Best Of Columbus!

Hello, Blogland! I'm just popping in quickly today to share a bit of news about which I am very, very excited. My business has been nominated in the Columbus Alive's Best of Columbus poll! We're nominated in the Best Brand Without a Storefront category. The nod was quite a surprise and I am so happy to be included alongside a few of my favorite local crafters.

You can find the full poll HERE, if you're so inclined. The poll covers everything from dining to entertainment with a majority of the shopping on the second page. Voting continues until the first of March at noon. Results will be released in the March 29th edition of the Alive.

Thank you for sharing in my news today! I'll be back to share another project in the next couple of days.

January Papertrey Blog Hop

Greetings, Blogland! Today is the January Papertrey Blog Hop and I thought it might be fun to participate (it also helps me keep the blog resolution dream alive). This month's challenge was to choose a favorite card from 2011 and make another card inspired by the first. Fun, right?

I chose a card I made with the 2010 anniversary set. I'd just fiddled around with the stamps for awhile and decided it was time to make a proper card. Does anyone remember this guy?

Looking at it again, I decided that I liked the layout and the stamp set so I decided to create a second card using those elements.

This time around I went with the poppies image rather than the dandelions and used one of the shorter sentiments since I knew I would have a smidgen less white space. I also chose a slightly wider ribbon that had a bit of a wrinkled, poppy-petal texture and I embellished the space around the flowers with rhinestones rather than gussy-up the blooms themselves.

All in all I'm rather pleased with my second version and I can definitely see a few more of these variations in my future.

Enjoy the blog hop, everyone! See you all again soon.

Recipe:
Stamps: Botanical Silhouettes, Polka Dot Basics II - Papertrey Ink
Cardstock: Kraft, Sweet Blush - Papertrey Ink; white
Ink: Spring Moss, Sweet Blush, Fresh Snow - Papertrey Ink; dark green pigment, brown pigment - Studio G
Other: Edgers 1 Dies - Papertrey Ink; White Ribbon - May Arts; Rhinestones (colored with a Sharpie) - Darice; Foam Adhesive - Scotch

Love Birds

Hello, Blogland! This week has been a busy one, no? It's been bananas around here. I finished a couple of big projects this week and I'm beat. I have a few smaller orders to fulfill this weekend, but I'm hoping for a nice, long night of rest before I tackle anything else.


At any rate I'm trying to keep up with my goal of one blog post per week (minimum) with this little ditty. I'm really beginning to throw myself into all things Valentine's Day and lovey dovey, so I thought these birds would be a nice start here on the blog. I started by die cutting and stamping the bird cage. I added the birds and the heart and set that whole piece aside.


Next I stamped the sentiment and chain images onto the base before running the base through the Cuttlebug with the Tin Types impression plate. I really love the subtle texture. I added some vellum and patterned paper to the base and then tied the whole thing with a bit of baker's twine. The final step was mounting the previously stamped cage to the card with mounting tape and embellishing the heart with a smidge of glitter to give it a little sparkle.

Well, that's all for me today, friends. I'm about 15 minutes and a good-night kiss away from dreamland. See you again soon!

Recipe:
Stamps: Love Birds, Simple Valentine (heart) - Papertrey Ink
Cardstock: Spring Rain, Textured Vellum - Papertrey Ink; white
Patterned Paper: Pure Poppy Bitty Boxes - Papertrey Ink
Ink: Smoky Shadow, Spring Rain, Pure Poppy - Papertrey Ink
Other: Tin Types Impression Plate - Papertrey In; Foam Adhesive - Scotch; Oyster Baker's Twine - Divine Twine; Scallop Edge Punch - Fiskars

Yippee!

Greetings, Blogland! Today's card is a congratulations card for someone in my world that had a pretty huge achievement this week. I spent some time going through all of the congratulatory sentiments I have, but nothing was packing quite enough punch. Then I remembered the block alphabet die. Eureka! I set about die cutting the letters to spell out "yippee!" in short order.


I lined up my letters on a scrap of white cardstock and determined how big my center panel was going to need to be. Once that was cut down, I scored a frame a smidgen over a 1/4" from the edge all the way around. Then I stamped the sentiment from Rhythm & Soul and drew a very, very light line across the panel so I could line up my letters reasonably well. After I mounted all of my letters I erased as much of the line as I could reach with my long, skinny eraser. That's why it's important to draw the line super light. There's no way you're really going to get to erase everything (without destroying your card, anyway), so any remainder needs to be so light that most folks wouldn't notice it.


