Fun at the Venetian Festival

What a fun day at the Venetian Festival yesterday! We rode rides, ate ice cream, watched the boat parade and the fireworks. This is a wonderful festival every year in St. Joseph. It's still going on today so I'll do my part for St. Joseph tourism and recommend you come take a peek before it closes at 7:00 tonight. Make sure you check out the town of St. Joe and the beautiful Silver Beach.

A New Look

I wasn't planning on changing my background for quite awhile because I really loved the one I chose but when I woke up this morning that background had completely disappeared along with the website I got it from so here we are with a different look, hope you like it. There won't be a new craft today as I have company coming but I do have a free day tomorrow and will continue on pulling out unfinished projects hoping to inspire you to do the same. Thanks to everyone who commented on my son's little art project, he was absolutely thrilled to get so many comments.

Art and Soul - Close to my Heart Television - New Episode!!

Before you see what I'm crafting today I wanted to let you all know that Close to my Heart has a free online tv show on my website called Art and Soul. It usually runs about 10-15 minutes and you can see new crafts, scrapbook pages, cards, etc. being made every month. The best part is that if you like what you see, you can do the whole thing at home with products that are especially discounted because they are part of the video! Check it out today and see what I'm talking about.

I'm not quite sure what this is

I promised my son I would post his artwork on my blog, this is the "moustache man" he made at Bible School.

Make your own pattern paper! Another unfinished project.

Are you ready for some inspiration. One of the nicest things about owning stamps is being able to make customized patterned paper. If you own a good selection of ink pads and several stamp sets you are in a position to make multiple designs for your scrapbooking and stamping needs. And isn't it fun to just play around with different patterns and colors? Here I took the stamp set Floral Elements (unfortunately retired) and fell in love with the rounded off square shapes. Just looking at them immediately made me think of doing a grid pattern for a couple of cards. I made the cards up to the point of rounding the corners a couple of weeks ago at a crop but they were sitting in my unfinished box until yesterday. I'm so glad I finished them.

I already had out the three colors that go with the Daydream papers so I laid them out in front of me along with a Double Scrubber to clean off your stamps in between stamping. The colors are lilac mist, blush and sweet leaf.

Take three of the same sized squares and stamp each in a different color in a straight line on your 12 x 12 paper. It's totally okay if you go off the page, give up that perfectionism!!

Fill your paper with the squares. If you noticed I didn't follow a certain pattern, that way if I were to mess up, it wouldn't matter.

Cut your paper for cards, I made two 5 1/2 by 4 1/4 cards. Isn't that pattern pretty? See how easy this is, just choose a stamp set and play!

Round off the edges with a corner rounder and then use your foam tool (sponge on a stick) to distress the sides with one of the colors you used, I used blush.

Cut two card bases 8 1/2 by 5 1/2 each, score them at the 4 1/4 inch mark and fold.

Cut two 1 inch by 5 1/2 inch strips of the blush paper. Distress with the blush ink.

Glue the strip onto the patterned paper, about an inch up from the bottom.

Cut two pieces of white paper 2 1/8 by 2 1/8 and then cut blush paper 2 1/4 by 2 1/4, distress the edges with blush ink.

Since the colors are so big and bright, It's a Zoo stamp set just fits the look!

First take one of largest squares on your Floral Elements set and stamp in sweet leaf, attach to the blush mat.

Now take the hippo and stamp it in blush at an angle so you can flue the squares in a diamond shape on your card.


Cut a white piece of cardstock 1 inch by 2 inches, stamp the words "wild and crazy" on it and distress the edges.

Turn the card vertically, the opening at the right. Attach the hippo about 1/2 inch down from the top making sure that it sits on the sweet leaf strip evenly, the points of the diamond right in the center of the strip. Glue a ribbon one inch from the bottom and attach the "wild and crazy" saying on the left hand side about 1/2 inch from the side.

Since it's a simple card why not add a little liquid glass? I filled in the whole hippo. This much liquid glass will take an hour or two to dry so set it aside. It will become more clear as it dries (I took this picture while it was still wet) and then it will be very shiny and look like an epoxy sticker. Once dry you can glue the card front down on the card base, I let the four corners of the blush cardstock to show but you could use your corner rounder and cut them off if you like. Hope this gives you some other ideas on how to use your stamps!

Don't you love summer?

Just wanted to share some pretty pictures I took at the Krasl Art Festival in St. Joseph, Michigan last weekend. This weekend it's our Venetian Festival. If you have never been to St. Joseph you are really missing out, one of the most beautiful beaches on Lake Michigan and the cutest little town. I feel lucky that it's so close to me.

