Envelope Mini Album cont'......

Hi and welcome back to part 2 of the envelope mini album. Ok so this is where we left off. After you cut your 2 pieces of paper out using the diagram in the last post and you fold it back and forth you will get this. Now take the little 1/2" lip and glue that to the long 4" strip and that will give you a "W" and that is what makes your inner pockets where you will have a pocket on the front as well as the back.

Next, now is a good time for you to use a corner rounder or decorative scissors to round or make pretty the lip of the pocket. I found that it was hard to do that once it was already glued to the card. Then, using your 1/2" mark that you made on the inside or your envelope line that up with the edge of your pocket and glue down. Go ahead and glue the rest of the edges down as well all the way around the card. Just like I did with the blue tape. I hope that you can see that well in the picture. Then once you get that done it's just a matter of cutting paper slightly smaller than the front and back of the card (so that your distressed edges will peek through) and gluing those down. Once you have the front and back patterned paper securely glued down, the go ahead and glue down the little flaps for your pocket.

Ok once that is done then you will need to open up the top pocket of the envelope and slip your 2" circle cutter back in to cut out the patterned paper. It's easier to only try to cut one sheet of paper at a time with those otherwise I found that you can rip your paper or it simply just want cut them both. Next, cut 2 more pieces of coordinating papers and slip those into the slots on the sides to cover the rest of the envelope. Again, you'll have to open up the envelope and cut out the half moon circle for the second tab. Then after that it's a matter of personal preference. You can decorate them anyway that you like. You can see in the picture above that I used distressed office tags but you could most certainly make your own tags. Now what to do with them.....well what I'm going to do is make a couple more of them then with my eyelet setter that I'm waiting on in the mail, I'm going to turn mine into an album using D rings through the eyelets. Or you could simply put this in a scrapbook and use it for a ton of journaling. You wouldn't be able to use the far back pocket once it was glued to your page but it would still be really fun and interactive for those flipping through your scrapbook. Or here's another idea....use it instead of a card. There is plenty of room to write sentiments or put pictures. Oh and here's an idea I just thought of......what about a money card? you could always fold money up and place it in one of the pockets. Or tickets or coupons to the movie theater. It would just make a great little card for that. Oh the possibilities are endless so go ahead go grab some of those boring old envelopes and get started and let your creative juices fly! Hope that you enjoy making them as much as I am.

Once I complete 2 more of these I have to set aside my paper projects for just a little bit and finish up a sewing project that I've been working on. I get too many things going at one time so it's time for me to stop and rewind you might say and get some previous projects done before I move on. So next time you'll get to see what I've been up to and it's for my mom so ya'll come on back soon and see what sweet something I've made for her.

Envelope Mini Album or Card...

Hi and welcome back....here's what I've been up to today. I'm getting back into paper crafting and was browsing youtube.com for some fresh ideas and stumbled across this and just had to make them. I give all the credit to Follow the Paper Trail...the lady is just unbelievable with all of her nifty ideas. So anyway I thought that I'd try my best to do a tutorial on how I made these.

First take a regular legal sized envelope, seal it up then clip each long end off so that you'll have an opening. Next measure 4" over from the end and make a score line, then 1/2" more and draw a line. That line will be for the placement of the inner pocket. Now go ahead and score your 4" line and use a bone folder or whatever you have handy to make a nice crisp, clean fold.

Sorry this picture didn't turn out very well, but what I did next was take my 2" circle punch and opened up one end of the envelope and cut out a half circle....then I went to the other end and did the same thing so that when the envelope is folded you can see both half rounds facing you.

Just as you see in the picture above....see how both half rounds are facing you. Ok now go ahead and distress your edges with some ink. I used walnut ink for my edges cause I wanted to really give it a worn aged look.

Now next step. I did this on white paper just so you could see the writing better but use some pretty patterned paper for this step cause it is what is going to form your top pockets. The lines that you see drawn are SCORING lines...not cutting lines so keep that in mind. Once you have those cut out you fold the paper back and forth.

Well since I can only put up 5 pictures at a time I'm going to have to end the tutorial here and pick back up in the next posts so don't go anywhere....the fun is about to start and you don't want to miss it....

Mom's 64th Birthday Party Begins!!

Ok so the parties started and I had forgotten to get a close up of the place setting...so I had to sneak to a spot where no one had sat down and grab a shot of this one. See how the little sunglasses just wrapped around the plastic ware and made the perfect napkin ring.

And here's the star of the party! My mom! Here the two of us are as she's getting ready to open her gifts.

FUN FUN FUN! Good food and Great friends and family! Here a few of them are with their "napkin rings" on. We all had so much fun. There was 50's music playing in the background and some of them got up and danced.

Another shot of some guest in their new shades....and in the background you can see the marquee sign that I made using again poster board and just free handing the painting.

And of course I couldn't have the guest going home empty handed so I made up gift bags and had them filled full of candies reminiscent of the 50's. Yes I googled to see what candies were popular and had a hard time finding some but the search was fun. Then I used more 45's as toppers for the plain brown paper bags and simple wrote Thank You on the record labels.

Well thank you all for allowing me to share with you one of the most fun parties I've ever had the opportunity of doing. My mom was so pleased with everything and the guest seemed to be as well. But I couldn't of done it alone, had it not been for my helpers I wouldn't of been able to pull it off...so thank you all!

Hope that this sparks some creative ideas for someone else who is wanting to do a 50's party. See you all soon.....

The decorating begins for Mom's 64th birthday party..

The decorating begins......as you can see although I made all the decorations, there was no shortage of people jumping in and helping me put everything together. My husband, son, youngest brother and sister-in-law were all there ready and eager to help. We actually had a good time listening to the 50's music and dancing around. I'll spare you and not show those pictures but trust me they were some funny ones. Especially with my brother...he's a cracker jack and had us all laughing even though we had worked ourselves silly.

