White and Cream LOVE with Melissa Frances ...

I am very pleased to share with you all that this sweet card I made using lots of Melissa Frances goodness was featured on the company blog today ...

This card was super fun to design!!  I'd love for you to take a peek at the Melissa Frances post and leave me a comment over there letting me know what you think of this white and cream creation!

Hugs!

xoxoxoxo

The Shabby Tea Room #94!

 Hello sweet friends and welcome to The Shabby Tea Room #94!  This week, Melissa is our creative host, and she has chosen the theme of 'A Colorful and Shabby New Year' for our challenge along with this festive photo for inspiration ...

... and Melissa asks that we create a card or project inspired by the above photo and USE PINK OR RED, BLUE, YELLOW and GREEN!

My husband treated me to this lovely tea set for two a couple weekends ago when we visited Wilmington!  We had a tea party (yes, my husband went to a Tea Room with me!!!) and at the end, he told me to pick out a set that I liked!  He knows I simply adore anything 'tea' related and love to host and attend tea parties, so this was a very thoughtful lunch that he treated me to ... and the tea set was the icing on the cake :)

So, I used this pretty little set as the spring board for my inspiration this week!  My in-laws arrive tomorrow for their annual holiday visit with us and will be staying through the 1st.  I thought it would be so much fun to host a 'real' tea party for my mother-in-law on New Year's Day when all the guys go golfing, so my project this week included a couple of cute tea pot and cup place markers that I can personalize with our names ...

 

... these both were made using templates and papers found on the {new} Creating With Vintage Illustrations CD available from Crafty Secrets!  The tag toppers were made with a couple of Creative Scraps from the Altered Fairies and Wonderland Tea sets.  

 

I'll be sure to take pics of the table when all set for the tea party and share here on the bloggity blog with you!  I love peppermint tea ... especially during the holidays!  The little pink wrapped peppermint candy is from Martha Stewart, pink & white flower from The Ribbon Reel, tags stamped with the Tea For Two set from My Time Made Easy, Pink Bubblegum and Vintage Winter White shabby vintage seam binding from my Etsy Shop.  

 

My mother-in-law is a HUGE tea drinker ... so I decided to take this little ensemble a step further and create a sweet little gift box to hold some tea bags that she could take home with her after our tea party!!

 

This adorable house is another template found on the {new} Creating With Vintage Illustrations CD from Crafty Secrets ... super simple to assemble, and then I embellished mine with some snipetts of vintage trim, lace, buttons, pearls and glitter!

 

I wish the glitter showed up better in the pics ... I glittered all the flowers on all four sides of the house!

 

And there you have it ... my sweet treat gift for my sweet mother-in-law!  I think she'll enjoy it, how about you???

And, if you hadn't guessed it yet, our {sweet} sponsor in the Tea Room this week is Crafty Secrets!  Sandy is generously donating a copy of the {new} Creating With Vintage Illustrations CD along with a $25 gift certificate to the shop for our lucky winner this week, so you'll definitely want to play along for your chance to win!!!

Please be sure to stop by the other Shabby Girls' blogs to see what they have designed for your inspiration this week:

Charlene Cundy - Expresstions of Me!
 
Cindy Holshouser - Sweet P Paperie

Fran Westmoreland - Purple Peanut's Crafty Blog

Melissa Bove - Creating From the Heart

Sheri Holt - My Sheri Card

... I cannot wait to see what you'll create for our color challenge this week!

Thanks for peeking in today!

Hugs!

xoxoxoxo

Challenges for this project:

Really Reasonable Ribbons #38 - anything and ribbon

PALS Paper Arts #125 - tag you're it!

The Ribbon Reel #18!

 MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!!!

Hello sweet friends and welcome to this extra special blog post ... I'm happy to share my project for The Ribbon Reel #18 challenge with you all on Christmas Day!!

This week our challenge is called 'Happy New Year' and we're asking you to make a card or project in this theme using black with cream/white and silver/gray.  We all took inspiration from this lovely photo for our projects this week:

 And here is my 'Happy New Year' themed card ...

 

The pretty sentiment is stamped using the Christmas Cheer set from Inspired by Stamping.  

I used a snipett of 10mm White May Arts Stitched Grosgrain from The Ribbon Reel Shop next to the pretty crystal trinket pins on the left side of the card.  A silver paper doilie anchors the base of the design and on top of that I added two layers of gorgeous, lush ribbons ... 25mm Creme Satin layered with Black Satin Pleated ribbon - stunning!!

 

The organza and rhinestone bloom is from my local craft shop.  I made a white candy cane from chenille stems and then layered that on top of a bow made from 3mm Silver May Arts Velvet!  A couple of tiny silver jingle bells, some Black Licorice baker's twine and a white felt snowflake with rhinestones for bling complete this festive New Year's card!!

 

Please be sure to pop on over to The Ribbon Reel Challenge Blog to check out the GORGEOUS inspiration from the teamies this week ... and then I hope you'll have a chance to play along with this fun and festive challenge!

Hugs to all!

xoxoxoxo

Challenges for this card:  

Really Reasonable Ribbons #38 - anything and ribbon

Stamptacular Sunday #144 - winter photo inspiration

Create for CARDS - New Year's

City Crafter Challenge Blog #88 - winter white

Fussy and Fancy #52 - monochromatic sparkle

A Very Merry ... Magical Christmas!!!

