MIM: Using Borders to Make Flowers

I am using the Make-It-Monday projects as a way to jump back into card making. I was so busy with work and trying to keep up with things at home that I wasn't making time to papercraft. The MIM projects are inspiring and do-able so I'm a happy camper. I ended up going a bit vintage with this card with the background paper from My Mind's Eye, the tinsel glitter, and the tea-dyed edges. I loved making the tiny tag. I used elements from Garden Variety Two to put together the stamped images on the tag. I think I could just make hundreds of little tags, I love the detail-oriented parts of projects. For MIM, I had to use a border die to create a floral accent. I used the Eyelet Lace Die for my flowers. The cool thing about this die is that there are the circles that cut from the centers. I die cut three strips of felt and then adhered the opposite color inside of each of the rolled flowers. I was pretty happy with this card; it might have to stay in my craft room :) I'll at least have to make more flowers with all of the border dies.

A close up of the tag and the border die flower.

The edges of the flowers look extra pretty too because of how it overlaps.

I {heart} Tiny Tags!

MIM: Using Those Scraps

Happy Mother's Day! I was just thinking about how my scrap bin is becoming an overwhelming mountain of lovely PTI paper. I can barely close the lid to the bin. Making one card isn't going to make that much of a difference in my pile but it's inspired me to pull out my scraps first before grabbing a fresh sheet of paper. I have ten tags to make for my seniors that are getting ready to graduate so I know that I will empty those bins out a little more. Okay, let's get to the card for this week's MIM over on Nichole's blog. Dawn had the most amazing and helpful video full of tips. I grabbed five different patterned papers from my stash and layered them like the rainbow. I find that I do this with almost everything, even when I eat M & Ms. There is a very special young lady who is graduating this year and I'm going to miss her a lot so this card is for her. She's had a lot of hardships but is a very strong individual. Also, I teach Spanish and have had her in Spanish three of her four years of high school. Plus, she studied Spanish over the summer at NYU and is going there in the fall to study linguistics. Okay, back to the card. After laying the papers, I die cut a star at an angle at the top of the paper. I was going to use the PTI star but it was too big so I pulled out my Spellbinders. I stamped "Girlie, You Rock" in the center of the star and added a few purple rhinestones. I added three clear butterflies and put rhinestones in the center. I also used my glue pen to trace around the edge of the star and added some super sparkly Palette glitter.

I couldn't bring myself to throw away the star so I put it on the envelope, cut out Skylar's name and used Stardust Stickles the letters. The button in the center of the star is layered and then tied together with twine. I hope she likes the card, now just to write a note inside.

Inspired Color Challenge

This is going to be a quick post since it's so late. The evening got away from me, as usual, and it's back to work tomorrow. Anyway, my Weight Watcher's leader is relocating to Alabama so I thought I'd make her a card to express how helpful she has been in my journey so far. I never paid attention to how many of one color I had on a card before so this gave me a chance to really pay attention to the color and elements of my card. I found that it was really hard to get three items of each color on the card but I'm pretty happy with the finished product. Everything, except the rhinestones, are from PTI (of course) :) The stamp sets I used were: Beautiful Butterflies and Background: Houndstooth. I can't believe I've not used either set until this card. What was I thinking??? Here's the card. I may come back later to edit the post to add details, if anyone has any questions. My eyes are getting heavy and I have 100 teenagers to work with tomorrow that are ready for summer break. (Me too....eight days left!)

April Blog Hop

It's been a LONG time since I've added anything to my blog. I have been busy raising a toddler, teaching Spanish to a lovely group of teens, and letting life take me where it leads. I couldn't resist joining the April Blog Hop after I saw the inspirational picture on Nichole's blog. Plus, I keep accumulating all of these great PTI supplies; I need to prove that I'm using them...not just collecting them, although that's fun too :) I have worked at the same high school for four years and it's quite a bittersweet year. I am watching an amazing group of students getting ready to graduate that I first knew as freshman. They have spent most of their high school careers molding themselves into fine individuals. Today was our last Spanish Club meeting of the year so I made a card for the club president, a young lady who I've known since her freshman year. I used the inspirational picture to decide the color scheme and also allowed that to influence me to use the Pretty Peonies butterfly.

I used the Cane Print plate as the background and then layered the mat stack dies in the center of the card. A few buttons around the die, rhinestones and sewing down the center of the butterfly, and a strip of Hawaiian Shores finished up the card. I hope it is well-received. I really enjoyed participating this month and really hope to become more active on my blog again. I miss it!