Hey there

I cannot believe that I have let a week pass with out a post. I had finals this week and the start of a new class. I have gotten a little creative work done also. I made a mini scrapbook for each of my daughters' teachers for Valentine's day. Let me know what you think if these pages. I also created a new template for packaging tea bags as gifts. I will post the picture as soon as I can get the camera hooked up.

I also started a new blanket project for Anastasia. Hobby Lobby had the 3 ball super saver Lilly brand cotton yarn on clearance, it is normally $21 for 3 large balls, and they had it for only $7. I picked the pink kit. It had two shades of solid pink and one ball of varigated. I love the colors and I might have to go back and pick up the blue kits for Shae. Each kit has over 2100 yards in it and this is plenty of yarn for a nice size throw. I also continued work on a baby ripple blanket that I am doing in two colors and one a 4 row repeat.

Layout of the day

This picture was taken on New Years Day. It was a sunny cool day and I wanted to take a few pictures out side.

How To:

I created the flower with a couple of patterned papers and clip art in a flower shape. I overlaid the paper with the help of a vector mask. Then I used the mosaic filter to change the look of the paper varing the size of the tiles and the grout. I then added a button embelishment on top for the center.

The Scallop paper border was created with a vector mask also. The shape was created in photoshop and then the patterned paper was laid over it with the vector mask switched on to shwo the scallop shape.

The frame was created with a layer mask painted white, and the photo was placed on top of it.

All of the elements and papers are freebies that I have downloaded from various sources.

I am working on a few designs of my own and I have a kit in progress and I am looking for people who would like to design a couple of page layouts with the papers and elements that I have made.

A couple of new pages

I am having so much fun with Digital Scrapbooking. Here is a page that I created using only freebees from Designer Digitals. I am trying to see how many different pages that I can make out of these freebees. There are 48 different sets of downloads and I think that just using these I will be challenging myself. I will be uploading them here as I finish them. I hope to be able to make at least double this number, by mixing these kits. This is one of my favorite sayings. I really want to paint it as a border in my bedroom. I think that this is something that you should always do to your children every night. The years when they want a goodnight kiss is so fleeting that I feel like I need to take advantage of it while I can.

My next page uses Anastasia's favorite quote. " I love you to the moon and back", when ever she tells me that she loves me she will say that to me, and I love if when she says it.

The Camera's Back

I found my camera cord so I can finally post my pictures. So be warned this will be a picture heavy post.

Here are a few of the cards that I have made over the past few weeks. The first two were welcome back cards for the girls teachers. I made them little bags of nugget candy with welcome back on the lables and a card each. I used stamps from a kit that I bought at Michael's it was a huge collection that came with ribbon, ink pads, chalk, wood mounted stamps, markers, paper, stickers, and more. The paper for these cards is All Dressed Up and I used a 1 1/2 in scallop circle punch, with a 1 inch circle layered on top.

The letter stamps that I used for this card are from all night media, the brads are making memories, the stickers are from hobby lobby, and paper is just a blue scrapbook cardstock, I inked the bottom section with distressing ink from the making memories distressing kit.

It is getting late so I will post a few more pictures tomorrow.

Digital Scrapbook Pages

I decied to try to my hand at a new medium. Please let me know what you think. I just wanted to post a couple of FOs for today. I have been working at the girls school everyday since they went back on Jan 2. I am so glad I really needed a good paycheck this month.


I will try to give a list of the kits that I used because I used a couple of Digital scrapbook freebies from a couple of different sites.

A Cool How-To

I really love this how to at this site and all the other ones that are on there also. This picture from there also. I just thought I would give a little inspiration for today.

Paper Crafting Blogs

This picture makes me feel cold just looking at it. I took this last evening in my back yard.

Here are a few paper crafting blogs that I found today, so I thought that I would share a few links that I thought some of you might like to check out. Let them know that I sent you.

I hope that you all have a good evening.

{Letters from Lizzie}
The Scrappy Chick
Stampin' Spots & Other Crafty Thoughts
Stampin and More with Crystal
pine is here.
No Time To Stamp?

NGT
Musings of an Addict
little treasures
Listen to this...
Just Give Me Stamps...

Inky Paws
imagine. dream. create.

erika designs
card creme

Inspirations of the Day

I love this idea. printable wrapping paper. I found this on Blueprint magazine's website. I thought I would share this very unique find. I really have gotten inspired lately to do more paper crafting. Here is a very cool blog by Tim Holtz, he is a mixed media, stamping artist. I used my weekly Michael's coupon for the Making Memories Distressing Kit. I love how it works but I think I might have to practice a little bit more before I show off anything. The bone folder that came with the kit is great I like hw crisp my folds look. I am working on a new scrapbook layout for Anastasia's scrapbook. I hope to have it done tonight. I

had to stop to watch my favorite show, NCIS. It was supposed to be a brand new one but, it is a rerun. I guess that I will get more done on my scrapbook than I thought.

I really am loving being out of school this week. I really needed the break, an essay each week has been a little hard in the sleep department. Going to bed at 12am and getting up at 6am to take the girls to school and hope that I would get to work that day (I am a substitute teacher at their school) then not getting home until 3 in the afternoon. When I got home I would have to cook dinner, do laundry and get the kids in bed by 7:30, and then start my school day over again.

