Can You Tell the Difference?

I was making some clear ornaments the day before and I was using my polar white Flower Soft inside to make it look like there was snow inside the balls.  All I had on hand was the one little container and I ran out of Flower Soft.  Luckily I had bought a package of the white foam balls to test out making my own Flower Soft.  If you haven't heard of this before, you take the foam balls and rub them together to grate them, and it looks and feels just like Flower Soft.  You need to use the foam that's hard and looks sparkly - not the styrofoam one like the stuff styrofoam cups are made out of.  Here's a picture of the foam balls I used:

Here's a picture of one of the ornaments with the Flower Soft inside.  I put the container from the Flower soft beside it in case you haven't seen this product yet.  Its actually filled with the grated foam and not Flower Soft.

For the ornaments, you cut a circle of acetate just slightly smaller than the diameter of your ornament (just a hair smaller). Stamp your image with Stazon ink, and then colour on the reverse side with Sharpies, Bics, or Copics.  If you colour on the same side as you stamp with the Stazon ink, your maker inks will wipe away the Stazon.  Once the inks have dried, you roll your acetate into a tube small enough to fit through the opening at the top of the ornament.  Push the acetate through and it will unroll, going across the inside of the ornament. You can put your Flower Soft, or glitter, or confetti in before or after you put your acetate in there, either way works.  I used long nose tweezers to position the image inside.

Now here's a picture of some Flower Soft and foam gratings side by side (click on the picture to open it up full size to get a good look at it).  Can you tell which one is which?  If I didn't know, I don't think I would be able to tell the difference...

Since both look pretty much exactly a like, I think I'll be using the foam balls from now on.  You can also use re-inker to custom dye the foam.  I do have one other pot of Flower Soft - Sweet Pea - which is multi-coloured, but I think you could also just make your own custom colour mixes as well.  The little pot of Polar White Flower Soft cost me $9.99 ($10.49 with tax).  My little pot of the Sweet Pea was $8.99 ($9.44 with tax).  I was able to get 6 foam balls for $4.99 ($5.24 with tax) at Walmart.  Out of 3 - 2.5" balls I got enough "Flower Soft" to fill 3 Flower Soft containers - so basically one container for every 2.5" foam ball.  That works out to about 87cents in total for a container.  Sure a lot cheaper than $10 a container...  Now, I'm not saying we shouldn't support the craft companies and buy their products.  But, this is a much more economical way to achieve the same results as Flower Soft and is great for the people with very limited budgets.

So, do you want to know which one is which?  The one on the right is the Flower Soft.  If I didn't tell you, I don't think you would be able to tell the difference.  Am I right?

That's it for today.

Talk to you later...

Cat

Fruits of My Labour...

Pun intended!  I have a couple pictures I wanted to show you of the canning I did with the fruits I picked from around my neighbourhood.  My first batch was from all the apples I picked.  I made apple sauce and apple syrup.  The only reason I ended up with apple syrup is because I tried making apple jelly that didn't set.   I wanted to use the natural pectin of the apples, but I guess the apples weren't fresh enough (they sat for a couple days before I could do anything with them) and lost their pectin.  I boiled that applejuice for hours and it still wouldn't set, but made very nice apple syrup.  The apple sauce is so good.  Absolutely no sugar was needed for it.  All I added was a little bit of cinnamon and a dash of nutmeg.  Here's a picture of the applesauce & the syrup:

I had a lot of apple peelings left still after trying the first batch of apple jelly, so I figured I would add powdered pectin since I didn't need a lot of apple syrup.  The jelly came out beautiful.  I stewed up all the apple peels and cores for about two hours - until they were just mush.  Then I strained them through a jelly bag and let that drip over night.  Most of the articles/blog posts I read about making jelly said not to squeeze the bag or you would get cloudy juice.  It really didn't make a difference to me, so I put a pot full of water on top of the jelly bag to add weight to press more juice out of it.  I don't know how much more juice it really squeezed out though. Once I did as many full batches of jelly as I could from the juice I had, I had 2 cups of juice left over.  I didn't want it to go to waste, so I added pomegrante juice to make up 5 cups of juice and made another batch of jelly.  This jelly is really good! It has a very nice flavour. And I love the colour it has in the jar.  The apple jelly is so good too.  I'm looking forward to using it (and the apple syrup) as a glaze for some ham or pork chops.

