Distress with Elegance

A few posts back, you saw how Renee altered the ‘Clip It Up’ with some Tattered Angels glimmer mist.  ‘Spraying mist’ seems to be very popular these days and it is by far one of my favorite things to do.  You can add mist to the background of something, use a mask to create a design, or just change the color of chipboard or a flower. 

I’ve used glimmer mist on a lot of layouts but today I wanted to try it on a card.  I also decided to blow the dust off my heat gun and try some heat embossing which seems to be swinging its way back around as well.  So glad I kept it!  The first thing I did was gathered my paper and decide which stamps I was going to use.  I just received a new release set from Justrite Stamps and  have been wanting to try it out.  The papers are a gold and bronze tone so I chose gold embossing powder. 

1)  Cut your 5" x 7" base out of Kraft cardstock.  Spray with glimmer mist and let dry.

2)      Stamp your image/sentiment with an embossing ink and add embossing powder.
3)      Remove extra powder and use heat gun to set the image.
4)      Cut and dry emboss a Spellbinders Nestabilities® Die Templates and adhere sentiment using pop dots.

5)      Create the background of your card by sewing color cardstock down first.  Add several layers of coordinating cardstock and top it with a Hambly ‘Old Lace’ Screen Print.
6)      Embellish with trim and pearls and finish it off by placing your sentiment slightly off to the side.

Supplies: 
Die Template - Spellbinders™ (Labels Three)
Stamps – Justrite (Decorative Frame Set, Loving Thoughts Set)
Glimmer Mist (Tattered Angles – Coffee)
Embossing Power – (Sparkle n’ Sprinkle)
Cardstock – Papertrey Ink
Pattern Paper – Hambly Studios
Screen Print – Hambly Studios
Trim – Prima Marketing
Pearls – Reflections

Julie Overby

February Winner

Congratulations to Jean Franks Beck from Carry, North Carolina.  She is the winner of our February Drawing, click here for details. Jean's prize is a Clip it Up Wall Mount and a package of Tabs and Labels.

Congrats Jean!!!

Keep checking our blog for details for our next contest.

Quote of the Week

“Ideas can be life-changing. Sometimes all you need to open the door is just one more good idea.”

― Jim Rohn

Spring Is Here!

Well, almost... right???

Hello, fellow organized crafty ladies, it's Nicole Rixon here! I am so pleased to be posting here on the Simply Renee blog. So many talented ladies so little time!

I live in the San Francisco Bay area and we have been so lucky to be seeing sun.  How about you?

Well...Hello weather, I'm ready for Spring!

So here is my very first Spring project  this year.

Here is another angle... with the bright sun!

Pretty cute project right?... Well, it also left a pretty large mess!Let me tell you it's no coincidence that I am on the Clip it Up design team. I love my clip it up! Here is why...

Messy room from my little easter house project.

I decided to time my clean up to show you how fast you can have a clean craft room using Clip it Up. So, here it goes...

Any guesses how long it took me???

Ready to see how great my room looks for just 7 minutes of easy clean up?

Of course, there is still lots of crafting left to be done in this room today... But, boy does it feel good to start again with a clean slate.  And, that is so possible when it only takes you 7 minutes to pick it all up and start again.

Happy Crafting, Happy Organizing, and Happy Spring!

Hugs,

Nicole Rixon 

www.onesweetromance.com

Flower Power

With all the beautiful patterned papers on the market now, I really love making my own handmade flowers to include on layouts. There are probably 20+ tutorials in the blogosphere about how to make various types of paper flowers, but here's one I discovered on my own when playing around with some papers last week.

 

The paper I'm using (by Lily Bee Designs) has a hexagon pattern (that's six sides, if you're math-challenged like me). So I hand-cut the hexagons out of the pattern. However, if you have a die-cutting machine or punch that can cut a hexagon or pentagon (5 sides), you can get the same effect with any paper you have on hand.

I started by cutting out 18 hexagons (they're about 1 1/4" each) from the patterned paper.

Then I applied glue to only the bottom edge of each hexagon and glued it to a piece of scrap paper.

 

I glued them into a circle using about half of the petals (9 hexagons) to form the bottom layer of the flower. I used 6 for the second layer and three for the top layer.

