Some clever ideas. . .

. . . from the design team at Mystic Paper.

Our fearless leader, Patty, started by altering and berry-adorning postcards and then decided to turn them all into the most darling banner.

Jenna got to use a beautiful Webster's Pages line. She used some of Mystic's wonderful vintage glass bottles in a way I never would have thought of.

I just have to say, Jenna reminds me so much of Kimberly Williams-Paisley. You know "Annie Banks." - - - - That is, the daughter in Father of the Bride. :) Did you know she is married to country singer Brad Paisley? I just found that out myself, thought I would share. Jenna is just as cute as Kimberly and seems just as sweet too!

(You can check out more on their blogs by clicking on their names.)

Glitter Glass and Graphic 45 @ Mystic Paper

Oh wow! I discovered my new favorite "bling-ing"addition for all my paper crafts at my favorite scrap store, that I also happen to design for, the lovely Mystic Paper.

The new bling I speak of. . . Vintage German Glitter Glass. It comes in lots of beautiful colors. Clear was perfect for my Christmasy design team project. Don't you love how it looks as snow? I used Glossy Accents (also available at Mystic Paper) to adhere the pretty glass. On the tree I went right over the top of the glass with Distress Stickles - the more sparkle the better huh?

I also used some 7-Gypsies acetate packaging with the Glitter Glass inside to make a cute little "snow globe." Let me know if you would like a how-to on that. ;)

The cute little carolers image is from a booklet of Crafty Secrets images - also Mystic. Hee hee, you gotta love the stuff they carry. I sure do! Can't get enough in fact. Ha!

I decided to make a Fold-up Accordion Song Book including the 12 days of Christmas lyrics. I love this Graphic 45 vintage-feel paper line. It's so perfect for eclectic looking cards, projects, and layouts. I can't wait to get more at Mystic to use for a little mini album with Christmas pictures of my girls. Payson had SNOW!!!

I made a Slide show for you with lots of pictures of My First Design Team Project below and I'll post soon with links to my fellow design team member's projects. You should see the awesome variety of paper lines Mystic has to choose from. Cheers!

I'm dreaming of a Vintage Christmas

I did this card for Priscilla Styles' Midnight Madness #32. She posts a sketch every week and I was so excited to get to play again. (My 2nd time.) Anyway, I used lots of K&Co. paper, including the little Christmas kiddo. The lace Prima stamp was perfect to make some of the diagonal trim and added a different texture than layering another real ribbon on top. (It's my favorite part of this card.) ;)

The circle pulls out and you can use it as an ornament for the tree. Kinda fun! I cut her out carefully with an exacto and then used tiny pop dots to, well make her "pop!"

I decided this one turned out well enough to send to my monthly (one card) swap pal. Hope she likes it.

Marie Antoinette Ornament Swap

I was recently accepted into an online group of crafters called the "Marie Antoinette Mail Art Group." I saw a beautiful apron on a blog of a member who linked to the group. Oh how I have been obsessed with Marie as of late (Thanks Alex! and Mystic Paper [Mystic has this gorgeous Marie Christmas Tree]), so I hopped on over and submitted my request to join.

And here we are. These are the first lovlies I have ever created using a Marie Antoinette theme. Be assured there are many more to come. Each base is different, but I tried to stick to the same materials.

First I painted the ornaments with gold acryllic paint. I have fallen in love with gold in my Obsession. I love it with the blue and pink. Next I traced the ornament shape, cut out Marie theme papers (K&Co and 7Gypsies), and glued them into place. I left one section uncovered, plain gold paint.

Then I punched out and attached my vintage dictionary page (yardsales are wonderful for these!!) After that I glimmer misted the entire ornament. Even over the paint, where some areas turned almost crackley. Don't freak (like I did) when the paper sections wrinkle, because (I swear) if you just leave them alone they eventually flatten.

I printed a Marie image on photo paper and punched it with a scalloped square. Glossy Accents (my favorite!) was used to attach pretty much everything on these. I really wanted it to stay together for my swap gals. I Glossied on the lace, then the sequin strand over that.

My favorite part of making these was pulling out my tackle box full of beads for the extra glitz. I used a pearl, a real chandelier crystal, a Swarovski crystal, and a sunburst sequin from a Making Memories Vintage Finds set all stacked up on a decorative pin. Which I then poked into the paper mache.

I also printed a few more MarieEsque images on photo paper. For the piece of her signature and the chandelier, I attached them to gold or blue cardstock, inked and even stamped (a Christmas Tree or Snowflake) on the back. Then I cut out and attached her monogram "MA," with an exacto (while I was watching So You Think You Can Dance, I had to keep rewinding, gotta love DVR.)

For the second set of ornaments, I decided to use something different than the paper mache. I found chipboard shapes that I liked an had two of the same shape. I glued them together for sturdiness, and used the same steps as above, minus the papering and Glimmer Misting.

Add a little lace, a lotta bling (rhinestones, glittered chipboard, Stickles, Mica Flakes) and Voila! An ornament fit for a queen.

Thanksgiving Treasure ~ A real life French vintage postcard!

Y'all,

I had the pleasure of spending the long Thanksgiving weekend at my parents house. I took some time (okay, quite a bit of time) to go through some old boxes of keepsake stuff from my dad's dad.

The stuff in there was a lot older than I expected. To quote myself, "This is like covered wagon days Dad!!"

Anyway, here is my favorite favorite! I was written to my great grandmother, Mamie, before she was married to my gg-pa in January 1909!!

I hope you enjoy it's beauty as much as I do. Wow my relatives left a legacy for me to find and I am so proud to have some of their treasures. Can't wait to share more of them with you!

