Friends with Flair and a Button Card

Welcome to another Unity FWF blog hop!

I was strolling through a dollar store yesterday and found packs of Making Memories Vintage Findings and couldn't resist. The buttons were perfect for the card I wanted to make this week. You see, I've noticed that projects with button cards are getting popular. Of course, vintage button cards aren't always easy to find so people are making do and creating their own as a way of sharing buttons with crafty friends. I thought that this image from the June '11 KOTM (all smiles) had a perfect area to sew on three buttons. If it were going to a crafty friend, she could just snip off the buttons and use them on her own project.... a kind of "upcycle" effect.

Other Supplies: Paper (Springtime Vintage DP and Cherry Cobbler c/s - Stampin Up), Large Label die & Doily die (My Favorite Things), lace trim (Wyla)

I hope you're inspired to make your own button card to share. Be sure and link in to see the other FWF participants over at the Unity blog and then browse around their retail site because we're post-CHA and that means lots of new stamps!

Have a great weekend,
Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)

WOYWW, WOTT, a beloved dog and an announcement

Welcome to What's on Your Workspace Wednesday #112 and What's on Tap Tuesday #16! Yes, my brother's album is still hanging over my head, but, hey, artists are allowed to muse. This is actually the first page I've put together. I'm hoping it will be the start of creative roll because once I get started, I get into it.

So, this page is about my brother's wish for a dog coming true. He was a gorgeous blue-eyed terrier with black, white and gray coloring so he was named Pinto (like the horses). I mentioned before that I bought the DCWV stack called Playtime just because of this sheet of patterned paper that went so well with the photo. I used an embossed frame that came in a pack by K&Co. and American Crafts chipboard letter stickers (both of which you can see on my desk). A Dymo label maker added the rest of the title. Once everything was glued down, I realized that, at first glance, there was no room for journaling and I had used strips of foam tape under all four sides of my framed photo, so I couldn't tuck a journaling card behind the photo either. The layout also looked a little plain so I decided to journal directly on the tree and when I had even more to say, I continued to the bottom of the page. I like the look of the words on the page. Now I feel it is complete and I'm happy with it. Good dog.

(A quick note: the random winner of my mini album on Friday is....... Sharon G! Congrats, Sharon. Check my profile for my email address and drop me the info I need to Pony Express the album to you.... *smile*)

I hope you, dear reader, will be tempted to link in below and show us what's on tap in your neck of the woods. Also, if you're hungering for more, check out Lynn's blog (below) for another installment of her fabulous workspace and then head to Julia's WOYWW post where you can link in with the workspace's of people all over the world.
*smile*

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)

FWF Summer Book

Hi again! Here we are with the weekly Unity Friends with Flair blog hop. You'll find the other participants HERE. Also, don't forget to visit the Unity website because there are lots of new post-CHA (Craft & Hobby Assn. show) goodies for sale now.

For FWF this week, I was inspired by a Die Cuts With a View (DCWV) stack that I recently picked up called "Playtime". Aren't patterned papers getting just so cute these days? The papers are so glittery and whimsical... I thought I'd make a summer mini album by cutting up a few sheets and adding little Unity images and sentiments. (A My Favorite Things cloud die came in real handy, too.) I positioned all the additions in such a way that cropped photos can be added to each page without a problem. (I even cut around that adorable flamingo so that the photo can tuck in behind him.) Lazy me, I just attached the pages to each other with one staple from Tim Holtz' Tiny Attacher. After you browse the pictures below, check out how you can get a chance to win this album! *smile*

Cover:

Pages 1 & 2:

Pages 3&4:

Closeup of 3&4:

Pages 5&6:

Closeup of p. 5:

Pages 7&8:

I had lots of ideas for more pages but ran out of time... but see how you can take patterned papers and cheat a little? Let their art shine and just embellish! *smile*

Now, here are all the sets I used (with links) in this album.
Ippity's Books a Flutter
Ippity's Quotes a la Happy
Love Life by Melody Ross
All You Need... Aug 2010 KOTM
Just Be You - Dec 2010 KOTM
Small Things - April 2011 KOTM
All Smiles - June 2011 KOTM

Have a wonderful weekend. If you're looking for a smile today, check out this LINK to a blog called Dear Photograph. It is so cool!

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr and Scrapcollectr57)

WOYWW#111, WOTT#15 and a Bingo Card

So, how was your week? It's Weds. again. Kinda sneaks up on us, huh? Time for another What's on Your Workspace Weds. hosted by Julia. A side trip to her site will give you the chance to see work desks from around the UK and other parts of the world, too. (If you missed it, this desk above was also What's on Tap Tuesday for those of us on this side of the pond.)

This week, I'm determined to get going on my bro's 50th birthday album. Just a clean and simple one. I sent out letters with blank stationery sheets to friends and family asking them to expound on one word that comes to mind when they think of my brother. I'm using a Creative Memories 8-1/2" x 11" album and will give each person their own page. I'll use colorful patterned papers and put their thoughts next to a photo. The paper stack you see on the left side of my desk is called Playtime by DCWV and I'm using it because it had the adorable sheet you see on my desk of the park and a dog. This page will hold an old picture of my brother and the dog he begged for.

