'tis (technically) NOT the season!

on the other hand, "christmas in july" has become a bit of A Thing in the wonderful world of online papercrafting, so that's what we have for you this fortnight, which also happens to be our 400th challenge at shopping our stash. if you make a christmas (or hanukkah!) card and link up with us this week, that's one less you'll have to make in december, and you'll be pleased about that when the holidays roll around, trust me! there may also be a present or two involved in this shindig, but more about that in a minute. first, here's my card:

patterned paper: basic grey; chipboard: echo park; burlap flower: petaloo; velvetty flower: we r memory keepers; velvet holly leaves: 7 gypsies; round brads and poinsettia brad: eyelet outlet; ink for edging: ranger distress; adhesives: elmers brand gluetape, 3m foam tape, gluedots

i used last week's sketch saturday, even though i knew it would not be live by the time i posted this. still, it was a great sketch and a huge help getting me started! i've got nothing but elderly stash here: ancient and well-beloved basic grey papers, chipboard from (i think) the very first echo park holiday collection (or at least... the first one i ever saw, lol), older flowers with loads of texture and even some totally old skool round brads!

in the spirit of SOS and also of the holiday season, i have some super-fun blog candy to give away to one random commenter on this post. some of these goodies are old-but-unopened; a few are gently used, but all have plenty of mileage left in them! to enter the giveaway please leave a comment telling me one of your favorite holiday cardmaking "go to's"; whether it's a specific brand or product, a favorite style of image, a never-fail color palette, or even the perfect playlist! comment as many times as you like, i'll announce a winner on the last day of this challenge, which is monday, july 30th!

be sure to head over to sos to help us celebrate challenge #400 and check out the rest of the design team's blogs this week. i cannot guarantee they will all have blog candy, but they will DEFINITELY all have inspiration! ♥

zine winner and ICAD preparedness training :)

many thanks to everyone who entered the drawing for the very awesome daisy yellow zine, issue #11, it was great to see some old friends there and meet new ones, as well! i've consulted the fine folks at random.org and the two numbers chosen are #12 and #15, which means the lucky winners are:

♥diana♥

and

♥phrogmom♥

congratulations to you both, please email me at llaurenb @ hotmail [dot] org and i'll get your names to tammy so she can send your pdf copies! (please note if you already purchased this issue, tammy will be sending you a refund, in lieu!) if you don't happen to be one of the lucky winners, you can still grab a copy at the daisy yellow etsy shop, and it's well worth the trip!!! 

♥♥♥

and now, onto ICAD 2014:

(vintage gardening notebook divider painted with white acrylic craft paint; machine stitched grid with various illustrations glued on; rub-ons by basic grey (mostly cut apart and re-arranged to fit grid); leather flower sticker by k and co; sparkly nature stickers by hallmark)

if you've followed daisy yellow or my blog over the last couple of years, then you'll probably realize it's almost time for the annual index card a day project (aka ICAD) a super-fun exercise which takes place in june and july, and is designed to help us establish (or re-establish, or just amp up) a daily art practice. i have absolutely LOVED participating the last two summers, so of course i'm pretty psyched! tammy's been posting some warm-up exercises to get us all in the mood, plus there's a great FAQ here, and of course there's a totally drool-worthy flickr group! there's even a choice of super-cool, totally colorful graphics by miss tammy that you can post on your blog if you're participating. this one's my fave:

i've been playing around with some of the warm ups, which, unlike ICAD proper, don't have to be done on an actual index card. the photo at the top of this post shows my "grid" from creative warm up #5. strangely enough, quite by accident, i did wind up working in a space that's pretty close to 3x5! i decided to use this divider from a cool vintage gardening book as my base, so i painted out the text at the bottom of the page, which just happened to be around that size! how cool is that?! something that's been taking up quite a lot of my daydreaming time lately are the improvements we're hoping to to make in our yard and garden this summer: we want to replace the old fence on one side of the property; we need to re-grade around our basement windows; we're planning to plant a few more trees out front, etc etc; so i suppose that is how this evolved into sort of a visual wishlist! here's a photo where you can see the whole page better:

i've also made a portable ICAD creation station, as described in warm-up exercise #4. it's actually my collage "treasures" box* full of lovely small-scale vintage and found items, PLUS my portable travel-journal tool kit, with some additional drawing and coloring instruments. i've added a nice supply of index cards: plain, ruled, and a few to which i've randomly pre-glued interesting backgrounds. somewhere i think i still have some uber-bright neon green ones... i have to find those before sunday, for sure! :)

as far as how i'm going to keep and store the finished cards, i'm 99% sure i'm going to punch the cards and add them to a (big honkin') book ring as i go along. that's what i did in 2012 and it worked well. last year i started out with a small plastic index card holder box, but outgrew it within a month and ended up punching them later. but i'm still deciding about 2014.

