Let a stencil be your guide!

Hi friends!

I hope everyone had a wonderful day!

I wanted to share a card with you that I made today

with a stenciled piece that I made almost a year ago!

February 27 to be exact :)

The colorful stenciled piece has been sitting in a bin on my desk

 under some other things and I found it today.

It was time to let this beauty make it's way onto a card!

No time like the present! ♥ 

The fun thing about this is ...... 

aside from being super simple and super clean (easy, one layer!)

is that it was made using a stencil from a notebook!

I found these little sprial notebooks in the .99c store

 and picked up a few with different ones seeing as how 

the cover is plastic (easy clean up!)

and they had super geometric designs (very cool!)

 Here's one of them:

 To create this simple card,

I first layered a piece of white cardstock under the notebook "stencil".

Using my distress ink cubes 

(wild honey, worn lipstick, crushed olive and broken china),

and my Ranger ink mini blending tool.

It's best to let these panels set after distressing (especially oxide inks!)

and mine definitely dried - for a year! LOL!

I ran it through my Cuttlebug with a die and created the shape,

added a sentiment from an MFT stamps set

 and set it to black cardstock to offset the colors. 

Here are a couple at a glance:

It's always fun to be creative when doing art!
These notebooks with the spiral paper drew me in with the shapes
and I instantly thought of stenciling!

What creative things have you found?
There are so many ways to be creative with DIY projects!
You can look around your home
and find all sorts of wonderful items to use in your crafty supplies.
 
Thanks for stopping by today!
Big hugs, bigger blessings! ♥
 ~Kelly

Exciting news to share!! :)

 Hi friends ♥

 I'm so excited to share today's post!

This year, I really wanted to do more in my card making + crafting

so I finally jumped from 'do it' instead of 'keep thinking about it!'

*I now have a craft channel on You-Tube!*

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7C9ZdYO0GdM&feature=youtu.be

It really seems surreal, and there were a few boo-boos,
 but that's okay - it's the journey that makes it worthwhile :)

The link above ↑ will take you straight to my channel 
if you like to take a peek. 
 If you subscribe, it will let you know about
new postings and I'll be having a giveaway soon! ♥

So, are you part of the planner craze?
I am seeing planners and planner clips and planner stickers everywhere!

Planner clips are really easy to make. But today I'm showing you another way to make them
using your stamps and dies.

All you need are your stamps, dies (and if you don't have those, then scissors), markers,  glue (hot glue or all purpose like Aleene's tacky glue) and paper clips!
That's it!

Stamps and dies are typically known for cards and scrapbooks,
but in times of budgeting, it's a great way to really get the full use out of your products and stretch their usage.

It's economical, fun to do and you can tailor it 
to exactly the style and design you need!

For today's post and planner/journal clips, I've used 2 different stamps
and dies from The Project Bin.
Kinda Pawsome and Feline Good .

I'm a calendar on the wall girl at heart ~
 best way keep track of our busy family's crazy schedule!
But, I do have a small personal planner on my desk to
keep track of the different card groups I'm in and it's amazingly helpful.

  

Here they are all packaged up, in a little gift container ♥ 
Such a cute gift idea for birthdays, holidays, and just because :)

 Thanks for stopping by today!
If you head over to The Project Bin inspiration blog,
you'll see a wonderful variety of cards to admire!

Big hugs, bigger blessings ♥

~Kelly 

I'm the Designer Highlight for Riley and Co stamps! ♥

Hi friends! 

I hope and pray you all had a wonderful Christmas! 

We sure did - surrounded by my husband and our 4 beautiful children all home at the same time (this, my friends, is a very difficult feat!) as well as the lovely young men our two oldest daughters are dating.  We had full bellies AND full hearts! ♥

Today is the day of a featured designer on the Riley and Company blog ...

and today the designer is me! :)

Thank you, Tanya, for the wonderful spotlight opportunity and 

to our fearless DT coordinator, Angii - who works tirelessly behind the scenes ♥

So, what did I make today?

A herd of moose!

 My son is a voracious reader (just like his mommy!) and plows through books faster than I can buy them or stack them up at the library!

He was my inspiration for thinking up this project -

bookmarks showcasing the literary classics.

Riley and Company stamps has SO MANY different storybook characters!

I chose the ones he was most familiar with or loves these particular books,

and 'snuck' a few girl ones in there, too.

 My Riley bookmarks were inspired by such characters as:  

Wheat Riley (Huckleberry Finn)

Sophie O'Hara (Gone with the Wind)

 Snow White Sophie, 

 Old World Riley (Rip Van Winkle), 

 Peter Pan Riley and Captain Hook Riley (Adventures of Peter Pan),

 Detective Riley  (Sherlock Holmes), 

Mad Hatter Riley (Alice in Wonderland) 

and Riley Pottermoose (Harry Potter)

 Here is what I made and how I made it: 

• First, I started with a container of jumbo clips found at a local off brand store.
• Next, I stamped out the Riley and Sophie stamps onto #110 heavy weight white cardstock (this step is important - they need to be durable and stand up.)
• I ran those through the cuttlebug with a simple circle die, then used the coordinating scallop die in different colors of cardstock in the same fashion.
• I colored all the Riley and Sophie stamps with my prismacolor markers, then joined them with adhesive and added some enamel dots. 
• I glued the colored cardstock (back of the circles) to the jumbo clips.  I used Aleene's tacky glue and let it dry overnight (24 hours = best!)
• Last, I decorated simply and then added a tag with some baker's twine with the "Life is a Fairy Tale" stamp. 

Now, whenever my son needs a bookmark, he can take one out of the can

and mark his page or share one with a friend,

like this quick example ↓

For more inspiring projects, the Riley and Co stamps blog

has amazing creations,

including the new Mushroom Lane stamps!

You can also follow along on Facebook where you'll not only see more

inspirational creations, including the monthly stamp club kit,

but upcoming events and blog hop information - check it out!

Thanks so much for stopping by today!

Big hugs, bigger blessings! ♥

~Kelly