A Bright Birthday

I've lived in Pittsburgh for 2 years.
More if you count my college years.

However, I can only drive to three places
1. Trader Joes
2. Anthropologie
3. The local stamp store

Everyplace else... well, the husband drives me to.
I'm not even convinced I know how to drive to my office.
(But I'm a big believer in public transit so I take the bus)

We own no GPS device.
I swear, we're like the only people not to own one...
Because my husband thinks its a silly device.
However, it sucks when I don't have a husband to drive me somewhere.

Like when I find myself in the Northeast.
Normally I rent one with my rental car.
But when I landed at 1am yesterday, I was too tired to care.
Then I got lost...
Lost on my way to the hotel.
Lost on my way to the client site.
Lost on my way to CVS.
(Because I forgot my prescription at home... but that's a whole other story)

I'm at my wit's end - I've begun looking for cheap GPS devices. 

Despite my husband making fun of me.

Yes, I'm directionally challenged.
And it does not help when the streets are not signed!
Darn Northeast!

In fact, I've been so tired that when my small-handed friend told me she saw this little card the other day, I forgot it was one I had created.
"Oooh, sounds cute" is what I said.
Ai yi yi!

It's pretty simple.
Just the fabulous music background set from WMS and with a little happy birthday sentiment.
And a feltie ice cream that I'd been hoarding forever.

It's good not to hoard.
And it's good to be bright.
Vellum does certainly help tone it down a bit as well. :)

Wishing you all a day without getting lost and a happy bright day.
Two of my favorite things. :-)

Make It Monday - Ugly Stepchild Purple

We've been a little sick in this household.

Actually...
I have a few sniffles. That's about as sick as I've ever been. And I'm miserable.
The husband... well lets just say if I was ever that sick, I'd probably fling myself off a building.
I'm actually a little convinced that our basil is sick too. I think Mr. Basil just misses the summer air though. 

So after dealing with the sniffles and a long two days at work (yes... I know it's only Wednesday), I decided I needed to each some chocolate, watch Biggest Loser and craft.

Is it just me but I LOVE watching people work out while I pig out. Is that odd?

I really don't just watch TV all night... I swear. 

To get into the swing of things, I decided to participate in Papertrey Ink's first Make it Monday challenge. Challenges are always a fun way to get the ideas spinning and I just needed that kick today. This week's challenge was to use multiple sentiments on your card.  What a fun concept - and something I've always loved when I've seen others do it.

When I chose colors, I decided to use purple. For some reason, it' a color I don't turn to often. It's like the ugly stepchild of colors for me. Do you have an ugly stepchild color?

So I stamped my sentiments in Versamark and embossed with clear embossing powder. I love embossing. Instead of using a stamped panel, I wanted to create a window. I have an obsession with windows right now as well. Embossing and windows...

To emphasize my window, I pierced a circle around my die cut window. Added a little crocheted flower and some buttons.

And there you go -- just a little simple didly for a friend on her birthday. Just don't tell them purple is my ugly stepchild...

Thanks for stopping by! :)
Have a fabulous rest of the week!



Stamps: (Birthday Basics, Up Up and Away) Papertrey Ink
Cardstock: (Plum Pudding, Lavendar Moon, Vintage Cream) Papertrey Ink
Hybrid Ink: (Plum Pudding) Papertrey Ink
Watermark Ink: Tsukineko
Embossing Powder: (clear) Ranger
Fibers: (floss) DMC, (twine) May Arts
Accents: (felt, buttons)
Tools: (Circle die) Spellbinders

Happy Birthday Claire

Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday dear Claire,
Happy Birthday to you!

We're having a birthday blog hop for the ever so lovely Claire! You should have come here from Laurie's blog. If you get lost along the way, make sure to check the WMS blog for the full list.

So here's my little happy birthday card.

No, there's no WMS banners ... yet ...

But banners are the perfect birthday accent, aren't they? ;-)

So how did I create the banners?
Seasons of Love - Tags. Heck yeah.

I stamped the corner of the star from the set onto a sheet of paper. In all sorts of fun colors.

Then trimmed these puppies out.

Sketch the arch for the banner string. Pierce holes.

Stitch and go. Watch the Bachelor while doing so. Yell at the TV as if they can hear you. Accidentally, skip a stitch... *shrug*  Sometimes you just need your Bachelor fix.

Happy birthday, Claire! Hope it's a banner year! ;-)

Next up, the wonderful Jennifer! I know she has something wonderful up her sleeve.





Stamps: (Seasons of Love - Tags, Half Pint Heroes) Waltzingmouse Stamps
Cardstock, Ink: Papertrey Ink
Fibers: silver jewelry thread

Glenda's Random Amusing Challenge #100 Blog Hop

** Please scroll down for my WMS Customer Waltz Post **

Glenda, one of my lovely blogging friends, hosts a fabulous challenge on her blog every week. This week is her 100th challenge! How awesome is that? So she invited a bunch of us to join her in the celebration! I'm so honored to be a part of this celebration! If you take part in the challenge, you can get a chance to win some fun prizes!

