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Challenges

Project 64: Apricot

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Wk6 feb7_13_Apricot

I carried this crayon around with me for several days wondering when I would discover something that was apricot. It's an odd shade and there's nothing in my closet or jewelry box that comes close. The first thing I thought of was my great-aunt's china which I inherited. And, yes, one of the flowers is pretty close.

Chinaw

When I opened a package of dried apricots, they really looked too orange, but when I put the crayon next to them, it's not bad.

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Then I was at the mall, and noticed the banner Anthropologie had hanging outside their store. VERY close, I'd say.

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But finally, on Friday night, we went to the George Eastman House for an opening of the new Civil War photography show. While we were there we wandered into the mansion where the annual Dutch Bulb Collection is in bloom. I have no idea what kind of flower this is, but the veins are definitely apricot, and it is a lovely, lovely flower.

ApricotFlower2w

So in the end, I found quite a bit, and had some fun in the looking. I'm really enjoying this project, and both Tracy and Matt are on the lookout with me for the color of the week.

Project 64

PTI Anniversary Party: BIG Challenge

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I'm enjoying these Papertrey challenges. Today's was to create a card with a BIG sentiment, focal point . . . I don't have a lot of large stamps but I do have Big and Bold Wishes and used a similar repetition from an earlier challenge. I find I'm wanting to stamp in bright and cheerful colors to counteract the dreary snow and cold here.

WishBig

Cardstock:  Select White & Hawaiian Shores (PTI) and Romani (Basic Grey); Stamps: Big and Bold Wishes (PTI), Ribbon: Celebrate It (Michaels) and dotted from stash; Birthday candle (unknown).

Tags and Frames

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Today Papertrey Ink introduced new tag and frame stamps designed to coordinate with products they already have on the market. I love the versality of stamps like these. The challenge was to combine a tag with a frame. It's been a very busy day so, fortunately, I had a tag and a frame already die-cut as well as a cute Teresa Collins star. It didn't take too long to stamp and put it altogether. Eventually, I'll probably put this on a birthday card.

TagFramePTI

Except for the star and ribbon from my stash, all Papertrey Ink:  Pure Poppy and Select White cardstock, Fillable Frame #5, twine, Pure Poppy button.

PTI Button Challenge

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Today was the first day of the new release at Papertrey Ink. I absolutely love buttons and use them all the time in both cardmaking and scrapbooking, so the stamps and dies really appealed to me. The challenge today, then, was to use buttons. Betsy Veldman's project this morning used fabric which inspired me to go buy some interfacing and try fabric with the Love Lives Here dies. I'm very happy with the way it worked out.

PTIButtonCard

Along with the Love Lives Here dies, I used a sentiment from the same set, a small kraft card by Paper Source and three heart buttons from my stash. I scored two lines between the die cuts and the sentiment. The fabric came from a fat quarter I picked up at JoAnne's since years ago I got rid of almost all the fabric I had when I gave up sewing on a regular basis.

Team-up Thursday: Celebration

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Another interesting mix this week for "celebration." I decided on Valentine sprinkles (haven't made the cookies yet) and Nancy photographed one of Highland Ave's snow sculptures. Thank goodness for folks who celebrate the winter around here. We need a few bright spots during the long, cold, snowy winters in Rochester!

Celebration Diptych

PTI Anniversary Party: Color Challenge

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This is my third post of the day since each challenge card for the PTI Anniversary Party requires a separate post. Today's challenge is a color challenge. I wanted to get the card done right away since I'll be out this afternoon. If I'm lucky I'll have time to get another one done before the deadline. All these challenges are adding to my card collection so I should be well prepared when birthdays and other occasions come along. I chose Erin Lincoln's colors: Ripe Avocado, Ocean Tides, Vintage Cream, & Dark Chocolate. Sadly, I seem to need a lot of get-well cards recently so I went to one of my favorite sets for this–"Chair-ished." The sentiment comes from the "On My Couch Additions" set, and the papers are all from the Green Tea Leaves collection.

PTIRecovered

 

PTI Anniversary Party: Make It Monday-Take 2

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Scroll down one post for an explanation of this Papertrey Ink Anniversary Challenge. For this Go-To Sentiments card I decided to fill the Friendship Jar with thank-you messages. I stamped and cut a piece of Clearly Creative cardstock and fit it on top of the stamped messages. Sadly, it's not too easy to see in the image.

