Punch Art Critters

Boy, I think I have found the most fun part of scrapbooking/cardmaking for sure...  Punch Art!!!!!!!  For those of you who are immune to the call of Pinterest, you may not have ever seen how cute some of these creations are, but let me tell you... It doesn't just result in an uber adorable finished product, the process is soooo fun and relaxing.  Here are two punch art creations I have been working on.  One was an attempt to copy one that came on a card I received and one was following a template I found on Pinterest.

First up: These awesome little penguins.  You can find the original tutorial HERE, but my exact measurements for each penguin were as follows:

1. 1" white oval for face with eyehole punched out then glued onto black sheet.
2. Lined up carefully, I punched out the 1" black circle so that the white had the same curve, though you could also cut the black circle first and then layer the white oval on top, then flip over and trim along the black edge carefully.
3. Cut two 2" black ovals.  One will be the body, one will be cut in half for the wing.
4. Cut a 2" white oval.  I layered it on the black page then punched out the black oval, but you could do the same as I described in #2 especially if you are using a die rather than a punch.  
5. The beak is cut from a yellow-orange 5 petal flower.  Definitely get one with the rounded point edges vs the completely round edges.  Another option would be a leaf punch. 
6. The feet are made of a 1" oval cut in half length-wise which is slightly different than the original tutorial, but made the most of my punching muscles.  :)

For the turtles, you basically just need a varying selection of circle punches and various shades of green from the same tone.  The holes for the eyes and the spots were just punched out with my crop-o-dile tool and then I put a black ink circle in the center of each eye.  For my turtle, I was sure to ink all the edges of my circles before layering to give it a little depth.  The tail is the only part that isn't just a basic circle punch.  For that I started with a 1" circle and cut a small crescent out of it.  I was able to get 3 tails from each circle.  :)  

I know punch art is nothing new and has been circulating through the Stampin' Up community for years, but I had never seen any examples because I don't follow the card making world very closely since I enjoy scrapbooking more.  Have you tried punch art?  I'd love it if you left me a link to some you have created in the comments or even just to some favorites you have saved to try!  :)

Thanks for visiting!

♥

2012 A Year in Review

I really can't believe another year has come to an end.  Amazing how it seems to start off so slow, but then Halloween to New Years is such a blur!  I wanted to take a moment to look back on some of my favorite projects that I've created over the past 12 months.  You can click the picture to go to the original post. :)

Favorite Card

Favorite Mini

I'm sharing this one with ABAC's year in reviewdesign team project!  Click the pic to go to theoriginal post to see the full series of inside pictures!

Favorite Layout

Favorite Off the Page Paper Creation

Favorite Non Scrappy Project

Favorite Gift

Thanks for visiting!

♥Christy

Day 9: Lace Flowers

Holy blurry video Batman!  My camera really struggled with finding the spot to focus on with the white on white.  I promise to work on getting better at this whole video thing.  :)

This flower can actual be made with most any kind of fun trim, try out your fav!  And don't forget to keep checking back!!

Eighth Day of Flowers

This is such a fun flower.  It can be made in so many designs if you buy white liners and dye/mist them or buy any of the variety of patterns/colors available in the baking section of most stores.  In fact I JUST found some awesome red and green foil liners that I am totally going to try this with next!

Flower #7

We can now return to our regularly scheduled crafting!!!  :)  Thank you to everyone who saw my post on FB and sent their best wishes.  We had a terrible week and unfortunately it prevented me from even checking in online, much less uploading my tutorials I worked so hard on.  Monday the baby kept getting sicker and sicker and by that evening was at the ER with dehydration and a kidney infection, which isn't all that common in little ones, but something we've dealt with her and her sister so we were prepared.  She also got a secondary stomach flu which wasn't related, but only making the dehydration worse.  Wednesday hubby had to go in for a routine surgery and after a weekend of recouping is doing 100% better.  Wish I could have said the same for the rest of us.  1yr olds are notorious for not wanting to share their toys, but their gastrointestinal flu??  SUPER GENEROUS!!!  My 7yr old came home early from school Thursday after getting sick in class, I followed, and my 11yr soon after.  All 4 people over the age of diapers in the house laid out and a 1yr old ruling the roost made for an interesting week/weekend.  So thank you all for the well wishes and the understanding.  I'm still going to be posting the remaining flowers because I am still so excited about them!!  :) :)

