A Cup of Love

Hey y'all,

I have enjoyed crafting and finding time to write on my blog again. I was quite busy for a while much more than I care to be. I am very much a one thing at a time person. LOL

I wanted to make a card for our pastor's mom. I understand she is having quite the birthday party. I wanted it to be our gift to them for his mom. I had decided I would make the very cute tea cup box card from Garden Party Box Cards SVG Kit by svgcuts.com  but then thought maybe I should ask if she drank tea. The answer was no but she would drink coffee from a cup and saucer. I thought the tea cup box card would work.

I started on the card but nothing was working, I just wasn't happy with it. I tried to make what I had do but I still wasn't happy with it. I told Mark this a.m. that I needed to start over and that is just what I did.

I cut the body of the card out using Blackbird Bazzill card stock. I used paper from Graphic 45 Bohemian paper collection for the accents and back piece. I edged the accent pieces with a black Copic marker and adhered them after writing Happy Birthday on the back and attaching the steam piece I made first.  I took my time writing first in pencil then going over the top with a memento Ink black marker, erasing the pencil afterwards.

 I wanted this card to be as if he had purchased the card himself to give to his mom. With that thought in mind, I chose not personalize the card with mom or her name.  I added few flowers with enamel dots for the centers.

I began to add all the flowers but I really wanted the cup to look like a coffee cup instead of a tea cup. As I stared at the bottom accent piece on my virtual mat it came to me to make a swirl of steam using the saucer accent piece. I added a another smaller narrow one to the center cutting the tap off and deleting nodes to make sure it looked correct. Once I got it the shape I wanted I welded the two pieces together and did a test cut. It needed a bit more tweaking. I adjusted the tabs to look like the ones Mary has so often used on her files. and kept the score line in the same area.  I adhered the fold of the cardstock vellum steam swirl over back top of the card. Make the accent piece for the back slightly larger and adhere the accent piece over the fold to hide it.  I took a photo of the writing because it turned out so pretty. I may not be able to make anything look that pretty again. If you look closely at the photo you can see how I hid the vellum tab with the back.  The swirl I cut for the inside of the card was a silhouette file cut from Stampin up Card Stock Vellum as was the steam swirl I created. I am sure Mary has something in her files either for free or purchased that would have worked as well, I just didn't take the time to look for one.

I cut the envelope and  inserted the card. I  look forward to showing  our sweet friend and pastor how to open the card for his mom. I hope she is blessed by this handmade gift.
Thank you for stopping by and visiting with me. Many blessings my dear friends and Happy Crafting Y'all!
Blessings, Sharalyn

Garden Party Box Cards SVG Kit

Supplies
Bazzill Card Stock-Blackbird
Graphic 45- Bohemian Collection
Card Stock Vellum- Stampin' Up
Copic Marker-Black
Enamel Dots
Scotch Quick Dry Adhesive (tacky glue)
Silhouette Business Addition
Silhouette Cameo

Autumn's First Pumpkin Cottage

Afternoon Y'all,
Hooray!!! It is the first day of Autumn and my Very Favorite time of year!!!!!! After a long hot summer I enjoy the crispness of the air and yes the wind. My Husband Mark hates the wind as it messes up his yards.  He is very blessed to make yards look amazing, so please don't tell him I enjoy the wind as well. It is very fitting that I should share  on this first day of Autumn,  my design of the Pumpkin Cottage SVG Kit. Lets get to it then.

I started with choosing my accent papers from my Silhouette digital papers I had purchased. I wanted to try out my new continuous ink system. The cost of it at start up was expensive but I am grateful I can now print without worrying how much ink I am using. This will be a learning process for me and I will share along the way how things are going. So far the print to cut feature is being a mite picky but I will learn how to use it. Upon the advice of Deb Maurer and Jeannie Lassey whom have these systems I chose pigment ink by Cobra Ink Systems. No I do not get a commission by adding the name.
I printed on white card stock but the color didn't "pop" to my liking so I tried American Craft carrot card stock but still not to my liking.  After thinking about it a while I chose lemon Yellow to print it on.  I got the affect I  was hoping for but the machine said it would not read the registration lines so it would not cut it out for me. I decided that was ok with me and cut it out with my Tim Holtz Snips. They are only 5 inches long but I like the handles and the seriated edges they blades have. It was much easier to "fussy cut" with them.  I purchased them in a small craft store in Big Bear but I have checked and Amazon has them as well.

