Pilin' on Handmade Embellishments

The theme this fortnight at Pile It On is Handmade Embellishments. I used digital paper & digi stamps from the Sew Grateful set by our sponsor, Doodle Pantry. My handmade embellishments are the little buttons, which I die-cut from Shrinky Dink plastic.

Inspiration/Challenges:

Copic Spain Challenge: Anything Goes
Crafty Creations: Hearts

DoubleClick Skittles: Use A Heart
Our Creative Corner: Sew and Sew
Simon Says Stamp: Have A Heart

Thank you for visiting & inspiring my crafting! Hope you'll join us at Pile It On,

Charmingly Poe

Lost Coast Designs is hosting an Edgar Allan Poe Appreciation Day Blog Hop and is challenging us to link up Poe-inspired projects that include rubber stamping by January 23. Although I've made many Poe-inspired items, somehow I never included rubber stamping! I have lots of great rubber stamps...but not the one I wanted, you know? And then the mail arrived...and I received a fabulous RAK from Elisa at Cards und More that contained rubber stamps of feathers, how perfect is that! Thank you Elisa! From there, I knew what I wanted to make for the Hop. Here's a Book Gift Box containing a Poe-inspired keychain:

I recently purchased this cute Hidden Compartment Book Box by Lori Whitlock at the Silhouette Store. I've made Book Boxes before, but using SVG Attic's discontinued Nevermore set. I like this new set, but I did add cut lines on the "pages" to mimic the old file. I made this box from white paper, inked it with 3 purple inks, and added some purple patterned paper & silver stickers. I used a new feather stamp (by Stampin' Up!) to add 3 feathers to the front (the silver one in the middle doesn't show well in the photo). I stamped the feather in black on some tissue paper and tucked the keychain inside. The box keeps closed with magnets.

inspiration

The silver charm with chains was a groundscore I found while on a walk the other day. I used printable, white Shrinky Dink plastic for the handmade charms. I printed the Poe Bust by Ikesart on one side and the words "Raven Lunatic" on the other. I made a purple gradient background for both. The sentiment is inspired by a T-shirt my mom sent me the last time the Ravens won the Super Bowl. This piece was cut with a label die (from Stampin' Up! & part of Elisa's gift; the holes were made with my Crop-o-dile. I inked both sides of more plastic with purple inks, stamped feathers on one side, and cut them out with deckle scissors. They shrunk quite nicely in our toaster oven. After baking, I coated the pieces (except for the feather sides) with Glossy Accents.

Thank you for visiting & may your days be filled with poetry,

Edgar Allan Poe Appreciation Day Blog Hop 

Main link-up is at Lost Coast Designs. Wow, can you believe all these gorgeous Poe projects?!

An InLinkz Link-up

Desert-themed ATCs - Final week of Crafting with Dragonflies Challenge

You have one more week to make a Set of 3 Artist Trading Cards (ATCs) for our current challenge at Crafting with Dragonflies (the deadline is July 8) They are fun to collect an swap, and make great card toppers. I had so much fun making my Message in a Bottle set that I decided to make a set of desert-themed ATCs:

The backgrounds are digi papers from the Camel Digital Stamp Pack by Coosty Creations. The birds are a stamp from the Cloudy Skies set by ArtsyfArtsy Stamps, which I recently won from Sweet Stamps (thank you!).

All of my desert-themed stamps seem to be quite large, so I pulled out my Shrinky-dink plastic and made embellishments for each of the ACTs. I coated them with Glossy Accents, which made them difficult to photograph but enhance the image in person.

The camel Shrinky-dink was made with an Animal Spirit Stamp by Sue Coccia for Earth Art International. I stamped this intricate design with Timber Brown Staz-On ink.

Don't you just love this digi paper with these curious camels?! I just added a little Antique Linen distress ink to the edges. I cut the little banner from a Kraft paper, doodled on it with a watermark pen (Versamark) and heat-embossed it with Brown Sugar embossing powder (ZING).

I made the border on a base of the plain desert digi paper, using Glossy Accents and gold microbeads.

It would probably be more accurate if this were a date palm, but I just had to use this Coconut Palm rubber stamp by Under the Rubber Tree to make a Shrinky-dink. I inked it with stamp markers.

The silly sentiment is from Inky Antics. I used the same ink for the sentiment as for the bird shadows (Gingerbread from VersaChalk), but I added some blue-green glitter embossing powder.

The refreshing watering-hole was hand-cut from a holographic plastic and embossed in my BigShot with a Sizzix folder. I put some mesh (one of my favorite recycled items, from a bag of avocados) behind it for added texture.