Today we are going to be making one of my new favorites.  You can totally change the look depending on the fabric/colors you use.  Any synthetic fiber like tulle, satin, organza, etc work.  Here is the one I made:

Day 6 - Fan Fold Flower

This idea is not new.  I see these EVERYWHERE!!!!  Not just being used as flowers, but on a bigger scale too.  They are super easy and so fun.  Make sure you email or comment with any questions and keep commenting and checking back!!!

Day 5 - Ribbon flower

This is one of the most simple flowers and I could easily knock out 1 every 3mins or so.  They can have such a different look depending on the ribbon you choose to use!!  Please email or comment with any questions and don't forget to keep commenting and letting me know what you think of each tutorial.

Also, after shooting several video's I realized my camera batteries were dying so the picture of the finished product is a little blurry, but it's super duper cute so that's okay!

Day 4 - Easy Peasy Carnation

I'm sure this could easily pass for several other flowers, but I used it as a carnation, so we'll call it that.  I will say I used scalloped circles that were 2" in diameter because it gave me the flower size I wanted, but you can easily make it bigger if you'd like!!!

Email or comment with any questions and don't forget to check back each day for a new tutorial!!!  If you felt froggy, please share it with your friends.  Post it on FB, twitter, add a short sentence/link to a blog post.  Anyway you can help get the word of the 12 flowers of Christmas out and I'd be so super grateful.  :)

Day 3... MIGHT be my favorite

I made this flower a few weeks ago for a ballerina themed princessy project and fell in love with it because the tulle gives it such a tutu look.  So this is being called the Tutu Flower.  Now don't forget if you have any questions, just shoot me an email or comment and I will get back to you.  ...and make sure you keep checking back!!

*several spots I got pretty chatty and you made need to pause to read all the text*

On the 2nd day of Christmas....

Oh yes, it's another flower tutorial!!  This one was a little more trial and error, and then one little tidbit stirred an entire 'Aha moment'!!!  When you are snipping along each circle following along with the video, make sure you cut an even number of slits.  It will make the finished product look nicer and make the making easier.  You will figure out just why when you get to the spreading the very last 'fringe' and think, "well ooops...is this supposed to go up or down"  LOL.

This flower was inspired by a LaLaLoopsy card I created for my daughter.  They are little rag doll inspired baby dolls that she absolutely is gaga over.

You can comment or email me with any questions you may have after watching the video and I will answer back here (or respond via email when possible).  Stay tuned tomorrow for a flower fit for a princess!! :)

On the 1st Day of Christmas....

♪♫ how does that song go again???  I'm sure it given enough brain power and eggnog, I could belt out every verse, but since we are about the business of scrappin' here (and I've been requested more than once by my children to never sing...never), I've decided to replace the lords a'leaping with lots o' flowers!!!  And we aren't going to wait until Christmas to kick start the fun!!!

Starting today, through the 12th, I am going to do a flower tutorial every single day.  Not all of the ideas are uniquely my own.  Some are flowers I've found on layouts that I just had to figure out how to recreate, some are tutorials that have been floating around blogdom.  Either way, if you check back here daily....or better yet click that little follow button to the right....you will find a fun new flower you can make to pretty up your paper crafting.

If you have any questions on this tutorial or any future ones I post, please ask me a question in the comments and I will come back and add the answer.  Or you can email me (see the 'about me' page above) and I'll respond directly.  Up first is a fantastic flower if you are looking for something with lots of dimension yet very little added height.  PERFECT for scrapbook pages.  The video shares lots of detail, but I will tell you this will work with ANY 5-6 petal flower that you can get 3 various sizes of blooms cut.  Diecuts, punches, machine cut, etc.  I chose to use the flower on the George and Basic shapes Cricut cart, because it's a resource available to lots of my readers.  You will need 2 of each size (3 sizes means six blooms total), but all of that is detailed after just hit the play button below:

I'm ALIVE!!!

