The Graphics Fairy - DIY: GIVEAWAY - French Fabric Labels

The Graphics Fairy - DIY: GIVEAWAY - French Fabric Labels

This wonderful blog site I follow is doing a great give away!

I'm going to start off by saying I absolutely love The Graphics Fairy!

When I fist stumbled onto this blog I went mental and started printing out absolutely everything I saw!

I since then have decided maybe I should save some trees and be a little pickier.

I do have to say though they have the best FREE vintage photo's and drawings I've seen!

Feel free to check it out, download/ print some beautiful stuff, and please comment that I sent you if you do!

And just so you know: I do have a serious blog crush on this lovely site!! :*)

EXCITED about Networked Blogs; FUTURE UPCOMING ANNOUNCEMENT TO FOLLOW

Just a small note to those lovely people that are friends on FACEBOOK, and or fans of my blog: I've figured out how to link the 2 together! YEAH FOR LEE!
She told me about this great thing on Facebook called http://www.facebook.com/networkedblogs
It works wondrously by linking everything together!

  

Thanks to her and that I will be able to share things with my adoring public, LOL

All that said PLEASE tour around my blog, and check out my past posts; especially my BLOGGITY, BLOG, BLOGGING post where I will be featuring ONE FRIEND OR FAMILY MEMBERS BLOG per month. ( Please inbox message me on Facebook to apply, or I will be randomly be selecting someone!)

 And FYI: NONE of my posts are old out of date junk, or old news.

They have all been posted within this month! NEW, got it! LOL

As well please follow me! I have a new box on the right side for you to do so!!
At 50 followers I will do a random draw of all the people that do, and give away a prize! Let's just say it will be something featured on my BLOG!!! (I may even let the person pick!)

OK, LAST BUT NOT LEAST I HAVE AN EXCITING ANNOUNCEMENT TO MAKE:

ON SEPTEMBER 1ST, 2011

STAY TUNED AND FOLLOW ME TO NOT MISS OUT ON THE EXCITEMENT!

Crazy UGLY little Boxes!

Ok, so a few weeks back I was hanging with my cool/ crazy friend Lee! She's the greatest crafter, scrapbooker, and sewer I've ever known! She makes all sorts of beautiful things! To be honest she is someone I look up to, and aspire to be like "when I grow up" :*)  (I hope she doesn't mind my saying that)
We met at a crop, and she's quickly become my BFF! She gets me! She gets that I love scraping and crafting, she understands the huge love I have for my family, and she also gets how pissed off I am about the muffin top I have. We sometimes scrap together, sometimes Zumba our assets off together, and defiantly have aspiring conversations about our next attack on the crafting world!
You can feel free to check out her blog at : http://www.createalways.com/

Anyways back to the STORY! Lee had some ugly boxes she didn't want and I was ALL OVER THAT! The base color was a bright pink, and I had an IDEA! I told her that when I got done with them she would want them back! So she let me run off with them! Here's what they looked like:

Actually originally they had an ugly red twine type ribbon running down the side of the yellow paper... URG!

So anyways, NEXT I took a little trip to the store to gather some supplies to make my boxes look FABULOUS! And here's what I used:

• sanding block
• black paint
• paint sponge
• stencils
• scissors
• black/ white ribbons
• assorted rhinestones/ pearl stones
• glue gun (not pictured)

AND a great printed plastic place mat.

I started out by picking off the ugly yellow and purple flowered edging, then giving the box a light sand with my sanding box to remove any leftover glue. Then I cut pieces of that lovely place mat to fit on the inside of my windowed box, and on the 2 edges of the smaller boxes. I glued them in place with my glue gun.

Then I took my assorted ribbons, and made some simple flowers, by gluing them in loops, with my glue gun.

I then added an assortment of rhinestones/ pearl stones also with my glue gun to the center of each flower.

These lovely flowers are inspired by Prima.

Then I added some matching ribbon along the edge of the place mat (on the small boxes),

and topped it off with my lovely flowers, securing them with the glue gun.

What beautiful tiny boxes!!

Now to finsih accenting the large one.

I used my stencil and the black paint to make a pretty design.

I then added some assorted rhinestones/ pearl stones, and finished it all off with some glitter glue!

Then on the opposite corner I added my other inspired flower, trimmed with a few feathers!

Here's how the large one looks!

WOW! OH, How lovely!

Total price tally:
3 free boxes
2 stix of glue gun glue $0.50
assorted rhinestones/ pearl stones $0.50 worth
feathers $0.10
place mat $0.50
black paint  $0.25 worth
ribbon $1
stencils $1
other tools on hand
TOTAL: $ 4.85

Lovely from ugly in about 2 hours!

SO WORTH IT!!!

BLOGGITY, BLOG, BLOGGING!!