I added a border with a TEKwriter glitter pen, and used bright green Liquid Pearls to accent the corners. I backed it onto a light blue cardstock.

The cactus stamp is from the Fred Bear Out West set from MFT. I stamped it in green pigment ink, colored it with a stamp marker, and fussy cut around all those darn little needles. And then I put it in the toaster oven & totally forgot about it...it burned just enough to give the green some tint, so it was a happy accident.

I printed this background with a blank top so that I could ink directly onto it. I used a die circle and its negative as masks to create the sun. I backed the scene onto a patterned paper.

These adorable little quail die cuts are from Cheery Lynn's Birds of Earth & Sky set, which I bought from Sweet Stamps. I cut them from a black-on-gray, textured Core'Dinations cardstock, sanded them very carefully to reveal some of the gray, and added details with a brown marker, a glitter pen, and a white Glaze pen. I have friends & family in Arizona, so this theme was very close to my heart. We call the baby quail "walnuts" and they are beyond cute in person. I used a border punch for the teensy flowers and a sunburst punch for the larger ones, and added some Liquid Pearls to the centers. The flowers were partly inspired by my best friend, who called me while this Spring while driving from Flagstaff to Phoenix, just to tell me how beautiful the blooming Sahuaros were!

Inspiration/Challenges:
Scrappy Hands #16: Use a Stamp
Wicked Wednesdays: Inspirational / Uplifting Quotes or Words (I'm entering the Oasis ATC with the "I'll never 'desert' you" sentiment)

Thank you for visiting, and hope you'll join us at Crafting with Dragonflies,

Top Tip twisted easel box card

I love the challenges, and especially all the tips, at Top Tip Tuesday and just had to participate in their Birthday Celebration. Happy 1st Birthday, Top Tippers! There are plenty ways to win lots of prizes:

1. Enter an easel card or an easel box into the Challenge (deadline: 9/13)
2. Leave a tip on your blog
3. Visit a DT blog and leave a comment on there
4. Leave a comment for another challenger on their blog
5. Visit the TTT Facebook Page, 'like' the page and then tag us on a picture of your creation

I did them all! Hope you'll at least make a card for the challenge, as I'd love to see your take. Here's my Twisted Easel Box Card:

The bird was paper pieced; boy, those eyes were tiny!

I made matching embellishments & buttons with shrink plastic. The branches are stamped in brown StazOn on Bright White plastic, then edged with a green Copic; the flowers were stamped on one side on clear plastic with black StazOn and then colored with Copics on the rough side.

Here's my tip:
I love making matchboxes, but I worry about crushing when I mail them.The top piece can fold down flat (when the box is taken apart), but it's easy enough to get the bottom, slide-out portion to fold flat as well: Before gluing the box together, add diagonal folds to the inside sides. Glue the flaps onto the opposite sides, where you'll affix the brads, to add support (you can add paper on top of this to hide the flaps). If you use wet glue, I find that binder clips come in really handy to keep everything together during drying.

Inspiration: Top Tip Tuesday Easel Card Box Challenge

Stamps: Blubird by Carolyn Shores Wright for Stamps Happen, Inc., Great Impressions, K&Company
Paper: Core'dinations, stash, Hammermill
Tools: Fiskars papercutter, stamp block, MS detailing scissors, Sizzix Texture Boutique & embossing folder, Crop-O-Dile, Marvy heat tool
Other: ZipDry glue, StazOn inks, Offray ribbon, Copics, stash eyelets & baker's twine

Update 9/13/11: Wow, I won Top Tipper for this challenge! Can't wait to spend my $25 gift certificate to Stamp and Create!

Just Some very early Spring ornaments

We're sure having fun with the "Shrink Plastic" theme at the Stampin' Dymonz Scrap Shack (SDSS) Off the Page group! Lots of tips and amazing projects have already been shared, and I can't enough of my new printable shrink plastic.

I decided to make some ornaments with some of my Just Some Lines digi stamps for their current Anything But a Card challenge. The ornaments are for an "Easter" (or Spring) tree; we always had one when I was growing up, and since I have a yard full of branches right now from tree-trimming (both purposeful and some with thanks to Hurricane Irene) it was pretty easy to find a tiny branch that would work.

The ornaments are matted with cardstock and colored with Copics.

Inspiration:
Just Some Lines Challenge: Anything But a Card

Copics: E17, E13, BV02, FY1, RV11, Y17, RV04, YG41, BG49, B63, BV04, V06, E33, RV02, YG03, G07, BG15, B00