MIXED MEDIA MONDAY - Creating Space!

We all have these... close to every stamping/ scrapbooking/ paper art magazine we've ever purchased. Something in the publication caught our eye and we just had to buy it. MAYBE we'll make the project we liked... maybe not. But one thing that does happen... they ACCUMULATE.

Monday posts last year were called - Magazine Monday - where I showcased my version of a card or project culled from the various magazines taking up space on my shelf. There were still some projects I wanted to keep for reference, but I need the shelf space. I plan to get the back copies of the Stampin UP catalogs out of the file drawer (they're curling & the drawer is full) and put them on the shelf where I can access them for inspiration or look up stamps someone might have for sale.

I spent two evenings with the TV marking my 'keeper' projects with post it strips. Then I spent the next afternoon copying them. Unless I felt the detail really would stand out better in color, I copied everything in B/W. I sorted them into 5 Categories: Cards, Tags & Calendars, Projects, Tutorials, Quotes & Patterns.

When I was done copying, this is what my desk looked like:

I copied the Title of each category on the front of the blue paper and put them in a 1.5" Durable Binder by Avery. And I added something I very seldom use... Pretty, plastic dividers. I always buy the inexpensive paper ones but I decided after all this work, I deserved a little treat ;-)

I'll continue to add the print-outs from Pinterest. With each print-out, I'll make note of the blog or designer so when I do create my version I can link back to them. 

And because none of the magazines were damaged, I can pass them on to another paper artist.

Creative Blessings!

Kel

WOYWW #207 - Artistic Focus

Happy WOYWW Everyone!

I really love Whats On Your Workdesk Wednesday. Hostess, Julida Dunnit at Stampin Ground has created this awesome web of participants that allows us to peek inside each other's studios every week. Just click -> WOYWW to see what it's all about. Come join the FUN!


Today is going to be really crazy here. We are going to pick up the granddaughters tomorrow. We'll have both girls, 5-1/2 years and the other 19 months, for 3 weeks. Then we'll take the baby home and just have the older one for another 3 weeks. So don't be surprised if you don't see me popping about for the next 6 weeks. Not because I don't want to. LOL

As you ca see, my desk has nothing to do with crafting this week. I am on a crucial deadline to get my novella manuscript to the editor. Deadline technically is May 31st but I've been pushing to get the manuscript off before we go after the girls. I don't think that's going to happen. Thankfully I have DH to help with the girls for the two more weeks so I can still make deadline.

I'm off to get the sleeping arrangements set up. Have a Super Creative Week!
Kelly

MIXED MEDIA MONDAY - Dauber Storage

I don't know why I had set this to run last Thursday. I wanted it to run today, so I've bumped it up.

Okay... I know the Mixed Media thing is a bit off course. I've just been so intent on getting things organized to use them that I've not done the mixed media art like I want to. I guess it's an OCD thing for me that I never realized I had until a couple of years ago. Things have to be 'just right' for me to work.

So for awhile my Mixed Media Monday posts will showcase some of the organization techniques I've been creating.

This week, it's all about Dauber Storage

I knew I wanted to use a dauber for each of my Stampin Up Ink Spots (which they've seen fit to retire - GRRRR!)

The challenge was how to bring the two together. How to store a dauber with its matching color? I didn't want them tossed into a dish to be dug through (that OCD thing kicking in again).  So after a bit of thought, I headed to my local hardware store and came up with these:

These are 9/16" diameter cork disks. They fit perfectly inside the finger hole of the dauber and they have adhesive on the back.  One cork is not thick enough to support the dauber. So I stacked them 2-high:

Then stuck one 'stack' on top of each spot lid:

I store my SPOTS, REFILLS and WaterColor Crayons by color family in their own Sterilite tub - minus the lid:

Next to each of the refill bottles, I have a piece of rubber mat like you put under exercise equipment that has a texture. The box of watercolor crayons store underneath the spot box.

With the retiring of the spots, I'll continue to use the available colors and my favorite colors. I don't think I'm going to purchase the full-size pads. I just don't have the room to store them... not even if I were to use one of those vertical storage units. I'd have to have a place to put that. LOL I'll purchase the refills and create a stamping pad with a dense sponge square whenever I need a color.

All the retired spots (I have all of those from when SU did a complete color family overhaul a couple years ago) are going to get their own daubers. Then I'm going to make a tray out of foam core to store them (along with their refill) with my Mixed Media supplies.

I'd love to hear how you store yours! What works for you?
Creative Blessings! - Kel

WOYWW #206 - What Do I Keep In Those Little Drawers?