If you recall, I posted a little while ago about one of my neighbours growing grapes in their back yard.  Well, I had picked about 2 pounds of grapes from them.  I made juice out of the grapes (they were really small - about the size of large-ish blueberries) and from the 2 pounds I made 5 cups of juice - exactly enough for a batch of jelly.  The jelly turned out great.  I had about 1/2 a jar too much, so I just let that set up in the fridge over night in a small plastic container.  Rob and I finished that off the next night with PB&J sandwiches for dinner.

So, once I finished with all the fruit I had picked in my neighbourhood, I was still hyped up about canning.  I decided I would try my hand at making marmelade. I was on the hunt to find directions on how to make marmalade. As a kid, my parents used to eat marmalade all the time.  I didn't like it - it was too bitter for my young palette. I have tried a few store bought ones and always found them bitter, except for one brand (which I don't remember the name of anymore).  It was sweet and orangey and so delicious.  I read the ingredients and too my surprise, it wasn't just orange peel in the marmalade, but also had lemon peel and lime peel. In my research, I found that what makes the marmalade bitter is the pith.  With this information in mind, I bought a couple oranges, a lemon, and a little bag of key limes (I used 6 limes for my marmalade).  The trick I found to not getting any pith on the rind when you're peeling it is to use a potato peeler on the thick rind fruit - the oranges and the lemons.  The little key limes, however, were too small and the skin seemed to be very tough, almost leathery.  Luckily, I have a good zester and used that to get as much rind off those little wee limes.  I took all the peel and chopped it into as fine slivers as I could, then boiled that for about 20 minutes in 1 1/2 cups of water so that they would soften and extract the essential oils.

The second important thing about marmalade making is to not get any of the tough skin around the flesh segments into the mix.  I peeled off all the pith from the oranges and the lemons, then cut the segments away.  I managed to only get 3 or 4 pieces of skin in there, but was able to see them when I was cooking the fruit and fished them out.  I had this big juicy mess left in my hands from the skin and what was left of the pulp I couldn't get out.  I just used my hands and squeezed it over a strainer to get as much juice as I could from the fruit.  The limes were another story though.  They were so small and the pith was so tough that I wouldn't be able to cut it away with out sacrificing all the pulp, so I just cut them in half and squeezed as much juice as I could out of them over a strainer to catch the seeds. Oh yeah, another important point to remember when making marmalade is to not get any seeds in there or they will make your marmalade bitter too.

I added this to the pot and let the fruit boil for about 20 minutes.  Once it was cooked I measured out enough of the fruit and peel and added enough water to make 5 cups and then added 2 tsp vanilla extract.  This seems to be the magic number for 1 package of pectin - 5 cups juice/fruit, 5 cups sugar, 1 package pectin crystals. After it was all cooked with the sugar and pectin, I put it into jars.  I couldn't wait until it was cooled and set so that we could try it.  Finally, the next day it was ready to try.  It was loosely set which was ok.  I didn't want it really set hard like jello, but it was a little softer than I would have liked.  Hopefully, the other jars will set up a little more as they age a bit.  Now, the taste, however, unbelievable.  It is soooooooo good.  It tasted even better than what the one I liked from the store tasted (from what I can remember).  I think what put it over the top is the vanilla.  I've been having this on toast almost every morning.  I will definitely make this again. Its a little more work than jelly, but so worth the effort.  Here's a picture of the jellies I made:

You can't tell from the pictures, but they look so pretty in the sunlight.  The colours are so deep and rich - almost jewel like.

