Happy Mother's Day!

My PicMonkey addiction continues.  Wishing all of you creative and amazing  Moms a wonderful  Mother’s Day.

These are some pics I took at Seattle’s Pike Place Market last weekend, and played around with using PicMonkey this weekend. I’d give each of you a bouquet of these if I could! The first pic uses a paint filter to fill in the blank space while maintaining the photo. I added the butterflies and the text.

This one I converted to B&W, added film strip edges and a canvas like texture. 

This one I framed with a Polaroid effect and used a color shot option to make everything but the center black and white. 

And this one, I just cropped , framed with photo corners and added a color mat.

Have fun today whatever you do!

Sharing At: 

Sherwin Williams Paint Chip Picker Has Created A Monster

It’s not exactly like I need another online thing to play with but in fairness, I didn’t go looking for this. I actually found it in this month’s Food Network magazine.

So what does a paint palette picker ( say that 3 times fast) have to do with a sandals?  Technically nothing. But this little tool from Sherwin Williams is  so cool for anyone who does any kind of designing.

You enter the URL of any online  picture in the box on their “Let’s Chip It” site, and up pops a color palette. It’s intended to help you pick a paint palette but there are all kinds of possibilities. You can also add a tool to your toolbar and they have a video that explains both options.   BTW, they don’t even know I’m posting this and I have no connection w/ them. I just thought it was  fun.

Here’s it’s probable intended use…picking a décor palette to go with some fabric you may have fallen in love with:

But let’s say you fell in love with a pair of those orange sandals and wanted to build an outfit around them? Purely hypothetically speaking of course not at all suggesting that I have fallen in love with a pair of those orange sandals or anything.

Or, let’s say a certain paper addict is attacked by some scrapbook paper:

and is looking for which coordinating cardstock to buy to go with it….or...or...or....

You can save your chips ( you have to log in w/ your Facebook ID ) or you can just keep entering URLs to get ideas.  Happy Saturday!

BFF Open House Link Party #52: Mother's Day Edition!

Gosh it feels like I just blink and it’s Friday again. The problem is that the weekends go by even faster.

All that blinking left me w/ out a BFF to feature this week. I am sure you’ve all been busy whipping up Mother’s Day, Teacher Appreciation, Graduation and End of Year ideas as well as DIYing , upcycling and making over!

I am getting the BEST Mother’s Day present. College Boy comes home on Saturday!!! Can’t wait. OK let’s party!

Pink Poppies and Butterfly Cards

I’m not normally drawn to pinks but you might remember the Recollections “Fashionably Chic” paper stack that attacked me at Michaels:

There are several patterns within each color family  and the pink papers immediately reminded me of two ladies I know. I think the flowers are poppies but Martha and I part ways at gardening so whatever they are, I liked them and chose a couple of coordinating papers from the stack.

Made my cards (5x7) and covered with the coordinating papers. Mounted the floral paper onto some lightweight cardstock and then trimmed around the flowers, spritzed them with Elmer’s spray adhesive, and then a good shake of Recollections extra fine iridescent glitter. 

The swirly embellishment is a Memory Box steel die. The chipboard butterfly is from a package of chipboard shapes I found at Michael’s (20 pieces for $1) by Studio 18.

 

Finished off the cards with coordinating self adhesive rhinestones I had in my stash.

Fortunately  I can deliver these cards  in person because they would cost me more to mail them than to make them.

Sharing At:

Recollections "Fashionably Chic Mother's Day Cards

I’ve confessed my paper addiction before. It’s not getting any better. I wasn’t even looking for paper when I walked past the paper stack section at Michaels and Recollections “Fashionably Chic” jumped off the shelf at me. Practically attacked me. It did!

The cover doesn’t do it justice. It repeats the same series of patterns in several colors and within a color family, you can mix the patterns.

I  made several different cards because I always like to recognize the special women in my life on Mother’s Day.

For the first card, I glued the scrapbook paper to a piece of cardstock to give some body, and then cut out the flower, hit it with a spray of adhesive and glittered it.

I used another piece of the same floral paper and a piece with a coordinating damask print for base panel of the card . Used foam dots to adhere the glittered flowers to the card.

For this one, I used a different floral pattern and dotted the inside of the flowers with iridescent Stickles. For the focal flower, I used Tim Holtz Alterations Tattered Floral die and cut the flowers using my Cuttlebug.

I don’t like to waste pretty paper so I use scraps to make embellishments to use in cards and other projects. This double sided tape I got at my local stamp store and is by a company called Sookwang. You can also use this tape to make your own washi tape.

I also played with another color combination from the stack:

I'm telling you. Paper just jumped off the shelf at me. Really.

Sharing At: 

BFF Open House Link Party #51: Wrap Up and Features

Thanks again for another fun party. I hope you all enjoyed meeting Karyn from Pint Sized Baker and her wonderful treats.

Here are a few things that caught my eye, all with what I’d call a modern and retro feel.

First up, Bethany from Pitter and Glink shared her new craft room lamp transformation:

Thrift store lamp meets chicken wire! Gorgeousness ensues.

Bev, from Flamingo Toes, shared another of her amazing jewelry creations:

I love the femininity of the pearls with the boldness of the chain. And the blue pearls with the silver chain is such  a stylish color combination.

If you are planning a trip to a Disney park and want to go with a shirt way cooler than any you’ll find there, check out this idea from Rachel over at Holy Craft:

Seriously. She made this! Rachel used her Silhouette and a retro Disneyland poster image. So cool.

Finally, Back for Seconds shared a modern interpretation of a classic. I mean Oreos are already pretty perfect but check these out:

Two words. Peanut. Butter.

Thanks everyone for linking up. Make it a creative week!

Feliz Cinco de Mayo! Celebrate With Chocolate

So first up , it’s not Mexican Independence Day which it’s commonly mistaken for. That’s September 16. Cinco de Mayo marks the unlikely defeat of the French by the Mexican Army at the Battle of Puebla. I am and forever shall be a history nerd.

Since we wouldn’t have chocolate ( shudder) without the ancient Aztecs of Mexico, how can we not include chocolate in Cinco de Mayo celebrations? I mean really! So here are a few recipes from around the web that might give you some ideas for your Cinco de Mayo celebrations . Haven’t decided which one of these to try yet! Maybe all of them!

Allrecipes.com has these

Cinco de Chili Chocolate Cupcakes with Chili Cream Cheese Frosting

But they also have these:

Chocolate Mexican Wedding Cookies

Then over at About.com Candy,  I found this recipe for :

Mexican Chocolate Fudge

that looks pretty tempting. This includes a pinch of cinnamon and cayenne pepper.
Continuing my journey, I came across S’Mores Nachos at Kitchen Daily.com:

Which makes me feel good because I was noodling the idea of a chocolate quesadilla using cinnamon sugar dusted flour tortillas and dark chocolate cream cheese which I haven’t tested yet!
How about Strawberry Chocolate Nachos?

At least someone else is kooky enough to think of putting  tortillas and chocolate together!
Then there’s this Mexican chocolate cake

Or a fun beverage ( contains alcohol ) :

 

As you can see, there is no shortage of chocolatey ways to celebrate Cinco de Mayo! Enjoy !