PTI paint by number

Have you been following all the latest Papertrey Ink news over on Nicole’s blog? All I can say is “Wow!” There are so many fun things coming our way from Papertrey! Felt, die cutting tools, paint, just to name a few. I’m excited to see what else Nicole’s got up her sleeve.

Nicole’s got a challenge going on right now as part of the Papertrey anniversary celebration. It’s a sketch + color challenge and the deadline is tomorrow morning. So, needless to say, I kept it simple. There’s a $100 prize package up for grabs just for playing along, so I had to give it a shot. Especially since I hadn’t been able to do any of the other challenges this weekend.

Here’s my color palette to go along with my user name.

And here is my card.

The kids are having a blast playing out in the snow in the dark. I imagine I’ll soon need to get a few mugs of hot cocoa ready to warm chilly noses and toes. It’s nice and quiet in here for now. Until someone loses a mitten!

Laters!

a tale of woe- my non-crafty weekend

Hello! How are you all?
I’m here to explain why this post contains no crafty photos whatsoever in spite of all my good intentions.

It’s all because of the snow!! Now you’d think that a few days being snowed in would result in lots of opportunities to get my craft on. That’s what I thought too. In fact, when I awoke on Saturday morning to deep drifts of snow up to my thighs I smiled to myself and began to plan my weekend at home with lots of time spent in my craft space. Visions of paper and ribbon and glitter and things being crossed off my to-do list danced through my head and I fairly squirmed in anticipation! The kids and I had loaded up on movies for the weekend (remember Eric was away in New Jersey) and I just knew we were going to have a gloriously relaxing couple of days just hanging out and having fun being snowed in together.

But it was not meant to be. A carbon monoxide scare had us evacuating our home as soon as we all got dressed and packed a few essentials. We headed over to my in-laws next door to spend the rest of our day there. It turned out the gas fumes were from the snow being so deep that it insulated our exhaust vent and the fumes had nowhere else to go except into our basement.

I sadly (and grouchily I admit) kissed my weekend plans goodbye!

My husband’s sister and her family where also camped out in my in-laws huge stone house for the weekend too, so the kids had a great time playing in the snow with their cousins. It was like a weekend long party for them!

We did absolutely nothing all day long except enjoy the snow and our kids, eat my mother-in-law’s delicious food, play games and watch movies. I headed over to our house to check on things a couple of times and pick up a few things we needed.

The kids were SO excited over all that snow. We got around 18″. When they woke up they ran from window to window excitedly exclaiming over how deep it was. They’d never seen this much snow before. That was before we hurriedly packed our things and headed out the door.

That night we stayed over at my in-laws for the night. The kids were begging to get to sleep at Grandma’s and I figured it wouldn’t hurt to stay out of our house for the night either, even though the detector was registering at zero. We were all a little freaked out.

It felt like I barely slept at all that night. I shared a bed with Isaiah who rolled into me a few times which woke me up. And Chloe who was sleeping in the same room kept crying out in her sleep. At 5:00 that morning I found out why. Apparently she had a little too much liquid the evening before and wet the bed. That meant I had to get up and find something to change her into. Remember my in-law’s house is a really huge old stone house? That meant I had to go down the steps, through the family room, through the formal dining room, through the kitchen in my bare feet on cold hard wood floors, and find our bags that held all our stuff and then again traipse back through the kitchen, through the formal dining room, through the living room, and back up the steps. Thank goodness we weren’t sleeping on the third floor! Turned out I had no clean underwear for her to wear. So she had to spend the rest of the night in a T-shirt and a dirty pair of sweats she had worn the day before. Sans underwear! Poor baby!

I awoke a couple of short hours later stuffed between Isaiah and Chloe who had also crawled into bed with us. I lay there feeling very tired and grouchy and grumbling to myself over my altered weekend plans and my lack of sleep. In my moment of extreme grouchiness I heard God gently remind me, cause He’s cool that way, that I won’t always understand why things happen the way they do and why he changes my plans, but that He loves me and always has my best in mind. Things happen for a reason and even though I don’t understand, it’s best to just go with the flow and not get all bent out of shape about the way things have to be. I don’t always “get” that very well. I get stressed when things don’t go as planned. I don’t always have a good attitude when things go wrong. God’s working on me in that area. (sigh) I’m afraid He has His work cut out for Him!

