Sparkly Crystal Bracelet: Sex and the City-Style

Happy Friday, everyone!  And what a gorgeous day it is! 

The project that I have to share today was inspired by the gorgeous ladies of Sex and the City! 

I was just floored by the colors that they are wearing in this issue of Entertainment Weekly.  And I literally started designing this bracelet in my head as soon as I saw this photo of them.  I mean, just look at those colors!  Icy, silvery blues – GORGEOUS! 

And to make it all more timely, this week’s challenge at Friends Having Fun is all about Sex and the City!  And of course, the movie has just opened, too — all sorts of SATC-related excitement happening now.  (And yes, I have heard that the movie reviews are not good, and I do not care at all.  The first SATC movie is one of my fave movies ever.  So, I’m still in.)

So here is my bracelet, inspired by those icy blue and silvery shades.  Here’s a look at the entire bracelet – click to enlarge!

And a closer look at the front of the bracelet – again, click to see this larger.  Lots of Swarovski crystals went into this one – white Swarovski pearls, a crystal in a color called Silver Shade, and also Aquamarine crystals.  The colors reminded me SO much of the dresses that the women wore on the EW cover.

Here is a closer look at the dangle piece of the bracelet that hangs from a little charm loop on the side.  I love the way this swings!  The “love” charm just felt totally appropriate for Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda, and Samantha.  After all, that is what it’s all about!

Oops – almost forgot!  For a laugh, I took the “Which Sex and the City Character Are You” quiz that was linked on Friends Having Fun.  Here’s my result – sounds about right, I think. 

I hope that everyone has a great long weekend!  Thanks so much for visiting – see you again soon!

A Day that Sparkles

Hello – happy Thursday!  I have a quick card to share today – a birthday card for my beloved little girl!  I just got this brand-new Elisabeth Bell Aladin set and I could not wait to use this image for my daughter.

This was a pretty interesting image to color – the veil stumped me a little bit!   I added a bit of the lavender color to hair to accommodate the veil.  I hope it worked out.  I have yet to get into the habit of taking note of the Copics that I used to color, but if anyone is interested, please feel free to leave me a comment and I will figure it out for you. 

Thanks so much for visiting – see you again soon!

What I Used:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink white cardstock, Stampin’ Up! Orchid Opulence and Lovely Lilac cardstock

Stamps:  Whiff of Joy/Elisabeth Bell Aladin set (girl image and sentiment), Inkadinkado Dot Flourishes set (swirls)

Ink: Stampin’ Up! Lovely Lilac

Accessories:  Cuttlebug – Spellbinders Nestabilities Label die, Textile Texture embossing folder; EK Success border punch;  Kaiser rhinestones; ribbon; dimensionals; Copic markers.

Apollo Gold and Blue Crystal Bracelet

Hey everyone!  I’ve been absent from my blog for a bit.  Life’s been so busy lately and a certain little girl had a big birthday.  By “big” I mean that we celebrated the occasion four times.   LOL – she’ll only be young once! 

I’ve still been making lots of stuff and have a bracelet to share today.  I LOVE the name of the beads I used on this bracelet so much – Apollo Gold!  How cool and mythological does that sound?  I’ve been reading Sherrilyn Kenyon’s Dark-Hunter series lately, with its mentions of Apollo, his sister Artemis, and the Apollites (did I lose anyone yet? lol), so using these beads felt like really good timing.  Maybe even a little divine intervention at work!

I designed this stretch bracelet around this blue and gold-ish glass heart bead that I had.  The only problem is that I had only one of them!   And that IS a problem for me – I have a little hoarding thing going on with my supplies.  I feel so uneasy if I don’t have access to more than one of an item, especially when I’m using the last one I have.  Is anyone else like this with their supplies?  C’mon, I can’t be the only one!

And here’s a shocker – I actually got my act together enough to list this bracelet on Etsy today!  I’ve shocked myself!  So for the low, low price of….oh, who I am kidding – I am so not a natural salesperson.  I’ll just say in a quiet voice…click here to see the item in my Etsy store. 

Thanks so much for visiting – see you again soon!

