Monday, September 26, 2011

Congrats Monica!


 Alexander has arrived!

We wish you joy, laughter, and SLEEP as this new chapter in your life begins.

Below is a link to add your cards to shower the new mommy of our group with love.


Monday, September 5, 2011

Baby Shower

This month we are throwing a baby shower!

Monica is having a little bundle of joy so I thought it would be fun to have a virtual shower for her.  Your challenge is to create a baby inspired card. 

Here are some inspiration photos to help get those creative juices flowing.  Congrats Monica!



Source: etsy.com via Jill on Pinterest


Thursday, June 9, 2011

June Challenge: Going in Circles

Summer is always fun and busy, and this month we are literally going in circles! Our June challenge is to create a card or project with round elements.
Papertrey Ink has recently released several sets with circular shapes (the Tag-its series, Simple Circles, Delightful Doilies and Button Boutique, to name a few). Some of the newer round dies are the Simple Circles border, the Doily Details die set, and both Buttoned Up die sets. The Tiny Treats sets, Mat Stack Collection sets, tag sets, Limitless Layers dies and Tag Sale #4 die are also round (or contain round elements). A quick peek through your older stamp sets will likely reveal a number of other options as well (Guide Lines ll, Dot Spot, Out to Sea and many others).
Please start working on your project and I will add Mr. Linky to a later post so you can add your link. All stampers are welcome to participate. It is not necessary to be a member of our group. Thanks for stopping by and we hope you will play along.
Remember to check back on Monday for my next post.

Happy stamping,
Dee





Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Pals May Challenge: Post your projects here!

The challenge for the month of May is to make a card for your mom (or other significant woman figure in your life). You must include some hand coloring in your project too! The details for this challenge can be found here.



Just add a link to your blog below! It can be a new post or could have been made and/or posted anytime throughout the month of May.

Thanks so much for playing along! Can't wait to see what you have made!



Saturday, May 21, 2011

Inspiration Post: Rethinking the Vintage Style

Vintage.

What is the first thought that comes to your mind?

Lace, maybe? Distressing? Buttons? Twine? Lots of layers? Pastel colors?


That style of vintage is stunning, but when you look at authentic vintage cards from the past century, they have few to no layers with bold colors and patterns. They look more like this...


Today I thought I'd share with you a few of my favorite authentic vintage cards from the 30s, 40s and 50s that I've collected and that have been inspiring me lately. I'll show you some observations I noticed about how cards used to be made and how they looked. I'll show you how you can view vintage in a whole new light! There are also a lot of Papertrey Ink supplies that would work perfectly to recreate the look of these cards.

Here's another example of a vintage card...


Many of the cards have a border or scallop design with an elegant font.


The shading is very airbrushed and soft.

Almost all of the cards are made from a thin weight of paper and were folded into fours (so the front and back were doubly thick). I was also surprised that almost every single card has an intricate 4-color pattern on the inside too.

The vintage cards also have lots of airbrushed colors with gradients and graduated colors. There is also some dry embossing.


The vintage cards also have a lot of cut outs and clever folding techniques. The star is cut out in the card below so you can see the message beneath.


There are cut outs around the circle here too...


This card very cleverly opens only half way, so you still see the scene below. The colors are really vibrant and set the tone.



This one reminds me of PTI's Poinsettia set and the airbrushing adds a soft look and feel.


And the airbrushing on this card provides a glow for the candle.


The gradient background is stunning on this card and creates a mood for the card.


Now here are some ways that the vintage cards can be recreated with Papertrey Ink products.

This shape reminds me of the Sending You die...



PTI Background Basics: Retro and Holly Jolly would work well to recreate this authentic art deco card.


This linear style reminds me of PTI's Text Boxed set and the lines look like the Faux Ribbon set. 



 PTI's Tiny Envelope die would be perfect with the newly released YOF Collection to recreate this card.


A couple more examples of vintage cards...