I bet you were all starting to wonder. ;) My back is definitely improving with this physical therapy and chiropratic treatments, but sitting at the scrappy table for long is still just a little too much. So I haven't gotten much done lately. I did manage a few 8x8 layouts for friends.

For the 'people I love' layouts I decided on a best friends theme. I was really wanting to create something in a pink/purple scheme and best girlie friends fit well I think. The flowers are all prima-style flowers by Recollections and the lettering is the same Cuttlekids set from above. I also stamped the letters, "b-e-s-t" and cut the letter into a rectangle strip. The swirls are a small sizzix die that I cut 2 off and placed under each side of the flower. I used both swiss dots and divine swirls Cuttlebug folders. The word 'friends' is cut from pink sugardust paper.
The last 8x8 I finished is this boy's baseball themed one. Once again the lettering is my Cuttlekids alpha set I can't seem to find the name for. The stamped images (varsity flag, blue oval, baseball) are from a swap I was in ages ago. The baseball paper is from Michael's and i used a coordinating grungy baseball paper for the top layer of the 'M-V-P'. I hope the people who get them can find a home for them in their own 8x8 albums. :)

BUBBLES!!!

I finally finished the last of my swaps over the weekend. At least till next month...hee hee. I did this title for an Everyday Living-Kids swap over at Scrapbook Bingo. I just wanted to share because I had to have made 3 different titles hating each one a little more than the last before I finally settled on this one and loved it. It's very simple but the 3D embellies are busy enough I think =)

Shaker Box Tutorial

Have you ever wanted to try a shaker box, but thought it sounded too intimidating? Well I am going to tell you a secret. It is one of the coolest effects and yet one of the easiest techniques around. You can make it as simple as a square with a square shaker. It can be as intricate as a Cricut cut paper piecing where the center shaker is cut in the same shape. I chose to recreate a cupcake I made a few posts back. I thought it'd be perfect for a birthday card, though I may add a candle if I find one that matches. =)

Here are the basics to making ANY shaker box. If you give it a try I want to see!!! So post a link to your blog post if you share or even a link to an online gallery. I just want to see!!!

Supplies
scissors
foam doublesided adhesive
cardstock scraps in chosen theme
transparency
glitter (or very small crystals)
1" punch

Step 1: Cut out the diecut or paper piecing pieces you plan to use. I used a cupcake paper piecing from ScrapbooksEtc.com. The striped paper is Me and My Big Ideas and the cupcake is lily white sugar coated cardstock.

Step 2: Use your chosen punch to cut out the center. I have cut a 1" square. SAVE the scrap that is removed.

Step 3: Use the scrap punch to cut around on your transparency so that the finished piece of transparency is slightly bigger than the hole it will cover. Do the same for you backing paper. The one that will show through the shaker material. Make this one slightly bigger than the tranparency. You will have three sizes of squares. Your original scrap, a transparency slightly bigger than that, and a backing square slightly bigger than the transparency.

Step 4: Turn your paper (the one with the hole in it) and cover the hole with the transparency. Then use the foam tape to adhere it to the back of the cardstock. (holey cardstock, transparency, THEN foam tape). Make sure there are NO gaps in the tape. At this point (before you expose the second side of sticky on the tape) rub over the whole transparency with a dryer sheet. You will read below why.

Step 5: After exposing the back of the double sided foam tape you pour in your filler. I used Mainstays Glitter in bubblegum and Fashion Glass pink glass. Very gently pour in and cover with your backing paper. Make sure you put it down so that the backing paper will show the side you want when flipped over. Press firmly along the foam tape. If you need to trim the backing paper a bit, now is the time.

