So Happy Together!

I love my weekends... but I don't like how they go so fast!  I swear... wasn't it just Friday?  Well, I guess the countdown to the coming weekend officially starts NOW! lol!  It was a nice two days of relaxation though and I did get some things accomplished.  I even got to create for a bit which really makes me happy!  I took the bull by the horns and I did it... I completed my submissions for the Bella Blvd. 2013-2014 Design Team.  I still have to hit the send button, but I actually went through with it and I'm really liking everything that I created for the call.  Now I just need to hope that the judging panel will like them (my cards) AND me too!  Yes, I am applying for a Card Designer position.  Not too sure about my luck there seeing as they are looking for only 2-4 people to fill those Card Maker spots.  Makes me nervous!  Anyway... I was thrilled to be in my scrappy happy creating environment again and I realized that I need to start carving out more of my creative time.  It's far better than all the other mundane day to day stuff that should be pushed to the back burner more often.  Ohh, and did I mention... my vacation starts in 11 days! 
Wa-Hoooo!!! Oh, I can hardly contain the excitement!   

 

So tonight before I go, I wanted to share a card that I recently had up on the Curtsey Boutique blog.

This one is a card that can be used as a simple little Anniversay or Wedding card.  All the sweet cork heart and butterfly shaped stickers can be found in the Curtsey Boutique Etsy shop, as well as the painted mini clothespin and the torn fabric strips.  The embossed panel behind the sentiment tag is kraft masking tape (Curtsey Boutique) that I layered onto a piece of cardstock.  I embossed the panel with an Anna Griffin Cuttlebug folder, inked the surface with some chalk ink and then cut out around the embossed edging.
 

 

 

 

 The enamel dots, tag and patterned paper are all by My Mind's Eye and the embossed Tillie Dots cardstock is Core'dinations.  Don't you LOVE that navy and aqua color combo?  I believe it's becoming a quick favorite of mine!  Good night everyone!  Have yourselves a wonderful week... enjoy!

Designing For Curtsey Boutique!

I have to say, I have thoroughly enjoyed designing for Curtsey Boutique these past months, AND if you like crafting with fun vintage inspired goodies and MORE, now could also be your chance because there is an open DT call happening right now!  Here is the blog post at Curtsey Boutique with all the deets...  CHECK IT OUT!!  

In other news... the new May Arts Ribbon DT was announced recently and unfortunately I did not make the cut.  It's all good though, because I gave it my best shot and that's really all I could do.  I will find something else down the road to occupy my crafty niche, I'm sure of it... I'll just need to keep plugging away!  :)  With that said... have you all heard that Bella Blvd. has a new DT call open now too for the 2013-2014 term?  Hmmm, must say that I was quite pleased to see that.  I really wanted to apply last year and the time got away from me.  So, I am seriously thinking of giving it a shot this time around.  A girl can only hope... I think there products are the absolute cutest around :) 

Before I say Good-Night, I will leave you all with a card share.  This card I created for our good friends' wedding a few weeks ago and I used  some gorgeous Curtsey Boutique embellies. 

 

 

I wanted this wedding card to have a vintage and homespun look all in one, to emulate the style of my friend's wedding décor and theme.  I chose to emboss the background with a vintage floral design  and then paired it perfectly with vintage touches of a pink floral fabric strip and a swatch of burlap from Curtsey Boutique.  The burlap was actually a section cut from one of the burlap bags.  I also cut strips of the burlap from the bag to use on a separate project! And the little bitty hearts... those are cork and I swiped them with some pink chalk ink. 

 

Other supplies used include-

Anna Griffin floral Cuttlebug emboss folder and machine

Cricut Sweethearts cartridge and machine

Core'dinations cardstock

Clearsnap  chalk ink (pink)

Ranger Perfect Pearls Mist (Heirloom gold)

FloraCraft Diamond Dust glass glitter

 

 

Bella Blvd. = Baby Bliss!

It's a fun week week for us designers at Core'dinations Cardstock because we've had the chance to team up with the fabulous designers at Bella Blvd., to share some over the top creations and inspiration on both the Core and Bella blogs!  I'll just say, it's insane how wonderfully these two companies compliment one another, and I'm sure you'll all agree! 