Here's wishing all of my blog friends all around the world a very Merry Christmas!

We spent the past week visiting Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida and were treated to beautiful fireworks, a stunning lighted Cindarella's Castle, magical parades ... and meeting Mickey and Minnie up close and personal ... it was truly the vacation of a lifetime!!

Each day we were treated to several performances by the Disney characters center stage on Cindarella's Castle!!

 

The parades were magical and FUN!!  I LOVE Toy Story!!

We had beautiful weather ... 70's and sunny!!

 

We managed to have great seats for all of the parades and performances ... in amongst thousands of other Disney lovers!!!

No matter where you are in the world and who you're with, I hope you're spending the day surrounded by people and things you LOVE!

Merry, merry!!

Hugs!!

xoxoxoxo

Crafty Secrets Design Team Challenge - Home Decor!

 Hello sweet friends and welcome to my blog today!  I'm super excited to share the project I created for the December Design Team Challenge at Crafty Secrets ... 'Home Decor' -- YUMMY!  I adore creating home decor projects out of paper and glue, so this one was really fun for me!  Warning ... I took lots of pictures of each little element I created, so grab a cuppa something warm and yummy and sit back, relax and enjoy!!

For today's home decor project, I used a combination of digital papers from:

Creating With Vintage Patterns CD

 Creating With Vintage Illustrations CD

Double Sided Creative Scraps - Christmas '07

and

Christmas Mail Clear Art Stamp Set

Ready, set ... here we go! 

 

I created a garland with tiny little hanging packages, rusty pie tins and burlap mittens ... all decorated with bits and bobs of treasures ... made with LOVE!

 

 

Mini rusty pie tins painted with cream paint and embellished with glitter leaves, paper flowers, bloomers, baker's twine, jingle bells and vintage holiday creative scraps!

 

I sewed two little burlap mittens together and left an opening at the top so I could fill with goodies!  I added pom-pom trim, glittered berries and leaves, buttons, twine, jingle bells and a vintage holiday creative scrap ticket!

 

I purchased tiny little boxes from the craft store and then wrapped them with papers from the CD's!  So darling in real life!!  I added pretty polka dotted ribbon, a large paper bloom and a kraft tag inked to give it a time-worn look!

 

Another burlap mitten ... this one is filled with red and white chenille candy canes that I made!!

 

This little sweetie is a cork heart cut with a Spellbinders die then embellished with a vintage holiday creative scrap, bloom, stamped angel wings, buttons, baker's twine and jingle bells.  The hanger is a green paper clip that I untwisted and hot glued to the back of the heart!

 

This is my favorite little goodie on the garland ... love this newsprint paper that is included on the Creating with Vintage Illustrations CD and how about that gorgeous red and white ticking ribbon - yum!  I added a couple of sweet green blooms with darling red polka dots and a kraft grungie tag too!!

 

Another vintage mini pie tin ...

 

Another sweet mini burlap mitten filled with treasures ...

 

And another tiny little box wrapped with adorable red polka dotted paper with aqua print in the background ... LOVE!

 

So, there you have it!  I strung my sweet, homespun garland across a bank of three windows I have in my kitchen and love to walk past it all day long and give it a little peek ... it just brings a smile to my face every time I see it!

Please be sure to visit all the other teamies' blog to check out their awesome Home Decor projects:

• Vicki Chrisman Team Leader
• Pam Hooten
• Heidi Blankenship
• Linda Duke
• Michele Kovack
• Julie Campbell
• Amy Teets
• Debbie Marcinkiewicz
• Fauve van Maanen
• Gini Cagle
• Jan Hennings
• Tammy Roberts
• Victoria Warren Mears
• Viola Mahr

Heartwarming Vintage Blog

Crafty Secrets Blog

Thank so much for allowing me to share my Home Decor project with you today!  I appreciate all of your amazing and sweet comments!

Happy Day!

Hugs!!

xoxoxoxo

The Shabby Tea Room #93!

 Hello sweet friends and welcome to The Shabby Tea Room #93!  Char is our fabby host this week and she has chosen the theme of 'A Kraft-y Christmas' and provided this beautiful photo for inspiration ...

... and Char asks us to create a card or project inspired by the above photo and to USE RED, KRAFT, NEWSPRINT, SILVER & A STAR!

 

I simply adore the theme of this challenge and had SO MUCH FUN creating my card!  I just kept piling it higher and higher with little bits and bobs of treasures and treats!  Our Tea Room sponsor this week is Bugaboo Stamps and I got to design using their Winter Circle Sentiment - Season's Greetings image!

 

All the patterned papers, dies, baker's twine and cardstock are from Stampin' Up!  I adore the sweet little clothes pin and jingle bells too!! Loads of my favorites in this little cutie pie!!

 

This card just makes me smile ... I hope the recipient will feel the same way!!

Please be sure to visit the other Shabby Girls' blogs to check out their inspiration this week:

Charlene Cundy - Expresstions of Me!
Cindy Holshouser - Sweet P Paperie

Fran Westmoreland - Purple Peanut's Crafty Blog

Melissa Bove - Creating From the Heart

Sheri Holt - My Sheri Cards

... and then I hope you'll have time to join in with all the fun of our 'A Kraft-y Christmas' challenge!!

Hugs!

xoxoxoxo