My Thanks to You

Well, my dear crafty friends, the day has come that I've been dreading for awhile and it still makes me a little teary to think of the end of our DT. I couldn't say it better than it has already been said this week-- these wonderful ladies have inspired me, encouraged me, made me laugh and truly blessed my life. I will forever be grateful for the cyber-friendships we have created by working together-- Kimm, Susan, Gini, Patricia, and Lori (as well as our past DT Elise), I LOVE YOU ALL and want you to know you all hold a very special place in my heart.

But more especially, I want to thank YOU, our followers whose support has given us the opportunity to share our ideas with you each week. Wherever you are, across the county and even through the world, I have felt connected to you each time you left a lovely comment or entered a project in our challenges giving me the chance to visit your blogs and view your talents. I am truly in awe of the vast community of creative women out there-- you are all amazing! One of the things I love best about scrapbooking and paper crafting is the connection it creates between crafters; it doesn't matter where we live, our age, job, education, family life or anything else-- creating something beautiful and sharing it with each us other gives us a special bond. And that is what I will miss more than anything. I hope I will continue to see your projects and comment back and forth out there in blogland.




My farewell project had to be a Tear Bear and so I created this Thank You card to go out to all of you! Thank you sincerely for all your support and best wishes to you all!!!

Almost Time for a Countdown!

The Holidays are fast approaching and I have one more project for you today to help you with your Christmas preparations! If your house is like mine, counting down to the big day is a BIG DEAL, with the excitement of the little guys growing each day as they eagerly anticipate Santa Claus and all the other fun stuff that comes with Christmas. My project today is a quick and easy way for your family to count down, plus a cute decoration to put up in your house!


I used the gorgeous new Christmas papers from My Mind's Eye Lost & Found line to create a countdown clipboard. I bought a wood clipboard from the dollar store (love the dollar store!) and covered it with one of the papers, using glue stick to adhere it to the wood. (two coats, one on the back on the paper, one on the front of the clipboard). Then I added a bunch of fun ribbons across the top, including some lace, seam binding and a jingle bell. The numbers and "days until Christmas" I printed off my computer and cut to the right size. If you would like to make a similar clipboard for your home, I've listed the dimensions below to help you!


Dimensions:
Paper for clipboard base -- 8 3/4 inches wide x 10 1/2 inches long (round corners)
Numbers -- 5 inches wide x 7 inches long (printed two to a page and then round corners)
"days until Christmas"-- 7 1/2 inches wide x 2 3/4 inches long (round corners)
Mat for "days until Christmas"-- 7 3/4 inches wide x 3 inches long (round corners)

Supplies used:
My Mind's Eye Lost & Found Christmas Collection Kit
(unfortunately out of stock, but check out these other Christmas papers)
Colorbox Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Seam Binding-- Kocha
Misc. ribbons
Rhinestones
Jingle Bell

I hope this helps you in your holiday planning! Keep those Beary Best projects coming for our month long challenge, we are loving seeing all your talented work!

Time for Christmas Decorations!

Happy beginning of the holiday season and thank you so much for all your wonderful entries so far in our month-long "Beary Best" challenge. I am so impressed by all your great projects, keep them coming!

My project this week is a couple of quick and easy Christmas decorations featuring the awesome Merry Christmas line from Echo Park. I completely adore the color combination in these papers-- traditional red and green but dark paired with BROWN (I love BROWN!) and just a tiny bit of grey. So pretty! I am in a red/green/brown mode this week as I prepare for my Christmas craft shows and I have been painting and embellishing everything in these colors, including both of these:

First is a set of stars, about 4 x 4 inches painted, sanded, varnished and then a little bit of paper added before my vinyl words.


Next is a set of JOY letters, about 12 inches tall, also painted, sanded and varnished then decorated. I added my Echo Park paper to the J by tracing and cutting it out then putting it on with a heavy layer of glue stick (one layer on the paper, one layer on the wood). I glittered up my O using tacky glue and some glitter-- imaging this O done with the German Glass Glitter from The Beary Scrap store; I didn't have any brown but the vibrant hues of the Glass Glitter would be absolutely gorgeous on a wood letter like this!

