Basic Grey Guest Designer Week 2

I've had a lot of fun playing along as a guest designer at Basic Grey Challenge blog this month and this time the theme was wide open with anything goes. I find that having the creative freedom to do ANYTHING can often be a lot harder than having a set bounding box. So many ideas flying around, its harder to get started. Well, I ended up combining the BG challenge with LOVEFEST2013C - Bring on the Bling  for this Girls Night Out card.

I stitched the background papers on my sewing machine. The chipboard swirls are embossed with black EP for a uniform look. The girls are colored with Copics and I wanted to color one of the dresses black until I realized I don't actually own a black Copic so instead my Bella wore a sequin dress improvised with Stickles. I'm pretty sure they had a great night out, but I'm off to get more Copics. Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies (All supplies are Stampin'Up! unless otherwise noted) :

• Stamps: Stampingbella Uptown Girls Victoria and Juliette's Night Out
• Paper: SU Basic Grey, Real Red, Basic Grey Among the Ruins from Scarlet's Letter collection
• Ink: Memento tuxedo black, SU Real Red, Basic Grey,  Copics: E51, E53, R59, R29, R27, R20, C-1, C-5, Y15, Y21, E33, E35 
• Accessories: Basic Grey chipboard flourishes from Periphery [un]dressed collection, black rhinestonesa, Icicle Stickles, Perfect Pearls
• Tools:Nestabilities, Dienamics flourish, sewing machine

~Olgy

CAS Christmas Candy

Popping in for another quick post. I had a chance to play along in the SCS Featured Stamper challenge today and case a cute CAS Christmas card from Allee's gallery. I know, its a little late... or early to be posting Christmas cards, but you could easily change it into a valentines day or birthday card.

The chanages I made from the original were to pop up the candies and wrap them up into clear packaging to look like real hard candies. I repurposed plastic cover from a paper stack, but you can also use the clear envelopes or other gift packaging. I also added silver chord and punched the bottom of the card.

Supplies :

• Stamps: Craftsmart candy stamp from Michaels, SU Best Yet
• Paper: GinaK white, chipboard
• Ink: SU Real Red, Versamark and silver EP
• Accessories: SU silver chord,  plastic packaging
• Tools: Martha Stewart scallop with 2 dots punch

~Olgy

Secret Santa Swap

Jennie organized a really fun Designer Secret Santa Swap this year to make a chipboard album, a card, an ornament and a tag in time for Christmas. I used a lot of Basic Grey papers on my album, tag and ornament and the card was featured in an earlier post .

Here's the same picture showing the back of the ornament. It's the fist time I've ever made one and I was a bit at a loss so kept it simple and decorated the Basic Grey ornament template with rhinestones on one side and cut out some some Christmas DP and rub ons for the other.

My Secret Santa was Novell and I got an absolutely stunning album and gifts from her! Check them out on her blog.

~Olgy

Vampire Girl Color Challenge

As promised, here's a layout for Candy Shoppe Designs Team Edward vs Team Jacob Challenge. I chose to be the vampire girl so my layout had to be full red, black and BLING! Well, I can't pass up on an excuse to use glitter, rhinestones and anything else that sparkles...

The theme of my page is actually not related to Halloween, but is titled "Miss Personality" and is a page about me. This is a copy of an old photo of me as a baby and my mom. I really wanted to add some lace to soften the dramatic red and black background, but since I didn't have any I just used border punches to recreate the same effect. For the layered flower embellishment I colored one of the white flowers red and then stamped over it with black, once it dried I covered it with Stickles. I also added a decorative pin, sheer leaves that Laura sent me last month and swirl chipboard. The journaling is printed on vellum, distressed with red ink, stamped with silver swirl and topped with rhinestones. I also used a glittery letter for my title and shimmery ribbons. Maybe I went overboard with the bling, but I think the layout still has an elegant look and I had a lot of fun with this challenge.

Don't forget that you have until tomorrow to leave a comment on CAS card post, I'll choosing one comment at random to send a surprise.

Supplies:

• Stamps: Nightingale's Song Alphabet from Inkque Boutique, Heidi Grace swirl stamp
  
• Paper: Recognition from Basic Grey Scrlet's Letter collection, vellum, white
  
• Ink: Versamark and white diamonds EP, silver, real red from Stampin'Up! and black
• Accessories: Pretties Kit from Stampin'Up!, rhinestones, Primas, K&Company Twinkle Type Chipboard, Heidi Swapp Silhouette words, sheer leaves, ribbonFX, striped ribbon from Michael's, Stickles
  
• Tools:Martha Stewart border punch

~Olgy

Pencillines Sketch Layout

I'm so happy the weekend is finally here. I had a couple of more projects that I finished up during the week (it's amazing how much more I can get done when I stop watching TV), but just didn't have time to photograph and post earlier.

The first layout is based on the Pencillines sketch 160 and Kathie Link's fun and colorful page. This is actually the first layout about our new home since I was so preoccupied with the move the first few months that I didn't have time to scrap. The page is titled "Joys of Owning a House," but I have to admit that there's some sarcasm in that title too. Before we can start enjoying the place, there was and still is a LOT of work to be done. To symbolize that, I journaled on the leaves of the tree - the hanging leaves are the things we were looking forward to and the leaves on the ground are the irritating things we have to put up with in the process. The tree is drawn freehand and the leaves are stamped and cut out from various scraps. On this picture my husband is cutting tile for our kitchen and let me tell you, I'm so glad that project is long behind us.

Supplies:

• Stamps: Leaves from God's Beauty set by Stampin'Up!
  
• Paper: Bluebird light blue DP by My Mind's Eye, Repose from Basic Grey's Scarlet's Letter collection and Mellow collection, brown, SU scraps for leaves
  
• Ink:Brown
• Accessories: twine, K&Company Amy Butler chipboard alphabet, Maya Road chipboard flowers, buttons, dreams pin, SEI tag, sandpaper

~Olgy

I'm Still Here

I don't know how I let the time get away from me. I was putting off posting until I got some new projects to share, but I had no time for stamping. Things haven't been going well at work - everybody's pay was cut by 10% so now I'm not sure whether we can proceed with buying our house. I spent a lot of time worrying, recalculating, renegotiating but now I just have to wait and see. In all honestly I don't even know if I still want to move given that all the improvements we were planning on would now have to be put on hold. At this point I just want to know one way or another.

On the bright side, after a few years or contemplation I finally bought a sewing machine. Last time I used one of these to do something other than a basic trim was when I was 9, so you can say I'm a bit rusty. I justified the purchase as an investment for making window treatments in the new house, but I'm also really excited about finally having a sewing machine handy for cards and scrapbooking. I plan on giving it a spin this weekend and posting something next time. Speaking of sewing, anyone have suggestions for good sewing websites and references?

In the mean time, here's a project I made a year ago but that I had a lot of fun doing - a chipbord album for my newphew's Cowboy themed birthday party for his 5th birthday. He just turned 6 this Saturday, so it feels appropriate.
The album is by Basic Grey that I got from my sweet DSS sis last year and the papers are from the Stampin'Up Outlaw collection.








~Olgy


Supplies (All supplies are Stampin'Up! unless otherwise noted) :

• Stamps: Wanted
  
• Paper: Outlaw, creamy caramel, really rust, chocolate chip, sage shadow, close to cocoa
  
• Ink: really rust, basic black, sage shadow, chocolate chip
  
• Accessories: brads, Hodgepodge hardware, twine, alphabet stickers by Basic Grey, jumbo eyelets, chipboard album by Basic Grey, ribbon
  
• Tools: punches, craft knife