We had the party at one of the local lodges so trying to camouflage all of the awards and what- nots that were already there was hard but we did our best to make them not stand out near as bad. I picked up some fuzzy dice at the dollar store to place on the tables as well and made the place settings with black plastic ware, pink napkins and used cheap dollar store sunglasses as a napkin ring. I'll show a close up of that a little later though.

Here gives you a better idea of just how large those "Pink Ladies" really were. They were HUGE and my mom loved them. They were the first thing that you saw when you walked through the door and so it really set the mood for the party.

Here is how I used the record labels. There were several of these "desks", I'm not sure what you would call them, that were around the room so I just used them for display. It made a great place for a photo op with the guest. So it turned out well I think.

I didn't take a picture of this at my house before bringing it to the venue. But here is the jukebox that I painted. I simply pulled up a picture of a jukebox then pulled out some poster board and free handed it. Of course my lines aren't perfect but I never claimed to be an artist, just a crafter and a daughter that wanted her mom to have a GREAT time. It fit perfect on the podium and was also a good place for a photo op.

Ok come on back cause I have more to show you......

Mom's 64th Birthday preperations...

Hi all....well I promised something special and here it is.....what's more special than being able to throw your mom their first birthday party? It took 64 years to do it but my dad had approached me about it and I jumped at the opportunity. What's even more special is that my mom and I share the same birthday so that made it extra special. This was back in 2006 when all this took place and I have just now found the dvd of picturs so I can share all the memories and things that I made for the party. So here goes....in the above picture you can see that I found old and new pictures of my mother and my siblings as kids then printed those off and used a variety of scrapbooking papers to make centerpieces for the tables. On each side there is a different picture. I did this so that those sitting on either side of the table would have one to look at while they were eating and I found people floating around the room so that they could get a look at all of them. When I was thinking about a party theme, the 50's was the first thing that popped into my head. After all, those were the years when she was a teenager and was loving all the wonderful things about that day and age. So I used the teal blue, pink and blacks throughout the theme.

What is a 50's party without a few poodle skirts? These were so much fun to make and they were life sized as well. You will see in a later post just how large they really are. And of course I had to add a Pink Ladies car tag. I used poster board to make the dresses, pink and teal blue tulle for the scarves and black tulle for the foo foo under the skirts and the rest is paint. The pink ladies car tag is made of poster board as well and just painted to look like a car tag.

Music Music Music.....yes that's one of the most memorable thing right? Here I simply referred to the internet for the most popular songs of the 50's and used cardstock to make the records and labeled them just like an old 45. They were super simple to make using a circle maker but you could also use anything to draw circles on cardstock and cut them out.

In my next post I'll show you how all these decorations came together so come on back, you hear?

And the winner is......

CONGRATULATIONS to Barbara at Barbara's World of Whimcees! You are the winner of my 100th post giveaway! Thanks so much for entering and I hope that you get many years of enjoyment out of my creations.
Thanks to everyone that entered and helped me celebrate my achievement. I'm still learning new things about blogging and how all this works so just bear with me and hang in there maybe I'll finally get the hang of it.
I have something special to share with you in my next couple of posts so be sure to come on back and see what that something is all about......

Hallway makeover...

Hi all! Well we don't have much longer to wait until we find out who the winner of the giveaway is going to be so if you haven't entered then please do so before the deadline. But in the meantime, I thought that I'd share with you what I've been up to this week. This started out as me just going to paint the little white side table then turned into a much larger project as you can see by the before and after pictures. So the above picture is of before and....

Here's what it looks like now.....I used the same color in the hallway as what I used in the kitchen and laundry room and it seems to all flow better. I'm extremely pleased with it. As you can see I also went ahead and painted the shelf black that is above the doorway.

Here's a closeup of the little side table before....I had painted it last year and roughed up the edges some to give a worn look but never have been completely satisfied with it sooo...

this is what it looks like now and you can see the details that I had added the first time to it better. I took anaglypta paintable wallpaper and cut out some of the patterns and glued them to some areas on the table to give it some more charm. I've used this technique many many times and just love it. I'm really pleased with the entire room now and that's just one more room less that I have checked off my to do list. It's on the living room hopefully soon. That project will take forever and I'll need the assistance of my husband to move the large pieces of furniture for me.

Well I'm off to see what else I can check off my ongoing list. You all check back real soon to find out who the winner of the giveaway is....good luck to all of you!

100th Post Giveaway!!!!

Ok just as promised here is what I've come up with for my 100th post giveaway. The lucky winner will receive everything shown in the picture above which includes an Annie doll, tooth fairy pillow, candle mat that is embroidered with Faith, Hope and Love, a pair of black earrings, blue earrings, red earrings and a red bracelet to match. The drawing will be over on February 14th and will be shipped out with the next 2-3 days. Unfortunately I do have to say something and I hate it really bad. I know that I have a lot of people from overseas that are faithful viewers of my blog but with the rising cost of shipping I have to limit the giveaway to United States folks only. I'm so sorry for this but I'm sure that those of you from overseas can understand and pray that you continue to read my blog. Ok now for the specifics.....I may have already posted 100 posts but I'm still a greenhorn to all of this and I'm not sure of how to pull up your email addresses just from random comments left so please....when you leave your comment to enter the contest please be sure to include your email address or I want have any way of contacting you that you've won so that I can get your shipping address. So that's extremely important! Also if your new to reading my blog, please feel free to sit back and look around a bit. You never know you may find something that sparks your interest. If your a returning reader, please be sure to get the word out about my giveaway. But most importantly I just want to say GOOD LUCK to EACH and EVERY one of you!!! Thank you so much for sticking with me and God Bless you all