November Birthdays

Happy Birthday to you! You're a hundred and two-- okay, just kidding, but that's how my kids sing it. I think they think I'm old! Oh well! My card today is a cute, cute birthday card for a cute, cute girl! My niece Devri turned ONE earlier this month and this is the card we sent her:


I love this little owl, he's so fun! And it matched the birthday paper perfectly. I have to show you the inside too, though I didn't really do much to the inside except for print out this big picture of Dev; babies always like to look at themselves in mirrors so I thought she would like her face inside the card, isn't she adorable?

I am entering this card in the following challenges:

Decorate to Celebrate-- Birthday Party
Birthday Sundaes-- Birthday wording on front

A Beary Sad Day

If you have been reading The Beary Scrap Design Team blog this week, you know that we are discontinuing our Design Team and that each of us has taken a day this week to say goodbye (what an awful word!) I have been dreading this day for awhile and it still makes me a little teary to think of the end of our DT. I love all my fellow DT ladies and will miss them dearly! These wonderful ladies have inspired me, encouraged me, made me laugh and truly blessed my life! You can view my full, sappy post here.


My Design Team farewell project had to be a Tear Bear and so I created this Thank You card as a tribute to all the Beary Scrap followers out there who kept us going so long, thank you!



I will miss the Design Team but Kimm's store is still open so be sure to check out her great prices!

Almost Time for a Countdown!

The Holidays are fast approaching and I have one more project for you today to help you with your Christmas preparations! If your house is like mine, counting down to the big day is a BIG DEAL, with the excitement of the little guys growing each day as they eagerly anticipate Santa Claus and all the other fun stuff that comes with Christmas. My project today is a quick and easy way for your family to count down, plus a cute decoration to put up in your house!


I used the gorgeous new Christmas papers from My Mind's Eye Lost & Found line to create a countdown clipboard. I bought a wood clipboard from the dollar store (love the dollar store!) and covered it with one of the papers, using glue stick to adhere it to the wood. (two coats, one on the back on the paper, one on the front of the clipboard). Then I added a bunch of fun ribbons across the top, including some lace, seam binding and a jingle bell. The numbers and "days until Christmas" I printed off my computer and cut to the right size. If you would like to make a similar clipboard for your home, I've listed the dimensions below to help you!


Dimensions:
Paper for clipboard base -- 8 3/4 inches wide x 10 1/2 inches long (round corners)
Numbers -- 5 inches wide x 7 inches long (printed two to a page and then round corners)
"days until Christmas"-- 7 1/2 inches wide x 2 3/4 inches long (round corners)
Mat for "days until Christmas"-- 7 3/4 inches wide x 3 inches long (round corners)


I hope this helps you in your holiday planning! Keep those Beary Best projects coming for our month long challenge over at The Beary Scrap, we are loving seeing all your talented work!

Thanksgiving Challenge at Friendship's Garden

Today I am so excited to share with you a card I made as a Guest Designer at Friendship's Garden. This is a new challenge blog for cards, tags and altered projects that I am so excited about! The DT ladies are fabulous and besides their beautiful projects, leave such nice comments! The focus of their challenges is to use something BESIDES a stamped image and I love this! I am in awe of the beautifully stamped and colored images I see all over blogland but that is just not me and let me tell you, this challenge blog is me! I love it!

So when they asked me to be a Guest Designer after I entered a challenge I was so excited and honored to do it. The challenge for this week is THANKSGIVING and the project recipe is: 1 Die cut, 2 patterned papers and 3 trims. This challenge is running for the next two weeks so take time to check out this new blog and enter your project.

Here is my Thanksgiving themed card:



Thanks for looking!

Week 2 of "Our Beary Best"

My project this week at The Beary Scrap is a couple of quick and easy Christmas decorations featuring these awesome Christmas papers. I completely adore the color combination in these papers-- traditional red and green but dark paired with BROWN (I love BROWN!) and just a tiny bit of grey. So pretty! I am in a red/green/brown mode this week as I prepare for my Christmas craft shows and I have been painting and embellishing everything in these colors, including both of these:

First is a set of stars, about 4 x 4 inches painted, sanded, varnished and then a little bit of paper added before my vinyl words.


Next is a set of JOY letters, about 12 inches tall, also painted, sanded and varnished then decorated. I added my Echo Park paper to the J by tracing and cutting it out then putting it on with a heavy layer of glue stick (one layer on the paper, one layer on the wood). I glittered up my O using tacky glue and some glitter.

I hope I passed a little of my holiday mood along to you-- we'd love to see what you are creating so hop on over to The Beary Scrap Design Team blog and enter your projects (more than one, if you want!) in our month long challenge for your chance to win a $30 voucher to The Beary Scrap store.

Card under 15 minutes!

Have you ever timed yourself making a card? I found the funnest (is that a word?) challenge over at a new challenge blog called Friendship's Garden (love, love, love this blog--- more details on that coming next week!) The challenge was to make a card in 15 minutes of less and I thought, that's easy, I can do that, no problem!

Well, it wasn't as easy as I thought because I started my timer and before I knew it, it was already up to 8 minutes and I was just starting! I had to hurry! This was such a fun challenge and really stretched me. Here is my official timer (yah, I just barely made it!)


And here is my card:


This card is based on this sketch from Card Patterns:



Definitely check out Friendship's Garden and see if you can make a card in 15 minutes or less!

Grateful

November is such a lovely month-- the beginning of the holiday season, a time for excitement, family and to remember to be thankful for all the wonderful things we have (as we celebrate Thanksgiving here in the United States). It's the perfect month, then, for the great challenge we have going on now at The Beary Scrap. We know your holidays get busy so we have made it easy peasy with an Anything Goes challenge called show us "Your Beary Best." This challenge goes ALL MONTH LONG, you can enter as many times as you like and the winner will get a $30.00 voucher to The Beary Scrap Boutique. We have lots of great projects entered so far and we'd love to see even more!

My project for this week is a Gratitude Journal:


I started with this Thanksgiving quote that I absolutely love and altered a composition notebook using papers from SEI's Oasis line-- these are perfect for fall and Thanksgiving theme projects with pretty fall colors and foil accents.


This journal could be used just by one person to record all the things they are grateful for or it could be used at the Thanksgiving table and sent around so that different family members had a chance to write down their thoughts, creating a family keepsake.

I am also entering this notebook in the following challenges:

ABC Challenges-- Crochet Flowers
Friendship's Garden -- Autumn Colors
Papertake Weekly-- Anything Goes (plus a bit of bling)
4 Crafty Chicks-- Die Cuts
Scrapalicious USA-- Fall into Autumn
Bearly Mine-- Anything Goes

Keep those "Beary Best" projects coming all November long! I love visiting your blogs and seeing all of your fantastic work-- I am grateful for you!