On the weekend I hosted an 80’s themed bridal shower for my very dear friend Sara.  Thank goodness I had  helpful bridesmaids and a grown-up flower girl on my side!

What could be more appropriate as an 80’s party favour than some candy that was around back then? NERDS! 

This was super easy to do.  I dressed the boxes up with a strip of scrapbook paper.  Next, I punched the 2 label shapes (Stampin’ Up!) out of bright cardstock and used some pop dots for dimension.  And of course, the “thank you” stamp (Stampendous).

Hiya,

Last night I hosted my very first Stampin’ Up! workshop, with friends and family.  Not many were stampers or had ever stamped anything in the past, so it was a fun new experience.  Here are the cards I demo-ed

I heart this owl card.  I didn’t have the right colour of blue paper to go with my little button and owl, but that’s ok for now.  Isn’t he cute?  And everyone loves embossing :D

This was our make and take.  Some people had some pretty creative variations!  I always like using chalk on Versamark ink.  It’s like magic.

This was a fun little box that I came up with.  Glue dots galore.. and look what’s inside………………………………….

Cherry candies of deliciousness.  I gave this little guy away as a door prize.

All in all, a fun evening.  Thanks for joining me, everyone!

To order anything from me, including custom made cards or materials, or to book your own workshop, contact away.  You can check out my Stampin’ Up! Website or email me.

Hi there!

I’ve been working on organizing a wedding shower and bachelorette for my best bud, Sara – with help from the other bridesmaids, of course.

Seeing as how I love all things made out of paper, I had a lot of fun making the shower invitations.  We mostly did invitations by email, but I got to make some real, tangible ones for her family peeps.  I’d fallen in love with the idea of a petal card, so I just had to do that.

Of course, I didn’t like any templates I came across, so I built my own.  Mostly so I could get it the right size.  I just used Microsoft Word, some ovals and a square.  Next, I pasted in the adorable birdies from Digital House Design.  Seriously, they’re so so cute!

One petal card accomplished!

For the pdf (outline and birdies only), click here.

Cheers,

I’ve been dabbling in crafty things.. in a very random style.  My Stampin’ Up! goodies have arrived, so I can start hosting parties.  Check out my site and store for more info!

I’ve also been playing with those braided headbands.  Check out what I came up with!

These are so much fun to make!  For the “untidy ends,” I wrapped a piece of ribbon around them, thanks to my friend Jana and a great tutorial for the suggestion.

These are now available in my Etsy Store!

Back to card making soon, I hope.  Sometimes you just have to go where the inspiration takes you :-)

I’m having a headband obsession type thingo.. I got inspired by my friend Jana who made a scrappy headband based on a tutorial over at Smile and Wave.  I decided I’d give this a try with some upcycled t-shirts!

At first, I really liked the white idea…

And then I decided to try some colour!

So far, I’ve made these 3.  They’re such a good use of scraps, and pretty easy to make, although my sewing machine didn’t much like sewing the ends.

I think I’ll give these a try with some different fabrics, like quilter’s weight cotton, to get a different look.. and how cute would they be with a little rosette? OK, doing that now!

look, look, look!

Tada!

These will be for sale in my Etsy Store soon!

Hey there,

Well, I’m still scrapbooking the wedding album.  We’ll have been married a year August 1st, and I still haven’t finished this!  Luckily I’ve gotten to honeymoons (we went on a mini one after the wedding, then a real trip in January).  This has sat on the back burner for many months now, so I figured today was a good day to pull it out.

As you can see, I’m doing pretty much the bare minimum, as far as scrapbooking goes.  Hey, I used pretty paper, and rounded my photo edges!  But yeah, no layouts, no layering, no embellishments.  If you’re lucky I might add a few stickers or something ;-)  And hey, I promise to label the pictures and even do a bit of journaling! 

I love having albums, but I’m more of a card maker, so the whole fancy-amazing scrapbook thing doesn’t happen much with me.

Cheers,

Hiya!

I recently had a birthday to go to.  A friend turned 30 (no one’s counting!), so I wanted to give her a nice little gift.  I made a pair of green dangly earrings (sorry, no pictures), and then needed a nice gift bag to put them in.

This is my first attempt at this bag, and I think it went pretty well.  There’s always room for improvement, right?  I definitely love the little butterflies!

I got the fabulous purse template over at Creations by AR.  It’s a bit finicky to glue together, but is super cute if you can get it all to stick and stay put!