That's right, be sure to check out all the posts at both blogs this week (and go back to check out Monday and today's as well).  There are opportunities to win some great Core and Bella Blvd. products so don't miss out!

For today I designed this baby card featuring Core Essentials and Whitewash paired with the adorable Baby Boy collection from Bella Blvd.  

This baby collection also has fun chipboard and sticker elements to match (take note of that sweet baby giraffe!).  And did you know Bella Blvd. now has their own Washi tape?  They do!! Swoon!! For this card I used some of the cool yellow chevron designer paper tape and I created some super cool alphas by applying some of the tape to a scrap of Core cardstock and then cutting them out using my Cricut. 

I used the Lyrical Letters Cricut cart - Jack Sprat font and cut my letters out at 3/4"... on the Core blog post I had said they were 1/2" letters, but they are 3/4"... sorry! 

Anyway, I only used one row of tape, but you could also line several strips together on top of one another and cut out larger alphas as well!

For this card I also folded some of the paper tape into tabs and used them on the neck of the giraffe diecut which was cut from some yellow WhiteWash Core. I embossed my giraffe die cut (Cricut New Arrival cart - cut at 6") with a Sissix animal print folder, sanded the spots and then went in and added some extra brown tones with a Ranger ink pad and the Ranger blending tool.   This really adds visual interest and texture to the die cut! 

Other product used here:

Core Essentials in green from the Nostalgia pack.

Bella Blvd. Simply Simona Orange Sophisticates Ciao Chipboard alphas.

Bella Blvd. Baby Boy Chipboard and stickers.

Bella Blvd. Baby Boy, Wild About You paper.

Martha Stewart Fringe scissors.

Bakers Twine from The Twinery.

Black pearls by Kaiser.

 

That's all I've got for now, but please remember to come back and visit the Core and Bella Blvd. blogs each day this week... you won't want to miss a thing!  Enjoy! 

It's a Holiday!

So glad to have an extra day to relax on this Labor Day, 2011!  I hope everyone is doing the same and enjoying one of the last days of Summer.  Not too much planned for the day here, and I kind of like it that way.  I've got some ribs slow cookin' in the crock pot and my mom and gram are coming a bit later to join me for supper... unfortunately the hubby has to work so he'll enjoy some leftovers later.  Other than that, I've got nothing else on tap except maybe some naps here and there :)

I did manage to squeeze in a little scrapping time over the weekend, although I didn't get nearly as much done as I had hoped I would.  Mostly I played around with my scraps of Bella Blvd.  And I do mean scraps!  I am using up every last morsel of the collections I've had in my stash, so I am ready to get my hands on some new... esp. their newest Fall collection, Finally Fall! What a scruptious looking line... afterall,I can never have enough Autumn stuff;) 
See,last week I had all intentions of trying to make these scraps of mine stretch enough to make a few newer layouts to use to enter into Bella Blvd.'s design team call, but they didn't get done.  I was able to create one more page and card though this weekend, so these are what I did.  So many cute things can be made with the Bella Blvd. lines, and I just love them all!

 

I especially love this combo that I used here with lots of green, aqua and a smidge of yellow... ohh and GRAY!!

And here's a Spring card that I put together too...

I think I probably have enough bits and pieces left now to make maybe 2 more cards... so we'll see! 

Thanks for dropping by, and have a terrific week, everyone! 

Lazy Saturday!

It is a very beautiful Saturday, and here I sit!  I am absolutely lazy... have not done a thing but flip the stupid remote.  I don't know what's wrong but I just can't find my motivation plus I'm sad because today is Knoebel's opening day, and since the dh is working, that means we aren't there :(  What a perfect day it would be for a day at the park! 

So since I have no urge for housework, I thought I'd at least squeeze in a blog post!  How bout' a look at some recent publications?  First up, I had 3 layouts and a card in the April/May issue of Cricut magazine. 

Once more, I can not stress enough how awesome the Cricut mags are!  Absolutely my favorite publication now.   And since Mother's Day is just days away, I can show a card that I made for my mom which is in this magazine...

For this card I used the cute button frame which can be found on the Cricut Wild Card cartridge.  It worked perfect with the sewing theme!

