BFF Open House Link Party #76 : Wrap Up and Features

Boo! Oh wait, that’s still a couple of days away. Thanks for another fun party! Here are a few ideas including some things you can still whip up in the next few days. For example:

How about these fun spooky spider straws that Keri over at Shaken Together linked up. 

They go perfectly with these potion jars by Laura over at The Shed:



Need a centerpiece for your Halloween table? See how to make one with just a few items over at Southern Scraps:

If you’ve already moved on from Halloween or it’s not your thing, Malia over at Yesterday on Tuesday has a gorgeous and fun fall wreath idea:


Finally, you’re going to line up a big glass of milk to go with this week’s chocolate feature.

Try to say that five times fast! Go visit Karen at Pint Sized Baker for the recipe.

Thanks again to everyone who linked up and hope to see you again on Friday. Make it a creative week!

BFF Open House Link Party #76

Happy Friday Eve! We're in Halloween countdown mode now. Less than a week to get all the ghouls goblins tricks and treats lined up. Don't forget I have a special treat to announce on Halloween....the winner of the $50 worth of  David Tutera Celebrate card making goodies. Still time to enter if you haven't already!


Now, let’s see what everyone’s been up to this week.

More Fun With Tutera Celebrate Including A $50 Giveaway!

A sweet couple, friends of The Mumster, are celebrating their 60th Anniversary this month. 60! I hope when we celebrate our 60th Anniversary we’re as energetic and on the go as they are.

You might remember last week, I posted about the new David Tutera Celebrate line at JoAnn’s? Well they sent me so much fun stuff to play with you’ll probably see several future cards made from this line. I used it for this card along with some other stuff I had in my stash.

Here’s the even more fun part. The wonderful folks at Core'dinations who sponsored my post last week are giving one of my readers the chance to win a “Celebrate” prize pack of their own, valued at $50. I’ll be using Rafflecopter for this giveaway which will run from today through October 30, winner announced on Halloween. Kind of a reverse trick or treat! Like I said in my post last week, ANYONE can be a cardmaker with this line.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck!

BFF Open House Link Party #75 : Wrap Up and Features

Thanks everyone for another fun party. I can’t believe Halloween is only 9 days away. As always, lots of inspiration was shared by you and here are just a few features.

First, Michele at The Scrap Shoppe shared this spectacular skeleton head idea but the magic is in the tutorial to achieve the look:

Carolyn at homework, shared how to make this adorable treat bags with supplies from the Dollar Store and eyes that glow in the dark.

I am in love with this harp chair from Kristy over at Shona Skye Creations. Just gorgeous:

And finally, this week’s chocolate feature is brought to you by Back for Seconds. Perfect for those cold Fall nights: Spicy Cinnamon Brownie Pie. Mmmmmmm.



Make it a creative week everyone!

Chunky Cowl Scarves

So, I was in Michaels one day wandering around and fell in love with this Poodle yarn. I’ve been seeing lots of chunky infinity and cowl scarves and thought even with my limited crochet and knitting skills , I could do this. This yarn proved a little more of a challenge than I thought. First plan was to crochet it. Plan FAIL. Knitting worked much better.

I cast on about 10 stitches and then just knit two skeins worth and sewed the ends together.

LIke a lot of crafty people, I buy supplies without really having a project in mind. OK just go along with me and tell me I’m not the only one who does that.

I had some chunky textured yarns I picked up somewhere along the way and since I still wanted to crochet an infinity scarf, played around with it. This one’s for a family friend who loves color. These colors remind my of changing leaves and Fall.

I didn’t have enough of either yarn to make it as thick as I wanted so I used to two different yarns. I like the effect when you twist the scarf. For this one, I crocheted about 160 stitches, joined in a circle then just double crocheted until I felt it was done.

Sharing At:

BFF Open House Link Party # 75 and Exciting News!

75 parties! WOW.  If it's your first time linking up, Welcome. If you're a regular, thanks for making this party so much fun.

I'm so excited to be able to share some fun news with you. Die Cuts With A View had a call for design team members for Blue Moon Beads ( one of their other great brands in addition to their glorious paper). Yours truly applied and was notified this week that I am on the Design Team! I screamed out loud. Did you hear me? I am so excited and will be posting 3 projects each month . This was truly a dream come true and I can't wait to get started so check back.

I never would have had the confidence to do this without the brilliant and supportive bloggers behind  Crafterminds. If you are a creative blogger, I cannot urge you strongly enough to visit the Crafterminds blog and if you can, participate in the weekly Twitter chats each week on Monday at 4 Eastern. Doesn't matter if you have 1 Follower or 1000, you'll learn something and make some new bloggy friends.


 Now, let’s see what everyone’s been up to this week. Only two more weeks until Halloween. What tricks and treats are up your sleeves?

Everyone's A Card Maker With David Tutera Celebrate

You might remember a few weeks ago when I posted a video about the new David Tutera Celebrate line that’s available (exclusively)  at Jo Ann’s? I’m so excited to post today about what I made with products from this fun new line of cardmaking and paper products.

This line is perfect for the novice or seasoned cardmaker. It requires no tools beyond adhesive and your imagination and takes no time at all to whip up a card that looks like it took hours and cost a fortune.

The Celebrate line is literally as easy as 1, 2, 3 which is how each of the components are labeled.

1.) The Card. Cards come in 4 x 5.5 or 5x7 and come in everything from plain white to metallic to natural and several colors.
2.) Layers sized to match you card. These are wonderful for those who may not have a fancy die cutting or embossing machine because the work is already done for you.
3.) Accents. These include borders, tags, layered sentiment stickers, rhinestones and smaller diecuts.

For the birthday card above I used a metallic silver 5x7 card  (Step 1), a grey layer with scrolled edges and a center cutout, along with a white embossed layer underneath ( Step 2) , some borders, birthday sentiment, and small diecuts ( Step 3).  1.2.3.

One of the things included in my package was this sanding block . His line uses papers by Core’dinations, one of my favorite papers to use in cards and other projects. When you sand the papers you reveal some of the color underneath and it completely changes the texture and appearance of your piece.

I love the shabbied up look after sanding and my supplies also  included a wonderful rag that wipes up all of the dust without affecting the paper.

I cut two of the  borders the width of the grey layer and adhered with a glue dots runner.

The borders are already textured for you so you there’s no dry embossing required.

I chose one of the layered birthday sentiment stickers, and placed it in the window of the grey layer and then finished off with a coordinating layered flower:

This card took me 10 minutes or less to make. Seriously. I think you’ll take longer deciding which combination of card, layers, and embellishments to use than to actually make the card. It’s so easy.

I had so much fun with it, I whipped up a Thank You card as well.

Again, 1. Card 2. Layers 3. Embellishments.

I don’t ever want to hear from anyone that they can’t make a card. Thanks to this line I’ll have to call fibs on you.

Now for even more excitement. You can enter to win $300,  yes $300 worth of David Tutera Celebrate products of your very own! How awesome is that?

Three lucky winners will receive a $300 grand prize pack of supplies fromDavid Tutera’s Celebrate cardmaking line AND a personally signed book from David! 20 additional winners will receive a $50 Celebrate prize pack.

Sign up here for a chance to win:  http://pages.exacttarget.com/tutera-optin-blog/.

You can also visit the David Tutera Facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/DavidTuteraCelebrate

And follow along on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/TuteraCelebrate