The Good, The Bad, & A Tutorial Revisited

Were you a fan of CHF?? Are you still mourning the retirement of some of their images?? I still have people offer to buy some of my backgrounders and sets. Well, then you may be glad to hear that Stamper's Ink has purchased the CHF line. They have not rolled out all the deets yet, but you can poke around their site to read a bit about them and their plans. I am glad to know these fabulous images are being given new life! That is the good news.

The bad news is that they have taken down the old site, gallery and even the blog. Maybe they will bring some of it back. I am really bummed about all the great tutorials that were available, the blog and website were a great resource!

Yesterday I got an email from Heidi looking for one of the tutorials I posted on the CHF blog. Well, I had the photos but none of the text. What was I thinking???! Here is a recap of my:

Jam Box

You will need a few supplies...

12x12 card stock for box

5 1/8" square piece of card stock for lid

1x12 strip of card stock for the handle

scoring tool

sticky tape

brads

Score the 12x12 card stock at 4 1/2" and 7 1/2" in each direction.

Cut along lines on opposite sides, up to first score line, as shown in photo below

Cut away 2 1/2" of the outer corners as shown below, leaving 2" sides. Trim corners so they don't bind when assembling the box.

Add sticky strip to the sides as shown and assemble the box

Score the 5 1/8" piece for the lid at 1" on all sides

Cut tabs like shown below, add adhesive and assemble lid.

Cover the panels of the box with patterned paper.

The handle is a strip of 1"x12" long, attached to the box with brads.

Here is another box I made, it is simply covered with some designer paper and accented with ribbon and a tag.

I also posted these, used to package ornaments rather than jam. Really, the boxes can work for many different things. You could even use a die cut to create a window in the front of the box but I would only do that if the contents aren't super heavy or it might compromise the strength of the box.

Here is a modified version I posted back in June. The box is made from a 9" square piece, scored at 3" and 6" in both directions.

Oh the days when I had time to tinker! I haven't even canned a single jar of anything this year. Revisiting this post has inspired me though. There is still time for salsa and peaches!

Enjoy!!

Vintage Awash

Still feeling blah. Oh my stars, I don't think I have ever had such a bad stomach bug before. I am so glad to see Friday get here.

I have one more card to share from last weekend. I combined the CHF text background stamp with SU's Awash with Flowers set. Cherry Cobbler is hands down my favorite new SU color, the red is just the right shade. The leaves were done in old olive.

The text was inked in kraft ink, the tone is light enough to work for a subtle backdrop. The sentiment is stamped onto the Modern Label punch which I cut in half. After it was done and I was looking at the photo, the label looked like it could double as a pot/vase so maybe next time I will have the flower coming out of it.

I wish you a wonderful weekend!

Shady Shades

TGIF!!

This will be a short post, I have 2 meeting first thing this morning. One of the stamp sets (Floral Occasions) that Nancy released from Shady Tree Studios on Friday is filled with florals. You may recognize some of them as they were previously available through CHF. Her florals were some of my favorites when I was on that DT. They're still fav's. Here is a card I made using the Iris in the set.

I used Prismacolor pencils and Gamsol this time, mounting it to a neutral backdrop of paper that I think is MME.

While I was in the mode, I took out the tulip image from CHF, this one is not in the set but many of you might already have this stamp.

This time I used SU inks to watercolor. I love Melon Mambo but when watercolored it looks a little fluorescent. Definitely a contrast to the first, more vintage sample.

That is it for me today. Thanks for stopping!

Menu Monday: Crockpot Ravioli

Welcome to another week!

This week Tops (our local grocery store) is having a big frozen food sale. I came home with a small pile of bags of cheese ravioli. That means ravioli is on the menu for this week. I do not have a lot of success making pasta in the crockpot, except for this recipe. It is simple and all it needs is a salad and some fresh bread.

Click on the recipe to get a larger view. The tomato image is from a CHF set by Shady Tree Studios. It is colored with Prismacolor pencils and gamsol. In person the reds match a bit better.

Speaking of Shady Tree, keep a watch for some new releases from Nancy coming soon!

Have a great day!

