book of birthdays

book of birthdays,
originally uploaded by Laura ODonnell.

Laura ODonnell's planner turned out terrific - Love it. I think these would be a great gift. She took the planner and made it her own.

You can go see the easy-peasy perpetual calendar to learn how to make this. I wonder if I should make one.... maybe.... we'll see!

Guy cards

I hit the blog site for a stamp store in my area and thought I'd feature Ken's cards. Ken, hubby of the owner of The Paper Garden has started teaching classes. His cards are great! Wait until you see his pool table card... too cool, masculine and creative! I didn't want to say "cute" and shake the mystique of masculinity out of it. (shhh, they are cute)

Hope you get some neat ideas and if you're in the area, stop on by their shop, which is a card-filled paradise - Fulton and Marconi - on the Fulton Avenue side in Sacramento, California. Ken and Stephanie are both very helpful.

ATC Wine bottle background

ATC Wine bottle background,
originally uploaded by Clarian's Hawk.

I see all kinds of chipboard items for sale and also checked out the alphabet sets for use in the Cuttlebug - great little machine for dry embossing and die cuts. (I am curiously patting the little think mentally).

I purchased the Olivia set of die cuts (40% off, yay) and found it also had numbers and some fun items as well. A tag, vase, flowers, saysings were part of this wonderful set.

I've been floundering in my efforts to come up with material I want to put on an Artist Trading Card (ATC) because I'm not sure how to lay the foundation - layer a bit of chipboard with paper/cardstock, whatever... but the boxes (tissue, cerreal, cracker and whatever else comes to hand) are sometimes perfect for a background of 2 1/2 inches by 3 1/2 inches. I even used the distressed bars folder (embossing folder for the Cuttlebug) on the base for this ATC. I added the vase, tag (with ribbon), stem, flowers, and "hi" to the base and all were cut from the Olivia die cut set. I love the quiet design on the tag.

Our Creative Corner time to submit your creations

The challenge is simple - love it http://ourcreativecorner6.blogspot.com/2008/08/occ-challenge-limited-supplies.html - do not use more than a maximum of four layers. After playing with colors on Hero Arts, this should be a simple one now. :)))) What do we know about color.... ok, a little, but you can do this. You might even have one already made to order.

August 6, 2008 - someone's birthday....

I left the album and birthday card on the table for my daughter-in-law to open when she woke up, (I love Andi's comment on a previous post). The card was the wrap=around card which spelled out her name on the back. Rosalie is extremely talented in the art field, so I'm especially glad she liked the card and page.

I got a nice call from work saying how much she loved the card and the page. Made a great workday for me.

Pumpkin orange yellow and purple blue

Pumpkin orange yellow and purple blue,
originally uploaded by Clarian's Hawk.

I took two challenges - one on OCC
ourcreativecorner6.blogspot.com/2008/08/occ-sketch-challe... and the Hero Arts Color contest. I wanted to try the pumpkin orange, yellow and purple blue, but I had a hard time finding those particular colors, so I took the sky off of two pieces of DCWV 12" X 12" papers for the background and found I had used the Swirls embossing folder on a piece of bright yellow paper. I had colored by little chick in already, so it wasn't too hard to put together. I'm still not completely happy with my cuts - this was the second blue piece I tried. It came out fairly decent though.