Apron Strings Contest

I was looking at the Page Maps Blog and saw this contest. Lori at Apron Strings has donated one of her fabulous Breadbox kits for this contest! The winner will receive the July kit, chocked full of Jenni Bowlin, My Mind's Eye and Bo Bunny goodness (including papers, card stock, die-cut paper, ribbons, flowers, transparency, bling, tickets, brads, stickers and so much more!).

All you have to do is create a layout based on the sketch above -- any size, any orientation, any way you want to interpret it (using any products you would like). This is what I plan to work on today. I have just the photo, but limited scrapping goodies as I am away on holiday, but I'm going to give it a go anyway.

Kodak Theatre

More Fancy Pants paper, this time I'm using them for a scrapbook page. I had this photo of the Kodak Theatre from the outside and a postcard of the inside as we were not allowed to take photos inside. The colours of these two pictures were a bit drab, so I went for brightening the whole effect with some Fancy Pants papers. I was not sure if the colours worked at first but I think it's growing on me!

I used Emma and Noah papers from the Sweet Pea line and My Sweetie from the Floral Chic line. A Page Map from March 2009. Some of the blossoms were from Jilly and others were cut with various punches. The centres were created with brads form a mixture of places. The letters are from American Crafts. So another page for the Hollywood album completed.

Fancy Pants

I have been sorting out some Fancy Pants 'Daydreams' papers and was reminded of these summer cards and tags I made last summer. I used the daydream papers, die cuts, ribbons and rubons. I also used large and medium retro flower punch by EK Success from Paper Maze, Self Adhesive gem stones 3D foam pads. Ink pads in blue, pink and lavender from Cardinal Colours.

Dreams and Wishes


This card measures 10 x 15 cm. Take double-sided patterned paper ‘Dream’, cut to measure 20 x 15cm. Score and fold in half, with Orange side on the outside.
Take some ‘UDream' paper and cut a piece 9.5 x 14.5cm, ink the edges with pink ink and add a length of zig-zag design ribbon about 2cm up from the bottom on the floral side, overlap edges and stick down. Stick this ribbon decorated piece to the main card, ink the edges of the card. It is now ready to decorate.
Select the white rub-on swirl with hearts, which says “Dreams are wishes from your heart” rub this onto the top left of the card.
Press the orange blossom from the die cut sheet, ink the edges, then curve the petals with the scissor blade. Stick to card just above the ribbon to the right of the card. Punch another blossom from the ‘Dream’ paper and the large punch, ink and attach over the orange blossom with a 3D foam pad.
Cut a circle from the ‘Imagine’ paper and attach this to the centre of the flower with another foam pad. Decorate the petals with self adhesive gem stones

Sweet Dreams

This card size is 15 x 15 cm
Make card as described above using ‘Believe’ paper and pink ink, no ribbon is needed. Cut the card to measure 30 x 15 cm, avoiding the orange blossom. Cut the panel to include the orange blossom, this should measure 14 x 14 cm.
Select the “Sweet dreams” rub-on, rub this onto the top right of the card.
Press the green blossom from the die cut sheet, ink the edges stick near the bottom of the Orange blossom. Punch two medium and two large flowers from the ‘Believe paper, ink and add to the top right of the Orange blossom with 3D foam pads.
Take the ‘Dream’ stamp from the die cut sheet, ink and add to the bottom left of the card with 3D foam pads.
Decorate the card by adding self adhesive gem stones as above. Add one or two smaller rub-on flowers as desired.


Spreading Joy
Card size 10 x 21 cm
Make card as above using ‘Envision’ paper, lavender ink and the flowery design ribbon. Cut the main card 20 x 21 cm and the front panel 9 x 20 cm.
Select the large orange flower rub-on swirl, rub this onto the top left of the card.
Press the pink heart from the die cut sheet, ink the edges stick to card overlapping the ribbon to the left of the centre with 3D foam pads.
Take the blue die cut heart, ink the edges and stick to the right of the pink heart, overlapping it slightly. Use a double layer of foam pads to raise the blue heart higher then the pink one.
Rub the words ‘Laugh’ and ‘Giggle’ onto the pink heart Add the rub-on words ‘Spreading joy’ along the bottom right of the card.


