No excuses

I am not going to provide any excuses or reasons why I haven't posted in a while. If you are still here, thank you. Now, straight to the creativity!

By golly, Lora, is that a layout?!?! Why yes, yes it is. I know this is Amy Tan's last year release and I have Sketchbook sitting on my desk, but I still just love this line and how easily it comes together. Some of the embellies are from the line while others are from either the class I took with Amy or from Sassafras Lass. There is also some Maya Road rub ons, a Hambly overlay tag and some random stuff I had and yes, I do believe that is the last of the pink polka dot crepe paper so you won't have to see it again. (Unless of course I find more!!!)

I hand stitched the "JOY" to the tag and sewed the paper laves to the bottom. Oh! The flower there is an Epiphany Crafts bottom with a Dear Lizzy button on top and the chevron pieces near the title are Studio Calico Fabrip leftovers.

Then there was this little guy. It is a Midnight Musing creation. A mini canvas painted, layered with dictionary paper strips, stamped with a repeating heart image in Staz-on, then a Balzer Designs stencil over that with yellow paint. The saying and the bird were stamped or drawn on sticky back canvas and cut out. Both were colored with Gelatos first. I used the Sakura Glaze pen to write the quote and draw the little heart.

The twig is from the backyard and painted green then layered with a bit of distress stain. And this guy, over here on the corner?

That is the spark of inspiration from the Midnight Musing. I used push and mold, pressed a metal key to create the shape, and melted the UTEE. I added bright green eyeshadow that I had and there it is! While the color is very similar to Perfect Pearls, the eyeshadow didn't have the pearlescent look to it so the UTTE piece is less shimmery, but I love it. The ribbon is dyed with glimmer mist.

This poor layout. I had to do it twice. The first round was a hot mess and went in the trash after I pulled the photo and some embellies off. The second round was much better. It is still way different from my original conception, but I am at least happy with it. This is a Pagemaps sketch, I believe, and the inspiration is from a friends' blog.

The pink woodgrain is made by me with a stamp and embossing powder, the light pink and brown polka dots are Pink Paislee. Journaling spot is Jillibean Soup, the flower with tulle and the wood buttons are Prima, the white resin pieces are Melissa Frances, the little flowers and pearl button along the bottom are Webster's, and the milk cap is of course Jenni Bowlin.

AC Thickers and chip butterfly, K & Co fabric flowers along the top, Recollections pink resin roses, and the wood grain strip above Miss Lily's bow is from Heidi Grace Designs. We are going to say that everything else is stash.

Some Gertrude Stein in My Bedroom

Hahaha, did that grab your attention? I spent most of today working from an inspiration photo that I once saw of Gertrude Stein in her Paris apartment. She was an avid collector of art and this specific photo showed her living room with a settee in the middle of this large wall that was covered in pictures of all types, floor to what seemed 14 foot ceilings. I loved it immediately and it has haunted my hopes of home decor ever since. No longer, my friends.

We had the perfect wall in the bedroom and goodness knows, I have collected more than enough art pieces. It started like this.

So sad!!! I dug around under the bed and pulled out the pictures I had been hoarding which quickly became piles, measured two pieces of architect's vellum across the wall, and then laid the paper on the floor of the library.

I had to work in there as the bedroom does not have the uninterrupted floor space I required. Did I say uninterrupted? I must have meant something else because my paper and I were certainly interrupted by the two resident feline clowns.

Lotus Chief and Fuzzface totally thought Mom had laid this crinkly paper out for them to play. About five seconds after this photo, the Fuzz tried to sneak up on LC, only to have LC jump straight up into the air and Fuzz tear out of the room. There were small kitty claw tracks all over.

I laid out the pieces that I wanted to hang, rearranging as I went. It was a good thing I had my art supervisor down there in the left hand corner telling me I was on the right track.

After drawing around the frames and measuring the hangers on the back, I taped the paper to the wall and got to setting the nails. This was the easiest part of the endeavor.

Finally I have the Gertrude Stein inspiration wall in the bedroom! There are some small spaces left open purposefully for future finds. While looking at this wall, I counted that there are only 2 things here that I bought in a regular retail store. Everything else is either thrifted or handmade. I love that. I also noticed that without intending to, I have quite a few Paris pieces. That isn't surprising since it is the first major International city the Hubs and I went to together.

A Creative Day

Yesterday I went to my bestie's house and spent a day creating. I have to admit that it was a struggle to get there, not because I didn't want to go, but honestly because I am so overwhelmed with the scrapbook supplies in my studio that I felt guilty about going to play and not staying home to clean. I did overcome this guilt and made a small altered project and a layout while there with my BFF and her puppies.