are ♥YOU♥ going to ICAD this summer? i know, i know, we all have too many commitments already, and if you have kids, the summer means they'll be home all day long. but it's only one card a day, and it's soooooooooooo much fun! plus, this is such a great way to try new techniques, explore different media, play around and just generally step outside your creative comfort zone in a really really GOOD way; there's NO pressure to end up with a beautiful finished product... this is just for ♥YOU♥!!! plus, did i mention there's a kid version this year??! c'monnnnnnnnnnnnnn... give it a try!!!

*ok, technically it's an empty fabriano box in which the awesome miss amy mailed me a little present last year; because she totally knows i'm the kind of gal who swoons over a beautiful box, and saves it to store treasures!!! thanks, amy! ♥♥♥

happy mail, for you and for me! ♥

first a little trip to random.org to determine the winner of my blog candy giveaway... mr. random himself has personally chosen lucky number 11 which means the winner is...

♥BANANASTAMPER♥!

please email me at llaurenb @ hotmail {dot} com so i can get your goodies on the way to you ASAP!

♥♥♥

now here are a couple of lovely things which arrived in MY mailbox last week, which i just HAVE TO show off. first up, an early birthday present from my lovely norwegian friend linda brun:

yeah, basically, there's a little bit of every type of art supply i enjoy... YUM!!! but then, all of this paled in comparison when i saw the gorgeous canvas linda made me:

 i ♥LOVE♥ it!!!

(btw, "det gryr av var" means "it was the dawn of" which makes it even more awesome, no?!)

coincidentally, on the very same day, my lovely friend missus trash sent me a super-cool "just because" present, in the shape of an adorable felt bird, which of course i ADORE:

i'm showing it off standing next to the fabulous custom clutch she made me several months ago, (with the coolest robot in the world embroidered on it!!!) only because although i *KNOW* i wrote a post about it at the time... somehow... i cannot find the post... so i'm showing it again! (proof that i love and USE it constantly for carrying amigurumis-in-progress, there are my extra stitch markers, dangling from the zip!) :)

finally, a giant vote of thanks to everyone who took the time to leave a comment with regard to my dental woes, those words of encouragement were MUCH APPRECIATED! it turns out i will, be getting an "implant"... (sadly--or perhaps luckily?-- i mean a tooth, and not the first step in a pamela anderson makeover!) ... a process which will require 3-4 rather nasty appointments over the next six months and cost more than a trip to disneyworld. but... the periodontist and everyone in his office were lovely and VERY kind; and i'm told the lines will be much shorter than the ones for space mountain! not sure if i can get the staff to dress up as my favorite princesses, although at these prices i really think they ought to be a liiiiiiiiiiiiittle more flexible on that point. the next big day is june 12th, at which time i'll probably be hitting you up for some more good vibes!

in the meantime, to miss linda, missus trash, and all the rest of you i say,

thank you, thank you, thank you, darlings!!!

♥♥♥

"shopping *MY* stash" blog candy giveaway (+ birthday princess crown)

have you been checking out the entries over at shopping our stash for the special two-week birthday bingo challenge? if not, you ought to high tail it over there, for they are quite spectacular! so much so, that i was inspired to create another project for this occasion. it's a birthday princess crown, for niece madeline, who turned eight last week!

i know, i know, it's a bit KERRRRR-AYYYY-ZEEEE, even for me; but i made one for miss riley last year and another for lindsay marie this past autumn, and i guess knowing this would be my last shot spurred me on to bold new levels of embellishment, both front and back, inside and out!!!