I also had a few pages in the issue, including this fun page of a photo I snapped of my crazy niece hugging a tree.

This one is of me doing one of my favorite Springtime activities... hanging out my laundry!  I used the Straight From the Nest cartridge to create the clothesline and to show that you can easily mix your Cricut diecuts with various company product lines as I have done here with the clothesline to match up with the American Crafts Dear Lizzy collection.

And my last published item in the issue is the first 2 pager I've had published!  This one was for their banners section and I used all Bella Blvd. for this layout, and once again, the Straight From the Nest cartridge. 

For some reason, blogger is not allowing me to change the sizes of my pix on here at the moment, so hopefully you can just click on a picture to view it larger.  This 2 pager has a ton of fun details... esp. with the banner.

 

And one more publication to share... a card that I had published in the March 2011 issue of CARDS. 

The butterflies used on this card I had cut from a roll of printed kraft paper wrap...

And the other "ingredients" came from one of the Yellow Bag kits from For The Luv of Art.com!

 

Okay... that's all of my projects for now.

Before I go though, just wanted to share one more thing that's near and dear to my heart.  As most of you know, I am a mommy to 3 beautiful Heavenly angels whom I'd give anything to just be able to mother them here on Earth.  Mother's Day is coming up shortly, and although I enjoy celebrating that day with my own mom, I still can't help but to feel let down, disappointed and hurt that I do not have my children here with me on that special day (and EVERY day).  Even though in my heart I know I am a mother, it's often very difficult to "feel" like a mother.   All mother's who have experienced their own loss feel this way to some degree and that is why International Babylost Mothers Day was established.  This day is celebrated tomorrow, Sunday, May 1st.  Please, if you have a close friend or family member who is missing their child, don't forget that even though their child is not here with them, they  still deserve to be a celebrated mother!

If you know of a mother who holds her baby in her heart and not in her arms, let her know you are thinking of her that day. "United in grief, we find love and strength"!

Winter Jammin' and Scrappin'!

Hello!! Good Thursday to you all!  Got just over an inch or so more of the white stuff last night, so not too, too bad compared to some other areas of PA!  I'm still really fed up with being so cold and I'm not at all thrilled about having to send in a $250.00 heating (electric) bill tomorrow!  But, what I am excited for is that we get to go to the Winter Jam concert tomorrow in State College!  I've been waiting for this for months and it's finally here! We didn't get to last year's event so we are really looking forward to this, and you so can't beat the price of admission for this... $10 for 10 bands/artists = a terrific day of entertainment! 

So... what have I been working on this week?  Well over the weekend I scrapped up a storm and it was so fun to have nothing on the agenda but playing with paper!  One of my very favorite scrappy sites, the Nook, had a crop going on so I participated in a bunch of their challenges which were so fun because they all centerd around the theme of a Family Reunion!  I believe I got 7 projects done, so not too shabby for a day's creating!  Here's what all I did...

                                      ( A card for the Monochromatic challenge!  I used lots of pink and mauve from  Bella BLVD. )

( A layout sharing something strange or nutty about a family member!  These pix of my SIL, Wendy fir the bill perfectly! )

( This challenge called for making a page with no patterned paper... all cardstock.  This happens to be one of my favorite things to do... I love all cardstock pages and cards!  I decided to make this one all about me for once.  My dh took this shot of me recently one Sunday afternoon with his new Galaxy phone.  I had not a stitch of make-up on and I don't believe my hair was even brushed, but I still kinda really liked it.  )

( Loved how this one turned out!  These are the last photos I happened to take of my Dad!  We went to vist for a weekend in Feb.of 2008 and I took my camera... I believe God nudged me to do so!  I had always wanted to take pictures of him reading.  I wanted to capture that because that was my Dad's favorite thing to do.  He was always reading and I wanted to get this aspect of him down on a scrapbook page.  I had wanted to get these pictures snapped for so long and then on this day I finally did it.  I can still remember him looking over at me and saying, "What in the world are you doing"?  I just smiled, laughed and said, "You know me... the scrapbooker"!  Am I ever grateful for taking those last special shots!  I never could have imagined that 2 months later he would be taken from us.  I would so regret not having them!  Just confirms to me the power of a picture!!   Anyway, for this challenge we needed to scrap with some of the older product in our stash, and here I used the June Bug collection from Basic Grey! )

(This page required us to use something that showcased "Wood" to represent the Family Tree aspect.  I happened to have the perfect photos for this and the cutest laser-cut tree accent that I had been saving from Riff Raff Designs.)