On the top right of my desk is a Bingo stamp by Unity and notice the small bingo token on top of it? When I saw these tokens by Tim Holtz in Michaels, I decided to make the following birthday bingo card for a cousin using a token with his age on it.

Finally, on the far right side of the desk, on top of the discarded patterned paper pile, but under my glasses and the Fiskars blade refills, are flattened cereal boxes. That leads us to Crafty tip #61: Before you throw out or recycle your cardboard cereal boxes, upcycle them by cutting them into usable squares for book projects. I used some 4"x4" squares recently for my dh's Father's Day accordion card.

Thanks for dropping in! I'd love for you to link in What's on Tap in your craft space today.... *smile*

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)

Ippity, ATU35 and a winner!

I'm going to keep you in suspense until the end of this post (but I can't control your scrolling down! *smile*)

I brought out my Ippity stamps to join in their Linky party today. After you leave here, check out their site HERE for more Ippity inspiration. I figured that I'd go ahead and use ribbon, too, so that I could enter it into the week-long All Things Unity challenge #35, which you will find HERE. Just so much fun going on today.

I used three Ippity sets on my little birdy card: birds (Quotes a la Happy), flowers (how YOU doin') and sentiment (Party Hat Wishes). I stamped the smallest flower of the set 10 times, colored and fussy cut them before I glued them to a sheet of patterned paper with all those pretty stems. Stamped and colored my absolute favorite birds and fussy cut them, too. Die cut the sentiment with my favorite Spellbinders Nestabilities Label #10 (which you can find HERE and if you join this site, you get a 40% off coupon monthly by email.)

I wanted unique party hats so I snipped them free hand out of text paper but I'm most thrilled with finding the word "happy" by accident. I just love serendipity.

Added the ribbon, ribbon slide, sparkly pom-poms and crystals to finish it off.

Hope you like it!

Now for the winner.... Random.org chose JEN, hooray! Jen, send me an email (you can find it in my profile) with your snail mail addy and the Mix and Match book from Friday is yours, or should I say, your daughter's? *smile*

Tomorrow is What's on Tap Tuesday. If you feel so inclined, come back to see what's going on on my desk and link in yours. So much fun to share.... Til then!

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)

Crafty Saturday

I came across a blog recently called Side Oats and Scribbles and I noticed that one of her sidebar challenges is to make a card and send it off to someone. Her recent challenge is over but since it was #3, I'm going to be watching for #4. It's nice to have a push in the right direction sometimes.

For that reason, I constructed a simpler version of my tri-shutter card (see sidebar tutorial) for a friend going through a hard time. Actually, the idea for it came together when I heard about a new stamp set called Little Labels by Tim Holtz and Stampers Anonymous. (I got it from Simon Says Stamp who snagged a few recently pre-CHA.) I imagined pairing the "pixie dust" label and one of Tim's corked vials filled with glitter and making it part of the sentiment. The adorable pixies are from a set by Stamping Bella, the gorgeous paper is from a botanical line by Brenda Walton for K&Co. and that tiny word sticker is from The Girls Paperie.

Another fun fact about this card: the sentiment on the second panel is from a Unity set by Melody Ross called She Did It Anyway. I wanted to continue the sentiment on the third panel with my own words, so I searched through my font library and found a font called Modern No. 20 that matched the stamp's font. I typed and printed my words at 24pt. I think it's a pretty good match.

Crafty tip #60: Save your broken costume jewelry to use on a craft project. One of my little Gap bracelets broke so I used the little beads for the inside of my big flower. Love how that looks....

Remember, if you know a youngster that would enjoy the little interactive book that I posted yesterday, just leave a comment telling me who it's for and I'll enter you into the random drawing for it on Monday.

Thanks for dropping by. May the pixies sprinkle a little dust on your day....

*smile*

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr and @scrapcollectr)

Friends with Flair and a Peachy project

Hello and TGIF everyone!

Friday means Unity's weekly Friends with Flair blog hop. I love to see what everyone is up to. My contribution is a double whammy. I created this little project for a DT assignment over at Let's Get Peachy. July is Anti-Boredom Month so I thought a little interactive book for a youngster would be a fun diversion this summer. I've outlined the steps I took to create this fun book over at LGP so stop in there if this is something you'd like to try. The pages inside are decorated with various animals and the mixing and matching comes from being able to flip portions of each page to come up with a silly saying. I intentionally left the top quarter blank because I thought it would be fun for the child to add a friend or family member's name for more silliness.

My children are too old for this kind of fun so I'll be choosing a random commenter to win this book. If you're interested, please let me know in the comment who you'd like to give this to. I'll post a winner on my blog on Monday morning.

So, to show you one of the pages inside.... I used my favorite Unity owl from the Aug. '10 KOTM (all you need...) to grace the page.