Next, I stamped a Soft Stone card base (I'm really starting to love that color as a neutral option) with one of the strips from Background Basics: Chevron. Well, actually, I stamped a different base with a few lines and decided it was way too busy, so I chucked it. I was much happier on the next go round. I embellished the base with a little embroidery floss and a gray button before mounting my sentiment panel with foam adhesive.

Well, that's all for me today. Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a great weekend!

Recipe:
Stamps: Rhythm & Soul, Background Basics: Chevron - Papertrey Ink
Cardstock: Soft Stone, Simply Chartreuse - Papertrey Ink; white
Ink: Turquoise pigment - Studio G
Other: Lowercase block alphabet die - Papertrey Ink; embroidery floss - DMC; foam adhesive - Scotch; gray button (I think I cut this one off of one of Sean's old work shirts)

Catching Up with Make It Monday

What the Devil?! Two posts in one week? I know, right? I'm motivated. And I thought it would be fun to play along with Papertrey's Make It Monday this week. Instead of debuting a new technique, this week they compiled all of the videos they've done over the last year-ish so folks who missed a week could catch up a smidge. Needless to say, I've missed a few weeks, but I thought it would be fun to catch one of the techniques on the flip side.

So I played along with the "#31: Creating a Background Using Non-Background Stamps." At least that's what I was going for. I suppose it could have also fit into the "#39: Multi-Stamp Background Building" too. Either way, I had fun stamping these little houses into a fairly successful pattern.

In keeping with the "I-love-my-fella" theme from the last card today's little ditty is another lovey dovey number. I think I'm going to make a bunch of sweet, kissy cards and give them to him whenever the mood strikes. Be prepared for lots of them this year.


First I put all of my house parts onto different blocks and assigned each a color. I didn't want to have to be cleaning stamps and switching inks in order to complete my pattern. Then I just started stamping away on my white cardstock. I began at the bottom-center and worked my way toward the edges and then toward the top. Once my background was complete I die cut the blue pinked edge and stitched the two together with embroidery floss. Then I stamped the polka dots on my base and adhered my background panel. The sentiment was stamped, matted and given a little swatch of ribbon before the whole piece was mounted to the base with foam adhesive.

Thanks so much for stopping by today! Have a great weekend!

Recipe:
Stamps: Love Lives Here, Polka Dot Basics 2 - Papertrey Ink
Cardstock: Enchanted Evening, Spring Moss, Pure Poppy - Papertrey Ink; white
Ink: Enchanted Evening, Spring Moss, Pure Poppy, Spring Rain, Ripe Avocado, Smoky Shadow - Papertrey Ink
Other: Pinked Edge Die, Spring Rain Saddle Stitched Ribbon - Papertrey Ink; Embroidery Floss - DMC; Foam Adhesive - Scotch

A Card and A Goal

Greetings, Blogland! Happy New Year to you and yours! I know it's been awhile since our last meeting and I wanted to address that really quickly first. I'm not usually big on New Year's resolutions (resolutions seem like they're made to be broken), but I wanted to set a few goals for myself this year. I have a good feeling about 2012 and I want to start it off right. So here are my two crafty goals for this year:

1. Post to the poor, neglected blog at least once a week. This could be a toughy, but I'm really, really going to try. I may have to spend my quiet months stocking up so I don't have a mental break in December (18-hour days are no one's friend), but I'm really going to bust my hiney to make posting a priority this year.

2. Keep the studio clean enough that there will never be another stamp set landslide. You don't want to see that, People. It isn't pretty. And I had my fair share of them in 2011, so this year I am setting a goal to keep things in relative order. I just spent 4 days cleaning and reorganizing and it's feeling pretty darn good right now.

So here we are on the 5th of January and I'm achieving my posting goal for this week with a quickie card I made for my fella. We've been talking a lot lately about how as our relationship grows and changes it only gets better. These chats inspired me to make him a little "just because" card. This accomplished a couple of things: I get back into the swing of things after a bit of a card making dry spell and he gets a sweet reminder of how much he's loved and appreciated. Everybody wins!


It's a pretty straightforward construction. I stamped the sentiment and the tree onto the base before running the base through the Cuttlebug with the woodgrain impression plate. Then I stamped the tree onto Kraft and trimmed it all the way to the edges before mounting it to the base with foam adhesive. The finishing touch was a little twine and a button. Easy peasy.

Thanks for checking in today. Hopefully I can keep this thing going. See you next time!

Recipe:
Stamps: Love and Marriage - Papertrey Ink
Cardstock: Kraft, Rustic White - Papertrey Ink
Ink: Ripe Avocado - Papertrey Ink; Brown pigment - Studio G
Other: Twine, Dark Chocolate Button, Woodgrain Impression Plate - Papertrey Ink; Foam Adhesive - Scotch