5.26.2012

Life is like a bicycle

"Life is like a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving." Albert Einstein



Apparently May is National Bicycle Month.  I am not a bicycler myself, but wanted to pay homage to the month by sharing a bicycle card I had made a while back.  The bicycles were cut on my Cricut.



Also, there are some cute bicycle images in the new Simple Stories line (see lower right hand corner of this page for an example).


5.10.2012

Trinkets, Charms and Chains

For my altered project for The Scrapbooking Studio this month, I made a super cute necklace!  Don't you just love the clever way the gals at the store came up with to display it?

Here are the supplies I used to create the necklace.  All found at the store!  (Thank you to Bobbi for leading me to the Tim Holtz chain.)

Totally bumming . . .

I found out yesterday that Scrapbooks etc. magazine is closing up shop.  I've been a subscriber for years and once even had the opportunity to visit their offices and meet the (now former) editor of the magazine (Melissa Inman, on the right).


Apparently the industry is surprised by this move.  Read more about it at Scrapbook Update.

And also a follow up article on the publishing industry itself.


5.07.2012

For the birds

 


Super cute bird products highlighted over on the Scrapbook Trends blog today. I love that birds are still popping up in scrapbooking. Chirp chirp!

4.21.2012

Hey Cupcake!

On the cover of the April Scrapbooks etc., are a plateful of colorful baker's twine cupcakes.  After seeing this, I just has to try one of my own.

 
The picture is kind of dark, but here is my cute little cupcake. (Actually it's not so little, it's kind of a jumbo cupcake.) 

I didn't take pictures of all the steps, but here is what I did:
1) Get a Styrofoam ball (I happened to have one on hand and it was kind of a large one, which is why my cupcake ended up jumbo). 
2) Cover Styrofoam ball with double stick tape (or redline tape would work well too).
3) Pop in a movie and settle in on the couch, because wrapping the twine takes a while.
4) Starting at the top, wrap twine around ball (about 3/4ths of the way down).
5) Create liner. It wouldn't fit in a standard cupcake liner, so I made my own by scoring and accordion folding some paper.  To make it taper at the bottom, I taped together every other pleat at the bottom.
6) Dig a small whole into the top with a craft knife for the candle.  Roll a piece of paper into a tube and stick into hole.  (In retrospect, I wish I had done a fatter tube, because the candle looks a little out of proportion.)  Cut pompon off of trim to use as the flame, attached to top of candle.
7) Push brads into top to create a sprinkle effect.
8) Set the cupcake into the liner to see if you've put the twine on far enough so that the Styrofoam doesn't show.  If not far enough, continue applying twine.  Also at this point you can see if you're going to have to cut the bottom off your Styrofoam ball if it sticks out of the bottom of your liner.
9) Once you're sure that your cupcake is ready: Put quick dry adhesive around the inside of the liner (about a quarter of the way up from the bottom) and carefully set the cupcake into the liner. Arrange cupcake so the candle is going straight up and then lightly, but firmly, press the liner against the cupcake to adhere.

All supplies, except the yellow pompon are from the Follow Your Heart line which can be found at The Scrapbooking Studio.

4.18.2012

Music to my ears

My Aunt Janet is passionate about 3 things: travel, cats, and her music.  She plays the oboe in two different symphony groups and practices everyday (she even brings her oboe with her when she travels so she won't miss a day).  Whenever I see music related paper, I always think about making a scrapbook page about her.  And finally I did with the Follow your Heart line from My Mind's Eye.  The honeycomb design of this line had sheet music subtly woven in and I decided it was perfect for a picture from the Saratoga Symphony.



All the cute coordinating embies are in the Follow your Heart line except for the letters, which are from American Crafts.  All found at The Scrapbooking Studio.

4.15.2012

Greetings

One of my assignments for this month's design team at The Scrapbooking Studio was the Teresa Collins Everyday Moments line. It has antiquey shades of yellow and blue and comes with some great die cuts and journaling blocks.  I supplemented the first card with some letter stickers from Authentique, which just happen to be in the same shades.