Top 13 Projects of 2013: Year In Review

Hello everyone. I can't believe a new year is dawning!  As 2014 approaches, I wanted to look back at my creative projects from 2013 and post a few of my favorites.  I love seeing these types of posts on your blogs and wanted to follow suit. 

Below are 13 of my favorites in the order that they appeared on my blog this year. The blue titles hyperlink back to the original posts and tutorials. 

At The Sea - Pebbles Inc. 

I'm All Ears - October Afternoon

Welcome Little One - Echo Park Paper

Lollipop Tents - Echo Park Paper

Delight - Little Yellow Bicycle

Sailboat Tag - Pebbles Inc.

Silly Amazing Handsome You - My Mind's Eye

The Race - My Mind's Eye

I Fell In Love - Fancy Pants Designs

Tuesdays With Cory Mini Album - Fancy Pants Designs

One Fine Day - Fancy Pants Designs

Toilet Roll Reindeer - Fancy Pants Designs

Shaker Card - Crate Paper

Do you have a favorite among these?

As it turned out, 2013 was the Year of the Pub for me. I had 38 projects in print publications this year including work in Paper Crafts Magazine, Creating Keepsakes, Better Homes and Gardens (specialty issue Make It Yourself), Scrapbook and Cards Today, Scrapbooking & Beyond, CARDS, Scrapbook Trends, Create and Simply Handmade.  Sadly, most of these magazines have either ceased publication or will publish only (or primarily) in digital form in 2014. 

I hope 2013 was a wonderful year for you. If you've written a list of favorite projects from the past year, I'd love to see your post. Please link it in the comments. 

Happy New Year!

Fancy Pants Designs: Thank You Card

Hi everyone and happy Monday!  I have a quick little card today made with the new Memories Captured line from Fancy Pants Designs. The collection includes a sheet of cute chalkboard style journaling cards that are perfect for card making.  

This close-up shows one of the chalkboard cards included on the collection.  I emphasized the white circles by adding a circle clip and a houndstooth button. The green checkerboard strip behind the chalkboard card is a tape sticker on top of green striped patterned paper. 

It's always nice to have a handmade thank you card on hand!  

Have a great week!

Card Pair: Little Yellow Bicycle Poppy

Cards are my favorite thing to make but I have somehow neglected them lately. So, I am rectifying that today with a card pair made from the new July kit at My Creative Scrapbook. The Creative Kit features the Poppy collection from Little Yellow Bicycle. It's a pretty floral line with a fun pop of orange. 

For these cards, I used canvas stickers from Little Yellow Bicycle as my sentiments. The stickers, which were included in the kit, give a nice texture without added weight or bulk. 

For the first card, I used a stamp to add the word "sending." The stamp said: Sending love your way and I masked the rest of the sentiment so that the card said: Sending sunshine. 

For my second card, I used the canvas word Smile with brackets on either side. 

Below is a photo of the kit. 

My Creative Scrapbook has several beautiful kits each month featuring all the best paper manufacturers. You can find the details here.

Thanks for stopping by. I'll be back next week with layouts! 

Sneak Peeks: My Creative Scrapbook July Kit

The summer is flying by!  Here it is July already and time for sneak peeks of the new creative kit at My Creative Scrapbook.

The full reveal is July 5.  Thanks for stopping by! 

Animal Cards: Bella Blvd

I'm sharing a couple cards today made with Bella Blvd that were published in recent issues of CARDS magazine. 

First up is a sweet baby card:

This is a shaped card connected at the top of the trunk and the top of the elephant's back.  I don't often make shaped cards, but this one was fun to do. 

I made the elephant's tail using a piece of twill ribbon from May Arts and used some floral paper and pom pom trim to make a blanket. 

Second is a birthday or celebration card:

The frog and gift are chipboard icons from separate collections.  To have the frog holding the gift, I added little frog hands cut from patterned paper. 

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you have a wonderful weekend. 

CARDS: Designer of the Month

I'm so excited to post today that CARDS magazine named me Designer of the Month in its current issue, February 2013, on stands now. 

The magazine chooses 12 designers a year for this designation. I am not sure how I slipped into the mix but I admit: I grinned ear to ear when I found out.  CARDS magazine published an interview with me and featured five of my cards. Four cards were new for the magazine and one was a favorite of mine that I made with Little Yellow Bicycle.  Unfortunately, I can't show the cards until March 1 due to my contract. 

But I can show a scan of the article.

And I can show you two of my cards that were published in the January issue of CARDS. 

This one was for the ribbon challenge.  I used my very favorite ribbon for this one: May Arts chevron twill.  I have it in every color. 

This card I made for an assignment with My Creative Scrapbook, using a kit that featured this cute collection from Echo Park Paper. 

Thanks so much for stopping by. I'll be back Tuesday with a new post. I hope you have a wonderful weekend. 

A Twine Birthday Giveaway!

The design team at Trendy Twine has a little something up its sleeve today:  a surprise birthday party for Lesley, the owner.  Today is her big day and to celebrate, we've each made birthday cards for her, which we mailed earlier this week.

Each team member is spotlighting Lesley's card on our blogs today. This is the card I made.

