Christmas Organizing and some cards

I am so excited for the holidays this year!  I broke out my huge boxes of Christmas scrapping stuff and they were really a diaster.  So I went through them and organized them.  I wanted to start to get some things organized for my December Daily.

I happened to have an extra Clip It Up base unit, so I decided that I would use it for my Christmas things for the next couple months so I have have everything right at my fingertips while doing my Dec. Daily.

Going through my stash, I found the ginormous pile of Dear Lizzy Christmas stuff that I had won last year from the American Crafts blog.  I really really love that collection, so I decided that THAT'S what I am going to use this year for my Dec. Daily.  I really don't need any more Christmas lines.

Along the way, I found pile of scraps papers from this line, so I whipped up a few cards!  I am happy to say that I have about 20 handmade Christmas cards from the past few months!  Here they are!

Halloween Banner with Clip It Up

I am very excited to share this project with you today using the tab dividers from the Clip It Up! 

The Clip It Up comes with some nice tab dividers that you can use to separate your stash into certain categories and make it easier to find things.  I decided to use mine for a different purpose!  These tags make a fantastic base for a Halloween Banner.  Here is a quick run through of how I made the banner.

First, did you know that you can emboss these  tabs with embossing plates???  I tried the first one, hoping it would work, and it came out just beautifully!  I used four different embossing plates on my tabs.

Next I use a die to cut out some scalloped circles from orange tulle and layered lots of circle together.

I used a punch to punch a bracket shape from this fantastic Echo Park Halloween line.  I inked the edges of each piece and added a chipboard letter by American Crafts.

The using a hot glue gun, I added the tulle flower to the lower portion of the tab and some orange pom-pom trim to the bottom edge.  Then I pop-dotted the punched bracket shape and letter on top.

To string up my tabs, I layered some orange and black buttons on some velvet ribbon and tied them around the ribbon. 

I was originally going to stitch them to the ribbon, but I found that by tying them, I could slid them around to make them evenly spaced.

I added my tabs to the ribbons and Voila!!  Here is my completed banner!

I hope that you can find some creative ways to use these tab dividers!

A page with no paper! A CIU project...

Well since I have arranged all of my favorite things on my Clip It Up, it’s time for me to start using them (cause let me tell ya, stuff is comin’ in faster than stuff is goin’ out!).  So I decided to really challenge myself on this one.  My challenge was to create a layout using ONLY things from my Clip It Up and a white piece of cardstock.  Yup, that’s right…no papers.  And since I wasn’t sure what I was going to be using, I decided on a photo that was black and white so that it would go with anything.

I started by going through my CIU and finding some things that I really liked, and some packages of things that were almost gone and that I wanted to get rid of.  So this is what I pulled off: (Note: I scrap at night, so it was hard for me to get good lighting on these photos!)

                                                 

I went through each package and pulled out things that I wanted to use.  I started to notice that there were certain colors in the items I had chosen: blue, green, and purple…not a combo I usually use, but I liked it!  One of the items I pulled off was this old ephemera pack from Making Memories.  It has some small pieces of corrugated cardboard in there, so I decided to take those out and use them. 

I wanted to add a bit more color to the page since I wasn’t using patterned papers, so I painted the cardboard pieces using some paint daubers from Ranger (which I LOVE).  I also had pulled out some tiny chipboard pieces from Maya Road, so I painted a few of those as well.

Then came the arranging.  I spent a little time just pushing the elements around the page until I was happy with the balance and the placement.  And here is my finished layout!

I have to tell you that this honestly came much better than I thought it was going to!!!  I was so please with the result; I might challenge myself to do this again!

Happy Birthday to....(and a chance to win!)

...Simply Renee Clip It Up!!!   I got to work with a CIU Base Unit and some papers and embellies from Little Yellow Bicycle to create an AWESOME cupcake display stand that I used for Charlotte's 2nd birthday!!! 

You have have FOUR chances to win by visiting both the CIU and LYB blogs and leaving comments, AND by posting on their FB pages!  Here are some photos of the "masterpiece" and details are on the Clip It Up blog!

Clip It Up Projects, bad habits, and one Cocoa Daisy...

Last month I recieved some goods from Clip It Up and their sponsors.  We have a special project going on a CIU that I can't quite tell you about yet, but I AM able to share with you some of the pages that I created with the sponsors!  PLEASE stop by the CIU blog today and check out my post!

This first page I shared last week and was based on a Page Maps sketch.  I used some my Little Shoebox and Nikki Silvils papers that were sent to me.  Luckily, we've had a few celebrations around here lately, so these papers fit perfectly!

Then I created this page with the Little Yellow Bicycle "Cupcake Love" collection, which is just so bright and fun and pretty!  And there are TONS of embellies!  I used a Page Maps sketch for this one, too, and I also based it on a challenge at Cocoa Daisy for the crop two weekends ago.

Love all the little things that come with this line. I actually used some of the crepe paper from Charlotte's Bday for this page, too! And just for a tease, I have another HUGE project to share very soon using these same products.

I will leave you with one last page that I did for the Cocoa Daisy crop (not with papers from CIU, but with the May Cocoa Daisy kit and some things from my stash)!   The challenge for this page was to use something related to books, at least 5 layers of papers, and a typewriter font.

We went to the library for the first time a few weeks ago, and these were Charlotte's first library books.  She LOVED Toddler Time at the Library, and she really loved these books!  I hated having to take them back to the library because I don't think she quite understood that they weren't hers!  :)

I used some other papers and embellies from the Crate Paper Toy Box line and a few odds n' ends from the Cocoa Daisy kit.

Clip It Up Altered Wall Mount

I'm not much of an "altered items" scrappers.  I love to do pages.  But when I got the wall mount and got an idea for a project, it consumed me and I totally got into it!

I will save all the details and "how-tos" for the post on the Clip It Up Blog (which is up today), but here are a few photos of my project.

Please go visit the Clip It Up Blog to get some more details!