B - U - N - C - O

Howdy! and welcome to my little slice of heaven.  Yeah, crafting is what keeps me going!  I love the whole process.  I'm not too sure my husband loves 'my process'.  But, he doesn't have any household chores, so he doesn't get to vote.  [wow, that sounds kinda mean.]

I belong to a Bunco group.  If you don't know what that is, it is a group of 12 people [ladies in my group] who get together once a month to socialize and play a dice game.  We, each take turns hosting [so everyone comes to your house] and the hostess makes dinner, and provides the 'prizes'.  My turn to host is July 7th.  So, I have already started making stuff, and getting stuff organized.  I am also a theme party planner.  [once my daughter's children are all in school (in about 3 years), we are going to start our own party planning service.  It will be awesome!] I love themes for parties.  I think it helps keep the party organized and focused.  My theme this year, is 'vintage Paris hot air balloons'.  Yep, that is a theme.  Vintage, to help keep me focused as to the over-all look and feel of the decor.  Paris, because who don't love romance, sparkle, and great food!  Hot air balloons, to give the decor a little flair.  It all works.   I purchased my invites from Impressions Paperie @ Etsy, HERE. 

here are the invites I purchased from Etsy:

I selected my invite first.  That way I would have a more exact color scheme to go with, but you can always select the color theme first.  This is how my prices went.  I knew that I wanted hot air balloons, and I'm a super big fan of shabby chic,  and I love mint and pink, so this is what I decided on.  Super happy with my purchase.  

Since my invite has dictated my exact color scheme, I can proceed on!  So, I decorated some plain ugly letters to sit on the mantel: B, U, N, C, O.  Here they are:

I purchased the letters from one of those big box stores.  They were about $1.49 each.  But, if you shop during a sale, you can get them for 30% off.  Bargain!  and since I plan ahead, I waited for them to go on sale.  I used an opaque gold paint I had on hand (gold, because that is the accent color of the invites).  A quick coat of paint while I was watching TV with my husband.  And then, I grabbed some seam binding that went along with my color scheme (colors found in the invite).  I matched various paper and fabric blossoms I already had on hand.  And the final touch was to add a trio of various 'sparkle' pieces: flat back faux pearls, rhinestones, and enamel dots.  I simply hot glued the multi-loop bows and blossoms on to the letters.

Thank you for stopping by.  I'll share with you more of my Bunco items, soon.  I have a great dinner planned, and the prizes are precious!  Stay tuned!

Pretty Collage

As promised, my post sharing another desk top calendar that I created.  Each of these desk top calendars, are for a specific person.  So, each one is unique.  This particular desk top calendar, was made for one of my very special, and dear friend.  This friend has a glamorous soul, who attracts pretty things.  So, I used a glamorous, pretty pattern papers, and kept my embellishments simply pretty!

Jan., Feb., March, April, May, and June

July, August, September, October, November, and December

I used Primrose pattern paper, purchased in a 12" x 12" pad, from a big box craft store.  I just loved the mix of patterns and florals.  The paper is just simply gorgeous!  There are some glitter accents on some of the pages, and who doesn't love a little sparkle?
I used the mini calendar pages from Paper Trey Ink.  I stamped the months by hand, and highlighted some various holidays.  I stamped those in soft suede classic ink.
The girlfriend, who received this calendar, loves french things, so I used a Paris themed stamp set, to stamp the various french images on the calendar pages, in crumb cake classic ink.
I will share some individual images of my favorite months, soon.  Thanks for stopping by!

Paris, retro

This is my second post today.  I stumbled upon this new sketch challenge blog, and I thought that the sketch was very interesting, so I am playing along.  As I was surfing the web, I also came across this beautiful color challenge at one of my favorite challenge blogs, and so I have decided to play along in that challenge as well.

The new challenge, is entitled:  Retro Sketches.  And one of my favorite inspirational challenge blogs is: the Shabby Tea Room.  

Here are their boards:

For my card, I did use the required neutral colors and Navy.  My distressed element is my postage stamp and background panel.  For the sketch, I did turn it on its side, I wanted something vertical.  

Here is my card:

I used two stamp sets to make the distressed background: sanded and friends 24-7; both sets are retired from Stampin' Up!.  The stander background was stamped in sahara sand classic ink, and then the flourishes were stamped in not quite navy classic ink.  

To make the main panel I did some collage stamping, using two different stamp sets: Paris, and Carte Postale.  I stamped the Eiffel tower in soft suede classic ink, as well as the 'Bonjour'.  I stamped Paris and true friend in not quite navy classic ink.  I stamped the postal mark and the flourish in crumb cake classic ink.  I stamped the paris address in sahara sand classic ink.  I stamped the postage stamp in going gray classic ink.  I stamped the floral strig in grey flannel ink.  

The two sentiment banners were made with vellum card stock.  

I distressed the edges of the light panels with crumb cake ink.  I added some buttons from my jar o'buttons.  I tied a piece of white taffeta ribbon around the bottom of the raised panel.  To finish the bow, I  added a floral rhinestone brad to the center.  The card looked like it was missing something, so I added a paper blossom on top of a scrap piece of frayed crochet trim.  

Thank you for looking, and I hope you have/had a chance to 'play' in your craft spaces this weekend!