Paints and Glitter © art with encouragement

Spring has sprung!

Here's a little card I made to practice my embossing skillz. You have to know about me, that I only enjoy the part where I get to pretend to torch the paper with the heat gun. Everything else is pretty much torture for me. It may sound insane, but as much as I love the end-product of stamping, I'd much rather draw the images myself, as I have a totally different experience with paint, and don't even get me going on the whole fussy cutting... but enough of how my brain works, here's the card:

The scalloped border was from a MS punch.

I made the twirly stem myself! The birdie was from M's dollar bin, behind him is a stamped & embossed image as well.

The ribbon is from my stash- I've only had it for over 10 years. Crazy!

Captured Fairy Received!

Ok, so last month I joined some new friends in a challenge and swap to make a captured fairy over at Alilscrapofheaven. My partner was Laura, and yesterday I received my fairy in the mail!! I was so excited to receive it and to my surprise, Laura included a generous rak as well. I am humbled at the kindness shared by all the people I've met through this blogging and crafting community, and I send a huge THANK YOU to Laura for the sweet gesture. Here are the pics...and LAura, you are clever!! You found out I love Hello Kitty!!-Awesome :) Thanks for putting a smile on my face!!

I wish you could see the pretty embossing Laura did on this card! It also has pretty blue glitter.

Are you kidding?!! You speak my Love language, & I love you back!

Laura added pretty pinks, blues, purples, and my fav. thing: butterflies!!

She also put pretty flowers on the tag, and fun bling everywhere.

This is the glittery back with butterflies!

Another butterfly on a charm :)

I tried to get a close-up of the pretty fairy.

Award Thank You

I've had a busy week and have been so fortunate to find among my messages that I've received an award from the very kind Sonia from Archiving Angel! I want to say a huge thank you and to pass this along to any one of my followers who'd like to grab the award as well. I feel that picking out a certain few wouldn't to justice to what fellow crafters are doing out there, and I gain so much from every one of you that it's impossible to choose. ( I've done it before & felt terribly uncomfortable) To go on with the award requirements I am to mention 7 things about myself so here goes:
1. I've met some cool people through this blog business and I'm not ashamed to use their names as if I've actually met them in person!
2. I'm not actually ashamed of much anyways- this comes from not taking myself too seriously.
3. I love to paint, draw, and ...
4. I love the images of hands, they tell a lot about a person.
5. I love all kinds of food also!
6. I love languages, even if I don't understand them ( the written word is beautiful to me).
7. I believe God's purpose for us is genuinely beautiful, and this makes all things bearable, for He sustains me.
So if you've read this post, grab on to that lil' award and let us know a bit about yourself too, come on, there's no shame in it!

Paislee Birthday Card

I know this is not a new cartridge, but I find myself wanting to use the cuts from different carts for cards just to "try them out". The image of this zebra was one of the reasons I wanted this cart, and yet, I hadn't used it yet! Go figure! So I decided it was time to use it and here it found it's way onto a birthday card. I also used the balloons from another cart and welded them to the image. This made it easier to glue the "colored" balloons down to an already existing template. To add a pop of color, I used glossy accents on the balloons & the center of the wheels. I just happened to find a ribbon in my stash that worked for me, and the traffic light is a sticker. TFL!

I used the cuttlebug to dry-emboss the background paper.

The sentiment was a stamp.

A closer look of the now-dimensional balloons.

St. Patricks Day

These were just a little treat I made for my son to hand out in his class. I thought they were terribly simplistic but I got a lot of compliments for them. Oh well- I guess that counts for something! They were incredibly easy to make with the Cricut and my Gypsy. TFL!

I used TBBM, Create a Critter, and a Sissix die

Yum! Chocolate!

My lucky charm with his green hair!

Hello Kitty/ Get Well Card

Hello there, I made this 9 by 4 card for a challenge last week & totally missed the deadline-but that's ok. The intention behind the card is all that matters anyhow, and I'll try to post a link as to what it's for. I used Hello Kitty (LOVE IT!!) and a paper pack by Heidi Grace. I love her designs and this isn't a new one-but it's a lovely collection nonetheless. The ribbon was a find at a local 2nd hand store, and I designed the sentiment on my Gypsy using George for the flowers and welding it to the letters. The window is from Christmas Noel, and the birdie is a sticker. I could've done more with the card, but decided to keep it simple for shipping purposes. TFL!

I also added flock to her pillow!

The flower border is a Martha Stewart punch.

I used chalk ink and chalk for the shadows.

Captured Fairy in a Bottle

Yay! I am so happy to be able to reveal the pics of the sneak-peek. I previously posted a card for a special someone & a sneak peek of a project I had worked on and now that I know it arrived safe & well I can say the recipient was Laura from Alilscrapofheaven. We participated in a captured fairy swap and it was truly so much fun to do, I was genuinely excited to send something in the mail & make a new scrapping friend in the process. (Did I mention it was my first swap?)
It was an altered & multi-medium piece, and I think that what I enjoyed most about it was that I got to use several of my favorite things. I love to draw & paint, so I started by designing the fairy & painting her in watercolors. I also made her wings myself so that they would match perfectly. Then I used mod-podge, acrylics, bling, beads, pearls, lace, and paper to make the rest of the embellishments for the bottle. I also used the cricut to cut the big flowers on it.
The tag was my own design, and on it I added small flowers I hand-painted, as well as a felt bird and a butterfly on back. I hope you like the pics!