To Infinity & Beyond….

Sorry, couldn’t resist.

The Infinity Board

I saw this online at Gina K’s Stamp TV site. Click anywhere on this line for instrux.

{Edited for Clarification} This Infinity Board is a homemade “Infinity Board” (cased from REAL Infinity Board) .  You can use this as a “backdrop" for photos of cards and other smaller projects.  It’s great for photographing small items for your blog or etsy and ebay type stores.  You will still need some good lighting for your photographs.  The IB provides a back ground of “white infinity”.  The curved paper prevents sharp corners or creases in your photograph (unless you accidentally crease your paper like I did and need to put a new one on).

I had to make one.  So today I ran out to WMart to find the parts to make it.  I couldn’t find the sketch paper so I subbed poster board which I had to cut down.

It was super easy to prepare and assemble and I think it took maybe 10 minutes once I located my Incredibly Tacky Tape and Fiskars Fingertip knife.  The other adjustment I made was to put some little “tabs” on the bottom side so that the end of the poster board would slip into it and make a deeper well for larger projects.  I love it so far, but I think I need to get a piece of poster board that is not shiny… back to WMart tomorrow….

 
The finished project.   Don’t mind the mess everywhere around it… I just shoved stuff out of the way cuz I was excited to “build” something. LOL!

I used a piece of the poster board that I had cut off to line up the corner to a proper 90* angle.  {cuz ya know, I couldn’t be bothered to open the big messy drawer to find the protractor… lol…}   When I tuck the end of the posterboard in the tabs, the curve becomes sharper and there’s more room on the board for objects.
  
Here’s a “close up” of the tabs I adhered to the bottom to hold the poster board in place.  I hope you can see it… click on the photo, it might help.  I taped just the bottom half of the tab, then stuck it down on the foam board.

Here’s the REAL Infinity Board (click REAL) that Gina K’s people totally cased…. Gina K’s people’s option… much cheaper!  (Poster board - $1.97, Foam board - $2.58, other materials on hand… Elbow Grease - $0.00)

And here we have a couple of examples of photos… I cleaned up my studio a little this morning and put away some of the odds and ends of stuff from projects I’ve been working on.   I put away some loose, unmounted stamps and a whole boatload of beads and baubles.  There’s a whole ‘nother ScrapONizer full of beads in baggies.

These photos of the card were snapped without any decent lighting.  I just flipped on my studio lights and snapped a couple of quick photos for clarification.

How you set up your shot.

Close ups (bad lighting and edited only to add the watermark), but you get the general idea. Please ignore the crease on the left.  I creased it accidentally when moving the board last night. UGH.  Back to Wmart…

Hope that clears it up!

 

These fabulous little ScrapONizer organizers can be purchased at Stamper Storage.   If you’d like to purchase multiples (2 or more sets) of the ScrapONizer large Organizer Sets shoot me an email and I will prepare a discount for you!

 
Above photo shows ScrapONizer 2 compartment divider and 8 SnapLock Minis (purchased separately).

 

The above two photos shows loose unmounted stamps stored in a ScrapONizer on two 8.5x11 folders (purchased separately).

I’m off to the showers and then to the “big city” of Provo to meet a girlfriend for dinner.  (She’s here visiting from the great northwest.)

Inky Smiles!

Last of the Cupcakes

Hey all!  I disappeared again for a bit.  No excuses other than life happening and priorities being lined up, etc.  Brent’s out mowing the lawn and I just finished a project to share with you tomorrow or Wed so I figured I had better get this posted first….

Here are the last couple of cupcake cards.   Well, one uses a sentiment only from the set, and the other is all chocolately and yummy.   These are my two absolute favorites from this plate of goodies.

Here’s the set from Skipping Stones Design.  

Heather let me know today that the shop is scheduled to open on September 30th.  YAY!  She’s got some fabulous treats coming up for you.

This card was fast and easy to make.  I used some Basic Grey Urban Prairie paper, Archiver’s dark chocolate cs, some ric rac, CTMH white and blush cs,  and oooodles of Doodlebug glitter.  The cute little cuppycake is topped off with a rhinestone star.  I’m really digging the argyle embossing folder for the Cuttlebug.  I like the contrast in texture and pattern that it provides with a lot of girlie things. The bottom right corner looked naked, so I added a few little rhinestone dots and then I felt better… hehe… rhinestones are a card’s best friend.

