Mom’s Garden

My mother has a beautiful garden, with her house in the middle of it!

 

Really, she has dozens of gardens around her house, garage and sheds.

 

 

Her garden has been featured on a local charity garden tour fund-raiser twice.

 

Many of the gardens are separated with fencing, sheds, tall grass and other items. And many of them have themes … there is an outdoor room, a water garden, multiple fairy gardens and a miniature golf garden (built for the grandkids). My favorite garden is a hidden garden. Once you find it, you see it is filled with pink flamingos made from all sorts of materials.

During the summer, I took some evening pictures of her garden. Of course, I had forgotten to wipe my memory card clean, so I didn’t get very many pictures, but I did get a few …

I’m sure these photos will find their way onto a scrapbook page or card at some point …

Enhanced Lighting

Last week, as the sun was setting, the outdoors took on an orange hue. It was beautiful. Everything seemed to become sharper, brighter and more beautiful. I, of course, grabbed my camera and took these amazing photographs of my flowers, my mother-in-law’s garden and the trees …

I love how lacy and transparent the petals on this one are.

You can see the orange hue in the air in this one …

The light reflecting off of these trees made the bark look orange … so beautiful!

Take A Closer Look

Today is the Elizabeth Craft Designs’ Designer Challenge … we had to use some of the new Peel-Off designs. Here’s what I did …

I love photographing flowers, trees, animals and other things in nature. Lately, I’ve been getting up close and getting photos that show off details not typically seen by just looking at the flowers from a distance.

Of course, once I take the flowers, I need to find something to do with them … on this page I wanted to showcase some of the up close photos I recently took, but I also wanted the entire page to give the feeling that you need to look behind and up close to see these natural beauties.

I used the Leafy Branch die from Elizabeth Craft Designs to give the feeling that the foxes were hiding in the grass or bushes. The way the die is made, it is easy to find places to cut the die cut to fit any size.

The foxes are outline Peel-Offs from ECD as well. I put them on X-Press It cardstock and colored them with Copic markers, then cut them out and adhered them with dimensional foam adhesive.

For the title, I used the Alphabet Caps die from ECD. I cut out the letters twice — once in black and once in the patterned paper (from Bo Bunny) I used for the journaling block and photo mat. Then I layered them together to give a shadow look.

Need more inspiration? Click here and see what the other designers created.

From Trash to Treasure

This is the project that brought me out of a period of extreme uncreativity. After days of frustrating failed attempts at creating art, depression was setting in and my husband suggested I ignore all deadlines and create something just for me. I remembered this old birdcage my nephew found in the trash for me and got to work cleaning it up. This is how it looked after a bath.

I added a few strips of May Arts ribbon and some vintage buttons around the base.

 

I used fake flowers and some blingy garland from the Michael’s and Hobby Lobby … cutting them up to fit where I needed them to go. I broke down and bought a hot glue gun (I despise them) to save time. It actually worked out okay … I only burned one finger and I managed to keep the stringy glue under control.

I also found some colored burlap flowers at Pier One. They were meant to be used as confetti on the table, but I added vintage buttons and adhered them to my project.

I added a little bird’s nest and eggs to the inside, along with some additional flowers.

I love how it turned out … it adds a bit of spring to my living room. I also found myself reaching for these same colors again and again … must be my new favorites … and have scattered them around my living room and kitchen. It is so pretty!

 

Thanks to Jakob for knowing I would love this birdcage and bringing it home for me. And to Matt for reminding me that sometimes we have to do something for ourselves!

 

Layering Flowers

This month, Elizabeth Craft Designs asked us to create something with flowers for the Designers’ Challenge.

I decided to create some layers of flowers, but didn’t want it to get too bulky, so I started with a stencil.

I made my own stencil by positioning some of the Elizabeth Craft Designs floral dies on a piece of acetate (clear plastic) and running it through my die-cutting machine.

Then, I used the stencil and a bit of Distress Ink to color my background paper.

I used the same flower dies to cut out Shimmer Sheetz and then used the coordinating die with Adhesive Velvet. I also cut the sentiment out of Adhesive Velvet because it is so easy — no glue needed on those tiny letters!

As a final touch, I added some Glitter Dot Peel-Offs on the stenciled flowers and then mounted it to a card base.

What do you think?

 

Save the Bees

This is my reminder to everyone to plant flowers to save our bees. Can you guess what book inspired this page (and my crusade)?

Click here to discover if you are correct … and cheer me on!

 

Flowers in a Box

 

Each month, the Elizabeth Craft Designs’ Design Team participates in a special challenge. This month’s theme is flowers and I decided to make a box filled with them.

I started with a simple box card made from green cardstock. I covered the panels and exterior of the box with new paper from Lawn Fawn.

 

Then, I began cutting out flowers of all shapes and sizes with dies from Elizabeth Craft Designs. I began with Flower Set 1, which I cut with Shimmer Sheetz and Velvet Adhesive Sheets and then layered together.

Next, I cut out the Flourish with Flowers die out of a Velvet Adhesive Sheet. Since it did not fit on the box panel, I needed to remove the adhesive off of the back side.

This is easily accomplished with baby powder. Use your finger or a small paint brush to coat the backside in baby powder. The adhesive will no longer be sticky (and it smells good, too!)

Then, I began filling in the space with leaves cut from the Curvy Leaves die. I used two different shades of green Shimmer Sheetz to add contrast.

And flowers cut with the Bunch of Flowers die.

HINT: Use the metal adaptor plate and run it through the Big Shot twice for the best results.

I added pearls and gems to the centers of the flowers.

For a final touch, I added the words With Love from the Assorted Words peel-off sheet.

To see more amazing creations featuring flowers, visit the ECD blog on March 31st.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Acetate Cards

A few months ago, I taught a class making acetate cards.

One of the students enjoyed it so much, she asked me to teach a private class to her stamp group. While I couldn’t do the original class because the supplies I used were no longer available, I created new ones using the same techniques.

The first one uses papers from TPC. I cut them out using the Tim Holtz flower die from Sizzix and attached them with a brad from American Crafts. A quarter circle on the inside and a few Robin’s Nest Dew Drops complete the card.

This one uses papers and rub-ons by Kaiser Craft. I love how the red paper appears to be floating on the patterned paper in the background. The effect was simple — I just attached the red to the inside of the card and the patterned to the outside of the card.

The final one uses papers and paper ribbon from the Olivia Collection from Basic Grey. I used them to create a pocket for writing and then tucked a tag inside the pocket. The flowers on the front were made using a die from Dies Direct and the stamp is from Northwoods. StazOn ink makes it possible to stamp on acetate.

Flat Bunny, please visit

I sent this invitation to Flat Bunny at BoBunny today.

I’m inviting her to come and scrap with us at Scrap Tales. If she chooses my invitation, she will come with BoBunny products for 10 of us to crop with.

The challenge was simple — make an invitation with BoBunny products.

I used papers, gems and flowers from the Jazmyne and Sophie collections, along with green BoBunny brads.

S.T. Mouse (the Scrap Tales Mouse) is cut out of BoBunny paper using the Accu-Cut system at the store. I used foam tape and three cut outs and layered him. He is accented with Distress Ink and Copic markers and a pearl from Queen & Company.

Keep your fingers crossed and maybe it will be selected and we can crop the night away!