The kids all wanted to have one last frolic in the snow with their cousins one last time before heading home to our own house. They didn’t want to leave grandma’s. By the time they were done in the snow it was lunch time, so we ate lunch and THEN headed home.
My husband got snowed in in New Jersey and couldn’t start for home until Sunday morning. He arrived home at the exact same time we did. The kids got put to bed for afternoon naps, even my ten year old, and Eric and I did the same. My bed never slept so good! When I woke up it was soon time for the Super bowl to start.
And so that is a long winded way to explain why I didn’t get a blessed crafty thing done all weekend long.

They say we’re supposed to be getting more snow this week. A significant amount. Hopefully this time I’ll get to enjoy it from the comfort of my own craft room!

If you’ve been reading this entire thing, bless you! I’m hoping to get time to get a few things accomplished this afternoon while Chloe sleeps.

So, how was your weekend?

Thanks for stopping by and for your sweet comments.

Let your heart have wings

Hi everyone! I hope you all have been having a great week and are ready for the weekend.
Have you all got plans for the Super Bowl? We were invited to a party, but opted to stay at home instead. Party poopers, I know! In fact, Eric is in Atlantic City this weekend at a Real Estate seminar and won’t get back until late Saturday. He felt like after being away for a few days and not getting to see his family much this week and the fact that he’ll most likely be exhausted when he gets home, that he’d rather just stay at home and watch the big game here with just us. I’m OK with that. It will definitely be more relaxing that way.

I truly meant to pop in here before this, but I got busy with lots of stuff around the house and didn’t get a chance to get back. Thanks so much for all your comments regarding my Makeover Monday posts. I really appreciate all of you taking the time to stop by and post your thoughts. My Makeover Monday posts are sometimes a bit of work for me to get together and it always feels good to know that you appreciate what I’ve shared.
I always enjoy reading your comments and love to hear what you have to say. I try to get back to your blogs and leave some love in return, although that doesn’t always happen, but please know that your comments are treasured and I’m trying to get better at responding.

I randomly picked a winner for the two packages of letter stickers. The number that got picked out of the hat (well, bowl really), is:

Karen

Wow! What great ideas! I usually just pass them on to my daughter eventually…but I know I have a bunch that I just don’t use but have plenty…I’ll have to try some of these ideas!

I’ve sent you an email. I just need your mailing address and I’ll get these right out to you. Thanks for your comment!

I have a super quick card to share with you today. It took me about, oh…….2 minutes to assemble. No kidding! Granted I did already have the butterflies die cut, so that cut back on my time, but this is seriously one of the quickest and easiest cards you’ll ever make and I love the way it turned out.

supplies: stamps: Papertrey Ink (background) & Stampin’ Up! (sentiment) ; ink, linen thread: Stampin’ Up!; card stock: Papertrey ink & Stampin’ Up!; patterned paper: Jenni Bowlin; page from an old book and button

Now I know that if you choose to make a card like mine that you’ll actually stamp the sentiment straight! Forgive me. My stamp-a-ma-jig and I don’t always get along!

Don’t you just love that background? That is, get this…..my first ever Papertrey Ink stamp set! I just got it last week. I’ve admired Papertrey products for a long, long time, and I’m not sure why I waited so long to purchase any of their sets. I love it!!! It stamps beautifully. I think I also need the polka dots background stamps from Papertrey. And their ribbon…and buttons….and, and…….!

So what kinds of fun things are you all doing for Valentine’s Day? It’s almost here, ya know! I admit I haven’t gotten nearly all (OK, make that any!) of the projects I’ve been wanting to get done. I had great plans to make some really cute Valentine’s Day decor and other cute projects, but it didn’t happen. I guess I will store those ideas away for another year.
The one thing we’ve been doing that the kids just love is our 14 days of Valentine’s. A couple of years ago I decorated some of those little mailboxes that were so popular. I made one for each child. We display them in a place that is easily accessible to the kids and starting on the first day of February I stick a little treat into each mailbox for them to find. Sometimes it’s candy. Other times it things like coupons for an ice cream date or tickets for other fun things. Sometimes it’s small toys or trinkets. This morning it was a letter of love that I wrote to each individual child telling each of them the things I really love and admire about them.
It’s always fun to hear their squeals of delight when they open up their mailboxes. It doesn’t take much to bring a smile to a kids face and they absolutely love this tradition. It’s one I’m sure we’ll be doing for many more years.

Have a fantastic weekend. Hopefully you all get the time to do something crafty. I plan to work on a few card challenges, so I might be back before the weekend is over.

Makeover Monday- use up those letter stickers!

Hello everyone! Happy Monday!
I don’t know about you, but I love the beginning of a brand new week. I love to see the days stretched out before me as an opportunity to see what I will accomplish before the weeks comes to an end.

Not only is it a brand new week, but it’s the first Monday in a brand new month and that means it’s time for another Makeover Monday. Just in case you’re new to my blog, Makeover Monday happens on the first Monday of every month here at Sweet Paper Treats. It’s a day I set aside to share some projects with you that feature ways to reuse and re-purpose some things you may have in your stash. Sometimes I show ways to transform an old decor piece into something fresh and new using your scrapbook stash. Sometimes I show ways to get more use out of the products you may already have.

This month the focus is on letter stickers. Whether you’re a scrapbooker or a card maker you most likely have a few packages of letter stickers in your arsenal. And, if you’re like me, you probably have a few packages that have been mostly used up except for a few odd letters that you can’t use to spell out anything. Or, if you’re like me, you might have a few packages from years ago that have somehow managed to avoid the purge.

Today we’re going to explore a few ways to get those stickers used up so you can make room for more exciting and interesting things.

When I sat down to create my projects for this Makeover Monday installment, the first package of letter stickers I pulled out to use were two packages of unopened ones I had picked up at the $ spot somewhere. I never used them, but couldn’t bring myself to get rid of them. I decided to use them to decorate some tiny square canvases that I had bought for another project that never came to fruition. (Geez, do I see a pattern here?)
First I randomly stuck the stickers all over the canvases, like this.

I made sure to extend them over the edges and then I trimmed them with my craft knife. Then I decorated them to make this.

I went with a Christmas theme since they were red and green. I think they’ll look great propped up against some of my other Christmas decor. I know it’s not typical to be working on Christmas projects in February, but I figure I’m just about 9-10 months ahead of myself! Hee! No matter. This project could be made to suit any season or decorating theme.

Then the idea started forming in my mind to try a masking technique with some old Making Memories letter stickers. These stickers have been in my stash for a long, long time. I don’t know why I didn’t pass them onto my kids before, but at any rate, they needed to be used up somehow.
Here’s what you need. A piece of card stock for your background. Stickers (I actually just used the numbers that came on this sheet of letters), and some misting spray such as Glimmer Mist or Maya mist.

First, place your stickers onto the paper in the area you’d like to mask. I stuck each sticker onto my sweater first to get rid of some of the stickiness so they’d be easier to remove later. You could even use lots of different letters here if you don’t have enough of one kind.

Then cut out your mask and place over top. I used a circle, but you could do almost any shape if you have a Cricut or something similar to cut out your shapes.

Now comes the fun part. Spray over your mask with the spray mist. I used Gold and Bubble Gum Glimmer Mist. I always place my project in a cardboard box to contain the spray.

Lift your mask and this is what you’ll have.

Let dry and then very carefully remove the stickers and you get this.

Now finish up your page.

I thought the masking technique would be fun to try with paints too, so using the above method I made two baby cards. Only instead of using the Glimmer Most I gently painted over the letter stickers with acrylic paint. Be sure to let the paint dry completely before removing your stickers.

How about using cast off letter stickers to make some unique scrapbook page backgrounds? I had a sheet of large letter stickers, monograms I guess is what they’re called. They came with only one or two of each letter on the sheet, so it was really hard to use them for page titles. They were just taking up space, so I used them to create this fun background on this page. Again, you could use a variety of different stickers if you don’t have enough of one kind.

Here’s another way to use those stickers to make an interesting page. I popped a couple of them up with pop dots for added interest.

How bout using some of those odd leftover letters along with rubber stamps or rub-ons to create new words?

If none of these ideas appeal to you, you can always donate your leftover letter stickers to your kids or to a school that would be happy to use them up for you.