Step 6: Flip over your finished shaker. Finish piecing together your pattern and/or embellish as you wish.

For this example, I made a cupcake shaker. I just tried to use up scraps so it can definitely be fancier with a little embellishing. You can make your shaker out of any paper piecing pattern that has a large area that can support a shaker. You can also cut out a diecut or even make your shaker square/round and simply embellish the finished product with embellishments to fit your theme. Also consider using 'shaker stuff' that is in your theme. For example: small buttons, confetti, tiny punches. The tip to rub a dryer sheet across your transparency after you are done cutting is important, before adhering, to avoid static build up that will leave you with a shaker that doesn't shake so well. =)

8x8's Swap

Okay girls....if you are in my group for the season themed 8x8s on Scrapbook Bingo and don't want the surprise ruined then head back now. There will be a brand new post up tomorrow, I'm sure and I'll try to keep the spoilers out of that. LOL. If you don't mind it not being a surprise, you just can't help yourself, or you think there is a fairly good chance you'll forget by March then scroll down.


These 8x8s are the winter themed set. There is a 4x6 and (2) 3x4 photo mattes. There are 6 total silver snowflake shaped sequins with silver brads in the center. I used sheer white ribbon throughout the layout including through the buckle on the quote box. I printed the lyrics to the song, "Winter Wonderland" on vellum for that. The white cardstock for the background is actually DieCuts With a View Embossed Stripe cardstock and the bottom half with the torn top edge is Paper Pizazz Snowflakes.

For the spring themed set I used Sky by Creative Imaginations. I cut grass printed paper (Spring Greens by Colorbok) in a wavy fashion and laid it over the bottom portion. The two types of flowers are punched out of two sided pink mulberry paper. White brads for the centers and butterfly eyelets fly through the sky. For the stems I used green ribbed ribbon. For the leaves I folded that same ribbon in two loops with a green brad through the center.

Three total shades of blue went into making the summer themed 8x8. Medium blue for the base 8x8. Dark blue matted the photo mattes and the title. I cut Travel Paper-Sand by Sandylion on a hill incline and then used the light paper and white paper in torn strips to create the surf. Misc beach themed stickers from my stash finish off the look

A shaker box and a title to share

I finished this last Thursday, but wasn't sure I was going to share at all. It took me 2 hours to make 3 shaker boxes for a contest being hosted on my scrapbooking group, Scrapbook Swap n Crop. I don't know why I struggled so much. Leaving out the rant as to why I need a Cricut or a Cuttlebug, I will point out how much easier it would be if I could make a diecut with a punch out of the middle when making these kinds of things. Everytime I mention this, I do indeed direct my hubby to this blog and hope at some point the hint sticks. LOL.

Anyway, here is my favorite of the shaker boxes I made for this contest. If you are from my group....don't read until after Sunday, it's supposed to be anonymous. LOL I used a 3D diecut from a set I purchased at the dollar store for the candle. The cupcake paper (bottom part) is cut from a pink striped piece of cardstock. The cupcake itself, I freehand cut from a piece of white diamond dust cardstock. I punched out the center in the size of the square birthday sticker I was going to display underneath. Pink glitter and beads complete the 'shaker' part of the box.



Another group I belong to, Scrapbook Bingo is hosting an A-Z title swap. Everyone got a letter and has to create 26 titles starting with that letter to swap with everyone else. End result is you get one title for every letter of the alphabet after trading. I picked "M" and settled on "Make a Wish". I have never made anything quite like this so I hope it's up to par with the awesome work I've seen made in that group.
The title is printed on a blue piece of cardstock. It is matted in green and then again in purple. It is attatched at the right side with 2 purple brads. On the left, I have embellished it with a simple shaker box. The paper inside the box has "Happy Birthday" written all over it in purple, green and blue. It is framed in purple and filled with itty bitty beads. I finished it off with green chalking around all of the edges and a birthday sticker in coordinating colors on the corner of the shaker box. If you are in the swap and don't want the surprise ruined....don't scroll down. LOL.