Everything But The Kitchen Sink Challege

Some of you have been so close at guessing exactly what we have been so excited about for the last week! So here is the deal lately I've been thinking of ways I can continue to challenge myself in my craft, and I thought it would be fun to involve some other bloggers. I'm proud to introduce:

Each month one of six bloggers will be revealing that month's challenge. The challenge will always be to use a specific item from around your house! There are tons of things we can use around our houses, but I think many times we forget to look!

So without further ado, here's this months challenge:

Use something from the mail as part of your card or scrapbook page!

Here's my card. Almost all of my card is made from the pages of a CB2 catalog I got in the mail. I love how it turned out!

And to help you get started here are the other Everything but the Kitchen Sink Hosts to help get your creative juices started. Check out there individual blogs to see exactly what they used out of the mail!

Ann Cox at Creative Antics

 

Winter Sims at Winter Wonderland

Kelley Eubanks at My Front Porch

Kelly Marie Alvarez at Lawn Fawn Cards

Lynette Kauffman at Netter's Notables

Now it's your turn! Have fun with it, think outside the box, and well just for fun we're throwing in $25 to Papertrey Ink for the winner.

Here's the details:

Create a card or scrapbook page, upload a photo of your card to your blog or online gallery & then come back here to post the link to your photo in the Mister Linky below (please link directly to your card). 

You have 10 days to complete your card (October 9 at Midnight Central Time)! We'll pick the winner by October 14. Also, this will run through World Card Making Day, where several of the other Challenge Hosts will be making another card to see what else we can come up with! So feel free to use this challenge as part of your World Card Making Day activities!

We would love for you to help us spread the word about Everything But the Kitchen Sink! Please feel free to post the logo on your blog! We hope you all are as excited as we are! I can't wait to see what all of you super talented artist come up with!

Challenge ends Oct. 9 at midnight central time.

CPS 135

Some of my friends from work brought sweet little toys for Maddie, and unfortunately my card supply has some how totally demolished lately. So I decided to use the CPS sketch this week to make a thank you card. Here is the sketch:

And here's what I came up with:

Supplies

Stamps: Thanks (American Crafts)

Paper: Wee pad (Sassafrass Lass)

Ink: Pumpkin Pie (SU)

Flower: Prima

I'm so excited that so many of you are excited about Wednesday's big announcement! Hopefully you will all check back and have some fun with us! And hopefully $25 to...

Will be worth you checking back in! 

CARDS - Challenge

Wow, sorry for the lack of commenting! Maddie has officially occupied all of my free time this weekend! Chase say's I'm officially in love.

I did decide to make a quick card for the CARDS challenge this week.

Cardstock: White (PTI); Ripe Avocado (PTI)

Pattern Paper: Cherry Hill (October Afternoon)

Ink and Ribbon: Ripe Avocado (PTI)

Also, thanks for all the congratulations for our new dog! If you have any great tips, bring them all! I've never had an inside dog, so I'm totally lost. You should have seen Chase and I trying to brush her teeth!

I'm off to bed! Hope you all had a great weekend!

Super exciting post!

This was completely unplanned, but Chase and I would like to introduce you to the newest member of the Baker family... Maddie.

Isn't she cute? To be honest most of my friends are shocked that we got a dog. I've never had an inside dog, and I've only ever really liked my families dogs. But I can honestly say I already love Maddie. She's so cute, and she is tiny! Basically my boss saw her at a local adoption location website and knowing that I like Yorkies sent me her picture. I had to go see her. Chase is fantastic with dogs, so he was 100% on board! And now she's here. And currently sleeping in my craft room!

Also, it's been an exciting weekend because before we went to get Maddie my sweet husband cleaned the entire house, and hung my latest decorating project. Here's how it happened.

I got this large round mirror at a yard sale. It had a lot of scratches on it. When I bout it I thought maybe I could paint the leather.

 

I thought for a $1 I could try it out. When I got it home, I decided to just check what was under the leather.

I was so excited to see the pieces of wood underneath. I knew it wouldn't be perfect, but I thought it would look distressed and perfect for my style. So I went for it!