 

When all of the petals were glued down, I cut the scrap paper from underneath the flower, leaving only a small circle that doesn't show from the top.

 

I used my fingers to pinch the edges of each petal so they would roll up slightly, adding some dimension to the flower. I also inked the edges a bit. Then I punched a small hole in the middle of the flower and topped with a large (28mm) brad. My brad was created with the Imaginisce i-Top tool in a coordinating patterned paper, but you could use any large brad or even a large button.
And finally it was ready to add to my layout.

 
There are so many ways you could play around with this concept using different shapes and colors. If you make one, please post a comment with a link so we can see your interpretation!

Supplies used:
Patterned paper: Lily Bee Designs
Cardstock: Bazzill Basics Paper
Die-cut frames: Lily Bee Designs
Die-cut letters: Quickutz
Letter stickers: Jenni Bowlin
Rub-on: Lily Bee Designs
Bling: Prima Marketing
Brad: i-Top Brad Maker by Imaginisce
Ink: Tim Holtz for Ranger Industries

Robyn Schaub
http://dreaminginscraps.blogspot.com

Quote of the Week

“It was when I found out I could make mistakes that I knew I was on to something.”

― Ornette Coleman

Gail’s Craft Room

Hi! I’m Gail, one of the members of the Organization Design Team and I would love to show you around my scrap room! I’m actually going to be moving rooms soon – yippee! More organizing! But for now, this is where I create, starting with what you see when you walk into the room:

Hidden behind the door are my punches stored in an over the door shoe holder.

On the opposite wall to my desk is my Expedit shelf from IKEA. I'm always changing what's stored where on these shelves - It will probably change again when I move rooms. At the moment I've tried to put smaller items and more precious items (such as albums all along the top row, wood mounted stamps, photo boxes) up higher and away from little hands. Along the bottom row are magazines (in files) and large boxes of memorabilia, spare adhesives etc.

I've switched from boxes to baskets for my main storage on my shelves now. It's so easy to just pull out the basket and grab whatever I need out.  In these baskets I have things such as ribbon, chipboard letters and shapes, fabric, stamp sets, card making essentials and items waiting to be altered. Here’s a look at in few of the baskets.

 

On one end of my shelves I have hooks where all my alphabet stickers hang sorted by color onto rings. Hmm. I think I need another Clip It Up for these!

Along the next wall is a large drawer set. The long surface is the perfect place for my Cuttlebug (although I do move it onto my desk when I need to use it) and a letter holder which is perfect for storing my Cuttlebug plates, dies and embossing folders. Oh – and the all important TV!

It’s also where I keep my Clip It Up where I've hung all my rub-ons, word fetti, border stickers, epoxy stickers etc. I love being able to flip through them when I create a layout to see if any might "fit" my project. I'm finding it's the only way to use them up!

Most of the drawers hold small embellishments and die cuts etc which are sorted into colors. Again, I like to look through these whenever I'm creating to see if I can use any of these goodies that I obsessively collect! I've just used cheap plastic containers in the drawers. I also have one drawer dedicated to my glitter, mists, embossing powders and paints. Here’s a peek in one of the color drawers:

Next up is my desk area where I like to keep all my essentials nice and handy. On it is my desktop carousel which holds all my tools and adhesives. I also have an easel to hold my magazines and things that I might be working from.

All my cardstock, patterned paper and planned pages live on my desk in vertical paper holders.

To the right of me as I sit at my desk (and very accessible to me as I create) is a single drawer file cabinet. On top I keep my paper trimmers and in the drawer are all my scraps, sorted by color of course.

Lastly, on the wall above the file cabinet I’ve used CD holders to store all my ink pads. I've labeled the side of each ink pad so I can see the colors at a glance.

So there you have it! Thanks so much for looking and I hope I have given you some ideas to implement in your own scrap room. If you have any questions, be sure to leave a comment as I’m only too happy to help! You can check out more details, as well as progress on my new scrap room as it happens on my blog (www.gaillindner.typepad.com).

And one more thing – my room is definitely NOT this tidy all the time! Hehe!

Gail Lindner