Framed

I did a workshop last week where we made a layout and framed it. This particular version was inspired by a piece of artwork I saw on a Close to my Heart bulletin board but I can't remember the name of the artist. If anyone recognizes the idea, please let me know her name. In the meantime, here's my friend, Paula and David Archuletta from American Idol. Paula and I go and try and get autographs at the Idol show every year, we've had great luck having met twelve idols so far. This is a great way to display your layouts too! Workshops are a great way to get some scrapbooking or card-making done without having to find the time in your own home. If you are interested in having a workshop in your home and you live in the southwest Michigan area, send me an email and we can set one up for you. caldreamin05@comcast.net

I just got a chance to take a picture of another one of the frames we made at the workshop last weekend. This is using More to Adore paper (above was Back Country) but the same basic layout, the stamp set is Extreme Happiness. You can also add ribbons around the frame, just slip a long piece of ribbon (or two) between the frame and the glass before closing it up in back, tie a bow (or two) and trim the ends. This is my sister and myself a few years back.

Aren't these fun?

A few years back paper dolls used to be so popular in scrapbooks, didn't they? During that time I would make up these dolls and sell them on ebay (with Stamping Station's permission). I was going through old files this morning and found my pictures of these Stick Kids and thought I'd show a few to you, maybe we can have a resurgence of paper dolls! All these designs are from Stamping Station. The raggedies were always my most favorite to make. They reminded me of my sister who always loved Raggedy Ann and Andy. Do kids still love these?

I envy any of you who have been lucky enough to go to Hawaii. That's the ultimate vacation spot, isn't it? The closest I ever got was making these dolls.

This barbeque set is so adorable, I don't know how Stamping Station kept coming up with all of these great ideas.

They not only had Army kids but Air Force, Navy, and the Marines. I have every kit they ever made. Am I the only one who loved paper dolls? I would love to hear what you think. Could we start a doll revolution?

These kids were in a kit called "All Dressed Up," I loved playing with the different hair and outfit colors, every doll could look different. Thanks for letting me share!

Thank you cards

How are you doing on completing your unfinished projects? I know you have some that are nagging at you. Take some time for yourself and pull one of them out.

Today I reached into my unfinished box again and pulled out some non-Close to my Heart cards this time. Yes, it's okay to use paper that doesn't belong to the company you work for! These already had the card faces attached to the card bases (hey, that rhymes) but they had no layers and no embellishments. I had a pile of scraps that went with them so I just started cutting them into shapes with no real rhyme or reason. I was just going to layer them on the cards and keep the stamping simple. I am not sure which company makes this paper, I'm thinking K & Company.


I don't have directions for these cards since I used scraps on all them so there was no real pattern. Hopefully you can get an idea just from the pictures this time.

I used my Gratitude stamp by Close to my Heart because it had a nice simple Thank You phrase. I used the same one on all the cards. You can never have too many thank you cards when you have customers as great as mine!

You can see I've used my favorite Magic Mesh product. I just love the texture that it adds. If you want to find out where to get some of this, let me know.

All sparkles are from Close to my Heart. Sparkles make any card better and they are perfect for filling up a space. I'd love to see how you use sparkles on your cards and layouts.

After you've done enough cards it isn't too hard to make up your own patterns. It takes lot of practice though, that would mean more scrapbooking and stamping, it's tough but you have to do it.

This one was actually already finished and I can tell I made it way back when I first started card making. I chose the wrong colors of eyelets and the flowers are way too dark. Don't make the mistake I made, choose colors that go together.

Here's another one that was previously made. I just added the Thank You.

Here's another one that had the flaws of my early card-making, too many eyelets of the wrong color and no layering. Layering makes the card!

This one was also completed. It looks okay but a strip across the bottom under the flower would have made it better. There's just too much empty space.

Without the flowers or fancy eyelets the card still looks great just with layering of the pretty paper and a few sparkles.

See how those sparkles look like they are all different colors? They really aren't. They just picked up the reflection of the papers, pretty cool, huh?

Even without instructions I hope these cards are giving you some inspiration. You can't imagine how great you'll feel after completing something that's been stuck in a box.

I love this one, when I layer the exact same print on itself with only a distressed edge separating the colors, it just looks cool!

Now everyone can do this card! So easy, just a few strips of paper across it and some magic mesh. A stamped saying and some sparkles and you're done.

It's your turn, get out something unfinshed and get it completed today!

I was thinking about you tonight.