Supplies Used:
Echo Park Merry Christmas papers (on sale right now, check out the great prices!)Colorbox Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Aleen's Tacky Glue

I hope I passed a little of my holiday mood along to you and I can't wait to see what you create this month!

Grateful

Please scroll down to see out Beary Sweet "Double or Nothing" winners!

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November is such a lovely month-- the beginning of the holiday season, a time for excitement, family and to remember to be thankful for all the wonderful things we have (as we celebrate Thanksgiving here in the United States). It's the perfect month, then, for the great challenge we have going on now, show us "Your Beary Best" and I am so delighted to see all the wonderful projects you have entered so far!
My project for this week is a Gratitude Journal:


I started with this Thanksgiving quote that I absolutely love and altered a composition notebook using papers from SEI's Oasis line-- these are perfect for fall and Thanksgiving theme projects with pretty fall colors and foil accents.

This journal could be used just by one person to record all the things they are grateful for or it could be used at the Thanksgiving table and sent around so that different family members had a chance to write down their thoughts, creating a family keepsake.

Supplies used:
SEI Oasis papers
Bo Bunny Double Dot cardstock-- Mint, Burnt Orange, Gingerbread
Tim Holtz Distress Ink-- Vintage Photo
Seam Binding-- Canyon (sprayed with Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist in Latte)
Misc. crochet flowers, rhinestones and stick pin

Keep those "Beary Best" projects coming all November long! I love visiting your blogs and seeing all of your fantastic work-- I am grateful for you!

Double, Double, Toil and Trouble. . .

Fillet of a fenny snake,

In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and owlet's wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

MacBeth Act IV Scene 1

Here I am with my second Double or Nothing post and this week is dedicated to our DT leader Susan (and a guy named William!)-- who inspired me early this week by saying she was waiting to see a Double, Double Toil and Trouble project! I guess I haven't had enough of Halloween because that got me in the mood for a little Shakespeare (I do have an English minor!) and a double dose of Tear Bear Witches.


And so my Double or Nothing project this week is a DOUBLE pair of Halloween birthday days with DOUBLE Tear Bear Witches to wish my two nieces a DOUBLE Halloween birthday! (Yes it's true, these two sisters, turning 8 and 5 this year, share that spooky day a birthday. If you read my Halloween post last year, you might know who else shares that day with them! Hint: There's a reason I like Halloween so much!)


Here's a look at the front of my Halloween birthday cards, the Tear Bears are decorated with all kinds of cute Halloween stickers and bling.

A closeup of one of the cards:

Here they are standing up:
And a look at the inside:

Supplies used:

Bo Bunny Double Dot Cardstock-- Grape, Licorice and Orange
Authentique 6 x 6 paper pad-- Glowing (sold out but check out these Halloween papers)
Teddy Tear Bear Pattern
Beary Creative Tool
Tear Bear Flush Brush
Color Box Fluid Chalk-- Creamy Brown
Color Box Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Sakura White pen
Sakura Micron black pen
Mulberry Paper-- Mocha
Mulberry Paper -- White

So, did you figure it out? Yep, it's my birthday too on Halloween, we are a whole freaky family of witches. And what I would love the most for my birthday is for YOU to enter our Double or Nothing challenge so I can visit your blogs and get inspired by your talented projects, so be sure to link up your project by 11:59 EST on Halloween night for your chance to win!

Spooky Double or Nothin'

Spooky Friday wishes to all my crafty friends out there!

I had so much fun making my Double or Nothing project for this week and can't wait to show you what I came up with:



I got this little wood coffin at my local craft store (it's about 6 inches tall and two inches deep) and couldn't wait to decorate it up. First I painted the whole thing black; for two reasons, first so I didn't have to cover every tiny surface with paper, and second, so that no wood would show between the edges of the paper.



Then I measured or traced each surface and cut some paper to fit from Authentique's fantastic Glowing papers. I know these are sold out in the story but Kimm has some super cute Halloween papers from My Mind's Eye and Echo Park that would also work great!

