Kerry's Paper Crafts

Father’s Day Cards: Mustaches galore…

May 15, 2012

OK I’m totally late to the mustache craze, but I am having so much fun with these…!

This first card is a total CASE from this card that I found on Pinterest. I just loved her card creation so I had to create something similar.

HOW ADORABLE is this bow tie…!??! I followed Mandy’s awesome tutorial to make this one. I am in love & will most definitely be making more

Here is my next card. Very simple - I distressed the patterned paper a bit so that it wasn’t too bright white – and just added a punched heart and some letter stickers from October Afternoon. The sentiment was stamped using this stamp set from Technique Tuesday.

Here is the sentiment on the inside of both these cards…(this was a dollar stamp at Michael’s from a few years back. Love those $1 stamps!)

…and just one more:

I used this digital cut file on my Silhouette to cut all the mustaches for these cards. I plan on listing these cards in my Etsy shop for sale.

thanks for looking, hope this inspired you all to go out there & put mustaches on a bunch of stuff, LOL!

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Brooke’s Monthly Layouts: Months 5 & 6

May 14, 2012

in Scrapbooking

Hi all! I hope everyone had a fabulous Mother’s Day weekend! The weather here in MA was just gorgeous and we got to really enjoy the weekend, spending time with friends & family (this Mama even got to sneak in a nap…ahhhhh it was amazing)

Today I am sharing months 5 & 6 of Brooke’s monthly layouts. Here is month 5:

I must say, I do the love the pics from this month. It was hard for me to narrow them down to just a few, which is why this layout is a bit crammed. But that’s OK, I still like how it turned out…

And here is month 6…more of my favorite pics. I actually think month 6 pics might be my most favorite, because that was the last month she would truly sit in one place while I took photos! Every month since then has pretty much been a game of me trying to click away as fast as possible before she crawled/scooted/walked away…!

I’ve been working on a few fun cards for Father’s Day, so stay tuned for those very soon!

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Brooke’s Monthly Layouts: Months 3 & 4

May 9, 2012

in Scrapbooking

I’ve got some catching up to do with these layouts! I am very proud to say that I’ve completed months 1-8 already (woo!) – but apparently I’ve forgot to share them here with you all. We left off at Month Two – so today I’m sharing months 3 & 4 with you:

This is the month that it was 90+ degrees, in our non-air-conditioned house, and she was not having any of it (hence the “all smiles” caption on the pic. My attempt at sarcasm!!)

I am trying to stick with the basic color scheme of primary colors (similar to the ones on the monthly stickers in each photo). I’m using a variety of papers on each layout to try and make them all look coordinated, but unique.

Here is Month 4…

I used more of the stamps from this stamp set . I must admit, the way the words are a little blurry in this stamp sort of bothers me. At first I thought it was my bad stamp job, but then I realized the stamp is *supposed* to look that way. Hmmph. Not sure how I feel about that…

I will post months 5 & 6 soon…!

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Brooke’s 1st Birthday: Recap

May 7, 2012

in Altered Stuff

I will warn you now – this post is going to be EXTREMELY long, and loaded with pics. I apologize in advance to my readers who don’t care about one-year-old Birthday Parties…!

So as you guys know, I love this type of stuff !! I was pretty pumped to put together decorations for my little peanut’s 1st Birthday party. We tried to keep it relatively small, as our house is only so big – and we both have large families. It turned out that we had amazing weather – 80 degrees & sunny in late April – awesome! Here are some pics & info on a bunch of the DIY decorations I made. I will do my best to give resources & explanations for each item, but if you have any specific questions just let me know. Thanks!

As you can probably gather from the photos, the theme for her party was owls. I love owls I wanted bright, fun colors – so I decided to use the Little Girl & Summer Days collection from Echo Park as my color inspiration. This is where my HUGE tip comes in: if you go to Jessica Sprague’s site, you can purchase Echo Park digital kits. These kits include their papers, embellishments, etc. – even better is on Wednesdays, they have Echo Park $1 deals – where they offer their digital kits for only $1 each! TOTAL SCORE! I ended up grabbing these kits on sale as I saw them, so I already had them on my computer ready to be used.