This little card is my absolute favorite of the bunch and of most things I’ve made lately.  It is COMPLETELY not my normal “style” and is out of my “box”.   I have a hard time combining lots of patterned papers… I always feel “cluttered” when I do that, but this time it really worked . I had to keep remembering what the nice lady at the quilt fabric store told me years ago when I had to pick out fabrics for a yellow brick road quilt that I made.  I needed a whole lot of coordinating patterned fabric and was in a tizzy trying to decide… my ocd brain was in overload…. anyway…. 30 mins later I ended up with 30 different fabrics and the quilt turned out beautiful! (I’m looking for the pics of it…)

Anyway… this card ended up being super fun to make.  The patterned papers are from Basic Grey – Urban Prairie.  I used a CB embossing folder to emboss the CTMH kiwi cs and tied a piece of American Crafts ribbon on the card.  I used my Nestie scalloped circle to cut a piece of BG paper and tucked it in the corner.  I added some rhinestones to embellish and called it good.   I really like that CB folder and have got to play with it again… first time I used it here…

Hope you’re having a GREAT day! 
Inky Smiles!

Oh La La! A Summer Candle with Charm

Let’s break up the string of cupcake cards and share this fun little project instead.

Last Thursday night we had an Enrichment meeting for church.  We had a garden style tea party and celebrated the female leaders in our church history.  It was loads of fun.  Some of the sisters dressed up in period clothing dating back to the pioneers and most came in modern day clothing, but lots of people wore a “tea party hat”.   We had a little “contest” and had two prizes.   This is the prize I contributed for “Second place”…. First place won a mini toy tea set. 

I wanted to use the Cupcake set from Skipping Stones Design again, but didn’t necessarily want to make a cupcake item.    I raided my stash for a candle and pulled this strawberry-kiwi scented one out and dolled it up a bit.

Here’s the set again:

I just love the “Oh La La!” sentiment.  It’s girlie and screams frilly! :)  I cut a strip of Kiwi paper from CTMH to fit the candle and then punched a border with Martha Stewart’s Lattice Border Punch (cuz it was sitting on the desk and I didn’t like the scallopy one I originally tried) and then stamped the sentiment around the bottom of the Kiwi paper.  Gotta add a big fat bow, too!

The ribbon is just wrapped around the candle and tied in the front.  I glued the paper to itself with my ATG gun and then poked holes in the candle, added a drop of Liquid Glass, and then poked silver brads in the holes to better secure the paper. I think the brads look like cute little buttons… hehe.

Tone on tone stamped sentiment.  I inked up the sentiment stamp in Kiwi ink and went to town…. benefit of clear blocks and clear stamps – you can stamp in a straight line!

I didn’t originally have the charm on the candle but I decided it needed something extra fun…. I was playing around with beads again prior to making the candle and decided it needed a charm.  So I loaded some Czech glass beads up on an earring wire and played around.  I like how it turned out!

And I liked it enough to make a pair of earrings, too! LOL!   I’ve gotta get some more of the little pink beads so that I can make a bracelet to match!  {This photo shows the closest to the REAL color of the chocolate cards.}

 
I think I’m going to need a bigger jewelry box….

More Cupcakes

Where did the weekend go?  It seemed to fly by so fast this time!   We were busy doing “outdoors” type stuff this weekend.  Brent went and helped Mini C#1 with his Eagle Scout Project on Saturday morning and then Saturday evening we worked on our disaster zone yard.   Last week we had some pretty big microbursts in Payson… several trees were blown over and in general it was a big mess.   The onions in our garden are all laid over :( and our yard looks like fall has arrived with all the leaves and branches strewn everywhere.  We were really lucky in this last couple of windstorms.  We didn’t lose any trees and we didn’t lose any shingles from the roof. (Thanks to Brent for HAND nailing every single set of shingles on the roof when we built the house.n  Not sure if it was worth the “sweat credit” the builder gave us, but we’ve not had any leaks or problems with our roof like many neighbors have.)

Anyway, we did some trimming in the front yard… I hit up the trees and Brent trimmed up the bushes along the house so that we no longer look like an overgrown jungle.  We also ripped out 3 bushes and LOADS of weeds and other overgrowth.  Usually our yard is pretty easy to manage, but this year we’ve neglected it somewhat and it all came due at once.   The front yard looks LOADS better and it looks like someone who cares lives here again.   We will be working on the back yard Wednesday night after work.  YAY!

