And the countdown begins...

The countdown to CHA, that is! In exactly a week I will be arriving in Chicago (I'll be driving so leaving VERY early next Friday morning) for a few days of pure bliss! I've been to a lot of these shows but this will be my first NOT going as a buyer but as a member of the press (I'll be going with Scrapbook News + Review). I don't know yet what to expect from this new role but I'm definitely so excited to see all the new goodies, catch up with old friends, and just be in a totally creative atmosphere for a few days!

And speaking of Scrapbook News + Review, we are looking for submissions for our August issue! You can find the main calls here. Several of the departments have separate calls now as well, including mine! Have I mentioned yet that I'll be coordinating the newly re-vamped "Altered Art and Home Dec" section? :) I'm so excited about the future plans for this section! And I'd love to see your work for it! Here is what we're looking for:

Artful Rooms - We're looking for items you have altered for your kitchen - utensil holders, spice racks, kitchen art, altered cookie sheets and cutting boards...anything you can put in your kitchen!

Options - Time to see how you keep your household on time! We're looking for a wide variety of altered clocks - any style - what makes YOU tick?

Seasonal - We're looking for items altered with summer or beach themes.

Wearables - We'd love to see anything made with scrapping supplies that can be worn (totes/purses count) - jewelry, shoes (would love to see some flip flops!), etc.

ATC's - Show us your favorite ATC's for a new ATC gallery feature!

Call Guidelines Please submit your projects with the following guidelines: - Of any size - No restrictions on whether it has been posted to an online gallery, blog, etc., but we respectfully request that you take them down when requested for publication. Submit to jfranklin@scrapbooknewsandreview.comThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it Deadline: July 31, 2008

I hope to see some of your work!!!

In the meantime, I'll leave you with one of the projects I had in the June issue - an altered wooden gift bag I made for my dad. I'm so in love with Basic Grey's Archaic line! I also used leather trim on this and clipped off the backs of some brads to just glue them on. The chipboard letters are 1.5" Prim & Proper font from Zsiage hammered with the Tim Holtz texture hammer then inked and swiped with gold and covered in Glossy Accents. Click on the picture to see the mega version and the details!


Let me know if you'll be at CHA too! I'd love to be on the lookout for you! :)

I am so proud!!!!

Here's my seven year old son's very first fully altered item (yes, I did the trimming with the Xacto for him)! All the Nemo stickers are from EK and the paper is from Paper Pizzazz. :)





And with this post I'm suddenly getting spam. Sigh - sorry guys, time to turn on the word verification!

Tea Holder WGB

I think I'm on a roll with this blogging thing this week! Ha - I shouldn't have said that, now I won't get around to it for another week, lol! Having a dark, dreary day here - it's trying to spit some snow out, but so far just enough to be a tiny bit annoying. So much for my son's hope for a snow day! Bad for picture taking though. I altered this little WGB (wooden gift bag) to use in my kitchen to hold teabags. I'm on a pretty big coffee kick lately (we finally have a Starbucks!), but do love the occasional cup of tea. My absolute favorite is from Celestial Seasonings and called Sleepytime. The box describes it as a "comforting blend of chamomile and spearmint". I love this at bedtime! I do not, however, like the box it comes in. So I thought I'd make myself something I DO like to hold my little packets of my favorite tea! I used Calcutta Gardens paper from Zsiage's Impressed With India? (see, there's that question again) line. This paper has a nice gradation in colors so I used one side (the lighter) for the front and back, then the darker side for the sides. It still felt kind of dark and I wanted to pep it up so I rubbed a pearl glaze from Making Memories over it. I overdid this just a bit, but still really like how it changed the look of the paper. Tip for the glazes - add a tiny bit at a time! It dries really quickly so while you can keep adding more, getting it toned down once you've put too much on is next to impossible. I used chipboard letters and a scroll from Zsiage covered in pearl blue Lumiere paint from Jacquard. My picture doesn't do it justice, but the pearl glaze and the pearl in the paint really do look striking together. I need to remember to pull my Lumiere paints out more often! I finished up with a few charms I had from the bowl I found in my cupboard a few weeks ago, again clipping off the hang tags. I had to fight the temptation to add ribbons to the top because I want to be able to get to my tea without getting caught up in ribbon, lol!