Hey there.  I hope the weekend was a good one!

I’ve been busy running around everywhere.. birthday parties, hockey games, shopping, crafting. 

Today I made this spiffy flower ring.  It’s my first attempt, so I’m hoping the future ones will be better.. but I’m still happy with this little guy!

I found a fabulous tutorial over at V and Co.  I found that since my fabric was super thin cotton, I should have cut a wider strip of it.. ooooh well, that’s for next time!  Maybe I’d fray the edges up a bit too.

Seriously. So. Easy.  You just need a strip of fabric, a ring blank, and a glue gun!  Maybe when I get good at them I’ll start making them in every colour!

Nathan’s birthday came around, as it usually does on April 8th.  His one request?  To have an “old school” birthday party, like back in grade 3.  The result?  Fun times, indeed!

These are the tops of the goodie bags I made.  I was so excited to get to make them and fill them up with delicious candy.  I made 14 in all using patterned paper, a circle punch, an Inkadinkado Thank you stamp and some versafine ink. 

Not super glamorous, but better than an old paper bag, non?

The rest of the birthday party involved hanging out with a whole bunch of friends, chatting, watching a hockey game, playing video games, drinking beer (and delicious martinis), and eating copious amounts of pizza and ice cream cake!  My boy was in heaven :-)

One of my besties had a birthday coming up, so I tried to think of things that I really love to do with her.  I couldn’t think of any one thing, but wanted to give her something that would keep us spending time together, since it’s sometimes hard with all of our commitments these days.  So I came up with a date book.

This is it before I got the ribbon tied.. I somehow failed to get a picture of the final product :-(  Anyways, what I did was give a 2-week time period for each date.  For example, sometime between April 12th -25th, we’re going to try a new recipe to make together (and this comes with money for ingredients).  All we have to do is find a time to book our “date,” then follow the instructions.  She received it really well and I’m definitely looking forward to the dates!

I cut my pages a few inches longer than the book size so I could fold the bottom up to create  a pocket.  Also, the cover pages are slightly bigger than the rest, with rounded corners.

I attached eyelets to the holes to keep them from ripping and make it easy to tie them with ribbon.

I slipped “date cards” inside the pockets along with anything needed for the dates, like gift cards.

I was perusing a friend’s blog and was instantly inspired! She very helpfully posts about things she covets, and today’s went straight to my heart.  It was all about how to make paper flowers using old books.  Check it out (including a tutorial) here at the blog of the lovely and talented Dawn McVey.  Here’s her version on a card:

I’ve been meaning to buy some old old books for various other projects, so seeing this book-page flower got my creative energy stirring in all kinds of crazy ways.  I took a walk downtown to seek out all the used book stores.  It was sadly very difficult to find a reasonably priced book that looked old enough for my needs.  Yah don’t need a super-aged one for these flowers, so I grabbed a book of fairy tale type stories along with another book I’d seen that looked a bit more yellow (for future projects).

Next, I rushed home to put Dawn’s tutorial into practice.  I grabbed my two biggest flower punches and punched away to my heart’s content.  Next step? Make some cards for these lovely little things.

Here’s one without the button.  Still cute, and appropriate for the flower size.  Things I now have on my crafty shopping list: Buttons! All sorts of buttons! button twine (my hemp was too thick to happily work with), a larger flower punch, antique copper brads (I’d been eyeing those up for months now anyhow).

I made a little gift package for my cousin-in-law, as I mentioned I was working on it before.  So here it is all put together.  This is similar to how I would put together a set of 6 cards to sell, with envelopes.

I cut a strip of scrapbook paper and attached it at the back to keep the bundle together.  Next, I attached a tag that I’d punched out, using some hemp rope.  I quite like that you can see the top card under there.  Why hide it?

Alright, so it’s January and I have yet to take down my Christmas tree or any of my random assortment of decorations.. but Christmas is just so pretty.  How can I take it away?  I told the boy that if he wants the tree down, it’s up to him to do it because I’m just too happy leaving it up forever.

Well, one of said decorations is some paper 3D snowflakes that I made.  I originally got the idea from a friend a few years back, but when I couldn’t remember how to make the things, I found some great instructions here at WikiHow. Take a look!

Some tips…

I did an extra fold so that I could do all the cuts at once.. a bit quicker!  The bit one is made from 12”x12” paper, and the little one is 8 1/2” x 8 1/2”