to each applicator. Very helpful :)

Cutting Edge ::Pun Intended::

Guess what, y'all!!! My Silhouette SD came in last week! I was so busy this week, that I wasn't able to play with it much, buuut I did take photos when I took it out of the box. Later, I'll post photos of what I've been doing with it this weekend :)