(base of crown made from 12x18" heavy duty oaktag; patterned papers (nearly all scraps!): creative imaginations, doodlebug, dcwv, echo park, anna griffin, sei, prima, mme, bo bunny, ki, and maybe a few more miscellaneous scraps!; florals: prima; ribbon + lace trim: michaels; rose trimmings: webster's pages; brads: american crafts; pins: pink paislee, joann essentials, k and co; gems and pearls: kaiser, martha stewart, recollections; butterfly punches: martha stewart; border punches: martha stewart, fiskars, recollections; stamps: autumn leaves, pti; inks: colorbox, ranger, stayzon; pen: copic multiliner; adhesives: xyron, tombow monorunner, 3m foam tape, gluedots, hot glue, sewing machine)

since, as i mentioned, this is a special SOS two-week anniversary challenge, we are still rockin' our awesomely inspirational bingo card; so you can choose ANY row or column you like, you just need to have five consecutive items!

i've used the diagonal row which starts at the top left space this time, so i've got: 

YELLOW 

(butterflies + flags + 1 border strip) 

PEARLS 

(brads + butterfly accents + some of the pennants) 

free 

(LOTS and lots of extras!!!) 

RIBBON 

(the laces and bow which hold it together) 

PINK 

(check! multiple shades, even!)

and now here's the blog candy giveaway: 

in true spirit of shopping our stash, i thought it was appropriate that my candy consist of things i already had... but unaccountably hadn't used or even opened... stuff i either "outgrew" or just bought too much of! so one lucky winner will receive a really mixed bag of older (but complete and pristine!) products of which this picture gives you an idea:

what's in there? oof--what ISN'T in there might be quicker to answer, lol! ok, well, there's an american crafts 12x12" paper pack, loads of alphabets, a bit of chipboard, felt embellies, ribbon, tags, stickers, journaling cards, and... well, there might even be a few "surprises" that i add in over the course of this week; feel free to enter as many times as you like, by leaving a comment on this post. the winner will be chosen by random draw and announced next monday, may 28th. good luck, darlings! ♥

ps: even a remedial black-thumbed non-gardener such as myself knows that the flowers on yesterday's card are DOGWOODS and not magnolias! i was just... ummmmmm... testing you, yeah, that's it, testing!!! :) :) :)

just enough stuff ♥GIVEAWAY♥!

i've been having a great time this week on the pixie blog telling you about some of my favorite uses for vintage goodies and talking about the fun stuff that's in my etsy shop, but now i'd like a little help from you... and i'm willing to "pay" for your assistance... sound good?! 

everyone who leaves a comment on this pixie post (<------click that link to go there!) between now and friday night, telling me their favorite vintage item to use for crafting will be entered in a random draw and the prize will be to choose $15 dollars worth of items from my etsy shop, JUST ENOUGH STUFF!

hop on over and check it out!♥

lucky devil!

and now without further ado... according to the fine folks at random.org, the winner of the "handsome devil" is:

*4*

so congratulations and a happy hooray to:

♥♥♥MARI♥♥♥

please contact me via llaurenb @ hotmail [dot] com with your snail mail address, so i can ship this little baby out to you ASAP! many thanks to everyone who played and especially for the cool APP suggestions which i LOVE!

xolauren

APP-solutely ♥devilish♥ amigurumi giveaway!

it's been too long since we've had an amigurumi giveaway, dontcha think?! so let's have one NOW!!! this handsome devil was made with an excellent & easy-to-follow pattern from simple arts planet:

i did the crocheting on my california trip, the finishing on our drive down to visit LHJ's parents, and the mouth sitting on my couch last night. the backdrop in the photo is made of harley-davidson papers that i brought to make a card for my b-i-l; the little toolbox is from home depot and intended to hold a giftcard... i'm planning to put little candies in it for nephew matthew's birthday. don't ask me why i thought these items would make for a nice picture, but i did. i also have AC/DC's "highway to hell" stuck in my head now. go figure.

at the moment, my favorite thing in the world is my early-birthday-present ♥i-phone♥, so to be eligible for the giveaway, howsabout you leave me a comment recommending your favorite APP? if you don't "do" apps, you can leave me a link to a blog or website, instead; or if you're realllllllly old skool, you can tell me a book you love. although if you're THAT old skool, it's hard to see what you'd be reading this post on! :)

enter as many times as you like, we'll keep this open until... let's say wednesday, june 29th at midnight? and i'll announce the winner (via random draw) on the 30th.