Wooden gift bags make great storage!

Have I mentioned how addicted to these little wooden ($1) gift bags I am? Besides being a great way to package up a small gift for someone, they are also useful after the gift! I keep a nice little stockpile of these around and make them often. Most I end up keeping simply because they're a great little storage item. I keep several on my workspace at all times to keep things handy. I have one on my desk for pens and pencils too (not my good scrapbook pens, of course - those are stored on their sides, as they should be!). Plan to see some that I am making for kitchen and bath storage too soon!



For this particular WGB (I think I'll coin a new abbreviation today!), I covered it in Fossils of Kenya patterned paper from Zsiage's Out of Africa? line (yes, a lot of their paper collections have names ending with a "?" - one of these days I'll remeber to ask Dina if there's a story behind that, lol). As you may have noticed I have an affinity for all things sparky and shiny, so I decided to rub on Making Memories pearl glaze - this completely changed the look of the paper - try clicking on the picture for the large version to see the subtle shine (ok, I checked and even in the gigantic view my photo didn't pick up the pearly effect so you'll have to just trust me that it looks really great)! Then I picked out a few Bazzill Blossoms (yikes, I'm starting to run low on Prima's! I need Hobby Lobby to carry that line too!) and layered them with small felt flowers from Creative Impressions and some glittered brads from Making Memories. I painted the inside and edges of the WGB with DecoArt's metallic finish paint in Dark Patina (this color is soooo striking in peson!) and dabbled a bit more of it around the center of the felt flowers and on the ridges of the larger blossoms. To add the paint highlights to the flowers, I used my favorite all-purpose tool that EVERYONE has...my finger!

On a side note, I've noticed I have several readers from Champaign - can anyone tell me where Scrapbook Expressions (I think the new owners might have re-named it?) moved to? I was going to stop by when I was in town a few weeks ago and it was no longer in the strip mall out on the south side. There are some things I'm dying to get my hands on that I'm hoping they carry so if anyone can help me out, I'd appreciate it! Thanks!

Valentine's Wooden Gift Bag

Ok, trying to break away from Christmas projects still so I started a few Valentine's Day, St. Pat's Day and Easter projects. This wooden gift bag will eventually hold a wooden mini-album I'm working on that will match. The patterned paper is from Reminisce as is the "love" block which is cut from another sheet from the same line and inked with black ink from Tsukineko. The glittered chipboard hearts are all from Scrapworks. The paint is Lipstck from Making Memories. I'm so NOT a pink kind of girl, but for some reason I just love this color! The ribbon is from these cute little $1 sets of 6 mini spools from Target. And, of course, Mod Podge from Plaid and a $1 wooden gift bag from Hobby Lobby or Michael's.

A tip about the brads along the bottom. I removed the tabs in the back using wire cutters in the middle, then used a pair of flat pliers to gently squish the remaining section of the tabs in flush with the edges of the brad. This gave me something for the adhesive (I used Aleene's Jewelry and Metal Glue from Duncan) to grab onto.

Front

Back

Sides

More Christmas goodies!

I made a bunch of these wooden gift bags for teachers/bus driver, etc. and just hapened to finish these two up last night and actually remembered to get pics, lol! Both are super quick (the only thing that took a while was drying the Scribbles, which I left overnight but was able to at least tie the ribbons after about a half hour). Papers and metal charms from Flair. Ribbon from Stampin Up. Mod Podge from Plaid. I used tons of Scribbles glitter paint on these too. On the left one, every star has clear glitter Scribbles in the center. On the one on the right, I used tons more and in matching colors - red, green, gold, and clear - to embellish all the ornaments. If you click on the picture you'll get a gigantic version in which you can see some of the detail. They are filled with peanut butter cup bells and hot cocoa kisses (yummy!!!)

