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!

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

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

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

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

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!

~Rebecca

Let the Challenges Begin!