S is for Sweet

I recently changed positions at work and a colleague whom I’ve come to consider a friend over the years but who lives in a different state was thoughtful enough to send me some delicious cookies. Of course this sweet gesture was a reason to make a sweet Thank You card. Can’t nag at my son to be on top of his Thank You cards if I’m not modeling the way right?! Plus I can’t exactly use the excuse of not getting to the store to buy one since I make cards.

S is also her initial so for the card’s focal point I used the Wall Décor and More cartridge to do a monogram on my Cricut Expression.

I ran a piece of cream cardstock through my Cuttlebug using the Textile folder, and mounted that on a green then turquoise panel. Card embellishments are from where else…K and Co. Susan Winget’s SW Botanical Grand Adhesions to be exact, along with a scrapbook border from the Abrianna collection. I used some of the small dimensional stickers to embellish the monogram.

Applied the clear “Sweet” sticker to a cream scrap, mounted to a blue scrap and tucked in the corner of the monogram. Off to have a cookie!

Grape, Gold, and Chocolate Necklace

This is the gift that I made to go along with the birthday card I shared a couple of days ago.

I went shopping in my stash which Mr. Chocolate would tell you means I don’t need to go to Michaels or JoAnn’s for the rest of the year. HA
Main components: Bead Landing gold chain ( Michaels), an antiqued gold toggle clasp that I picked up @ JoAnn’s, and the pendant is from Blue Moon’s Global Nomad collection.

The beads are faceted crystal I picked up on a couple of different trips. Hubs is used to me scoping out bead, paper, art stores wherever we go on vacation!
I wasn’t sure what I was going to do when I started so I made some different combos using head pins or bead caps and strung some spacer beads ( all of the findings are from Blue Moon) on larger jump rings.

I ended up spacing some of the beads throughout the chain and using others with the pendant. I liked the combo of the chocolately brown pendant with the deep grape of the beads. The other beads are an iridescent light brown that pick up the gold from the chain , the brown from the pendant and the purple from the other beads.
It’s for a cousin who’s really more like an Auntie to me. I hope she likes it!

Linking Up At: 

BFF Open House #10 Wrap Up Features and Giveaway Winner!

Another great party with wonderful projects linked up and some new blogs I get to explore! As always, it’s hard to pick just a few projects to feature (so if you haven’t you should go visit ALL of the links!) but here goes. Seems my eyes were drawn to “Black and White and Bright” this week. Let’s start with a bright one:

A gorgeous quilled paper butterfly by Suzy from Suzy’s Artsy Craftsy Sitcom. Quilling is one of the paperarts I’ve yet to try and Suzy makes it look so easy! Isn’t that gorgeous?!

You really are going to have to go visit The Pear Tree Cottage to see the before of this incredible after fireplace transformation. Just amazing:

After that, pop on over to A Glimpse Inside for a truly warm and colorful welcome.

Finally, it’s not often I can get my son interested in projects from blogland but his first question when I showed him this Sci Fi Subway Art from Christine and Co was: “So is this one of those things you can win”? Total stamp of approval by a self-certified Sci-Fi nut!

Now for the winner of my celebrating good fortune giveaway notecards…Random.org chose comment #3 which was left by Jenn @ Rook No. 17!! Congrats Jen!

Life is Sweet Birthday Card

What’s sweeter than a birthday cake?! I fell in love ( of course)  with these dimensional stickers in KandCo’s birthday collection. And I needed to make a birthday card. Win-win!

I already had the Abrianna scrapbook borders of theirs on hand. I went to my paper stash and chose a paper from DCWV’s “Indian Summer Collection”.

Tore the top of the the striped panel and mounted on a piece of blue cardstock, tore a strip of the blue to go across the middle and used one of the scrapbook borders on the bottom. Wrapped with a coordinating piece of grosgrain ribbon and finished with paper flowers, buttons, and self adhesive rhinestones.

Even though I thought  the cake sticker was already cute, I added some adhesive pearl “frosting” dots! Now I want a cupcake.

Mumster’s Mosaic Box

The BFF Open House link party is still up and running if you want to link up and don’t forget to comment if you want to be eligible for the giveaway.

The Mumster (aka my Mom if you’re a newer visitor)  like other members of my family, is an enabler in the best kind of way. Hubs brings me broken and discarded items to see what I can do with them and even though Mom lives several states away, she saves things to bring me when she comes to visit. She had a ceramic piece that broke. Normal people throw these things out. I never pretended to come from normal people! Naturally she said “ You can do something with this right?” I can just imagine that conversation with TSA.

“Ma’am, do you always fly with broken ceramic pieces and if so why?”
“Well my daughter’s a crafter and she likes to make things out of broken and discarded pieces and she has a blog called The Answer Is Chocolate that you should go visit”
“Security!”