 

I really wanted it to be dark, so I didn't wipe any of the stain off, I just let it soak it all up! I also went back and made some sections even darker. It gave it a really nice effect. 

And here is hanging up on my mantle. Chase kindly took down the TV:

And here it is now!

Now I know some of you are probably wondering about why we would take down our tv. Well, to be honest we never watch it. When we are watching TV it is always upstairs! So the old TV is now my computer/monitor (more on that another day). Oh, and I have to show you this picture of Maddie. She fits in well with our living room.

And last thing... as you probably red yesterday, I have some exciting news to share with you on the 30th! Here's another clue!

 

Thanks for stopping by!

 

Halloween Wreath

If you watched my first video from CK Nashville (here) you saw the supplies for this wreath. My original idea was to make on similar to my Christmas wreath last year (here). However, I forgot one of the main reasons that paper worked so well... it was double sided. The glitter paper I was so excited about was not. Here's what I ended up with:

First I cut my glitter paper into 1x5 strips. Then, I just wrapped them around and pinned them into my foam wreath. I wasn't too worried about keeping the back pretty, since I knew it wouldn't show. For my letters, I just used some old SU! Chipboard letters and covered them with some American Crafts Halloween paper. I think the contrast worked out well.

Can you tell I'm excited about decorating for Halloween? I can't wait to hang this up on Halloween night when my trick or treaters come. Oh, wait, yea... that's right... I don't have any. I'll hang it up anyway! Maybe I'll go around and beg some kids to come to come.

In other news, on September 30 I have some very exciting news that I am going to be announcing with a few other fabulous bloggers, and I hope it is something you will be excited about as well! And if this helps any, there is a $25 gift card involved!

Here's a little hint:

Any guesses? I hope you're having a great Friday!

Decorating for Halloween.

***This post has a lot of picture. Don't say I didn't warn you!***

Okay, so I STILL don't have the big-super exciting project up yet. Chase and I tried to do it last night, but we were missing a tool. However, I do have another fun, simple thing for you.

***I got this idea from another blog, but for the life of me I can't find it anymore. It's not one of the "normal" blogs I read, but it was a great one.

Saturday I bought three cheap $3 pumpkins at target... cute right?

Well, if you know me well, you know that I love all things neutral. I really do (at least in home decor and my clothing choices). So... I decided to make some faux mercury glass pumpkins. First I started off with metallic silver spray paint.

 

Then while that was still wet, I used a brown metallic spray paint over it. I tried my best to make it blotchy and messy.  It actually looks better in person. And since my can was pretty full, I had to use a cloth to make the paint come out messy. But be warned your fingers will look like this afterwards:

But it was totally worth it because now I have these:

And I promise that last picture is not black and white. It totally looks like it though!

I also have a card to show you. I sent this to my little sister last week! She's so sweet.

Stamps: Brenda Watson (Inkadinkado); Go Green (My Cute Stamps); Sentiments (American Crafts)

Buttons: Hibiscus Burst (PTI)

Felt: Hand cut from my stash

Done. I promise!

Around The House Challenge

I decided I wanted to participate in the Moxie Fab challenge this time around, but it looks like I'm just barely making it!

To be honest, I don't have any "around the house" type stamps so I had to settle for my Cosmo Cricket Girl Friday Elements sheets. And, well I have already well loved this sheet! So I didn't have many options. However here's what I came up with:

Stamps: None can you believe it?

Patterned Paper: Cherry Hill (October Afternoon); Girl Friday Elements (Cosmo Cricket)

Cardstock:  Vintage Cream (PTI); Blue Bayou (Stampin' Up)

Letter: Basic Grey Chipboard Letters

I started off by sewing the little banners, but one thing I've learned about sewing, you sew one thing and then you need to sew everything else! Also, when sewing two sheets of cardstock... well it's just better if you can do one at a time - trust me!

Today, I also got my picture I had purchased from Traveling Mama!I've already matted it and hung it! When I purchased it, I really had no idea where it would go, but it works perfect in my guest bathroom.