 


If you would like to see more vintage cards, this site has a lot of wonderful examples of vintage cards: http://twocrazycrafters.blogspot.com/. Etsy also has some great examples of vintage cards too.

I hope you enjoyed looking at vintage in a slightly different way today! Just a reminder, this Monday I'll post the link so you can link up your Pals challenge for this month (to make a card for your mother with your hand coloring on it).

Thanks for stopping by! :)

Monday, May 2, 2011

Pals May Challenge: Make a Card for Your Mom!


Mother's day is approaching this weekend! Since May is the month for mothers, it seemed like it might be fitting to have a Pals challenge devoted to our mothers.

So the challenge this month is to make a card for your Mom (or other significant woman figure in your life). And remember how when we were kids we would color pictures for our moms? The additional part of the challenge is to add some hand coloring somewhere onto your project. You can use copics, colored pencils, watercolors, whatever medium you choose as long as it's got some of your beautiful artwork on it! :)

The card or project doesn't have to just be for mother's day--it can also be for your mom's birthday, just because or a thinking of you type of thing too!

Here are some more pictures to inspire you to get started! :)


Looking forward to seeing your hand colored cards for your mom! The link will open at the end of the month, but if you have a mother's day card you'd like to share early, just post it in the comments! Thanks for playing along!!

ETA: The link is now open! You can link up your projects here.

Monday, April 25, 2011

Paper Challenge

Hope you've been able to start on April's challenge! This is the week to link up your cards and/or projects. Remember, you need to have at least 3 patterned papers.

I've been up to my eyeballs in party planning for my (almost) 3 year old daughter. She's in love with Tinkerbell, so we're having a fairy birthday party next week. I'm having it at our local civic center, so I needed to have lots of decorations. Enter this month's challenge!


I thought the walls might need some fun butterflies. So, I cut out a TON of butterflies using my cricut and sewed down the center of them, making long strips. This was the easiest way to use a lot of my patterned paper (what you see here is only a few of the ones I used).


I can't wait to see them all together at her party. I have about 6 or 7 strips like this :)


Remember to link up your project. I can't wait to see them all!

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Stuck On You




Do you ever get stuck on something that you just can't stop creating with? Color combos, embellishments, layouts, dies, stamp sets, etc? It really amazes me how I get going on just one thing. Lately it's been bright, summery colors. Raspberry Fizz, Hawaiian Shores, Plum Pudding and Lemon Zest. mmmm...

I find that I'm really driven by holidays and seasons. I start getting tired of one and move onto the next one. We got done with Christmas and I was ready for Valentines Day. Then I got sick of the dull colors and the gray skies and needed some color in my life. In pops all the above colors I'm swooning over!

What are you stuck on? Do the seasons or holidays or weather dictate your creativity? Or are you more driven by what the current stamp and die releases are or the design calls?

-liz

Monday, April 4, 2011

April Challenge

Happy April! Since it's the first Monday in April, it's time for a new challenge here at the PALs blog. Thanks to everyone for playing along on the last challenge. If you haven't gotten time to play, the link will stay up, so please make sure to link up to your project!


Now for April's Challenge....If you're anything like me (and I'm sure most of you are), you have stacks upon stacks of patterned paper. Your challenge is to complete a project and use as many patterned papers as you can, but you must use at least 3 different papers. You can do a blog post at any time, but the official link post won't be up until the end of the month. Good luck and I can't wait to see what you come up with!

Liz

Monday, March 28, 2011

Easter Projects

Today is the day for posting all our wonderful Easter Projects!

Here is a sneak peek at mine.

I can't wait to hop by and see what everyone made!
Rebecca

Monday, March 21, 2011

My Crafts This Month

Wow has it been a busy month.  Sophie and I have been working on projects a little at a time so our craft space was trashed!  We did a major clean up this weekend :)


Our big project the last few weeks has been working on her Young Authors book.  Not very crafty, I know. She has been editing & illustrating like crazy.  We finally finished.  We made a cover from card stock and brads.  Then she used some PTI dies to cut and decorate her title.  The picture isn't very clear but she was happy and wanted to share!