♥good luck, darlings!♥

and the dragon winner is.......

and according to the fine folks at random.org, the winner is #4!

so according to the comments, that means a small green amigurumi named

♥DRACONIS♥

will be packing his tiny crocheted suitcase to go and live with the lovely

♥CHERYL NELSON♥

cheryl, best to put fresh batteries in the smoke alarms, stock up on beef jerky, and email me (llaurenb @ hotmail dot com) with your snail mail address, cause this guy is keen to travel!!!

many thanks to all who entered! if i ever need to name another dragon, or indeed any small cute creature, i know exactly who i'll ask first...there were some AWESOME names sent in!!!

♥♥♥♥

and the winner isssssssssssssssss:

accordion to the calculations of the fine folk at random.org the winner of the halloween ♥MONSTA♥ giveaway is...wouldja believe? contestant #1*??!?! which, in this case, means that the lovely miss

♥DAWN♥

should email me using the address on my profile page in order that i can ready cthulhu for his (or her?!) journey! congrats to both dawn and cthulhu, i hope you will have a very HAPPY HALLOWEEN together! ♥♥♥

*i realize that statistically speaking, if you're going to choose a random number out of a series of numbers, EVERY number automatically has an EQUAL chance of being picked...but i don't think i've ever heard of #1 winning...have you?! kinda cool, really: no longer will i worry that if i am the first commenter i have NO CHANCE! :)

halloween ♥MONSTA♥ giveaway!

what's cute and ♥green♥ with arms, wings, and tentacles?! drat, i was hoping you knew, cause he (or she?!) is sittin' right next to me!!! and he (or she?!) is longing to take a little trick-or-treating trip to SOMEONE'S house in time for halloween!!!

wikipedia describes h.p. lovecraft's creation cthulhu as being part dragon, part octopus, and part alien entity...but as translated in creepy cute crochet terms he (or she?!) is entirely adorable!

to enter the giveaway, leave a comment on this post telling me what you're going to be for halloween this year OR your favorite costume from your trick-or-treating days OR what you'd secretly like to dress up as if you were a person who dressed up for halloween! i will close the comments at midnight on sunday, october 24th and choose a winner by random draw.

monsta love, darlings!

~♥♥♥~

and the giveaway winner is...........................

can i get a drumroll, please? or perhaps a fanfare? no?? too early to be so noisy on a saturday? well alrighty then, let's get right to the number chosen completely scientifically by the random number generator at random.org, which was...

♥15♥

...which means that the lovely...

♥♥♥♥♥ Sandy Ang ♥♥♥♥♥
is our lucky winner!

hooooraaaay!!!

many thanks to all those who entered and shared their awesome coincidence stories, or just said "howdy"-- it's always nice to hear from friends both old and new!!!
♥

SANDY, please email me your info using the address on my profile page, so i can get this big box of fabulousness (which is totally PINEAPPLE-FREE!) on its way to you ASAP!

LAST DAY! coincidental *163* giveaway!

ETA friday morning: since i don't have anything fab to show you today, i thought i'd put this post back on top and give anyone who hasn't yet left a comment the chance to jump in before midnight! back tomorrow with a random winner and my 2S4Y card for this week! happy friday the 13th, darlings!

~♥♥♥~

yesterday it came to pass that i reached 163 blog followers... (thank you very much!) ...on my 163rd blog post!!! how cool is *THAT*?! being the coincidence-loving weirdo that i am, this of course inspired me to choose 163 things from my vast stash of indescribably funky vintage stuff and stage a giveaway!

perhaps you'd like to see what's at stake?!

there's too much to list, but i've photo-ed it in groups...we've got lace & ribbon & fabric scraps & buckles & sparkly stuff...

representin' the scrappy contingent, there's bling & stickers & rubber stamps & book plates & confetti & lots & LOTS of flowers...

from the land of uncharacterizableness comes a whollllllllllllllle lot of vintage buttons & different sorts of beads & a bunch of game tokens & poker chips & a tiny eiffel towel & an even tinier turtle!

finally, if you like miscellaneous paper stuff you will love this bunch of game cards & puzzle pieces & little map thingies & spinners & over a million dollars in genuine play money!!!