Some Jewelry I Just Have to Keep for Myself…

…like these two bracelets I’m posting today. 

Since I’ve started making jewelry, I’ve been giving lots of stuff to my family and friends, but these two I made just for me.  Want to see?

This one is a stretch bracelet – really easy to put on and take off, which I seem to do several times a day.  And I added the fleur de lis charm since that is one my favorite shapes.

This next bracelet has a clasp, and the sterling silver tube beads on this make it nice and light to wear.  Since it has fewer beads, it weighs so little! 

I have been making a LOT of stuff lately, so I expect to be posting a lot in the coming days.  I am planning to get more jewelry listed my Etsy store really soon too (there are a just few bracelets in the store right now).  I’ve been feeling really fussy about learning, and practicing, and practicing, and practicing some more before I start to sell the stuff – that is just my way – but soon, I will start putting some things up for sale.  Should be pretty fun!

Thanks so much for visiting – see you again soon!

Kitten Update!

My, how she’s grown!  Here is our little Ragdoll Fluffy at four months old.  She has grown SO much in the two months that she’s been with us – it’s amazing how fast it’s going. 

Doesn’t she look like a big girl here?   Such a big-girl face!

And here, you can still see a baby-ish look about her.  She looks like she is thinking of pouncing on whatever she’s looking at…

And to think that she looked like this just a few short weeks ago!  Her chocolate point coloring has really come in since this pic was taken in February.

I will be back tomorrow with more projects to show.  Thanks so much for visiting and seeing my sweet kitty!

Beaded Bookmarks

I have some new beading projects to show today – BOOKMARKS!  Please forgive my loud, shouting caps, but I am so excited about these!  While I enjoy making charms for my journals (which is how I got my start with beading), I am seriously excited to start making these bookmarks.  They are so much more useful.  So I am HAPPY about these! 

Here is a bookmark that I sent to Beth.  Last week, I had mentioned how kind she was to lend me the Black Dagger Brotherhood books, so she HAD to have a reading-related prezzie in return. And here is Beth’s bookmark in action, in a J.R. Ward book, of course.

Here’s another one in my fave blues — I LOVE those periwinkle crackled-glass beads so much.  This all reminds me of being a kid with marbles – I just want to PLAY with them. 

I have a BUNCH more bookmarks to show, so I will be posting those soon.  Thank you so much for visiting – see you again soon!

Birthday Wishes

Oh, my poor neglected blog!  Rather than dwelling on my guilt over my lack of posting, how about I just show you my card?

This one, a birthday card for my sister, is my latest attempt with my Copics. I believe that this Elisabeth Bell stamp is meant to be a holiday image (note the holly!), but I overlooked that for this card since I wanted to use purples.   Hopefully I got away with it! 

Here is a look at the entire card:

And a closer look at the stamped image that was colored with Copics:

I hope you all have a great weekend!  I’ll definitely be posting more projects next week.  Thanks so much for visiting!

What I Used:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink Vintage Cream cardstock, Stampin’ Up! Elegant Eggplant cardstock; Tinkering Ink Provincial Fair designer paper

Stamps:  Elisabeth Bell for Whiff of Joy stamps; Inkadinkado (sentiment); Stampin’ Up! Baroque Motifs (swirl)

Ink:  Versafine Onyx Black; Versamark; Stampin’ Up! Almost Amethyst

Accessories:  Cuttlebug:  Spellbinders Nestabilities Labels Eight die; EK Success border punch; Kaiser pearls; ribbon; dimensionals; clear embossing powder; Copic markers; Sakura Gelly Roll pens

Twilight Tuesday: New Challenge and BLOG HOP!

Life got in the way for me and I wasn’t able to participate in yesterday’s Twilight Tuesday Inspiration Challenge, but I wanted to provide the details.  The theme for yesterday’s TTIC54 is The Raven, giving you a chance to look a little closer at a Quileute legend.  

The other bit of news – we’re celebrating the release of The Twilight Saga: New Moon with a blog hop on Friday, 20 November!  This will be so fun – we’ve got a bunch of special guests lined up and will be working alongside Artful INKables, who are doing their own blog hop that same day!  That means you can enter both the Twilight Tuesday blog hop and the Artful INKables hop using the same project.  There are a lot more details to be found at Twilight Tuesday, including how to sign up – click here and join us! 