Deck the Halls

I love Christmas - have I mentioned that? I love decorating for it. I love making and buying presents for the people I love. And I LOVE making Christmas crafts! In fact, I've been so busy making Christmas crafts this year, that for once my house doesn't yet look like an elf threw up all over it! Yet, lol! The tree is up, but very little else has been unboxed yet and if I keep making new stuff I won't have room!

But yes, I made yet another wooden gift bag anyways! I'm in love with this one too. This would be why I've had an Etsy shop for months now and have never put a single thing in it yet - I make these things then can't bear to part with them! This one comes with a few little tips and tricks I'd like to share...and my signature not-so-great photography! I used more paper from the Romantic Collection from Prima - I know this line is supposed to be geared towards romance, but every time I look at it I just see Christmas! I edged everything with a gold marker from Sakura - it's a very subtle detail but adds a nice touch to transition to the interior. I painted the interior with a metallic green from DecoArt (they really do some fantastic shades of metallics!). The holly leaves and berry brads are from Making Memories. The original red just didn't work for me, so I used gold glitter Scribbles over them.

Scribbles vs. Stickles. I have been using these like crazy lately! Both kinds. Stickles are from Ranger, and once dry, have complete glitter coverage. Scribbles are from Duncan and are actually meant for fabrics. They come in dimensional regular colors, neons, glitters, metallics and pearls. And are less than half the cost of Stickles! The Scribbles glitter gives a random glitter pattern with plenty of the color showing through from underneath (which is why I used them for this application). Both definitely have their very distinct uses though so I keep lots of both on hand!

The rubons are from American Crafts, from the Christmas Book Two MiniMarks. What I want to focus on is the design below the words. I used two scrolly rubons. I also made a mistake and wanted to let you know how I fixed it! As I was twirling them around trying to get the placement the way I wanted it, I wasn't paying that great of attention to which side was up (ahem, here's my plug for using a good natural light such as an Ott Light or Daylight lamp - I have several and just didn't have one on, which would have saved me this step...). I put the first one down and began to rub and it was upside down. So part of the design was gone. I used a needle tool to remove the rest of the section to a joint where it would make sense then repeated the process on that exact same section out of the matching rubon. Obviously this won't work on words, but then again, who's going to get a word upside down anyways?

Halloween Wooden Gift Bag

This was a fun little piece I put together for a Halloween decoration. Those wooden gift bags I loved from Hobby Lobby but hadn't seen? Michael's has TONS of them with their holiday $1 wood! Yes, I definitely stocked up! The patterned paper I used is Textured Inferno from the Flouristics collection from Zsiage. The flocked stickers and rubons are from Making Memories. I wasn't terribly thrilled with the flocked rubons. You put down the double sided sticker and then press the flocking on from a sheet. It didn't transfer well - I did a lot of filling in with a marker and used Un-Du to remove several that didn't work at all. Which is too bad - there are some really cute designs. I might try them again with maybe a glitter or something but at least I got this project completed (glad I had the sticker version on hand!).

Create Wooden Gift Bag

I found these adorable wooden gift bags at Hobby Lobby and wish I had picked up more because I haven't seen them there since and they're a lot of fun to work with for a small project with tons of storage useage (this one is currently in my studio holding scissors on my workspace). I used Surf & Turf from Zsiage's new line New England (which is one of my all-time favorite collections from Zsiage - seriously yummy and versatile!). It's hard to tell from the picture, but I did not Mod Podge over the top of the paper. Instead I used Ranger's crackle finish over the swirls (looks shiny in the picture). The ribbon is just a piece of stray white I had hanging around. The flower is from Prima. The letters and flower center are Zsiage's chipboard. This stuff is awesome - it has a nice white glossy finish to it. I used Ranger alcohol ink and metallic mixative over them and then the crackle finish again. I'm not sure if it's the glossy finish or the alcohol ink/crackle finish that caused it, but it ended up with a super cracked finish - deep, crumbly cracks. It's a neat look - they look almost like amber! You can see where I somehow managed to forget to pull out a "t" when first doing this so I did the "t" later, resulting in a bad color match when trying to remember how much alcohol ink versus how much metallic mixative to use. So there's my next tip - proofread yourself when doing anything that requires color mixing!