I Left My Heart ......

Where? And who sang the song?

In no particular order, a few pictures:

Union Square

Transamerica Pyramid Building

On the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge - boy was it WINDY!

YUM! Ghiradelli Square

Fisherman's Wharf

The Coit Tower

Morgan had a college showcase soccer tournament in a city just east of San Francisco over the weekend, we (Morgan, a teammate, and me) left on Friday bright and early for the drive up. After playing in 4 games Saturday and Sunday, we spent Monday in San Francisco before heading to Monterey for the night. We left Tuesday morning and drove the beautiful Highway 1 down the coast.

I'll be back to creating soon, after I recover! LOL


V.~

Rain...~

This is so cool! Enjoy!

V.~

Have a Wonderful Day~

I blew the dust off a box of Hero Arts stamps that had been squirreled away and played in the SCS Featured Stamper Challenge this morning.

Here's the card I used for inspiration:
Karen's Kard
The object is to change at least 2 things, I changed more than that, but used it as a jumping point and kept the cards similar in feel to each other.

V.~

Stamps: Hero Arts Watercolor Coneflower, Distressed Background Block, Wonderful Day
Ink: Crushed Curry, Soft Suede
Other: Memento Markers: Cantaloupe, Rich Cocoa, Pear Tart, FlowerSoft® Nut Brown, Spritzer Tool, Chocolate grosgrain, Corner Rounder, Dimensionals

Just About 10 Minutes....

Before the front door was about to open. The kids and I went to Target to pick up a few things - they wanted to buy their dad birthday cards this time - I'm okay with that, really. I still hadn't made a card for him, due date tomorrow, so I looked at Target, and looked some more, and looked even more. I couldn't find anything that spoke to me and that I wanted to spend $5 or so on, especially with all I've invested here at home. So they came home with funny cards, me, empty handed.

Anyways, we got home at 3:45 or so, which left me about 10 minutes to get a card together without Jay being around. Luckily the leftover patterned paper from the card below was still out, waiting to be cleaned up. What you see here is the reverse side of that paper. Perfect for a guy card and especially a guy who loves red. I loved that his age appeared in the numbers, so I trimmed a scrap that framed the number 48. He's always dreamed of having an old car as a project car - but with kids and their schooling and sports and you know, the process of raising a family - it's not been a reality yet. Someday.....

Knowing that, I remembered this classic truck and coordinating sentiment set from CHF. I stamped the truck in red and the sentiment in teal, a teal mat, clip and small snippet of ribbon....and in he walked just as I was tying the ribbon....to loud shouts from the kids, don't come in here yet!

The base card size is an off size, too, as it's also what is leftover from the 5" x 5" card below - it finishes off at 3-1/2" x 5-1/2"

Now just to write something soppy on the inside, nahhh, prolly not, we're not the soppy kind.

V.~

p.s. now final wishes for a wonderful weekend, whatever your plans!

Stamps: 1956 Chevrolet 3100 Truck and You're A Classic by CHF
Ink: SU! Riding Hood Red and Taken with Teal
Paper: Natural White by Neenah, Taken with Teal by SU!
Patterned Paper: Blue and White Motel and Skyline Motor Inn from the Road Map Collection by October Afternoon
Other: Clip, Red ribbon, Distressing tool, Dimensionals

Happy Birthday, Cupcake~

Another niece has a birthday approaching at the end of the month so I set aside a bit of time to make this card for her this morning. Ever have one of those simple cards that becomes a time pit? This was one of those cards, I am not sure why, it was so simple in my head! :) I fiddled and fiddled and fiddled with it, almost chucking the whole thing - but the stubborn side of me kept at it and it finally came together.

After all that fiddling, I need to get on with the rest of my day and weekend.
We've a busy one with birthday celebrations and a soccer tournament.
Have a great one, whatever you are doing!

V.~

Stamps:
Summer Sweets by Our Craft Lounge, Teeny Tiny Wishes by SU!
Ink: SU! Wild Wasabi, Tango Tangerine, Crushed Curry, Taken with Teal, Riding Hood Red
Paper: Classic Crest Natural White by Neenah
Patterned Paper: Blue and White Motel and Skyline Motor Inn from the Road Map Collection by October Afternoon
Other: Nestabilities Circle Die, Cuttlebug Tag die, Satin ribbon, Linen thread, Eyelet, Distressing tool, Dimensionals

You Might Be Old.....

