So far...

Sorry for the quick and dirty post - I'm trying to get some photos from this week up before I run to work. This is my first quote wall - I think it turned out pretty cute.



This is my staging area for quotes - now that I've got the easy wall done, I'm not really sure how I'm going to get to the others. There's a lot of furniture in the way.



I got a Papertrey order last night, and grabbed a kraft scrap to try out my new inks on. I got full-size pads of their Fresh Snow and True Black, and spot-sized pads of Raspberry Fizz, Ripe Avocado, and Spring Rain. I'm LOVING the Fresh Snow and True Black. Maybe I just haven't had a juicy new white or black ink in a while, but they work SO well, and the detail of the black is fantastic. I stamped the flower with Raspberry Fizz, so I thought I'd throw together a background using Fresh Snow on Raspberry Fizz cardstock. It's basic, but I think it turned out cute!

It's a kit!

I was trying to get inspired for Valentine's Day, and brought home these great little boxes from work. I was thinking about the little valentines that kids take to school, and decided to divide up the box and make a valentine kit. It's got pre-folded 3x3 cards, pink squares for matting, various stamped and embossed elements, ribbons, beads, two kinds of flowers, and a fun little button card. Everything all pre-cut for easy assembly!



I did a little paper quilt for the lid, with some zig-zag faux stitching - I'd love to figure out how to do real stitching on paper with my machine, but I don't quite have it down yet.

Miscellany

Made a couple different versions of this owl card for my sister last week - I'd already been thinking of her when I was using the 60s-ish Sassafras Lass paper, and sure enough, she liked it and needed some thank-yous, so I came up with a design that used smaller strips so I'd have enough. I think they turned out pretty cute!



I also got started on some Valentines last night - I'm maybe a little late to the game, but I was looking at some pink and brown cards at work last week and got inspired.



In other news, I did an interview on another crafter's blog - it was really fun! She's a very good interviewer and I enjoyed doing it.

The Finalists

I think I'll need to buy more vinyl... we've come up with some great ones. The finalists, one per wall, are:

"By viewing Nature, Nature's handmaid, art, makes mighty things from small beginnings grow." -John Dryden

"I want an infinite book and the rest of time"

“Art is never finished, only abandoned.” -Da Vinci

"The art of art, the glory of expression and the sunshine of the light of letters, is simplicity." -Walt Whitman

I also made a cute card yesterday to put in my Etsy shop - I love pink and green, and I've been having a ball with some pink glitter I picked up (maybe a little too much... I ended up spilling it EVERYWHERE yesterday).

Suggestions Needed

I just ordered vinyl to put quote cutouts on my wall - I saw a ton in Salado a few weeks ago, and they were all like $50, but I can get some vinyl for $10 and make them myself with a borrowed Cricut, so that's what I'm going to do. But now I can't decide what to put up there... My room is mostly windows, so there's not just a ton of space, but I have all of the walls above the windows to work with. I'm looking for non-cliched, fairly short, inspirational quotes. I'm sort of tempted to put "I sound my barbaric yawp" on the main wall, because it tickles me to think of my little crafts as my own personal barbaric yawp, but I'm open to hearing other suggestions.

Per Casey's suggestion (thanks, Casey!), a photo of the room... I wasn't really thinking about the area over the windows when I took the picture, but you can see what's up there.



And this doesn't show the space over the windows, but you can see more of what the room looks like:

Continuing the process

This may not look like a natural next step in the evolution from my last post, but it is. This is the flip side of the Sassafras Lass paper used on my last owl card. I love how the same flowers go from funky-retro to sweet vintage. I cut around the top edge of the bunch of flowers with my craft knife to make a pocket, then cut a scalloped oval and punched holes to mimic the eyelet lace in the design. The "Bonjour" stamp is from a set I got for Christmas - all put together, it makes a fun card-within-a-card, since the back of the oval is blank and can be removed. It would be a great place to put a photo.

