Paper inspiration - Cards

When I walked into the scrapbook store on Friday I promised myself that I would not purchase any more paper.  HA!  Really ... telling a papercrafter that they cannot buy a piece of paper when they walk into a scrapbook store is like telling me that I'm not allowed to create canvases anymore.  Who was I kidding?? ha ha.

I used a little bit of this paper line in my previous post and it is from BasicGrey and is their "25th and Pine" line of papers.  How can you not love the little hits of retro combined with a whole lot of color!  I love that there is pink in this line.  It reminds me of walking into a 50's retro kitchen with pink counter top and one of those old school retro fridges. 

I also combined in a few other pieces of paper because silly me, I didn't buy the whole line of paper.  Next time I'll know better :-)  I tend to go pretty simple with my cards because these are the small ones and there is not really a lot of room on the front.  I love to punch the card with a bit of contrast and that is where the navy blue skinny ribbon came in.  For me it ties the whole look together ... literally.

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I'm on a roll ......

The inspiration continues and I am so thankful that today I had a few moments to continue on this crazy creative journey I am on!

For those people that know me and those who are new to my blog I have to say that I'm a bit of a snow worshiper. It's fluffy, it's pretty in its original form and best of all you get to do really fun things with it like getting right in it and creating a wonderful snowman.  Thus is the inspiration for my canvas today.

I have to thank the fabulous Charmagne Gibb, whom I took a mixed media class from, for the great idea for the snowman.  She taught us to create little rosette flowers with cheese cloth and when I decided to make the snowman I knew I needed something circular and white. Perfect!!! All you do is take long skinny strips of cheese cloth and twist it. Once it is twisted you lay down Mod lodge on the canvas and then lay the cheesecloth down in a circular pattern.

The snow at the bottom of the canvas was created by cutting out a piece of cheese cloth and laying it down on the canvas.  I then added molding paste over top to set it down.  I went back after and added a little blue to the molding paste to create a bit of movement in the snow.

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Grand finale - Part 4 - Canvas, canvas, and more canvas

Pwepf ... I am quite tired at this point.  Between all this blogging and all my creativeness it was quite a weekend.   Next ......... ha ha ha.  I am actually quite rejuvenated after this wonderfully fabulous weekend.  Did I mention I had a great creative weekend??? Okay I know enough  ...

So here is my grand finale items which I am so immensely proud of.  As of late I felt that my canvases were a bit lackluster, so to speak.  Today though I feel so inspired and I cannot wait to do more.

These are 3 little mini canvases 4 x 4 inch plus one wood block sign.  #1 and #2 I used a tissue paper background.  #3 and #4 I used napkins I purchased from SuperStore.  You may be able to see that they are a chevron pattern which as you know from my previous post is my favorite print.  I just have to say that napkins work fabulous for backgrounds you just have to be careful when applying so that they don't rip.

Other methods I used: Stenciling, stamping, embossing, and smudging with gelatos.

Happy viewing .. hope that these help to inspire you as much as they did me.

ChelleB

#1 - Poinsettia

#2 - Oh Christmas Tree

#3 - When pigs fly

#4 - Merry Christmas

Hallelujah - Part 3 - A Bingo Christmas

Part 3 of my crazy crazy creative weekend.  Yes I did all these projects in one weekend.  Thank you Starbucks for the great energy boosts!!!

I can't really say much more than I FELL IN LOVE with this paper line.  My favorite holiday (Christmas) mixed in with my favorite era (Retro), mixed in with my favorite print (Chevron) all in one!  I was smitten to say the least.  Simple Stories/December Documented/Bingo-Chevron is the paper I used for the Bingo Cards.  The other background paper is from BasicGrey and is their 25th and Pine paper line.

One problem ... I love Chevron and I love Bingo cards so it was super hard to cut through one side when I knew I loved the other side .. ha ha.  Oh the troubles us papercrafter's face!!

So here are they are.  Cute, fun and whimsical.

Thanks for popping by!

ChelleB

Hallelujah - Part 2 - Blueprint Christmas cards

This post is a carry on from the previous one.  Many, many, many creative juices were flowing this weekend as you will see.

Project #2 was to use my brand new Tim Holtz Christmas Stamp Set #3 - Blueprint.  Oh I have been ogling over these for quite some time and I finally had to break down and spend a few of the dollars I have for me each month :)

These are pretty much self explanatory other than I used Faber Castell's Gelatos for all the coloring. I'm still getting used to these but I sure do love them.  I love being able to create a watercolor effect with these.  I also used my great little Dymo Caption maker machine for the holidays wishes.  Brown Kraft paper and card/envelopes seemed fitting for these because I didn't want to take away from the splendor of these beautiful stamps.

Thanks for stopping by!

Hallelujah the creativeness is back ... and with a vengence I might add!!!

Long time no see!  As I mentioned in my last post I was a bit lost for a little while but now I have found my creative person again.  I am soooo thankful because this weekend was one of the best ones I've had in a really long time.  2 days I locked myself up in my little corner of the living room and made a complete mess and I LOVED it!!  Ink, paper and Mod Podge was scattered from one end of my desk to the other desk to the dining room table.  I work well in very tight spaces apparently.  2 desks and one dining room table and this is the teeny space I worked in.  Is anyone else like me??? I'm so weird!!! Who works in a small space like that? ha ha.

So even though I worked in the teeny tiny little space I still managed to create so much fabulousness.  Project #1 was using my brand new Dee's Dinstinctively die's.  Merry Christmas and Poinsettia were my base inspiration for these 4 cards. I used pre-printed cards that already had the background design on them which, wow, saves you so much time in the end.  I believe they were DCVW from Michael's.  I picked them up about 2 years ago.

Since I have many more projects to post I am going to separate posts for each type of projects. 1 down 3 more to go :)

Oh Canada

Today we give thanks to the all those men and women who sacrificed their lives so we could have freedom in our country.  I am a very thankful Canadian today among millions of others who pay tribute to those who have fallen in order to secure our safety and freedom.  Thank you.

Today I am also thankful that I found my creative person this weekend.  Where was she?? I have no idea but I am sure glad to have her back. Sometimes I think we get ourselves into this mundane state of just living day to day but it takes something little that snaps us out of it and for me it was watching Christy Tomlinson's You tube video from 2011 and her Christmas canvases.  Wow, now that gal is inspiring.  I have always been so focused on making sure everything was perfect and lined up a certain way and that I drew between the lines.  Throw that out the window!!!!  Art is not about perfection.  Art is about letting your freaky creative self fly and boy did I ever .. WOO HOO!!!  Yes I am quite excited about what I accomplished as you will see in my upcoming posts.

For the time being I wanted to share a special project I worked on about a year ago. Today is a perfect day to launch this beauty out into the world because I am a proud Canadian.  So here she is:

My ode to Canada chipboard book

As always my main source of inspiration on this piece was the master works of Tim Holtz.  I mean how can you not be inspired by that man.  He does it like no other.

Front page:

All these cut out were from the Canada Cricut cartridge.  The double page "Canada" spread as you can see had a gazillion (well maybe not quite that many but it seemed that way) little pieces of all the little pieces of land up north.  Yes I glued those on all individually by hand, it did not come on a magic little piece of paper that I just stuck down .. ha ha.  That by far was the most challenging.  99.9% of the paper is from one of Tim Holtz paper packs.

I'm so proud of this project and it has a special little place on the coffee table in my living room.  As was the purpose for me creating it.

Hope you enjoy looking at it as much as I did making it.

ChelleB