Well, thats all I have for today about my canning escapades.  If you haven't tried making jelly you should.  Its really quite simple and all you need is some juice (but not juice from concentrate).  You can pick up real fruit juice at the grocery store really cheap.  After I slaved over the stove making my own apple juice, I found a litre of apple juice (not from concentrate) at Walmart for about 90 cents.  Its not the same as making it from scratch, but it will work if you want apple jelly and no apples. :)

Ok, so talk to you later...

Cat

Terrible, Terrible news...

I'm absolutely devastated this morning.  I can't believe this.  Its so tragic.  MY DISHWASHER BROKE LAST NIGHT!!!!  I have a full load of dishes and now I'm going to have to wash them by hand.  Ugh!  And to add insult to injury, the parts place has to order the part in and that will take 2 weeks to get here.  My husband wasn't all that understanding either.  He told the clerk I didn't know how to wash dishes by hand.  Its not that I don't know how... I just don't like doing it.  That also means I'll have to do most of the cooking because when Rob cooks, he dirties every pot & dish in the house and if I'm the one having to do the dishes, he's not going to step foot near the stove.  Other than whining because I don't like doing dishes, there is the fact that when I stand in one place for more than about 10 minutes, my hips start to scream at me.  And, my back hurts because I'm taller than the average person and I have to be bent over to reach into the sink.  I guess I better stock up on my NSAIDs until my dishwasher gets fixed.

Ok, that's enough self-pity for one day. I'll have something better to post about next time.

Talk to you later...

Cat

A Little Gift For You...

I have these images I drew that I never got around to using.  I thought I would offer them to you.  Hopefully, you can use them.  Please, if you download them, do not share them.  If someone asks you for the images, please send them here for the link.  Also, these images are for personal use only.  I would appreciate a little note back with a link if you use the images.  I would love to see what you make with them. :)  Here are previews of the images. The link to download will be at the end of this post.  Enjoy & create!

And here is the link to download the non-watermarked, full-sized images:  CatScrapFever Digi Stamps

Talk to you later...

Cat

ADFD Challenge #4 - Black Out

The new challenge at A Day for Daisies starts today!  The challenge this time is to use black.  Lots of black. In keeping with Halloween coming at the end of the month.  All the kids I know can't wait until Halloween gets here. They love all the candy they get.  Well, there is a little piece of "candy" for you over at ADFD website.  Tammy is offereing a very cute little witch for this challenge.  Its so cute - and along with the rest of the prize package, this challenge will be so much fun.

I don't normally work with a lot of black except at this time of year.  Don't get me wrong.  I love black.  The majority of my wardrobe is black (it very slimming you know).  It can make a project look very elegant.  Thats the reason I love doing these challenges.  It pushes me outside of my creative comfort zone.  Here is a picture of the project I made for this current challenge:

Supplies:
stamps:  Wildflowers digital stamp - ADFD 
card stock:  SU!  Black, Wausau Exact Index 110# 
Flowers:  unknown
Brads:  Michaels
Rhinestones:  Michaels
Inks:  Versamark
Tools/other products:  Pencil crayons, oms, Stampendous black sparkle embossing powder, black copic marker, stickles (black, silver, white), CraftRobo

For this chest of drawers, I first cut the bracket shape thats the bottom and top on my CraftRobo.  I made them two layers thick and I also cut one extra for the top to prop up the image.  I made 3 tubes, just slightly bigger than 3" x 3" x 1" and stacked them - these were the sliders for my drawers.  I them made 3 box bottoms  3" x 3" x 1".  I cut a swirl pattern on my CraftRobo, used xyron adhesive on the back and covered the front with Versamark ink and embossed the swirl with sparkle black embossing powder.  The big black rhinestones on the drawers didn't start out as black rhinestones.  I didn't have any black ones that were big enough for the project, so I used clear rhinestones and coloured them with a black copic marker.  Once the ink was dry, I glued them to the front of the drawer on top of the swirls.  For the top, I scored the bracket shape in half and then at the quarter mark.  I folded it and then adhered it to the top only putting glue on half, so that the folded flap was free.  I then attached the coloured image with pop dots to the part of the folded bracket shape that was upright so that the image would stand up and then tacked down the little point with some glue so the image would stay upright.  I then glued paper flowers with brad centres to the top for a little more embellishment.