I spend a lot of time thinking about you, my readers, my followers, whatever the proper term is. This blog is for you and I hope that what you have been seeing so far is something you need. I've done a lot of research and there are so many great blogs out there with artwork far better than mine but I always wonder "how did they do that?" So, here I am trying to show you how I do it and hopefully it's written well enough that you can do it too, make a card, a step stool, a layout page. I hope that my pictures and writing are helping you and inspiring you to go out and create for yourself. As always I am looking for feedback so I can make this blog better for you, please leave a comment or email me at caldreamin05@comcast.net and let me know what you think.

Finding Prince Charming

My friend, Heather, directed me to a very neat blog called Mojo Monday where there is a card sketch every Monday. I was inspired and decided to try out this week's sketch. If you've been following my blog for awhile you know I love random stamping so I thought I'd try some on this particular card. I used the Emporium paper and color choices on this card. The stamp set for the random stamping is Connections. A friend had used it on her card and I knew it would be perfect for random stamping so I bought it! The ink colors are Buttercup, Cocoa, Crystal Blue and Sweet Leaf. Choose one of the large circles on your stamp set and randomly stamp in Sweet Leaf over a piece of colonial white paper that you've cut 5 3/4" by 5 3/4". Distress edges with Cocoa Ink.

Choose another circle and stamp randomly in Crystal Blue. I tried to fit the second circle in between the first ones.

Choose one more circle and stamp in Buttercup. This time I put the Buttercup circles right in the middle of the Sweet Leaf ones.

Take one of the small flowers on your stamp set and stamp in Cocoa around the paper, remembering the trick of stamping in triangles, each three stamps should form one.

Pick another flower and stamp in Sweet Leaf and one last little flower to fill in the white spaces, you can use Crystal Blue.

Mat the randomly stamped page on a piece of the Emporium paper, I used the Sweet Leaf floral pattern. Distress with Cocoa ink.

Cut a piece of the Crystal Blue paper (it's on the back of the Sweet Leaf pattern you just used) 2" by 6," distress with Cocoa ink and attach about 3/4" from the bottom of the card. Only glue it on the bottom and the two sides leaving the top open to slip the tags down in later. Turn over that scrap and cut the Sweet Leaf patterned paper 1/2" by 6 and attach it flush with the top of the Crystal Blue paper.

Cut a thin 1/4" strip of paper about 12" long. You are going to tie this like a ribbon, being very careful not to break it. Because it has two sides, it will look very neat no matter which side pops up in the bow. Distress it first with Cocoa ink.

Trim the bow and glue down to the left hand side of your card as shown.

Cut a 2" by 2" piece of the colonial white paper and stamp on it with a word background stamp. I used the retired Floral Elements. Use Sweet Leaf ink. Take one of the accent words and stamp over it in Cocoa. Cut a 2 1/4" by 2 1/4" piece of colonial white and stamp a different background stamp in Cocoa, this one was also from the Floral Elements stamp set. Distress both pieces with Cocoa ink.

Put the square one inch from the right hand side, 1 1/2" from the bottom.

Use your trimmer and a dry embossing tool or a crimper to add texture to a 2 1/2" by 4" piece of Crystal Blue cardstock. To make it easy on myself I dry embossed a larger piece of paper and then cut it to the size I wanted.

Sand the paper to let the white core show through, Close to my Heart is one of the rare companies that has that wonderful white core that can give your pages the distressed look. Distress the edges with Cocoa.

Cut a 2" by 3 1/2" piece of colonial white paper. Distress the edge. Using the adorable Happy Endings stamp set, stamp the princess in Cocoa. We're going to do some paper piecing.

Stamp the princess again on some of the Crystal Blue pattern paper, cut out just the skirt.

Stamp her again on some Crystal Blue cardstock.

Now cut out the sleeves and attach those and the skirt to the orginal stamped image.


Do the same thing with the crown on either Sweet Leaf or Buttercup paper, I thought the Buttercup was a little light so I went with the Sweet Leaf. Color in the rest of the dress with Buttercup ink and a blending pen. Stamp a wand for the little princess (shown on the final card).

On some of that leftover Sweet Leaf patterned paper, stamp the frog. Cut him out and glue him next to the word "love" on your small square. Attach one of our great "regal" foundry bookplates.

Tuck your Crystal Blue embossed piece into the pocket you made on your page and glue it down. Mat the princess on a piece of the Sweet Leaf patterned paper cut 2 1/4" by 3 3/4". Distress edges with Cocoa. Now attach that, slightly tipped, into the pocket.

Get out your sparkles, put a small one on the princess' wand and larger sparkles on the centers of the flowers on the upper half of your card. Attach your finished card front to a piece of cardstock you've cut 12" by 6" and folded in half. You're done! Hope you enjoyed this card!