Quackers for You!

Hello Stampers! We are midweek already. That means my boys will be home from camp in 2 days, that sure flew by fast. I have such a long list of things to do but the humidity is so high this week that virtually nothing is getting done. Can you spell d-r-a-i-n-e-d? We need A/C in a bad way.

Beginning on Saturday and running for a whole week is the 2010 Dare to Get Dirty over at Splitcoaststampers. This is the 5th annual and I am so excited about what the Dirty Girls, past and present, have cooked up for you! You can read all about the event here. I will be hosting a challenge on Tuesday. I have been busy working on my sample and I am excited about how it is all coming together. I hope many of you will play along.

I do have something crafty to show you today. This was a project I made for the Summer Fling which was cancelled.

The animal cracker box is from a tutorial I posted here last year. You can find it here. It is such a fun box and comes together pretty easily. The images are from the My Pets II set from CHF's Tom Fun collection. They are colored with Copics and trimmed to leave a bit of white. The almost look like stickers, don't they? There is acetate in the window but to keep the crackers fresh I still sealed them in a cello bag. These mini animal crackers are from a Mennonite market and are oh so addicting! It must be the size cause they are really the same flavor as the regular sized one but somehow taste better. I know...don't say it...I'm weird. Not news to me, lol.

Speaking of food, we're having Reuben sandwiches for lunch today. It's an office staff lunch at our house. I am drooling already. I prefer making them to buying them out because I like my rye bread to be seedless. How is that for needless, weird trivia about me?

Later!

Say Cheese!

The project I am sharing with you today totally cracks me up! I was in a bit of a goofy mood when I designed this....

Get it? "Say Cheese"...cheesy grinning moose...bag of cheese crackers. Yes, I am a cheesy kinda gal, ROTFL!

It started with these Gold Fish crackers that had mini basketballs in the mix. I made the base of the tag with a Spellbinder die and then repeatedly stamped the sentiment from the Kim Hughes Pet-Tootie sentiment set over the whole thing. The cute moose is from the Cool Dudes I set. His hands are perfectly positioned to hold something so I made a basketball to fit the space. My favorite part of this tag is something you probably can't see very well. (try clicking the photo for a better view) I added a touch of glitter to one of his teeth. He has been blingified!!! Just like those cheesy shots in the movies when they show that sparkle when someone smiles. Tell me you know what I am talking about. My cheesy hubby totally got my vision....after I explained it to him, lol.

We should be heading back home tomorrow, just in time to do up the mountain of laundry and ship the boys off to another week of camp. Note to self...next year don't pack the calendar so much! I'm such a knucklehead sometimes. But at least hubby will be home with me this time. I wonder what kind of fun we can cook up with out the boys around? Oohh, now I can't wait.

Have a super weekend!

Vroom Vroom

Happy Monday! Many of you might still be enjoying the day off today. Some hot weather has settled in so I am glad we are at the lake where the breeze helps to keep things a few degrees cooler.

Later today will be the first card making session at camp. This is another one of the cards we will be making. Masculine cards are tough for people so had to slip at least one design in there for the men in our lives.

This 1938 Suburban stamp is so cool! I love the classic look and what could be easier than simply stamping it in black? I paired it with the uber cool License Plate backgrounder from CHF. The celebrate sentiment could be for a birthday, congrats to a new driver or for someone embarking on a new adventure.

I hope the stampers like what I have planned for them!

Thanks for stopping by!

The Sweetest Moments...

are sometimes bittersweet! The Cornish Heritage Farm DT learned yesterday that Liz and Richard are closing the doors on the stamp company. They are moving onto a new chapter in their lives and hope to find a buyer for the business. I certainly hope they find a buyer too! There are too many wonderful stamps in their store. These stamps are like old friends so you can imagine the sadness we feel at the moment. You can read complete details about this news here.

But we do wish Richard and Liz much happiness in the next chapter of their lives. They are special people and their lives are never dull! It has been a privilege to serve on the design team for the last 10 months.