Paint Happiness

The size of this card is 14 x 14 cm
Make card as described above with ‘Gaze’ paper, blue ink and the swirl design ribbon. Cut the card to measure 28 x 14 cm, and the panel to measure 13.5 x 13.5 cm. Select the floral arrangement rub-on; rub this onto the top right side of the card above the ribbon. Rub the words “Paint your life with happiness” to the bottom right of the card.
Press the butterfly wings from the die cut sheet, ink the edges stick to card overlapping the ribbon, the flowers and the left side of the card. Use 3D foam pads to raise the wings from the card, using a double layer of pads to the outer edges.
Tear a strip of paper from the ‘Envision’ sheet, ink and roll tightly to form the body of the butterfly. Stick to the butterfly.
Cut a very thin strip of paper and curl the ends by wrapping them round a pencil tightly. Fold in half and attach to the top of the body to form antenna





Dream Big & Imagine Tags

Tag 1 measures 7.5 x 11 cm
Cut ‘Believe’ paper to measure 7.5 x 10.5cm. Ink the edges.
Press the tab top from the die cut sheet and ink the edges. Attach to the top of the tag so it overlaps the edge by 1cm.
Use the ‘Dream Big’ image from the rub-on sheet and place near the top of the tag, ready to write your message. Add a small heart and circle to rub-on to the ‘Dream Big’ rub-on.
Take the four flower cluster rub-on and place this towards the bottom of the tag. Add a gem stone to the centre of each flower.
Punch a hole and attach a length of zig-zag ribbon to the top of the tag.

Tag 2 measures 8 x 14 cm
Cut ‘Imagine’ paper to measure 8 x 13.5 cm. Shape the top of the tag as desired and punch a hole at the top centre. Ink the edges.
Press the scalloped strip from the die cut sheet and cut a length 8cm long. Attach to the bottom of the tag so it overlaps the edge by 0.5cm.
Punch three large and three medium flowers from the ‘Imagine’ paper. Ink and make up as before with 3D foam pads. Add gems to the flower centres. Attach to the tag in a diagonal fashion, overlapping one another.
Cut the swirl rub-on into three pieces and rub into place around the flowers.
Add a length of swirl ribbon and attach through the hole at the top of the tag.

Now I'm off to do some scrapping with my Fancy Pants Papaer as they are excellent for the next few pages of my Hollywood album.

Hollywood Blvd.

Today I scrapped another page for the Hollywood Album, this double layout features the day we visited Hollywood Blvd, the theatres, the shops, restaurants and shops.




I used Basic Grey Urban Couture papers, lots of photos and stars!

Here is a card I made for my friend Angela (Sophie's Mum) using some smaller bits of Urban Couture which is her favourite paper of all time. I also used stamps from Crafters Companion. stamped the numbers several times onto different sections and designs of paper, cut the out separately and stuck them to the base to make each of the patches.









Not such a good day weather wise today, so we did some gardening at the house and then went to the cinema to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Followed by dinner in Frankie Benny's

The Hotel

Today I made another card using the stamped images (Stampin' Up) from yesterday, and a Layout for the Hollywood album, both with papers from Basic Grey's Phresh and Phunky line. The page shows photos of the girls in our hotel room, views of the pool and one of the outside of the hotel.

Summer by the Sea

I am away on holiday in Suffolk and thought I would take some card making bits along with me, including some stamps I have been meaning to try out. Linda and I also swapped some of our stamps, we thought we could give each other some inspiration with our existing stamps if we tried out a few belonging to one another - that's our theory! So today I have been playing with these delightful Stampin' Up stamps.

The first two were made with Stampin' Up stamps from Linda's collection, I have stamped lots of images and coloured them with water colours, I have only made two of these into cards so far, but will add the others later when complete.

I also used scraps from the August Scrapholix kit both the Bazzill card stock and the Daisy Bucket papers. The blossoms are from a delightful little organza bag full of mixed blossoms given to me by Jilly Beans two years ago and still going strong (thanks Jill). The greeting stamp is an old, well used favourite from The Craft Barn, made by Fun Stamps.

For the next two I used a fish stamp (sorry I can't remember who made this one, please comment if you know). I used a Craftwork Cards frame and some garden twine for the first one. I also used lots of chalk ink. I coloured the fish with Letraset Promarkers. More left overs from the Daisy Bucket papers and Bazzill card stock were used here too. Some self adhesive metallic dots from Paperchase, and plenty of Liquid Pearls to add the finishing touches. The greeting is also from Stampin' Up.

Next I used an old stamp of beach huts, one of my favourite things, influenced by a trip to Felixstowe sea front today! The first uses water colours and some 'Phresh and Phunky' papers by Basic Grey. The second is a blast of colour using more Promarkers and Basic Grey's 'Colour Me Silly' range of papers.

Party all weekend

Party all weekend with Shimelle, I'm going to try to keep up with some of the inspiration from this party. Pop over to her blog and take a look.