This came in especially handy when it was time to put together the invitations: (I used Photoshop for this – and I’ve blurred out personal info)

The best part about these digital kits was using the digital papers on the goodies for the party. I loved the colors in these collections, but I didn’t want to have to go & buy all that scrapbook paper, only to use it & throw it away! Instead, I printed out a bunch of designer paper from the digital kits. I printed it on regular old computer paper, and just backed it with white cardstock when I needed to.

Here are some party hats getting ready for assembly. I started by using this digital cut file with my Silhouette. I then glued some printed designer paper onto some regular white cardstock to make them nice & sturdy.

I printed out some super cute owls and created little embellishments from them using punches. I added them to my hats and tied some elastic through some holes & they were all set. Cheap, easy & quick party hats!

The birthday girl of course had her own special hat (made with the real designer paper). I picked up some pom poms at Hobby Lobby and used my hot glue gun to add them around the rim of the hat. I also created my own pom (more on that below) for the top of the hat & glued it on using the hot glue gun. Lastly, I cut out the number 1 using my Silhouette and adhered with some foam adhesive. I really love how it turned out – it looked SUPER cute on her!

I made some of these large owl decorations using my Cricut and my Silhouette. I have the Silhouette SD, which does not cut 12″x12″ paper. So I pulled out my Cricut and cut out the largest scallops that I could (using 12″x12″ paper & the “fit to page” option). I believe these ended up being roughly 11.5″ or so. I then cut out circles to layer inside. The owls were all cut from this cut file that I found in the Silhouette online store. These guys were SUPER fun to make – and you seriously cannot beat the price of $0.99 for 4 owls – one of the many reasons I love my Silhouette over my Cricut!

I hung them up in various spots throughout the house…

(paper lanterns from Hobby Lobby. Photo books are ones that I recently created on Shutterfly and put them out for viewing.)

I made the pom pom garlands using yarn that I grabbed at my local craft store. I picked the colors that I thought matched best, and just created them while watching TV a little each night. They don’t take too long to make, and I think they are so fun. They will be great to re-use in her playroom now that the party is over. I also used them as a backdrop in her cake smash photoshoot.

We had a ton of balloons – which the kids LOVED. I bought one of those do-it-yourself tanks (“Balloon Time” I think they are called?). Grandpa (my Dad) sat there all morning blowing up balloons – he did a great job. It was so fun to have all that extra color. Each kid got to take a few balloons home with them – so they were pretty happy with that!

I also made a few banners. Banners & garlands seemed to be another them to this party…!

This was a small banner to go in the front of her high chair, I adhered it to the tray using glue dots:

This next banner says “Brooke is One” – also made using my Silhouette (sorry for the funky photo – I had to use my fish eye lens to fit this banner into one pic, so it sort of looks funny!).

Another banner – this one says “Happy Birthday” – I hung this above the table with the food & goodie bags. I made the large tissue paper poms by following this tutorial – they were surprisingly easy to do!

One of my favorite projects was this garland depicting her first 12 months. I totally grabbed this idea from Pinterest.

I used some American Crafts Thickers for the numbers. I simply punched out some cardstock with a circle punch, and adhered the Thickers. I then used a glue dot to stick the circles to the clothespins.

I had a whole bunch of photos printed out & I wanted to try and display as many as I could. I decided to use the mantle above our wood stove to display photos of Brooke from those early days. I just used more of those wooden clothespins and some pom pom yarn.

Also, those owls that you see? They were a TOTAL score that I found at my local Christmas Tree Shop (a store local to New England). They were like $4 each. I stumbled upon them a few weeks before her party & couldn’t believe it. They were the SAME colors that I was using for her party, and super cute! I plan on re-purposing these in her nursery or playroom.

This last one is not a banner or garland, but just another display of some of my favorite photos from the past year. I had this hung up above her high chair. This photo hanger is actually from IKEA. I got it there a few years ago, so I have no idea they still sell them.

The goodie bags were a fun project. I grabbed some colored bags at Hobby Lobby (green for the boys, purple for the girls) and made them into owls. Again, used my Silhouette to do some die cutting for this.

