ON A ROLL

As it turns out, there will be another lady coming to

Jenny's birthday lunch tomorrow... Stella, who is celebrating her

81st birthday on the same day as Jenny.  So, I decided to

make each of them the same style cards

but in different colours.

Inspiration for these cards can be found here http://www.card-making-magic.com/doublezigzagcard.html

Both of these gals love flowers so I'm sure they will enjoy these cards.

Hope you are having better weather than us here in

southwestern Ontario ... minus degree temperatures, with

snow and high winds resulting in white out conditions.

Of course these are just regular conditions for you Gail!

http://scrappintimes-gail.blogspot.ca/2013/01/celebrate-what-you-want-to-see-more-of.html

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

CREATING ABOVE GROUND

Since Mom decided to move to a retirement home, the bedroom that we had built for her was calling my name.  Moving my craft room from the basement to the

main floor of our home was to say the least, extremely arduous ... 

but so worth it.

Now I am crafting above the ground and LOVING IT!

Spending time on Pinterest is very addicting but I have been so inspired

by the many incredible ideas that I find there.  The next card is one of those ideas.

It is a zig zag fold card

and the instructions can be found here:  

http://www.card-making-magic.com/doublezigzagcard.html

Modesty aside ... you know when you complete a project and you

just feel so good when you look at it?  Well, that's how I

feel about this card.  My dear friend Jenny is celebrating her

80th birthday next week and we are taking her out for dinner.  

This will be her birthday card.

I ♥ SNOOPY.  And have ever since I was a little girl.  

I have made it a mandate to haul out some of my old and never been inked stamps

and create with them.  In a drawer marked "Snoopy", I have several 

stamps paying homage to him and here is a little card that I 

made with one of them.

And I would like to share an idea with you for my new

method of housing my punches.

I have several edge punches that cannot be stacked or

otherwise stored in an organized way, so I came up with this idea.

These Bygel rails can be purchased at Ikea and I hung them

on the inside of my closet door in my craft craft room.

I drilled a small hole in each punch, where a hook could be placed and the

punch subsequently hung on the rail.  Then I punched a sample of each 

punch and have them hanging with the punches on the door.

Well that's it for now.  

And thank you CURT for lighting a fire under me

to post on my blog again.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

MADISON WINDOW

After working on my next Workshop Friday Project for the past several weeks,

I decided to deviate from the project for a much needed rest. 

Using my Grand Madison Window die and trying my hand at 

making some flowers, I managed to create this card.

Soft Sky is one of my favourite SU colours so I decided

to use that as my starting point.

I added a couple of flourishes, some MS sprigs, 

a few pearls 

and 

there you have it.

It felt sooo good to make a card again.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

HERE'S MY HEART

On a trip to Michael's in the summer, I found this dollar bin stamp

and immediately knew I wanted to use it for a Valentine's card

for my Hubby.  As with many of my purchases, I tucked it away and forgot 

about it.

Well, I accidentally came across it and inked it up right away, before 

I forgot it again.  We are not a Valentine-type couple but I really wanted

to make my sweetie a card this year (a Tim Horton's coffee card will be

tucked inside).

We have a mill outlet store in our area, that is chalked full of fabric, trims, 

yarns and all things sewing.  I found this black satin/velvet pleated ribbon 

there the other day and it worked out great on this card 

(hope they still have some left 'cause I would like more).

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

A BIRTHDAY TRIO

Got a little carried away on this design ... had to make

one in each colour.  But with several upcoming birthday's, they will

be put to good use.

I am so loving this M/S deep edge punch.  I originally got it to use on

scrapbook layouts but really like using it as a card border.

The image stamp I used is from a set that is one of my originally stamps from

13 years ago.  Boy, we sure have come a long way

since then.  As I look around my craft room and see all of the

punches, embellishments, tools, machines and paper, it's hard to believe

that it all started so long ago with a stamp, stamp pad, embossing powder and

a heat gun.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

MORE BEAR HUGS

The other day, I posted a couple of cards that I made using

Fred Bear Gives Comfort by MFT.  I struggled for several days trying to

achieve some success colouring this image, but seemed to get nowhere and I actually

had decided not to use the stamp any more.  Then, I read a comment that

BEATE posted on my blog, about the difficulty in colouring open images that had no

shading to guide you.  I realized that it wasn't just me and decided to give it

another try.  

The first image was stamped onto dark c/s and shaded with a black

Prismacolour pencil.  And while it is acceptable, it still was not the success I was 

hoping for. 

The second image was coloured with Copics,

but only 2 shades.  And I am more pleased with these results.  While it's not perfect, I am not going to beat myself up over it.  Once I put everything together and made this little

tissue holder, I realized that it is perfectly acceptable to send to someone.

(the tissue holder was an idea that I found on

Curt's blog)

http://curtsplayhouse.blogspot.com/2011/03/wednesday-evening-post-for-march-16.html

Here is a close-up shot of FRED, coloured with Copics.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is don't get discouraged if you can't perfect a technique ... keep trying and eventually you will get to a spot where

you can live with the results.

And a BIG thanks to BEATE for her encouragement

and kind comments.

While I was wallowing in self-pity for not being able to succeed in my 

colouring attempts, I decided to break out my very under-used Cricut machine and

create a birthday card.

It's not possible to see in the photos, but the dog head is attached with 

an Action Wobble and wiggles side to side when touched.  The card was created

using 3 different Cricut cartridges and was cased from an idea 

that I found here:

http://liveloveandscrap.blogspot.com/2011/06/scrappy-moms-birthday-celebration-i-dig.html

Well, that's it for now. I have another run of ME days so I hope

to get a few more things crossed off my to-do list...craft things, of course!