I cut the base of the  Pumpkin Cottage SVG Kit out of Pumpkin Patch Bazzill card stock. Appropriately named eh? lol.  I had purchased digital papers from Snap Click.com for the step and door. The door was a Carta Bella paper collection called Hello Fall and the Step was a Bo Bunny Collection called Forever Fall. I printed those on white American Craft smooth Card Stock. I think I prefer the textured but my printer doesn't always love that so we shall see what I purchase more of to print on. I cut off the back of a brad I had in my stash and added a tiny glue dot to adhere it to the door.  I forgot to turn off the cut lines off the step when I was printing so I had black cut lines. I did my best to hide them  with a dark brown distress ink.
Those cut out just fine. You can use the actually collections if you have them but I did not so I used the digital versions.
I cut the base and other brown elements using a favorite of mine Bazzill Mud Pie. The window frames and roof were cut using Bazzill Mocha Divine. The roof accents were embossed with cuttlebug Argyle emboss folder then inked with Archival Brilliance Cosmic Copper ink. I try to purchase the re-inker when I buy a new ink pad as you never know when they will discontinue that ink and it is cost effective to re-ink your pads rather than continually purchase new pads. Occasionally I have to purchase new dew drop pads of the copper as they fall apart after a while from my use of them, particularly in the Fall.
The flowers in the window box were inked with Stamping up real red, only orange and rich razzleberry inks. I believe these can still be purchased on ebay though they are older inks.
enamel dots were added to the centers. I have quite the collection of them so I use whatever I feel matches.

I used a dark brown pen and added diagonal lines to the widow boxes as well as edging all sides with the pen. I cut the vellum for the windows using Stampin Up cardstock vellum and setting them on some scratch paper, I used a smooth leaf stamp from Basic Grey I dropped drops of yellow orange and red onto a baby wipe. Use the baby wipe as your stamp pad and the smooth leaf stamp to the colors onto your vellum. Let them dry and adhere to the back of the pumpkin Cottage window body with the stamped image facing the outside. This keeps the ink from smearing. You could use any smooth stamp but  I like having the shape as well as the colors.
Looking through my stash I found some sunflower buttons I cut the shank off of and hot glued into place on the vines. I also found a scarecrow sticker that fit in well and the rake that was added next to the pile of leaves was in my stash as well. Almost all of my buttons come from Buttons Galore and More.

The leaves are from my stash and are from a SVG collection called Autumn Elements SVG Collection . I measured them and they are sized at less than an 1/2 inch long. If you keep your measurements locked you should be able to type in .50 in the length and it should give you a width as well. Set your machine to cut at a slower rate so it does not tear your design. Also make sure you turn on the overcut markings to help with this. This is if you have a silhouette machine as that is what I design and cut with. I used a little hot glue to get the piled look.
The kitty in the widow effect was added to one of the extra vellums I cut for the two other windows. This was done with a silhouette shape of a cat and then print and cut feature on my silhouette.  Part of the nice thing about my silhouette is that I can change the size of a print or the direction to fit the piece I am wanting to put it on.
The welcome mat on the step was a half cloud shaped sticker with a woodgrain print on it from Carta Bella The story of fall paper Collection I had in my stash. I simply wrote welcome on it with a pen.