all together, it looks a bit like this, but believe it or not it all fits in a mailable box and i will send it all to *YOU* if you're the lucky winner!!!

to be eligible for my random drawing, just leave a comment on this post by midnight this friday... (the thirteenth!) ...and tell me a cool cooincidence that has happened to you OR your favorite conspiracy theory OR a weird and wonderful fact about youself OR heck just say hello!

travel book giveaway!

now that you see how easy the whole travel book process is once you sensibly embrace *CHEATING* the way i do, wouldn't it be great if you had a book of your own to try it out? well, then, how about this one?



yep, i made an extra one, with a decorated cover, days-of-the-week pages, themed pages, and loads of blanks to fill in however you'd like. you only need to add some memories...and maybe a postcard or two!

just leave a comment on this post telling me your favorite vacation...or your dream vacation...by midnight on thursday, july 29th, and i will choose a random winner to get the "GO!" book...and maybe i'll even throw in a few travel-inspired vintage goodies from my stash, too!

halloween cards (& blog candy winner!)

i don't usually "do" halloween, but when jolene surprised me with these *FABULOUS* recollections monsta stamps, i knew immediately that i had to use them to make cards for the nieces and nephew. (well, i mean, there are FOUR of them...and they are LITTLE MONSTAS...how perfect can ya get??!) these guys are hangin' out over at caardvarks today, where there's also additional holiday eye candy for your viewing pleasure!

(monstas: recollections clear stamps; text background: justrite "brayton uppercase" font set; patterned paper: bo bunny, kaiser, sassafras, basic grey, scrapbook wizard, gcd, autumn leaves; cardstock: core'dinations; black glossy cardstock: ranger; inks: colorbox & staz-on; ribbon: michaels; buttons: joann fabric; adhesives: xyron, tombow mono runner, 3m foam tape)

i based the entire set on this adorable sheet of bo-bunny paper, which i actually bought for its reverse side during the Great Purple Quest surrounding niece lindsay's birthday. i know it sounds nuts to say the whole thing's based on this when there is only one teeeeeeny circle of it used, but the color scheme, the cute-but-not-cutesy style, and the verrrrrrrry faint distressing all came directly from here. see?

to make the spooky "boo BOOOO boOOoOOOooO" text background behind the monstas i used the larger block of my justrite horizontal wood stampers set and all the B's and O's (& zeros & upside down Q's!!!) from the font set and the 2 3/8" round stamper set; then i stamped the whole thing on each color of basic grey solid paper...then lined up just underneath each block... (the JR's are easily aligned if you work pretty parallel and trim the edges) ...and stamped again to fill the space. i wanted each one to be the same...but different...and i don't have any halloween text stamps.

i made the "tombstone" by tracing a fancy colorbok chipboard frame (from darling june); the bats are hand-drawn & mounted on jewelry wire with foam tape. you can't really see it in the photo, but the b&w panels and the colored mats are attached to each other (& the card) with machine stitching. "happy halloween" is computer-generated in "westate" font & printed on avery clear labels; it's inside each card, as well. oh yeah, and everything with eyes has a googly eyes...except the bats, who have teeeeeeeeeeny purple pearls. you know, to make them more *realistic*! :)

ok so now that all the creative essplainin' stuff is over, let's get to the GOOD PART, ok?!?! by which i mean, of course,

who won the blog candy??!

the random number generator chose # 32

which means that ♥Leah♥ is the lucky winner!

(which is quite funny, since her nom d'blog is "LEAH THE ORANGE" & i had already turned this bit of text orange for halloween!)

please email me with your postal address, missus, so i can get your goodies in the mail ASAP!

many thanks to everyone who played & all to the darlings who linked to my giveaway! i ♥LOVED♥ reading all of your favorites and hope you had a chance to look at everyone else's answers, because there's some great stuff there!!!

candy, candy, CANDY!!!!!!

and the winner...as determined by the random number generator at random.org is:

NUMBER THREE!!!

c'mon down

♥MARJOLEIN!!!!!!!!!♥

email me with your address and i shall be off to the post office, post haste, and a wholllllllllllllllllle lot of stuff will be on its way to you!!!

many thanks to all who participated, and for all the fabulous input on your likes, dislikes, and ideas for challenges! i assure you every comment has been noted and considered! i hope you enjoyed the CAARDVARKS readers' weekend...if you haven't gotten over there yet, do go and have a look, because there were some AMAZING cards--and cardmakers--featured over the course of the three days!

and now, it's back to real life--happy monday, darlings!!!

