April Showers Stick Pin Swap

The theme for the April Stick Pin Swap at Your Paper Pantry was April Showers...anything that reminds you of rain...rainbows, mud puddles, clouds, storms, umbrellas...well, you get the picture. : )

To display my pins, I cut a cloud with the Zoobaloo cricut cartridge. The large cloud is cut at 7". Yes, that's right, 7", even though the finished size is less than 4". It had another cloud on the same cut and I didn't use that one. The little cloud is cut at 3" and is about 1.5" high. I embossed the clouds with D'vine Swirls folder and then inked the edges with TH Antique Linen.

I got all my beads from Hobby Lobby. I'm not sure of the brands...just that they were on sale 50% off. : ) I'm getting a little braver with my stick pins. I bought two different types of bead caps and spacers. My packages of beads that I purchased had different shaped beads and I did try to mix it up and use different shapes on the pins. All in all, I'm very please with my progress. I have received lots of great stick pins in past swaps, so I have lots of inspiration!

I went with mud puddles, rain, and rainbows. Mud puddles: I tried to find some bronze or brown beads, but couldn't find anything that I liked. I ended up with some amber colored beads. Rain: A blue bead with some pretty bead caps. Rainbows: This pin is my favorite. I found this bag of metallic beads and when I saw them, I knew they would be perfect.

I also submitted this project for the Challenge Me Monday #107 at the Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog.

YPP Many Things To Do - Swap Notebook

The April "Many Things To Do" Swap was a swap notebook that we could use to keep track of all of our swap info each month. The theme was flowers. Each book had to have 12 tabbed sections with a few sheets of paper in each section.

For the covers I used 4x5 chipboard and painted edges with brown acrylic paint. I cut my paper for the cover and all the interior pages 1/4" smaller. I inked the edges of the cover pages, divider pages, and tabs with distress ink. I just used copy paper for the blank pages in each section.


Paper: DCWV Coral Couture, Botanical
Vintage Photo Distress Ink
SU! Tab Punch
Bind-It-All

Check out the video below for all the scrappy details. : )

Happy Birthday Tyler!

I went to a 5 hour crop this weekend and tried to catch up on some scrapbooking. I have been so caught up in doing swaps over the last several months that my scrapbooking has taken a backseat. I was able to do 6 pages at the crop and then come home and do 6 more. Nice! Imagine my delight when I checked my email today and found that one of my pages would work for not just one challenge, but TWO different challenges. Woo Hoo!

The challenge for this week at Bitten By the Bug 2 was to use balloons on your project. The challenge at My Craft Spot was "Make It Pop" by using dimensional adhesive on your project.

OK, this is how far behind I am in my scrapbooking. These pages are from my nephew's First Birthday...in 2009! He's going to be 4 next month. That big orange space if for the journaling.

The presents are actually Christmas presents from the Christmas Cheer cartridge. I cut them at various sizes from 2"-3". I used glossy accents on all the bows. I cut the balloons from Stretch your Imagination. I'm not sure of the size. I wanted the balloon part to be about 2" so I just stretched them out using Design Studio until they were the right size.

I also used glossy accents on the balloons.

It's kind of hard to tell, but the invitation and all the balloons are adhered with dimensional adhesive.

I used primary colored cardstock from my stash. I have NO idea where that piece of patterned paper came from.... I have had it for a long time!

Cigar Box Swap

In February/March, I participated in a Cigar Box Swap at Mini Album Scraps. This was my first time doing one of these and I really enjoyed it. I hope I get the chance to do it again sometime.

We had to decorate a cigar box and then fill it with $20 worth of NEW goodies and 1 hand made item. I picked up a cigar box from my local cigar shop for around $2. I painted it with white acrylic paint. I downloaded a vintage ledger paper from The Graphics Fairy and printed it on cream cardstock and trimmed it to fit the top of my box. The butterfly paper is from the 7gypsies Conservatory 6x6 pad. The bling and the flowers I received in a past swap.

On the inside lid of my box I adhered another sheet of the vintage ledger paper and another sheet of the Conservatory paper. The bling I picked up at the CKC Expo last year and the lace and flowers were from a previous swap.

I also lined the inside of the box with another piece of the vintage ledger paper.

 Here are all the goodies that I bought to fill her box. I'm sure there is more than $20 worth, since I picked most of it up on sale or clearance.

We had to include one handmade item in our box. I made these flowers for a swap that I changed my mind about participating in. I sent 2 sets. See this post for details on the flowers.

Now, this is the box that my partner made for me. I just love it! I told her that I wanted to use my box to store my stick pins in and if she could make the lid (inside or outside) padded, I would appreciate it.

Not only did she pad the inside of the lid, she made this super cute pin cushion for the top of the box.

The inside of the lid is padded in order to give me more room to store stick pins. She sent me all kinds of beads and charms to add to my growing selection of stick pin paraphernalia. : ) Oh, and she sent me a Tim Holtz Antique Linen Distress Ink.

Birthday Tag Swap

For the April swap at Scrapbooking...Buy, Sell, Trade, & Share we made Birthday Tags. They could be for a package or for a scrapbook page. I chose to do mine for a scrapbook.

My tags are 4"x2.5" and I cut the patterned paper 1/4" smaller on each side. I used ribbon and fibers from my stash.

The tags with the party hats I left blank on the back. On the front, I used a little bit of Elmer's glitter glue on one hat on each tag. In retrospect, if I had to do it again, I would probably just use the clear glitter glue on all the hats instead of using the colored glitter glue on the colored hats.

 I used a journaling stamp on the back of the candle tags.

I had a great time with this swap and absolutely LOVE all the birthday tags I received in return.

Supplies:
Paper: The Paper Studio - Birthday Hats and Party Candles
Cardstock: I'm not sure of the brand, but I picked it up at ACMoore. The color is called Brown Paper Bag.
Vintage Photo Distress Ink
Stamp: Doodle Tagged by Autumn Leaves
Elmers Glitter Glue
Fun Fur
Fastenater Stapler & Staples

DeAnna...Your Craft Concierge

My friend Tracy asked me to make three mini albums. She is a teacher and wanted a meaningful "thank you" gift for the other teachers on her team. When she sent me the payment, she noted in the memo line "Craft Concierge." I like it! :)

These minis were inspired by Christy. Her YouTube channel is twinz4me2. We did a swap last month and as I was perusing her channel, I came across this video of an album that she made for her sister. I liked it because it was made for the "non-scrapper." The photo mats are all 4"x6" and all the recipient needs to do is trim 1/4" off two sides of the photo and glue it down. 

These minis are 6"x8." I painted the edges with acrylic paint. The papers are trimmed 1/4" smaller than the album and all the photo mats are 4"x6." I made a Thank You card that matched each album and I incorporated a magnetic bookmark into each card.

I used DCWV paper stacks and Bazill cardstock.

Coral Couture

Botanical

Tres Chic

Check out the video below for all the scrappy details. :)

TP Mini for Christy

This mini is for the February/March TP Mini Album Swap at Mini Album Scraps. My partner was Christy. She made a super cute mini for me. You can check it out here. This was the first time I have made a mini out of toilet paper rolls. It was a fun little project, but it was hard to do something so small!

Check out the video below for all the scrappy details. :)

March Stick Pin Swap

There were two options for the March Stick Pin Swap at Life on the Scrapbeach: Pastel/Easter or St. Patty's Day. I chose to do pins for both groups.

Pastel stick pins:

St. Patty's Day stick pins: