CCL TP Mini Album Challenge

This past month, over at Creating the Crafty Life, they're having a TP mini challenge. A TP mini is an album made of a several empty toilet paper rolls. They're quick, easy, and a lot of fun to make not to mention a great way to recycle.

I've had DCWV's Colorful Life papers in my stash for a while and decided to use it for the project below. This mini will hold some of my favorite art quotes. Enjoy!

Millie

      

Graphic 45 By the Sea Projects 2014

Last October, our family headed to Mystic Seaport for the long Columbus Day weekend. It was such a great trip and when I saw Graphic 45's beautiful By the Sea collection, I knew exactly what to do with it.

I created three coordinating projects: a mini album, a box to store our memorabilia, and a sextant for the top of the box because I just had to be different! Below are the photos.

 I love the colors for this collection! Perfect for summer

and patriotic holidays! 

For those who don't know,

a sextant is a navigational device used by seaman

It looks something like this:

It took me  a while to figure out how to make one

out of chipboard but I think I got the gist of it. :-)

 The sextant sits on top of the box. I didn't glue it down 

so I could remove it whenever we wanted to look

through our souvenirs in the box. 

 I kept the inside of the box pretty plain partly because

I was exhausted from constructing the sextant and

the mini (haha)!. It's actually an old cigar box

I found at Goodwill for .99 cents.

I made a pocket from some fishing net and attached a 

photo of one of the many ships we saw that 

weekend. 

I owe a great deal of thanks to Gloria Stengel. I absolutely 

love her mini flip book design and have made

several of them using different collections. The one below

is the most complex version I've made yet.

Her original design is approximately 6" x 6". I adjusted

the size and made some modifications to the design, but 

the basic structure is still there. It's a great design 

and easy to put together. And Gloria's tutorial

is excellent!

The whole project took about two months to complete but it was worth. Love how it all came together.

Blessings,

Melissa

Celebrating Spring! Graphic 45 May Pole

Around these parts, Spring is taking it's dear sweet time making it's entrance so I decided to create a little bit of my own.

For this project, I created a May Pole using papers from Graphic 45's Sweet Sentiments, Secret Garden, and a sheet of the Cherished paper from their adorable (but retired) Little Darlings collection.

The back wall was created from chipboard and die cut using 

Tim Holtz's Distressed Doily Die. I covered it with the

Little Darlings Cherished paper. The flowers in the 

background were fussy cut from the Sweet Sentiments

paper. The ribbons on the pole were cut from

papers from Secret Garden's 6x6 pad. 

The lovely girls were stamped from the "Clara" stamp

which is part of G45's Nutcracker Sweet Stamp Set #1.

Their dresses were paper pieced using papers from 

Sweet Sentiments and Secret Garden's 6x6 pad. 

The flowers are from Hobby Lobby. The trims and doilies

are from friends. 

!!!!WELCOME SPRING!!!!

Blessings!

Millie 

Easter/Paris Themed ATCs

This month over at Creating the Crafty Life, Misty is hosting an ATC swap. For those who don't know, ATCs are tiny works of art that are always swapped and never sold. They're like trading cards for grow ups. :-)

We had a choice of doing either a Paris theme or a traditional Easter theme using the beautiful pastel colors of spring. I couldn't make up my mind, so I melded both themes together and this is the result.

Voila! Easter in Paris! I found the egg shaped ATC cards through an Etsy seller. I edged the sides with Dusty Concord Distress Ink, then covered the front and back with the pretty Kirby Teesdale paper from Paper Studio (Hobby Lobby).  

The flowers in the back are from a beautiful trim I found at Goodwill last year (10 yards for $7.99!!!). The glittery Eiffel Tower is a Jolee sticker.

I found the springy Victorian ladies online, resized them, and printed them off on some pearlized card stock. The sentiment, "Joyeuses Pasques" (Happy Easter) was also printed on the same card stock. The purple flowers are from an online seller (who's name escapes me at the moment) and the yellow roses are from the $1.50 spot at Michael's. I used an EK Success punch for the green branches.

