Kusudama

When I was in Kingston in April, I visited my cousin one afternoon. She took me to a tea store there called Cha Cha tea, that was run by the nicest Japanese lady. I love origami, so I was looking around at her decorations as well as the tea. I think I surprised and impressed the woman when I asked her about the kusudama in her store! Her face lit up and we started talking not only about the kusudama, but also the 1,000 cranes decoration she had hanging in the front window, and of course, we talked about tea. Her kusudama was different from the one I made here, but I have yet to see a kusudama that I don't want to try!

This one in particular is made from 60 pieces of 2" x 2" paper. Each piece makes one petal, then you attach them in groups of 5, and then you make a half of the kusudama by attaching 6 flowers together, and then you glue the halves together. Sounds simple, right? It is! The only thing is that making a kusudama requires patience. It takes a while to complete one. My friend Sandra made one all at once, and it took her four hours! That is a long haul, so I break mine up, allowing the glue to dry overnight, and then tackling a little bit the next day. Not to mention, folding 60 pieces of paper makes your fingertips raw, so having a bone folder handy is essential.

The tutorial I followed is found on a site called "Folding Trees", and it has excellent step by step instructions and pictures. I loved making this one, and am trying to find instructions for a different fold, but have not found one yet. You'll know when I do!

Have a great day!

Yikes! What happened?

Well, I tried to schedule this post to appear while I was away, but it seems it didn't work...and here I thought I was so smart! LOL That'll teach me! Anyway, we're back from Disney, and phew! What a week! And it was toasty!! My poor girls wilted like flowers in the heat, and I turned into a sprinkler! I swear I was the only one sweating, everyone else looked like it was just a lovely spring day! Of course, we come home and it's 13 Celsius (brrr) and the shuttle driver tells us it was 27 yesterday! Wha?? Is that right? Maybe he was in Orlando, too! LOL
So here is the post that was supposed to magically appear while I was away. It was a tribute to the beautiful simplicity that is rub-ons! Doncha just love 'em?

They can make quick work of a project! This was a little mint tin I just emptied (they were good-now I need to go out and buy some more!). All I had to do was peel the label and add the rub-on! Now to figure out what to put into it!

I will slowly get back into the stampin groove this week and I'll be posting more. Maybe I won't try to schedule anything to magically appear until I get it figured out! LOL

Have a great Monday!

M-i-c-k-e-y ....

Well, we're on our way to Disney on Monday, but I did manage to set up one post to show up magically while I'm away. I don't have time to do another one, and I won't have access to my computer while I'm there (gulp!), so even though I have a lot of stuff to show you it will have to wait until my return...I hope everyone has a great week!

Twinkle, Twinkle...

This is the gift I gave my sister for her shower on Friday night. I have had this idea brewing in my mind for quite some time, and had actually started with a yellow star and pastel coloured letters, but then my sister had her baby girl, and I saw how pink her room was, and I knew my yellow star wouldn't look as nice as one done with the Raspberry tart dsp. My friend Kim let me borrow her star die and I have the die for the letters (I can't remember the name, but it is the long thin die with the alphabet). I had bought that die thinking I could use it to personalize cards since the letters were so small, and they worked perfectly for this project too!

It was a great night and I was able to catch up with some of my sister's friends whom I haven't seen in quite a while. I was a good girl and didn't try to hog my niece during the entire shower, although I really wanted to! LOL She's just so sweet, I can't help it!

Have a great day!

Purses, purses, I love purses!

Don't you? It's funny, I see a lot of women carrying purses that I love, but when I go shopping for one, I can never find one that I like as much...maybe I should just walk up to those women and offer to buy their purse on the spot. That would definitely save me some time! LOL

Here is a purse you don't have to shop for! And you can make it just the way you want it! I loved this project from the moment I saw it, and knew I had to try one. It turned out so well, that I even made extras for those times that I needed a quick hand-made gift. I love the idea of a cute purse holding cards! There are tons of variations, of course, and I think this is only the second purse style I've tried, but I have to say, I'm hooked! I love these cute little purses!(did I say that already? LOL) They are perfect for girlfriends, moms (ie on Mother's Day, although I didn't give my extras away on Mother's Day...I'm such a hoarder! LOL), sisters, etc. The Fifth Avenue Floral is perfect to decorate the outside, but there are a few other sets that come to mind (ie Baroque motifs) that would work just as well. And you could create this in the recipient's favourite colour...the possibilities are endless! I also thought that as the button for the purse, using the largest flower from the Pretties kit would be an elegant touch. You could colour it to match and use either a pearl or a jewelled brad...see? Endless!

If you decide to try one, send me a link in the comments section so I can see your version!

For all of the Canadians, Happy Victoria Day weekend! Hope you get out to enjoy the sunshine, friends and family!

Happy stamping!

Time flies!!

Hello again!

Wow, I can't believe I haven't posted yet this month! Yikes!

This weekend I will be travelling to Kingston with some stampin' friends to go visit some other stampin' friends to...you got it! To do some stampin'! I can hardly wait! I need some inspiration to get me going and what could be better than a room full of fellow stampers? Think of all the creativity that will be floating in the air! LOL I can hardly wait! I am sure I'll come back with at least a few projects to show you, so stay tuned!

Have a great weekend!

