play, create, share

camera happy...

These sweet little Blythe dolls are so hard to resist! This new hobby has quickly gone into full blown addiction. Have I mentioned that a 5th doll is already on its way to me as I type this and I just put in a pre-order this week for a 6th doll. Yes, I am a Blythe addict and I'm not looking for a cure anytime soon ;)

Lately I've been spending tons of time on the Blythe groups at Flickr and a couple of my favorite Blythe websites. So much fun! It's made me really camera happy too. Earlier this week my girls (my daughters, not my dolls) wanted to go to the park and take some outdoor pictures of my Blythes, so we did our first "outdoor photo shoot". It was so much fun! Here are some of my recent pics. I've got the rest on my flickr account that I've been using for all my Blythe stuff.

time to pick a winner...

Thanks to all those that entered my little drawing. It's always so much to do these little giveaways. I used the random number picker to pick the winning comment...

 

And our winner is ...

awww everything looks lovely!! i'd love to enter. will follow your blog also. :)

Posted by: cutcopycreate | July 02, 2009 at 11:27 AM

 

Congratulations! Please send me your mailing info so that I can send your prize out to you.

Again, thanks to those of you that entered. I hope to do another one of these little giveaways again soon.

In the meantime, I'm off to do a little bit of painting. This time it won't be in an art journal. I've decided to do a little bit of customizing to one of my Blythe dolls. Never done this before, so wish me luck :-)

there's still time...

Just wanted to quickly post that there's still time to enter my little giveaway. I was going to pick a winner tonight but my girls wanted to do a family game night tonight on the wii. So I figured it would just be easier to pick a winner tomorrow instead. Good luck to those of you that have entered. If you want to toss your name into the hat for the drawing just post a comment on THIS post.

Have a great evening. Be back tomorrow :-)

let's do a giveaway...

Even though the recent weeks have left me little time for creating, it didn't stop me from doing a little shopping. ;) While in San Diego over the weekend I paid a visit to one of my favorite stores, Paper Tales, and came home with two bags of fun goodies. I also did quite a bit of shopping at Etsy and at one of my favorite online stores, Stamp Diva. I figure now that summer is here I should stock up on some fun supplies and goodies for all my summertime creating!

One of my most favorite shopping finds were these adorable glittered tags from Cavallini & Co. I just love their products and whenever I see them online or in a store I just have to grab them. When these new tags arrived in the mail I just couldn't get over how cute they are. I was also quite impressed with how many tags came in the tin and so I thought it would be fun to share them with some of my blog readers.

So I've put together a little goodie bag with six glittered "Sweet Treats" tags along with six of their beautiful Paris tags and a couple of their vintage bird postcards. I'll be sending all of these pretty goodies to one lucky winner. If you would like a chance to win just leave me a comment on this post and on Sunday night I'll pick a winner at random! Good Luck!

small and sweet...

One of the best things I've done so far this year was to start a mini art journal. Back in January, after reading Kristen Robinson's article in Somerset's Art Journaling I became so intrigued with the idea of a smaller art journal. I ended up running right out and picking up a small moleskin book. Most of my journals tend to be around the 8 x 10 size or larger. I loved the challenge of trying a new smaller size. I also liked the fact that smaller pages would take less time to complete which would be great on busy days that leave little time for creating. There's also the portability factor of being able to toss a small journal into my purse and being able to work on it whenever the mood strikes.

Slowly over the past several months I've been filling up pages in my new little journal. The smaller size definitely keeps things interesting. Working on a smaller scale means that sometimes words must be kept short and sweet and collage bits and other elements must be limited. I'll admit that most of the time I do find myself reaching for my bigger art journal but I really love having the option of various sizes to work in.

With these past few weeks being so busy, this smaller art journal has been a lifesaver for me. With free time being a luxury it was nice to have my mini art journal that I could just grab and work on for a few minutes here and there. The more I work in this little book the more I come to love this fun little size. I plan to work more and more in it as the summer months go on.

 

Be sure to come back tomorrow. I have a fun little giveaway planned :-)

hello summer!

I can't even begin to say how excited I am that summer is finally here! I don't think I've ever looked forward to summertime as much as I have this year. I'm so glad that school is finally out and that we've got lots of sunny lazy summer days ahead. I'm really looking forward to having extra free time these next couple of months. I've already started making plans for things I hope to do this summer. This past weekend we kicked off our summer with our favorite summertime tradition and that is going to San Diego County Fair. We had a blast (as always!). I can't think of a more perfect way to start off our summer!

