So much for being a good blogger...

It has been two months since I have written anything. Lots of things have happened. I had a birthday, we have had two vacation weeks off, one of which we drove to Florida and back. I guess I will have to go back to the drawing board in how to keep this up. If anyone has any suggestions, I would welcome them!!

Valentines!!!

I am struggling with insomnia again so I figured I would write another post tonight. If my grammar or spelling isn't perfect, it is because I am tired. I have been working on Valentine's goodie bags for some of my friends' at work and I thought I would share. 

I had a hard time figuring out what I wanted to make this year. I browsed tons of blogs and Pinterest to get my mojo going but no "brilliant," original idea came to me. Instead, I filled glassine bags with Lindt chocolate and decorated them.

The image is a printable that Papertrey Ink made available during their anniversary celebration last year. I was hoping it would eventually become a stamp but it didn't. Being a printable, though, helped make the assembly line process go a little easier.

I printed about 15 bees on a sheet of white cardstock and punched the images out with a circle punch. I then colored the them in using the copic marker colors above, black stickles and a red Spica marker. The edges were inked with Vintage photo ink and the heart wing was created by using a heart punch and a pop dot. Aren't the little bees cute?

My next step was to die cut the scalloped circles out of yellow and the doilies out of red patterned paper. I was then ready to put all the bags together.

I went through my patterned paper scraps and my stash to find paper that would fit with the Valentine theme but also coordinate with my bees. My first pick was a 12" by 12" sheet of heart paper but Echo Park. I only had one sheet so I cut it into 6, 2" by 12" strips. 

I placed each strip around the bag so the open ends would be in front. I then stapled the two ends together. I covered up the staple by layering the doily, the scallop and bee image on top of each other.

I did the same process for all the other pieces of patterned paper I chose. Below is a group shot of some of the bags I put together. I only wish I could have made them for everybody in the department!!

I hope you all have a happy Valentine's Day!! Thank you for stopping by!!

Nora

Papertrey Ink Sketch Challenge

I swear this will be my last post for today. I am exhausted and have no mojo left to do anything!!

Today there is a sketch challenge over at Papertrey Ink to celebrate their 6th anniversary. I chose to create my card with sketch #4 as my inspiration.

Here is the card I created:

I chose to use dark chocolate as the base of the card and to pair it with orange zest and raspberry fizz. I used Heart-2-Heart #12 to stamp the "flowers" and leaves. The bee is from a printable from PTI's 5th year anniversary. 

I am not sure if you can tell but I die cut and stamped 2 of the flowers and die cut one of the stems for this card. I also die cut the middle of the tag and the elements went under it. I chose to pop dot 2 of the flowers and the offset buttons were a choice. You can see this in the view below.

That is all I have for you today!! Thank you for stopping by!!

Nora

PTI 6th Anniversary Challenge

Another post with a Papertrey Ink challenge!! This challenge was posted at the beginning of the week Nichole Heady's blog and was to create a project that was inspired by one of the design teams favorite projects. I chose to use Dawn McVey as my inspiration this go around...surprise, surprise!!

The bottom left card was the card I chose to use as my inspiration. Here is what I came up with:

I stuck with Dawn's color scheme and layout on the card but made it a Valentine's Day card. I stamped the houndstooth background in Pure Poppy and Raspberry Fizz ink on vintage cream card stock and adhered it to a Raspberry Fizz card base. I die cut the heart border using my Silhouette machine and die cut the butterfly and leaves with my Big Shot using the PTI dies. I then stamped the butterfly using Pretty Peonies set and the leaf using the Turning a New Leaf set. I pop dotted the butterfly to give it some dimension and used some gems around the Valentine sentiment.

Here is a side view of the card:

I will be back later with another entry for today's challenge!!!

Nora

CASADIA-I adore you

I am constantly browsing other card makers blogs. One day I clicked on a link and found this blog that had these fantastic cards. Wilda at Beacharado also had a challenge where you CASE one another. How fun is that? If you want to come and play, all the information is here. Don't be surprised if you get lost in her blog because this woman is oh so talented!!

The chain began with Wida CASEing the card below by Laura Basson.

It continued more then thirty cards down to Mynette Kitchen's card below, which I had to CASE. Isn't it fabulous?

The creative aspect that really struck me about this card are the heart cut outs. I wanted to do something that had cut outs in it. I also liked the idea of a valentine since this week is Valentine's day. I chose to take Mynette's love theme and try to use cut outs on my card. Below is what I came up with-

I knew I wanted to incorporate the Lawn Fawn border stamp somewhere on this card. I also decided to use a Papertrey ink heart die for the tiny cut outs. I adhered different patterned Washi tape where the hearts were die cut. I also pop dotted the card front, the large pink heart and the little red hearts for added interest.

Here are a few close up's so you can see the details:

Please come on over to CASADIA and browse the other amazing cards that are on this blog. You will definitely get some fabulous ideas!! Have a great day!!

Nora