always believe

something wonderful is about to happen

My 13-year old niece & I decided to play today making her a canvas for her room

I wanted to show her how fun Gelatos are, so we used

Donna Downey how-to video for Dry Techniques

and since the sentiment is from Unity Stamp Company

along with Donna Downey's Empowered Word stamp set

We are entering this in Unity's Friends with Flair

here's a blow-up of that sentiment

Trees!

Some of us on the Mountain Plains Crafters Desgin Team

occasionally do a just-for-fun challenge

and since a few of us don't do Black Friday

we decided to create something with 

TREES!

I slept in (almost unheard of, but it happened today) and got a very late start on mine.

Then I made three things that went into the trash!

Just one fail after another so I went looking for a card sketch to help me out

Pals Paper Arts #229

to the rescue!

and it still didn't turn out as cute as I thought it would

but it's not horrible so I guess someone on my mailing list will be getting it

Printed Papers - My Mind's Eye 12 Days of Christmas

Tree Stamps - CloseToMyHeart Holiday Trinkets

Inks - CloseToMyHeart New England Ivy, Sweet Leaf, Christmas Red & Crystal Blue

also Tim Holtz Pickled Raspberry & Peeled Paint

soaring

UmWow Studio has a sketch every month to play with

I fully intended to make a scrapbook layout

and have simply run out of time with Thanksgiving being tomorrow

and family obligations

so a card it is!

I think it turned out beautiful!

Kraft Card base

for the background I used UWS Chevron Mask with Tim Holtz Pumice Stone

then I stamped Gelatos in Metallic Blueberry with

Unity Stamp Company's Beautiful Elements

All Papers are from 7 Dots Studio's Nature Walk along with the sentiment sticker

(don't pass-out, yes I said STICKER!)

all the little banners were hand-cut and ink distressed

plus UmWow Studio's Nature Walk Flair

bird stamp is also from Unity Stamp Co.'s She Did It Anyway

music stamp is a small portion from a Unity Stamp Co. KOM  {white lies within us}

birds stamped using Tim Holtz Black Soot ink

here is the fav sketch

Peaceful Christmas

Unity Stamp Company's Be Inspired Monthly Challenge

this month is a gorgeous mix of Reds, White, Silver & Gray

which I loosely combined with their card sketch as well

to get this:

it reminds me of that lone bird on our country road

after a freshly fallen snow

so very Peaceful

Bird Image Stamp - Unity Stamp Co KOM November 2014

{what lies wihtin us}

background heat embossed using Zing in Silver

bird stamped using CloseToMyHeart in Cranberry

Snowflake Image - Unity Stamp Co Grab Bag

heat embossed using clear glitter embossing powder (misc stash)

Stampin' Up Snowflake punch

Stampin' Up Red & Grey cardstocks

Silver cardstock - Paper-Papers in Galvanised

misc sparkly ribbon

a study in purple

I was looking for a sketch to use with my newly received Unity Stamp Co. Kit of the Month from November 2014 {what lies within us} when I ran across



Freshly Made Sketches #163 in my blog list!

Sentiments are from Unity Stamp Co. Kit of the Month  from September 2014 {happy, thankful & blessed}

Printed Paper - Basic Grey Kioshi

Solid Cardstocks - CloseToMyHeart

Floral Stamp colored using Faber-Castell Gelatos

Inks - Tim Holtz Distressed Ink

Dark Purple dots - Viva Glass Effects Gel in Blackberry

Ribbons - Misc

1000,000+ PageViews Giveaway WINNER!

Hello my wonderful followers!

I don't know if you remember since it has been awhile but

I've been working on a 100,000 PageView Giveaway & guess what?!

This past weekend while at my son's

TaeKwonDo  Team USA tryouts

I finally hit that magic number!

Time for that giveaway!

If you remember, I had rules to follow & a couple of people didn't

so I felt obligated to not add their names in the drawing.