I think I'm going to fill the drawers up with little embellishments, like buttons, rhinestones, & brads and send this along as a little gift for my niece.  I know she'll love it and it will help out build up her craft stash too.

So check out the challenge at ADFD.  Don't be shy - its all fun and good people.  The link to the challenge is in my sidebar, but just in case here it is for you again:  ADFD Challenge #4 - Black Out

Talk to you later...

Cat

Thanksgiving & A Bounty of Local Fruit

Its Thanksgiving here in Canada tomorrow.  While I haven't been working for the last 7 months, I've been trying to learn to do a few new things - like this year I wanted to learn how to can fruit & vegetables.  I decided to see what fruits grow locally, within my neighbourhood.  You would be surprised at the variety of apples grown in Calgary.  There are two trees in my neighbourhood in particular that have beautiful apples. The one tree (my favourite) has big sweet apples about the size of a red delicious with crisp white flesh.  The other tree is a crabapple tree with large apples about the size of small macintosh apples.  The flesh was a lot like a macintosh apple as well.  From all the apples I picked, I canned a dozen 1/2 ltr jars of unsweetened applesauce. The apples were sweet enough that I didn't need any sugar.  I also made and froze some apple pie filling - probably enough for about 4 large pies. I saved all the peelings and cores and attempted to make apple jelly, but it didn't set.  But, I do have some very yummy apple syrup for my pancakes this winter.  Its also quite delicious drizzled over vanilla icecream.  There are two plum trees in the neighbourhood also.  One tree is wild red plums - which makes beautiful jams. The other is the nice round blue plums which would make nice prunes and stewed plums.  I didn't ask to pick any plums this year because I didn't want to overwhelm myself. Also, I want to make sure I have the process down so that I don't risk poisoning myself or wasting all the ingredients. The last thing I'm really surprised to find growing in the back yard of one of our neighbours are grapes.  I noticed them the other day when I was walking Mitzy.  I didn't think we had a long enough growing season here to grow grapes.  Then I thought they must be just an ornamental variety.  Well, today as I was walking Mitzy again, the neighbours were out in their yard, so I stopped and asked them what kind of grapes they were.  They're concord grapes.  They're very very small and at first I though they would have been champagne grapes.  Here's a picture of one cluster:

 

You'll notice a few missing from the cluster.  I tried them.  They're very tart, but very flavourful.  However, they have a couple of seeds in the berry that make them almost impossible to eat as a snack.  I have about 2lbs of the fruit that I will juice and make into jelly.

I'm so happy that I decided to ask my neighbours if I could pick these fruits.  They were more than willing for me to take it away.  I think most of the time, they don't want to be bothered to clean it up when it falls to the ground and starts to rot.  All it cost me so far was the cost for some canning jars and a 10lb bag of sugar for the jelly.  So, look around your neighbourhood.  I'll bet there is lots of "free" fruit if you just ask.

Talk to you later...

Cat

So, I Caved Today....

I had a 50% off coupon for Michaels, so I used it to get:

Its not as heavy as I thought it was.  I tried a couple different ones before (a big yellow clunker) and they were really heavy and hurt my wrists when they flopped over to the side.  It could be that my wrists aren't as bad with carpal tunnel as they were before since I've been off work for so long now.  There are a couple of Michaels stores within about 15 minutes driving between stores and my house, so I think I'll take a couple more 50% off coupons and get some refills while I have the coupons.  I can't believe how much more they charge at Michaels in Canada for these things.  This gun is about $30 in the states, but was $54.99 here. That's why I never buy anything at Michaels (except the $1.50 stuff) without a coupon.  I think I'll try to limit myself now to when they offer 50% off coupons.  I had tried to put off my purchases before to when they were offering the 50% off coupons, but it seemed just as I decided to do that, they didn't have one for months and months and all they were offering were the 40% coupons.  Really, I have soooo much stuff I should be ashamed of myself for wanting to buy more and thinking I can't make another thing unless I go shopping.  Oh yeah, I bought some more card stock.  Like I need that like I need another hole in my head. :)  I've been using Tombow dry adhesive runners and, honestly, that stuff sucks the big one.  I have a card here that I made only about a month ago with the Tombow and its already fallen apart.  I had to go and re-glue a couple albums of scrapbook pages I put together using that glue.  It was getting expensive cause I had to use so much of it to get things to stick.