***frenzied spring-cleaning blog candy giveaway gala weekend spectacular!!!***

and the prize goes to the first person who can say that three times, fast!!! (~lol~)

nope, as is customary on these occasions, the winner shall be picked randomly from the comments made on this post between now (friday may 1st--happy may day, btw!) and midnight on sunday (may 3rd). but i seem to have gotten just slightly ahead of myself. let's start over, shall we?!

if you are here as part of the CAARDVARKS gala reader weekend, may i extend an extra-special

HELLO!

and

welcome!

i'm so pleased you stopped by and hope you are having a lovely time! be sure to come along to CAARDVARKS on tuesday to check out the new challenge, it's a good one, with a prize you will *love*!

speaking of PRIZES, let's talk about the candy now, ok? first off, you might be thinking, "hey lauren--why is it called the FRENZIED SPRING-CLEANING blog candy giveaway?" i'm so pleased you asked! it's called that because, while 10% the things in the photo are current product bought (on sale, mostly) with a view to being blog candy; the other 90% have been gleaned from a recent, long-overdue, clearout of my stash. everything here is in "brand-new" condition: it's unused... it's full sheets... it's unopened packages...but...most of it is *OLDER* product. so in other words, if you are a strict "latest-and-greatest" sort of supply person, this will probably not appeal to you!

there are LOADS of stickers, a whole bunch of rub-ons, a couple of little clear stamps, some prima flowers & paper birds, a box of heidi swapp colored pencils, a cute chipboard mini-album that's shaped like a house, some iron-on thingies, a set of unopened (but the plastic's yellowed with age, and i have NO IDEA where they've come from) hero arts flower-border stamps which may have come over with the pilgrims on the mayflower...

lemme sum up: there is A LOT of stuff here, and i think it all reallllllllllllly wants to come and live at your house!!!

(the STUFF: in real life, this is a 2 foot by 3 foot of my dining room carpet. don't worry, the carpet is not included. but everything else is ALL YOURS!!!)

right, so you've read this far, and you are undiscouraged. so now you are probably wondering, "hey lauren--how can i become eligible to *WIN* this enormous assortment of only vaguely appalling old stuff?!" i'm so pleased you asked! since this *IS* the CAARDVARKS gala reader weekend...and since we are all about making the CAARDVARKS card challenge site even more fun for our lovely readers...i'd love to hear your thoughts about challenges!

leave me a comment telling me the best challenge you've entered...whether it was at 'VARKS or elsewhere: why was it best--great theme, cool prize, exciting DT examples?

OR
tell me your LEAST favorite challenge--one that you just COULD NOT figure out how--or maybe WHY--to do it! was it too specific? too "far out"? too vague? spill the dirt...but in a NICE way, ok?!

OR

tell me a challenge that you keep *hoping* to see, but no one has ever done yet! wanna make cards based on pink floyd lyrics? hoping for a dried-macaroni-collage invitational? we are always on the lookout for something new!

there's a lot of scope here, folks. tell me something about art challenges generally, and you shall be entered in the drawing! you may enter as many times as you like, but you have to leave a pertinent comment each time. i will ship world-wide. if i can figure out how to close the comments at the end i will, but if not we will just go with midnight on sunday, US eastern standard time.

thanks for stopping by

and good luck!!!

~♥♥♥~

and the winner is...

(hehehe--i've always wanted to say that!)

ok, sorry, sorry, sorry. just kidding. daniel craig did not win the beautiful things blog candy giveaway! even though many would argue strenuously that he does in fact constitute a BEAUTIFUL THING by pretty much any standard we could set.

but i digress.

the handy dandy random integer generator when queried, had this to say:

Random Integer Generator
Here are your random numbers: 18
Timestamp: 2008-08-04 11:57:53 UTC

which means...

(can i get a drumroll here?)

the winner of the beautiful things blog candy giveaway is...

ZARAH!!!

