Scrapbook Bargains!

Well folks I hit the mother-load of scrappy goodness at the dollar tree the other day. I ran in for a swimming ring for the kids and took a swing down the scrapbook isle and they had 11 different sets of brads in different themes each with photo turns, mini brads, glazed brads and shaped brads, 46 pieces in all for $1. They had the cute pocket envelops {a ton of them} that I have been using lately, 25 for a dollar and the acrylic accents I used on this card:

Digital Stamp: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff, PP: American Crafts, Cardstock: Coordanations

If you check out the dollar three be sure to check out the other craft isle they have because they have gorgeous grosgrain ribbon too 4 yards for a buck too and some funky rhinestone packs!

Speaking of bargains the magnolia digital stamp I used on this card is only a buck too! It’s one of the new designs I released this week over at Lindsay’s Stamp Stuff! If you spend $5 you get a free stamp too, how’s that for a bargain? The cool glimmered paper I snagged at Jo-Anns this week, 6 sheets for .96 cents! I’m not sure when the Jo Anns sale is over so call ahead.

Be sure to stop by the blog on Monday for the creative Cuts and More blog hop, they are releasing the cutest card kits, you have just got to see them! the blog hop theme is birthday and if the preceding hops are any indication you are going to see some wonderful fun projects and maybe even win some blog candy! We’ll see you back here Monday and until then happy crafting!

29 Again…

No, I’m just kidding, I have no qualms sharing my age (33 today) and the sun is shining, what more could I want! Hubby and the kids let me sleep in and then made me breakfast and got me some wonderful gifts: A book I’ve been eyeing “100 flowers to knit and crochet”, a CD from the blues band Sapphire and get this my very own laptop computer!!! I am a lucky girl! I decided to make a birthday card with the sketch over at 2sketches4you and this was tricky for me, it took a few tries but in the end I like the results:

Digital stamp: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff, Paper/Cardstock: American Crafts, Georgia Pacific, Brads: Dollar tree, Rubber stamps: Rubberstampede, SU!, Die cut flourish: Cricut (ercolor crayons tutorial, how to watercolor crayons, blending pen, waterbrush, 2sketche) Scallop Border font: DB Pretty Borders cut with cricut and SCAL software.

I used watercolor crayons to color my new Oriental Poppy digital stamp. I like to use watercolor crayons because they are quick, easy and non toxic. I usually will print out a sheet of images and use my little Caran Dache watercolor crayon set of 15 colors and color them with my kids while they are coloring in their colorbooks. Its great to do while listing to audio books, their favorite are the “Junie B. Jones” books by Barbara Park (I like them too!) Also I used the font DB pretty Borders to cut the scallop borders on the card with my cricut at SCAL software.

How to color with watercolor crayons:

Step one: Loosely color in your image with the wc crayons. (I’m using a digital stamp printed on Georgia Pacific White cardstock from Sams Club) Don’t worry about coloring right to the edge of the design, you can “push” the pigment around with your waterbrush or blending pen later. *A waterbrush is a paintbrush with a hollow handle you can fill with water or paint, a blending pen is a marker with clear ink inside, the clear ink is made from water and glycerin.

Step two: Use a Blending pen or waterbrush filled with equal parts water and glycerin to blend the colors. The glycerin keeps the pigment moving smoothly without damaging or wrinkling the cardstock (or making the printer ink bleed if using a digital stamp) scribble on a piece of scrap paper to clean the brush.

Step three: after coloring use a pom-pom dipped in chalk to color the background, it give a nice quick blended effect.

That’s all there is to it! Practice to get the feel of this fun medium. I confess that I have the full set of 84 Caran Dache watercolor crayons but I mostly use my travel set of 15 half sticks because I can blend then and achieve almost any color I want and they are easy to stick in my pocket and travel with.

Other tips:

Since the crayon is pure color there is no waste, when you sharpen the crayons save the shavings in a small watercolor palette, give them a spritz of water and you can paint with them rather than tossing all of that good pigment away. I usually use a knife to sharpen mine (which I don’t do too often) If I need a fine line of color I wet a fine nylon brush and lift the color off the crayon stick.

If you don’t have a waterbrush or blending pen use a nylon artist brush dipped in a mixture of equal parts water and glycerin. Keep a paper towel handy to blot off extra water. * if working on watercolor paper with waterproof ink  omit the glycerin.

If you cannot find watercolor crayons try water-soluble oil pastels. You can get a set of 16 at staples (portfolio line by Crayola) for about $9, cheaper on-line I’m sure! They are also wonderful, they are thick and creamy, almost like lipstick. I would use a paintbrush or waterbrush rather than a blending pen for these.

Thanks for stopping by on my birthday, I’m gonna get out and enjoy this sunshine Till next time happy crafting!

4 new digi-stamps and a freebie!