Glenda's Random Amusing Challenge #100 is to use red on your card or project.  Use as much or as little as you like.  Incorporate it by using paper, ink, ribbon, embellishments, whatever you like!  You must play along with the challenge to be eligible to win the blog candy.  If you play along, please leave a comment on Glenda's blog (http://papersscissorsrocks.blogspot.com) and link back to her post from your post.  If you upload to an online gallery, please use the keyword GRAC100.

You have until midnight Pacific Time on January 23rd to play along and you can play along as many times as you like.  The winner will be randomly chosen and announced on January 24th. It's such an easy challenge to play along with! Hope to see you participate!

For my card, I opted to do a "congrats" card since it's a celebratory occasion! :)  I used some buttons to create some balloons trailing out of the car. There's some fun silver perfect pearls on the car headlights for texture and color. 


Thanks for stopping by!


Participating Bloggers - be sure to check out all the fabulous projects!
Allison Fillo http://stampinwhenican.blogspot.com/
Allison Miles http://allistamps.blogspot.com/
Beate Johns http://beate.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/
Belinda Chang Langner http://cadnileb.blogspot.com
Carly Robertson http://carlyrobertson.typepad.com/
Cheiron Brandon http://www.cheironbrandon.typepad.com/
Chris Sather http://cattsscratchingpost.blogspot.com/
Dawn Stein http://www.lavendergiraffe.blogspot.com/
Donna Hitz http://www.frozenstamper.blogspot.com/
Elena Shacochis http://thestampingshac.blogspot.com/
Geeta Suggs http://www.craftyengineer.typepad.com/
Jenn Shurkus http://jennshurkus.typepad.com/creative_chick/
Jennie Moczan http://www.simplycaffeinated.typepad.com/
Jill Grace http://creativegrace.typepad.com/
Joan Jeffery http://www.j-jcreations.blogspot.com/
June Gibbons http://perfectlikeacurl.blogspot.com/
Kamila Younkman http://littlescrapsofheaven.typepad.com/
Krystie Lee Hersch http://www.cupcakemartini.com/
Meghan Fahey http://driventoink.com/
Michelle Clark http://www.sparkledesigns.typepad.com/
Michelle Mathey http://msmathey.blogspot.com/
Michelle Woerner http://stopandstamptheroses.blogspot.com
Nance Lempinen-Leedy http://nanceleedy.blogspot.com/
Sherry Czarnecki http://littlestampsbiglife.blogspot.com/
Silke Ledlow http://silkeledlow.blogspot.com/
Teresa Kline http://www.enjoythevasunshine.blogspot.com

Sending My Love

So who else is still struggling with the whole coming back to reality after vacation?  I swear, I need coffee and it's 8pm...   This is the longest break I've taken in awhile as we didn't have the funds to go anywhere special this year. Ok, enough of my petty complaints...

I think by this point, many of you have heard about Katie Renz already. If you haven't heard, Katie has posted her story on her blog so be sure to check it out. I was just thinking about how when I was a wee little stamper just dipping my toes into this crazy stamping world, Katie is one of the ladies that really encouraged me -- I even have a few RAKs from her (here and here).   I wanted to send something to her to let her know I was thinking about her -- the least I could do.

Just wanted to send a little ray of sunshine over her way. I kept it bright and happy. A little bit of coloring, a little bit of inking and a lot of paper piecing. I love doing this with scraps of paper... punch a few with the handy dandy square punch (or trim them to size) and create your own quilt. It gives a fun colorful effect -- to bring out the edges, I do apply some distress inking to the edges. It's not necessary but I think it makes the pieces stand out more if you use similar colors.



Stamps: (Branching Out) There She Goes
Cardstock: PTI
Patterned Paper: (365 Degrees) Pink Paislee
Fibers: (ribbon) PTI, (twill) Craft Supply
Accents: (buttons) Making Memories
Die cuts: Spellbinders

Waltzingmouse Twelve Days of Christmas

ETA: I created the hat from paper. Added some more details to step 6

Hi there! I am pleased to be your hostess this morning for Day 5 of the Twelve Days of Christmas, Waltzingmouse Style! Be sure to check out the WMS Blog for the past few days and for the upcoming days!

Normally at this time we would be previewing new stamp sets for release. However, this month WMS is taking a break from releasing new stamps to allow us (all!) to enjoy the holidays with family and friends, as well as to focus on some fantastic things happening behind-the-scenes! It is all very exciting, and we appreciate your enthusiasm!