After covering the coffin with my TWO designer papers, I went to work embellishing it (oh, the most fun part!) with TWO types of trim (black tulle and Pumpkin Seam Binding) , two vintage Halloween potion tags (digi images bought off etsy), TWO black candy dots and TWO sparkly spiders.

But wait, I still have one more DOUBLE on my project, it's also a DOUBLE treat-- a cute coffin and then inside--


an extra goodie! I filled my coffin with some Halloween candy and this cute little mummy. I actually was thinking of putting a creepy skeleton inside but I've been making lots of these candy mummies and my daughter insisted this was perfect for putting into the coffin.


This one is a mini version made from a package of Tic Tacs (though I have been using full size Hershey bars for my other ones). Simply rip some strips of muslin fabric, glue around the candy, add two eyes and a sentiment (or any other decoration; I wanted to add a spider but then that would be 3 spiders and ruin my doubles! Hee hee).

I hope you have enjoyed our first week of Double or Nothing projects and are inspired to make one of your own. WE LOVE SEEING YOUR CREATIONS AND VISITING YOUR BLOGS so be sure to enter our current Beary Sweet Challenge by clicking HERE; you just might win a Beary Sweet voucher!

Last Day of Free For Fall!!

Happy Friday to all you fabulous paper crafters out there! Thank you so much for playing with us at The Beary Scrap during the last challenge-- you have outdone yourselves with all the incredible entries and I have had so much fun visiting your blogs to look at your creative ideas. You have one more day to enter to our Free for Fall challenge so link up your project by clicking here for your chance to win!

Here is a teeny peek at my second Free for Fall project:




For a long time I have been wanting to make a layout with the chorus from a Trace Adkins song that I absolutely love-- it makes me tear up every time I hear it, which is usually in my car full of 3 busy kids as I'm driving them from one activity to the next and the words really hit home for me:

You're gonna miss this
You're gonna want this back
You're gonna wish these days hadn't gone by so fast
These are some good times
So take a good look around
You may not know it now
But you're gonna miss this

And so I finally decided this was the week and I made my layout on this song and our crazy busy life. Here is my two page layout, with pictures of kids' various activities this week.


A closer look at page 1, this page has the song lyrics down the right hand side along with a picture I took in my car looking at my kids in the rear view mirrow-- I saw this idea somewhere in a scrapbook magazine once and thought what a cool picture, as I so often see my kids that way as I peek in the mirror to see what chaos may be happening in the back seat!


Here is the second page, down the left hand side of this page is a list of all the things our days currently include (like school, homework, swim team, football practice, piano lessons, etc) and my feelings about the craziness:

Supplies used:
Bazzill cardstock
Authentique Splendid 6 x 6 paper pad
Echo Park double sided Cardstock Victoria Gardens Wildrose/Bluebird
Bo Bunny Double Dot-- Coffee
Colorbox FluidChalk-- Chestnut Roan
Sassafras Lass papers, stickers, and layered flowers
Heart charm
Yellow bakers' twine
Misc. embellies

Thanks for letting me share this layout with you, even if it's a little bit sappy! And don't forget to show us your projects!

Pumpkin Free for F'All

I have been so excited to see all your wonderful projects entered in our Free for F'All challenge-- wow! Keep those entries coming, you are all so talented and creative!

My project for this week is a quick paper pumpkin you can make as seasonal decor or to use as table favors for a fall occasion. All you need is a scallop circle punch and some great fall paper!


If you want to try out this little pumpkin for yourself, follow these steps:

1. From your patterned fall paper (you could use Halloween papers for a spooky pumpkin!), punch 8 scalloped circles. My punch was 3 inches but you could do smaller or larger depending on what you have or cut them out with a die cut machine.


2. Ink the edges of your scallop circles and then carefully line them up exactly and fold them in half.


3. After they are folded and even, unfold them and cut off the bottom scalloped edges to make a straight edge. The straight edge needs to be the same on all of the circles so measure carefully. (I had a little bit of a hard time getting them even, so don't get frustrated if the first try doesn't work out perfect! Just try again!)