Here were the official entries:

here is my winner

I am so VERY thankful to all the entries, I have a little gift for each of you that entered :-)

Which means everyone of you that entered needs to send me your snail mail info to

ScrapAddictsAttic at gmail dot com

for me to send that little something to you 

and THANK YOU so much for being a follower of mine!

Please contact me within ONE WEEK!

oh and the boy... well at Saturday's TaeKwonDo Tounament,

he took 3rd place in forms plus 2nd place in sparing in his division

(see pic below)

as for the Italy trip....

well he made it!

we are all so very proud & excited for him

MPC November blog hop

 November is the one month out of the year that many of us take the time to reflect on what we are thankful for.  Mountain Plains Crafters is so thankful to have The Unity Stamp Company and Tombow USA Adhesives as sponsors. One lucky fan will win the big prize from both Unity Stamps and Tombow!

I'd personally like to thank Angela @ Unity Stamp Company for emptying my spending money more often than not! I have a wonderfully large Unity Stamp collection. Give them a shoutout on their Facebook page here and visit their website here to see their amazing line of products,and thank them for sponsoring the giveaway at MPC!

Also, since being on the MPC Design Team, I have a new found love of Tombow USA... great adhesive products! Check out the Tombow Facebook page (give them a shout-out & thanks them for sponsoring the giveaway on MCP) and visit their website too.  There's lots of creating and inspiration going on over there.

Giveaway details are located on the Mountain Plains Crafters blog,
it is AWESOME!

Blog Hop Day 2 - Nov. 14th - THAT's TODAY!

Guest Blogger, Angeline Choo from Scrappy Scrappy

Christina Ramon

Debra Davison

MariLynn DeGroot

Paula McClane - -me!

Blog Hop Day 1 - Nov. 13th - just in case you missed it yesterday!

Terri Burson

Sheryl Kemper

Pam Stang

Jennifer Loftfield



And now for my project, I chose to make a piece for my fall wreath (I made the wreath a couple of weeks ago but it was kinda meh). I decided to do a monogram embellishment for it. Here's a little photo tutorial for you:

Step One:
You will need a plain, unfinished Letter
my last name starts with an 'M'

Step Two:
Choose your paint color
(I used acrylic paints)
and slap on a couple of coats.
My wreath will be on the front porch
under the roof, so I am not making
it weather or water proof

Allow to dry completely before proceeding.

Step Three:
Choose your accent paint color
and smear a very thin coat on
a craft mat or similar product

Step Four:
Using your selected image
{I used Unity Stamp Company Kit of the Month
love & joy for the holidays - October 2014
pinecone & leaf}
I stamped onto the paint
then did a sample image stamp on
my craft mat before stamping on my wood letter.
Luckily with acrylic paint, if you mess up
you can just use your base color again &
take another try at it. I got it right the first time!

Since this is a very thin layer of paint, the dry time should be fairly short.

Step Five:
Apply the Bling
I chose to use Stickles in Cinnamon
to really make the pinecone POP.










Step Six:
Using Tombow USA Aqua Liquid Glue,
I placed three brown dew drops along the bottom
of the 'M'

Step Seven:
Next up, Liquid Pearls in Avocado...
These I used to detail a few of the sprigs of leaves.
Be careful to stay away from the
Stickles as mine hadn't completely finished drying yet.

Step Eight:
Tie it on!
I found this great burlap ribbon at
CloseToMyHeart a while back and
don't use it nearly as often as I would like to







Finished Project

I hope you've enjoyed our blog hop!

Friendship Explored

Friends With Flair

from Unity Stamp Company

is something I look forward to each & every week.

This week, while I've got my project all ready to go

I'm posting it the night before.

You see this weekend my younger son (13yo right now)

will be competing for a spot on

TaeKwonDo USA Team going to Italy next summer!

yes, you read that right...

