Paper Pieced Poppies

So, I needed a mess of Birthday cards mainly and I received this Poppy Background stamp from Sweet and Sassy Stamps before Christmas and thought this would be a good day to take it out of the package.

This was stamped on some old Basic Grey printed paper and over colored with an blushing bride marker. the sentiment is from Stampin Up and was die cut with the banner in the lawn fawn stitched journal card die set. the ribbon is Blushing bride and the printed paper is from My minds eye.

I was thinking I wanted some kind of texture in the center and the other day at work June and I were talking about the sequins trend. And I have a few and struggle to use them. I think its the holes in the centers and they look better to me if that is covered with something say a pearl or this is an experiment, stickles. This one is 6" square in real life. 

Again stamped on old Basic Grey printed paper and cut out, has some marker over the top with vintage lace and graphic 45 pinted paper. this one is blank. and 5 1/2" square in real life the base is insulation pink from My favorite things. 

This one is A-6 in real life, the sentiment is from Hero Arts. 

This one went a little more blinged out and a little more shabby frilly.

The sentiment, gold ribbon and white metal frame are from SU. the peach lace is vintage. the gingham pp is from Graphic 45 and the green pp is a very old scrap. this one is 6" square in real life. 

and while all those cards were drying... I stamped a mess more of these blooms and paper pieced them in a few ways and popped up some piece with pop dots. then I started laughing because, I am certain this look is something I have seen before. this was the reason I bought this bloom because, I had seen it stamped with printed papers and before I went any farther than this I ended up poking around in my favorites at SCS and found it... these were totally inspired by these by Dina. not sure how they are going to end up finished but, best guess is they will not be getting curvy banners haha so they are not a total CASE. I did end up lining each of them with some cover sheet and inking the edges black so they are not totally filmsy and now I am just waiting for the glue to dry. 

I'll Laugh..

Just a simple one, this Unity itty bitty stamp set was one of 3 in my Christmas stocking this last year. the phone is stamped with soft sky on Neenah and the sentiment is over that with some Versafine. this panel was cut with an MFT stitched rectangle and the blue texture panel was cut with an Simon Says Stamps stitched rectangle die this is A-6 in real life. 

WOYWW #292

Welcome to Wednesday's Desk display If you would like to play along this blog hop starts at Julia's Blog seen here. ... this is how I left it Sunday am when we left to go to a (supposedly "HUGE" flea market ) about 80 miles from us. (came home with 2 old stamps have not shot a photo of them oops they are in the kitchen) 

 and so, I went upstairs yesterday evening after work and shot this. nope, it's not normally that light up in the cave but, this one was edited in photoshop this morning haha.

I have officially opened all the sizzix dies from Christmas and have cut a couple of the tall coffee mugs so far. and added in some felt holly from the Hero Arts die I was playing with last week for this gift card holder and starting to dr. up the title page for the December Daily book. 

thought this paper looked like sweater texture and it would be a good pair for warm and cozy and felt.

this mug is big enough to fit on an A-7 card front. if that gives you an idea size wise and funny I never noticed the paper was not lined up on the mug to the handle I was more looking at the where to place the curve in the top of the handle on the side of the mug than anything else. guess I will have to pay attention to the next bunch. 

another holly ended up here. 

Some Tags

So, I was messing around with this holly die from Hero Arts last night and thought it would make some cute embellishments for that December album and cut a few extra's just because I had everything out and then started pushing around some scrabble tiles and kraft doilies and the doilies and tiles were just about an exact match color wise...So I had posted a photo on instagram about this and people had cool suggestions of how to add some contrast.

and this is how some of them got used. ( I still have one of each color for the album if I want to figure out where to use them) and what I did to these tiles was I sanded them then drug them across some distress ink pads. then blotted them. then hit them with a heat gun... they are still not completely dry yet. So, they are parked in front of a heater hoping maybe tomorrow they will be dry. ( the red seems to be staying wet longer than the brown) These are Size 8 Shipping tags that were cut down to 5 1/2" long and sprayed with some distress old paper ( it ends up being a very pale green in real life) 

now this was done simply because, one of the tile words I was pushing around was this one... the heart was done a while back when I sprayed this thin Recollections sheet music with the gold shimmer spray. ( it doesnt really dry either this rubs off even after all this time) its backed with a kraft cardstock diecut and edged with an krylon gold paint pen. 

funnily enough the red on the shipping tag came from the box the tags were sprayed in... and I had started over with a new sheet to catch the mist in the bottom of the box but, I have used this box so much over the years the sides are probably in need of pages taped to them now. 