So, it seems like almost everyone I know is starting to blog!! All sorts of friends writing about things they wanna share with the world, ME TOO PLEASE!!
So, I've decided I'm going to blog about blogs!!
Once a week I'm going to POST the LINK to my good friends and family members bogs, as well as some cool other blogs I've found as of late!
SO BEGINS: BLOGGITY, BLOG, BLOGGING!!
1st I'd like to say if you are eager and can't wait to know what I've been looking at and who I find interesting in the world of blogging feel free to dip into my BLOGGING BRAIN and check out who it is exactly I follow. Trust me, if I saw it and it was not something I really want to see regularly I wouldn't follow it. That said lets get BLOGGITY, BLOG, BLOGGING!!

The first person I know, that actually came out and said that she had a blog,

was my wonderful cousin-in-law Aylx!

 

She and my cousin suffered a horrible accident a couple years back. Aylx has a permanent brain injury because of that. Since then she has made major changes to her life, including becoming a vegan, and is doing fabulously well! I'm super proud of her and how passionate she is about the gift of life and bettering it through compassion and vegan-ism. Here's the link to her  BLOG:  http://plantpowered.blogspot.com/

We may not live close enough, but I truly am happy to say she is a strong and wonderful woman with great determination! I LOVE YOU, AYLX! Keep BLOGGIN"!

Digitally Goofing off!

So for those who know me know that this last week involved a tragic death in my husbands family. This has prompted me into thinking about my own relationships with my family, sister and cousins. With a heavy heart I've turned to something both that I find relaxing, and that has newly sparked my interest:
Digital Scrapbooking.

I have been a scrapbooker for years and over this last year I've been slowly rekindled that love. Of course this is subject to me having the spare time to gather the things I need, find/ print photo's, and all the while keep my darling daughter out of it all. HARD!! And usually results in 1 thing: frustration.

Now, being at home during the days gives me some spare time usually to check out FACEBOOK, and GOOGLE, and millions of other randomness such as PINTREST which usually twirls me around to other peoples blogs. With all this happening I seem to end up reading something interesting about: digital scrapbooking!!

So, why not try it out... I mean REALLY try to give it a shot. I started out by looking for free digital scrapbooking kits, including papers and all sorts of embellishments. Then just opened the PrintMaster Platinum program I've had for years and started playing around. I figured out if I open an item in my photo viewer, or even something online and just copy and paste it, it can go into my program, onto my virtual scrapbook page! WOW, I thought, this makes things easier. If I don't like something I can crop, or delete it totally. I can even find some cute ready matched kits, page templates for ideas, or even finished pages to add photos to ( if I wanted to be lazy or needed something done FAST).

I've been goofing around with endless amount of posiabilities. So, now for what I did:
I went into my PrintMaster program, opened a 12x 12 page, added a background, which came striped
and with a curved boarder and flowers already added. I found it at: http://digital-scrapbooking-japan.blogspot.com/  She has a great blog with loads of free cute stuff!
I then added the movie ticket and bow embellishments. The mats were next, then I cropped and added the adorable photos of my daughter, Ana (in pink), and niece Ayla  (in brown, both photos were taken the same day). Of course, I just had to adorn these two sweet girls with printed angel wings. I tinted the wings so they turned different colors then the black they came. I lastly changed the color on the separate letter font to black & white, and added them singly to spell out cousin.
 I can't remember where they all individually came from, if I do I will defiantly credit them too.

SUCH FUN! AND LOOK WHAT i MADE:

My little pink girl, Ana and her sweet cousin Ayla.

So... how did I do? This one of my very first tries & I hope you like it!

The Frugal Crafter Cleans Up

Through the maze of wonderful sites I've been looking at I found this gem of a recipe to make your own stamp cleaner.

Personally I was just using a dab of dish soap and a specially purchased baby toothbrush for the job, but do think this may be a better idea to help my newly purchased stamps last allot longer.

Please feel free to check out this lovely blog, Lily Pad cards, and especially the free recipe to make the homemade stamp cleaner!

The Frugal Crafter Cleans Up

Lisa's Tutorial - Studio Calico

Hello ALL! It's been an interesting week filled with trips to the EX, kids and work. FUN, and tiring.

I've been looking around around downloading some awesome stuff to do some digital scrapbooking with, and also finding some new techniques I want to try out.

This link below shows a great technique for spray on shimmer/ glimmer mists (whatever you call them).

Lisa's Tutorial - Studio Calico I think I may just have to try it out for myself...

So I've decided to try the free classes offered by big picture classes, and see what happens!
I promise to keep you posted with some photos and details about what it's like, and what I've come up with.
I'm the type of person who follows directions rather as a guide then as what I HAVE TO DO, just so you know!
Here's hoping it's fun and worth my time!

HELLO!!

Ok, so I've decided to give in to the urge of blogging! So lets talk about ME!


Me as a person: I'm a great rambler, kid and husband take carer-er (if there is any such word, LOL), and crafty girl. I'm super friendly, a bit bossy, and generally fun... well mostly.


My current situation: I find myself at home with my son and daughter during the days right now, and trying to start my own cleaning business on the side. I'm married, but mostly in love with SCRAPBOOKING!


My goal:  To share what I know and make with the world.


My hubby asks allot, "and what is that for?" about my craftiness, but hey who would expect a guy to know, LOL Maybe you can help me find my words to better explain it to him, or maybe you can just confirm my thought about how neat it indeed is!