A Quick One

American Crafts paper, stickers, crocheted and felt flowers and tags; Prima letters, decorative pebbles, and wooden button; Pink Paislee pleated ribbon; K&Co letter tag; handmade bows.

Weekend Wrap Up

The Hubs had took a four day weekend which seemed to extend my weekend too. On Friday, we went to see The Hunger Games. I have read the book, but the Hubs hasn't, and he was honestly a bit lost in the movie. I have to say that the casting is SPOT ON. I am really impressed with the actors and their portrayals of the characters. Then we ran some errands and caught happy hour at our favorite restaurant

I sported my interpretation of this outfit I found on Pinterest forever ago.

(Link)

My version is more in grays and whites, rather than browns. Not the greatest shot, but that is what you get having the Hubs do it.

Check out the boots! These are score of the month. They are Frye brand AND I paid a whopping $20 for them! 

Saturday I spent re-reading The Hunger Games and babysitting two of the sweetest kids ever. We made these cute pom pom animals for our craft. 

Sunday, The Hubs and I spent most of the day reading and then headed out to Half Priced Books to catch their 50% coupon day and grab Chinese food for dinner.

I finished re-reading the Hunger Games series last night before finally drifting off. I have to say that after seeing the movie and reading the entire story again, I felt drawn in deeper than I did the first time I read it. I am glad that I read them, but with the three H.G. books, The Help, Love in the Time of Cholera, and The Throne of Fire all consumed in the last week, I think it is time for a break from reading for a bit.

Great News to Share!

I am so very excited to share that in August, I will be a part of The Art Life's Inaugural Inspiration Weekend! The Art Life is a small company ran by my bestie, Daniela Costa. She features wonderful kits in her online store and teaches classes nationally, sharing her unique and fun love of creating.

Daniela has decided to put together a three day weekend here in the beautiful Bay Area. The retreat will feature four classes each with a different teacher, make and takes, food, crop time, giveaways, free goodies, and without a doubt, TONS of laughter and great memories. Let me just say that I have had the opportunity to take classes with all the teachers but one and you are in for a real treat if you are able to come.

Daniela will of course, be teaching a mixed media canvas class that I cannot wait to see! As I am sure you recall, The Art Life projects that I have made and shown on the blog are full of wonderful goodies. Her blog shows even more of Daniela's talent, The Art Life.

Halloween Tray Class

Paper Mosaic Box Class

Next up is Suzy West, a very inspiring teacher who has created lines with companies like My Little Shoebox and Basically Bare. I took her Christmas mini album class and she is a total blast! Suzy's blog, What You See is What You Get, is full of her spunky projects and personality.

Girlie Glitz Album Class

Happy Holidays Album Class

The third instructor on the roster is Marion Smith. You may know her from her A-MAZ-ING lines with Prima or you may have seen her teaching online through her blog, A Piece of Craft. She is an absolute DOLL and I was lucky enough to take a class with her last year.

Lovely Memories Class

Finally, your fourth teacher will be me! Yes, I am beyond honored to be teaching with these incredible ladies. I have been brainstorming like crazy and losing sleep to my midnight musings while I come up with an altered project that will make you smile every time you see it. 

You can find all of the details on the website, The Art Life Inspiration Weekend. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or need any suggestions for travel, etc. I do hope that I get to see every one of you at this retreat!

Two of my weakest links

To make a card and a baby card at that. Almost. Impossible. Yet, I had to have it to put in the box tonight to be mailed tomorrow.

Brights on a grey day.

My one layout from the crop last night. I used American Crafts Margarita line for this layout with the exception of the Thickers which are from Dear Lizzy, the mini ticket strip and the star pins which are from Maya Road. The picture is of my cousin and sister from the Oregon State Fair. The edge of the base paper is painted with Picket Fence Distress Stain and dotted with Jenni Bowlin's Lemon Drop paint.

Risk a little

Light gray card stock layered with a Basic Grey doily reverse side up. I used the same doily as a mask on the dark gray card stock and spritzed apricot chalkboard glimmer mist. Scraps from the Soiree-Pink Paislee line and Jenni Bowlin. Felt word, hearts, and dots from K&Company and doily overlays from Maya Road.

This layout features a fashion risk I took, wearing a pair of heels out to run errands. Surprisingly, they were more comfortable than one would think.

Other bits and pieces

While making and working on the Twelve Months of Minis, I have also been puttering around the studio doing other things. For example, I am currently going through my layouts and putting them into the new American Crafts D ring binders I got fro Christmas from a very thoughtful Hubs. Of course, knowing me as well as he does, he realized that I would want to personalize my albums and bought me three with plain chipboard covers, so I have been covering those and moving the layouts into them.