In lieu of a release this month, we are instead coming together to bring you some ideas and inspiration for holiday crafting (and beyond) which we are calling the Twelve Days of Christmas, Waltzingmouse Style! Each day will showcase a different Design Team member, so be sure to check the WMS Blog daily through December 17th for the links.

So on the 5th day of Christmas, I present a fun little gift for your friends, family and neighbors.

I present to you snowmen spa tubes. :) They're something you can make for the young at heart or even let the little ones help. I know most of us are super busy around this time so I wanted to create something relatively easy to mass produce as well.

I filled some test tubes with bath salts -- after the stressful holidays, the recipient can relax in their own tub. To make the tubes festive, I decided to make my tube a snowman. And what snowman can go to his new home without a snazzy carrier?

Just because I used bath salts, doesn't mean you have to -- you can really fill it with anything. You can fill it with hot cocoa, bath salts, jelly beans, nuts, the list goes on. Since it's chilly outside, I made some hot cocoa ones (layers of hot cocoa, chocolate chips and marshmallows) as well - yum!

I took some pictures while making this little snowmen in case you'd like to try them as well.

1. Gather your supplies.

• Test Tube(s) - Mine are 6 inches with a 1 inch diameter that I got from Etsy (In the Clear).
• Gems
• Ribbon
• Adhesive

2. (Optional) Color your gems. I don't have black gems so I used a Sharpie marker to color my gems black.

3. Adhere gems to your test tube (which I had already filled with bath salts (so you can see the gems)

4. Cut and color your snowman nose. I used the end of a wooden skewer which I made my husband saw for me which then caused him to curse all things craft as he hurt his finger. Carrie told me that I should have used garden shears instead (if only we owned such things).

5. Tie ribbon around snowman. You can see right now that one end sticks up...

6. With a glue dot, adhere the ribbon down. Finish decorating the snowman as you see fit.
For the hat, I wrapped a thin strip of black paper around the tube. The hat lid is created by creating a ring with my circle punches (outer diameter is 1 3/8 inch and the inner diameter is 1 1/8).

If you run out of time, you could just tie a tag to the snowman's scarf and stop here.

7. Create box. Cut a 8.5" by 5" cardstock. (This means you can create 2 boxes with one piece of cardstock). Place it in the landscape direction and score at 1.5", 3.5", 5", and 7".

8. Turn it in the portrait direction and score at 1.5" and 3.5".

9. Make 1.5" cuts from the top of the page and from the bottom.

10. Use the nesties to cut a circle.

11. Assemble the box. Cut two 2" by 8.5" pieces of acrylic cardstock for the sides of the holder. I used the SU! word window punch to punch handles for my holder, scored my acrylic sheet one end at the 2 inch mark (for the base) and the at the other end at the 1 3/4 inch mark and the 2 3/4 inch mark.

12. Decorate your box as you see fit and place your snowman in. For the box, I stamped the pattern from Pic-Nic Patterns and created a simple little band with the let it snow sentiment from Compliments of the Season. I created a little tag for the top and tied it with a bit of silver twine.

Hope you enjoyed the 5th day of the Twelve Days of WMS Christmas. Thanks for stopping by!


Stamps: (Compliments of the Season, Pic-Nic Patterns, Half Baked, Around Christmastime )
Accents: (gems) Hero Arts
Fibers: (ribbon) Craft Supply, (silver twine) Jewelry Essentials
Tools: (Word Window Punch) SU!, (circle die) Spellbinders
Other: (tubes) In the Clear Etsy Shop, (skewers)

Ahoy Sailor

To help with your Christmas inspiration, all the WMS DT members are coming together for 12 Days of Christmas Waltzingmouse Style! Each day will showcase a different design team member, so be sure to check back Claire's blog through December 17th for the links... and enjoy! I will be posting my project this Friday so I've been busy behind the scenes.

Some of you may have seen this already but I never actually blogged about it. I created this for a friend who had a baby boy. :) I used some brads to give a fun "water" texture. Sweet and simple.

I had intended to make some matching onesies, but those never materialized...  maybe one of these days...



Cardstock, Patterned Paper: Papertrey Ink
Stamps: (Bitty Baby Blessings) Papertrey Ink
Accents: (brads) Making Memories
Tools: (Swiss Dots Embossing Folder) Provo Craft

September CARDS

This doldrum period hits my crafty desires as well so we're going into the archives to find a card to share. This card was published in the September issue of CARDS Magazine.  (Thanks, CARDS!) Lots of great inspiration as usual! Be sure to check it out!

The spools are cut out from patterned paper. You know I'm not normally a fan of cutting out images from patterned paper but I've been enjoying it more and more. It's quite calming to do so. The buttons on the left are some fun rubons -- love that they turned out so vibrant even on kraft.

The new Paper Crafts special issue Card Creations: Favorite Occasions was released recently and I was lucky enough to have a card picked up for it (Thanks Paper Crafts!). Make sure you it out. It's filled with great ideas for the common card making occasions!