There you have it a lengthy explanation of my Pumpkin Cottage SVG Kit .  I enjoyed this kit very much and am looking forward to making a Christmas version of some kind. Again it will be hard to choose papers as seemed to be the thing that took me the most time but isn't that the way it is with us creative people. Thank you so much for stopping by and reading my blog. Many blessing to you on all this first day of Autumn and Happy Crafting Y'all!!! Blessings, Sharalyn

Pumpkin Cottage SVG Kit

Bazzill Card Stock
Pumpkin Patch
Rainforest
Mocha Divine
Mud Pie
Leaves American Craft
Apricot, pomegranate, sunflower
Mc Gill Flower Shaping Tools
Buttons Galore and More
Stampin up Ink Pads, Markers
Hot Glue
Scotch Quick Dry Adhesive
Silhouette Cameo
Silhouette Business Addition
If you have any questions feel free to contact me on my facebook page Shara's Paper Creations and I will answer. Opie Kitty says Nite all.

Past Midnite.... Honey Bee Fairy House turns into a pumpkin!

Hey Y'all,
It is my favorite time of year again... Fall!
Here in Joshua Tree it is not usually getting cold till Halloween but today I put pants on because I was cold. Granted I don't have as much fat anymore but even our tortoises are telling us fall is on the way.

I have a lot of followers for which I am very grateful for but one in particular blesses my heart because she has made a lot of the things I have made with my instructions. It was my desire when I started my blog to help encourage others that you can make the things I make.  Nicole Austin has done that several times over with her recreations of my creations. Thank you Nicole. This blog post was written with you in mind to keep your creativity going and because you have blessed my heart by showing me your finished creations.

Lets get started...
I cut the Honey Bee Fairy House SVG base using Bazzill pumpkin cardstock and used Carta Bella Autumn paper pack for my accents.
My thought all along was to make this look like a pumpkin and Mary Rudakas -Bonk, made a pumpkin  last year with a wonderful stem that I used on this fairy house. That Kit with the pumpkin is called Harvest Sunset SVG Kit. You will need to size the stem down, I did have the exact measurements but cannot find them now.    The pumpkin leaves are from the same kit in the extras file, they were sized to W. 1.42 X 1.375 H. I used Tim Holtz mowed lawn distress ink to add shade to the leaves. The curly vines were cut on my paper trimmer but you could also use the vines from Pick a Pumpkin SVG Kit . Trim the ends at an angle to give it more of a pointed look. The curly step was one of the vines from Gourds Galore SVG Collection.
Assemble the fairy house following Leo's instructions. Do not add the flower or the bees.
I glued the stem of the pumpkin from  Harvest Sunset SVG Kit to the top of the fairy house. I added ink to the stem as well then using the pumpkin leaves I camouflaged  the stem with the leaves and vines because the fit was not perfect. The  green and pomegranate colored flower on the side was the small flower in the Honey Bee Fairy House SVG  and a flower from the  ABC Flowers SVG Bundle.
I glued the small pomegranate flower to the green flower and using a stamen center from Amazon I glued that to the center of the flower.
The "doorbell" was another small flower with a tiny bell from the Christmas section of Michael's. The "light" above the house was glued to the flower and was a plastic Christmas light from the same section in Michaels.  I added gold rhinestones above and below the windows and one in the center of the flowers on the front and back.
An added benefit was that I already had the cute little sunflower scarecrow boy and girls. I purchased them a few years ago from Walgreens and have seen them almost every year since. They made the photo that much cuter.

That is how I made this cute little fairy pumpkin house. Nothing special really and easy peasy.
I hope you enjoyed my little pumpkin house. I have another blog post I need to get written up for you and will start working on that one tomorrow. I apologize for it taking me so long today. I had internet issues and had to make 5 phone calls to get it cleared up. Tomorrow after the mail comes I hope to get my Continuous ink System up and running, the goal is to be able to print just what I need and cut down on the load my paper shelf is under. Wish me luck I will need it. I have a very stubborn printer. If all goes well the blog post will be up sometime on Sunday after church.
Thank you for stopping by and reading my blog. Have a wonderful evening and Happy Craftin' Y'all!!! Blessings, Sharalyn

Supplies:
Bazzill Pumpkin card stock
American Craft Pomegranate  Card Stock
Carta Bella Autumn Paper Collection
Tim Holtz Distress Ink- Mowed Lawn
Yellow Stamen
Tiny Bell
Small Plastic Christmas Light.
Scotch Quick Dry Tacky Glue
Silhouette Business Addition
Silhouette Cameo