Inside each bag was a variety of things: bubbles (with an added owl on top!), sidewalk chalk, stickers, and some coloring pages with crayons.

These coloring pages were actually quite neat. I found this website and used it to print out a variety of fun party-themed coloring pages. I cut them down to 4.25″x5.5″ and they fit nicely into a clear plastic bag that I use for my greeting cards. I grabbed some crayons at the Dollar store and added a few to each package. I also printed out full 8.5″x11″ sheets of these coloring pages and put them out in the playroom for the kids to color while they were at the party. However the weather ended up being SO nice that no one even went upstairs to the playroom – they were all outside!

For food, we kept it simple & went with munchies, pizza and salad. I put on my baking hat (well, I attempted)…to make the cupcakes & Brooke’s cake. Let’s just say that although I am pleased with how they turned out, I am NOT a baker. I am a paper crafter. I should probably just stick to working with paper. LOL.

I made the cupcake toppers with toothpicks and the same punched out owls from above. It was a little warm that day, so of course the eyes of the owls started sliding off a little. GAH! (everything always looks so easy on Pinterest, doesn’t it?)

Brooke had her own cake to smash – because let’s face it – who wants to eat cake after the kid smushes their yucky hands into it?

Even the little ones had their own snacks at this party. It was Toddler heaven…

I used more of that digital scrapbooking paper that I had printed to wrap around these water bottles. My Mom was teasing for me this level of detail But it took 2 minutes to do, and I had PLENTY of the paper to use – so I figured why not!

SO – there you have it. All the crafty details. Holy cow, that was a lot – sorry to overload you!

And if you’re wondering how it all went? Well, Brooke totally enjoyed herself! She ate, walked around, played with her cousins, got lots of cool gifts and had a grand old time. Her big gift from Mama & Dada was a Radio Flyer wagon – which she LOVED. All she wanted to do was have someone pull her around in the wagon & eat Goldfish. By the end of the day she was running around in just her onesie. She was filthy, sweaty, tired…and covered in cake, frosting, water, dirt and goldfish. She didn’t nap – but was totally ripping it up and having a great time.

I’d say it was a total success and a great way to say HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY to my sweet little girl!

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it’s that time of year…

May 1, 2012

in Altered Stuff,Etsy

Right now I’m working on stocking my Etsy Shop with plenty of Teacher Gifts – we are getting closer & closer to the end of the school year – time to grab a small gift or card to say THANKS to all the awesome Teachers out there. Here are some photos of recent projects I’ve been working on. You can find most all of these for sale in my shop. If you are local, I am willing to meet up with you so that you don’t have to worry about shipping costs – makes it easier for both of us! Contact me if you have any special requests or questions.

For most of these, I decided to try out using some digital stamps. I recently stumbled upon Scrappin Doodles digital stamps and found some really fun stamps to try out.

What I like about digital stamps: the cost is lower than a traditional stamp, shipping is free (just a download link) and you can customize them to any size you want. I grabbed some of these school themed stamps from Scrappin Doodles and I was able to use them to make some really fun Teacher themed gifts. (I found Scrappin Doodles simply by doing a Google search for digital stamps – if you guys have any other faves or recommendations, feel free to leave them here as a comment, I’d love to check them out – thanks!)

The first project I created was this mini gable box filled with a mini bottle of hand sanitizer (what Teacher doesn’t need that, right?) – and a mini post-it magnet holder. I was thinking that you could add more to this box if you’d like – a gift card, maybe some candy, etc.

You can customize to the name of your Teacher if you want, or you can simply say “Thank You Teacher” – I am offering both options.

I will mail these flat for easier/cheaper shipping – and you will just need to assemble the box and add the goodies.