Well, anyway.  Wanted to share my new toy with you all.  I'll post a picture of something as soon as I use it to make something.

Talk to you later...

Cat

P.S.  Have you checked out the sketch challenge at CDAC that A Day for Daisies is sponsoring.  You have until the 20th to join in and you get a free image to work with.  Go check it out:  CDAC  You'll need to register - but that's free, then just look under the Challenges to find it.   See ya there!

Jasmine's Crafts

My niece is a talented little girl and she loves doing crafts.  Every once in a while I send her a bunch of craft stuff that I pick up for her, or stuff that I'm not using.  I usually have a box under my table that I keep the stuff in and when it gets full, or its a special occasion like her birthday I send her the box. Well, for her birthday this past summer, I sent her a bunch of stamping stuff.  I bought a stamp kit at Walmart and it was really nice. There were I think 8 stamps sets and a few other things.  I pulled out a bunch of paper from my huge stash and sent her a whole whack of patterned paper and card stock and some ribbon, embellies, and ink pads I wasn't using.  She loves it.  So now, we have crafting dates over the internet via Skype (my family uses Skype a lot to keep in touch).  So, I told Jasmine that I would post her projects on my blog so she can show the world her creations too - just like her aunty.

This is Jasmine's first project we did together over Skype.  Its a little gift bag/box.  I think she did amazingly well with it considering I was giving her verbal instructions and trying to show her over the webcam how to do it.

Front:

Back:

She used a stamp I had sent her on the front (the teddy bear - from the dollar store) and she coloured in a stamped image I sent her.

I think she did a fabulous job.  If you have a minute, please leave her a comment.  She's only 9 and I know it will thrill her to death to know people are looking at her crafts.

Have a great day!

Cat

UPDATE:  Here is what Jasmine wrote in an email to me:

 something amazing
today i cheked your blog and seen the comments they where AMAZING. i am so so so happy about the nice comments that people said about my crafts 
 from jasmine

Thanks everyone who commented on Jasmine's crafts.  I'll be posting more in the future. 

Blog background change...

Just a quick note.  I meant to do this at the beginning of the month but I kept getting side tracked and kept forgetting, so I made myself do it tonight.  I changed the background to pink in honour of Breast Cancer Awareness month.  My family has been affected by cancer too many times as I'm sure so many other families have been also. My prayers go out to those families dealing with this right now and to those of you who have lost loved ones to this horrible disease.

A Couple Cards & a Product Review

Hi all. I want to show you some cards I made for a challenge over at Crafter's Digital Art Centre being sponsored by A Day for Daisies. The challenge starts tomorrow, so don't miss it.  It is a sketch challenge that is quite easy to work with (if I can do it, you all can do it I'm sure). You will also get an amazing free image to work with. How great is that eh? Here are the cards I made. The first one is using the Fall Fun image (this will be the image Tammy is offering for the challenge - its so fun!).

Supplies
Stamps:  Fall Fun - A Day for Daisies digital stamp (main image), Inky Antics (sentiments)
Papers:  Wausau 80# Exact Index cardstock, Recollections, Cat Scrap Fever Designs (me - patterned paper)
Inks:  Studio G pigment ink
Embellishments:  Paper flower, brads, rafia, & silk leaves - dollar store,  button & ribbon - Michaels
Tools:  Craft Robo, pencil crayons (prisma & crayola), oms 

I used pencil crayons & oms to colour the main image.  I also used my Craft Robo to design and cut the pumpkin and leaves.  The little tendrils are created by putting some scrap cardstock in the cutter and then cutting very thin slivers of the cardstock.  They will curl on their own, but I wrapped these ones around a pencil and shaped them.  I don't think they'll stay nice and springy once they've been in an envelope and gone through the mail.  Its a shame because they look so cute.