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

POINSETTIAS

One of the many things that I love about this time of the year are poinsettias.

I recently came across a blog that I am totally addicted to.  Kittie is not only 

amazingly talented but very generous in sharing her knowledge through

well written and easy to understand tutorials.

Here is the link to her blog ...   http://kittiekraft.typepad.com/kittiekraft/

I have been having so much fun making these poinsettias 

and thank Kittie so much for her tutorial.  

I would not be having the success I am, without her tutorial.

Since I love red at Christmas, I decided to try some red on red and I really loved how it turned out.

I have a ME week between Christmas and New Year's so I plan 

to try as many of Kittie's tutorials as I can.

I have also been playing with some digital images and came across

these adorable snow people, which I made into cards for some of my neighbours.

(the nice ones!)

Took the image and cut it out with an oval Nestie.  Cut out a shadow mat.

Embossed the background with a snowflake folder. 

 Punched out a border strip.  Used tiny ovals for the greeting.

Added some glitter to the image, around the image oval and to the greeting.

Stuck it all together and there you have it ... fast, easy and sweet little

Christmas cards.

Don't forget to check out Kittie's blog ... you won't be sorry.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

IT'S THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR!

One of my all-time favourite projects is an advent calendar clipboard, that my friend Cathy (http://thestampwhisperer.blogspot.com/) designed and
invited me over to make with her.
Of course, I chose PINK.

I have it displayed all year long in my craft studio
but really enjoy actually using

it during December.

I covered the clipboard front with DP and began to layer my pieces.

The Ornaments are a Sizzix die and have a magnet attached to the back.

Behind the circle nestabilities, I cut a small piece of sheet metal for the magnets

to adhere to.

The ornament magnets are stored on the back side of the clipboard,

by attaching a piece of sheet metal and then DP to cover the metal sheet.

I also made a plastic pouch using a heavy duty sheet protector and s/a velcro dots 

to keep it closed.

The trees were made from a Sizzix die, 'glitterfied' and then popped up.

The tag was also made using a Sizzix die .

 The next card was made for my friend Curt (http://curtsplayhouse.blogspot.com/).
When I saw the stamp of the dog with the Santa hat,
I knew that I 'needed' it to make a card for Curt since

the image reminded me so much
of his Shotsy and Gunther (Curt's giant schnauzer kids).

The little oval tag just tucks inside the top of the Santa stocking.

We have new neighbours and our Abbey has been smitten with their

little beagle, Jessie.  So this card was to Jessie from Abbey with

a little gift for Christmas.

And finally, this little gatefold card was made and sent to a few of my blogging

friends.  I have had these Justrite stamps for quite a while and finally put them

to good use.

Well, that's it for now.  

I'm off to my kitchen to make some Christmas caramels.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

IT'S A MAUVE CHRISTMAS

With the dreaded Halloween season being over (dry up those tears Curt), I can now concentrate on my favourite time of the year ... CHRISTMAS.
My first card this year is for my Mother-In-Law, who loves mauve.
I have been wanting to use these Flower Soft display globes since last year when I purchased them.  I can remember when I first began to stamp (over 13 years ago),
I was really intrigued with shaker cards.  And while I did manage to create a few,
they never quite looked 'right'.  Using these

display globes combined with Spellbinder dies, the results are quite pleasing.

The one problem I did have was trying to photograph the card.  No matter what

I did, I had a reflection of light that bounced off the globe.  

Anyway, I think you will get the gist of the card from the photos below.

It's difficult to see the image but I used an image from The Stamp Barn of

a deer looking at a bright star in the sky (I highlighted the star by using a tiny 

crystal bling).  I stamped the deer with Versacolour White and then

highlighted the entire image with Pearl-Ex.  Martha Stewart carrara marble 

tinsel glitter was used as snow inside of the globe.

One card down ... only a few dozen to go!

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

MOJO MONDAY 189

With all of the 'poopy' weather we've been having lately (windstorms, rain, cool temperatures), I'm beginning to think that we might not ever see Spring this year.  

So, I decided for Mojo Monday this week (thanks Julee for another great sketch),

 to haul out some "in-your-face" colours for my card project, to at least 

brighten up my spirits, if only for a couple of hours.  The DP is SU's Kaleidoscope 

and the solids are Peach Parfait, Melon Mambo and Tempting Turquoise.

Becca Feeken of Amazing Paper Grace is such an inspiration to so many, not the least of which is me.  The flower on my card was made using a technique that can

be found here on Becca's blog.

My next card is for a friend who just found out that she has breast cancer.

I am hoping that some mail might cheer her up a bit.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

TRUE BEAUTY

Hand Stamped Sentiments is hosting a challenge here, to create 

any project with Mom in mind.

My Mother-In-Law is one of the sweetest and most gentle women I know
and epitomizes the word "LADY" to the fullest extent.  She has had a difficult life, even spent time in a concentration camp near the end of the war.  But throughout all of her trials and difficult times, she remains the sweet, honest and gentle soul that 

I love with all my heart.

Since it's Mother's Day soon, I wanted to pay homage to her by posting 

this layout that I did of her.

She is pictured here with her little ShihTzu, Candy.

Mom, you are truly beautiful, inside and out.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~

MOJO MONDAY 187

This week's sketch is a classic ... centred, balanced, clean ... just the way I like it.  Thanks Maria for a good one!  You can find this week's sketch here.

This is a new LOTV stamp that I used in yesterday's post but this one was

coloured with a lighter pink shade.

Thanks for stopping by.

~Bonnie~