I really love What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday. Hostess, Julia Dunnit at Stampin' Ground has created this awesome web of participants that allows us to peek inside each other's studios every week. Just click -> WOYWW to see what it's all about.

In the mean time... some of you have asked about my little drawer units at the back of my desk. These are 2 separate units of 6 drawers each... 3 over 3. I found them at a Goodwill store for $5 each. Not sure what I would do with them at the time, but I knew I couldn't leave them there. When I brought them home and sat them on the table, I knew they'd be perfect for items I use a lot but didn't want just sitting about. I later found these same drawer units in Oriental Trading for $30 each! Now I really wish I'd bought them all! So here we go...

Top Drawer - Glue Dots & Red Tape

Bottom Drawer - Pop Dots

Top Drawer - Acrylic Blocks

Bottom Drawer - Piercing Tools & Replacement Cutting Blades

Top Drawer - Hammer, Eyelet Tools, TH Sanding Block & refills

 Top Drawer - Shape Punches (May donate)

Bottom Drawer - Charms & other Metal Hardware

If I donate those hand punches, I'm going to use this drawer for the little ID Stamps I use on every card... you know the ones that say 'Stamped With Love', 'This Wish Stamped For You', etc. as well as my 2 most used large ink pads - VersaMark and Memento Black

And just in case you guys think my desk is never messy, I shot this pic after my crafting session on Saturday. I finally got the cards done up I was behind on... every one inspired by a card on Pinterest. I'll show them another time.. but here's my desk before clean-up:

I left just enough space in front of me to bring in the paper trimmer when needed. You can just see the stack of images to the left that I'd printed off my Pinterest board - Paper Playhouse. I've since done something else with them I'll be showing one day next week. Today, my desk is back to normal. 

And here's a puzzle for you... look to the upper right side of the picture.. just in front of the green corner punch. Can you tell what that might be? I will tell you it's one of my new organization tips I'll be showing soon. In the mean time, I'd love to hear what you think it is.

With hubby home a day early and two deadlines looming, I'll get around to as many of you as I can. Happy WOYWW!

Creative Blessings!

Kelly

BLOG CANDY GIVEAWAY - Courtesy of Kezzy's Crafty Journey

Okay y'all! I know you LOVE FREE stuff and my WOYWW bud, Kezzy has an AWESOME assortment of goodies to give away.

There are no hoops to jump through... just stop at her blog and wish her a Happy Blog Anniversary! Though if you want to stalk... I mean follow... her, she wouldn't mind. Hehe
So cruise on over to Kezzys Crafty Journey for your chance to win. Winner will be selected by Random.org on May 23rd!

Good Luck & Creative Blessings!
Kel

TEAPOT TUESDAY - Bring On the Wine!

Today's card is for a lady in Canada. Marie thought she had the flu, only to be diagnosed with H1N1. She's use to being active so the rest required for her to recuperate is not going to be easy. So we decided to bring food & wine.

I thought I had the perfect image. I had several 'kits' left over from a Make & Take back when I worked at Michaels. With everything cut this card should take me all of five minutes to put together.  HA! All the pieces were cut... but none of the images had been stamped. All I had was the sample but not the stamp.

PrintShop to the rescue. I do not know what I'll do if I ever have a system that will not allow me to load my PrintShop. I LOVE this program have used it a lot over the past 15 years. I found this image with wine and cheese and fruit. Yum!  Since I've recently discovered I enjoy a glass of wine in the evenings, this was a card right up my grape arbor - one I'm still hoping to get planted soon! LOL

The kits had all been cut from the Heritage Collection pak of the ValuCardstock and a single 12x12 sheet of adhesive-backed cork (found with the scrapbooking paper). I replaced the P A R T Y sentiment originally used in the kit with this sentiment from Heidi Grace Sentiments CS collection. Brads for texture. 

While I was printing the image, I printed enough to finish up the remaining 9 card kits. I can stamp a sentiment on the inside for birthday, anniversary, promotion... 

But that's one more UFO project put together... and it only took me 2 hours to make all 10 cards!

I already have tomorrow's post ready to go. Technically we're suppose to take a picture of what our desk looks like on Wednesday morning for the Whats On Your Workdesk Wednesday.  But some of you keep asking what I keep in those little drawers and I promised to share them with you tomorrow. Pics are done, resized and I'll write that post up next.

And it's a good thing. Bob called to let me know he'll be home either really late tonight (okay wee hours of the morning) or mid-day tomorrow instead of tomorrow night... Which means I'm cleaning like a whirlwind today! LOL

Happy Tuesday!