4. Begin attaching the circles to each other, one at time so all the scallops match up (as close as possible) and the flat edges are all together on the bottom. You may have to fold a little more and adjust as you go to get everything matched up. You also may have to trim a little off the bottom to make the pumpkin stand straight if not all your straight edges lined up. You should end up with a shape that looks like this:



5. Embellish however you want! I broke a branch off a tree in my yard for a stem and worked it through the center of the pumpkin. You could also use some wire, fabric or just more paper for a stem. Add leaves, curled up wire or anything else you like! I spritzed some seam binding with Glimmer Mist and used that for my leaves.

Supplies used:
Authentique 6 x6 paper pad-- Glowing
Seam Binding-- Key Lime
Colorbox Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Glue Dots
Aleene's Tacky Glue

Happy Crafting this weekend and remember to enter your project in our current challenge!

Buttons & Pumpkins

I have absolutely loved looking at all the stunning fall projects this way by our DT Ladies and also have been completely wowed by your challenge entries in our current Beary Sweet Challenge, "Happy Fall Y'All." Keep it up! You have an entire week still to enter and we'd love to see what gorgeous autumn creation you are working on.

Our challenge this week was to add buttons to our Happy Fall projects and I decided I wouldn't add just a button or two, but a whole barrel full!




Or at least an entire pumpkin full! The center of my card is a pumpkin made from buttons.




To start with I found a pumpkin pattern, (you can get your own copy by clicking here), traced it onto Bo Bunny Double Dot Burnt Orange cardstock and cut it out. Then I used Tacky Glue and adhered all shades and sizes of orange buttons to my pumpkin. This is a little tricky and I found it worked the best to just put glue on a small area, find buttons to fit and then move on to the next area, adjusting as I went. Once my pumpkin was dry I could then mount it to my card.


For my card I used some of the awesome new papers from Authentique's Glowing line. I love all their 6 x 6 paper pads, make sure to check out these new arrivals in the Beary Scrap store. I made my sentiment by applying letter stickers, inking over the top with an ink dauber and then removing the stickers.


Supplies Used:
Bo Bunny Cardstock-- Burnt Orange, Coffee, Clover
Authentique Glowing 6 x6 paper pad
SEI Windsor paper-- Farleigh
Seam Binding-- Key Lime
Color Box Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Pink Paislee Expressions Whimsies Alphabet-- Chocolate
Fiskars Border Punch
Aleene's Quick Dry Tacky Glue
Lots of miscellaneous buttons!

I hope the beautiful fall colors and weather find you wherever you are and continue to inspire you to create this weekend. Happy crafting!

Happy Fall Y'All!

Well, it's Friday and it's also time for a brand new Beary Sweet Challenge! Our new theme is Happy Fall Y'All and I'd have to say, this is a piece of cake for me because I LOVE FALL. I love the cooler temperatures and the crisp scent in the air. I love harvest time (and I do live on a farm! :)), back to school, football and the beautiful fall colors! I chose to focus on some of those colors for my card this week:



I saw this idea for a strip of circles on a card here and was so excited to try it! What a simple, classic and cute idea. So here is how I did it:

1. Cut a strip of paper 3 inches wide by 5 7/8 inches long (so it will fit on a 6 inch card base).



2. Punch 16 circles from coordinating paper and ink all the edges. I used a 1 1/4 inch circle punch and the beautiful papers from Scenic Route's Sonoma line-- these are so perfect for fall, love them!


3. Begin glueing the circles onto the cardstock strip, starting at the bottom and overhanging the edges and overlapping the circles as you move up. I laid all the circles out on the cardstock without glue first to get the feel of where they should go.



4. Continue until you have used all 16 circles, the top ones will hang over the edge quite a way, that is fine!

5. Turn the whole thing over and trim the edges of the overhanging circles so they are even with the cardstock strip. Then ink around the edges of the whole piece.

.
There you are! The strip of circles is finished and ready to adhere to a card. I zigzagged stitched mine to another piece of cardstock 5 7/8 x 5 7/8 and then attached that to my 6 inch card. My word is a custom made vinyl applique that was actually for another project but has just been sitting around my work table and fit here perfect!