*hooray!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!*

i will be mailing her lovely pack of goodies as soon as i find out where they go, so zarah, if you're reading this, g'head and email me your address!!!

many MANY thanks to all who stopped by and shared their beautiful things, i had a blast reading them! i wish i had a prize for *EVERYBODY*!

(...especially you-know-who!)

(hubba hubba!)

BLOG CANDY--extended!!!

edited and reposted, saturday 8-2-08

being as how blogger has been exceptionally temperamental for the last 24 hours, and i have heard from several people that they were unable to access the comments section during that time, i have decided to

extend the drawing deadline

until midnight, on sunday 8-3

(...and i will leave this post on top until then...)

it hardly seems possibly that it's been twelve months since, inspired by clare grant’s amazing blog, three beautiful things, i quite hesitantly decided to embark on my own daily “3BT’ journal! but since i have four--count ’em four--completed 3-month books to prove it, clearly an entire year has indeed elapsed!

the idea was to combine my growing interest in the idea of art journaling with the safety net of the 3BT structure. (seeing as up until then my attempts at journal/diary-keeping had lasted a week, tops, i felt i needed the back-up of something *particular* to record each day!) it took a while for me to get into the routine, and even longer to really allow the “art-journaling” part of it to catch fire, but it has become a habit that's often the best part of my day!

i love looking at all four books together: the first one is tiny, almost entirely flat, and uses hardly anything but the plain ivory pages with which it came stocked; the second is 4 x 6” and while still quite lump-less i had begun to mix in postcards and other ephemera; book three, at 5” square, has started to have some pages with texture, and ribbons & other embellies overhang the edge of an occasional page; the last volume mingles pages of every shape and size, and is crammed full of all the day-to-day treasures i feel compelled to collect and save!

to celebrate my year of “beautiful things” ...and since i've been very remiss in allowing benchmarks like 100 posts and my one-year blogiversary pass unremarked... i've assembled a little collection of BLOG CANDY goodies. look:

the lucky winner gets: 2 making memories 9 x 9 paper packs ("bella" & "sam"); a christina cole 8 x 8 paper slab; an assortment of glittery handmade 8.5 x 11 papers; a set of technique tuesday clear stamps ("petal pushers"); a set of my sentiments exactly clear alphabet stamps ("collage caps"); some mambi bling; american crafts metal photo corners; 2 packs of li'l davis designs glitter garden chipboard shapes ("floral ice" & "floral rose"); 2 packs of chip chatter flower shapes…and maybe one or two surprises from my vast collection of vintage weirdness!

just leave a comment on this post by the new deadline, midnight, sunday august 3, telling me one of YOUR beautiful things for the day to be included in the random drawing. so tell your friends...tell your grandma...tell your grandma's friends and your friends' grandmas ...OR... keep it all to yourself & increase your odds; but whatever you decide, be sure and enter today for a chance at the swag!!! ♥♥♥♥♥

ps: many thanks to nina for teaching me the secret of the tiny heart!!! :)

so then, what's next?

i have not meant, in my recent posts, to imply that i won't be 3BT-ing anymore! in fact it's so much of an ingrained habit now, i'm not sure i could stop if i wanted to--which i don't! :) however, thanks to having a whole year of journaling under my belt, i now feel like i have the confidence to pursue the "ART" part of "art journaling" a bit more! so i've got me a very special little lined notebook for the 3BT... (which the lovely monkee maker gave me a while back; i've been savin' it for something special!) ...and i've made a special home for what i hope will be daily art pages!

'member this guy??!

(5x7 art journal made from: large sheet of chipboard; page from a vintage child's book about the solar system; love elsie patterned papers; sharpie pens, colorbox inks)

yes, it's the very cleverly disguised flying purple people eater, from back in april! i found him recently in a stack of "stuff too cute to throw out" and thought he seemed like the perfect muse for a slightly nervous newbie art journaler. being as he is a uniquely stylish kind of guy, i don't suppose i can go too far wrong under the PPE's expert tutelage, do you??!

(the back of said journal; eventually it will have the name of the project and dates inscribed upon it; but...and here is proof of how silly i can be...i don't like to do that until it's full--for fear of jinxing the project!!!) :)

i suspect there will be some cross-over btw the new and old journals, as my main fear is a lack of daily subject matter. i find it quite comforting to know that when i haven't got a firm idea i can always "fall back" on one or more of a day's three beautiful things as my inspiration; whilst also going a bit further afield into conceptual ideas that don't involve text. or that's the IDEA, anyway; we shall see how it goes!