Anyway, since Turkey Weekend, I have become obsessed with Vintage Postcards. That's why I am sitting here surfing and savoring at 45 til midnight when I promised myself to hit the hay at 10:15 PM. Ha!

I found a wonderful blog http://www.cpaphilblog.com/ which does a Postcard Friendship Friday. I just happened upon it today, Friday, so I decided to play.

Proud Parents

Another 2-fer I did for my parents 35th anniversary book.

I love this picture of my brother and I with our new babies. It's so fun to have him close (really close, they live with us now). It's odd that we have not lived in the same town for 11 years and how we are still SO much alike. Especially when it comes to our kiddos. We dance and sing and be loud and goof around. Anything to put a smile on the munchins!

OMG Edward!

Hey all! More from my Twilight themed Mini Album...

(The Bella Italia was the restaurant they ate at in the book.

"About three things I was absolutely positive. First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was part of him — and I didn’t know how potent that part might be — that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him."

"One side of his mouth pulled up into my favorite uneven smile. "

"Edward in the sunlight was shocking. I couldn’t get used to it, though I’d been staring at him all afternoon. His skin, white despite the faint flush from yesterday’s hunting trip, literally sparkled, like thousands of tiny diamonds were embedded in the surface. "

"Because when I thought of him, of his voice, his hypnotic eyes, the magnetic force of his personality, I wanted nothing more than to be with him right now. "

"Do I dazzle you? "

Sibs

I love my lil' brother. :) These are pictures of us growing up. My favorite I think is the Christmas morning one in our PJ's.

Once he went with my mom out of town for schooling. When he came home on the weekends, we vowed to sit next to each other in the big ol' rocking chair for an hour. Ha! It's fun to see that sibling relationship with my two baby girls. They are just about the same distance apart as my bro and I.

First Design Team Kit

Look at the beautiful papers I got in my first Mystic Paper Design Team kit. I have to say I was jumping up and down when these Graphic 45 Christmas Past papers floated out of the bag with my name on it. I met my fellow DT members Jenna, and Surina who got some wonderful papers too, so be sure to check out their blogs! I didn't meet Sheri yet, but she came up with a sweet holiday banner. Also in my bag were two really great trims and some itty bitty jingle bells to use for embellishment.

I bet you can't wait to see what I came up with. . . stay tuned.

La Push & Jacob Black

Hey all!

Another 2 pager in my Twilight album. For the "tide pools" I cut circles and Distress inked the edges. Then I dotted Stickles around and used my finger to spread it thin. The flimsy blue paper curled some which turned out okay because it added dimension. The wetness of the Stickles blended the Distress ink for a nice look too.

Should have taken a close up on the details of this one guys; sorry.



For the wolf, I found an outline clipart online and printed it to the size I wanted. Then I cut out the ears and face shapes and traced them onto Coredinations cardstock. (Did I mention I love this stuff?) I tore the edges in the shape I traced. Then I used a file for the inside face and ear details and shading. Last I drew the eyes, nose and mouth with a black Sharpie.

Quotes from Twilight on these pages:

"I loved the tide pools. They had fascinated me since I was a child; they were one of the only things I ever looked forward to when I had to come to Forks."

"Have you ever seen a driftwood fire?"

"Another legend claims that we descended from wolves — and that the wolves are our brothers still."

'I’m Jacob Black. You bought my dad’s truck."

"He flashed a brilliant smile, looking at me appreciatively in a way I was learning to recognize."

Baby ME

Another set for my parents 35th. The pages before this were titled, "First Came Love" & "Then Came Marriage." So following suit, I titled this one, "Then Along Came Holly." I was thinking of that song, "Along comes Mary" sang by The Association in 1966. I know, I'm weird. There is always some song humming around in my head. Ha! I always joke that if you give me a word, I can sing a song with that word in it.

Don't you love the retro bouncy walker?

Forks & First Sight

So are you all enjoying my Twilight Mini as I post it little by little? Hope so... I had so much fun creating it and I was pleasantly surprised when it turned out pretty darn close to the vision I had of it floating around up there in my brain before I put paper to chipboard.

For the page below, I found a drawing of something that looked like Bella's truck. Then I turned it to grayscale and printed it on Ruby Coredinations paper. (Love this stuff! Read all about it HERE.)

Here are the quotes I used:

"My primary motivation behind buying a car, despite the scarcity of my funds, was that I refused to be driven around town in a car with red and blue lights on top. Nothing slows down traffic like a cop."

"It does great in a collision."

"I don’t think a tank could take out that old monster."

"It was nice to be alone, not to have to smile and look pleased; a relief to stare dejectedly out the window at the sheeting rain and let just a few tears escape."

Below I used actual notebook paper under the long quote. That and the tiny manila folders were perfect for the "high school" theme I wanted for the page. You can't tell here, but pop dots were definitely my right hand man. Dimension is my friend! Hee hee. :)

And the quotes for the next pages:

"No blood, no foul."

"His fingers were ice-cold, like he’d been holding them in a snowdrift before class. But that wasn’t why I jerked my hand away so quickly. When he touched me, it stung my hand as if an electric current had passed through us.

"How did you get over here so fast?"

"Trust me."

Baby Brother

I know it's not Twilight, but ya gotta love these cute baby pictures of my little bro. Or do they scare you like vampires? Hee hee.

This is another 2 pager I did for my parent's 35th anni. album. Funny the rattle pic is one of the only snapshots I could find of just my brother. In most of them, it was me (the eldest) or we were together. (Note to self: Be sure to take little Izzy's picture all alone sometimes.) :) Enjoy!