While sorting the layouts, I have come across some that are either unfinished or are in need of repair. Yes, journaling is my weak spot and I canNOT stress to you how aggravating it is to have to repair layouts due to less than stellar adhesive. For some of you, I am sure you completely understand my level of intolerance for this.

These are the two piles currently sitting on my sewing table. The one on the left is the unfinished pile, while the one on the right is the repair pile. Sad that they are about the same size. I am this close [ ] to using Gorilla Glue or E6000 on them.

I have also been trying to find my desk after my return from CHA. As always, it was incredible and I was fortunate to be able to take some classes while there, but this is what my desk looks like after emptying the suitcases.

In addition to the projects already there, I added two mini books, a bunch of jewelry projects, and some incredible mixed media projects. Honestly, the hardest part of sorting this disaster is not getting side tracked by the cool things I come across.

Beginning of something new

Way back in October, I was purging through my supplies and realized I have hoarded a large amount of chipboard mini albums. I have no idea why I thought I would need this many, but I did realize I needed to come up with a way to use them soon. As usual, while laying in bed trying to sleep, the idea of a mini per month for 2012 was born. I know this isn't a new concept as there is Project Life, (overachievers ;), and whatnot, but it is a commitment I think I can fulfill.

I, of course, had every intention of having all 12 books covered and ready to fill with memories on January 1, but as life would have it, I didn't. Something called Breaking Dawn, the holidays, and laundry came into play there. I will say that I did have the books all gathered in one place AND even had made a list of which book would be for what month and what papers I wanted to use. I will also confess that at the time of this blog post, I have no idea which notebook holds said list...

The main thing is there are no real "rules" for me. It isn't a daily thing because 1) my life isn't that exciting and if I did it daily, would be 26 days of cat and house cleaning photos with the 4-5 pictures of actual events, and 2) there is absolutely no way I would keep up with a daily journal.

So far, January's book has 26 pages while February's only has 16. That is okay. I will record the days that stick out, the ones I remember to take a photo for. I have almost finished January's book, (printer issues- GRR!!!), and have February's ready to go, painted and papered. This week, I will pull out the March book and start covering it, so hopefully I will be ahead of the game.

Enough blah blah, here are some photos of the books.

I used a Tattered Angels album, covered with one of my all time favorite lines, Bo Bunny's Snowy Serenade, mixed with a glimmer misting. The snowflakes on the pages are a Martha Stewart punch, the cover has My Mind's Eye sticker letters, crepe paper, ball trim, Thickers numbers and a plastic glitter snowflake from Target layered with an organza flower and a Prima center. The flower was made for me during a swap. I did the journaling on tags I cut from white card stock and tied with four colors of baker's twine.

I am by no means going to show every page because that would just be tedious to both myself and the readers, but these are a couple of the favorites. I was super excited to learn how to print the photo booth strips from the Incredi-booth app on 4"x6" paper for a cute mini strip. I love things in miniature.

February is a Maya Road album featuring another favorite paper, the Love Me Do line from My Mind's Eye.  I didn't have quite enough to cover the inside pages, so I snuck in some Making Memories paper. I must note that for the first time ever, I didn't really worry about what paper went where, I just covered the pages and let it be. Normally, I make sure there are equal alternations in the pages. While I will admit that there are no same papers facing each other, it is still a random mix of how they all line up in the book. At least as random as I can be in this.

Two books used and two lines that have been in my stash for at least 2 years used. That is a really good feeling.

It has taken a year

for me to finish this layout. A year. That is just sad, really. The layout itself came together very smoothly, which for a one picture per page scrapper like myself, that is impressive with the 15 pictures on this page. I LOVE the colors and have used this line for at least two other projects.

Honestly, I wasn't sure what to do with the journaling. I wanted it to be on the doily obviously, but did I handwrite it or type it? And if I typed it, how was I going to make sure it was in a circle? So incomplete it stayed.

Until today when I sat down at the computer, actually read the "Help" section on my word processing program and figured out how to type in a circle. Then I was faced with what to say. How did I impart in a 4.5"x4.5" space how special it was and is to me that my Grandma and I were both born in January? How did I say that simply sharing the month with her made me feel special, gave me a bond to her that has even 18 years after her death, continued to warm my heart in this otherwise dreary month? I just typed and let what ever come to mind become journaling.

One of my favorite parts of the layout is the feathers. I love feathers and adding them to the page just gives it a fun and different touch to me. I also added a few red bling in homage to the garnet, January's birthstone.