I tied a bit of Twisted Lime twine around the chipboard vase then curled it for a decorative effect.  To curl the twine, I wet the twine with a glue medium and rolled it around a toothpick to dry.  When I removed the toothpick, the twine held its curlicue shape.

The team invites you to join the party with a hop to each blog. You'll find lots of great tips with twine along the way and a few prizes too.

The next stop on the hop is Jamie. If you get lost, just pop over to the Trendy Twine blog for the full lineup.

The prize on this stop is 20 yards of holiday twine.

You'll get 5 yards each of the holiday colors: Berry, Holly and Holly Berry plus 5 yards of Orange Truffle which we are featuring this month (not pictured).  To enter the drawing, follow this blog and leave a comment here on this post by 9 pm EST on Tuesday, Nov. 20. A winner will be chosen by random.org and posted here on Wednesday, Nov. 21. 

Happy birthday, Lesley!  

Products used:
CS: American Crafts
PP: Crate
Chipboard: Crate
Stickers: Pebbles Inc (sentiment), Echo Park Paper (flower)
Pearl: Close To My Heart
Wood veneer: Studio Calico
Twine: Trendy Twine
Sewing Machine: Bernina 

Christmas Projects with Little Yellow Bicycle

I’m super excited today to show you a couple holiday projects I made for a guest spot with Little Yellow Bicycle.  LYB is doing a fun 12 Days of Christmas series with 12 members of the Once Upon A Christmas cycling team.  I’m Day 3 and am featured on the Little Yellow Bicycle blog today.

If you don’t have Once Upon A Christmas, run to your closest scrapbook store.  This collection is a classic.  It features deep red and green and great neutrals to soften them. The icons are of nature: birds, trees and deer.  And there’s a Father Christmas too.

When I opened my cycling team box, the dark brown houndstooth paper was the first thing that caught my eye. I went to work with it right away.  It made the perfect cozy backdrop for this holiday photo of my sister and son on a carousel ride.  My son’s sweater featured reindeer and snowflakes so I pulled both of those into my design.

  

On this page, I used a journaling card as a decorative element for a cluster of items, including a little pennant made from a vellum strip and a stick pin.

  

For my actual journaling, I made a tag to slide under the photo. I used a piece of cream paper from the collection, stitched around the edges and added a word sticker at the top. The tab at the top of the journaling card is made with a little piece of vellum strip backed with cardstock.

For my title spot, I used a tag, embellishing it with a sticker and punched snowflake.

For my second project, I made a simple holiday card.  The OUAC collection has a pretty piece of red damask paper with a large script sentiment, Merry Christmas, at the bottom. As soon as I saw that paper, I knew it would be perfect for a card.

To make the card, I trimmed the sentiment from the damask paper, then added a bit of red houndstooth with a vellum strip above it.

An accordion flower from the line’s Paper Crafting Kit added some dimension to complete the card.  These flowers come pre-scored in the kit and are so easy to make. I love them.

I have one more project with Once Upon A Christmas: paper ornaments.  They are on the Little Yellow Bicycle blog today. I'll be back with those - and a tutorial - on Monday. 

Simple Cards: My Creative Scrapbook

I think my favorite part of kit work - besides excitedly opening each new DT box - is near the end when I gather the scraps from my projects to make a card.  By then, I know the line I'm working with really well. I know which patterns I like to mix and match and I have a lot of freedom.  The layouts I obsess over are done and there are no photos to edit. It's just me, some scraps, glue and my imagination.

I have a clean style so my imagination doesn't really have to work too hard...Below are cards I made with leftovers from two different November kits at My Creative Scrapbook 

The first is from the Creative kit, which featured the lovely Walnut Grove line from Pebbles:

I admit: I unabashedly love the pennant craze.  I made the "thank you" pennant by folding a sticker around a long toothpick. 

The soft muslin pennants under the vase are Pink Paislee trim.  The bottom row is natural (straight from the packaging) and the top row is misted to match the flowers.  

The second card is from the Album kit, which featured The Good Life, a pretty new line from Fancy Pants. I really loved the colors and the punch of black. 

I thought this card was perfect for retirement.  I used a very simple design, just stitching patterned paper on part of a card, then adding a tag. 

To make the tag, I started with a plain white shipping tag.  I used a zig zag stitch around the edges just for a hint of texture and added a ribbon to cover the reinforcement hole at the top. Then, I added a sentiment sticker and a piece of chipboard that overlapped the tag and grounded it to the card. To finish, I added a couple buttons for bicycle wheels.

My Creative Scrapbook features four different kits each month.  Here's a photo of the two November kits I used.  You can find out more about these kits, including a Christmas special, here.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Sneak Peeks: My Creative Scrapbook November kits

Every month, I look so forward to reveal day at My Creative Scrapbook. The kits are gorgeous every time. I don't know how the owner does it! 

My Creative Scrapbook has four primary kits each month.  I worked with two kits for November.  Both kits featured manufacturers that I tend to work with less often and I have to say: I don't know why!  I was grateful to have both of these companies back on my radar.  These were such fun kits and great lines. 

Here's a few sneak peeks of what's to come on my blog on next week:

You can find sneak peeks from all the designers on the My Creative Scrapbook blog.  The full reveals are Monday.   I hope you have a great weekend!