....but you're not quite extinct!
Perfect for a 50th birthday card for my BIL. I "thought" for just a moment on buying one of those funny, sarcastic cards for him, or perhaps a serious 50th card, but the card maker side of me won out. He'll get a chuckle out of this tribal card, I hope anyway. Now, just to come up with a witty inside greeting. Any ideas?

You can find these images in The Tribe set by Our Craft Lounge

I wasn't quite sure where I was going with a layout when I started, I colored the dude with various Copic markers and highlighted with a black Glaze pen, white gel pen and a gold glitter pen. The rock sentiment was colored with Copics using lots of dots, to emulate a slab of rock.
After coloring everything, the main image was still too white looking, so I outlined him in BG0000 followed by a spatter with a sand marker and spritzer tool.

Then I picked out a scrap of patterned paper from my scrap drawer (Graphic 45, if memory serves) and adhered it to a black base. I pulled orange and green from the image to brighten up the card. Sanded paper edges, an offset mat and burlap string finish off the layout.

You can see the trimmings for the inside mat, just waiting for a clever and witty inside sentiment. Maybe after our swim at the "Y" it will come to me, or someone will post something here!

V.~

Whispy Thanks~

Clean and simple, yes it is!
SCS has a weekly CAS challenge posted each Monday. I decided to take a break from all the behind the scenes work I've been doing for the new soon to be released metric Scor-Pal (for those of you on the metric system, lots of tutorials coming your way soon!) and play in the challenge this morning.
On a Tuesday. :)

We were to select an art piece from art.com and use it as inspiration. I chose the
Three Gerberas Print
and used the flowers from Whispy Blooms and floated them on a white card. The sentiment is from Growing Gratitude. A few piercings and an embossed score line keep it CAS!

V.~

Supplies not listed above:
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black and Versafine Onyx Black by Tsukineko
Paper: Neenah Solar White, SU! Basic Black
Copic Markers: Y13, Y15, Y17, YR24, YG03, YR0000, YR01, YR02, YR65, R02, R14, R24, R27, R39, R89
Other: Glossy Accents, Microbeads, Scor-Pal, Design Ruler, Dimensionals

Sweet Treats ~

Another fun "class" project courtesy of one of my online pals.

It's a card, treat holder, gift card holder, whatever your imagination desires.
I'll be putting my niece's gift card for her birthday inside in the right pocket.

The layout for the card is from the Our Craft Lounge's July Sketch Challenge.
I left out a couple things and moved the oval down, but the overall sketch is there.


Folio directions:

Here

I also added a small piece of Scor-Tape on the outside edge to keep the flap closed.


Stamps used for this project are:

Summer Sweets by Our Craft Lounge
Mix Up of Cuteness by Unity Stamp Company
SU!'s It's Your Birthday

Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black and Versafine Onyx Black
Paper: Neenah Solar White, SU! Basic Black and Green Galore
Patterned paper by BoBunny
Other: Copic Markers: R81, R83, E97, E99, and 0, Oval punches, Pink mini brads, Distressing tool, Dimensionals

We're off the Balboa Park to play for a while at the Science Center.
Have a great day!

V.~

Whispy Blooms Tag Box~

If you've had a look at the new SU! catalog there's a box on page 14 that has everyone guessing on how to make it. I'm sure there's several versions floating around with different measurements and ways to assemble, but I came up with this one. However, I could not do Christmas tags, it's 92 degrees outside and December is not on my mind right now!

It's a tag box full of 16 Whispy flower tags; 4 of each design.
Images for the tags are from Whispy Blooms by Our Craft Lounge
They are stamped on to Neenah Solar White cardstock with Memento Tuxedo Black and colored in with Copic Markers. R81, R83, RV17 for the pinks and YG03 and YG25 for the greens.
They are punched with assorted SU! punches: Scallop circle, Scallop oval, Tag, and Curly Label. To disguise the coloring bleed through on the back, I punched a matching shape for each one and glued them together before hole punching, setting an eyelet, and adding silver cording.

Tag Box Tutorial

Paper Sizes:

• 1 - 8" x 8" square piece of cardstock
• 1 - 3" x 3-15/16" piece of cardstock
• 2 - 1-7/8" x 5-7/8" pieces of cardstock
• 1 - 4-1/16" x 11" piece of transparency

Other Supplies:

• Scor-Pal
• Scor-Mat
• Scor-Tape
• Craft Knife
• Metal Edged Ruler
• Stamps and Ink
• Coloring medium, if necessary, for line art stamps
• Eyelets, punch and setting tool
• Cording and Ribbon

Step 1
Align the 8" x 8" square to the top fence, left side, and score at
1", 2", 6", and 7"
Step 2
Rotate 1/4 turn and repeat.