Here is another version of the Crystal Light containers that I have done in the past. These are great to fill with candy, or can be used as a little pen/pencil holder on a Teacher’s desk:

Here is a set of 3″x3″ cards – perfect size for writing a small note of Thanks:

Some more Skinny Notepads…

and finally, a different spin on some post-it holders:

WHEW! That was a long post with a lot of pics. A cookie to you if you made it this far

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Sunshine Wall Art

April 30, 2012

in Altered Stuff

I’ve been working on decorating Brooke’s playroom for a few weeks/months now. (everything takes longer these days!) I’m sticking with fun & bright colors (no shock there, ha). I’ve been looking at lots of great & inexpensive ideas for wall art on Pinterest. I came across this piece of artwork and got inspired to try making my own version. Here’s what I came up with…

I used my Silhouette to cut out the circles and the black face for the sun. But other than that, there was no die cutting involved on this. Super easy! I can tell you that this worked up very quickly (and is a great way to use all those scraps!). Stay tuned as I will be offering a tutorial for making another version of this for A Cherry On Top’s celebration of National Scrapbooking Day!

So fun! All I need to do now is find a simple white frame for it & I can hang it on the wall. I plan on doing a post about all the DIY projects in Brooke’s playroom, so stay tuned for that.

By the way, you can follow me on Pinterest by clicking here. Have a great day everyone!

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Cake Smash!

April 30, 2012

in Photography

Just sharing a few shots from the cake smash photoshoot that I did with Brooke. She had a blast smooshing her hands in all that cake – I don’t think she could believe I was letting her do it, ha!

messy, but OHH so fun!

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12 Months.

April 30, 2012

in Brooke Monthly

Well, here we are…my 12 months of photos is OVER! Can hardly believe it. I am so glad that I was able to keep up with these updates. I have 7 months of Brooke’s monthly scrapbook layouts completed and I must say that it’s turning into one of my very favorite scrapbook albums. (which reminds me that I need to post my latest layouts on here, haven’t done that yet either, yikes).

Brooke’s birthday fell on a Monday, so we decided to take her to the zoo on the Sunday before that, as a special Birthday treat. We had a spell of gorgeous Spring weather those few days, so the night of her birthday we were able to take her out for a hot dog and some ice cream. YUM. I will hopefully post some pics from those events soon. Even more exciting, was her 1st Birthday Bash at our house this past weekend. We had to stuck to immediate family (we both have big families!), and we still had a LOT of people. I have LOTS of pics from all the decorations. I will have a full post on that coming soon. It was so much fun to make all the Birthday goodies – I think I could do this for a living! LOL!

Here is the last of Brooke’s one year updates…thanks to everyone for listening to me do these each month. It really helps me to have these to look back on. I really love having it all documented!

At 12 Months, Brooke:

is a walking FOOL! Walking everywhere now. Pretty steady on her feet when the surface is smooth…we are working on getting over door jams, hills, and walking on grass

But overall she is doing great and zooming around everywhere! She started just after turning 11 months…

LOVES to say the word “ball”. EVERYTHING is “bah!”. If there is a ball in the area, she let’s you know about it. Even things that don’t remotely resemble a ball, are “bah’s”

Also says Mama, Dada, UH OH (when she drops something), and Bubbles (“buh buh”) – we were pretty surprised with that last one, but it came flying out when we were playing w/ bubbles on Easter! She has *sort of* said Thank You a few times – we are working on that one.

Loves her green giraffe stuffed animal, and her Elmo doll. We pretty much always have one of them with us at all times.

LOVES to be outside. Wants to go outside all the time (hates it when we bring her back INSIDE)

Is long & lean, weighing just 19lbs. 1oz. and measuring 29.5″ long…! I’m not sure where she puts all the food she eats…!

Finally has tooth #2 coming in, right next to tooth #1…!

LOVES hot dogs

Started taking music class and is loving all the singing, dancing and interacting with other kids her own age – I can’t get her to sit still when we’re there – all she wants to do is bop around and sit on other people’s laps…!!

Has her own little mind & personality already. Not much is getting in her way when she wants something (*sigh*). She is very social and does great around other babies – loves watching & playing with them. She’s pretty good at grabbing the toys she wants (and holding onto them)

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Homeketeers Scrapbook Kits

April 24, 2012

in Product Review,Scrapbooking

The good people over at Homeketeers contacted me and asked if I would be interested in reviewing some of their scrapbooking kits. I like to make sure that any product review I take on is something I could actually see myself using. After checking out their website & viewing the kits they had in their shop, I knew there would be quite a few that I could put to good use. (After all, I am trying my best to keep up with scrapbooking photos of Brooke!) The best part about their kits is that they offer tutorials along with them, so you not only get the supplies, but also instructions/inspiration for your creating your layouts.

