soared to be happy

I spent a few hours yesterday morning make a little pick-me-up gift for a friend. I knew I wanted to do something with a bird and the flying theme; somehow the blue and green used in this tutorial seemed to be the perfect thing for it!

I have 3 of the Tim Holtz Distress stains and so far love them. I used the Broken China over white card stock.


Added a little of the Peeled Paint then gave it a spritz with the Tattered Angels Snow Queen.

I had already in my collection a birdcage cut from grunge board and a chipboard bird that I covered with a sheet of vintage paper. I painted the cage gold and used some Snow Queen on that; the bird I darkened with some Vintage Paper distress ink. (finding it amusing that the vintage paper was being colored with vintage paper ink)


For the words I stamped onto some brown card-stock like paper and the 'happy' was chipboard letters I covered in a pink paper, then inked over with the Spun Sugar stain. I ended up mounting the entire thing on a piece of sturdy chipboard.


Not quite like the original, but the original served as a FANTASTIC jumping off point for me. I love a project when I can make it my own and I see another one of these in my future as a wedding gift.

Original and very inspiring tutorial can be found here: My Kind of Creating

birdies!

adorable birdie bunting up in my shop now!

Home

You know, this summer seems to have breezed by in a haze of laziness on my part. I haven't update my Etsy shop since July and I haven't embarked on any big projects as of late. I went on vacation and came back refreshed, but came back to heat that I just found so awful I have done nothing but watch television and play video games. (And read! But that's a given)

I finally made it around to a Totally Tim Studio Day at Scrapbook 911. Studio Day is when you work on whatever you'd like and there's demos and whatnot of Tim Holtz products. It was a good time and I did get a project done!

Although, now that I think about it, it was more a 7 Gypsies inspired project...oh well!

I put together this box from over at One Lucky Day mostly because I wanted to see if I could measure and cut, then build, a box from scratch. I'm not the best with measurements and straight lines as it is, but found this to be a breeze to put together. It was a bit on the time consuming side, but very satisfying once the box started coming together.

In progress:


Best part: now that I know I can build a box from scratch, I know I can build them in different sizes to suit my needs.

Box without it's roof: It's lined with some paper I picked up at 911 (which I now can't remember what it's called) and to that I just edged it out with some distressed ink. The doilies I sprayed with Adirondack Colorwash Spray. ( I love that stuff) The rest is just millinery flowers and bird, a branch from a nearby bush, and some Prima fabric leaves.



All carefully glued together to become this:


No clue where I'll hang it, but I do love it. It further shows my love (okay, obsession) with bird houses and little mini-buntings!

And now for mine

Since I know that my partners have received their boxes, here's a peek for everyone else!

Belle of the Ball

I don't really do a shop update entry often (because I'm not very good at selling myself)...but...this lovely lady and 4 of her friends are now listed for sale over in my Etsy shop!

3 random things

One:


Two: battling a really bad sore throat/sinus infection for the 9th day.

Three: thinking about getting my own website and moving away from Blogger.

Birds of a feather

This was actually yesterday's project. These were today's project. Simple little foam circles covered in French seam binding and some leftover ribbons. I glued on a little bird and some flowers and viola! Instant cuteness.


In case you were looking for small wreaths, I got mine at FactoryDirectCraft.com.

Edited on 09/18: I redid the photos. Much cuter now!

Wrap up

Remember this recent post about a birthday gift for a friend?

I finally got around to wrapping and mailing off her gift. I am so in love with these two photos, especially the second one. Something about the darkness and the mood of it.

Here's the card: I just embellished a retro snowflake card from Paper-Source (they have such great sales!) with some ribbon and a few felt flowers.



It's not wrapping paper, it's Girl Scout scrapbook paper. The pink and green circles is the bulk of the paper and since it wasn't big enough to cover the entire frame, I had to use a section of the dotted circles on the back. (Check out the rest of the Girl Scout line. There's some super cute stuff there! In fact, I see some stuff I might need to buy!) I used the same ribbon and flowers on the package and the little birdie card was an extra from a recent Etsy purchase.



Up today: a birthday present for a favorite fellow blogger!

before and after

Before: little house found at a thrift store and paid 45 cents for, spray painted a pretty shade of blue:

After: following an exhaustive hunt for decent looking birds, a new bird house.
Before: an old cabinet door, spray painted pink.



After: completed with a piece of foam core board cut and covered with fabric to make a new bulletin board.

2 gifts down...

A few more to go.

I made these this morning. They actually went rather quickly and came out very cute, in a whimsical kind of way. I really like the birds, which I got from this Etsy seller. (Her felt is fantastic!)

Small version:



Larger version.


I'm very slowly getting into the Christmas gift groove. Now if I could just get around to making Christmas cards...

oh! oh! oh! i made one!

There will be better pictures tomorrow, but I was too excited about this to not post it now!




From this tutorial.