JarofThanks

All products by Papertrey Ink: Cardstock: Kraft, Clearly Creative, and Select White; Twine; Dark Chocolate button; Stamps: Autumn Tags, Autumn Abundance, Beyond Basic Borders, Vintage Picnic, Take Three Summer, Mat Stack #3 Collection, Friendship Jar, & Year of the Flower: Violet

PTI Anniversary Party: Make It Monday-Take 1

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More fun at Papertrey Ink. They've started a biweekly challenge with video. This week's is a Go-To Sentiment card where you stamp multiple sentiments from different stamps sets to create a card. My first one is a birthday card and uses sentiments from six different PTI stamp sets. I used Brilliance inks which have a bit of sparkle to them and colored the cute cake stamp (which has been in my collection for years!) with Copic glitter markers.

MakeItBirthday

Stamp Sets used: Round & Round, Blooming Button Bits, Mat Stack 1 Collection, Make a Wish, Birthday Bash Sentiments, Enjoy the Ride

Project 64 and Sweet Shot Tuesday

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Project 64

It's time to post photos for last week's Project 64 color and Sweet Shot Tuesday. Brooke made a comment about the purpose of Project 64 this week that sums up why I enjoy these challenges. "After all," she said, " . . . this project is all about having fun, learning and improving though practice!" I took 106 photos one day this week. I probably looked closely at about 30 of them, and edited many fifteen for a variety of projects, but I'm learning more and more about my macro lens and having a good time thinking about composition and struggling (as always) with lighting in my very dark house. In winter, especially, photographic projects are essential or I would only have my camera out to take photos of papercrafting projects.

Wk5 Jan31_feb6_Gray

Papersw

Gray Papers

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Spools of Gray

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Gray Ribbon

GrayButtonw

Gray Sweater (the photo I chose to submit)

And Sweet Shot Tuesday (as well as Project 52):

    Sweetshotbutton
P52-125

I think this is turning out to be the Year of the Flowers. They're my favorite thing to shoot this time of year. I bought my first paperwhite kit from Target just after Christmas, and they've started to bloom this week. Here's my favorite shot of the week:

Paperwhitew

And a different view:

Paperwhites2w

 

 

PTI Anniversary Party: Day 2 with Lisa Johnson

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My favorite tag in today's download as part of Papertrey Ink's Anniversary Party was this one by Lisa Johnson. I know I'll use it again and again. (Scroll down for today's other posts.)

FriendsForever

All products by Papertrey Ink unless otherwise noted. Cardstock: True Black, Hawaiian Shores & Pure Poppy; Dies: Limitless Layers & Tag Sale #3; Stamps:  Tiny Treats: Valentines; Ribbon: Summer Sunrise; Copic markers; Doiley: Martha Stewart

PTI Anniversary Party: Day 2 with Maile Belles

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Here's my second project for today's anniversary party at Papertrey Ink. Maile Belles is one of my favorite designers and I'm thrilled she'll be designing stamps as well as projects for Papertrey this year.

CelebrateYouMaile

All products by Papertrey Ink except the gems from my stash. Cardstock: Select White & Enchanted Evening; Patterned paper: Bitty Dots; Dies: Limitless Layers and small rickrack; Copic markers.

 

 

PTI Anniversary Party: Day 2 with Ali Miles

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Papertrey Ink's at it again today with great challenges. Today nine designers created tags that could be downloaded, printed, and used to create a project. My first project is a notepad which I need for an upcoming blog giveaway.

Notepad

All products by Papertrey unless noted. Tag designed by Ali Miles; Cardstock: Spring Moss, Select White; Stamps: It's Official, Mat Stack Collection #3; Dies: Limitless Layers; Button: New Leaf; Copic markers; Patterned paper: DeLovely (Cosmo Cricket); DMC floss

Papertrey Ink’s 4th Anniversary Party

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It's Papertrey Ink's 4th anniversary, and in typical Papertrey style they've started celebrating big-time! You can check out the details of the contest here. Despite the odds against winning this fabulous prize package, I knew I'd find it interesting to go back through the year (February to February) and look at what I created with Papertrey products. I found several I like more than others. This, this (the first card), this, and this. But I finally decided on this thank-you card that I created for all my Christmas thank-you notes. I love the simplicity of it, and the colors. And it uses one of my favorite stamp sets, Love Lives Here, that was released in the last year. Details are here.