♥ in the meantime ♥

you have until MIDNIGHT TONIGHT (friday, august 1) to enter the famous beautiful things blog candy giveaway! just leave a comment ON THE ORIGINAL POST and tell me one of YOUR beautiful things for the day. i'll be picking the winner randomly, and announcing the name tomorrow! good luck to all...i only wish i had prizes for everybody!!!

random stuff i've learned from a year of 3BT-ing

before saying one more word on this subject let me re-emphasize that not just this project, but the ENTIRE IDEA AND CONCEPT of "three beautiful things" is the pure genius of the lovely and amazing clare grant! if you like *anything* about this, pleeeeeeeeeeease go along and check out her blog--you can thank me later!!! there is NO WAY i would ever have thought this up on my own; i am continually awestruck by the way she can distill the very essence of an experience into one perfect...and perfectly evocative...sentence; she has my heartfelt thanks and admiration always!

and now a few summing up thoughts for the year:

1. my friend beshka’s advice, “give yourself permission to make something ugly” …a thing which i at first didn't understand…and then did not believe helpful…is a statement of absolutely invaluable genius for which I am grateful pretty much every single day!

the very first page i made...bird mania had only just begun!

2. “using up” time, energy, and supplies on a “morning page” is never EVER a waste... (i feel i owe julia cameron quite a large and sheepish mental apology on this point!) ...more like an investment; one that pays serious dividends!

3. making “pointless” things (those which cannot be given or sold and don’t “lead to” anything else) is hardly ever pointless…and almost always leads to something else…eventually…that i could not possibly have imagined or planned for.

a recent page featuring the "new baby", whom i have christened "sister klara" in honor of kristie's old pal

4. having always hoarded little bits of paper, stickers, badges, advertisements, postcards, photos cut out of magazines…some wind up in a project or greeting card but lots more just get “saved” in a box or clutter my desk until either feel frustrated or finally part with them. a daily journal provides an EXCELLENT home for such treasures!

5. my handwriting isn’t so bad, afterall; and immediately makes any item on which it is featured uniquely “MINE” (if not always uniquely *readable* lol!)

a recent page made with ZERO planning...testament to instinct kickin' in when it's needed!

6. it sounds counter-intuitive, but 3BT-ing is actually quite effective against mild depression. it turns out there is often quite a bit to be happy about, which just gets hidden or forgotten in the rush and bustle of daily life. especially if there are bigger, less positive things going on...it is quite helpful to be actively seeking the good stuff!!!

7. shaped pages (like, say, a flower) can be challenging to work with…but they make ya think in creative ways! in fact, generally speaking, a "problem to solve" can be your best friend, creatively.

8. planning is excellent…but sometimes “winging it” is great! once in a while you’ve just gotta start drawing/stamping/gluing WITHOUT A PLAN!!! (& a journal is the ultimate no-pressure, no-audience, no-expectation setting for such experiments!)

a vintage party invitation i have been "saving" for...something...yet loathe to use! VOILA! it's been given a permanent home where it can be loved and cherished!

9. i don’t have to love how every page turns out! (you have no idea what a breakthrough this one was for me!!!) pages which are the most fun to make might not be my favorites to look at…or vice versa...and that’s ok.

10. if i never make anything i HATE…i am probably not taking enough risks in my art! sometimes it is GOOD to “go too far”!

11. and finally--this is not a NEW insight, but it bears repeating anyway--there are very few paper-crafting crises which can’t be fixed (or at least improved) by the judicious application of rhinestones!!!!!!!!!!

page 366: it only seems right to come full circle!

there are still two days to enter my beautiful things blog candy giveaway!

leave a comment ON THE BLOG CANDY POST and tell me one of your beautiful things for today! ...AND...if you have a few minutes, go and read the ones that people have already left! they are magnificent, every single one! thank you!!!

ps to those who've very kindly expressed interest in seeing additional pages: if you click on the "3 beautiful things" label at the bottom of this post you will get a list of all the posts i have done on this subject...all of which have at least a few pictures!