Zoo Crew Magnets

 Last weekend while I was camping with some of my girlfriends, I brought along some Zoo Crew designer paper to cut out the images.  The paper is filled with cute images of animals, doing fun things in life.  The paper is from last year and I wanted to finally do something with it.

Here I am cutting away!

When I got home, I found 100 magnet backs in my stamping room so I decided to make some little magnets with the Zoo Crew images.  

Honestly, they were so much fun to make.  I just couldn't stop.  

I used colorful papers for the backgrounds and some simple sayings to go along with the animals.  Each magnet has a button and a little tiny flower that I cut out from the papers.

I made about 33 of them, one third of the magnet box.  Every one is a little bit different and the images are embellished with Wink of Stella and some rhinestones to make them sparkle.

I especially like the little hedgehog working on a painting.  I can relate to him - always working on a craft project.  

I love the animal page with the animals that are in the woods.  Here you can see the lion roasting a marshmallow over the fire and the little skunk out on a bird watch.

Then there's the little pig on a hike - seriously, they are just so cute.  

Can you tell that I was having a great time making these?  They're colorful, sweet and just so cute.

Which one do you like the best?  I like them all, but my favs are the bear, the pig and the hedgehog.  

What have you make using the Zoo Crew?  

Bird Decor Pillows

While I was cleaning up my sewing room, I found some cute panels to play around with.  I thought these little birds were so cute!  I stitched them up into little decor pillows and love how they came out.  

The colors are so beautiful and they would look great on a shelf or in a basket or bowl with some other bird items.  They are small panels, about 5" square from the Morris Creative Group for QT Fabrics.  

I love crafts with little birds on them and I plan to put some of these panels into a baby quilt that I will be making soon.  I won't be using all of the panels, so there will still be more to work with.  

Don't they look so cute in the basket filled with lace?  

 

Hills of Tuscany

Even though this stamp set, Hills of Tuscany, retired this year, I wanted to get a chance to use it.  So this week I made three cards that definitely have the "Tuscany" look to them.

I got my ideas from Mikeala Titheredge on Pinterest.  They are beautiful cards and I was so happy to make them, putting my own spin on them, of course.  

This is one of the prettiest cards I have ever made; I just love the serene look to this!  It's like looking into a snow globe.  :)  I stamped the image onto a white scrap and tucked that behind the circle hole that I cut out of the background.  A piece of vellum is next, to give the card the look as if it was glass.  I used the Tin Tile embossing folder and gently colored the raised areas with some white craft ink using a sponge dobber.

The base of the globe is from the Snow Globe Scene dies.  The flower cut outs are from the Country Flower dies.  I painted some watercolor paper with a paint brush using the ink from the stamp pads and then cut them out, to give them a soft watercolor look.

The second card is pretty similar to the first, only this time I added the circle to the front of the card.  I eliminated the vellum for this one.  It's still so beautiful.

Here is a look at the two of them side by side.  

The third card is more like a post card.  I loved playing around with this set.  It reminds me of when I visited Italy.  I could easily make more things with it.

While looking through some photos this week, I found this pic of when I went to Italy.  The background almost looks like the stamp set images!  Maybe that's why I liked the set so much.  :)

 

The Kitties are Everywhere

Here are a few more of the zippered kitty bags that I made.  This kitty has such a mysterious look on her face.  I love her surrounded by the blue fabric.  It matches the design so well.

This is a variation of the black kitty panel.  Did you notice the cute little bird on his head?  So sweet :)  .  

After seeing how the scraps in the coral basket brightened up the last bag, I took out some yellow fabric.  I love the addition of more colors for the bags.

The possibilities are endless for these little kitties.  I'm so glad that I worked with the kitties this week.  It's been fun to spend more time on my crafts.

Today was a nice summer day, so I brought the kitties outside for their photos.  They do look sweet, don't they?  Which one is your favorite?