This is my first set of ATCs and I think I'm hooked. It's a great project if you're looking to satisfy your urge to make something but are a little short on time. :-) 

Blessings!

Millie

G45 Easter Bonnet

"In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it, 

You'll be the grandest lady in the Easter parade."

This time of year, I start daydreaming of spring. This particular year, I started a lot earlier. I love to stroll through the little girl's departments at the mall to enjoy this season's crop of pretty, frilly dresses. One thing I've noticed, however, is that "Easter bonnets" are no longer to be found or at least difficult to find. 

So this year, I decided to add my own little bonnet to our Easter decorations. 

For this project, I used several Graphic 45 

collections. I love how the papers

easily mix and match.

The images on the top and bottom of the hat are from 

the new Sweet Sentiments line, the polka dot paper for 

the hat itself are from Little Darlings, and the 

yellow check bow is made from Secret Garden. 

I trimmed the bottom of the hat with some crepe

paper and pretty lace given to me by a friend.

This was a great addition to our decorations this year and I have another hat under construction. :-)

Blessings,

Melissa

CCL Key to My Heart Holiday Challenge

CCL (Creating the Crafty Life), is having a Valentine challenge! The challenge was to create a project using a heart shape and it had to be dimensional. 

A few weeks ago, I found two of these heart shaped plaques at Goodwill for .99 cents each:

They were cute, in an 80-ish kind of way, 

but I wanted to dress them up a little so....

 ....this was the end result. :-)

THE DETAILS: I reached for my G45 Place in Time 

February Cut Aparts again for this project . 

It's embellished with flowers, bling, doilies, and lace

from my stash. It stands about 8" tall and can 

sit on the easel as shown below or be hung

from a peg. The pretty pink bauble at the top

was another Goodwill find. 

Valentine's Day is only a few days away and I need to get busy on some masculine/boy themed Valentine's for my sweeties and I still have a couple of projects to complete for the Artful Creation Contest! But it was nice to take a break and create this very girly project for my favorite holiday!

Blessings!

Millie

CCL ARTFUL CREATION CONTEST: Valentine Tussie Mussie (Project #5)

For my 5th project entry, I decided to create a Valentine tussie mussie. I used the following items from Lucky's box of supplies:

White lace

Silver mesh

12 x 12 and 6 x 6 sheets of grey cardstock

Pearls and rhinestones

Silver metallic pleated trim

White satin pleated trim

"PARIS" bling

Black mesh bling

Crystal acrylic chandelier drop

Large deep red velvet rose

I started  by printing a black pattern on the grey card stock

using a large damask stamp. 

Next I formed the tussie mussie. 

I inserted layers of the white lace, silver mesh, and

some black lace I had on hand. 

I added the pretty deep red rose, a smaller off white 

paper rose, and a grey paper flower I created using

the smaller sheet of card stock and a flower punch. 

I created the stickpin with some beads I had on hand

and some of the "PARIS" bling Lucky included

in the kit. Behind it is a small white feather spray

I found in Hobby Lobby's wedding section.

the Eiffel Tower in the back was cut from some 

Paris themed wrapping paper I hand. 

For the cone, I die cut a doily and heart using my

dies from Cottage Cutz. 

I adhered three rhinestones to the heart for 

added bling and hung the acrylic chandelier

drop to the bottom. 

The red, white, and grey paper roses are from my stash. 

Behind them is another white feather spray 

from Hobby Lobby.

I used the black bling as a dangle and also 

wrapped it around the bottom of the cone. 

Below that, I wrapped the silver and white pleated trims. 

Lastly, I cut the silver mesh into strips and attached

it to the bottom of the cone. 

This was way off my usual style. I'm not a big fan of the Paris theme but I like how this turned out. 

Blessings,

Millie