Holiday Card Step Out

Hi there! I've been churning away on Instagram (@scrapcollectr there). It's my way of mini blogging daily. But today, I wanted to share a quick visual of a simple holiday card I made which incorporates the revival of shaker cards.

I happen to still have some cute little shaker cups from Stampin Up that coordinate with some of their stamp sets so I brought them out to save me making my own shaker box.

Step 1: Stamp the snowglobe (Sweet Snowglobe from Stampin Up) in navy and red. Color the trees green before and after stamping. The add more color to the house and door.

Step 2: Cut a patterned mat for your folded card and position the 1-3/4" circle punch over the top and punch.

Step 3: So that this is the result. A hole through both layers.

Step 4: Punch the snowglobe with the same circle punch and glue it down to the inside of the card using the hole as a guide. Cut out the red stamped base and glue down to front of card.

Step 5: You could also glue down a red base on the inside of the card, but you'll see that I changed that later. Add a small amount of beads and glass glitter (Stampin Up) to the shaker cup. I used Wink of Stella markers to add a little shine to snow on the image.

Step 6: I colored up the scarf of a mini snowman and matted the mini greeting with silver paper. (Both from SU's Happy Winter, I think.) Made a quick bow with some ribbon I got with a recent present.

Step 7: A quick look inside the card. I cut another patterned paper to cover the shaker box edges. Oh by the way, the shaker has adhesive on the edges so you just position it upside down in the hole of the card front and close the card to adhere it without losing your beads and glitter.

Step 8: Finished card with a little bling at the corners!

I hope you have a wonderful holiday season!

Love,

Filofax-ing, charity, yarn, nails and bling...

Hi friends,
In addtion to my daily Instagram (IG) posts, most every Monday, I try to post a Filofax weekly update on IG (I'm @scrapcollectr and I have 625 followers over there... hard to believe. :-) So this is that post for last week's goings on.

Last weekend I took a lot of my unused craft supplies to a local flea market and sold it all for $1 a piece (because that's the only way things move at flea markets) and earmarked the net sales for charity. Although I cleared $177 after the vendor fees, I promised my hubby that some of that would go to gas since it was a long way away. Even so, I was able to donate $150 to a new charity I just learned about. It can be found at www.skip1.org. They ask people to skip something and donate it to feeding the hungry. Check them out. 

I've recently become addicted to crochet. It started when I saw a Pinterest post about a really easy infinity scarf pattern. I made it and love it. It was super easy. Then I found out about a group found at www.crochetforcancer.org They gather crocheted caps for people undergoing cancer treatment. They provide easy patterns provided by another group at www.crochethooksyou.com So... I've finished my 6th cap. The website provides regional addresses to mail the finished caps to. Here's my latest one: a slouchy beanie modeled by my son's old tiger (I realize I need a mannequin head, going forward. Lol.) The monkey was made by me also. It's an amigurumi (knitted toy). It's the second one I've done and I don't think there will be many more because it requires a lot of patience but I do like this little guy. 

It's understandable now that crochet magazines and new yarns will follow. Picked up a few things at Joanns for future ideas. I broke down and went with the new nail color trend, too. Took a little getting used to but it's fun.

Lastly, I'm now even more of a fan of HSN. I bought this lovely Herkimer Quartz necklace from them in January and it chipped so I called up hoping they'd help out and they are taking it back no problem. I love companies with good customer service. 

Thanks for dropping by. I hope you're having a good week. Now I need to go organize my crafty stuff. I think they've been playing tag behind my back because they are scattered everywhere.

*wink*

Hobbies, hobbies, hobbies...

Hello,

Several different hobbies are occupying my free time these days and I just wanted to give you a glimpse into them (in case you don't follow me on Instagram - my feed is @scrapcollectr).

One thing I'm doing is crocheting caps for cancer patients. The website www.CrochetForCancer.org offers free easy patterns and addresses of regional locations to mail your finished caps. The supplier of the patterns is www.crochethooksyou.com . Both have Facebook pages. When I'm finished, I usually post my latest cap at the latter. I used to love crocheting long ago so I'm enjoying taking it up again. I'm a little afraid that I'm getting a little too excited about yarn purchases though. Lol. I'm working on my sixth cap now. This is what one of the finished ones looks like. I also tried my hand at amigurumi ("knitted toys" in Japanese). It was fun but more effort!

Then, I'm also really into using a Filofax as a decorated diary. I'm using stickers, flyers, business cards, and photos that I print from my Canon Selphy, as well as any number of other flat items on the pages. I post recaps on Mondays on Instagram. Here is the latest one.

