Lifestyle Crafts "I Made This Week 11" giveaway

Go to Lifestyle Crafts' blog for more info on how you can win a $500 shopping spree to Lifestyle Crafts and a bundle of Echo Park Paper. If you enter, Good Luck! If not, why not (you could always share your winnings with me)?

Pebbles Inc winnings...

During the month of December many manufacturers and bloggers had amazing giveaways. I was lucky enough to win the Pebbles Prize Pack giveaway on Facebook (if you would like to "Like" Pebbles on Facebook in anticipation of a future giveaway, head over to https://www.facebook.com/pebblesinc).

The collection I was lucky enough to win (with all of these wonderful embellishments) is called Pebbles Inc With Love. Perfect for upcoming Valentine's Day cards or layouts. I had a hard time getting everything in one photo but managed after overlapping several items.

Everything that was in the box

Here are close-ups of the embossed paper.

front of the embossed paper

back of the embossed paper

I particularly love this paper called Sweetheart. Depending on the angle that you look at it the hearts printed in white look different.

Here are some of the embellishments that were included:

stickers

stickers

 

clothes pins

button candy dots

dimensional flowers

clear stamps

Kraft tags & envelopes

dimensional hearts

paper clips

5 ribbons

If you would like to see better images of the With Love collection, head over to Pebbles' website. There are several posts on the Pebbles' blog in case you need some inspiration using the With Love collection. Reach the "home" page of the Pebbles' blog at http://pebblesinc.blogspot.com/.

Good luck to you when you enter some of the many giveaways found online. Thanks for stopping by! And many thanks to Pebbles Inc for sponsoring this amazing giveaway!

The Silhouette Cameo

If you want one of the recently released Silhouette Cameos, head over to Tatertots & Jello blog for your chance to win one. If you don't want to wait to see if your won a Cameo, there is a great discount code there as well. If you enter, good luck!

Hurry, the discount code ends January 5th, but there are a limited number of Cameos available. The contest winner will be announced on January 3rd, 2012.

Who would not want to win an Ipad 2?

Lifestyle Crafts, as part of their I Made This Challenge, is giving away an Ipad 2 this week. Just head over to their blog for all of the details. Good luck everyone!

My poor neglected blog

I wish I could make more time in the day to craft and share my items with you. Someday. I'm optimistic.

In the meantime, head over to Dear Lizzy's A very Christmas-y giveaway for your chance to win an art journal from Evalicious or the new Winter Moon CD from Mindy Gledhill!

Good luck! 

December Daily SC Kit Giveaway on Dear Lizzy's Blog

It has been too long since I've had a chance to update my blog, but this is a perfect reason to make the time. Go to Dear Lizzy's blog at http://elizabethkartchner.blogspot.com/2011/11/december-daily-sc-kit-giveaway.html for a chance to win the December Daily SC Kit. Winning would be a perfect reason to stop procrastinating and start scrapping!

Giveaway: The Twinery products on Two Prince Bakery Theater's blog

Head over to Two Prince Bakery Theater to learn how you can win the Twinery's Colorful Bunch Sampler Pack, which contains 11 colors.

Teresa Collins is going to be a host on My Craft Channel

It was announced today on the My Craft Channel Blog. Read the blog how you can win some great prizes. Good luck to you if you enter! You can also Like them on Facebook at My Craft Channel.

Another Independence Day Banner

Unfortunately I did not get this project uploaded in time for the 1st Unofficial Crop Chocolate Blog Hop, but I thought I would share my newest banner anyway.

I used the Making Memories Slice Design Cutter with “Basics 1” for most of my cuts. I used my Cricut Expression with the “Stand and Salute” cartridge to cut out the “4^th of July” design, primarily because I was using pre-glittered paper and could choose the multi-cut feature and set my blade depth so I would not have to use my craft knife to finish the cut (I still had to use my craft knife a bit though). FYI, there is a “4^th of July” design on the Making Memories Slice Design Card “Words and Expressions: Holiday”.

