I hope you are seeing more spring than we are! We've had snow, rain, clouds, wind and just barely enough sunshine to make me ache for warm weather! And that is what inspired my canvas this month from the March Mixed Media kit with Christy's fun papers!
Every year I can barely wait for warm weather and SUNSHINE after the long, dreary winter so I made a canvas that is happy and warm and full of promise of the coming spring. It says, "Bring back the golden sunshine."
Hi there!
I'm popping in here with some praise for Christy and her workshops and classes. They are amazing and so fun! I have loved them all! Christy's She Art girls are adorable and her color workshop and Three hearts class were great, too, but my favorite so far is definitely the Art of Wild Abandonment with Junelle Jacobsen.
Junelle teaches the "wild art" classes and Christy does her own series of videos on Wednesdays with her take on the class and projects. Junelle is the sweetest person - you really feel like you are there with her as she teaches. She is funny and real and so encouraging. I have loved "meeting" her through the workshop!
I am not an artist. I took an art class a long, long time ago in high school, but I haven't drawn or sketched since then. I can't even doodle and I have never used watercolors since I was a child so I am a complete beginner in this area. BUT. . .
here is my very first project from the class. Drawing radishes!!
Crazy fun! And honestly - if I can do this - anyone can. I love that we jump right in and forget the "rules" and we use the simplest tools - paper and a mechanical pen and a big eraser. Then we learn how to use watercolor and so on.
This is another idea from the class. Simple owls.
See - I am not an artist. My youngest children can draw better than this and I may not get much better. I doubt if I'll ever completely "WOW" anyone with my art - but I can already tell that I really like this way of expressing myself and I want to learn more. Isn't it wonderful when we find a medium that allows us to grow and fulfills our need be creative and expressive and that is satisfying to us! So I'm encouraging you to try new things - art or gardening or photography or whatever interests you - and try it!
Or rediscover it!
Or reinvent it!
And remember - we all have to start somewhere and the bottom is as good as anywhere! ;)
There are so many ways to share the things we love. We can take photos of moments and family and document them like I did in this layout of my son enjoying the sunshine and warmth of summer. We will love looking at them and remembering again and again.
I kept it simple since I want the photos to shine. The February frugal fab kit was full of fun things that reminded me of summer - vivid greens and yellows and reds and fun beach-themed ATC cards and bright buttons. I decorated one of the buttons with parts of the alphabet stickers in the kit to make a smiley face in the top corner and I used some of the Pink Paislee bling stickers to look like water droplets.
I love to give handmade gifts whenever I can. Since spring is coming and there are always several weddings and bridal showers that will be coming up, I made some simple recipe cards to give to new brides. I know I appreciated some of the recipes I received when I was first married. It was nice to have some recipes I knew were tasty and that my new husband liked.
If I have some of these cards on hand, it is so simple to add some kitchen towels and an apron for a personal and fun gift.
And since I love surprises and surprising people and I love gifts in pretty packaging, I'm sharing another of my loves a friend - peach jam - tied with lace from the February frugal fab kit and dressed up with tags and paper from the February main kit.
And I think I've found a new love! The little gift bag made with pretty paper and the pinwheel sticker would be perfect filled with cookies or candy or scones. I love it! Wouldn't it be so fun to give or receive a goodie in one of those?!
And as we jump into March, we will be thinking about numbers. We use numbers in so many ways during each day without even thinking about it or realizing it! We make lists (at least I do), we have to wake up and go to work or take children to practice at a certain time, , we have to watch the number on the speedometer when we drive, we measure ingredients to bake or buy a certain number of items at the store, we have time limits or we try to beat a certain time, we say or do things a certain number of times in a day or a week, we count down the days to holidays and on and on.
Numbers are everywhere in our lives and it will be fun to see how our numbers add up this month for the design team.
Join us! Leave a comment or a link on any of our posts this month or add your projects to the Scarlet Lime Gallery so we can see them! We absolutely love to see your work - you can count on that!
Hello everyone! I'm still playing with the January kits and I have to say one of the wonderful things about the Scarlet Lime kits is how much I love going back to them! I'm inspired all over again whenever I get out an older kit!