I also submitted a project for a PaperCraft Magazine Call.  Sadly, it did not get accepted :(  but my mom will be excited when she receives her invite for game night!  The theme was Under the Big Top.  I posted this question on my personal blog, so I will ask it here too..

What is missing between the scallops and tent flaps? 
I felt like it needed something while it was closed but just couldn't make anything work.


I used a variation of the Triple Tier Slider card tutorial that I saw on Splitcoast.  This time I only used 2 tiers and made the pull tab larger.  (Just a note, if you give this a try the middle tier should be cut @ 10 1/4 inches not 10 3/4)  The box and mini pail came from the dollar tree.  I thought that pail was really cute and I'm sure it will be showing up in other projects in the future.


Lastly, I have been working on an altered composition book for my brother.  He loves to write and I thought it would be a nice surprise for him.  I haven't managed to get any pictures yet but will share them when I do.

Hope you enjoyed this little peak into my craft room.
Rebecca

Monday, March 14, 2011

Oh Mojo, where have you gone?

So, I've carved out some precious craft time, sit down at my desk & nothing...I've got nothing!  This happens to me way too often.  

What I have found is that inspiration comes to me at the oddest times.  I will be shopping with my dd and see an outfit that has the most amazing colors for a card - lol.  I have started saving jpegs in a mojo file on my computer.  Before I even sit down at the desk, I take a quick peek through it and see what jumps out.


I also like to flip through bedding catalogs.  The pictures are full of colors and patterns.  The mixture of materials helps me see textures for my cards.  I always find some mojo in the pages!  I love the far right picture below.  It reminds me of Damask Designs.


Many times I know what great paper or stamp set I want to use but the layout just isn't coming together.  My favorite resource for solving this problem is Card Positioning Systems.  CPS offers weekly contests you can participate in but for me the best part is the  Past Card Sketches link.  It takes you to jpegs of all the sketches you could ever dream of!  If you haven't used it before, I highly recomend you check it out.


I hope you have enjoyed seeing the method to my madness and are inspired to create!

Monday, March 7, 2011

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Hello from Northern Illinois...new PALS member :)

I am so excited to be a part of the PALS.  My name is Debbie and I have been scrapbooking, card making & papercrafting for many many years...I may actually be in the double digits by now.  A few things about me...married for 12 years this October (but together for 16), I have three beautiful daughters-age 13, 10 & 8, 1 dog & 2 cats.  I have lived in Northern Illinois all my life except for when I went to Southern Illinois for college.  I work for a child safety website that creates child safety IDs and many other safety products for family, travel, pets, etc...but my passion is for papercrafting...I have a website for custom greeting cards.  I am also a Publisher Mom with Macaroni Kid.  I publish a weekly newsletter telling my subscribers what there is to do with their kids and family locally...it has given me another outlet to do things with my kids.

Most recently, I have been asked to be on a design team for a local scrapbook store...it is my first time doing anything like that but I am so very excited...I can hardly contain myself about it.

My PTI obsession...I have come to grips with my obsession with PTI.  I found them about 2 years ago and I am not sure what I did before them.  I follow Nichole Heady's blog very regularly...along with Dawn McVey...they are a complete inspiration to me.  The color combinations, a love for all things doily and the creative use of stamps keep me coming back day after day.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Our New Format

Hello all.  I thought I would pop in to give you an update on what the Pals have been doing.  We have spent some time revamping our blog and developing a new format to follow.  This year we decided to assign each member a month they will be responsible for.

Starting in March, every Monday there will be a new post.  The first will be a challenge post.  The second and third will consist of craft insights and inspirations from the Member of the Month.  The fourth post will be the challenge reveal and a link where you can add your creations.

We hope that you enjoy the changes and will play along!
Rebecca