What's Black and White and Read all over???

The answer is... A NEWSPAPER!!! Hmm that was funnier when I was six... Not as funny now, and especially not since you can see the spelling of 'read' rather than hearing it and assuming I mean the color RED. Ah well it was still clever of me at the time especially since it gave me a backstory to ramble about for this post lol! Now that I've gotten that out of the way, I can get to the relevance of that story to my post! My Hubby left for Army BCT yesterday and so I got the brilliant idea to keep a journal while he's gone so he won't miss a thing while he's gone. During my last trip to my LCS, I grabbed a few things to alter/decorate, mainly made of balsa wood, (you'll see projects with those things soon so stay tuned!!!) and I found the ugliest little monogramed journals for $2. I knew they would be perfect for this journal/ scrapbook I was planning on creating so I grabbed one and immediately headed home to start beautifying my awesome find. In about an hour (not including fussy cutting the image with an X-Acto knife) this masterpiece came together:

(Head: C.C. Friday Night/ Body: Anya Strolls)



 

 

 

Ok I know I say this a lot but seriously, I am IN LOVE with this alteration combo of C.C. Friday Night with Anya Strolls! Saturday I showed you guys a door hanger that I created with this same concept. It turned out so fabulous I just had to have it on something else and what better than a once ugly journal that was sitting on the shelf screaming "Take me home, Make me PRETTY!" I swear I heard it, I'm not crazy! Also it gave me a chance to use some of the washi tape I made out of a few stamps, some twinkling H2Os and a roll of inexpensive masking tape. This is so simple to do, I plan to go back and get a few more journals to alter and give as gifts. It comes together quickly and looks amazing and there are plenty of ways to personalize and customize to suit the crafter's taste. The hardest part was trying to fussy cut the image with an X-Acto knife to make sure I didn't have any empty white spaces. Its not really a necessary step but to me it looks more professional. I plan to enter this in the 7 kids challenge blog, Anything goes, Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge, It's a Mystery, and the FFF Challenge over at Splendid Stamping,  "Cut it Out" since this definitely took some time to cut out! Such a fun blog challenge, if you're feeling crafty you should definitely stop by and play along. Hope to see you there TTYL!

 

-Krys

Hanging Around

Back again and today we'll be bumming wifi from Mc Donalds, while my kids run themselves silly at the Play Place ^.^ ! I swear its starting to feel like a fun game, you never know where I'll blog from next hee hee! Anywho, the other day I was looking over on one of my favorite blogs,  Paper Drama and remembered a wonderful tutorial on rendering leopard print with copic markers. I've been meaning to try it out myself it really is a gorgeous technique requires only about 3 or 4 markers and is so easy to do. I've also been obsessed with how great the Anya Strolls body looks with  C.C. Friday Night's head so I keep playing around with the paper piecing long after the Alter Ego challenge over at Splendid Stamping has ended. I also noticed I've been doing a lot of cards so I decided to give a few other projects a chance, that being said, whipped out my Homemade Mod Podge and got to work. This is what I came up with:

Head: c.c. Friday Night Body: Anya Strolls

I started with a plain ol' balsa wood door hanger from my local CSS and covered it in black cardstock. I then cut out rectangles in various sizes from several different scraps from a DCWV stack and glued them down. Next came my Anya/ Friday combo with more Mod Podge and the sentiment from the Anya Strolls set stamped in no particular pattern, with red and black ink. A little candy cane stickles swirled here and there, a bow from my stash, and TA-DAAAA! Isn't it awesome? And you can bet this wont be the last project you see spots on, or my Anya/Friday combo! I plan to enter her in the latest awesome challenge over at Splendid Stamping, where the FFF challenge is "Cut it Out". So excited, wish me luck and thanks for stopping by!

-Krys

Dog-gone Cute

Hellooooo bloggers! Today's the day, as promised yesterday my head swapping obsession comes to an end as we reach the closing of an awesomely fun challenge over at Splendid Stamping . Seriously this was probably the most fun I've ever had with a challenge  and I can't wait to see what great theme they come up with next! My final entry for the Alter-Ego Challenge  (and quite possibly my favorite) was just so much fun and has a sort of modern vintage flair or at least that's what I was going for :D

Head: C.C. Friday Night Body: Anya Strolls

Sentiment: Winky Bean

For this card I used C.C. Friday Night with Anya Strolls.The trendy fedora with skinny jeans work well together and the perfect pooch complete this fashion forward gal! The sentiment from the Winky Bean set, along with some ribbon and pearls from my stash finished off the card and added the perfect final touches! Let me tell you, I absolutely adore how well the Creeper Crew heads fit on the Big Anya bodies! TGF stamps are seriously so versatile and interchangeable that you can get many looks  and possibilities from only a few stamps. This is especially great when you're just starting to build your collection because you don't feel extremely limited by only having a handfull of stamps! As a crafter I can tell you, card making is not the most inexpensive hobby, so I try and save money wherever I can and the versatility of TGF's stamps makes it easier to get more bang for my buck which is always welcome! This dynamic duo  is my last project for the challenge but fear not my friends, definately not my last creation! See you guys tomorrow and thanks so much for the support!