I pulled some paper and the Pink Paislee wood shapes from the January main kit and decided I could incorporate one of my other loves into a project - crochet. I wanted to dress up the wood shapes somehow and noticed some of them have little holes along the edges
I chose the cute table or cake stand shape and used a cotton crochet thread to backstitch through those holes with a needle to form a foundation. Then I crocheted a simple edging and now it looks like there is a lacey edge on the table!
Since we are thinking about love this month, I also cut a simple heart out of paper and sewed around the edge with a blanket stitch to form a foundation for more crochet. I added another simple edge to make my heart pretty.
I'll incorporate both of these little altered embellishments into projects very soon.
So grab an older kit and be inspired to find a new way to use it! We would love to see how you are inspired all over again!!!
There are so many things I love! Maybe I could make a list a mile long if I truly started naming everything. So I'll just list some of the first things that come into my head.
I love sunshine and warm weather.
I love lilacs.
I love to bake and cook and try new recipes.
I love lace and ruffles and pretty dresses.
I love the color green.
I love sewing and quilting and crafting.
I love to be at home.
I love peaches.
I love to experiement and learn new things.
I love my family more than anything.
I love to crochet.
I love surprises.
I love tomatoes.
I love bright colors and fabric and paper with fun patterns.
I love packages with cute details and pretty wrapping.
I love the sound of children laughing.
I love lazy mornings.
I love fireworks.
I love the mountains and the smell of pine trees.
I also love it when my box from Scarlet Lime comes in the mail!
I think this layout really shows some of the elements of my "style." There is lots of white space and balance and the embellishments are all related to the story - and I actually decided not to add any journaling or explanation to this page because I thought the photos, title and accents told the story by themselves. I drew the black border with a pen and ruler even though you can't tell I used a ruler. Hmmm - It just looks more personal right?
I love the separated title and even the separated photos. I usually like to group photos together but placing them apart made sense this time since my boy was looking up into the trees for birds and also shows that there was some space between him and what he was looking for.
This decorated tin can also fits my style. Its girly and pink and also has a vintage look to it because of the pretty paper and tags from the January main kit. I moved some of my favorite pens from my messy desk drawer and put them on the desktop so they are nearby when I work. This is a super simple project and definitely not a new idea -- but sometimes the simplest projects make me the happiest.
This spring frame was one of those experiments I talked about in my style post earlier this month. I have seen lots of pretty art made from butterflies and I just wanted to see what I could do with that concept. I cut out individual butterflies from paper in the January frugal fab kit and folded the wings up so they would be dimensional when I glued them onto the background. Most of the butterfly art I've seen has the butterflies arranged in a grid - like specimens would be. I wanted mine to look like they were fluttering so arranged them in a random slanted line across the page. I added some glitter glue to the foam letters to add some more sparkle and then put the page in a pretty vintage frame.
What is my personal style?
This is a hard one because I'm not sure I have a defining style. I doubt if anyone sees a project I make and they immediately just say, "Lori made that." Plus I love to try new things so I am always trying a new technique or a different pattern in my projects. Here is an example -
I loved the look and texture of iris folding and used the technique on a scrapbook page.
So - my style is ecclectic and constantly changing because of my love of experimenting and trying new ideas.
I know I love vintage items and colors and I love pretty, girly things so I love to use buttons and ribbon and lace. I also love to sew and quilt and crochet so there is stitching or fabric or some item from another hobby on my projects, too.
And as I looked back at the projects I've done this past year I noticed that I like my photos to be in a line or in a group but the embellishments don't necessarily have to be grouped together or with the photos. I just like the photos to be grouped together in a line or a grid. I also like the elements on the page to help tell the story or be related to the photos or other items. So if I'm doing a page about picking apples, I probably won't use veggies or pears on the page or if I'm telling about a child who pretends to be a star, I probably won't put hearts on the page. I want the colors, photos and embellishments to all be part of the story and to be consistent with the story. That doesn't mean I would never mix hearts and stars because I definitely would! If somthing helps tell the story or expresses an emotion or mood then I will mix and match any elements that show that.
I guess my style is a mix of lots of styles - linear, ecclectic, logical, evolving and unpredictable. Fun! I love it!!!
Hello and Happy Holidays!
I am going to share my projects using the December "Chestnuts and Cinnamon" kit this time. I have some projects started using the Dec. frugal fab kit, but I need to put them away for a few days and concentrate on the holidays.