ARTIST KAYLAN BUTEYN - Win a set of her watercolor cards!

One of my fav places to cruise on WOYWW is The Emerald Homestead.

Kaylan is a fabulous watercolor artist, loving wife and mother, (in my mind) a bit of traditionalist. Today is offering you the opportunity to win a set of her beautiful cards (with envelopes).  I hope you'll pop over and introduce yourself.

Good Luck and Creative Blessings!
Kel

LIVING ART AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT - and a chance to WIN!

Good morning, everyone!

I have a special surprise for you today.

I love ANYTHING having to do with paper, ink, paint, assemblage, etc.  I also appreciate Pam Carriker's ability to share her talent with anyone wanting to learn. Watching one of her videos is like sitting down to your crafting table with a friend. Her easy-going style and passion for what she does is contagious.

I was introduced to Pam through this video I ordered from Interweave. I had a question about acquiring a 

tool she used. She responded right back in a friendly manner... just like the woman on the video. Yep. I was hooked on Pam Carriker and her teaching style.

You may have seen her book- ART AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT - maybe even own a copy.  Book 2 is due for release in September.  But Pam is NOT waiting to share goodies with you. She is offering ONLY 2 on-line CLASSES this year. And she's giving everyone the opportunity to win their choice of which one.

All you have to do is go to THIS post and follow the instructions for entering. They're easy.  You'll also get an overview of the courses Pam is teaching this year.  

To help you out, I've created a couple of Tweets. Feel free to use these as you Share to Win!

Chance to #WIN on-line class by @pamcarriker http://pamcarriker.com/2013/05/07/online-workshop-giveaways/

@pamcarriker wants to put #FUN in your summer. #WIN a free class http://pamcarriker.com/2013/05/07/online-workshop-giveaways/

Get your #ART on with @pamcarriker. Chance to #WIN #FREE class http://pamcarriker.com/2013/05/07/online-workshop-giveaways/

But HURRY! THIS GIVEAWAY WILL END ON FRIDAY @ 12PM CST

Creative Blessings!

Kel

WOYWW #205 - Room to Play!

It's WOYWW - aka snooping other people's work areas to see what they're up to. The tour is directed by the multi-talented Julia Dunnit. You can read about our journey at Stamping Ground.

Yep, as you can see from a couple of previous posts I've had room and time to play. My task for today (or tomorrow - which ever day the rain moves in and I can't be on-line) I am behind in some cards. A friend of mine graduates from college this weekend.  I totally spaced it, which is sad because Sal has worked so hard to earn his teaching degree. He's going to be AWESOME!

 I also belong to a local (state) group called ShowMeStampers. We started as a Missouri group of stampers. Some of us have moved out of state but are still a part of the group. We do a lot of things one of which is, if we choose to participate, is we are each assigned someone on our list to send a card to. Just some happy mail amongst the mountain of bills and junk. I've not reciprocated a single time this year because my studio has been such a disaster. This is month 5. So I have at least 5 cards to get done. I'm hoping for more as I'll not get any crafting time except with Adrian once the girls get here Memorial Day weekend.

So here's my desk:

The printouts are of cards off my Pinterest board - Paper Playhouse - that I want to make. I got them off so I could craft even if I couldn't get on-line. There are about 30 samples there.

I'm so excited to be playing on a regular basis again! Can't wait to see your spots. Weather permitting I'll be cruising your spaces.

Creative Blessings!

Kel

TEAPOT TUESDAY - Beam Me Up!

This week's challenge instructed us to think Star Trek. Okay.. I'm not a trekky nor have I ever been. And I find it hard to even think about Star Trek without having images of Leonard and Sheldon. Come on, you know you do, too LOL

Our card this week is for a Trekky - Rich. Please read his heartbreaking story HERE

Not having any Trekky stamps I went in search of a graphic. Using graphics for putting on social media sights is tricky. And I'm hoping the guys don't want to sue me for uploading it here. However, the image is for a wallpaper which is FREE to download and I'm linking back to the website so hopefully they'll get some traffic. The variety of items (not just wallpapers) on StarTrekDesktopWallpaper is some of the best I've seen. The details are amazing. These guys really put thought into their offerings. Please go check out the site and send your Trekky friends! Give y'all something to do while you wait for the release of the movie :-)

I used the ruler on my word program to resize the graphic of the Starship Enterprise to 5" which automatically brought the sides to 3.75" After printing out the graphic I ran it, along with the hologram CS through my 5" Xyron sticker maker so I'd get a good adhesion to the SU Black CS. I added some misc. gold ric rack over the new grey braid trim from Michaels ($1 bin). The Sentiment is from Gina K Designs. The image is suppose to fit inside a circle design but I cut the 3 words apart and lined them up to fit within the confines of the SU window tag punch.