-Krys

Off With Their Heads!!!

Hello ladies and gents! I'm actually attempting to blog from my cell phone and let me tell ya, its sooo not easy so I'm gonna keep this one short sweet and to the point. Long story short funds have been tight so I had to choose between my cell phone or my internet and as much as it sucked, the cell phone will trump internet hands down any day (especially with all the places o ffering free wifi!)Anyway I've been keeping an eye on the Splendid Stamping blog because I freakin LOVE IT! Anyway they announced the other day that there would be no more gvt or retro fresh challenges but there will still (thank God) be a FFF challenge as well as another type of challenge to which the current theme is Who's Your Alter Ego a challenge that required switching heads, bodies outfits etc between two or more TGF stams. Personally I LOVE doing that just to experiment so this challenge was not so much a challenge for me. Without further ado,my super duper switcheroo:

(Left: Head: c.c. Lula, Body: c.c. Leslie / RIGHT: Head: C.C.Friday Night,  Body: Anya Styles) 

Both ladies (well all 4) are colored with copics and glittered beyond all reason with Waterfall stickles all papers are DCWV. 

  

This lovely creation is the first of a few more creations to be entered in the Who's Your Alter Ego Challenge challenge at splendis stamping so wish me luck and stay tuned!

-Krys

A 'SMASH' ing Alteration

Hi bloggers, its been a while, I'm still trying to turn those stubborn lemons into something worth the wait but its slow going. Meanwhile, I'd been working on a project that has taken me quite a while to complete. I'm proud to say, it has been completed and I couldn't be more excited to show and tell, but first, a back story!

A few months ago I started seeing these K & Co 'Smash Journals' everywhere (along with DIY tutorials on how to make your own). I loved the tutorials because when you can DIY and save money its always a great feeling on you and your pockets! And lets face it, at roughly 14.99 a book its a bit steep so why not do it yourself? why? I'll tell you why, Michaels sent me a '50% off one regular priced item' coupon in the mail and it was burning a hole in my pocket :). Anywho, I selected and purchased the one with the pink binding, Pretty Style Folio, got home, and waited for some great creative revelation to hit me... Weeks later I was still waiting. I tried journaling in it, doodling, treating it like a scrapbook, but nothing. No great work of art or much of anything else came about and I started to give up hope until one day I found the problem. It was boring, plain, and downright ordinary looking! How could I be inspired when the book itself was so uninspiring. I immediately began to design the perfect cover and to do this I had to take it in stages. A lot of hard work and many hours went into this project but it was definitely a labor of love and I'd do it again!

(BEFORE)

 

 

(AFTER)

Lolli Anya, Cheeky Geeky, Queen Bean, Alice Bean, C.C. Madden, Cheshire Bean, C.C. Friday Night, C.C. Lula

Sentiments: Anya Strolls, Anya Lifts, O&A My Favorite Things

Cheeky Geeky, Queen Bean, Alice Bean, C.C. Madden

Cheeky Geeky, Queen Bean, Alice Bean, C.C. Madden, Cheshire Bean

Lolli Anya, C.C. Lula, Cheeky Geeky, Cheshire Bean

Sentiments: Anya Strolls, Anya Lifts

Lolli Anya, Cheeky Geeky, C.C. Lula, C.C. Friday Night

C.C. Madden & Lolli Anya

 

As you can see, I had lots of fun layering and distressing and stamping and coloring to bring this book cover to life! I used quite a few of the TGF stamps in my arsenal, and actually have about 5 or 6 more colored up that were unfortunately too big to make the cover but will still be used for future projects, promise! I used Tim Holtz Walnut Stain to distress the edges of several sheets of paper from DCWV as well as a sheet of translucent vellum with script. I added a few pages from an old book also distressed with Walnut Stain as well as Antique Linen. Each of the girlies were stamped around a sheet of kraft colored cardstock and each took about an hour to color. I love the way prismas look on kraft cardstock so I tried to experiment with skin tones as well as outfit colors and was very happy with the outcome. Dark skin is not the easiest to render on kraft, found that out the hard way. But the key is layering, much like working with copics. Once I figured that out it was (semi) smooth sailing from there! Everything was held on and sealed with my homemade mod podge, which I found a 'recipe' for on Pintrest. Honestly, can you really call it a recipe if there's only 2 ingredients? oh well, the point is, whatever you call it, it works GREAT! I'll never buy the real thing again! To finish off the book I created several charms to fit my personality, connected a few jump rings and made a hanging charm for the binding of my book (gotta love that shrinky dink!). I plan to enter my altered SMASH folio in the following challenges:

 

The Greeting Farm Retro Fresh Challenge- Layers!

The Greeting Farm FFF Challenge- School's Out

Simon Says Stamp Anything Goes

 

Until next time,

-Krys