On other pages, I used Sparky the kitty from Hugs and Kitties and the rooster, fish and cow from Ippity's Farm Fresh, Fishy Philosophy and Simply Home sets, respectively. (Go to the Ippity blog and use their locator to find an Ippity Chick, if you'd like one of these sets.)

Don't forget to check out all the fun stamps at Unity's main site and the blog hop at the Unity blog. You're sure to walk away inspired!
*smile*
Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)

WOYWW#110 and WOTT #14

Hello! Here's What's on My Workspace Wednesday (which was also What's on Tap Tuesday) this week. The chaos left over after I finished a submission for a magazine (plus layers of supplies from previous cards) and a paper stack that I'm considering using for my brother's 50th birthday album.

Some Nestabilities dies have been roosting on the desk awhile and I've avoided putting them away because I'm not happy with the system I use for storing them. It's not conducive to using them. I'd heard somewhere that storing them on magnet sheets is better. (One woman even put magnet sheets on a file cabinet door and sees them there whenever she opens the door. That would be great but I couldn't shoehorn a filing cabinet in here unfortunately.)

So I dug up some Xyron magnet rolls that I got for a steal when a teaching supply store was going out of business and made 8-1/2"x11" sheets to keep in a 3-ring binder. I stuck my Nestabilities on the sheets by shape and used dividers to sort them. Now, I have them more readily accessible.

Of course, this project was supposed to be way down on the the to-do list because I really should be working on my brother's album, but at least its done now.

I hope you'll link in below to show us what's going on in your craft space. Also, use the WOYWW link in the first sentence to see what's going on in workspaces around the globe (courtesy of the lovely Ms. Julia in the U.K.) Have a great week!

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)

Friends with Flair... Unity style

Hi friends and welcome to another Unity FWF Friday!

I wanted to use the "Ulysses" idea from last Friday in a graduation card this week. But instead of having his head peek through, this time I constructed a flapped card that allows me to tuck bills behind a scene that features copies of Ulysses face. I have to tell you that my son's little inexpensive copier made color copies of these bills so authentic looking I can just imagine how counterfeiters do it! Thank goodness our government magically sticks a watermark image within the bill...

The banner on the front of my card came from the May '10 KOTM (a little Happy). I stamped it twice directly on my panel then used my Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher between all the pennants for a little interest. I added paper pieced pennants and rub-on letters to spell out my greeting. (Can I tell you that I did this twice? The first time I spelled out Happy Birthday then realized it was supposed to be a graduation card, silly me! So my pennants have extra dimension because I had to add another layer to make it the right saying! Lol.) Lastly, one of the adorable birds from the Ippity set Quotes a la Happy decided to fly into my scene.

On the inside, I used Suzi Blu's Queen of Glitter image for the bodies of the three Ulysses. I like that the hands are up and waving and her blouse makes a good man's shirt. I cut the faces out of the bills that I had copied, adhered them and topped each with the party hat from Hugs and Kitties. By using foam spacers, I made the pocket for the bills hiding place. The empty panel above it is for a handwritten note.

Thanks for dropping by! Be sure and check out the other participants these week on the Unity blog HERE.

Have a great weekend,

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr, aka Scrapcollectr57 on Splitcoast)

WOYWW #109, WOTT #13 and a Peachy Layout

What's on Your Workspace Wedsnesday and What's on Tap Tuesday here. This is what I saw when I dared to enter my scrap area this holiday weekend. It was the chaos left behind when I finished the card I last posted on Thursday. Let's see, there's the red, white and blue twine that I considered for my card but rejected. Great for the postal theme but colors didn't jibe. (They're good here though because I'm writing this on July 4th.) There are several Unity Kits of the Month. I think I used three different ones on my card. The cube calendar still says June 28th. Lots of adhesive and diamond shaped pop dots (they create a nice trellis as I use them, don't they?) Oh, and under my glasses are the journal cards that will go in a Project Life album. Click HERE to know more about Project Life. I decided that this being the halfway mark of the year, I'd just jump in here and start taking daily photos and journaling about them. Better late than never, right?

Well, all this is being cleaned off today because I have to make a card for a grad party that we're going to on Saturday and, more important, my brother (you know the one who's 50th birthday is TODAY) is supposed to be getting an album from me. I'm still waiting for some responses from family to include in the album (including my own mom!) I sent off letters with blank stationery asking family and friends to write about one word that they feel describes my brother. I will definitely show you the album when it's done. (Expect clean and simple.)

What I can show you today is a layout I did about the photo shoot with my eldest when he was turning one (19 years ago). More details can be found on the Let's Get Peachy blog HERE. This layout was part of a recipe challenge currently going on at the site. You choose 4 or more items to include on your layout, then submit it by linking in on the LGP sidebar for a chance at a prize!

I hope you had a fun weekend. I don't expect that you had a lot of time to be working on any projects but if you'd like to share the madness currently on your desk, I'd love to see it! Link up below.

Question of the day: What's your favorite hobby besides crafting? I'm trying to get back into reading. Currently enjoying the second book of The Hunger Games trilogy. How about you?

Cindy (aka Scrapcollectr)