my two least favorite words...

...are"ROOT" and "CANAL"!!!

i won't bore you with the details, but lemme sum up this weekend by saying that if i'd been offered the chance to swap it for the time last spring when i had the worst stomach flu of my entire life, i would have at least considered making the deal! :(

on the plus side, i discovered that the kozy shack corporation makes MANY fine ready-to-serve products which come in a variety of delicious flavors; some are even sugar free!

needless to say, i was not over-flowing with creativity, and didn't accomplish much of anything, so i'm going to take a couple of blogging days off, catch up a bit, and meetcha back here on friday for the brand new JINGLE BELLES prompt.

in the meantime, if you're looking for something to do, the current JINGLE BELLES prompt is pretty good, if i say so myself. and you could check out the PDP blog where my fellow pixies are rockin' the MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM kit! if you need a laugh, two funny blogs i've recently discovered are: hyperbole and a half (the A LOT is a particular fave!) and postcards to stinks.

right then, i'll leave you to it, i have some very important daytime television to watch; that nice jerry springer has the most interesting friends, doesn't he??!?!

have a lovely week, darlings!

(eat something CRUNCHY for me, ok?!)

♥♥♥

a project just for ♥ME♥!

if you've been reading my blog for awhile, you may remember that last year i talked A LOT about bruce mau's incomplete manifesto for growth. and as much as i talked about it, i *thought* about it even more. i felt like it was one of those things that seriously revolutionized the way i think about art, life and creativity.

i bookmarked the link above and went back to re-read it every couple of weeks. at some point i printed it, as well, and whenever i'd find the print, i'd sit and read it all AGAIN. different bits of it would take turns being the most interesting to me. sometimes a point i previously found uninteresting would suddenly strike me with cartoon-lightbulb-style emphasis. "OH!" i would say, "THAT's what he meant!!!"

eventually i decided i wanted to MAKE a keepsake for myself which would contain the entire manifesto... a little book, maybe? ATC's?? i wasn't sure about format or style or, well, anything. but i figured a really good idea would come to me eventually, if i waited for just the right thing.

then july's pixie dust paperie kit, MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM just happened to have a set of pink paislee flip notes in it. if you haven't seen them, they're little diecut tabbed cards, kind of like you find in a rolodex, but waaaaaaaay prettier. these happen to be from the "sweetness" collection and have a lovely floral theme. and immediately i knew these were just the right thing!

i had to make a few extra pages, of course. and then i had to think of how to do the text, and what embellies to use, and how to hold the entire thing together. but really, once i had the flip notes--and all the other pretties-- in the kit, i was good to go!

the photo above shows the cover and gives you an idea of the style. there are lots more pictures, and a description of how i put the project together on the pixie blog today. i hope you'll stop over and check it out. i am particularly proud of this, and especially pleased that i get to KEEP IT! ♥

JB28: holiday leftovers!!! :)

this week at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ the prompt is "holiday leftovers" by which we mean: make a card using as many scraps, offcuts, bits and bobs as you possibly can! as a rule, one of my favorite ways to do that is to make inchies; another is to emulate the brilliant quilters of the world who constantly astonish us with what they can do with nothing except tiny bits of fabric and a whole lot of ingenuity! i've done plenty of paper-piecing and other techniques that are "lifted" from sewing... but this time i decided to actually use a proper quilting pattern and just adapt it to paper. i considered both the "crazy quilt" style and the traditional "log cabin" pattern, but this quilt--and the step by step guide--at quiltville.com made me decide to try to re-create a "string-pieced quilt".

here's my card:

(patterned paper... OOF... there are lots and ALL were teeny strips in my scrap box, but off the top of my head i see: basic grey, my mind's eye, creative imaginations, love elsie, pink paislee, paper co, and some stamped and misted "essperiments" of my own; blue cardstock (which was a SCRAP!): core'dinations; glossy white cardstock: ranger; poinsettias: michaels & we r memory keepers; snowflakes: ki, recollections, jolees; brad: around the block; gem flourish: oriental trading co; ink: martha stewart; adhesives: tombow monorunner, 3m foam tape, sewing machine; other: decorative scissors)

this was such a fun and easy technique that i thought it'd be fun to show you, step-by-step, how i did it:

1. adhere strips diagonally to square

my square is 5x5" and my strips are of all different lengths and widths. i went light on adhesive since i knew i'd be stitching each piece as well.

2. "quilt" the square

this is optional. if you adhere everything firmly in step one, you can faux stitch or leave it out altogether. i stuck my square to some cheap index stock so that i could run over on the edges with my machine and not have to pull or trim 20,000 thread ends,

3. make the triangles

cut your square in half diagonally and the two resulting triangles in half again; for the pattern shown on card one, cut the four the four pieces in half AGAIN; either way, when you've got all your pieces, re-assemble in a pleasing manner.

4. assemble, mount and "quilt" again

another optional step, but i think it adds a lot of interest. i lightly glued my triangles onto a contrasting square of cardstock, sewed all the way around the perimeter, and finally trimmed the base with decorative scissors. if you prefer the look of step 3, skip this and move right to card assembly!

5. add embellishments

i made a compound layered snowflake/flower accent using a variety of stickers and diecuts, and set it off with a rhinestone flourish.

of course the best bit is, now i quite painlessly have TWO more cards this week... and a few less scraps!

if i was really on the ball, i could've made a whole bunch of the large "strip squares" and then divided them and mixed them up, like one would in a real quilt. but at the moment i'm really enjoying the "once a week" unicard vibe over at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥! hey--why don't you try it, too??!?! :)

lavender and... lime?

last week i had so much fun combining challenges to make the "one of a kind" card* that i thought i'd try to do it again! for the current challenge at city crafter, they are working to a sketch provided by my lovely (& rather brilliant) friend ros crawford, so i had to have a go at that, obviously:

meanwhile, over at shopping our stash, for challenge #6 they've asked for us to make something either entirely out of scraps and leftovers OR to repurpose something. i've kind of gone down the middle on that: all of the papers and stickers with which i've constructed my background are off-cuts from previous projects AND ALSO they include a bit of ledger paper, some sheet music and aglimmer misted japanese workbook page... all of which is sort of re-purposing, though obviously it's not as good as using a bit of packaging or bubble wrap or recycling a soda can!

finally, simon says stamp challenges is doing "lemon and lavender" and i suddenly remembered the cool set of perfume label stickers i bought several years ago and have been using/hoarding intermittently... this one is actually for lavender water, so i was realllllllly doing well... until i decided that i liked GREEN with it much more than yellow, so i sort of changed course there. :) but while i was looking for their blog i found simon says stamp and show where this week they want us to feature a word! and i've got that cool chipboard "SHINE" from a packet leslie gave me (thanks, missus)!!! so i'm swapping out for that one, instead. :)

phew. i sure did have a lot of essplainin' to do! now can i show my card??! thanks.

(recycled bits: vintage ledger paper, japanese workbook page & sheet music; scraps & leftovers: 1/2 of a k&co stamp sticker; 1/2 of a pink paislee ticket strip, 1/2 of a girls' paperie scallop sticker, 2/3 of a prima flourish; other: k&co chipboard word; recollections butterfly; laughing elephant french cosmetic sticker; glossy black cardstock: ranger; adhesives: tombow monorunner, uhu gluestick, sewing machine)

by the way, the "one of a kind" card was lucky enough to be featured on CCCB last week and also in the top 3 at SOS... where stef was, too!!! so i say to both parties, thank you thank you thank you for those very lovely honors!!! ♥♥♥

these are (quite) a few...

...of my favorite things! because when it comes to paper and embellies i have LOTS, and thus also a proportionally large number of favorites. why am i telling you this? well, because this week the shabby tearoom asked to see them! so i went i little bit nuts: i've got loads of pink-n-kraft; some gems & glitter; a little bit of paint ('cause i like to get messy!); a ♥CUPCAKE♥ (who doesn't love those?!); and a feather because ever since kirsty put some into june's pixie dust kit, SUMMER OF LOVE, i've had a mini-obsession.

also this week, shopping our stash challenge #6 requested a card made entirely from scraps OR utilizing recycled/upcycled elements. i've done the latter--and i've actually got THREE different bits of packaging on this card: the butterfly is punched from the cover of a girls' paperie sticker book, the doily is cut from the acrylic sheet to which my prima flowers were affixed, and the "chocolate" cupcake paper is actually the backing sheet from some k&co chipboard words. the weird thing is, i wasn't really TRYING to work any of those in for the challenge... i just really thought they were fab! :)

finally, simon says stamp and show would like to see projects with a word featured prominently, and it just so happened i had fussy cut the "happy" from some teresa collins paper to finish off m'card.

speaking of m'card... i think it's finally time to SHOW IT!!! (yay!) ♥

(vintage: sheet music; patterned paper: girls' paperie, glitz design, teresa collins, tim holtz; flowers & feather: michaels; birthday sticker: girls' paperie; recycled items: see above; pearls: kaiser; brads: doodlebug; butterfly punch: ek success; inks: colorbox; adhesives: uhu gluestick, tombow monorunner, 3m foam tape; other: maya road cupcake chipboard used as a template + sewing machine)

heart shaped pixie trinket box

i know you already know how much i love to wrap presents... i also like to make cute little boxes to hold them! i made this one using july's pixie dust paperie kit, which is called MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM, and totally lives up to its name! there are papers from american crafts, pink paislee, graphic 45, and glitz design; embellies from pebbles and the girls' paperie, and LOTS MORE!

speaking of more: you can see additional photos of this project on the pixie blog today, including one that reveals a sweet little *SURPRISE* hidden inside the lid of the box! check it out, darlings! ♥

JB27: stars OR stripes, forever!

this week, in honor of the 3-day, fourth of july weekend here in the USA, we ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ are making, as the title of this post suggests, cards that feature stars OR stripes on them. you don't have to use BOTH... and you definitely don't have to assay red, white and blue. but i did! :)

first i should mention, i loved last week's cards & things challenges sketch (#84) which i saw on allison fillo's blog, in her brilliant sketch round up feature:

i'm too late to submit for the challenge, but i loved the sketch and it even already had a star on it--how perfect is that?! so obviously i had to use it, and i did:

(patterned paper: basic grey; glitter cardstock: dcwv; cardstock ring sticker: creative imaginations; chipboard journalling sticker: my mind's eye; glitter sentiment rub-on, star brads and star trim: making memories; star dies: nestabilities; border punches: recollections, fiskars, martha stewart; circle punch: ek success; inks: stewart superior, colorbox; adhesives: tombow monorunner, 3m foam tape, sewing machine; other: plain white copier paper, decorative scissors)

if you have a little free time this holiday weekend, i hope you'll hop over to JINGLE BELLES and join in the fun! the inlinkz for this prompt will be open until 6pm on wednesday, and we'd love to see what you will do!!!

whatever you do this weekend, whether it is a holiday for you or not... i hope you will have a fun, safe ♥HAPPY♥ time!!! take care, darlings!!! ♥