(This one I kinda got disqualified for because not only were we supposed to use "Timeless Treasures" in the page title somewhere, but we also needed to include a"vintage" photo.  Although the subject of my photos here is vintage, the photos are not, as they were just taken this Christmas!  No worries though because I still got a nice page scrapped! )

(And for this last challenge I did, we had to use a family monogram.  I loved this one because I've been wanting to use my Cricut vinyl for the longest time to create a monogrammed charger plate.  This was so fun and easy to to and I can already tell I'll be making a lot more of these type of projects! ) 

Sooo, geesh, I think this post got a bit picture heavy!  I was going to share another card I did the other night but I think I'll save that for later, lol!  Anyway, thanks to everyone who took the time to go over to the myStamp BOX blog and leave such nice comments for me... I really appreciated it!  And if you want to check out something else I did over there this month, I have a new tutorial posted on the blog again today about Glimmer Mist Stamping!  Thanks again!!

Time Keeps On Slippin'!

How can this be?  It's already well into December... and this is my first post of the month?!! Geeesh!  Time is slippin' away!

So much more yet to get done before next weekend and sooo little time.  I hope everyone has been having a terrific holiday season, even if it is going fast for ya!

Anyway,  last time I blogged a post, I did say that I was going to share with you all a lot more of the projects that I had done for LCOM using the new Bella BLVD. lines that the DT was givin to work with.  I can still share a bit, but I have to tell ya... several of my Bella projects have been picked up for publication!   Yeah!!  Last week was totally a great week of requests for me... I had a total of 6 project, requests!  First, I had 3 layouts and 1 card picked up for the April/May 2011 issue of the new Cricut magazine from Northridge Publishing.  Very exciting because as most of you all probably know,I love, love, love using my Cricut... how cool it would be to have something published in every Cricut issue (fingers crossed)... so far so good because I'm 2 for 2! Then, I also had a card picked up for the May 2011 issue of CARDS, which is one of my Bella BLVD. creations.  Last, I had 2 more layouts requested for the other new Cricut inspired magazine, The Bug Magazine.  They requested 2 pages for the Spring theme, however I could only send them one because the other was already sent in for the Cricut magazine request!  So looking forward to seeing all these things in print in the coming year! 

So yes... here are some things that I can share with you... all using Bella BLVD.  I had never really played with Bella BLVD. before getting these collections in my hand, but they are seriously CUTE lines!  I love how there are 12x12 pages full of coordinating sticker embellies AND alphas... perfect! 

This first card uses the Hello Beautiful line.  Aren't the bold colors fun?  Lovin' the teal paired with the red.  See the embossing in the cupcake to make it look wavy on the blue icing top?  I used the Zebra animal-print texture plate from Sissix! 

I used the Distressed Stripes folder from Cuttlebug to add the texture to the cupcake liner.  The cupcake is actually one of the cut-outs from the 12x12 sheet of Hello Beautiful paper. 

And, here's a layout that I made... this using mostly the Lovey dovey line!  Sorry about the quality of these photos though... for some reason I was having a tough time photographing this page well... the colors just didn't show up well for me at all.  They really don't appear as washed out IRL, as they do here! 

This page has been a long time coming. I've been wanting to scrap this photo for awhile and the Lovey dovey line from Bella BLVD. just seemed to really fit the "feel" that I wanted for this layout! The flower part I cut using my Cricut and then I embossed it with the Meadow Lark Cuttlebug folder. I cut the heart portion from a sheet of the 12x12 pp from the Lovey dovey line and used it for the center of the flower!

Well, as always, thanks for stopping by to visit!  I hope to come back to make another post before Christmas arrives... time willing!  It's been one whirl-wind of a month for sure, but I'd still like to share pix of our Christmas decorations for this year so I hope to do that.  Enjoy your weekend ahead and have fun getting all the last minute stuff together... one more week equals last minute IMO!