Sunday, July 22.

Sometimes, what happens in the craft room, stays in the craft room. Today I am helping a friend out and have her son spending the night at my house. I picked him up mid afternoon. His mom's birthday was Friday, so he and I discussed options of things he could make her for her birthday.  We did some shopping and stopped at his favorite, Pizza Ranch, for dinner. As soon as we got to my house, he wanted to head to the craft room. We worked on a birthday card, but I can't post pictures. He looked at Pinterest and found one that he liked. He made his version of it. He picked his own colors, not what the sample had at all. I think it turned out great! We will work on the gift tomorrow, so it will be another day of what happens in the craft room, stays in the craft room. Maybe after he gives her his gifts, I can post pictures. I will have to ask him! 😉

Saturday, July 21

What is happening in the Craft Room today? Hmmmmm.......as I look around the room, the item that jumps out screaming, "Pick Me! Pick Me!" is my planner. I bought a planner last year and enjoyed watching a lot of Youtube videos on cute and wonderful planners. If you are interested in the planner world, go to Youtube and search Big Happy Planner. The planners that are demonstrated are so cute and wonderful! Like I said, I tried it last year, and although I loved decorating the planner pages, I just never got to writing real plans in the book. Kind of defeats the purpose, doesn't it?

I decided to give it another try, but I am not going to pressure myself into thinking I need a beautiful layout. This year, I purchased the Big Plans Planner Kit from Stampin' Up.

I love the colors of this kit. They are Basic Gray, Calypso Coral, Gray Granite, Petal Pink and Pineapple Punch. I plan to use those Stampin' Up colors to decorate my pages. I can use the coordinating card stock, ink pads, markers and designer series papers. I am so excited! Here is what my planner looks like.

You can start this planner whenever you want. I will begin mine in August. When I put the pages in the 2 ring binder, I put August in the front. Each month begins with a full month calendar page. The squares are not numbered, so you can use this whatever year you want. I wrote all of the numbers in and added a "to do" sticker on the right side of the calendar. There are lines there to write things I want to get done for the month. You can use this list however you want. I just decided I needed a to do list. Here is what that page looks like.

I love how I do not feel overwhelmed to decorate with this one like I did with the MAMBI Big Happy Planner. Here is a picture of a weekly spread. I have gone through the calendar and added birthday stickers. There is still plenty of room to write other things in the space provided for each day. 

At the end of the month, there is a notes page. Here is a picture of the notes page. I am still deciding just how I am going to use this page. There is an area to make a list with bullets, an area to write a narrative and a colored box to do some other journaling.

I will keep you updated on how I am using this planner. If you would like to order one for yourself, let me know! Big Plans Planner Kit.

In the Craft Room today...

I am getting ready for a new school year. That means I need to paint new wooden discs for my classroom birthday sign.

A few years ago, I made this sign -

The sign is 24 inches long and 7 inches wide. I love making wooden signs with my Silhouette machine. Today, I took all of the discs off and started to repaint them. After 6 coats of paint and still being able to see the names and dates, I decided to start over with new discs. I don't know how many students I will have in class this year, so I painted 42 discs. We will see if that is enough or not. Just in case it is not, here are the paint colors I used today. Making a list here should help me find the names of the colors if I need to paint more. Apple Barrel - Petunia Purple, Folk Art - Green, Engine Red, Americana - Cadmium Yellow, Turquoise Blue and Bright Orange. 

Here is a picture of the finished discs with the sign. 

Here is another birthday sign I made for my home. 

That's a lot of discs!! This is my siblings and families and Bill's siblings and families. I am missing a few of the youngest members of the family and some of the writing has faded and needs redone. This will be done in the next few days. If you like this sign and would like one made, leave me a message and we can talk about it! 

Have a great day and go create something!

I am back to making cards!

Card Club is starting back up!!

I took a year off from hosting a monthly card making group in my home. I didn't intend to take a year off. But, you know, life sometimes gets in the way. I have been having a very enjoyable summer break from school and am ready to start hosting the card club again. I made this card today and really liked it, so I prepped 12 card kits for members of the card club to make their own version of this card. I hope you enjoy the card.

I started with a piece of 5 1/2" by 8 1/2" piece of blue card stock. I folded it in half for the card base. Then I took yellow card stock and stamped 2 daisies using the Daisy Delight stamp set. I used the same color of stamp pad that the card stock is. Then I used Stampin Up Daisy punch (item #143713) and punched out the stamped image. I staggered the two daisies on top of each other and attached them using the mini glue dots (item #103683) I punched out a small circle for the center of the flower and attached it with a glue dot. I curled the petals of the flower slightly by rubbing them on a bone folder (item #102300) like you do to curl ribbon. I stamped the thank you sentiment on a piece of brown card stock in the lower right corner. The brown card stock measured 5" by 3 3/4". I wrapped a brown ribbon around the brown card stock and taped the ribbon to the back. I attached the brown card stock to a piece of white card stock that measured 5 1/4" by 4". That was then attached to the blue card base. I added a Stampin Up dimensional (item #104430) to the back of the flower and attached that to the card. I really like the color combination.

I am a Stampin' Up demonstrator. I used to be a Close To My Heart demonstrator. I still have a ton of card stock from CTMH and decided to use it up on this card. If I were to use Stampin' Up colors, I would use Pacific Point (#111350), Whisper White (#100730), Soft Suede (#115318), Crushed Curry (#131199) and Cajun Craze (#119684).

If you would like to purchase Stampin' Up products, please visit my website Sandy's Craftroom.