Italy!

and he's already told me I can't go... we will be speaking on the subject again

once we find out if he makes the team or not

I'm too excited

I'm too nervous

I'm extremely proud

*for the background, I created the grid with a ruler & pen

because I can't randomly do squares

*it's just not in me

*then I filled those squares with Galetos in Cotton Candy & Pistachio

blend blend blend

*then I applied Gelatos in Black Licorice using the wedge shaped Faber-Castell thingy

*using Unity's Donna Downey Stamp Imagine It flourish with Spearmint,

I applied the Gelatos directly to the stamp & spritzed with water

stamped on background 4 times, spritzing between each

*next I cut a piece of vellum & stamped the sentiment from Unity's The Right Words using Staz-On

*again using the flourish, I inked it up using Brilliance in Pearlescent Sky Blue and

dabbed a bit of the Staz-On here & there, stamped on vellum

*using UmWow Studio circle mask with the Brilliance, I applied using my fingertip

*I placed one tiny Zot in each corner and a few around the parameter

before adding Queen & Company's Washi Tape

*last I glued it all down to a green cardbase

Release Them

I am really getting into my Art Journal

kinda doing my own thing

learning stuff as I go

watching videos & experimenting.

Some supplies I just don't have

some are pretty expensive

so I'm looking for alternatives.

But here it is,

Page 3

Release Them

(aka butterflies, butterflies, butterflies)

all the butterflies you see are from Unity Stamp Company

that's not saying these are all of the Unity butterflies

(it's not, I have some I didn't use)

I colored it using Faber-Castell Gelatos

and some acrylic paints

a bit of Gesso

a smidge of Mod Podge

some fun Washi Tape

and a tiny bit of CloseToMyHeart create-a-shade paint in Pearl

Gelatos & Unity Stamps

to me, they are the perfect pair!

I spent much of last weekend in my craft room

watching YouTube videos & playing.

You see I'm very new to Gelatos

I know, I know... day late for that train

but I'm having so much FUN with them!

Here are the things I created last weekend,

I've already shared on my facebook page

Paula's Paper Playhouse

so you may have seen them already

but I wanted to share in the blogging world as well

Everything was made using Faber-Castell Gelatos & Unity Stamps

First Up: Moonlit Owls

Nanny

(vellum & dots, plus small dot embossing folder)

Aunt Leila

(brown & gold ribbon)

Wintery Mix

(silver metal snowflakes)

Art Journal Page 2

(butterfly & star chippies, plus diamond mask) from UmWow Studio

I hope you like what I've done

If you have any questions at all, please ask!

non-traditional Christmas colors

I really struggle using non-traditional Christmas colors

so when Unity Stamp Company introduced the current

Color Combo Challenge

it was really hard for me to make something

I did make a card using the card sketch

but I don't really like it

so I wanted a second chance

here it is

oh right, I made TWO cards

but I think I like the first one the best

since it works better for the Color Combo

Image & Sentiment - Unity Stamp Co. Ornamental Season

Heat Embossed using Zing in Gold

then colored with Gelatos (spritzed with a bit of water so they run some)

First card Paper Pack - Crate Paper Peppermint

Second card Paperr Pack (& bling) - My Mind's Eye 12 days of Christmas

Pink Snow!

well, I guess it's better than Yellow Snow!

LOL

can't tell I have two sons, can ya?!

I've yet again been in a crafty funk lately

just not feelin' it & who knows why...

certainly not me.

To help me out, one of my Design Team Sisters
{dEb}

over on Mountain Plains Crafters

offered up some challenge & I chose

Pink Snow

I'm also entering this in Unity's Friends With Flair

Several shades of Pink cardstock from CloseToMyHeart

Dressform Image & Sentiment - Unity Stamp Co. Santa Baby

Snowflake stamps - CloseToMyHeart Holiday Trinketes

Inks - Several Shades of Pink from CloseToMyHeart

Hexagon Punches - Creative Memories

Snowflake Punch - Stampin' Up

Pink Glitter Embossing Powder - Stampin' Up (very old)

Fluorescent Pink Copic Marker
Fuffy pieces - Liquid Applique