My walls are much more yellow than the above.

Also, if you'd like to buy a print, 100% of the proceeds to go help redo a school in Morocco. Check out her shop here.

A video, some crafty six graders, and a decorating project.

I don't have a card to show you tonight, but I do have a ton of other stuff.

First up... here's the continuation of my first video about my shopping at CK Nashville.

Next up, yesterday I promised a decorating project, well I have a little to show you today. However, the thing I'm most excited about is going to have to wait until my sweet husband (hint, hint) hangs it for me! Yesterday I went to just a few yard sales around my neighborhood. In total I spent $1.25. I got this cute little tray for $0.25 (the one below it I painted as well, but I already had it but it was way too red for my taste).

1. Lightly sand.
2. Paint two coats.
3. Seal with clear coat.
4. Gather some cute things from around the house and...

There's a little too much on it at the moment, but I just could help adding I was so excited. I also think this will be so cute to use when we have house guest. I think it would be super cute to have bottle water, soap, etc.


Tonight I had six 6th grade girls here for their Sunday night small group. We thought it would be fun to have them decorate their own journal for their study. I'm all about encouraging creativity! And look how cute they are...

Polka Dot Paradise Color Challenge

Tomorrow we are celebrating my sister-in-law Courtney's birthday (yes we have the same name... it always make things interesting to have two Courtney Bakers). I decided I wanted to used the embellish challenge, and to be honest I don't even want to tell you how long this took! I decided to go a little old school and bring out my Koh-i-nor color pencils. Normally this isn't my style, but it was fun just to sit, watch football, and color away!

Here are the fabulous colors:

 

Click the image above to see the other participants.

And here's my card:

 

 

Stamps: In Bloom, Vintage Picnic Sentiments

Ink: Memento Black, Vintage Cream

Cardstock: Vintage Cream, Bravo Burgandy, Summer Sunrise

Ribbon: Martha Stewart Burgandy; May Arts Twine

Button: Basic Grey

In other news, I did a really exciting decorating project today. Make sure you check back tomorrow to see (can you tell I'm excited?)

Also, my blog friend Kelly Marie mentioned that my problem with my memento ink may be the stamps. And she was totally right. I guess I never looked at where American Craft stamps were made or what they are made of, but that was totally the issue. Anyone else think it's funny that a company called American Crafts has their stamps made in China? I used my memento ink tonight and it worked great. Super crisp and clean!

Indian Summer and Us

I'm not sure if I've ever talked about this on my blog, but I do some design work for my local scrapbook store, The Scrap Room. It's always fun to walk around with the store owner and anticipate what line she would like me to create something with. I usually get really excited when she starts walking towards the many lines of Basic Grey. However, this time I knew there was one line I did not want. So which line did she really want me to make something with? Yep, you got it... Indian Summer. So obviously I'm not the biggest fan, but after playing with I think I've totally changed my mind. It's actually really nice.

Here's what I came up with:

I honestly never would have picked the sheet of squash, had I not seen Kristina Werner's card, but I do love it now.

I did paint on the edges of the sheet of Dogwood. I also stitched around my inner square. I think the details really make this page fun. 

After making my scrapbook page, I decided to make a card with some of the leftover pieces:

There is not any stamping on this card, which is a big change for me. At the heart of it all, I love to stamp, but on this card I just used my own hand writing (or a version of it).

Well, Chase is out of town this weekend, so I feel a major crafting weekend about to begin! Anyone making anything fun?

Boo!

Thank you to everyone that left advice for my pursuit of the perfect black ink! I haven't decided which way to go, but you all left some great options!

I have another Halloween card tonight. And can I just say I love this stamp set? This my first ever Halloween set... so maybe that's it, but it's just great.

Stamps: Halloween Tags
Paper: Elegant Eggplant, Basic Gray, White, More Mustard
Ink: Elegant Eggplant, More Mustard, VersaMark
Embossing Powder: Clear, Ranger
Ribbon: Black Saddle Stitch, PTI