How about we have a fun little giveaway to go along with our letter stickers theme? I’ll randomly pick one person to receive two packages of letter stickers. I promise they’ll be new, unused, and not out dated!

To win just tell me what you think. Have any of these tips been helpful to you? Leave a comment here on this post. I’d love to hear what you do with your leftover letter stickers once you’ve used up all the good ones.

I’ll pick a winner in a couple of days from now, OK?

Have a good one!

all squared up!

I had such a lovely day today. My sister-in-law (Crystal), mother-in-law (Marlene) and mother-in-law’s twin sister (Arlene) and her daughter-in-law (Missy) and I all spent the day in downtown Lancaster in honor of my Mom-in-law’s and her twin sister’s birthdays today. We shopped the quaint little antique shops and stopped to eat lunch at a little Spanish restaurant where we ate delicious beans and rice.

It was so good to have a girls’ day out without our kids. We visited the sweetest little shop called Mamalicious. It was the first time I was there, but you can be sure it won’t be my last. I fell in love with the place from the moment I set foot inside the door. I was like “um, yeah, can I just move in, please?”

I did take my camera and the shop owner was such a sweet woman and she let me take photos inside her shop.

This is outside the shop. Doesn’t it look inviting? Love the blue doors!

I want this vintage yellow double chair thingy! Isn’t it so cheerful looking?

I think this handmade purse is just adorable? I can see using these colors and similar patterns on a paper crafting project. This purse would make a great color inspiration challenge.

Check this out! Look at the “hooks” that the necklaces are hanging from. Is that not one of the coolest ideas you have ever seen? I want a sewing room now. Forget that. Maybe I could do this in my bedroom to hang my own jewelry from. If that wasn’t awesome enough in itself, the necklaces were made from all kinds of salvaged stuff. Like vacuum cleaner belts and a whole lot of other stuff that I can’t remember. For someone like me, it was pure heaven! I just stood there and savored for a long time.

This next photo is one I snapped of another one of the shops we visited. I just love to admire the architecture of old buildings. Especially when they’re painted in fun color schemes like this one.

I like to gain inspiration from the things I see around me and incorporate them into my paper crafting projects. It might be a color scheme, or an arrangement of certain items that inspires me, or a whole new way of using something that I can take and use in a project. You just might see some projects in the near future that have been inspired by the photos I have just shared with you. Feel free to use them for your own inspiration if you wish.

Just in case you thought I wasn’t going to share anything crafty today, never fear. I have a few cards I made for this weeks challenge on the Cards blog. The challenge this time was to use squares.

It’s been a while since I’ve played along with the Cards blog challenge and I really had fun with this one.

The first card I made is this one. The squares are drawn with a marker and then I filled them in with square stamped bird images, gems, and some stamped word strips. It’s hard to see, but I pierced the paper in a few spots. If you click on the photo to enlarge it you may be able to see it better.

supplies: card stock, ink, marker (Stampin’ Up!); stamps (Inkadinkado); gems (Prima); ribbon (Michael’s)

This is one of my favorite color schemes. I thought these colors would look great on a nature inspired card. Did you know that Pantone has named turquoise the color of the year for 2010? I’m very OK with that.

This next card is the one I gave to my mother-in-law for her birthday today. She enjoys sewing, so I knew she would appreciate the machine stitching and the row of lovely buttons.

supplies: card stock, ink, stamp, chipboard square, linen thread (Stampin’ Up!); patterned paper (Stampin’ Up!, American Crafts, K & Company); buttons (Foofala); twill (unknown source)

I incorporated a square for the challenge with the chipboard frame. I’m in love with the soft, feminine colors on this one. I’ve been reaching for a lot more pastel shades lately. Maybe since I know spring is not too far away.

I’m planning to give this last card to my husband. I don’t know if I’ll save it for Valentine’s Day or if I’ll sneak it into his brief case one day. I used The Boyfriend collection from Cosmo Cricket for this one. I just love that line. It has so many fun, masculine images and patterns. Perfect for cards and scrapbook pages for the guys!

supplies: Card stock, clear buttons (Stampin’ Up!); patterned paper and stickers (Cosmo Cricket); baker’s twine (Martha Stewart Crafts)

Those are some square clear buttons I’ve had in my stash for a while. I was glad to get a chance to use some of them up. For some reason it’s easy for me to use circles. But squares, not so much.
This card has a lot of dimension. I popped up the square letter stickers with foam dots in varying heights. Then I adhered the buttons to patterned paper and attached them under and over the letter stickers. You can see more of the dimension here in this photo.