So I was supposed to go in to work today because B has a conference that I’m going to with him tomorrow, but my boss wants me to come in later this week, so I had a little time this morning to post more cards.

Here’s the set again:

 

Here are a couple more cupcake cards.

Sweet!

I love the argyle Cuttle Bug folder!  It’s difficult to see in this pic… dark chocolate brown is always hard to photograph… perhaps I need to build a light box!  Anyway… it’s an improvement of the first pink prototype card.  I embossed the mats with Nestabilities dies and layered up the cupcake with foam dots from American Crafts.   The images are stamped with CTMH inks.  I used the “shadow” cupcake stamp and then stamped over it with the frosting lines.   I used a Quickie Glue pen to trace the cupcake frosting and sprinkled with Martha Stewart Glitter.   I am quickly becoming a fan of BIG bows… lol!  I think it’s cuz I’ve been haunting Becky Feeken’s blog…..

Oh La La!

This was a fun card to make.  First I punched a border along the bottom with Martha Stewart’s Lattice Border Punch and then I pulled out my Score-Pal and scored a bunch of horizontal lines on the card base.  I stamped the cupcake top and wrapper on Basic Grey paper and cut out.   The frosting is traced with a Quickie Glue pen and sprinkled with Cupcake glitter from Doodlebug… Topped the cupcake with cherry sprinkles (a pile of glass beads on a glob of Liquid Glass), stamped a sentiment on a white scrap of CS and tied it all up with a gold ribbon from my scrap stash.

There’s a couple more cupcakey cards coming up and a “non card” project using this stamp set.  Thanks for popping in!

Inky Smiles!

Cupcakes

What is better than a plate full of cupcakes (or yummy lemon poppyseed mini muffins for your sweet neighbor)?

A stack full of cupcake CARDS!

My friend, Heather, asked me to be on her design team for her stamp company, Skipping Stones Design.  They’ve been around for a while now but she is revamping the website and the store and preparing for a grand re-opening.   No definite relaunch date but I’m excited to share with you some of her stamps!

Anyway.. she sent me several stamp sets and I have been having a lot of fun with this cupcake one.   I should have snapped a photo of this set before I stained it up with permanent ink…..  I love being able to mix up the cupcake stamps. 

My friend, Tammy, came over to play last week (after school – she’s in college getting certified as a medical assistant, hence the scrubs) and we made a boatload of cupcake cards and a fabulous BRA card (from a different SSD set.. .coming later). 

Oh… and I have to brag her up!  Tammy competed in a State wide competition of medical assistant students and took FIRST IN THE STATE…. and then she went on the the NATIONAL competition and took SECOND IN THE NATION…. How cooool is that?  GO TAMMY!  ROCKIN’ THE COMPETITIONS!

Here’s my card that we made loads of duplicates and variations of.  This was my first “test run” of the stamp set so it’s super basic and simple.   But hey, I like basic and simple.  I ran the card front base through my CuttleBug, using the Swiss Dots embossing folder.  The cupcake is mounted on my new Nestabilities Labels die and is accented with Liquid Glass. I cut a rectangle for the sentiment and used a hole punch to snip the corners.  All CTMH cardstock.

Here’s a little mini card I was toying around with with leftover pieces of cupcake…  I used scraps of CTMH patterened paper and CS and a bit of white organdy ribbon, also CTMH.   THe edges of the papers are cut with Fiskars and Martha Stewart border punches.  The card measures approximately 2.75x3.5”.    I used a Quickie Glue pen to outline the cupcake frosting and sprinkled it with Cupcake Glitter.  I was messing around with Liquid Glass on the cupcake wrapper, not sure I like it.  Sentiment is SSD.

I have a few more cupcake cards (my FAVORITES) to share in the next couple of posts.    Till then… INKY SMILES :)

Kids, Kids, and more Kids

Hey all!  It’s been a wonky week again.  Summers are usually this way for us and we usually end up with a plethora of odds n’ ends kids hanging out with us around our house….

I had a surprise visit from my nieces (on B’s side) Tuesday through Thursday.   Their mom had to work and their babysitter got promoted to full time at her regular job so they came to stay with me for a couple of days.   We had a blast, went to the pool and yesterday we made some jewelry with my leftover “kid beads” and made a boatload of chicken salad sandwich stuff for a church party (Enrichment).