Inside there is a note for Rich directng him to the website so he has a fun place to cruise when the Klingons have zapped him of his energy force. 

Beam Me Up!

MIXED MEDIA MONDAY! - and a WINNER!

Hey all...

I don't have a mixed media project today because I've been a bit preoccupied the past few days while the internet was turned off (due to storms). I could have spent the time creating but I'm still in this pitching and organizing mood so I want to keep at it while I'm in the zone.

The picture above is of my embellishment shelving unit behind my SU storage cabinet. The very top shelf is all stuff to be altered.. tags, board books, etc.

The next shelf is what today's post is about. I'll come back to it in a moment.
The third shelf is all about flowers. As you can see I have quite an assortment. I think they're going to be part of the give-away on Friday... as long as the weather holds so I can post!

I attached a curtain rod on the front edge of that shelf to hold my paddle punches. My MS punches wouldn't fit. They wanted to fall through between the rod and the edge of the shelf. And let me tell you, anything that falls behind that SU cabinet is not coming out easily. So I try to avoid that issue.

The next shelf you can't see well (and I'll give you a closer look in August during the Operation Organization class) But it is full of Nestle Quick containers that hold this and that such as can tabs and binder clips.

The two shelves below that I don't access much as they require moving my SU Markers and Embellishment boxes (still in the creative stages).

Okay... back to today's 'mixed media' project. One of the blogs I visit periodically (not often enough because the man is amazing!) is Curt's World.  Curt was in the process of making several of these cute little boxes to store cards in. He got the idea from Sami over at Scrapmaster's Paradise.  When I saw the posts, I knew I had to take my card storage from this:

to this:

Each box is made from 1 9x12 sheet of card stock plus pieces of DP to embelllish as you desire. I made 19 of these, decorated them accordingly then tagged them using the SU Curly Label punch. Each box will hold approx. 10 cards /w/ envelopes. Because I had so many of some types of cards, I have some of them sans envies. I can grab an envelope quick enough from the stationary cabinet when I need one.

The cool thing is you can see at a glance what theme of card you might be low on. Then when a card challenge comes along, use the challenge to fill in the gaps so you always have THE card on hand you need.

Okay, since I'm in this organization mood, I am over-due for announcing the winner of the book. So here we go...

Only 3 people qualified for the entry. They followed all the rules by commenting, following and linking back to the give away. In order of posting that would be Maggie, Brenda and April.  So I dropped the #3 in Random.org (haven't figured out how to do the 'show image' so trust me).

The Winner is .....

#2 - Brenda!

Congratulations sweetie. This gives you two in a row. LOL Wanna try for 3 with the May Basket give away this week? Hehehe

Tell your friends.... Creative Dreams is the place to WIN!
See you tomorrow (hopefully - barring storms) for my Teapot Tuesday.

Creative Blessings!
Kel

FRIDAY FRENZIE - Free Book!

After having a copy of Polymer Cafe magazine to give away a few weeks ago I discovered I really enjoy giving things away! LOL So periodically I'll use my Free For All Friday to give something away.

If you're a part of the WOYWW then you had a heads up that I'd be doing this today. While in Peoria IL a few weeks ago I had to make a trip to Menards home improvement. While wandering the isles looking for stuff I could use in my art work I came across one of those dump box bins. You know... where they just dump the inventory and you get to dig through it depending on how interested you are in what might be buried there.

The box was full of hardbacks and paper backs ranging from fiction novels to craft and decorating books. The paper crafting books included books from Creating Keepsakes and Making Memories. I also found this book by Jo Packham - Organzing Your Craft Space.

I've read this before so thought I'd grab it for a refresher cruise than pass it on to one of you.  Oh yeah.. and these 'expensive' books rang up at $6 each! I LOVE bargains like that but seldom find them.

The book covers organizing studios for all types of crafts. Whether you're a paper artist, a beader, quilter... Jo has some great tips to share. She also takes you into studios of the pros like Dee Gruenig and Freddy Moran. There are quizzes to help you determine your storage/ organizing style and TONS of lucious color photographs to inspire you.

So how do you win this copy for yourself? It's easy!
A- Leave A comment and tell me about your biggest organizing challenge
B - Become a Follower of my Blog
C - Link this post to your blog so your followers can have a chance, too!

If you're already following... just tell me so I'll know ;-)

Good luck! I'll see you Monday with a Mixed Media project. I'm diving back into my ABC's of me book.