Happy Birthday Noah!

This is the card I made for Noah's 7th birthday. I'll admit I was scratching my head a little when I sat down at my desk, not quite knowing what to make... Then I decided, instead of trying to figure out what would appeal to him, to go with something that made sense to me, hoping that one day we can sit down together and re-read his old cards. He doesn't seem to care much about the cards now, but maybe one day it will matter to him that he had them.

So I leafed through my new stack of DCWV Flowers Shower and found this rainbow/clouds paper.

I always say Noah is my ray of sunshine so the tag grabbed my eye right away, I just added the Happy Birthday, and the little ladybug for fun... ;-) Then I made little rays out of cardstock and added the button to create a little sun. I love rainbows (who doesn't! ;-)) and the clouds reminded me of Noah's autism... :-( The rainbow peeking out of the clouds, is my hope that he will get much much better... Finally I added little rhinestones as rain drops (the tears I shed from watching my child struggle with life) and some Stickles on the clouds just to make it more interesting for him to look at, and because autism can be quite fascinating... :-)

The last touch was a little heart button, because I love this little guy to pieces...

School projects with the Cricut

These are some projects I made for Noah's school using my Cricut "Everyday Paper Dolls" cartridge. As you can see (or can't, unless you enlarge the pic... ;-)), I had fun with details. It was very time consuming because of all the different colors and the fact that everything is laminated, then cut again by hand. I didn't take pics of the "striped characters" but the clothes come off (there's velcro between all the layers) so that the kids have to dress the character appropriately for the weather. I love it, my only concern is that even with the laminating it might not be very sturdy over time...

This one was done using the same cartridge (and I think also the "Paperdoll Dress Up"). (Again it is hard to see, but clicking on the pic will give you the giant version.) This time it is sorting worksheets. ( in the kitchen/in the bathroom, animals in my house/animals in the jungle, toys/food, in the garden/in the sea). Same problem as above, besides the time consuming aspect to choose and cut all those little pieces, even laminated I'm wondering if they will withstand being handled by kids repeatedly. A larger version would have been better but then you don't have 2 different groups on the same page...

Anyway, I got those cartridges thinking my daughter would have a blast with them, but I have to admit I love them just as much... now if I only had the time to use them! ;-)

Tea Box

It's my sweet neighbor Katie's birthday today, and I got her some of my favorite tea of the moment. I used the shutterfly box from MTME. Since my Cricut has been acting up I used the PDF file that you print from your computer instead and then I tweaked it a little bit by making the container shorter so that it would kind of match the height of tea bags... ;-) I was able to put 12 in there which isn't bad for something I couldn't rezize.

I decorated my box using Fanciful Flourishes and as a little wink I used the little TAZO logo that I find very cute as a little medallion on my box, (adhered with foam tape of course... ;-)) No wondering what's inside! The little tag was made with a PTI holiday set.

It is really hard to see in my pic, the leaves are actually green and I rubbed gold ink all over the edges to give it a little patina. I like messy and imperfect looks!... ;-)

Lilac Blooms

When I was about 7 years old, we moved into a big appartment (that used to be a beer brewery!) with the most magical suspended garden ever! We had a huge cherry tree (my Mom made jam every year, I remember pitting the cherries...), a japanese apple blossom tree, irises, bamboos, huge peonies, and several lilac trees (purple and white). I was very fond of this garden and wish I could show it to my kids one day, although I doubt it will ever happen... We moved to a bigger nearby city a few years later, in an appartment without a garden... :-(
Maybe it's because of this garden that lilac and peonies are my favorite flowers to this day, and that cherry and japanese apple blossom are my favorite trees... :-)

Anyway, when I saw this little flower in "Argyle Amazment" by MTME, it reminded me of the tiny flowers on a lilac bloom and I just had to try and recreate it somehow... this card was my experiment... I printed the flower in different shades of purple and with different intensity. Then I highlighted some areas with my versamark marker and embossed them with clear powder. That's what gives the glossy pink effect on the detail pic below. In real life the bloom catches the light in a very nice way. (You can see better by clicking on the pics, as this will give you giant versions)

I then embossed some more flowers and some leaves that I randomly added on pop-dots. I made the mistake of trying a branch and didn't like it but since I liked my bloom I didn't want to start over, that explains the little cluster of leaves, LOL ;-) The little rick-rack is from a Cut File called "Random ribbons", I added pearl ex on some centers, and ... voilà! :-)
I will definitely make more attempts at lilac blooms, and I think this stamp could work well for hydrangeas too (although technically I think the tiny flowers that form the big blooms might have 5 petals, but when you're an artist you are allowed some creative freedom!... ;-))

This card will go to a friend in NY with a little spring surprise. With all the snow this year I'm sure she could use a little spring flair right now... ;-)

In the spotlight: A Creative Mint

I LOVE this blog. Such gorgeous pictures, "vignettes of colors" as Leslie calls them. If you like colors and pretty pics, this blog is for you. Burst of instant happiness guaranteed!... :-D

http://www.acreativemint.typepad.com/a_creative_mint/

Enjoy! :-)

4 Lauren

If you read my blog regularly, you know I like Lauren Meader's work... You also know that she recently decided to start her own business and now sells stamps, digital paper and templates (http://www.mytimemadeeasy.com/).
Now I am not part of her design team, and she doesn't pay me to advertise for her, but this card is made using 4 of her products: 2 stamps set and 2 Cut Files!
That's because the card is for her, a little pat on the back for her hard work and her leap of faith for starting a business in this economy. Of course the main color is purple because it is her favorite color... ;-)

The little argyle panel was made with her stamps set "Argyle Amazement", the butterfly, flower and leaves were cut with my Cricut and SCAL using her "Flutter and Flowers" Cut file (really great in svg. file since you can resize things the way you want!) I then stamped a pattern on the butterfly with her stamps set "All a Flutter" (tons of options to make your customized butterfly....) and the little border I weaved my ribbon into is also a Cut File called "Random Ribbon"...

The "congratulations" stamp is from a My Favorite Things sentiments set (I think she'll forgive me!... ;-)) and the border punch at the bottom is from EK Success.

I hope she likes it. It must be quite a feeling, albeit a weird one, seeing something made with stamps and such that you created!! :-)

"Bee-day"

A birthday card for my french friend Soizick, who knows me under the nickname of Bee, so I had to use that stamp set... ;-) And the bee dictated the yellow, which dictated the ribbon... Not my colors again, but it reminds me of spring so we're all good! :-)

Button Ballons

This is my last card for "my soldier". I just found out she is going home! :-)

If you'd like to support the troops, check out http://www.soldiersangels.com/, they have lots of opportunities for volunteers. You don't have to "adopt" someone, you can also chose to send cards to random soldiers. I think I will do that next, it was harder than I had expected to write regularly to someone you don't know a thing about without getting any feedback at all! I hope the visual of the cards did make up for the beyond boring writing inside!... ;-)

Anyway, simple straightforward card. Totally out of my comfort zone though, because those are not my colors. I hate yellow so I rarely use it but I picked my colors to match the flower ribbon so... ;-)