This news means the Summer Fling is over even though we were not able to complete it. I have several projects that I made for future weeks of the fling so now I might as well share them here. The Sweet Bee set from the Rummage Bin line is one of my favorite sets. I created a tag for a bag of chocolate chip cookies I made to share with a friend.

This tag is as close to collage as I get! In addition to the Sweet Bee set, I used the Distressed Circles and Vintage Text Scrapblocks. I was in "distress" mode, using several different Distress inks as well as some Distress Crackle paint. I remember making this several weeks ago, it was an inky good time, lol.

Here is a close up. The bottom border was made with a Martha Stewart border punch, the blooms seemed appropriate.

Well, my guys have returned safely from their canoe trip with the scouts. They have been all abuzz with stories of tipped canoes, cooking in the rain and chipmunks in their tents. They said it was fun but I don't think their definition of fun is the same as mine. I am so glad I stayed home, lol!

Today is all about packing for our coming week at Family Camp. I have a couple things pre-posted so my blog won't be idle while I am away.

I wish you a safe and fun 4th of July!!

Gettin' Ready...

for next week. We will be spending the week at Family Camp. It is a marvelous get away even though it is only 30 minutes down the road. There are programs, crafts and such every day for kids and adults. It is also a great time to reconnect with people we know through ministry over the years. Once again I will be offering 2 sessions of card making for adults. I limit each class to 25 but you never know how many people you will actually get. The card designs need to be fairly straight forward since there is a mix of skill levels. My goal in these classes is always to provide a fun time with fun projects that expose people to a variety of products and styles. I love seeing how excited people get about their cards when they are done.

Last night I had a power session in my studio, designing 8 of the 10 cards I need. Before work this morning I designed the last 2 cards so now all that is left to do is cut and prep the materials. My studio looks like a hurricane hit it, lol. No sense in cleaning it until I am done with all my prep.

Here is one of the cards we will be making.

We will be using a background stamp (CHF's Newspaper Ads Scrapblock), a border punch, doing some distressing and coloring directly onto the stamp. That is a good amount of ground to cover with just one card. The cream and black with red works so well together.

If I get a chance to photograph and edit more of the cards I will share them with you. There is so much to do in the next two days to get ready!

Don't forget to leave a comment on this post (and the others on the blog hop too) by tonight at midnight. Even though we are hi-lighting different stamp lines that CHF carries, the gift certificates up for grabs are good on anything in the CHF store!!

Blessings,

Friendly Kritters Hop

Welcome to week 4 of the CHF Summer Fling! If you are blog hopping with us then you should have arrived here from Jean's blog. This week features the adorable Friendly Kritters stamps by Tom Allen. I love the detail on these stamps! The card I made for this week served as a Father's Day card for my FIL.This kitty's expression is priceless! Once again, my coloring was done primarily with Copic markers followed by some Prismacolor pencil work. The twill ribbon seemed a bit plain so I stamped a fish from a Kim Hughes set onto it, it was just the right touch.

Here's what you need to know about this week:

-ALL Friendly Kritters stamps are 25% off this week (sale ends Thursday at midnight).

-make sure to leave comments on all the blog hop blogs by Thursday (7/1/2010) at midnight EST to have a chance at the CHF gift certificates (one $20.00 and one $10.00)! The more blogs you comment on, the better your chances!

-Upload a card using a Friendly Kritters stamp in this weeks special gallery (by Thursday at midnight) and you could win free stamps of your choice up to $16.99!

-Check the Be Creative Blog on Friday to see if you won!

-if you get lost along the way, go back to the beginning (Be Creative Blog) for the full list of hoppers.

Now it is time to check out what Kristine has in store for you!

Thanks for hopping by, good luck!

I Want to Ride...

my bicycle! Actually, I want to participate in another challenge, this time it's the Moxie Fab challenge to use a bicycle in your project. It also happens to use another CHF ATC set, called Bicycle Life. I love all the vintage goodness in this set!!!!

My Tim Holtz Bingo folder finally got used, isn't it fun? I embossed it onto some white core paper so I could draw out the pattern with a bit of sanding and inking with Distress inks. Since the card looked a bit masculine, I went with black twine to finish it off.

