Burlap Monogram

Well hello! Yes, I am still alive, despite the two-month long gap in the scrapbooking blog. I have to admit, I have not gotten a whole lot done in these past months--but I promise have a good excuse!

I may not have made a lot of crafty things recently, but I have been working on making something else--a baby! That's right, we are pregnant and due March 2013. And so, to be honest, for the past weeks I have not felt up to doing anything. The energy bank has totally run dry, so that when I get home from work all I can do is crash on the couch or bed and sleep until 6am, when it's time to do it all over again. Thankfully, I happen to have one of the best husbands in the world, who has been taking care of all the cooking, cleaning, dog-walking, grocery shopping, and all the other stuff I'm forgetting. He is the best!

But, last week, my soon to be newest sister-in-law was in town for a short trip which included her bridal shower, so there was a gift to be made! I had an idea of what I wanted to do a long time ago, but of course I waited until only a few days beforehand to actually get off the couch and do it. Bed Bath and Beyond was my backup in case my project went awry, but thankfully all went according to plan. Here's how it turned out (thank you Pinterest and Etsy for the inspiration!)

Okay, here's how I did it. I bought some burlap and Heat n Bond-type fabric stabilizer from Joann's, cut out a sheet of Heat n Bond that measured 8.5x11, and adhered that to the burlap. (For the record, if you ever misread the Heat n Bond instructions and have a massive accident where glue gets ALL OVER your iron--here's the solution: simply iron a fabric softener sheet and voila--the glue comes right off. Plus the smell of the dryer sheet is MUCH much better than the smell of burning glue. Just so you know.)

Next I cut out the burlap-adhered-to-the-stabilizer, made up the monogram that I wanted using Microsoft Publisher, and simply ran it through the printer. (Actually it was not so simple. My printer did not want to take the burlap at first, but my once again awesome husband somehow managed to push that burlap through until the printer accepted it.) After that I popped the burlap into a frame from Michaels, and tada it was done.

For a more helpful tutorial than this on how to print on burlap, here is a website I found super useful.

So Tim and Anna now have a little piece of artwork to hang on their new walls come October. And I feel a huge sense of accomplishment for actually getting a crafty project done. Since then I have even gotten a few scrapbook layouts done!

Since you have been so good as to read to the end of this post, your reward is a first look at our little baby (who at 8 weeks looked a bit like a hamster). Dave is convinced it's a boy, which, based on his family's history of making boys, is probably pretty accurate.

Wedding Cards

Hope everyone had a great 4th of July! We had a very laid-back day. Ate way too much food, watched fireworks from the back porch of my parents' house, and tried to comfort the dogs through all the loud noises.

And of course I did a little scrapbooking! My favorite thing to do on days off :-)

For today, I've got wedding/congratulations cards. This first one was super simple. Beautiful paper will pretty much do all the work for you, and with this card I used a DCWV paper pack. The colors and patterns are so fun and happy, and everything coordinates so that makes it even easier.

For both cards I used the same "Congratulations" rubber stamp, but here I embossed it with white embossing powder and a heat gun.

This second card was a little more time intensive. I used a border punch to create the detail for the wedding cake, and then layered that paper onto a piece of the same size and color paper. You could also do two different colors and I think that would look cool too. Three tiers of that makes a wedding cake, and I added some flower embellishments to the top, a ribbon along the bottom, and stamped it on the side. The background paper is also from a DCWV paper pack.

Here's a close-up of how the border punch looks on the cake.

Wedding Toasts

Here is the latest installment of the Allison/Stephen wedding album. I don't want to share too many of the layouts because I want to keep most of it a surprise for them, but here's just one final sneak peek:

Beth and Teresa did a hilarious toast together, and I wanted to make sure that was included in the album. 

It's hard to tell in the picture, but those are champagne flute stickers.

I cut out all the letters using my Cricut machine. I don't think I could live without that thing! The little blue flower embellishments I found on sale at Michaels.

Using a Layout Sketch

Hello again! Sorry it's been so long.

Got a little bit of scrapbooking done this weekend, including this single page layout for Allison and Stephen's wedding album. I wanted to try going from a pre-designed sketch (never done that before; usually I just make it up myself as I go along). So I did some Google searching, and found the My Little Sketch Blook website, where Liz has created dozens of layout ideas to give some inspiration.

I had two horizontal 4x6's to work with, so that narrowed down my choices of sketches. In the end I chose this one for my inspirational starting point.

And here is what I came up with (sorry about the weird glare above Allison's head)

I left out some of the frills (including the butterflies. Wasn't a fan of those), but I did want to do some kind of flower in the bottom left corner. I used a Martha Stewart flower punch for that, and whatever yellow and beige paper scraps I had lying around. I added ribbon to the top, because it matched the paper perfectly so I couldn't resist. For the journaling circle, I punched out holes using a nail (I know, super scrapbook-y equipment, right?) and then used embroidery floss for the stitching (I have pretty much every color of the rainbow, from my old cross stitching days). For the title, once again I used my Cricut and Sure Cuts a Lot software. I'm just now figuring out all the cool things I can do with that program. 

I really enjoyed having a sketch to start from, so I'll be looking for some more sketch inspiration for other pages. Usually I try to fit so much more than 2 pictures to a page, and most sketches don't do that. But for Allison and Stephen's album I have plenty of room for pages so I'm not worried about squeezing all of them in. 

Later this week I'll show some of the cards I've made using Target brand washi tape! 

Sneak Peek

Good morning!

Last night I finished a layout for Stephen and Allison's wedding album, so I thought I'd share it as a little sneak peek of the fun I've been having.

Every week I get fresh flowers on my desk at work--the leftovers from the flower arrangement on Sunday. Usually they are pretty dead and nasty by the time Friday comes around, but earlier this year we had a bunch of blue hydrangeas that still looked beautiful at the end of the week. (Probably because they had been in the senior pastor's office all week, and it's basically as cold as a refrigerator in there.)

I was so excited when I saw the flowers, since blue hydrangeas were part of Allison's bouquet. So I cut them up, pressed them in a book, 3 months later zipped them through my laminating machine, and voila--a beautiful embellishment to these even more beautiful pictures!

Hello!

Hello! I am finally starting this blog. I've been meaning to for ages, but never got around to pushing the publish button.

I wanted somewhere to document the different scrapbooking/crafty projects I am working on, and of course to share them with all you on the internet. (My family is probably tired of being forced to gush about my crafty projects, so I need a fresh audience.)

I am so, so excited about my latest scrapbooking endeavor. My lovely friend, Allison, got married in January and I am working on her wedding album. Their wedding pictures were gorgeous. Nothing makes scrapbooking fun like beautiful pictures.

I can't wait to hand Allison and Stephen their (very belated) wedding gift. But for now, I am having fun with the process of making it :-)