Merry Christmas! -finally!

Nothing quite as exhilarating as waiting until the last minute! I finally finished my Christmas cards! All 24 this year! And here I thought I was cutting back...

This card gave me so much trouble! I was just trying to turn my Halloween card (see it HERE) into a Christmas card instead. I must have tried 7 different snowflake stamps for the center, 2 different embossing powders, and countless sparkles! All that and I ended up using my snowflake punch. 

 If you look closely, I sponged the background in blue to make my snowflake stand out. I also used Close To My Heart's clear Glitz Gel to make little sparkles on all the snowflakes. Every Christmas card needs a bit of bling!

Thanks for stopping by and MERRY CHRISTMAS from Tina's scrap crap!

Christmas box

I have mentioned before what creative people I get to hang out with being a Close To My Heart consultant; so I was TERRIFIED that I had to make a "Christmas something" for a swap with all those creative people! The only rule was to stay under $10 and use all CTMH products. This is what I came up with:

From the outside it just looks like a present, but open it up and...

It's an exploding box! I love making these for Christmas! Someday I will post pictures of my other ones with different themes. I left this one pretty generic so whoever ended up with it could personalize it themselves. 

There are 8 little pockets with journaling tags inside and room for at least 9-21 photos! 

I am happy to report that the woman who ended up with my exploding Christmas box was happy, and the rest of the group was so impressed that I am teaching them all how to make it in January!!! Talk about an honor!

Just goes to show that maybe we shouldn't be so hard on ourselves all the time!

The countdown begins! ...5 days ago

Ok, so I didn't finish on time. At least I was close this year... Here is the cute Christmas Countdown box I started early November:

I used Close To My Heart's memory game cube. It has a strong magnetic closure and is pretty kid-proof. It comes with a countdown-convenient 24 cards inside.

So I came up with 24 things to do each day and decorated! A good old fashioned glue stick seems to work best with the chipboard. Plus it's cheap! 

A little warning: when you first get this box all the squares fit inside with lots of room to spare; after you add a few layers of paper it becomes a pretty tight fit. If you are using all 24 squares, I would NOT recommend any 3D embellishments at all. They will not fit!

Maybe I should start my Christmas cards now...

November layouts

Wow, it's been awhile! Here are the layouts we made at my scrapbook group in November: (sorry, I don't have time to edit them so they are a little rough)

This first one uses the Sonoma paper packet. Honestly, when I first saw this packet I was not impressed. It was a little... dull for my normal scrapbook subjects (crazy kids). But I really love how this layout turned out. It has a very regal feel to it that I think will be perfect for photos of my kids with their great-grandparents. Even if they are jumping on the couch at the time!

Just a close up of my strategic accordion pleats! I wanted them evenly spaced with the brads, so this took a bit of scrap paper practice!

This last one is the gorgeous Dreamin' paper. The big blank white spot is where a big colorful 8x10 will go. I have fall leaf pictures of me and my husband a few years back (ok, 9 years back) that match great.  

Lots of leaf cutting, but I love the look! After I get the pictures on I am going to trace the flourishes with Bronze glitz gel to add a bit of sparkle! 

I know what you are thinking, why didn't she just cut out the leaves with the Cricut? All the leaf stamps have a matching cut? Well yes, I could have done that and it is much faster; but I wanted a closer cut than what the Cricut does. Also my Cricut is buried right now... maybe next time!

Thanks for looking, back to the sick baby!

Finally Fall!

It is about time things finally cooled off! I would soooo much rather be cold than hot. Think about it: when you are cold, you can put on a sweater; when you are hot, there is only so much naked you can get :)

Here is a card to celebrate breaking out the sweaters:

Pretty much everything I used is discontinued Close To My Heart... but the colors of this paper packet will always be one of my favorites! 

Happy Fall!

Back Away From The Heat Gun!

Apparently I am addicted to embossing lately! Here is my entry for the Heart 2 Heart Halloween challenge this week:

I love how this turned out! Plus it was a great excuse to use my spiderweb border punch :) Here is a close up of the part I am most proud of:

The spider stamp I had was too small, so after I stamped it in Versamark I used my embossing pen to make all the legs a little longer! It is hard to see exactly what you are doing with a clear embossing pen, so I was pleasantly surprised that it turned out AWESOME! Then I sponged grey around the spider and also in the center of the spider webs so it wasn't so bright. 

It is always nice when the finished product turns out just as good as the vision in your head at 4 am!

Hmmm...

Well, so much for posting twice a week!

I finally took pictures of the pages we made at my monthly scrapbook group! (If you are in the Pleasant Grove, Utah area, let me know if you ever want to join us) I am not sure why the photos are so poor, but here is a slightly blurry look:

This first one is the Roxie paper packet. We only used a few embellishments because I wanted the swirly paper to stand out. 

Here is a close-up of the title. It was a lot of strategic masking and embossing!

This next one is the Mischief paper packet. We also used the new spooky felt shapes which I now LOVE! 

I'm not sure how well you can tell, but this is a close up of the cool embossing technique I used on the border. (Click on the photo to enlarge it) I stamped the image first in colonial white and blotted it with a napkin, then stamped it in grey wool a few times to darken it. Last I stamped it in Versmark and embossed it with clear embossing powder slightly off to give a black shadow. Gotta love clear stamps!