Pinterest inspired Valentine's cards

I was inspired to attempt this style of card by this pin on Pinterest. I loved the simplicity of it. I decided to stamp using CTMH retired stamp set Love Ya! in Tulip and Holiday Red ink and layer it on Tulip cardstock.

Here I added a little black in the sentiment and the cardstock layer.

Here I added a lot of black to attempt to make it more masculine.

Again attempting to make a masculine card I wouldn't be embarrassed to give to one my sons. This card uses CTMH A Melody and Whooo's Your Valentine stamps.

This was a special request by my oldest son for a card he can give his girlfriend.

And then I moved on to another Pin-spiration design. I was attempting to keep this masculine for my other son, I failed when I added the bow. I will be revisiting this design and maybe a button and CTMH Waxy Flax will appear more masculine.

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!

Big buttoned infinity scarf

I can't seem to stop making scarves. Infinities are my current favorite. I just finished this one. I pinned this idea on Pinterest, and within hours I had shopped through my yarn stash and pulled out my crochet hooks and was sitting down in front of my TV working away. Her picture tutorial was super easy to follow. I whipped this up in an evening. I followed her stitch pattern exactly, but mine is narrower and a little more open weave because I used a much smaller less chunky yarn. I was working with what I have.

For the first time I decided to add some big chunky buttons for decoration. These colors match the flecks in the Loops & Thread Impeccable Charcoal yarn. It's fun. And different. That's good, since I now have like 10 or more scarves to wear. Yikes! Somebody stop me.

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!

Holiday shaped gate fold cards

I was inspired  to create these by this pin on Pinterest. I created them on my Cricut using Design Studio and the CTMH Art Philosophy cartridge. I was using up paper stacks I have had on hand for years. I did some border punching along all the flap and cardstock straight edges. A little bit of  decorative bling on the front flap and they are ready to go. The finished size of both is kept intentionally under 4.25 x 5.5 inches so that they will both fit in standard A2 envelopes. 

Here is a detail shot of the first flap raised.

And the bottom flap lowered, showing the interior liner so that I could stamp a sentiment since this paper is beautiful double sided stuff. The above stamps are all from the current CTMH Whooo's your Valentine promo set. So cute. 

Here is the egg shaped card with its first flap flipped up.

And the inner liner exposed with the lower flap out of the way. creationsbypatti.blogspot.com had a beautiful idea and I really enjoyed recreating it on the Cricut.

As always, I am happy to send you my Design Studio .cut file if you would like to give a go at recreating this card also. Be sure to leave your email address in the comments section below and I will send it out to you. 

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!

Spring infinity scarf

I have been playing with yarn again. This time I am crocheting. It's funny how I haven't done it in years but it really did come back to me just like riding a bike. I was inspired by this picture I pinned here, from the beautiful blog fiberflux.blogspot.com. I had such a hard time deciding which pattern to try, but I finally chose her vanilla bean scarf for this beautiful Loops & Threads Impeccable yarn in Fresh Lilac Ombre. It turned out perfect, it's the shortest infinity scarf I have made yet, but since the yarn is so soft and floppy it lays perfectly and feels wonderful to wear. I whipped it up in about 3 hours with 3 false starts. But once I got the start I was happy with, it flowed nicely. I can't wait to make more.



Here is another close up. The colors are a little softer in real life than they appear here, in my opinion.

I have made three other scarves recently, from this pattern, I love this pattern. It crochets up quickly and makes a nice medium weight scarf that is pretty and functional all at the same time.

This was my first one. I was using some free yarn someone gave me, two very old skeins of acrylic Red Heart yarn. Nothing special but it is a pretty scarf.

So then I made these two out of Loops & Threads yarns again. The left one is Charisma in Black Raspberry and the right one is Hearth & Home but I don't have the label anymore for the color. They feel amazing, soft and velvety. I am addicted to wearing these lately. They are light and comfortable but I enjoy the warmth. 

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!

Whooo's Your Valentine card

I have been dying to ink up my CTMH Whooo's Your Valentine promo stamp set. I saw this great background idea and saved it to Pinterest, and I was finally able to try my hand at it tonight. I really like the finished result. 