Supplies used:
Scenic Route Sonoma papers (a seriously good price, check them out!)
Bazzill cardstock
Bo Bunny Double Dot-- Coffee
ColorBox Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Misc. jewels
1 1/4 inch circle punch
Vinyl wording

I can't wait to see your Fall creations, make sure to enter them in our new challenge for your chance to win!

Trucks are not Girly, Right?

Happy Friday everyone! Here is my attempt at something "not girly"-- I agree with Lori, I love to put flowers, bling, ribbon and lace on everything-- it is hard to come up with something not girly. But I think my masculine birthday card based on our current sketch came out pretty well-



While trying to decide what to do I had a sudden flash of this green pickup that I had seen on the Country Drive from Echo Park stickers and knew that would be the focus of my card. There are a lot of colors in this paper line but I stuck with just red, green and blue for my boy colors.

I popped up my pickup truck with some foam squares and then filled up the back with "Happy Birthday" strips. I couldn't resist putting just a little Stickles glitter glue on it for some detail and a few green hearts off the same sticker page as the pickup. (Hearts can be on a guy card, right?)

Supplies used:
Echo Park Country Drive designer papers and stickers
Bazzill cardstock
Foam Squares
Stickles-- Diamond and Black Diamond

Have a great weekend and be sure to enter our sketch challenge for your chance to win!

Brothers

Welcome to the second day of our brand new Beary Sweet Challenge with this great sketch for us all to play with! I loved seeing Lori's lovely elephant card yesterday and I am so excited to have her join our team permanently!

My project using the sketch is as 12 x 12 layout using these great Windsor papers from SEI. I thought the colors perfectly complemented the sepia pictures of my boys together.



I wanted to include many of the beautiful patterns from this paper line and so I pieced together the background of my layout instead of using just one large paper. I left off the flowers in the top left hand corner as this is a boyish layout (although I do think these papers are not what you would call traditional "boy" papers-- just goes to show you can use anything!). So instead of the flowers, I used a chipboard flourish that I first inked and then spritzed with Glimmer Mist. I really love how the whole thing came together and I will definitely be using these papers again! (I'm thinking beautiful for fall wedding cards!)

Supplies used:

SEI Windsor line Designer papers (on sale right now, check out the incredible prices!)
Bo Bunny Double Dot cardstock-- Shitake (base)
Tim Holtz Distress Ink-- Vintage Photo
Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist-- Sun Sisters
Pink Paislee EXPRESSIONS Whimsies Cardstock Alphabet Stickers - Chocolate
Martha Stewart border punch
Colorbox Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan

I can't wait to see what you make with the sketch so get those entries coming!

Tic Tac Toe for Back to School

I love this time of year-- back to school! And no, it's not just that my two older kids have been driving me crazy and I was excited to send them back (though that is a tad bit true.) As a former teacher, there is just something about the smell of a classroom, clean and awaiting new students, that makes me smile! Mostly it's the promise that the new school year holds-- those piles of new notebooks and unsharpened pencils, new school clothes and backpacks all represent the journey that the kids will undertake this school year and makes me wonder where they will be at the end of it next May and how they will have grown and changed.



So my project for this week's round 2 of our Tic Tac Toe challenge is a little teacher gift for the first day of school. This one is actually for my 4 year old's preschool teacher as he doesn't start until next week and her gift is still at my house-- the other two kids already took theirs on back to school night.


This was a really quick and simple gift to make. I used a small legal pad and just covered it by cutting a 5 x 8 piece of paper for the front and gluing it securely to the top of the notebook (not the paper itself). I cut a 5 x 9 piece for the back and folded it over the top to cover where I glued the first piece. The pencil holder is an empty Prima flower bottle that I have been holding onto knowing it was too cute to throw away! It's always great to reuse stuff!

