More Christmas Gifts in the works!

As I mentioned in my last post, I'm also getting things ready for the December meeting of our widow's group.  We'll be having a Christmas lunch here at my house and I've been busy make a few small gifts for each of the ladies.  There could be 20 or more ladies here that day!

I found these frames at Michael's in the dollar bin...so I bought about 25 of them.  I printed out several different verses from the Bible, then stamped a floral image (The stamp is from a very old set I had from SU!) Here's a peek at the gifts:

After I got all the verses printed and stamped, with the help of a couple of ladies from our group, we got them all put into the frames.  I also made boxes for each of the frames and decorated each of the boxes.  Here's just a small sample of the 20+ boxes I decorated:

I did a little heat embossing, a little coloring with Copics, and just decorated a few of them with sparkly paper and die cuts.  I just can't make up my mind which one of these I like best!  SO....which one of these boxes is your favorite? 

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by for a visit!  Hope you'll come back soon!  Your comments are greatly appreciated! Until next time...

Busy, Busy, Busy.....

I've been very busy the last few weeks. This post will be VERY photo heavy! Working hard to get some Christmas presents completed.  My DIL asked me to tat some bracelets for her to give to co-workers, my youngest granddaughter has a birthday coming up in November, and I'm getting ready for a luncheon I'll be having for the widow's group from my church.

I've had a difficult time getting involved in things during the past year and a half.  I finally started attending the widow's group that meets at my church once a month and have become friends with a couple of the ladies.

It's nice to have someone to call when you just need to get out of the house for a while!So...first I'll show you a few of the bracelets I've made for my DIL. (If you click on the photos you can see them a little bigger)

I also made the boxes for the bracelets and decorated each of them.  The boxes fold like a pizza box, but they're not as heavy duty.  It takes one sheet of  letter size card stock for each box. Here's a sample of some of the boxes:

I ended up making 10 bracelets and 10 boxes to put them in.  It was a lot of work, but the end result was kinda cool!

I've also had requests for tatted crosses....so I've made about 6 of these:

The crosses are about 3" x 4.5" and really turned out nice. The pattern is by Grace Tan and can be found here. I learned how to tat using shuttles, but these were done with needle tatting. I think for me, the needle tatting is much faster.

I have so many crafts I enjoy, sometimes I just get snowed under with it all! LOL!




I know this was a photo heavy post....but thanks for taking the time to visit!

Thanks so much for stopping by! As always, your visits and your comments are greatly appreciated!  Until next time....

Where has the time GONE!!!

I can't believe I haven't posted since the end of July!! Life has been hectic and crazy around here it seems. I'm industriously working on getting some Christmas presents made and I guess time has just passed me by!

WARNING!!! THIS POST WILL BE VERY PHOTO HEAVY!

I mentioned back in July that I have picked my tatting up again.  Haven't tatted in years, but I discovered needle tatting...and it is SO much easier to do than shuttle tatting (at least it is for me!) I have also made a few cards, but put some of them in the mail before photographing them.  I did make a card today to share with you.  My youngest grandson will be turning 3 soon, so I made a card specially for him.

I cut this card out with my Cameo and flattened off the bottom of the card so that it would stand up.  I ran the front side of the card through with a Spellbinder embossing folder, then inked the edges with distress ink. The little robot is a stamp from My Mind's Eye.  I colored him with Copics, then added a touch of glossy accents to his shoes and "claws".  I cut him out and used foam tape to adhere him to the card.  The banner is one that I just cut out after I stamped the sentiment.  I added it to a little pole for the robot to hold and used some pop dots to hold it on the card.  I think it turned out really cute...not to sure he'll care at all, but I do like it! LOL!

Now...the following photos are just a few of the 24 ornaments that I have completed thus far.  Some of the designs are patterns I found online and quite a few of them are patterns that I just made up as I went along.  I love how they all turned out.

This first ornament is tatted with one of my own designs (since I didn't write it down, I probably can't duplicate it!) The ornaments are about 3 inches in diameter.  This is two shots of the same ornament so that you could see the top and bottom of the ornament.

This next one is also a pattern that I designed.  This ornament and the one above are rich purple even though it's difficult to tell from the photos.

The next ornament (top and bottom both pictured) were tatted using a pattern from Robin Perfetti for the top of the ornament.  It tats up very quickly and fits perfectly over the top of the ornament.  For the bottom of the ornament, I used a pattern found here which is a pattern by Orsi.