HeartHomeThanks

 

Project 64

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I really need motivation to take photos on a daily basis. I've started Project 365 twice and made it to about June before I gave it up. It's much easier for me if I have a prompt of some kind, some kind of muse to keep me focused. Recently I came upon Project 64: Out of the Box which began just five weeks ago, so catching up wasn't much of a problem, although you can join the group anytime and just start where they are. Here's the explanation for the project, taken from the website.

Project 64

We are calling this photographic journey Project64: Out of the Box. We are a group of 6 ladies and one official color selector (my hubby) planning on taking a 64 week journey through a box of crayons. We are hoping to take the crayons out of the box for a little inspiration in our photographic work! Each week we will be assigned a color, chosen at random from a box of 64 count crayola crayons. We will then take our color inspiration and search for it in the world around us! You'd be surprised by the colors you miss when you're not looking! The goal of the project is to challenge us creatively, making us think outside the box, and to hopefully slow down a little bit and notice the world around us! Of course accomplishing a 64 week goal is fun too!

I just happened to have a brand new box of 64 crayons in my craft closet.

64Crayonsw

Here are the first five colors for the project.

5weeksw

Week 1 was Yellow Green. There's not much in my house that's yellow green, but while I was holding the crayon I looked up on my bookshelf and found Bill Bryson's "Dictionary for Writers and Editors." It's almost a perfect match.

YellowGreenBookw

Week 2 was Carnation Pink. I've had these tulips on my table for nearly a week. Another perfect match–even though they're not carnations.

CarnationPinkTulipsw

Week 3 was Chesnut. This basket holds my 8X8 pads of paper.

ChesnutBasketw

Last week's search was for Robin's Egg Blue. I didn't think there'd be much of that around here either, but was delighted to find some twine I just received from The Twinery that was Robin's Egg Blue.

RobinsEggTwinew

As it turns out, I didn't need to leave my studio to find any of these colors!

This week's color is gray, and I'll post it next week when the link goes up at Project 64. One of the things I think I'll enjoy about these challenges is another chance to put the 60mm macro lens to use.

 

One Little Word–January

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Rinda threw down a challenge earlier this month to create an art journal, book, or some method of keeping a record of your progress with your One Little Word. My word for 2011 is FINISH, and I am well aware that having some method of accountabilty helps me in any endeavor. Typically I made a book or a layout to document my One Little Word, but I've never done a monthly accounting. I've decided to join her, and created a tag book to record my progress.

I had a set of chipboard tags from The Paper Source that I purchased for a project that was never finished. (Hah, thus my word for 2011!) I decided this was a perfect format for this project. I painted the tags with Making Memories Manila paint, and distressed the edges with Tim Holtz Walnut Stain ink. Then I chose some papers for the project. I decided to stick with Papertrey Ink papers since their colors remain consistent from one paper collection to the next. I chose a kraft cardstock and shades of brown, kraft, & cream with a bit of green mixed in for the patterned papers.

Supplies

Coverw

My second decision was to utilize my stamp collection rather than letter stickers. For the cover I stamped Papertrey's Fillable Frame #9 and the word "finish" with the Fresh Alphabet. The 2011 came from Calendar Basics which I used to stamp all of the months as well as the little star detail (more about that later.) The tab and hanging tag are both from Basic Grey.

CoverClosew

There are seven tags total. I'll journal for each month on one side. For the back of the cover I typed up a list of projects I'd like to finish this year, cut them in strips and distressed the edges. Do I think I can complete all 12 projects? Probably not, but I think the list will help keep me focused this year. You can see one star next to JYC 2010 because I have finished that project. As I complete each project, a small star will be added next to the title.

ProjectPagew

Januaryw

For the journaling I've decided to use Papertrey's Spiral Notebook Page die and paper from their Library Ledger collection. It seems to be just the right size, and I'm trying to streamline this project as much as possible so it doesn't become an unfinished project in the end. I also decided to change the color of my ink whenever I use the word "finish" as a way to accent the accomplishments. You can see I chose to add a comment about another activity as well as my papercraft projects.

BookShelf2w

I found the perfect spot to display the tag book—on my table under my printer's drawer that holds many of my wooden stamps. I'll see it every day and will have a visual reminder of my focus for 2011. Thanks, Rinda! I'm not sure I would have done this without your prompting, and I'm glad I did.

 

Ced2011logo

I'm linking this post to Creative Every Day.