This next picture is another card using the same sketch, but in a Halloween theme.

Supplies
Stamps:  Pretty Witch by A Day for Daisies (digital stamp - focal image), Studio G (sentiments)
Papers: Wausau 80# Exact Index cardstock, Recollections, K&Company (patterned paper)
Inks: Studio G pigment ink
Embellishments: Paper flower, rhinestones, & brads - dollar store, buttons - Michaels, black & green stickles
Tools: pencil crayons (prisma & crayola), oms 

This card is pretty straight forward.  I coloured the image with pencil crayons & oms.  Other than that, the only thing "special" is that I glued rhinestones into the buttons because I couldn't find my black embroidery floss to thread into the holes.  I also put glitter glue on the hat ribbon & black stickles on the cat on the witch's lap.

I really like this next card because the image is so cute.  Again, I really didn't do anything spectacular for this card, but I did add glitter glue to the wings because all fairies wings sparkle. :)

Supplies
Stamps:  Little Nimph by A Day for Daisies (digital stamp - focal image), Studio G (sentiments)
Papers: Wausau 80# Exact Index cardstock, Recollections, S.E.I. (patterned paper)
Inks: Studio G pigment ink
Embellishments: Paper flower, ribbon, & button - Michaels, pink & orange glitter glue - Studio G
Tools: pencil crayons (prisma & crayola), oms


PRODUCT REVIEW - STUDIO G CRAFT INK 

So, I found a new ink that I'm really liking for my clear stamps - especially the cheap Studio G stamps.  A lot of people have problems getting these stamps to ink up properly and problems getting a good image from them.  I haven't had too much of a problem myself, but sometimes the image isn't just so.  I bought some Studio G ink cubes quite a while ago and just used them the other day - on the cards I just showed you and some Halloween cards I made for my craft show (I didn't have time to take pics before the craft show, but I have one left that I'll post later - maybe tomorrow).  Since my Halloween cards have a lot of black cardstock, I thought I would try out the white Studio G ink cube.  This ink is really really good for a white ink.  If you look at the Halloween card I posted above, the white is bright and crisp.  Most any other white ink I've tried soaks into the paper and doesn't stay nice and bright unless you emboss it.  Also, what is so great about this ink is that it dries completely!  Yes, within minutes I was able to rub my finger over the stamped image without smearing it.  A lot of the other craft inks I've tried always take forever to dry (if they ever even dry) and once they're dry they will still smear.  Another thing that I like about these is the price - $1.50 in Canada (they'll be in the $1 bins in the US).  Plus, they have $1.50 glitter glue to match the ink colours.  Aaaannnd, (I know - it keeps going) it also matches some of the new recollections card stocks.  If you look at the first card, the ink I used for the sentiment matches the rusty coloured cardstock, and on the last card the ink for the sentiment matches the green cardstock (although its hard to tell since I stamped it on blue cards stock - but I did test it out to see how closely it matched).  The only thing is that I haven't seen a black ink cube yet.  If I ever do, I'll be snatching up one of those too.  I'm contemplating going back and picking up a couple more white cubes I like it that much.  So if you see these at a Michaels store near you, give them a try.  I don't think you'll be disappointed - especially at this price point.  Just so you know what you're looking for, here's a picture of what the cubes look like:

Well, that's it for today.  Make sure you get over to CDAC and check out the sketch challenge ADFD is sponsoring tomorrow.  It will be fun and you get a great image to boot!

Talk to you later...

Cat

ADFD Challenge #3 - Layers

Well, I'm back.  Things are still up in the air as far as the health issue I've been dealing with, but I'm not going to let it get to me any more.  Worrying about it isn't going to make things better - will probably aggravate it if anything.  So, thank you to everyone for sending their well wishes.  I really appreciate it.