        

This next ornament is another of my own designs...I really should have written the directions down for these!

 This next ornament is also one of my designs...and I think perhaps it might be my favorite!

The last one I have to share with you was made using the same two designs I used in the blue ornaments above except that this time I used blue thread and put the designs on silver ornaments

As you can see, I've really been quite busy...so forgive me for not posting more often.  I'll REALLY try to post more often (and get my cards photographed before I mail them out!)

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your comments and your visits are always appreciated!! Until next time...

LIM 182 - Anything Goes

It's been quite a while since I've played along with the Less is More challenge. Oh, I've made some cards for the challenge quite a few times....just never got them posted!  The challenge this week is Anything Goes in honor of Chrissie's birthday.  Happy, Happy birthday, Chrissie!

There's a few cards I've finished recently that will work perfectly for this challenge.

This first card I was practicing with doing inset words in a card.  My choice of die for this first card was probably not that good...it was a little difficult to piece back together.  Once I finished it though, I was pleased with how it turned out.  I added the "birthday" with heat embossing in black.  The stars were from a set from Clearly Besotted and were stamped in blue, then coated with some glitter from a Wink of Stella pen.  The word "happy" is also in blue...even though it looks black on here! I adhered the pieced panel to a piece of dark blue card stock and popped it on a card base.

This second card was basically the same procedures, except the letters for this "happy" are individual letters and I ended up not getting the letters completely straight...but it works!  I cut the letters from the card base and then cut them again from a piece of shiny card stock from an old tissue box.  The "birthday" was stamped in black.  The stars were outline stars that I stamped in black, and then put some gold Wink of Stella inside the stars.  Rounded the corners with a corner chomper.  Since there wasn't a front panel for the die cut, I simple put a single piece of card stock inside the front cover to cover up the cut out word.

I think this card is my favorite of the three.  I love these poppy stamps from Penny Black (they also have a matching die).  I found it very difficult to stamp and then cut out...missed the lines completely! Then I tried cutting the image with the die first before stamping...then I couldn't get it on the die straight!  I finally got close enough to make me happy!  Is there a trick to this that I don't know about? A thinking of you cards works for a birthday too...don't you think?

That's it for me today...see you soon (I hope!)

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your comments and your visits are always appreciated!! Until next time...

Tat...Tat...Tat....

After getting all the dust and cobwebs removed from my blog, I finally got around to taking a few photos of some of the tatting I've been doing recently.

I learned to tat many (many) years ago!  I learned how to tat using a shuttle (or 2 shuttles depending on the pattern).  My sister showed me some of the tatting she had been doing with needles, so I knew I had to give it a try.  After figuring out how to use the needles for tatting (can I say LOTS of YouTube videos!), here are a few of the things I've been working on.  None of them are perfect, but I'm getting a little better each time!

I've made a few bracelets...with beads and without beads.  Putting beads on is a real pain!  I think my favorite of these five bracelets is the red one (4th). Which is your favorite?

I also tried my hand at some snowflakes.  I've done these with 2 shuttles before, so it took a few tries before I grasped what I was trying to do.  I'm not sure how to stiffen them, but I'm thinking I'll use a glue/water solution.  Seems like that's what I used years ago.  We'll see how it works.  I've made about 5 of them now, but they are basically the same.  Need to find a new pattern and try something different.

That's it for today.  I'll be back a little later with a card or two...and maybe a scrapbook layout. I've also been working on a few Zentangle pieces but haven't taken any photos yet. Just trying to stay busy!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your comments and your visits are always appreciated!! Until next time...

Hello....Hello!

 A-choo!! Boy, it's been a while! The dust has settled over my blog....let me dust things off and show you a bit of what I've been up to lately!

I've made quite a few cards, some were even for challenges...unfortunately, I didn't get them photographed in time for the said challenges...so I'll just share them with you now.

This card was made by cutting out the roses with the Cameo, then I paper pieced the red and green behind the cut outs, added a strip of red down the side and stamped on a sentiment...super quick and easy! 

This card was from waaaaaay back during the online watercolor class I took.  I used stamps from PTI and stamped the image on watercolor paper with versamark ink and them heat embossed the image in white.  Added some water to the paper and then touched each area with a little color.  The sentiment is also from PTI.  This card was made entirely with watercolor paper as a one layer card. 