I also finished the inside of this card. The Boyfriend collection includes a sheet of journaling spots and witty sayings, including the one I used here.

I thought this card would be a great way to let Eric know that I am crazy about him. He’s such a smart, hard working, handsome man who loves his wife and kids. It’s no wonder I’m crazy about him!

I’m heading off to the land of nod. It’s been a long day with an early start. Tomorrow promises to be another busy day as I catch up on all the housework that’s been piling up around here. Tomorrow night is family night. We’re heading out for pizza and laser tag.

Have a fantabulous weekend !

Spring Chickie

So sorry for all the spring related scrapbook pages I’ve been offering up lately. It just so happens to be where I’m at in my large collection of photos to scrap. I have no intention of causing anyone any early bouts of spring fever. Just let the photos of spring flowers bring you reassurance that spring will come again sometime soon.

It feels pretty natural for me to be working on warm weather projects since that is what all the current card/scrapbook page calls are for. I’ve been working on summer themes for a little while already. When I first began submitting it kind of messed with my head a bit to work about six months ahead, but it’s growing on me.
I am so excited to see my first card in publication in the February issue of Cards magazine! Look for it at your local craft store or in your mailbox soon!

My page for today is a bit random. Take a look.

I’m on a mission to use up all the leftover pieces to the scrapbook kits I got from Stampin’ Up! over the years. There are tons of little pieces left that are too cute to throw away and it’s driving me crazy! I’ve got to use them up, so on this page I used a lot of border pieces from various kits. I layered them, pleated them, and stapled them, and folded them into tabs. I also used a couple of different punches. The scallop edge punch from Stampin’ Up! and my Martha Stewart Butterfly punch. The doily stamp is new from Hero Arts (love!), and I scattered a few gems from Prima here and there.

Gotta go put my little darling down for a nap. I tired her out with a lot of shopping this morning. I found some great deals at Children’s Place and then we walked around the mall for a while, looking at the pets in the pet store and sharing a soft pretzel. I love spending time with her. She’s such a fun companion during the day. I love listening to her incessant chatter about all kinds of things that are interesting to a four year old and holding her little hand in mine. Kids are such amazing little beings!

Gonna go sneak in a short nap as well. I get to smell the delicious aroma coming from my oven while I snooze on the sofa. I’m trying Pioneer Woman’s recipe for Spicy Shredded Pork tonight for dinner. When Chloe and I were out I picked up some limes, salsa and guacamole to eat with the pork. It’s only been in the oven for about an hour and a half so far, but let me tell you, it smells SO good! I’ll let you know how that turns out.

Moxie Fab in turquoise

Today’s card was one I made for the Tuesday Trigger challenge at the Moxie Fab World blog. I noticed the deadline was extended due to Cath being at CHA, so I figured I’d be able to participate after all.

Here’s the challenge photo courtesy of House of Turquoise.

Here’s my card.

Laters!

supplies: card stock (Stampin’ up!); vellum (Stampin’ Up!); stamps (Inkadinkado, Autumn Leaves); ink (Stampin’ Up!); ribbon (Stampin’ Up!, Offray); other: buttons and half pearl

EBTKS sketch challenge #3

Good Monday morning to you all! It’s been storming like mad here this morning. All kinds of wind and driving rain. When I woke up this morning I was concerned that the roof might blow off the house! And to think I need to venture out sometime for a quick run to the grocery store. I’m postponing it as long as possible. I’m enjoying my snug, warm little house even more this morning and don’t envy my husband and sons who had to run through the wind and rain on their way to work and school.

Today’s card is one I whipped up last night for the sketch challenge from Everything But the Kitchen Sink.
Here’s the sketch.

A rainy day is not a good day for photography and so the colors in these photos turned out just a bit wonky. That orange piece is actually yellow in real life. The same color as the button, actually, but no amount of adjusting on my part would make it look the right shade.

I stayed very true to the sketch this time. The flower is made from a fabric pattern that I folded and ran through my sewing machine to gather it. Here’s a closer look.