I must admit that for me, one of the hardest/most time consuming parts of scrapping is finding the perfect mix of product for each layout. I was intrigued by this idea of using a kit for that very reason: to have a kit already pulled together takes the guess work out of finding coordinating supplies! All of that means that my scrapbooking goes MUCH quicker! (score for a busy Mama! I think I might try this kit thing more often…)

Anyhoo – here are some pics of the lovely kits they sent over to me – they are chock FULL of stuff! You could easily create several layouts, plus even a few cards with these kits:

And here is what I was able to make with them – these pages pulled together VERY quickly. The hardest part was determining which photos to use!

The title on this first one says “Let’s swing…it’s Spring!”

The matching stickers made it super easy to embellish, just added some stamping for the date and adhered to the page along with buttons that came in the kit.

I printed my journaling on the matching green cardstock and embellished with more of the ribbon, buttons and flowers that all came in the kit. SO easy!

This second page is titled “Dada Kisses”…I used the included stickers for the word “Dada” but decided to dig into my stash for the word “kisses”.

How fun is that owl pin? When I saw it in the kit, I wasn’t really sure how I could use it, but I think adding some ribbon and the coordinating button to this page adds interest. And since it’s going under a page protector, I don’t really have to worry about that pin sticking anyone!

I chose to do lots of layering on this page. Mostly because I couldn’t decide between all the gorgeous colors of patterned paper, and lace trim, HA. But I think it turned out nice – the photos are still the main piece of this layout – and I didn’t need much journaling so I just created a small tag to note the date & location these photos were taken…

I am blown away by how much stuff I still have left from these kits! I plan on using the leftovers to make some greeting cards. I’m sure they will work up pretty fast since all of the items already coordinate. Can’t beat that!

If you would like to check out Homeketeers for yourself, you can head on over to their webpage, or even try and win some of their kits from the National Scrapbooking Day website!

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a few “Mom” cards

April 2, 2012

in Cards

Well, if you can believe it, it’s already April – which means that next month is May – and it’s all about the Mom’s! I decided to create a few bright and bold cards to give as a Mother’s Day card or even a birthday/everyday card if you’d like. I couldn’t resist this color combo. It might be a bit non-traditional for Mother’s Day, but that’s what made it more appealing to me!

I was a lucky girl & won this Ornate Blossom stamp from my Stampin Up demo (thanks Michelle!!) It’s gorgeous (and wood mounted, so I don’t have to worry about the darn thing falling off!). As soon as I saw it, I knew it would be fun to create backgrounds with. I used Pumpkin Pie cardstock, ink, and a stamp-a-ma-jig to hand stamp the backgrounds for both of these cards. The designer paper is some retired SU paper – I admit, I miss it. It was just gorgeous paper!

The stamp on this card is from the “Loved Ones” stamp set from Stampin Up. I have to send out a big thanks to everyone who commented on my previous post with tips on getting my SU cling stamps to actually CLING! I decided to not use the label on this “MOM” stamp and it clung to my clear block with no problem! That must be the secret…let’s hope that SU figures that whole thing out soon though, right??

This next card was made using a flower from this digital cut file set from the extremely talented Kristina Werner. This flower cuts out amazingly well in my Silhouette. The detail of the petals look stunning.

I cut the flower out twice (one slightly larger than the other) and layered them with some foam adhesive. I decided to skip a sentiment on this card, thinking I can just add whatever sentiment I’d like to the inside. This card can be used for Mother’s Day, Birthday, or anything really!

Kristina’s die cuts are simple, yet so elegant. I really love using them!

I’ve listed these cards in my Etsy shop if any of you are looking for some Spring or Mother’s Day cards. If for some reason you don’t see them listed, please contact me as they may have sold. I can always create a custom listing if there is something in particular you are looking for. Thanks!