I used some not-so-typical school paper from SEI's Sonoma collection. I really love the colors of these papers and they are perfect for a more vintage look instead of the typical bright primary colors. I thought the sheet of numbers really represented a back to school theme. I also used the Die Cut Labels and Arrows from that collection. These are all a fantastic price right now at the store so make sure you check them out!


For the Tic Tac Toe choices I used distress (dark brown ink around the edges and I used my Zutter Distress-All to roughen up some of the papers), glitter (red Stickles around the apples) and lace. For me lace wasn't an obvious choice for a back-to-school project either but I really loved how it turned out and adds to that vintage look.

Supplies used:
5 x 8 legal pad
Prima flower bottle
SEI Sonoma papers and die cuts
Stickles-- Red
Colorbox Fluid Chalk-- Chestnut Roan
Pink Paislee Expressions Whimsies Alphabet-- Chocolate (wow! only $1.00)
Misc. lace, clip, buttons and bakers' twine
Sizzix apple die

YOUR Tic Tac Toe projects so far are phenomenal! Check out everything that has been entered so far by clicking here, it's definitely worth looking! There are still a few more days to enter this challenge for your chance to win a $20.00 voucher to The Beary Scrap so spend some time this weekend getting your creative juices flowing.

Tic-Tac-Toe . . . .and a Tear Bear

Oh! I just love this new challenge and it's been fabulous looking at the entries you all have entered so far! Keep up the great work!

For my tic-tac-toe project, I chose paper piecing, pearl and button to make this baby card for my neighbors who just had a new little girl:


To start I paper pieced a Baby Tear Bear-- this is the first time I have made one of these tiny little guys and they are oh so cute! Just as easy as the original Tear Bears to make and the perfect size for a baby card.




I used My Mind's Eye Alphabet Soup Girl papers to make my easel card-- I love these colors for a baby girl-- I'm not a big fan of pink so to mix it up with a little blue and even green was perfect!

Then I added my pearls and my buttons are actually stick pins with pastel buttons on the ends.

Supplies used:
My Mind's Eye Alphabet Soup Girl papers
Bazzill cardstock -- cream
Mulberry paper-- mocha and white
Baby Tear Bear pattern
Tear Bear Tools
Colorbox Fluid Chalk-- Creamy Brown
Kaisercraft Pearls-- Latte
Prima flowers-- Original Sprites, Blue dotted
Seam Binding-- white

So, if you haven't done it yet, pick your three squares on our Tic Tac Toe board and enter your project in our current Beary Sweet Challenge and good luck!

Are you a . . . .

BRAVE GIRL?

Well, sometimes I am and sometimes I'm not, just depending on what it is. But I know one thing for sure, I was nowhere near as brave when I was a little girl as my 7 year old daughter is. She'll try anything and shows no fear (and yes, I definitely realize this may not always be a good thing!) She is up for adventure of any kind and I have spent many moments this summer cringing as she rides her bike down hills, does front flips off the high dive at the city pool, being pulled on a tube behind a boat on the lake and her new love-- waterskiing-- which is the subject of my layout this week.


I am pretty sure I was at least 12 years old before I attempted to waterski, but not my daughter-- she outshone her older brother and several cousins by learning this summer and her usual comment was "Go faster." What a girl!


I stuck to the basic sketch for this layout but wanted to mix it up just a little from last week and so I tilted the sketch a different direction and then added three smaller pictures to the side of my main image. I used the fabulous new collection from Echo Park called Splash-- you have got to check it out! Kimm just got it in the store this week and it is perfect for summer activities of many kinds. I just love the bright colors. I did add some hot pink in the mat for my main photo and the letter stickers to make it a little more "girly." I used Element Stickers from the Splash collection pack to accent my page instead of the flowers on the original sketch and added Stickles for a little shine to my wave.

Supplies Used:
Echo Park Splash Collection Designer Papers and Element Stickers
Echo Park Summer Days Collection Designer papers (hot pink)
Stickles-- Turquoise
Glue dots
Misc. letter stickers
Misc. buttons

So go on, be a brave girl and do something a little adventurous this weekend! Or just spend a little time crafting and enter your take on our sketch in our current Beary Sweet Challenge.