She's Making Lists......

.......and more importantly, CHECKING off on the lists!!

Order invites for Newest Kiddo's graduation party:  CHECK

Individual Senior Boys Baseball collages put together and ordered:  CHECK

Coach's and Team Baseball collages put together and ordered:  CHECK

Teacher appreciation gift card (yes, I admit that that I caved to the convenience of a gift card. Survival is what we are aiming for in the month of May!):  CHECK

Cute presentation Teacher's Mug to give gift card:   CHECK, CHECK, CHECK!!  

Thank heavens for those paper crafter's who are willing to share their talents and templates online.  It is those saintly souls who make harried mom's like me not look quite so lame in in our gift giving.

Traci Cornelius has a wonderful video that demonstrates how to make this cute little mug. Since she did such a fabulous job, I skipped the step by step photos. This is truly easy  peasy to make!! You can find her video here.  

It actually took me longer to figure out what papers I wanted to use then the making of the mug itself.  The gift card peeking out the top will give you an idea as to the size of the mug.  It's tiny, but CUTE! 

I made the mug and handle out of Gina K's pure luxury 120# card stock as I wanted the cup to be more sturdy. You will notice in the last picture that the handle started pulling off the mug due to the stiffness of the paper.  I had used Scor-tape originally to adhere the handle, but had to resort to TenSecond Studios Humungo Killer tape to get the job done correctly.  The decorative papers are from Graphic 45's An ABC Primer line.  

Using up hoarded paper stash:  CHECK

I'm off to try and accomplish more check marks off my list before an afternoon of watching the Oldest and Newest Kiddo's baseball game.  To all you wonderful and under appreciated Teachers:  a HUGE THANK YOU!!

And to all you mom's (harried or cool, calm and got it together) HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!

'Till next time......................

Taking Dares

This Thursday started the Dare to Get Dirty challenges on SCS. Each day thru Saturday, eight challenges will be hosted by previous/current Dirty Gals. Welllllll......................I will admit that there is a teeny tiny person inside me who would love to be a Dirty Girl on SCS (ok...she is probably bigger than I'd like to admit, but I'm all for denial of my weight!! hehe). So, I had to pull out that inner dirty girl and play!

I wish I had time to do each challenge separately, but reality is: that is just soooo not happening!!


So I straining my brain I came up with a project that includes 7 of the 16 challenges already posted (if I really s...t....r...e...t...c...h....e...d I could get two more in on the list, but I really consider that cheating in my case as I know the challenge was meant a little differently!!)



Here's the list (condensed) that I completed so far: Tag art (using tags in the creation), Making it clear (as in transparency sheets/windows etc), Creative Packaging using premade or invented boxes/bags, Using Wings (butterflies, angels, birds, etc), Food related creation (packaging, displaying recipes, etc) and Use of Texture (embossing folders, embossing, beads, glitter, etc) and last but not least~make your own designer paper.


And my creation:

I made a clear box from a transparency sheet (that I get from Office Depot). The box is 4 1/4" high by 2 1/2" wide. It was made with the idea to hold snowballs (those little white cookies) or fudge. But all I had to show was chocolate chips (FYI: this little box will hold a 11.5oz bag of chocolate chips). I would have LOVED to have baked some real goodies to showcase this clever little gift box. But it is like 95+ degrees here. My oven is SOOOO not getting turned on. And the fact that baking would have required me to go to the store (with two boys) And then bake. And this project is already on day two in trying to get completed!! ANYWHOOOS!! The base and lid are SU's Ballet Blue. I tried Cool Caribbean at first but I felt that it looked like a Tiffany box and I was going for a richer/Christmas blue look. I love DP that has texture on it. So I made my own DP by stamping with SU's white craft and embossing with Iridecsent Ice (this is of course after I first tried stamping with my glue pad and using Dazzling Diamonds. Which looked ok, except a little lighter than I wanted and of course, someone didn't center her images and it looked all off). Then I made the scalloped edge with SU's scalloped edge punch. I used white Stazon to stamp the bird from Inkadinkadoo's Winter Birds on the front. BTW: stamping on transparency is HARD. Very easy to smear. Obviously, I could have tried again to stamp a better image...but in reality this is the third time this was stamped. The first time I had added some more snowflakes/swirls to the entire box. Put it together to decide that it was just too busy. Re-stamped. Messed up. Re-stamped again. Good enough (now you know one of the many reasons why I will never make the Dirt Pile. It takes me six times to get something half way right and then I just get lazy and say forgetaboutit!!!). Where was I?

The tag. This (of course) is not the first tag that I had in mind. I actually have a lovely oval tag stamped with the new Christmas Punch set. Problem? I don't actually have the punch that goes with the image I chose. No biggie~~I have Spellbinders nestabilities with the oval in plain and scalloped. Great. Except that the tag ended up too big for my little box. I couldn't get it to look right on the box (of course). This whole project is just starting to wear on me at this point!! So, I pulled out my tag punches (WHICH if I really stretched, I could claim I did another of the challenges which was to use dies/punches in the project. But my brain says it should be more of a punch/die creation vs just a small punch accent). Made the bow from a silver fiber ornament hanger (AGAIN!! I could claim another challenge here which was to use ribbon/fibers in the project, but!! I know the hostess was hoping for something more creative than a little bow!!). Using my Cropadile, I punched a hole at each corner of the lid, threaded some silver cord through the holes and the tag and then added some TEXTURE with the beads.

FINALLY!! It is done. Of course, I will be able to whip out more of these cute boxes much faster now that I've made all my mistakes (and now have my templates in hand). I think these might make cute teacher gifts or for the neighbors. (HOLY COW!! I just made something that is Christmasy in July....geesh!!! I might get ahead of the game at this rate!! BWHHAAAAA)

Thanks for stopping by!! I'm going to see if I can find 2" of clean space on this desk so that I can maybe do a few more of the challenges.