Smiley Guy Designs: October 2012

October 25, 2012

My Friend Valerie ROCKS!

My friend Valerie is taking the internet by storm. On her blog, ValByDesign, she posts many different types of things. She shares cards she's made, various videos she sees on the internet (i.e scrapbook organization and card making techniques, etc.) and her scrapbook pages for Project Life.

I met Valerie while working at my part-time job at Archivers. Some of my readers may remember my post showing the Thank You card I made for her Special Thank You for Friend. She is such a friendly, happy and talented crafter. She has four kids and each year creates an album for EACH kid - now that's LOTS of scrapbooking. I have no idea how she finds time to do any kind of crafting - but where there's a will there's a way and she definitely has the will going.

Valerie did a recent post on her blog to show some mini Thank You cards she made using Core'dinations cardstock. This cardstock is a wonderful item for crafters since it's a colored core cardstock that can be sanded to expose the color underneath. Crafters just love it! The people at Core'dinations saw Val's blog and posted it on their Facebook page. They also tweeted about it on Twitter. Valerie's blog post

Now while this is FABULOUS in and of itself...by the time I'm finishing up this post, Valerie has MORE good news. The people at Cricut (personal electronic die cut machine) sent a message to Valerie asking her to post her projects on their Cricut.com Project Center page. The card below was made using the Cricut die cutting machine and the Spongebob SquarePants cartridge to cut out the images. Isn't it just adorable? No wonder Cricut wants Valerie to post her projects on their site.

Birthday Card with Cricut's SpongeBob Squarepants

I told you Valerie ROCKS. Keep up the good work - I'm so proud of you!!!

Thanks for stopping by and see you again soon!
Heidi

October 15, 2012

Guess Who's In CardMaker Magazine

Hello my friends! Bet you're surprised to hear from me again so soon but I had to share this with everyone. I'm pretty stoked!!!!

I just received the November, 2012 issue of CardMaker magazine and... wait for it....wait for it.....if you turn to page 72 guess what you'll see....a card by yours truly. It's a Hanukkah card using a stamped image from Stampin Bella called 'Menorah Bella'.

As some of you may know, I teach card classes part time at Archiver's (a local scrapbooking store). This past weekend, I was teaching a class and one of the ladies told me she had gotten her magazine and recognized my name. It was rather exciting to have someone see my card without me showing it to them.

Here's a close up of the image used on the front of the card. She's colored with COPIC markers. (E00, E11, B24, B26, Y15, R29, E33, E35, E37). The glitter cardstock is from Michael's and it's the greatest - all the sparkle and none of the glittery mess (anyone who works with glitter knows that all you have to do is look at it and it's stuck to your face, in your hair, etc.).

Here's a picture of the card along with the instructions and materials list. I just love how they always set the stage to make each card look fabulous!

Here's a copy of the front of the magazine so that if you want to go to your local scrapbook store you know what to look for.

There's a funny story about this card. My original card had a different focal point - it was a Star of David and had the word 'Shalom' inside.

When the editor told me they had picked the card for publication she asked if I could change the focal point to remove the word 'Shalom'. Since they had picked the card I said 'sure, why not'. But I didn't have anything small enough to fit in the middle so I did a paper piecing technique and strategically covered the word. I sent it in and the editor loved it. Then a few weeks later I received yet another email advising that particular stamp was being discontinued from Stampin Up so they couldn't use it. She asked if I could do another focal point. That's the point when I frantically searched my stamp stash and found my lovely Menorah Bella.

I made the new focal point and sent it in. So, by the time the magazine actually came out I had no idea what the card would look like. I must say I think it turned out well...phew!!!!

Thanks for checking and hope to see you again soon!
Heidi

October 13, 2012

Hallo 'WASHI' ween!!!

Happy Saturday y'all!! Is everyone enjoying this fall weather? In the midwest it's definitely fall. The weather is crisp and leaves are changing into the most beautiful reds, oranges and yellows! Pretty soon though the trees will just be 'nekked'! Even though fall is my fav time of year - I'm so glad I live in an apartment and do NOT, repeat NOT, have to rake said beautiful leaves.

I have to show you guys this picture....I took my Mom to the clinic/hospital on Sunday to have an MRI done...when I pulled into the parking lot there were NO cars in the parking lot near me. We were in there about an hour and when I came out look what I found next to me??? Seriously? There was NO other place for them to park? I have my Mom in a transport wheelchair and she gets in on the passenger side. Gee, I hope I didn't put any dings in their door!!!

Now on to some Halloween stuff. I made some tags for my co-workers at Assurant Health. I used a bunch of different washi tapes. If you don't know what washi tape is it's really cool. It's a very thin tape that comes on a roll like scotch tape or masking tape. It's really thin and can be torn or cut off the roll. They're repositional so if you don't put it down in the right spot you can pick it up and move it. Some of them are a little transparent so if you put one over another you may be able to see the pattern underneath. It's really fun and seems to be the big trend for the season.

I just unrolled a bunch of the tape and cut the edges. I wrapped the tape around the back of the white piece of paper. On some of them I punched out a 1" circle and then a 1.5" circle out of pattermed paper and glued it on the back. I punched and adhered the black spider to the front. Then I realized that was a bunch of extra work. So then I decided to just punch a 1" circle of patterned paper and adhere it directly to the front and then adhered the spider. Cut out two steps and it all looks the same. Sometimes I get tunnel vision and have to do things the hard way....then a light bulb goes off and it's DUH....I coulda done it differently.

Here's a picture of the washi tapes rolls I used. Most of them are from Queen & Co. The orange one that has the words on it is from another company but I can't remember which one...sorry!

That's all for today. Thanks for stopping by and hope to see you again soon!

Heidi