Yep, I tore a page out of a discarded hard back book I rescued from the garbage, just to use it as part of my background. I stamped 3 of the many hearts images from the new set in CTMH Ruby ink randomly all over the book page. I inked the edges with CTMH Desert Sand and Ruby inks, then layered it on a piece of CTMH Tulip cardstock (I don't own any Ruby cardstock yet, so I improvised,) I stamped the sentiment on a scrap of the trimmed edges from the book page and layered that on another scrap of Tulip cardstock. Last little detail was the stitches on either side of the sentiment using CTMH white hemp. Attached it to my 5 x 7 card base and it is my first completed Valentine's card for the year. Cuteness! I love hearts. I love red and cream. I love this card. I guess it really is the season of LOVE!

If you are interested in ordering this set you can do so online here. Stop by and check it out. It's a cute set and a great deal and only available through January 31st.

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!

Welcome baby card

This card was soooo fun to make. This card is a welcome baby card for a co-workers new son. He was so eager to get to meet his mommy and daddy and older brother that he was nearly 3 months premature. But I hear he is strong and doing very well. Since I didn't get to make a baby shower card, I improvised and made this one. 

You might notice I did the masking technique again, yep I'm a bit obsessed with it right now. I stamped in the  masked area using Hero Arts Envelope Pattern background stamp in CTMH Desert Sand. Also, just like yesterdays card, I sponged around the outer edges of the masked area with the same ink. I got out the teddy bear stamp I have had literally for decades, yes plural, I have been rubber stamping for that long. It says it's Annette Watkins brand but that's it.  I also have a coordinating bunny stamp. Cute as can be for baby cards, I think. Except that they both have a little bouquet of flowers in the center of the stamp, in the belly area. You can get away with flowers for a baby shower, especially if you don't know the sex of the baby, pastels and flowers are pretty standard. But since Mason is all boy, I decided to cover up the flowers with punched out circles with his name spelled out. The teddy's are stamped in CTMH Outdoor Denim, Indian Corn Blue, Desert Sand, Garden Green and Olive inks. I fussy cut each of the teddy's out, whew, way more work than I usually would do. But worth it.  All of the edges of the teddy's and the punched circles are sponged in the Desert Sand ink also. The teddy's are pop dotted up from the card base. I wrapped CTMH Outdoor Denim bakers twine around this layer and then attached it to Garden Green and Outdoor Denim cardstock layers and holding all the layers together are CTMH Olive brads at the corners.

A close up shot, so you can see the layers and details. A card to celebrate a sweet new baby boys birth.

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!

Sympathy card

I am finally back at my craft work space, unfortunately it is because I needed a sympathy card. I found some great inspiration here on Pinterest.

This technique is so easy but adds such wow factor I think. I used painters blue masking tape and taped off the edges, I have also used post it notes before but I didn't have any big ones left. I inked up the Hero Arts Old Letter Writing stamp for the background using CTMH Desert Sand ink. I stamped it off once on scratch paper and then stamped the space inside the painters tape. Then I used a sponge and more ink and sponged the edges just inside the painters tape, for a nice aged look. Then I inked up SU! Strength & Hope butterfly stamp using CTMH Twilight ink, and stamping it off on scratch paper each time, I stamped partial butterfly images all around the masked edge.  I now carefully peeled off the masking tape, stamped the sentiment and then on a scrap of paper stamped the butterfly and fussy cut it out. It is popped up in the center of the masked area and the wings are slightly rounded up away from the card base. 

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy! 

2012 A blogging year in review

It has been a fun crafty year for myself. Thank you so much for visiting my blog and checking out all of my creations, from cards to sewing to my newest obsession of knitting. I appreciate all the kind comments and the Pinterest pins, I hope I help to inspire you to craft and create. This post is a review of my most popular posts of 2012, as determined by bloggers count of hits to the individual pages. It's very interesting to me, to see which ones get the most visits. Here we go:

10. With 171 views. 

9. With 181 views.  

8. With 186 views.  

7. With 192 views. 

6. With 200 views. 

5. With 211 views. 

4. With 235 views. 

3. With 298 views. 

2. With 369 views. 

Drum roll please......

1. With 7,437 views.  Yes, you read that right. 7,437 views. Actually, as I have written this post is has gone up even more. Wow.

As I was writing I noticed that every one of these Top 10 posts from my blog were all directly inspired by something I found on Pinterest. With the exception of number 3, but it was created using the number 1 post creation, so it still counts as Pinterest inspired. Suffice it to say I am addicted to Pinterest, and it is helping me be creative. You can follow my Pinterest boards here, see specifically what I have created from Pinterest inspirations here, and even see what I have been whipping up in the kitchen from Pinspirations found here.

I hope 2013 is as crafty as 2012 was. Happy New Year!

Find inspiration everywhere! Go... Create something fun & fabulous. Enjoy!