4th of July design cut from Cricut cartridge Stand and Salute

I cut 3 red and 3 blue triangles at 4 inches using the Slice. I used my “40 Embossing and Debossing Templates with Storage Binder by Lisa Bearnson” (it was item number F03407 on the Q – I love these, I don’t know why they got so many bad reviews) to create “stripes” on my red triangles and stars on my blue triangles. To emphasize my stars, I used a white gel pen to “stitch” around the stars.

The red and blue triangles and the letters were cut from Slice Design Card Basics 1

Using the “Basics 1” Design Card I cut the letters at 2 inches on the Slice. I ran them right side down through a Xyron to make them sticky and then used Martha Stewart Crafts Tinsel-cut glitter in Crystal to cover the adhesive. I used pop dots to attach the letters and “4^th of July” die cut.

I used my Crop-a-Dile to attach the silver eyelets. I used grosgrain and organza ribbon in 3 different widths and colors (red, blue and white) to string the banner pieces together. 

Completed Banner

 

I learned a couple of things making this project. My cat, Pumpkin, is attracted to glitter (she knocked a bottle off the table which blew off the cap and leaked about 1/3 of the glitter – I’ll be seeing sparkles everywhere for weeks) and organza ribbon (she ran off with the end and unraveled almost the entire spool and tried to eat about 1 foot off it before deciding it did not taste good – fortunately she did not ingest it enough to make her choke). I also learned that organza ribbon gets stiff when it gets washed.

I thought a Canada Day Banner would be cute using the Maple Leaf from either the Making Memories Slice “Fall/Back to School” or “Basic Elements & Seasons” Design Cards. In addition to the “Noteworthy” Design Card, I saw images on “Vintage Findings” and “Travel USA” that would make nice “backgrounds” for banners.

I hope you enjoyed my latest project. 

Welcome to the 1st Unofficial CC Blog Hop

Welcome to my blog. I'm rather new to maintaining a blog and this is the first time I have participated in a blog hop. I am the 6th blog on the 1st Unofficial Crop Chocolate Blog Hop organized by Scrappy Canuck. If you "stumbled upon" our Unofficial CC Blog Hop, you may want to start at the beginning, a page maintained by Wild Flower, because those that comment on each blog participating in the hop are eligible for the prize drawing.


The project I am sharing today is the nth iteration of a banner I saw in a catalog. My original sketch started out like this:

The arrow coming in from the right was a reminder to myself with how I could create the stars and stripes. I have a great set of embossing templates I purchased when Lisa Bearnson was demonstrating them on the Q.

Then I thought of this alternate shape for the background and star bling hanging from the bottom of the shape:

Unfortunately I did  not see any star bling in the store. Then started going through my Slice Design Guides, the little paper pamphlets that come with the Design Cards, and hit upon a star shape and that's when I came up with this:

I used my Slice Design Cutter and the Basics 1 Design Card for all of the die cuts. I cut the red star at 4 inches and the white star at 3.5 inches. I cut the letters at 2 inches. When cutting my letters I did not lift my Slice and cut a second time (this is when the hands free kit comes in really handy). The Slice blade was not deep enough to cut all the way through the pre-glittered paper, but there was enough of a indention in the paper so it was easy to use a craft knife to complete the cut. Prior to layering the star pieces, I used gold star glitter on the edges of the white star. I used foam squares cut down to attach the letters. I used red eyelets to create a way to string my die cuts and my Crop-A-Dile to attach them. I used organza ribbon to hang the letters. Here is a close-up of one of the letters:

I have files created on my Gypsy to create my first impression of the banner. If I get a chance to cut and assemble them, I'll post a photo here.

I hope you enjoyed visiting my page. Don't forget to leave a comment so you are eligible for the prize drawing. The next blog in our hop is Dream Big Cre8tions.