We didn’t take a lot of photos on this visit, we were too busy playing and running errands…    Brent forgot his work laptop so we had to drive up to meet him halfway and decided to stop at IHOP for breakfast… yum!  After that we hit up WalMart for some supplies for our afternoon activity!

But first I had to make a boatload of chicken salad sandwich filling for the finger sandwiches for our “garden tea party” which was supposed to be in my friend’s MIL’s grand back yard, but due to the nasty microbursts we’ve been having we relocated to the church.

If I never see chicken salad sandwich filling ever again I will be a happy girl. LOL!  Thank goodness for my little helpers!

{Keepin it REAL… please ignore the bedhead hair & lack of make up… lol}

Chop, chop, chop, the 6 lbs of chicken…. then stirrrrrrr in some chopped celery and green onions… MMMMMM!

 

We made two different styles of earrings but decided on the one on the right because it was more “little girl” vs “teen girl”..  

They were worried that mom wouldn’t let them wear “too long of earrings”…  LOL!  Smart kids!

And in keeping with tradition… you gotta take goofy pics.

Yes, we snapped the photo upside down… hehehe!

Next up… CUPCAKES…. real & paper.

A Little Blingy Bling: Jewelry for Grown Ups

When my sister was here, my niece, Squid, and I made a bracelet and necklace set for her (see this post).  Afterwards, I think she ran off in pure bliss and then crashed out. (I don’t quite remember the details as I was immersed in grown up beads….)

Anyway…  Squid and I had made a cool multi colored bracelet and some earrings to go with them for my mom back in May.  Mom wore them to a party at my Grandma’s in June and Grandma wanted a “reddish orange” set like the reddish orange beads in Mom’s earrings.   So I sat down and played around with the reddish orange beads I had in my stash. (see below)

Jewelry making is super duper easy.  You just need some basic tools (wire snips, round nose pliers, and a flat nose plier) and basic jewelry findings (tiger wire, clasps, crimp beads, misc findings and beads).   You lay the beads all out on a beading board (I am not sure what they are really called) until you get the design you like and then you string it up.  I like whimsical and funky.  There’s no “real” rhyme or reason… just play around until you get what you like. :)
 

Reddish Orange Set:

This is the first set I came up with.  I don’t want to give it away, but I guess that’s what makes it so special. LOL!   I think I am going to hit the bead store and replicate this set because I have just the perfect shirt for it to go with :)  All findings are silver plate except the earring hooks which are real silver to prevent a reaction with the ears. (I can’t wear anything but real gold or silver in my ears so that’s what I had in stock.)

  

 Hot Pink Set:

I HEART this set!  It looks way cool ON.   The circle beads are about 3/4” in diameter.   I strung the wire through the open beads and then carefully strung another bead on the wire before slipping thru the other side of the open beads.  The center pink beads spin around on the wire and are really cool, especially in the earrings.

Jewelry is difficult to photograph in the indoors in the evening… that background is one of the decorative {sacred} pillows from my bed.

Hope you enjoyed!  Inky Smiles & see you soon with some cards and I think I really should do a giveaway asap!   :)

Bling It, Squid!

When I get to visit with my family I love to do things with my niece, Squid. Squid LOVES jewelry, bling, and pretty things. (Hey, like her favorite auntie!)

Anyway… one of the days she was here we made a bracelet and necklace set for her. For a little squirt, she’s pretty good at stringing beads. She even helped me make an adult styled bracelet for my mom back in May when B & I were in Iowa.

Here we are having our own adventure “building” a bracelet for Squid the Kid… Because she’s only 3, we used some larger beads and stretchy string.

Picking out the beads:

“Need middles for the flowers, Erin!”

{A very tired} Auntie Erin getting it started:

Squid can do it herself! {Auntie Erin helped with getting the flowers and centers on, Squid did the silver hearts and loved it.}

“Ta Daaaaaaaa!!!!”

The final result and one happy {and very tired} Squid. The necklace was an afterthought. We had some beads leftover and she loved the big pink hearts. :)

Such a cheeser… look at those tired eyes… We had too much fun all week!

Inky Smiles!

Next up, Jewelry for Grown Ups (later TODAY... it's scheduled)… and then CARDS!

(See ya after work!)