One of my goals for this summer is to start being a more active blogger again. This poor blog of mine has been sorely neglected for several months. I really hope to change that this summer and go back to updating at least 2-3 times per week. Also, look for a little blog giveaway later on this week. I'm really excited about it so keep checking back :-)

I thought I would start things off again with participating in the Simple Woman's Daybook. I first read about this last week and really wanted to participate. Unfortunately as luck would have it I was sick with the flu for most of last week and just wasn't able to post anything. I love this idea of making a few notes about your day. I think it would be fun to do this every week and turn it into a mini album.

 

For Today...

Outside my window...several birds sweetly chirping

I am thinking...about our plans for the 4th of July

I am thankful for...my wonderful husband and my two sweet daughters

From the kitchen...warm chocolate chip muffins that just came out of the oven

I am wearing...jeans and a comfy t-shirt

I am creating...pages in my mini art journal

I am going...nowhere today :-)

I am reading...some favorite magazines, Somerset Life, Somerset Studio, & Romantic Homes

I am hoping...to make a scrapbook page today

I am hearing...my girls having fun playing Cooking Mama on the Wii in the living room

Around the house...a couple of bags from our weekend in San Diego that need to be unpacked and empty cloth grocery bags that need to go back in the car

One of my favorite things...being able to spend the day with Chris and the girls and not having anywhere to go or anything that has to be done.

A few plans for the rest of the week...some boring household chores, art journaling, scrapbooking, the flea market, going to the pool and a fun 4th of July.

A picture to share...sorry I'll have to do this one next time. My pictures from the weekend are still on my camera.

in a nutshell...

I can't believe it's been two weeks since I've blogged. I so didn't mean for that to happen. This time of year gets so crazy for us sometimes and it's easy for things (like blogging) to sort of slip through the cracks. I've already made myself a promise to try to be a better blogger this summer!

So what's been going on around here? Well, here it is in a nutshell, all done with total randomness...

- I've still been having fun and learning a lot in the Layer Love online class. Did quite a bit of painting last week (you can see some of what I did throughout this post). Keep in mind that these are just backgrounds and will (hopefully) eventually become part of a journal page, collage, painting, etc...

- I have attended at least ten school-related events. No, that's not really an exaggeration. I'm starting to look forward to the end of school more than my kids are. LOL!

- I purchased my 4th Blythe doll. She's a real cutie. I just love her. I guess it's safe to say I'm officially obsessed with Blythes now since I've bought four of them in six weeks! Yikes!

- In case I was ever in doubt, I now know for sure that I'm not claustrophobic since last week I had my very first MRI. Spending an hour and a half in a tunnel with a cage around your head is definitely a unique experience! So much for this year being the year with no health scares or issues. LOL

- I have finally found the world's greatest lip gloss. Perfect in so many ways and very addicting! I know this may seem trivial to most people, but it really is *that* good! I won't even tell you how many tubes of it I have in my purse right now. ;)

 

- I have downloaded approximately 10,000 apps for my iphone. OK, that number is probably a little bit on the high side, but seriously, I have downloaded a ton of them. I can't believe how many fun apps are out there. I guess it just sort of feeds right into my obsession with my iPhone. ;)

- Still have not figured out how to be in two or three places at once. Hoping to find a solution by next Saturday! ;)

- I still am not done with my lace scarf. Not even close. If I keep knitting at this rate it should be done sometime around mid 2012. Another promise I've made to myself is that I need to devote more time to knitting. After all, it's much easier to justify buying more yarn once you've actually started using up your stash. LOL

- I did complete two scrapbook layouts. I'm still loving that feeling of using up my stash and not worrying about "saving" the good stuff anymore. Love the creative freedom!

- Still addicted to Twitter. Love meeting new people and reading what everyone is up to. I even won some great prizes from Ki Memories too!

So that's what I've been up to for the past two weeks. Turned out a little longer than I had planned. Not sure if it's still really considered a "nutshell" now or what? Ah, who cares! There's probably some stuff I have forgotten too.

On my to-do list for this weekend is to relax, have fun and create stuff. Looking forward to doing all three :-)

playing with paint...