Perfect ingredient for a mosaic project. Oops. I haven’t really ever done a mosaic project! OK no time like the present. I found a couple of these at club GW:

Plain wood caddy.  I bought two. They only had two. They were a whole $1.99 but it was 50% off blue sticker day! I painted this one with a lilac acrylic. I also Mod Podged on some coordinating paper. Just did. Don’t ask me why.  Then I got out the pieces along with some glass mosaic tiles I had on hand in the event that I ever got this particular craft urge. I was a Girl Scout. Always be prepared!

For someone who hadn’t done mosaics, I even had a tile nipper for just in case. Mr. Chocolate bought it for me last year at the fair. The guy totally thought he was buying it for himself. HA!

Broke the broken pieces into more pieces and nipped some of the glass tiles and glued to one side of the box:

I found some pre-mixed grout at Michaels, more expensive I’m sure than the stuff you can mix yourself, but that’s what 40% coupons are for. Frosted my box ( because it’s like cake frosting) and let it set up then wiped off per instructions. I put a really thick coat on because the pieces were thick and some were rounded and I wanted to get things as even as possible. You will also be wiping a lot longer!

After I got the grout off I wasn’t happy so typical of me, I started adding stuff. I did a dry brush of white to age it up. I cut some white vinyl with my Cricut to give it some detail. I ripped up some muslin strips that I tied on one side of the handle and added some charms. And then I added some paper flowers I’d bought on my visit to the LA Garment district in April. OK there. Less is not more. MORE is more!

I think Mom can use it to hold napkins or silverware or stationery or pens or…..Now I just have to ship it to her. Surprise Mumster!

Linking Up At: 

BFF Link Party#10 and BFF Scatter Girls!

Don’t know about you, but weeks that start off with a Monday holiday really throw me off. Not complaining mind you but it’s Friday already?! Lots to cover at this week’s Open House here at TAIC.

First…I’m very excited to feature this week a brand spanking new blog that will officially launch itself on Monday July 11. Fun will be had by all because the ladies behind this are each wonderfully creative on their own and now they’ve teamed up to create a new online community! Introducing:

Left: Lauren  Center: Gina and Right: Chrissy

You can also find Lauren at The Elephant’s Trunk and Gina at Hiya Luv

So what is Scatter Girls all about?

Do you love the handmade community (Yep!)

crafting (Oh yes)

sharing your creations (Affirmative)

chatting with others about all things handmade? (Roger that)

Do you love to try new crafts (Do I like chocolate?)

perhaps you have a stash of fabric (check)

rubber stamps (I plead the 5th)

buttons ( I might have a stash or five jars)

You get the point! These gals are creative and they’re getting together to create an online space where other creative souls can gather. There will be tutorials, features, sharing, and tips on growing your handmade business. They’re going to have a weeklong kickoff starting Monday July 11 so go visit, check things out, find out what Scatter Girls is all about! You’ll also have to go if you want to know which one of the Scatter Girls loves Hershey’s Nuggets with Toffee and Almonds, which one loves to sew, and which one specializes in handmade wine accessories.

OK on with the party! Anything goes…as long as it was made or made over by you. If you can sand it, paint it, glue it, glitter it, or cover it in chocolate, link it! Just no advertising or Etsy shops please.

And FINALLY, as I posted earlier in the week, to celebrate my recent and exciting bloggy good fortune, one of you will win these:

A set of six handmade notecards. Just a little thank you from me to you. To be eligible to win just leave a comment. That’s it! Winner will be selected by random.org on Monday July 11.

Now really on with the party!

Celebrating With A Giveaway!

 I hope everyone had a spectacular 4th!

Last week was crazy good. It started out with an email from Heather at Whipperberry that I’d won her superfantastic giveaway sponsored by Lifestyle Crafts of the Epic Combo Letterpress Kit! Squeal!!! I can’t wait to get it and start playing. Thank you so much Whipperberry and Lifestyle, and if you’ve never visited Whipperberry  you’ve been missing out! Amazing projects, features, link parties….!

Then, on Friday, Cassie from Paper Issues let me know I’d been selected to join the Paper Issues Creative Team!!!  I’m so excited and honored to be on this team with some of the most creative paper artists. If you are into anything paper (believe me, it’s not just cards and scrapbooking although there are some incredible examples of those) and have never visited Paper Issues, you really want to check it out.

To celebrate, I thought I’d do a little giveaway. The giveaway will be part of this week’s BFF Open House link party so you’ll need to come back Friday to enter!

A set of 6 notecards (5.5 x 4.25) featuring KandCo’s Poppy Seeds collection. Die cuts, self adhesive scrapbook borders, and dimensional stickers. Each card has an embossed panel I did with my Cuttlebug:

and each card is finished with coordinating rhinestone accents.

These made me really happy to make…I love the whimsical design of the series and it was a fun color palette to work with. Just something I thought I’d share to celebrate my good fortune! Come back Friday if you want to win!!