Today is the start of the A Day for Daisies Challenge #3.  The theme this time is Layers - lot of layers.  I usually don't use a whole bunch of layers so this was going to be a stretch for me - but I guess that's why its called a Challenge huh?  I really wanted to use the Babe Basket image.  It is so cute.  I also wanted to use it on a scrapbook page.  I had the perfect image for the layout - a picture of my niece I took only 12 hours after she was born.  I took artistic liberties with interpreting the challenge and decided to use "layers" (= shades) of a colour.  I have layers of purples and pinks in this project.  Here is the layout I came up with for the challenge plus a few close up shots of some of the elements:

 

 

Supplies:
Image:  Babe Basket - A Day for Daisies (printed on a Canon MP560)
Cardstock:  Recollections, Wausau Exact Index 80# white
Patterned Paper:  unknown 
Flowers:  Michaels (large pink silk flowers), unknown (paper flowers)
Buttons:  Dollar Store
Brads:  Unknown
Ribbon:  Michaels
Studio G glitter glue, Stickles, Liquid Pearls,  Tattered Angels Sherbert Glimmer Mist
EK Success Tulips Large Edger Punch, Copic Markers, Sharpie Markers , Cats Eye ink
Velum tag:  Deja View 

I printed the image 3 times and then cut out the various layers and popped them up on pop-dots so that the blanket and flowers would have some dimension.  I used my CraftRobo to cut the butterflies and glued little rhinestones to the wings and put purple stickles on the body.  I also used my CraftRobo to cut the title from the patterned paper and then used pink cardstock and cut the matting for the words.  It doesn't show up in the photo, but I used glimmer mist on the purple cardstock.  Once that was dry, with a pencil I lightly drew some large swirls and then used stickles, glitter glue, & liquid pearls to create some "bling" swirls on the background. I've had the vellum tag for a really long time so I thought it was time to use it.  I tore the edges and then inked them with purple Cats Eye ink.  Assembling the layout was pretty straight forward.  The only thing I had to do was mount the layout onto a heavier piece of Domtar 130# card stock.  After using the glimmer mist, the purple card stock warped a little.  I cut a piece 11.75" x 11.75" and glued the layout to it so that it will lay flat.

I didn't get this next project completed on time, but want to show you a really pretty image from ADFD.  I'm such a sucker for Christmas images and this one is so cute I just had to have it.  Its the Christmas Elf image and its a great image to work with - so many colour possibilities.  Here is a card I made with it:

Supplies:
Image:  ADFD Christmas Elf A (printed on a Canon MP560)
Stamps:  Studio G (sentiments)
Ink:  Marvy markers, Copic markers, Sharpie markers 
Cardstock:  Wausau Exact Index 80# white, SU! Whisper White, Recollections
Patterned Paper:  DCWV
Punches:  Martha Stewart Branch, EK Success Snowflake Edge, Marvy Uchida Snowflake, Marvy Uchida
   Southwestern corner punch
Ribbon:  Dollar Store, DMC floss 
ProvoCraft Snowflake embossing folder, stickles, glitter glue

I coloured the image with Copics and Sharpies.  I then put stickles and glitter glue on the hat and pompoms to jazz it up a bit.  I used the Southwestern corner punch after I double matted the image and wrapped embroidery floss around the edges through the punched corners.  I punch both sides of a strip of Christmas patterned paper to make it look sort of like lace and adhered that over the embossed whisper white card stock.  I punched a few branches with the Martha Stewart punch and glued them into a "swag"  and glued that to the card and then glued a punch snowflake on top to hide all the glue.  I put stickles and glitter glue on the swag and snowflake as well.

That's all I have for today.  You should head over to ADFD and enter into the challenge (the link is in my sidebar).  There is a great prize offered to one of the lucky participants of the challenge.  I have another craft show this weekend and have a couple things I want to prepare for it so I will post pictures of the new items next week.

Take care & talk to you later...

Cat