On a complete aside...last weekend I went exploring Flea Markets in Buffalo and came across a stack of old Bingo cards. They were the old cardboard ones, with 2 boards per card. I snatched a whole stack thinking they would be cheap but when I asked about the price, they wanted .50 each for them. Yes, .50 is cheap but not when you have a stack of 20-30 in your hand! Don't ask me what I planned on doing with that many. I promptly put them down. Thing is...I really wanted some of them. I am not a good bargainer though so I walked away. An hour later I was finished walking the rest of the market and was still empty handed. Those bingo cards were nagging me so I went back and asked the owner of the Bingo cards if he'd take a buck for 4. He agreed and now I am the proud owner of 8 cards. I know! What a big spender I am, a whopping $2.00, ROTFL!! No earthly idea what I will do with them but I am so happy to have them, lol. Now I want to go to more flea markets to see what other useless items I can find for cheap.

Blessings!

More Samples...

from the ATC line at CHF. This first one I made using the Haute Couture set. The Eiffel Tower image is my favorite and here I paired it with some fashion themed DP from Graphic 45. The deep blues and creams in the paper are so lovely. I did a lot of sponging around the image, giving it a dreamy, night time feel. Gotta love distress inks!

The other sample I made is another recipe card. We love to buy kettle corn when we go to a fair or market but what if you want it when there isn't a fair around?? I found this simple recipe and we have made it several times. MMMmmm is all I can say. The corn image is from the Fall Harvest set, I like the advertising feel of this one.

It's back to work for me, catch you later!

CHF Summer Blog Hop Week 3--ATC

Mondays are so much more enjoyable with these summer blog hops, don't you agree? Today kicks off week #3 and this week our focus is on the ATC (All Things Considered) line. I love these stamp sets!! You should have landed here after visiting Lisa's blog.

If the Summer Fling is completely news to you, then check out this post for full details. You don't want to miss the sales and prizes each week this summer.

For my sample this week I worked with the Can It set. If you have visited my blog for any length of time then you know I love to can! I've put up my first batches of jam and am waiting ever so patiently for the produce in the area to ripen so I can do more. I give a lot of it away and being a paper crafter means I can't just hand someone a jar, it neeeeeds to be gussied up, lol. I made this cute holder for my latest jam, strawberry-rhubarb.

I modified the dimensions on this box to create a shorter version without a top. The box was done in kraft cardstock and covered with some DCWV Farmers Market DP. I edged the top of the box with the Fence border punch from Martha Stewart. The tag stamp in this set is so versatile, I stamped it on vanilla paper and added the basket stamp over top. When cut out, the tag image looks like a real tag, I love it! The sentiment is from the same set, that is one of the great features with these ATC sets, they are complete with images and sentiments that work together.

Here is a side view of the box.

Here's what you need to know about this week:

-ALL ATC stamp sets are 25% off this week (sale ends Thursday at midnight).

-make sure to leave comments on all the blog hop blogs by Thursday (6/24/2010) at midnight EST to have a chance at the CHF gift certificates (one $20.00 and one $10.00)! The more blogs you comment on, the better your chances!

-Upload a card using an ATC set in this weeks special gallery (by Thursday at midnight) and you could win free stamps of your choice up to $16.99!

-Check the Be Creative Blog on Friday to see if you won!

-if you get lost along the way, go back to the beginning (Be Creative Blog) for the full list of hoppers.

Now it is time to check out what Laura has in store for you!

Thanks for stopping by, happy hopping!

Bawk, Bawk...

It is finally Friday! Hubby will be home tomorrow and I can not wait.

I have 2 items to share with you, they are actually items I made for last weeks Backgrounder focus at CHF, both using the Chicken Wire backgrounder. They also both use this adorable Sizzix chicken die.

We live in a pretty rural area and it is not uncommon for people to keep chickens. It also isn't uncommon to get random gifts of eggs. The senior pastor at our church has chickens and when I had my gallbladder surgery, instead of a card, I got a carton of eggs with the words "praying 4 you" spelled out on the top of the eggs. Cute, eh? So this chicken themed thank you card comes in handy around here, lol. Embossing the Chicken Wire in silver draws attention to it. The finished size of the card is about 4".