Concept evolution

I got this great card from Emily for my birthday last year. I was looking around my sunroom for inspiration, and noticed it, and remembered that I have the same patterned paper it's based on. And I'm terrible at using orange, so I decided to take a shot at putting my own twist on it.



This was my first iteration - this is how I do things sometimes. Take someone else's concept, basically copy it with a few minor changes, and see what I come up with. If I like it, I'll keep working. In this case, I used my own "Wise Owl" stamp set from Papertrey, a rub-on from a retired Stampin' Up rub-on set for the branch, pearls instead of rhinestones on the corners, and moved the flowers to the left - I made the sentiment part of the image, since I had to enlarge the image a bit to fit the larger owl.



This is my latest iteration, one that I felt comfortable putting on etsy. I obviously don't like putting near-copies of other people's cards up to sell, so I use them as personal cards and as stepping stones to my own creations. In this case, once I was a little more comfortable using orange, I pulled out some AWESOME Sassafras Lass paper (seriously, I love this stuff... I end up buying about three sheets of each paper because both sides are so cute) that has an orange theme, and managed to find some blue and orange scraps in my file to coordinate. I mounted this on kraft paper, because I think it enhances the 60s-style look of the paper, and used a scrap of the kraft for the birthday sentiment. This one's a bit simpler than the original, and I think it's a bit more earthy - it's a very different style for me, but I love it!

Christmas Gifts

Finally, my Christmas gifts! I made these great stationery sets for my mom, mother-in-law, and grandma. I got the stationery itself from Papertrey - they offer a great pre-packaged set of writing paper, envelopes, and a tin for seals. It also comes with adhesive labels for the seals, but I preferred to make my own.

My mom's set was built around this coffee mug I found that was so "her". I'd also gotten Stampin' Up's "Tender Toile" stamp set a while back with her in mind - she loves toile. Her set was stamped with Tender Toile and the JustRite stamper in SU's Buckaroo Blue (retired), River Rock (retired), and Palette Burnt Umber.



I think my grandma's set turned out so modern-cool and still classic. This one used all Papertrey materials - Lemon Tart and Summer Sunrise cardstock, and Lemon Tart, Pure Poppy, and Noir ink. I used Papertrey's "Remember" stamp set and, again, the JustRite stamper.



For my mother-in-law, I wanted something soft and sweet, to go in the cool box I had for her (I wish I'd gotten a picture of that - it was a neat antique toolbox, painted Tiffany blue). I did a floral theme using my Fancy Pants "Pollen Dust" set - one of my all-occasion favorites - and Papertrey's Spring Moss and Sweet Blush colors.

For the seals for all of them, I ran strips of cardstock through my Xyron to get the adhesive on the back, then cut out scalloped circles with a borrowed set of Nestabilities and stamped "From the desk of XXX" with the JustRite stamper. They were perfect for the little tin!

Berry Delight

I uploaded this sweet card set to Etsy yesterday - there are four different garden-themed cards (from Papertrey's Green Thumb set) in a coordinating box. I actually made the box/bag (it's open on top and has ribbon handles, so it's sort of both) a while back, then finally made cards to go in it this weekend.



I'm a sucker for strawberries, so I'm showing my favorite card from the group, but they're all pretty cute, I think.

Tomorrow: The Christmas presents I gave this year! I was so excited about them, but couldn't post them till after Christmas when I'd given them away.

Favorite Bella

I made this card this week to put up on my Etsy site - I need to be better about remembering to post here as well as there. This is my first and favorite bella - Jammybella. The bellas are so much fun to paper-piece, and I especially love picking out coordinating papers for Jammybella's pants and top. Her slippers are fun, too - I keep meaning to try flocking to give them that fuzzy look, but I do at least always put Stickles or Liquid Pearls or something on them to make them a pop.



I made two versions of this card - one with lighter pink and one with darker pink. I'd actually started out making just one, but the background ended up a lot darker overall than the bella, so I figured I'd just split it into two cards and make them coordinate a little better. You can probably tell I love this designer paper from Papertrey - I even ordered an extra pack mostly for the one design. It's so sweet!