The "Chestnuts and Cinnamon" kit is definitely Christmasy, but I find its easy to take elements of the kit and create so many great non-holiday projects.
I made a small and very simple pocket album to remind me of my goal to show more gratitude in 2012 and added tags with some of my favorite quotes.
The quote above is one of my very favorite and I want to make some art soon based it that I can display and look at often.
I am absolutely in love with these giant floss bobbins I made from the kit papers. I was inspired by this image
Photo courtesy of Pinterest
on my Pinterest board. It will be perfect for my goal to organize. I can't wait to use some of my pretty paper scraps to make more bobbins and then untangle my ribbon and vintage lace and put all my pretty organized bobbins in a basket to look at and use! I almost want to work on this one during the holidays because I am so excited about it!
My last little project is a letter charm using that fun wood alphabet from the December kit. I just glued a small jewelry bail on the letter and let it dry. Then I used a piece of ribbon from the kit to make a pretty monogram necklace. I made several of these letter charms for personalized and easy gifts. I also want to use some of the letters tied onto packages with bows to add some cuteness to my holiday gift wrapping.
Oh goodness - I truly have no idea what this year will bring. This will be the year that my youngest children are no longer "little" and my first one will leave home and be gone for more than a few weeks or months at a time. So I am going to hold onto each and every moment with them and try my hardest to let them know how important it is to be a family and that each one is so dear to me. (And I'm going to try very hard not to cry about everything since just writing this makes me want to)
I really want to be more GRATEFUL this year. I have so many blessings and more "things" than I need and I want to turn my focus outward to others a little more. I want to find ways to say thank you to so many people who help me and my family and I want to contribute more to humanitarian and other service efforts through my church and community. I guess I want to give back a little of the encouragement and help I have appreciated so much during these busy, crazy years.
I don't know how often I've said I'll have more time as soon as this event is over or after the children get a certain age or whatever and it NEVER happens. I know better than to think this year will be any different - it'll be crazy as every but I'm still going to set some of the same goals do every year.
Wish me luck!!!
I adore the November Scarlet Lime kits and I keep finding projects to make with them! I made an easy set of cards from the November Main kit "Sugar Plum" and I'm going to show you how to make them, too.
First choose any four coordinating papers from the kit.
Then cut one 12 x 3 3/4 inch strip from two of the papers and one 12x 1 1/2 inch strip from the other two papers.
From the the 3 3/4 inch strips cut
three pieces 3 3/4 x 2 3/4 inches
and
three pieces 3 3/4 x 1 1/4 inches
From the 1 1/2 inch strips cut
three 1 1/2 x 2 3/4 inch pieces
and
three 1 1/2 x 1 1/4 inch pieces
(Each 12 inch strip should yield six smaller pieces and a teeny scrap left over)
You will need three pieces of 8 1/2 x 11 cardstock for the card backgrounds. You can choose any color or a variety of colors. The background will frame and the patterned paper pieces like a window so the color and shade of the background will change the look of the cards which can be fun.
Trim the cardstock in half so you will have six pieces that measure 8 1/2 x 5 1/2. Fold the cardstock to make card backgrounds.
Ink or distress or stamp the pieces of patterned paper if you want and start arranging the pieces onto the cards. You can arrange the papers any way you want to on your cards. I used one of each pattern but you could use two or three of the same pattern if you want. I found it was best to arrange all of the cards before I started glueing them down so I knew I wouldn't end up with all one pattern on the last card and to make sure I liked the arrangements.
Remember that most of the papers are double-sided so you can use both sides of the papers to give you more variety and color.
When you have arranged all six cards the way you like them, glue all the pieces in place.
The last step is to use all those wonderful embellishments in the kit to make your cards pretty and unique. I added some ribbon and flowers from my personal stash but all the other embellishments are from the November main kit.
Did anyone else buy yards and yards of yarn fibers when it was all the rage in scrapbooking years ago? heh- heh - I couldn't resist pulling some out and adding it to one my cards. I can't help it - I still like the whimsy of fluffy fibers - within reason, of course!
So there you are - a set of six coordinated and easy cards to share your sentiments or to package together and give as a set.
And just so you know - you can use more papers or cut more strips from each paper and increase the number of cards you can make!
Have fun!