And I guess along the same lines, just today, I decided to use my collection of flair buttons to decorate the outside of a little notebook that I got from Filofax's clearance section awhile back. It didn't have a calendar in it so I order the inserts and will use it more as a planner since the above is more of a diary after the fact.

You know that I like to make cards, so if you didn't see my previous post, check out the never-ending card that I made for a special uncle last week.

Thanks for coming by. I hope you enjoyed it. *smile*

Never Ending Card technique

Hi Friends!
I love Instagram (IG). I'm posting over there at least once a day (my moniker is @scrapcollectr) but I'm realizing that if I want to say more, it's best to get this blog going again.

Like today. I pulled out a fun card that I made awhile back because it is so appropriate to use as a thank you for a recent giveaway I won. A souvenir box filled with items from Tokyo from the lovely @maybelleimasa over on IG.

What's fun about this is that it is a Never Ending Card. It flips over and over four times until it returns to the original image. Below my four photos, I'll give you a link to the tutorial over at Splitcoast Stampers, a wonderful free source for cardmakers. When you get to the tutorial, don't be overwhelmed by the step by step instructions. It's worth the effort.

So here are my photos. It was fun to cut the papers so that the flower image was still continuous. I've tried to track down the name of the stamp set that includes these lovely little geishas but I haven't yet. I'll keep you posted.

So now, give it a try. Here's the link. Have a great time. I'd love to see what you do with it!
Thanks for stopping by.... *smile*

Oh, and if you'd like to see it in action, I did a VINE post of it. My ID there is also Scrapcollectr.

A little visit to HSN

Hi friends!
It was my turn to post over at The Crafting Journals, so here's a little sample of what I'm writing about today.

It's a mini Smashbook that I made about a recent trip to HSN. Come to the blog to read more! Also, I'm pretty active over on Instagram and Twitter (@scrapcollectr) so check out my photos for the daily prompt game that I was playing this past month. For those of you not on Instagram, I'll try to come back soon and post them here little by little.
Thanks for visiting!

Envy is setting in of all those crafty souls headed to CHA (Craft and Hobby Association) in warm Anaheim soon. It is so cold outside, the house is struggling to keep up with the drafts seeping in. I guess I can take heart that I'm headed to Tampa to help behind the scenes at some HSN broadcasts. It's gotten a little cool there but it will be about 60 degrees warmer than here!

I did a little prepping this morning for a Project Life card swap with a new friend. These kits are so generous, you could swap with about 4 people and still have a complete set of all the journaling card designs.

I used to put a sample of each design in pocket pages and store them in binders but as cool as it was to flip through the binders and see each one, they got heavy fast. Now I'm just going back to a card file system. The 3x4's store nicely side by side in these card files that I got a while back at Staples. I'm not done with the converting yet so I may need two of them but I'm happy that I can see them pretty easily this way also.

Hope you have a crafty day and stay warm and toasty!
Check out The Crafting Journals too, for a little pom pom tutorial over there. *smile*

Project Life 2014 Album and News

Hi Friends,
I have to admit, I can more often be found on Instagram. Are you an IG'er? I use "Scrapcollectr" as my moniker. I just love taking photos of daily life because I then upload them and my journaling into my CollectPhotoApp with the intention of printing them in a 4x6 format and then slipping them into a binder. Lately, I'm following monthly prompts provided by another Instagrammer called @FatMumSlim. Check her out if you'd like to play along.

If that wasn't enough, I'm enrolled in a Studio Calico class called Day by Day that's enabling me to keep a more traditional Project Life Album this year. On this 6th day of January, I've already created a title page and a first page that illustrates two of their prompts. I decided to use one of Becky Higgin's Project Life kit that I bought through HSN awhile back that changed up the sizes of pockets in the page protectors. It's called Just Add Color and I'm having fun with the little 2x2 cards included in the kit.

Here are the two pages I mentioned, as well as a closeup of the first page. Just wanted you to see that I snuck in little features like a wood veneer word bubble (Studio Calico) and wood veneer bird (Recollections) and a paper clip shaped like a magnifying glass (Literary Set by Barnes & Nobel) and a red gem. I was illustrating the fact that I spied little red berries on the snow covered tree next to my garage and that made me happy.

The NEWS I mentioned in the subject line is that after working for EK Success for a year and a half, I finally get to go to HSN this week to help with the setup of 3 spots that will air this Friday (the 10th) at 7am, 3pm and 6pm EST. They are Martha Stewart Craft spots that celebrate the upcoming Valentine season with loads of fun punches, stickers, papers, glitters and more. I hope you will tune in. Just imagine me somewhere back beyond the studio lights. *smile*

Have a crafty week and don't forget to check out the group blog that I participate in: The Crafting Journals. There is always crafty fun going on over there!