Step 3
For illustration purposes, I've used plain cardstock with pencil lines indicating the score lines.
Using a craft knife, metal edged ruler, and your Scor-Mat, cut as shown on the orange lines.

Now, cut as shown on the blue lines

After cutting, this is what you will end up with.

Step 4
Notch 4 small tabs.
Now take a sliver off each side of the 4" flap. 8 cuts total, from the edge of the paper to the first score line. This will ensure the box folds together nicely without binding in the corners.

Step 5
Attach a small piece of Scor-Tape to each tab.

Step 6
Turn cardstock over and attach 4 strips of Scor-Tape to outside edge of flaps.

Step 7
Prefold all scores.

Step 8
Adhere tabs to inside to create box form.

Step 9
Adhere flaps to create box, burnish sides with your Scor-Tool to create crisp sides.

Step 10
Align the 3" x 3-15/16" piece of cardstock to the top fence, left side, and score at
1/2", 1-1/2", and 2-1/2"

Step 11
Prefold all scores and attach a piece of Scor-Tape, as shown.

Adhere together.

Step 12
Align one of the 1-7/8" x 5-7/8" pieces of cardstock at top fence, on the 1/6th (midway between the 0 and 1/8") at the left side, and score at 2", 3", and 4"
Repeat with second piece of cardstock.

Prefold both pieces and attach a piece of Scor-Tape.

{Insert missing photo here of both pieces adhered together.}


Step 13
On the longest of the 3 inserts, place 2 pieces of Scor-Tape, as shown.

Step 14
Attach the 2 smaller inserts to the Scor-Tape.
Tip: Attach to one end and then the other, finally to the middle, this ensures all edges line up; burnish with the Scor-Tool.

Step 15
Align the transparency sheet to the top fence, left side, and score at
2-1/2", 3-1/2", 7-1/2", and 8-1/2"

Tip: Even after scoring, transparency sheets can be hard to fold. I line up a metal edged ruler to the scored lines and fold over the ruler, and then burnish with the Scor-Tool to get a hard edge.

Step 16
Attach a piece of Scor-Tape to one edge and wrap scored transparency around the box.

Finished Tag Box
Slide clear cover off, insert stamped tags, replace clear cover and tie a ribbon around the box.

I hope you enjoy making these tag boxes!

V.~

Out of the Box....

and into the bag!

The July Flower Soft Design Team challenge was to use Flower Soft® in an out of the box way. Hmmm, what to do, what to do.....This week the PTB at Flower Soft® sent us a bit of new product, Holiday Card Toppers and Polar White Flower Soft, so I decided to go headfirst into the holidays.

My out of the box project was to create a Beary Merry Christmas gift bag. I trimmed the tree/bear image from the topper sheet, matted it on green, and added fun pop out accents (light and bear parts) for additional dimension. A bit of Polar White Flower Soft® sits as snow on the trees. The pop out accents are so fun, they remind me of paper dress up dolls from when I was a kid. I also added a bit of Glossy Accents to the light fixture and bear noses.

The bag was something I purchased some time ago at Michaels. I added a red cardstock strip to help anchor the image and a button/gingham check ribbon embellishment on the handle. The bear image was attached with dimensional foam to the bag front. That's just about as much holiday creating I could do today - it's hard to wrap my brain around that time of year when it's in the 90's outside. :)

Getting back into summertime colors, my other out of the box project is a shadow box card, using Sweet Pea Flower Soft® on the cupcake frosting. The fun cupcake image and sweet sentiment inside is from Summer Sweets by Our Craft Lounge. The Happy Birthday sentiment is from Drake the Dragon.

Supplies not listed above are:
Ink: SU! Kiwi Kiss, Regal Rose, Basic Gray, ColorBox Fluid Chalk Prussian Blue
Paper: SU! Very Vanilla, Pink Piroutte, Prism Iced Teal
Patterned Paper: Cherry Hill Cookie Jar by October Afternoon
Tools: Scor-Pal, Cuttlebug, Nestabilities Scallop and Circle Dies, SU! Modern Label Punch
Accessories: Buttons, Cardstock thread, Olive grosgrain, Glue dots, Dimensionals

V.~

eta: the scheduling part of Blogger is apparently not working today as you can tell by the post date. So, please pretend that it's the 1st! As I well know, once published, even if retracted, the post stays on some readers.