I've been having so much fun this week experimenting with paint and making backgrounds for the Layer Love online class I'm taking. I've already learned some cool techniques in the class and I've really been enjoying trying them all out. 

Another cool thing I learned this week is that certain Michael's stores carry Golden paints! OK, some of you might have already known that, but it was news to me. I had to fight the urge to do a happy dance right there in the aisle of the store as soon as I saw their section of Golden products. For any OC people reading this, the stores in San Clemente, Mission Viejo, and Huntington Beach all carry them. Also the store locator on the Golden site lists the locations that carry their products. Michael's was a total lifesaver for me. I needed this one particular color and luckily they had it (and a few other things I needed too!) Normally I go to my favorite art supply store, Sterling Art, for my paints and supplies, but they've recently moved and their stock is really low right now. Thankfully they're expecting new product any time now but in the meantime it's good to know that Michael's is an option too.

Anyway, here are a couple of backgrounds I made this week. The first one is a second attempt at our first lesson. I really like how it turned out, especially with the drips going down the page. I think it by flipping it vertically it will make the perfect art journal page and those drips will be perfect for writing on.

 

This next one I did last night. It was my first attempt at our second lesson. It did not turn out at all the way I had planned. I made a few mistakes. I still like how it looks, but I just don't think it turned out the way the lesson had intended it to look. I plan on doing a do-over of this one hopefully tonight or tomorrow.

 

I can't tell you how excited I am about this three day weekend finally being here. This past week was crazy busy with end of the year school activities. It seemed like every night we were (hurriedly) eating dinner an hour or two early so that we could race out the door to be at a school function. This has been the first year that the girls are in different schools and sometimes it can keep us pretty busy. So it's going to be really nice for the four of us to have three full days to relax and have fun and not have to be anywhere or do anything in particular. I plan to take advantage of this weekend and snag some extra creative time for myself. My poor lace scarf I've been knitting has been so neglected lately. I hope to get some more done on it this weekend. I got a new Slice card a few days ago that I'm really anxious to play with so hopefully I can also make a scrapbook page or two. And of course, I'll be devoting some time to painting more backgrounds too!

Have a wonderful weekend! :-)

finishing up...

Last week I finally had a chance to finish up my last two projects from La Petite Maison Blanc. I had such a great time at Kim's event and was so anxious to finish up the fabulous projects we created that day. Life has been so busy and I can't believe that it's been nearly two months since that wonderful day. I'm so glad that I was finally able to complete my projects and now they're each proudly displayed in our home :-)

This project was from our class with Amy Hanna. It's a canvas wall hanging. Mine turned out quite a bit different than Amy's class samples. Her canvases were just incredible! Originally I was going to put a family photo in the middle of mine and write some quote along the sides of the canvas. Unfortunately it seemed that both of the family photos I wanted to use didn't fit quite just right so I went with this favorite photo I had of my girls. And for the sides I used a foam stamp with some paint and just created a swirled border. I really love how it turned out and I definitely plan on making more of these.

 

 

This next project was from Teresa McFayden's class. We created a beautiful milagros made out of metal. Originally the project was intended to have a round vintage locket attached to it but I eventually decided to leave it off of my finished project. Instead I got a Martha Stewart shadowbox, lined it with some vintage wallpaper and attached my finished milagros to it.

 

We actually created three projects that day. The first was a fun coffee filter garland that was taught by Pam Garrison. I actually finished that one up several weeks ago. I have it posted here.

I really love having handmade items displayed all through out our home. I think it adds such a warm, cozy touch to every room.

lovin' the layers...

So last night I made my first attempt at doing the techniques from our first lesson in the Layer Love online class. I won't even tell you how long it took me to do this and I made a huge mess doing it but most I had a lot of fun and that's really all that matters, right?

It didn't come out exactly as I had hoped. There's definitely a few mistakes here and there, but I am actually very happy with how it looks. I know that the color is pretty strong. I rarely use red in my projects so this was a step out of the box for me. Chris was teasing me a little last night saying it looked like the caverns of hell or something, LOL. (he did think it looked really cool though) I actually like the bold color. I could totally see this being the background for a journal page about love or about something I'm feeling passionate about.

Anyway, I'm so enjoying this class so far. I'm anxious to see what's in store for us next. In the meantime I think I'll keep painting more of these backgrounds. I'm anxious to see what it will look like in other colors. :-)