A little typography, a lot of stamping and a cute little love card. :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Love you

My hard drive died recently and with it, all my craft pictures. Since I travel often and usually with only a few day's notice, I have a pile of cards that I use for blog fodder when I'm not around. So for the next few weeks blogging might be a little slower as I need to build up my arsenal of fodder again. I'm also slowly reinstalling all my software. Sigh...  As a public service announcement, be sure to backup your files! :) Although the only thing I really didn't back up is my craft files and I managed to recover most everything else.

Luckily I have the entire next week off -- woohoo for Thanksgiving! :) Although given the state of my little abode, I'm spending most of next week cleaning and then the rest cooking and then cleaning up after my cooking mess. Ah, Thanksgiving.

With the recent holiday stress, it's nice to remind your friends and family that you love them and all the talk about Thanksgiving/Christmas is just temporary. I'm pretty sure my husband wants to rip his ears out right now and would prefer I talk about things aside from turkey. Perhaps I'll give him some earplugs for Christmas...

This is a simple quicky card with a little stamping and some scraps.  I added some pearls to the swirls and to the scalloped border. I really love the look of stamping over stamps but I just don't do it enough. Perhaps that should be remedied.

Anyways, have a great rest of the weekend!

Stamps: (Sweethearts) Waltzingmouse Stamps, (Flourish, Polka Dot Basics 2) PTI
Cardstock, Ribbon: PTI
Accents: (pearls) Hero Arts
Tools: (border punch) Fiskars

Nov/Dec Paper Crafts

I'm just sharing a card I was lucky enough to have picked up for the November/December 2010 issue of Paper Crafts (Thanks Paper Crafts!). Make sure you check out the current issue. It's filled with great holiday ideas!

My project is an online bonus feature so you can see it here. Since it's time to ring those Xmas bells soon, I felt it was time to share this little project on the blog as well.

Thanks for stopping by and have a fabulous day!

WMS November Customer Waltz - Candle Tutorial

ETA: I have never had issues with burning the tissue paper -- if you are worried, I'd suggest punching a slightly larger hole where you thread the wick

Welcome to the WMS Customer Waltz! You should be sure to check out all the fabulous projects at the WMS forum! :) And as usual, there's a fun game as well. Spot all the watermarks in the WMS DT member's photos and you could win a fun prize. We might have 0 watermarks, 1,2, 3 or more!

This month's theme is Christmas so I figured I'd share a Christmas gift idea. I made a set of candles the other weekend and I thought I'd share the process. I'm one of those people that needs to hand out "perfect" candles... so I had my husband dig through our mini tea light candles to find perfect ones for this gift set.

That said, I don't have enough to create one for each family member as I originally intended. Perhaps... I'll get my bum out to pick up more or one lucky person will just get this "Belinda" original. It's really starting to look like the later as the Xmas season stresses me out. My perfectionist tendencies are not optimal for the gift frenzy season.

So let's get started shall we? These are actually really quick to make and they look fabulous. It always amazes me how much you can do with a little tissue paper and some wax.

 1. Gather your supplies - I used a 1 3/8 inch circle punch, snowflake from Seasons of Love - Tags, ink, tissue paper, and candles

2. Stamp the snowflake onto the tissue paper. I usually test an image by placing it onto my candle to see what works best.

 3. Punch out your snowflakes. To give my tissue paper more umph, I slip a post-it note behind so that I get a clean punch.

 4. Punch a hole in the middle of your snowflake

 5. Thread the tissue paper snowflakes onto your candle.

 6. Using your trusty heat gun, apply heat until the wax starts to melt. It'll pull the tissue paper in (and I keep a paper piercer nearby that I use to help it along). Be careful not to hold the heat too long or it'll burn the tissue paper.

 6. Ta da! You have pretty candles. Now wrap them up all nice and tight. Add some pretty decorations and you have a great Xmas gift.

 7. I'm going to admit, I usually eye the boxes. I place three candles on the paper, mark the edges and score them. Then I measure the height of the candle. I determined it was 6/8 inches so I scored two lines in each direction 6/8 inches apart.

 8. Using some oragami skills, I cut some corners, folded and created a box.  (Ok, I apologize for this part of the tutorial. If there is interest, I can do a better box tutorial. Unfortunately, I tend to just use a little simple math usually to get my box and never write down measurements).

9. Decorate the box as you see fit.


Stamps: (Seasons of Love - Tags) Waltzingmouse Stamps
Cardstock: Bazzill, (acrylic) Office Max
Patterned Paper: (Colorful Christmas) My Mind's Eye
Fibers: (ribbon) American Crafts, (silver twine)
Accents: (button) Making Memories, (gems) Hero Arts
Tools: (circle punches) EK Success