I also got to watch Carol Duvall's Holiday Workshop today, and I loved the idea of the folded paper tree. Here is the link for this I hope that you find it as interesting and easy as I have.

School Is Over For The Year

I finished my classes on Saturday and the girls on Friday. I have been going crazy this weekend making a few things and letting the girls make collages. I bought myself a new cabinet to store my craft stuff that we use in the house so I don't have to carry things back and forth from the studio. It is a Making Memories Embelishment Cabinet, Michael's had then on sale for 30% off and I just had to have it. It has been great. I have things for paper crafting, stamping, scrapbooking, and beading all in one cabinet. It has made keeping things organized and easy to get to. Look at all the storage space. I love the ribbon rods, I thought I had more ribbon than this, I will have to look through a few more drawers. I have the jars filled with floss, buttons, beads, paper scaps, paint daubers.

Here is one of the scrapbook pages that I made last night. This one is Shae's first trip to Stone Mt. in 2003.

Supply list:

Black Dye Ink Pad

Blue Eyelet Snaps

Forest Green Cardstock

Round Journaling Stamp

Flourish Stamp

Tree Stamp

1 inch round paper punch

Green Crinkle print paper

All Night Media Typerwiter Key Letter Stamp Set

Dark Blue Ink Dauber (used to distress the edges of paper)

Anastasia's first year in school.

Supply List:

1 inch round paper punch

Paper Flowers K & Company

Large Brads K & Company

Fabric Stickers

Making Memories Heart Brads

K & Company Chipboard accents

Plum Ink Dauber

Scallop Scissors

Round Journaling Stamp

Striped Pattern paper

Pink Cardstock

Amy Butler Mat Stack

I also got an early christmas present. I bought my self a new camera. It is a Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-S700. Circuit City had it on sale for $20 lower than wal-mart and they gave a 1G memory stich with purchase. Yipee, my last one fell in the atrium waterfountain at the Georgia Aquarium, this summer.

Here is the list of books and magazines that I have used to get some ideas for my paper crafting.

Vintage Paper Crafts

The Decorated Page

The Encyclopedia of Scrapbooking Tool & Techniques

This weeks update

We have been really busy this week. We made two countdown calendars, one for each of the girls.

Anastasia's is a bottle cap tree with round tags for the covers and I left the strings because I thought it would help her pull the tags off each day.

Shae's is made out of origami water cups that were glued to a piece of poster board.

Each of these took less than one and a half hours and they offer a fun change of pace.

I really can't believe that these pictures are so dark, but I don't get home until late and it is still dark when I leave so I have to deal with afternoon light and the dreaded flash.

What I have been up to this week.

School has been taking up so much of my time this week. I thought I would see what you think about some of my drawings.

I had to draw this chair and chest of drawers for my History of Furniture class.

What I have been up to lately (picture heavy post)

I have been very busy over the last week. So here is a few pages from my illustrated journal. I picked up a journal last week at Barnes and Noble and Have been going crazy ever since. I love the graph paper pages they seem so artsy.

I also got the itch to start beading again, as I did it in my pre-blogging days. Here is a few of the earrings that will be in the shop in the coming days. You can clink on any of the pictures for a larger view.

Fabric Notebook

Fabric Notebook
Originally uploaded by many layers of kate.

I have seen this idea in a few places, (a japanese Craft book and in the current issue of Craft) so I decided that I had to try my hand at it. I used a scrap of recycled prequilted fabric and I emblished it with blanket stitches. I also finished the edges with blanket stitching. It was a very relaxing project and I think that it will be very useful to have it in my bag. I consider this a WIP because I have not finished all of the embelishment that I plan for this book I would love to be considered for the Reform School Prize also.

Crafting Update

I have an updated picture of my recycled address file.

More Recycled crafting. This is my cereal box gift box. I am in a swap and I like to package each element in its own box and this is the way that I am able to do it. I use the Candy Box Template from Mirk wood designs for these boxes. I also use these boxes for my Crafty Collage Box that I sell. Each of these collage boxes boxes have over 12 different types of items in them and I will post a picture as soon as I get a day were I can get good light. It has been gray and cloudy for the past week here. I hope I don't go blind when the sun comes out again. :-)

Whip-up Inspired

Here is the completed box that I ended up covering with some scrapbook paper leftover from another project.
I have been looking at this for the past few days and I just had to make one of my own. I used what I had on hand and so the box will be covered tomorrow with fabric and I did find enough magazine order cards to make the address cards. I used index cards for the dividers and left over scrapbook letters for the alphabet. The box is half of a band-aid box and I plan on using the other half for another one. It was very time consuming I worked most of the day cutting the cards and about 30 min cutting and labeling the dividers. I started looking for a box or a container for the cards and I found the box almost empty in the cabinet.

Here are the in process pictures.

I used a standard business card as the size for each address card as my template. The size is 2" x 3.5"
Here are the address cards. This was the fun part, I enjoyed deciding where the placement of the color and the design of the cards.
The measurments on the dividers is 4"x 3" to the top if the tab.

I hope that this helps anyone out there who is like me and would like to recycle their own version. I know that in no way is this as good as the original it will work for my use on my desk. I hope to be able to keep track of my swap addresses and help me when I want to send a thank you to someone who has helped me out in the blog world.