This card was also made during the online watercolor class.  It's difficult to see here, but I mixed a little perfect pearls with my water colors and used that to paint the flower and leaves that had been stamped with Versamark and heat embossed with white.  I cut around the edges of the image and then cut the rest of the panel into a rectangle.  Sentiment is from PTI.

I've seen lots of cards lately with the layered angled cut piece, so I thought I'd give it a try.  Both this card and the next card were my attempts with this technique.  I think I like it!  The card above was super simple...just cut the "hello" from white card stock, then cut it again into the Kraft card stock and did a little paper piecing to get all the pieces back together.  Added a white stitching line around the Kraft piece.

This card was a little more difficult...more fiddly, but was done the same way.  The exception on this card was that I popped the angled layer up off the card base.  

I've also been "re-learning" tatting.  I tatted years ago when I was making clothes from my girls, but haven't touched it in years.  In re-discovering tatting, I've learned that it can actually be done with a special tatting needle...and I've been working on mastering tatting with a needle rather than a shuttle. I'll have to get a few pics to share with you some of the things I've made in the last few days.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your comments and your visits are always appreciated!! Until next time...

Watercolor Card Class...practice, practice, practice...

Warning...Warning....This post covers the first 5 days of class and is photo heavy! I have learned quite a bit, but I think the biggest lesson I've learned is that I'll never be very good at water coloring.  I'm too much a perfectionist to let thing "bleed" into each other!  I keep trying to get the colors to "line up"...which is totally NOT what I'm suppose to be doing! Anyway...off to my cards.  

This first card was made using techniques shown by Kristina Werner on Day 1.  I heat embossed the stamped image...but for some reason my embossing powder didn't seem to want to melt on the watercolor paper.  Then when I tried to "smush" the colors together, I got some muddy looking areas! I finally had to call it quits on this method (we won't talk about how much ended up in the trash!). The happy die cut is a Simon Says die.  I tried to heat emboss the word "birthday" but couldn't get good coverage with the white powder. Popped the whole thing up on a deep purple card base and called it good.

For this card, I tried to use a color wash background by coloring with watercolor pencils as we were shown on Day 2...I'm showing you this card...but I'm not really crazy about it!  I had to draw my flower pot with pencils, then tried to blend...that didn't work too well.  The flowers were made by stamping a stem stamp from PTI repeatedly, then added some blooms to some of the stems.  Sentiment is from HA. Popped the water color paper onto some pink card stock then called it finished! I also used some of the distress marker techniques from Day 3 

This card was me trying to stamp and color with distress markers....Pfff~!  This was similar to what I did above...and I still wasn't too crazy about the finished card!  I did, however, finally pull out my TH spritzer gizmo and give it a whirl to add a little color to the background...it's not too bad...but I do need practice!  I think the flowers are a HA stamp.  

The techniques for Day 4....hmmmmm...I finally gave up!  Everything I tried was just to "messy" looking for me.  So..here's a card which was inspired by the logo for the class...

I love the look of this....I just need to learn to "blend" my watercolors a little better!  

This card is just something I was playing around with.  I think I got my blending down a little better.  Funny thing is...I did this water coloring on a piece of plain card stock that I found in my scrap box. I had dry embossed it with a hexagon die at some time to use and then didn't use it, so I thought I'd see what water color would do to plain card stock.  It bucked and buckled like you wouldn't believe...but I zapped it with my heat tool after it was completely dry and it mostly flattened out.  The word "thanks" is a die from Simon Says. I cut it out 4 times and glued the layers together.  Then added a bit of sparkly with my wink of stella pen.  The stamped part of the sentiment is from a VERY old stamp set...no idea who makes it.  I added a few sequins and some pearls and popped the water colored piece on to a dark blue card base.  Kinda like how this one turned out.

Finally...you've seen just a few of the cards I kept...but oh so many went into the trash!!  On to my

FAVORITE!

This card was a technique shown by Shari Carroll...and I LOVE how this turned out. I heat embossed a partial background, then colored the shapes with my distress markers and added water....WA-LA....LOVE it!!  I popped it up on a dark orange card base and added a banner.  The "happy" is the same die cut I used in the above card, only I cut the top layer for this one from a teal card stock (even though you can't really tell that in this photo!).  The 'birthday' was from a PTI set.

WHEW!...That's a lot of cards, isn't it?  Which is your favorite...and why?  

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your comments and your visits are always appreciated!! Until next time...