Even though there's more panels, it's time to move on to another project today.  Maybe some tea cups? We'll see.

 

Zippered Kitty Bags

For the past couple of weeks I have been spending more time in my sewing room.  And honestly, I am loving it.

As I was sorting some of my fabrics, I came across fabric that had cute little kitty images on it.  I almost forgot that I had bought it!

So I looked at it for a couple of days and then decided to cut them up and make little zippered pouches out of the kitty panels.  The panels are about 4" square, so they are not too big.  

Each bag is a little different and I had fun picking out scraps of fabric and zippers that matched each panel.

I could make these all day - oh, wait - I did.  :)

Seriously, each panel is just so cute!  The colors are great, the kitties are so sweet and the project is just plain old fun.  

After they were finished I added a little tassel to them.  The tassels were from Stampin Up at least 10 years ago, and they were just waiting for the perfect project to go with them.

I love how the black tassel brings out the text on the cat and the leaves in the plant.  

I'm not sure if I even want to part with them.  

The fabric is It's Raining cats and Dogs by Terry Runyan for Benartex.  I bought it a couple of years ago.

After I finished up some of the kitty bags, I counted to see how many more panels that I have left.  There's still 28 more cats, so I can keep making more or save them for another project.  

They would even make a sweet wall hanging for my sewing room.  

What do you think of them?  Now I have to go through more fabric piles to see if I have more panels to play with.

I think this little kitty is my favorite, but it's hard to pick.  I love how the teal and pink flowers go so well with this panel. 

He's just enjoying his time relaxing in the flowers.  And what's better on a nice summer day? 

 

Crafting for Mother's Day

Crafting is always a welcome thing pretty much any time in my house.  This year for Mother's Day, my granddaughter Addy and I worked on making some gifts for her Mom, my daughter.

I had picked up some wooden flower photo holders for us to paint.  Here is Addy painting the flower.  She is serious about making her crafts, just like her Nana.  She wanted to use black paint, but I told her flowers were bright colors so she chose the magenta.  

You can see how serious she is in this pic, painting every spot on the flower, including the edges.  She was also making a colorful painting, which is on the table, for her mom as she was crafting the photo holder.  I forgot to take a pic of the finished project, but with the photo attached, some glitter and ribbon, it looked the best Mother's Day gift ever.  

While she was napping, I made a sweet bracelet for her Mom along with a homemade card.  We wrapped them all up and tucked in some chocolates to go along with the gifts.  

Addy was so proud to give the gifts to her Mom, but she made sure to sample a piece of the chocolate first before presenting the other gifts to her.   

Bright Skies

 This week I started out to make some cards using Bright Skies stamp set and Sunny Days paper from this year's Sale-a-Bration.  I thought that I was going to make cards with clouds on them, but they turned out more like flower cards than clouds!  

I love the bright, cheery papers that coordinate with the set.  They have sort of a retro look to them.

For the sayings, I used Best Family Ever stamps.  It has cute sayings and all kinds of family names.  I don't know who I will send the cards to, so I just used the generic "friend" stamp.  

The cut outs are from Designer Tag Dies and Nested Essentials, which I think are still available to purchase.  

I hope the cards still make your feel like you're gazing at fluffy clouds on a nice day.  That was the look I was going for.  

 

Birthday Thank You Cards

For my birthday Thank You cards this year I made some pretty green cards with the Framed Florets stamp set.  I found some 6x6 papers from a few years back that I used for the backgrounds of my cards.

The saying is from So Sentimental and is one of my favs.  I am so grateful for my friends and the times that we have together.  They always make my birthday so special.  

Each of the cards uses a different paper from the designer pack.  The green and pink combo is one that I like to use a lot.  

I used Granny Apple Green and Shaded Spruce for the green colors.  On this card, instead of using ribbon, I added a strip of the paper to give it more color.  

I loved making these cards.  It's fun to mix old and new supplies for a new look.