How To Curl Twine: Vase of Paper Flowers

I am delighted to announce this news today:  I’ve joined the design team of Trendy Twine.  I first fell in love with Trendy Twine back in January when I was a guest designer. The twine is such a great weight and lays and falls so nicely. Trendy Twine is a three-color twist that comes in traditional colors mixed with white as well as custom colors mixed with other colors. It’s beautiful to work with and I couldn’t be more excited to join the team.

Let’s see some Trendy Twine at work, shall we? For this project, I made a vase of paper flowers.

　

I used flower kits from Little Yellow Bicycle’s Paradise and Wonder & Wishes collections to make the accordian flowers, added button centers from Basic Grey, then attached the flowers to floral wire stems. To incorporate the twine, I wrapped Twisted Lime twine around the five largest flowers.

To make a curled "ribbon" from twine, I wet the twine with glue, using Claudine Hellmuth's Multi Medium Matte.  While wet, I wrapped the twine around a straw. Once the twine dried, I unwound it from the straw and the twine sprung right back into shape. (Note the twine in the demonstration below is a different shade of green).

Here is a close-up of the curly cue twine ribbon.

To celebrate the new design team, Trendy Twine is having a blog hop and is giving a way a spool of twine (winner's choice) to a commenter chosen by random draw. You can find all the details on the Trendy Twine website here.  

Thanks so much for stopping by.  I really appreciate your visit.  I'll be back tomorrow with reveal day and a Prima contest from My Creative Scrapbook.

Linking this to Tip Me Tuesday, Tater Tots & Jello and Today's Creative Blog.

Sneak Peeks: My Creative Scrapbook Kit

Some exciting things are happening this month at My Creative Scrapbook. A new kit is revealed on June 5 and we are launching a month-long Prima contest with lots of prizes.

Next week, I'll show you full reveals and will have more info on the Prima contest.  For now, I have a few sneak peeks of layouts using the June kit.  Do you recognize this line or manufacturer?

For more peeks and info on the June kit, visit My Creative Scrapbook here. Thanks for stopping by. I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

Nothing Like A Good Pair Of Old Jeans: Sketch Challenge

It’s hard to match the lived-in comfortableness of a good pair of old jeans. When I was in the Peace Corps, I brought a brand new pair of classic Levis with me to Namibia and wore them so often that by the time I left my service, the jeans were like sweat pants.

Relationships are like that too. I love the feeling of being around someone for so long that they are as comfy to me as an old pair of jeans. When I saw the worn denim patterned paper in Authentique’s Genuine collection, that feeling of comfort is exactly what I thought of. So I had to make a jean pocket.

Those sweet little crocheted flowers are from my good friend Tabbetha Gilbert. I thought they fit perfectly here with the jeans.

The card is based on the May monthly sketch at Authentique Paper. I put the flowers in the square grid format.

You can find all the details here.

Supplies:

CS: American Crafts

PP: Authentique Genuine (Perfection); Loyal (Honest)

Stickers: Authentique (Genuine Details), (Delightful Elements)

Crocheted Flowers: craft supply (made by Tabbetha Gilbert)

Sewing Machine: Bernina

Pausing To Remember: Cards For Our Troops

I come from a military family and while I love the long weekend that Memorial Day affords, today I also want to pause. Today, I remember the fallen. As someone once said: freedom is never free.

Today, I remember our heroes, and I remember too that our country is still at war. Sometimes, it’s easy to forget that we are still sending men and women to battle.

When my brother was deployed to Iraq in 2005, we wrote each other frequently and occasionally he would ask me to write to one of his buddies who didn’t get a lot of mail from home. Those letters and packages were always fun to send because they were unexpected. After my brother returned home, I sometimes wrote to “any soldier.” I haven’t done that in a long time, but today, I will.

If you’d like to write a note to a service member or send a card, one organization that accepts mail then distributes it overseas is Operation Gratitude here.

To send mail directly to a specific service member, you can choose a name from AnySoldier.com here.  Or ask around your neighborhood, office or place of worship to make a more personal connection with a service member.

To the men and women who fought for freedom, or who are still fighting, and to their families, thank you.

Hexagon Punch: LYB Hello Spring Card

I admit: I am behind the trend on hexagons. I have used some fun hexagon themed patterned paper in the past but I’ve never made my own hexagons. But now, I’m officially trendy!

 

Part of the reason I had never made hexagons before was that I didn’t have a hexagon punch, a particularly elusive creature. I am not sure why there aren’t more hexagon punches on the market. But I managed to find an old one by Creative Memories that did just the trick. This particular punch makes hexagons in two sizes and you can also nest them. Nice.

This shows the punch and the beginning of my card panel, albeit upside down.... I used the larger hexagon for my project. 

Here's a close-up. Paper and embellies are Little Yellow Bicycle, the Hello Spring line. It’s such a fun and vibrant collection and perfect for this time of year.

Thanks so much for stopping by my blog. I hope you have a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.

Documenting Baby's First Year: 11 Months

I started scrapbooking in 2009 just prior to my son’s birth with the goal of making a baby book of his first year. Someone had given me an album, cardstock and stickers at a baby shower and that was my start.

As my son grew, I was dogged about one thing: taking a photo each month of my baby on his birthdate and writing down that month’s milestones. Recently, I was looking through his baby album and saw I had milestone layouts for months 1 – 9 and a birthday page for age 1. Hey, that’s pretty good. I was just missing milestones for months 10 and 11.

So, here we have it: the 11-month milestone page. I was grateful I had written these down. At the time, you think you’ll never forget. But trust me, new mommas, you will.  Here, I added the list of milestones to a cardstock pennant.

I used Echo Park Paper for this layout, primarily the Note To Self collection. The star paper is from EP’s Pride and Joy mini theme. The wood veneer heart is Studio Calico; stickers are October Afternoon. The Polaroid frame is a die cut from Paper Issues’ etsy shop.

And coming soon to a blog near you: the 10-month milestone page.

And speaking of Echo Park , I was so pleased to see this little beach ball card I made from EP scraps muscle its way into the week’s top 3 lists at Two Peas in a Bucket.  Two Peas just recently switched from daily top 3 lists to weekly ones. This shaped beach ball card topped the list for the week as the most liked project and came in 2nd as most bookmarked.

I originally blogged about this card here.  I had made the card for a publication call for shaped cards. It wasn't picked up, which is always a bit deflating, so it was extra sweet to find the card in the Two Peas rankings. :)  

Bark, Ruff, Howl: A Doggie Hello

Hi, hey, hello there.  Bark, ruff, howl.  I like to keep a stash of cards with every day sentiments on hand, something that I can send for any occasion or just because. I’m always on the lookout for a paper line that fits this bill and the Echo Park Paper's mini theme Woof was perfect.  Even though we aren’t dog owners, I couldn’t resist this cute collection.

I particularly liked the paper in the Woof collection with all the doggie sayings. I used that paper as a background on my card, then pop-dotted a few speech bubbles for emphasis. The chipboard doggie is from Echo Park's Hello Summer line and worked perfectly with the Woof collection. 

Also, I wanted to share some fun news today. My Creative Scrapbook is having a contest that starts June 5. The particulars are still under wraps but I know it involves Prima and bling and lots of fabulous prizes. I’ll post more information about the contest and sneak peeks of the prizes as soon as I know more.

All the details of the contest will be posted on http://www.mycreativescrapbook.com/ . We’d love to have you join us!