La La Lands Guest DT - Anything But a Card

Happy Wednesday!
Are you almost ready for the big day?
Tomorrow it's Christmas Eve but there's still time for a new creation from LaLa Lands.
This week to team was required to make "Anything But A Card" and that is so much fun for me.
I've always been an "altering" kind of gal and so these are never "challenges" for me, more like time to have some fun!
A couple of weeks ago I found this cute wooden Christmas Tree at Hobby Lobby and imagined it with someone standing next to it. But I didn't think I'd get time to make it this year but then I got the super cute LaLa with Ornament and this challenge came up and I knew I had the perfect combination.
So I ended up with a new Christmas decoration and you ended up with a new project to see!

I also found a few challenges to help me along the way.

Trimmies had a Free week
365 Cards Day 292 had a AD for inspiration
Paper Make Up had a Christmas theme with Red, Green and White
Frosted Design had a Paper Piecing theme and I paper pieced the tree.
Allsorts also wanted Anything But A Card
Alphabet Challenge were at J for Jewels
Corrosive wanted to see Bling!
Hand Full Of Stamps wanted to see Red (a little or a lot)
Stamp Something had a theme of "Holiday Somethings"



I traced the tree and paper pieced the tree, star and trunk. I painted the base and added Puffy Paint and Glitter to make snow.
I stamped LaLa with Ornament twice and colored her with Copic's. I cut her out and popped one up on Pop Dots.
I added Christmas trim and rhinestones for the ornaments on the tree.
Finally I made a gift and added it under the tree.

Here's a close up of cute Lala!
You can see all the other wonderful team work on their blogs
Elena
Jane
Kathy
Kim
Kristine
Lisa
Maureen
If you have time in your busy Holiday schedule maybe you can enter the challenge to at LaLa Lands!
Have a wonderful Christmas!
Katie

Recipe Box and Matching Card

Happy Tuesday!
It is grey and actually "cold" only in the 60's for high's and that's cold for TX!
Last week I showed you a Halloween altered lunchbox and it actually got chosen as a Top Pick in the Halloween section at Card Of The Week.com!
So It spurred me on to create another box.
This time I chose to make it into a recipe box and to include a matching card!
I hope you like it!

Here you can see the box and the card together.
I used some fabulous dp from The Paper Studio that I got at Hobby Lobby, it really was the starting point for the whole project. The chipboard letters are from an old collection from the $1 spot at Target.
I used my Threading Water border punch for the border around both the box and the title and carried it through to the card.

This fantastic image is from Victoria Case from her "Girls" CD which is still available, you just need to email her directly, but it is well worth it!
I colored her with Copic's and added faux stitching to the mat and also to the nestie holding the the sentiment.

The inside is more of the wonderfu dp and a message mat trimmed with the Threading Water punch.

Here is a close up of the box alone.
I hope you enjoyed looking and have a great evening!
Katie

BOO! Did I make you jump?

Happy Saturday!
It's another busy weekend here with mre Boy Scout stuff and everything else that goes on in a family of 5!
Today I don't a card or anything with a challenge on it, but I do have a crafty creation to share!
Back in 2005 I started making Altered Lunchboxes and to date have made well over 100 different ones. I love how easily you can adapt them to any theme you like and how the same box can hold memories, recipes, photos, addresses, cards.....you get the picture.
Well the trend died down and you didn't see them around much.
But towards the Holidays there are always those people that you just can't shop for and that's when one of these boxes can be the perfect gift!
So as well as selling my cards on eBay I do make a few of the boxes and I really love them!
Enough of my prattling on and on and here is my latest!


The colors and design of this paper is so much fun!
I added tons of ribbons to the handles, I knew my stash would come in handy!
I crackle painted the chipboard letters and I love how that part turned out.



Here you can see a better view of the letters and also the cute spider crawling down from them!



Inside there are a dozen index style cards for you add Halloween memories to or you could store your favorite Halloween photos in ready to go in your scrapbook.

Anyway, I hope you liked it and if you would like to see more photos you can do on the eBay listing
Have a great Saturday and be sure to check back tomorrow for a new card for the My Grafico Design Team.
Katie

My Guest project for the Victoria Case Challenge

Hello Everyone!
Last week my card was picked (albeit randomly ;)) at Victoria Case Challenges and it meant I got to play with her Design Team on this weeks challenge!
Of course I couldn't do a project without finding other challenges along the way!

I started with the Victoria Case Challenge which was a color challenge of Red, Orange and Brown.
Then I took the sketch from Friday Sketchers and tweaked it to fit the front of the lunchbox.
Then I saw that Scrappy Frogs were looking for 3D projects and this fitted the bill there too!
Also The Secret Crafter wanted Hearts and Flowers and the border punch has hearts and you can definately see the flowers!
And My Time To Craft wanted Polka Dots and I have them on the ribbon and the flowers too!