Preliminary Dec Daily pages

So, these are like base pages with some photos added in so far... this stripe paper and the back page chevron paper came with the album and are too large to fit into the 6X8 page protectors. 

I did run this page through the sewing machine and since I did not want the stitching to be visible on the flip side I did cover it up with a free printable calendar I found on pinterest.

  

I had loved what I had seen on pinterest with people using the pages with no paper in the pocket so the what ever could free float so I put in this wooden snowflake and it does not want to stay put in the pocket and I don't want to glue it to the pocket so, I think this page will be going through the sewing machine when I decide its "done"

Day two was tying one on at work ;) ( that is 40 bows on that particular line up of boxes) 

the first of several colors of Christmas cactus's in my laundry room that bloom actually during the holidays. mine tend to go several times a year 

This one I did cut the 4X6 photo of an metal bird ornament in half to fit both those pockets the top right snowflake is heat embossed on vellum. the little page is a tim holtz page protector. ( it fits an size 8 shipping tag) 

The one photo of the float is actually from day 6? maybe day 5 have to look at a calendar again but, the rest are all from the 13th and really they all kind of go together so. the thing I learned doing this is I have no page pockets with horizontal 3X4 pockets. they are all vertical. so this is hmmm, and then I think its not like its a huge book and someone would not be able to tilt it side ways...

when our son left for boot came my husband teased him for the last 8 months before he left about did he want to see his mom's blue prints for what she was going to do to his room... the plan had been to do something like this while he was at boot camp but, it didn't get done. so, while he was at SOI his room was painted all one color ( previous before bedroom shots are not in here ) and so, we had just finished putting this together the sunday before he got home for Christmas. ( there is no minute like the last minute) 

I have some more wrapping photos that are not printed to the right scale yet.

the free printable on the right is on the outside of the page protector. the boot button has the shank removed and its also on the outside of the page.

the green layer was kraft cardstock that the embossing folder was inked before it was run through it.

on Christmas eve we always shut down at work early and so, this year we went to see the Hobbit. oh and they are watching a boot camp video on June's desk. when he was little and came to work some times in the summer they would watch partial movies some days sitting just like that. 

the tag page does not want to hang open on the other side. the little photos were taken with an 

instax mini 8 they are the size of a credit card. 

The page on the left was my favorite gifts. His being able to come home and the little toy camera. 

the photos on the right were cut in half to tuck into the pockets and I am still trying to tell my self that side ways is not bothering me.

the day after Christmas we did a photo shoot to get mug shot for our Christmas cards which still have not been mailed yet. 

more of the same top left is the one going out. 

So far this card is just glued to the back page but, I want to stitch around it like the front page and I have not found something to cover up the back side stitches with yet so, it just looks like this. I am debating about cutting down both of these pages so that they will fit into the page protectors. 

New Year's Cards

I don't find myself making resolutions on New Years... ever not really. but, today did find me making cards. and the one thing I did not do last year was play along in the Christmas card challenges through out last year like I used to... so, this was a change I needed to be back on the wagon for.

So, that being said the fan club Christmas card challenge opened today with a look back and the last 3 years worth of monthly challenges and you are free to pick between them to do your card ( or cards) 

This one goes back to March of 2012. and it was card number two for me today. ( card number one is at the bottom of this post) and it need tore up again. ( I cannot get it to look Straight) more about that below. this one the holly leaves (Hero Arts) are cut from some DCWV corrugate cs and the berries are done in recollections foil. the printed paper is from a line called gdc studios. the base is bazzill and this one is 6" square in real life. 

These three are also 6" square in real life with the sentiment being changed to an Unity stamps one. the tag is an mama elephant die. 

now this sentiment is from the Hero Arts set called holly jolly. this one is also 6" square in real life. the centers of the open letters were colored with an distress marker.

This was the last one for the day the felt is from A Muse Studio. the doily is from recollections. the red printed paper was a scrap from something I put into the December daily album, punched along the edge with an SU hand held punch and the sentiment is from Hero Arts. this one is 5" square in real life. the scrap of the first card below.

now, this one was done for the January 2012 challenge to use something new. this sizzix tall mug die is New, the Hero Arts holly jolly stamp and die set is new. the sentiment was cut with some classic circle spellbinders dies and tied on with burlap string. but, every time I moved the handle or moved the mug it looked more and more crooked to me, so this one I may mess around with and see if its "fixable" tomorrow in the daylight.