Gotta run! I’m working on next week’s Makeover Monday post, some Valentine’s Day related stuff, and a whole host of other projects to accomplish. My brain is spilling over with all the ideas I have crammed in there that need to get out. Gonna put the munchkin down for a nap when I get back from my run to the grocery store and get to work! Fun, Fun!!!

supplies: card stock: Stampin’ Up!; patterned paper: Making Memories, Stampin’ up!; Stamps: Martha Stewart Crafts, Autumn Leaves; ink: Stampin’ Up!; punch: Martha Stewart crafts; other: dress makers pattern, corsage pins, button

Embellish with stripes

Where has the week gone??? Not much happening around here. Tonight’s a quiet evening with Eric away at a meeting tonight. The kids are due to go to bed a bit early since they had a late night last night. It’s a perfect night for getting my craft on…..but where’s my mojo? It’s been really kind of weird for me this week. I’ve actually had a few opportunities to work on a few things but I feel uninspired. Not sure what that’s all about. I know I just need to sit down and play and it probably won’t take long for the ideas to begin to flow once again.

I did manage to make a couple of cards in my mojo-less state for the current challenge over at Embellish. Here’s the challenge.

I love this challenge photo, especially since I’m not usually a purple kind of girl. But I was struggling because, since I almost never use purple, I don’t have much of it in my stash. It made it even more of a struggle when I couldn’t find much of anything striped in the colors I needed. But, I did still manage to squeeze out two cards with the meager supplies I was able to find.

Here’s my first attempt.

supplies: card stock, ink, stamp, friend rub-on (Stampin’ up!); flower rub-ons (Basic Grey); Gems (Prima)

As a crafter, do you ever have a fear of coming up with an awesome idea, but not have the proper supplies or tools to carry out your idea? I do. It’s happened to me before. I have an idea in my head. A really great idea, and then realize I don’t have what I need to make that idea become reality. The curse of not being able to have it all. It’s what makes me want to immediately head to my nearest LSS and buy up everything in sight. You know just in case I might need it. Since that can’t happen, it’s times like that when a bit of innovation and creativity has to kick in.

I don’t know where the idea came from for this next card. All I know is that a picture (an idea) popped into my brain. Where do ideas like that come from anyway? All problems would have been solved if I would have had a Cricut or Silhouette, or a similar kind of cutting device. But I don’t. And I don’t foresee it getting crossed off my wish list any time soon. Sooo…in order to make this idea work I had to do things the old fashioned way and (gasp!) cut by hand!

supplies: card stock, stamp, ink (Stampin’ Up!); patterned paper (All My Memories, Pebbles); Pearls (Basic Grey)

It’s not perfect and you will probably be able to see some imperfect cutting. Hon, if you’re reading this, please take this as a hint that I really want a Cricut and that you should buy me one just as soon as the opportunity arises! (Hey, it’s worth a shot, right?)

After I made this card I thought it would have looked better to have the stripes going in different directions, but there was no way under the sun I was going to cut that all out again!

Hope you like!

Strawberries

Ahhh…the sun is brightly shining here today! It’s lovely! Over the last week or so we’ve been having milder weather and it’s almost been giving me spring fever. Almost! I have a lot of winter projects to complete yet before I’m going to allow spring fever to set in.

Today’s pages are some I completed at the last crop I attended. I had a kit made up of supplies I wanted to use with these photos, so while I had all the supplies ready I just went ahead and made a page for each of my sons to save myself the trouble of digging out all the supplies all over again later.

Picking strawberries is a favorite summer activity for the kids and I. It marks the beginning of summer vacation for us since the berries are ready to be picked usually a couple of weeks after school is out for the summer. As soon as we see the local strawberry field open up for pickers we head out and fill buckets full to bring home and make into jam, pie, shortcake and smoothies. One of my favorite ways to eat strawberries besides pie is to toss them into a spinach salad. Heavenly!

Strawberries are one of my kids favorite foods ever, especially my most picky eater. So the kids know that after we get them home and wash them they are allowed to eat all the strawberries they want. And eat them they do!

Oh dear! I do believe I feel a twinge of longing for warm weather seeping in! Must stop thinking about strawberries!!! Has spring fever hit you yet?