Back in the spring I tried out a new recipe for a dinner at church. It was a keeper recipe so I made a card for my files.

You should be able to click on the photo for a better view.

Our neighbors have chickens and though they can be somewhat noisy, they didn't really bother us. Now, the rooster they got last year...that is a different matter. I guess it is all part of livin' in the country.

Have a super weekend!

Blog Hop Week 2-Thomas Kinkade

Happy Monday! Welcome to the 2nd blog hop in the Cornish Heritage Farm's Summer Fling!

This week we are featuring the Thomas Kinkade line. There are so many beautiful scenes to chose from. If you have never ordered one before then you should know they come beautifully etched in red rubber, mounted on a wood block and have a color image on the block for reference. These stamps are amazing to stamp with! I decided to work with the The Old Fishin' Hole image. I colored with Prismacolor pencils this time, using Gamsol for the blending. The Fishnet backgrounder matched up well for the theme of the card. The sentiment is from the Kim Hughes Pet-Tootie set.

Here what you need to know about the hop this week...

-All Thomas Kinkade stamps are on sale this week---25% off! (ends Thursday at midnight)

-make sure to leave comments by Thursday (6/17/2010) at midnight EST to have a chance at the CHF gift certificates! The more blogs you comment on, the better your chances!

-Upload a card using a CHF backgrounder in this weeks special gallery (by Thursday at midnight) and you could win free stamps!

-Check the Be Creative Blog on Friday to see if you won!

-if you get lost along the way, go back to the beginning (Be Creative Blog) for the full list of hoppers.

Kristine is your next stop along the hop, I am sure she has something colorful for you to enjoy! Click here to get on your way!

CHF Blog Hop...Backgrounders!

Welcome to the first blog hop for Cornish Heritage Farms 12 Weeks of Summer! You should have arrived here from Joannes blog. If you happened upon here first, you can go back and start the blog hop at the Be Creative Blog. Two Gift Certificates will be awarded to 2 lucky winners who successfully follow the blog hop & comment as they go in the time allotted. This is not a race. The Blog Hop starts from the CHF Be Creative Blog today, comments must be made before midnight EST on Thursday (6/10/10). Winners will be announced on Friday. 1st prize is a $20 CHF Gift Certificate, 2nd Prize is a $10 Gift Certificate which will be emailed to the winning participants. The Gift Certificates will be valid for 6 mths from date of issue. PLEASE NOTE that if you have a Club CHF award awaiting you on your next order, you will need to wait for the following order to use your Gift Certificate as the store only allows one discount per order.

If you upload a qualifying card using a CHF Backgrounder to the special gallery for this week you will be eligible for the Design Team's Favorite prize which will be a rubber stamp/stamp set of your choice up to the value of $16.99 Looking forward to having you play along with us for the summer.

So...this week we are featuring Backgrounders. It is no secret that I love

backgrounders! They are so versatile and can be used in card making and so much more. For my sample, I created pendants using one of my favorite CHF backgrounders, Leaves #3.

These pendants started out with Sculpey Clay in ivory and green. I conditioned the clay and flattened it out before firmly pressing the backgrounder into the clay. I used a hobby blade and a ruler to cut the pendants into the rectangle shape and used a straw to make the hole at the top. After they baked for about 30 minutes and cooled, I used acrylic paint on the fronts. I let the paint slightly dry before I wiped a soft cloth across the top. The paint remained in the indentations left by the stamp. I added a length of satin cord and now they are ready to wear or share. This could easily become addicting.


Don't forget:

-All backgrounders are on sale this week---25% off! (ends Thursday at midnight)

-make sure to leave a comments by Thursday (6/10/2010) at midnight EST to have a chance at the CHF gift certificates! The more blogs you comment on, the better your chances!

-Upload a card using a CHF backgrounder in this weeks special gallery and you could win free stamps!

-Check the Be Creative Blog on Friday to see if you won!

-if you get lost along the way, go back to the beginning (Be Creative Blog) for the full list of hoppers.

Now it is time to go check out what Melony has in store for you.