***SVG link is fixed, sorry about that ***

Wow, it’s Thursday again, where did the week go? I just added 4 new stamps to the Lindsay’s Stamp Stuff Shop, all flower themed, here are some projects made with them. Don’t forget for ever $5 you spend in the LSS shop you get a free stamp!

Stamps: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff, Paper: Strathmore, Stampin Up, Georgia Pacific, Pizza box Template: See free download links below.

this is what the inside of the pizza box looks like, dowload links below

I used my Cricut and Sure cuts a Lot software to make the pizza box.I cut it from 12″x18″: Strathmore Art paper, I love this stuff for making boxes because it is very sturdy and has a nice texture plus it is super cheap, a pack of 40 assorted color 12″x18″ sheets is under $10, I’ve seen it around $5 on-line at places like Cheapjoes.com and Blick Art Materials. It also comes 9″x12″ and it cuts well in the cricut. To help fold the ridgid paper I used my scor-pal, since the box was bigger than the platform I had to maneuver it a bit to score it but it was worth the effort, I used my Scor bugs to make the pierced holes and I assembled it with scor-tape which I hadn’t tried before and was skeptical about, but it really stuck and I only used a little bit of the 1/2″ tape under each flap. The neat thing about the tape is that you can tear off the amount you need and that’s great for me because I always seem to lose my scissors in the middle of a project Also I used watercolor crayons and a blender pen to color my digital stamps.

Download the Pizza Box .cut file if you have  Cricut Design Studio and the Plantain Schoolbook cartridge.

Download the Pizza Box SVG file if you have a cricut and SCAL software.

Here is a printable Pizza Box template.

Note: there is a wonderful tutorial over at Splitcoast Stampers on making a mini pizza box so if you don’t have a cricut you may want to try it.

We still have design team members who haven’t given out their freebies yet (I designed a digital stamp for each of my DT members to give away for a week, you will need to check out their blogs and see who has this weeks freebie and be sure to leave some love!) Without further ado here is the fabulous design team:

Margie

Melissa Craig

Leanne

Lisa

Row

Katt

Melissa Bove

Janet

Olena

Kim

Tracey

Tamara

Erin Bailey July Guest DT

Thanks for stopping by and till next time happy crafting!

Happy Birthday!

In my family the summer is choc-full of adult birthdays so when I get a few spare minutes I whip up a birthday card:

Stamps: Stampin Up!, Paper: MME, Cardstock: The Paper Co.

I again used scraps lying on the craft table (these were actually left over form a friend who came over the scrap the other day) and I used my fave little old “happy birthday” stamp and “God’s Beauty” hostess set I got free with my SU order back in February. Talk about frugal! The “dew Drops” are little dabs of hot glue I colored with alcohol inks, for a tutorial click here. I stamped the butterfly on diamond dust paper with stazon ink and I used one of my little crochet flowers that I am addicted to making as an embellishment.

Homemade flowers and dew drops: Treseye, butterfly, happy birthday, cardmaking chic {and frugal too!}

Thanks for stopping by, hope to see you tomorrow when we check in on the Lindsay’s stamp Stuff DT, they have some great stuff in store for us as well as another hidden freebie! Til then Happy Crafting!

Here for You!

I played with my “Friends 24-7″ set from Stampin Up! a bit more and came up with this super quick card:

stamps/cardstock/ink: Stampin Up!, pattern paper: MME, American Crafts

First I layered the 2 pattern papers and stamped over both of them and colored my image with colored pencils, then I used my Scor-Pal and Scor Bug to make the stitching holes (way easier than using a ruler on a foam pad and it is accurate!) I traces the holes with a pen, added the sentiment and used a stampin around wheel to make the border at the bottom along with another row of pierced holes. This card only took a few minuted and used up scraps left out on my craft table, I call it productive cleaning;)

Till next time happy crafting!

My first Cuttlebug Embossing Folder!

I was shopping at my local scrapbook store a few weeks ago and saw this lovely Cuttlebug “textile” embossing folder. I had not tried the CB folders before so I though “why not!” I love the crisp detail I got using it in my Ellison Big Shot Die Cutter:

Stamps: Stampin Up!, Paper/Cardstock/Ribbon: American Crafts, Emb. Folder: Cuttlebug, Die: Ellison

If you don’t have a manual die cut machine you can still emboss with the folders using a rolling pin. Here’s How: Lightly mist the paper with water, place the paper inside the folder and roll over it firmly with a rolling pin, easy as pie…well actually easier than pie and calorie free!

Here is a close up! I love my little croched flowers, scroll down to last Fridays post for details!

I used stamps from Stampin Up (I ordered these back in February during Sale-a-Bration but didn’t get them inked up till today, oh the shame!) and American Crafts Pattern paper and cardstock. The stamped bits of paper are from the scrap pile!

To make the stamp I stamped the flourish in clear ink then dabbed it with chalks.

I made my own decorative stick pins with eye pins from my jewelry stash, I like these because I can customize them with matching beads and they are stiff enough to poke through the ribbon but are blunt on the end so the recipient won’t get their fingers pricked (it’s nice not to injure people!)

Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!

Mahalo {Thanks} to you!

I must say when I started this blog just about a year ago I didn’t think anyone would bother to read it…boy was I wrong! Thank you for all of you your visits and kind comments;) They make my day! As a thanks I thought I would share a pack of 9 origami papers I made that you can print and use as much as you like. Here I printed the pink paper on plain old copy paper in the general printing mode and used a Hawaiian shirt origami pattern to make this shirt based on the sketch over at 2sketches4you, what do you think?

Hawaiian Paper: Lindsay Weirich Freebie, see download link above, Blue Clouds: DCWV, Bitty Letter Stamps: Studio G

Here is the paper pack you can download for free

Here is a freebie for you! Download link above.

Thanks so much for stopping by, I love to hear what you think of the papers so if you have a minute leave a comment, I appreciate them all. Til next time happy crafting!

Hooray for Crochet!

I love all of the pretty dainty crocheted flowers popping up on cards and scrapbook pages everywhere.  tried to make some a while back but they were ANYTHING but dainty, then I found an easy tutorial over at Nicole Heady’s blog and it was so easy. I used embroidery floss and crochet cotton thread to make the flowers her with a #0 hook but it was really weird to get used to the thread so I made a few in sugar & cream cotton yarn first to get the hang of it then tried it with the thread, here is how they came out.

Die Cuts: Creative Cuts and More, Stamp: Stampin Up!, Punch: Martha Stewart

The flowers on this card are not from Nicole’s pattern but I used the same stitches, once you get the hang of it you can make up your own flowers. The little 4 petal flower was made with the crochet cotton then I sprayed it with my trusty homemade shimmer spray, I also sprayed the scroll die cuts to tone down the black. All the die cuts are from Creative cuts and More. They are looking for a few new guest designers so if you are interested check out the call here, you have until July 6th to apply!

I scanned a few of the flowers I made, then removed the background and saved them as a png file (transparent background) so digital scrappers can add the soft homespun look to their pages too They are in one file so use the selection tool to pick the one you want!

free flowers to digiscrap with, drop shadow on the preview only, see download link below.

You can download my crocheted flower elements for digital scrapbookers here.

If you want to find more patterns and awesome examples check out this thread over at splitcoast stampers.

There are also some cool flower patterns at Lion brand yarn.

Have fun making your own little crocheted flowers, if you find a cool pattern leave a link in the comments section. Beware these are very addicting but you can make use of little scraps of time my making these while you watch TV or riding in the car or waiting for the kids. It’s fun! Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!

Excitement, Freebies, Fun!

Lot’s of excitement around Lindsay’s stamp Stuff, first of all we have a new Guest Designer for July, Erin Bailey, who is sure to inspire and we have 2 new full time DT members, Melissa Craig and Leanne Garner,  to add to our ranks! What a week! I just got back form a fun mini vacation with my family (thank goodness for scheduled blog posts) and here are a few pics I took, I used the sketch #63 from Triple the sketch as my inspiration:

Digital Stamps: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff, Rubber Stamp (journaling spot) Autumn Leaves, Die cuts: Cricut and SCAL software

I used my brand new, added to the shop yesterday Ice Cream #1 (yes, I’m feeling a series coming on) and my 2 Cherries stamp on this. I wanted a fun boarder strip so I designed one that you can cut with your Cricut if you have SCAL software, you could weld it to a rectangle to make shaped paper too. I also cut the bracket and title with my cricut with scal using free fonts I found online. If you don’t have SCAL I have a coupon code to save you 10%: 4757558 it will expire on 7/7/09 so don’t wait.

Download the wavy bracket border SVG here.

Since I had some leftovers I made a quick card too:

Digital Stamp: Lindsay's Stamp Stuff, Rubber Stamp: SU!

SALE! July Special: get a free digital stamp for every $5 you spend in the Lindsay’s Stamp Stuff Store! So if you spend $15 you get 3 free stamps, they don’t call me the frugal crafter for nothing

Now let’s see what the design team has for us this week, don’t forget there is a hidden freebie on one of their blogs so be sure to check them out and snag your free stamp!

Melissa Craig

Leanne

Lisa

Katt

Row

Melissa Bove

Janet

Olena

Kim A Mommy and Me project!

Tracey

Tamara

Margie

Erin Bailey July Guest DT

Cindy (June Guest DT) *bonus project!

Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!

Isn’t it Romantic…

I made this card a while back and realized that I hadn’t shared it:

Stamps: Crafty Secrets, Inkadinkado, Hero Arts and others, Cardstock/Ink SU!

It’s cardstock and stamping with a flower and die cut for embellishment. It was based on one of Laura’s Sketches over at 2 Sketches 4 You but not this weeks sketch (I hope to get a crack at that one this week!) Easy. Simple. Good. Till next time happy crafting!