This image is off an older Victoria Case CD called Girls but you can still get it by contacting Victoria at her Art Designs website.
I colored her with Copic's.
The dp is DCWV from a couple of stacks, The Citrus Stack and the Sweet Stack.
The sentiment is Marcella for K@Co from Target and the flower is The Paper Studio from Hobby Lobby.



The ribbons are always the fun part of decorating a lunchbox and this time I just picked as many that I thought looked good together. Then I added 3 flowers with fabric brad centers to complete the look.



I just had to show you a close up of this sweetie as I think she is so super cute! I'm not sure who or what she is thinking of but it sures makes her look happy.
I hope you drop on over to the Victoria Case Challenge blog and join in the fun!
Have a great day!
Katie

The curse of technology but I got there in the end!

First let me wish myself and my dh a Happy 15th Wedding Anniversary!
Through the good and the bad we are still together and still as silly with each other as ever :)
We are getting a rare dinner out alone tonight so Nate's Seafood here we come!

This morning was wonderful with a trip to Sam Moon's which if you are an accessories lover you will think you've died and gone to Handbag Heaven!
This afternoon I got a a couple of hours to update my blog, finish (well start) some DT projects whose deadlines are racing towards me. Well I put my Flash card in the PC and no way could I get it to read it. I tried a new card, retook the photos and still no joy. I went downstairs to use my dh's PC to read the photos, it worked and I emailed them back to myself to work on.
Then my editing program wouldn't work. Then I got one image to work on but the other was corrupt. So I had to take the photo again, run downstair to the other PC (climbing on a chair to reach the CPU as it's high on a shelf in the media closet), email it back to myself, run back upstairs and finally I got the image done.
Ugh...
Oh well here it is!LOL
I started with the colors at Kaboodle Doodles which were Black, White and Purple.
Truly Scrumptious wanted anything but a card
Then Bee Crafty wanted us to go a little OTT ( I think this is pretty OTT for a notebook)
Double Dutch wanted us to Go Back In Time and choose an old challenge so I chose their #3 challenge which was "Just a Note" where they wanted you to "pimp a notebook"
Whimsy Stamps wanted you to Add a Little Sparkle
and Pile it On told us "Good Things Comes in Threes"
Simon Says had a Back to School challenge and as the kids going back to school means more creating time for me I decided that this pimped notebook, that holds all my challenge notes, fitted the bill perfectly!
and last but by no means least Modern Sugar Blvd wanted to see Polka Dots.



This fabulous image is called Blogging Mama and is one of the latest Digital Stamps at Modern Sugar Blvd. I really think on a project like this digi's come into their own as I could never have found a rubber stamp this big but my digi's I can size them just how I like!
I colored her with Copic's and it's the first time I attempted black hair and I used just C5 and C7 and I don't think she looks too grey. The dp on the book is DCWV from last years Halloween stack. I printed out the sentiment and then matted it on Coredinations cardstock that I had embossed with Swiss Dots and sanded for the purple to come through.
I added bows and flowers and rhinestones and ribbons to try and get the "Over The Top" feel, did it work?



I just wanted a close up of her hair as it's the first black hair and I wanted to remember it! LOL
Anyway, I must log off as all my plans for this afternoon went up in smoke apart from getting this up but at least one thing was done!
Katie

Just Magnolia's 1st Monthly Challenge

As soon as I saw the challenge at Just Magnolia I knew I had to do it.
I've been altering items for about 4 years now and to add a beloved Maggie to an altered item was just what I needed to do :)
I'll warn you now that there are a lot of photos (7!) but I wanted you all to see how it turned out.



Here you can see that I chose a small wooden tray as the item to alter. It measures about 8" by 6" and is made of light weight balsar wood.
I painted it all over with Kiwi paint from Apple Barrel paints.
Then I covered the inside bottom, outside bottom and sides with dp from DCWV Nana's Nursery Baby Girl.



The Magnolia images I used were Well Dressed Tilda fromt he Holiday 2008 collection and the School Books. I colored her with my Copic's and tried to make the dress look like it had cherries to match the dp. I don't know if you can see but I used Diamond Stickles on her wings, hairbow and tights to coordinate with the glitter is the paper.



I added a sentiment from Making Memories that says "A thing of Beauty is a joy forever". I added a glittery butterfly from the $1 spot at Michaels and flowers from the bridal dept.



Here you can see that I added dp and two layers of ribbon all the way around the sides of the tray (apart from the handle ends)



A quick view of the back showing that is is painted and covered with dp too.





The final two views are just from other angles so you can see all the details.
I really loved doing this project and it was a nice break from a card.
I hope you have a happy rest of your day, I'm off for a dip in the neighbors pool to cool off from this Texas heat.
Katie