And feel free to grab this blinkie for your own blog.  I can’t wait for the 20th!

Looking for a Free Broom Ride?

Well…I might just be able to help you out with that.  Or, more specifically, Lily can help  – she is always up for a free broom ride!  Lily is one of the Wildflower Kids, and her stamp, along with the broom rides sentiment, is available in the new stamp set called Free Broom Rides.  This set, along with the other new sets from Wildflower Kids Stamps, is available exclusively at the Stamp Happens Shop. 

I stayed with traditional Halloween colors for this card, and colored Lily with Prismacolor colored pencils.  Lily is really fun to color – go grab your own set and get coloring too!

What I Used:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink white and black cardstock; The Paper Company peach shimmer cardstock

Stamps:  Wildflower Kids Stamps Free Broom Rides set, from the Stamp Happens Shop

Ink:  Ranger Archival Ink in jet black; Stampin’ Up! Pumpkin Pie

Accessories: Cuttlebug: Boo to You and Swiss Dots embossing folder; Spellbinders Nestabilities oval, scalloped oval, and tag dies; Making Memories brad; dimensionals; ribbon; Prismacolor pencils with gamsol;

StampInsanity Stamps Sneak Peek!

Exciting happenings this week — StampInsanity Stamps is releasing three new sets this week! And wait until you see these — they are FANTASTIC!   Two of the sets, Morgan’s Spell and Halloween Henry, are Halloween-themed.  The third set, called Morgan’s Love, is a HUGE set that is perfect for all the bookworms out there!  It’s filled with sentiments related to losing yourself in good books and is sooo much fun.  I will be displaying a project using that set as soon as I can!

To give you a little hint on the contents of the new sets, here is a card that I made the set called Morgan’s Spell. Morgan is a regular character in the StampInsanity lines – you’ll see her in this badge (at the left) as well. 

StampInsanity Stamps are sold exclusively at the Stamp Happen Shop, beginning on Friday, September 25th.   Today, the members of the Senior Design Team of the Stamp Sistahs are unveiling sneak peeks from these three new sets, and the full Stamp Sistahs Design Team will be posting their projects on Friday.  Visit the Senior Design Team members today to see their awesome projects!

Beth (owner, StampInsanity Stamps)

Tonya (owner, Stamp Happens Shop)

Jen, Deconstructing Jen

And here is my card!  I used the new set called Morgan’s Spell and I could not WAIT to get this witchy little stamp inked up!  How adorable is she? 

Coloring this image was so much fun.  I stamped the image with black ink and colored it with Prismacolor markers, with a couple of glittery highlights done with my fave Jelly Roll pens.  Her earrings just HAD to sparkle!  I used Stickles in Frosted Lace on the moon, and penciled in a little extra “moonglow” around the moon with a really pale blue-grey Prismacolor pencil.  The stars in the background are also from the Morgan’s Spell set and were stamped in metallic silver.  I embossed the white background with a stars texture plate from Fiskars. 

The quote on the card is yet another stamp from this set, and it features the classic witchy quote from Macbeth: 

Double, double, toil and trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble.

~ William Shakespeare

Lots of details for you!  I had a TON of fun making this one.  Be sure to hit the Stamp Happens Shop on Friday to grab these three new sets before they’re gone!

What I Used:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink white cardstock; Stampin’ Up! Ballet Blue cardstock; The Paper Company silver metallic cardstock; Bazzill Bling in Tiara

Stamps:  StampInsanity Stamps Morgan’s Spell set (girl image, quote, and stars) from the Stamp Happens Shop

Ink:  Stampin’ Up! Ballet Blue and Night of Navy

Accessories:  Cuttlebug: Fiskars texture plate in stars; Spellbinders Nestabilities Labels Three die and ribbon slide die; Dew Drops in metallic silver; EK Success deco corner punch; dimensionals; ribbon; Prismacolor markers and pencils; Sakura Jelly Roll pens in silver and clear; Stickles in Frosted Lace