D

Mini Photo Album

Hello! Today I am sharing a mini photo album I made. I just love pink and brown together, don't you? So for my first mini album, I decided to use one of my favourite colour combos.
For this album, I dug into the archives a bit, pulling out Purely Pomegranate to go with the browns and Pretty in Pink. The dsp on the edge is also an oldie but goody. In fact, I used this to determine my colours-makes it easy on the brain that way! Now normally, I don't like to cut too much (unlike some of my stampin' friends...hey Jacqui!) because it is not one of my strengths, and so cutting all of these flowers took me a lot of time-then I had to sponge the little gaffers! I survived the torture and managed to put the album together though!
I think this is the only time I've used the Build-a-brad (bottom right), but I really do like them-so fun! This album was made so that it could hold 4x6" pictures, because sometimes, you just don't want to cut a favourite picture! In spite of the fact that this album has 5 pages, plus front and back cover, putting the jumbo eyelets in to hold it all together was a cinch-don't you just love the crop-a-dile for that! It saved my fingers-especially after all that cutting!

Well, now I guess I should find some pictures worthy of being inside my pretty little album...



Have a great day!

Donna

Happy Birthday Kim!

Yesterday, I attended the Stampin' Up Regional Conference in London. It was a great day! I got stamp with my girls: Sandra, Kim and Jacqui. We were having a blast whether we were stamping or listening to one of the many talented presenters. I have my head full of great ideas now, I just have to find the time to put them to use!

Saturday was also our friend Kim's birthday! We tried to get them to announce it on the mike so that the whole room would then sing Happy Birthday to her, but they wouldn't do it. What they did do, however, was come over and sing Happy Birthday to Kim personally during our lunch break. Wasn't that sweet? And what better way to spend your day than stamping! I hope Kim had a terrific birthday-she certainly deserves it!

Here are pictures of Kim doing some serious stamping, and being serenaded by the SU ladies. See how she's smiling? If I'd have sung Happy Birthday to her, the picture would have been a little different-she'd have her fingers in her ears and be hiding under the table! LOL

Birthday Cards and the 70's...

Hello again! Today's card is quick and simple, and it is "translatable" into either a male or female birthday card! I have a hard time coming up with cards for men and boys, probably because I tend to by stamp sets with flowers and flourishes, and other girly delights. For some reason, guys don't really appreciate flowers and princesses, accented with birds, butterflies and glitter...

This card uses the Wow Flowers stamp set, but that one flower looks more like a cool retro 70's thing...it actually reminds me of these tin stars or flower thingys that my mom had hung in our basement when I was little. My grandma had them too, now that I think of it. They kind of looked like they were made from pop cans, but they were store bought decor...I wonder if one of them bought some for the other...at any rate, even as a five-year-old, I recognized these as some strange kind of decor pieces, but of course I'm sure one day my girls will be asking me what I was thinking when I used (fill in the blank here) to decorate our house. At which point I will defer to my hubby since he buys most of the accents for our house, and I'll tell my girls lovingly that it is their dad, not me, with the wacky taste. I was just quietly stamping in the basement, not decorating with wacky pieces, I'll say...

Any way, my point here, is the one stamp doesn't really look like a flower which is why I think it works for a man's card. Ok, so I threw a gem in the centre of the card, but you could certainly remove it or not use it if you think it would offend the male receiving the card. You don't want to offend anyone on their birthday, of course. But you can see how using more masculine colours could "man up" this card, and make it acceptable for the man in your life.

These cards measure 4" x 4", which is a perfect size to fit all of the circles with just a hint of room to spare around the edges. I like using different sizes of cards, just to change things up a bit, and to challenge myself. Using this basic template, imagine all the different images you could use around the sentiment. It wouldn't even have to be something that fit perfectly inside the 1 1/4" circle punch...the possibilities are endless!

Ok, I think I've said enough for now. I will let you go (to stamp!) here, but I'll be back soon with more creations.


Have a great day!


Donna

Butterfly Bookmark

Since my sister is in the hospital and starting to feel better, she has been doing a lot of reading. When I visited her one day, I noticed she didn't have a bookmark, so I decided to change that! I like making bookmarks because they give you just a small amount of space to work with, which is perfect when you have that creative block. And I need a creative jumpstart these days! So this was a perfect excuse to get me stamping without feeling overwhelmed.

I used a sentiment from the old Sale-a-bration set called "Happy Harmony". I don't often like the sayings they make stamps of, but I really do like this one. It's perfect for butterflies, or if you were scrapbooking pictures of your children as babies, or a grandparent-with-grandchild photo, or a favourite pet as a youngin'....the possibilities are endless with this sentiment!



I attached butterflies to it instead of flowers since there were flowers on the dsp I used. I thought stamping the butterflies (from the Dreams du Jour set) on window sheets (in Staz-On) would be fun. I cut them out, attached them with mini-glue dots (so quick and neat!) and folded up the wings a bit, as you can see in the close-up, for a neat, 3-D effect.



On the back of this bookmark I attached a mini calendar for 2009. It seems that the life of "luxury" my sister's been living in the hospital has blended all into one luxurious stay, and she isn't sure of which day it is-although she has a general idea of the day of the week, she's not sure of the date. So I thought this would be a welcomed idea.



Now that this bookmark is finished, and I look at these pictures, I see a beautiful card in here somewhere. See how simple it was to kickstart that little bit of creativity? Sometimes thinking outside the box for a bit makes going back to the box a lot easier.



So my challenge for you, to help you get started with your creativity, is to create a bookmark, and then the card it inspires! Don't think about a card as you create your bookmark, just focus on making a bookmark. Only think about a card after you've finished your bookmark. If you would like to post a link to your picture of your creations in the comments section, I would love to check out what you've done!



Happy creating!

Donna