Wednesday Wonder – Keeping Memories in Travelers Notebook Inserts

Posted on June 14, 2017 by Kristie Sloan

It is amazing how many ways people find themselves doing some sort of memory keeping!

Using Travelers Notebooks for small scrapbooking.

Some of us are proud to consider ourselves “scrapbookers,” and others just want to keep a few memories along the way without shouldering the title. In the end, it’s about the stories and the pictures. Sometimes we don’t even have a photo of the actual story we want to tell, but with a little creativity, there is usually some kind of photo or something you can use to illustrate the story. In that case, the story truly is the star.

Traveler’s Notebook Inserts have become quite popular for a variety of uses; journals, bullet journals, lists, mixed media, etc. These inserts are perfect for capturing bits and pieces of daily memories, and they are small enough that they don’t feel as intimidating as a large blank page often does. Beth from ScrappingWonders.com shows how she has used one to save a story from her daughter’s third grade final party. The video is below. Beth has also found that mixed media Traveler’s Notebook were either hard to come by or non-existent, and has started making them and carrying them in her Scrapping Wonders Etsy shop. Stop by if you want to grab one, or more!

Watch as Beth shows us a quick layout in her Traveler’s Notebook.

Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures,

Tool Tip Tuesday – Duck Duct Tape

Posted on June 13, 2017 by Kristie Sloan

Most of you already know there a million things you can use duct tape for.

3 reasons to use duct tape on your stencils.

We commonly refer to it as “Duck Tape,” which is actually a popular brand name of duct tape. I’m sure you’ve seen some of things people have made, from wallets to prom dresses. Today, we’re sticking with a crafty use. I recently noticed someone had used a pretty duck tape to edge her stencils. Brilliant! Having all the edges extend beyond the existing borders of the stencils was really helpful.

Duct tape edges give more space to cover the project beyond the stencil.
A stack of stencils slide more easily across each other.
There is more to hold on to as you clean your stencils.

We even soaked and cleaned stencils in a tub of water and the duct tape held up great! We were actually encouraged to use Duck brand duct tape, as it seems to actually work better for this purpose. I had envisioned using some wild prints and really jazzing up the edges, until I found out that the solid colors had TWICE as many yards as the prints, for the SAME PRICE. Yes, I started with a solid color! However, you can grab a coupon for your big box craft store and get started with some wild prints more economically. If you have some doubts, just do a few to get started.

A final tip, if there is info on the stencil you want to keep, just grab a permanent marker and write it on the tape.

Write any info about the stencil right on the tape with a permanent marker.

Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures!

Wednesday Wonder – Painted Globe Project

Posted on June 7, 2017 by Kristie Sloan

Today I wanted to share a fantastic project by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer!

New life for an old globe.

You know how fond I am of taking found items and sprucing them up! Julie took an old globe she found at a thrift store and used some paint and vinyl cutouts to create a really great update to the globe. In fact, the direction she took this project will allow this globe to be used no matter how or when boundaries are redrawn for country borders, or what areas are renamed. She uses some great step-by-step photos so you can follow her project.

As you can see, it’s another way to use an electronic cutter for an artsy project. Using the letters for both a masking technique, as well as adding phrases, is such a great use of her machine and her creativity! Julie uses a Brother ScanNCut machine, but you can use your Cricut or Silhouette!

I hope you enjoy the project as much as I did! Hop on over and take a peek at her globe project now!

Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures!

Baby Shower Adventure

Posted on May 22, 2017 by Kristie Sloan

I know you are not going to believe it, but I’m going to be a great-grandma. Although I was invited to the baby shower, my daughter and granddaughter never expected I would travel from Texas to Minnesota just to come for the shower. But I did it anyway! When they found out I was coming, they were so excited. Who wouldn’t be, right? The problem with being crafty is the fact that your family can put you to work. Right away, they gave me a list of things they wanted to know if I could help with, hoping I had some crafty way to make quick work of what they wanted done. Of course I said I would help! They wanted special corsages for the grandmothers and aunties, and I even figured out a way to make those and bring them. In the end, my carry-on bag for the plane was basically a shower-in-a-suitcase.

Shower-in-a-suitcase.

One of the requests was to make a diaper cake – but not the usual cake. It was to be a tricycle “cake.” Thank goodness for YouTube and all the wonderful people who share how-to videos! I put this item together to make sure it was right, and then I partially disassembled it so it would fit in the suitcase. With minimal effort I put it back together on arrival.

Diaper tricycle, complete with baby elephant to complete the theme.

artful adventure baby shower kristie sloan diaper tricycle back

Back view of diaper tricycle.

I was asked to make some signage for various things going on at the party. Thanks to a great brush font I found online, I was able to pull off a hand lettered look. And thanks to my Cricut die cut machine, I was able to find all kinds of things to for the elephant theme.

The elephant on the tricycle was set on the gift table with this sign.

Gift table sign

Advice for the mommy-to-be is always a good thing. These cards also included guest’s predictions on the actual birth day, the babies weight and length.

Advice to the mommy-to-be, including some fun guessing on birth day, time and baby’s weight.

This was a fun game — trying to guess the size of the mommy-to-be’s waist. Believe it or not, there were two people who were so close, and one was almost exactly right! Most guesses were off by about 8 inches or more!

Guess mommy’s waist size!

Shhh, don’t tell anyone, this is probably not proper etiquette, but sure will be a time saver!

Self addressing the envelopes for thank you notes can be a big help.

Baby info to answer the questions that are asked over and over.

The basic info

Mommy-to-be got a special large corsage in the form of a maternity belly sash. When I started researching this, I found that many of these are made and used for pregnancy photo shoots, and then the flowery sash is used for a newborn photo shoot! Great multi-use item. By the way, I watched 30 minutes of a video in Spanish to figure out how to structure the support on the back of one of these large corsages!

Maternity Belly Sash, as asked for!

What party would be complete without some type of photo booth fun? I was such a proud crafty mom/grandma to see they had made this.

Photo booth decor.

They were also proud of this Pinterest win, and who wouldn’t be? Isn’t this the cutest thing ever — a baby buggy watermelon fruit bowl!

Baby buggy watermelon fruit salad.

For a little party favor, the elephant theme was continued.

Thanks for coming, party animals!

Party treats for elephant themed baby shower.

We had a lot of fun, and I was glad I got to attend! Nothing is better than family. Love them!

Nothing is better than family!

Hope you enjoyed a recap of an Artful Adventure baby shower!

Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures,

Spring – Word Tags for All Seasons

Posted on March 20, 2017 by Kristie Sloan

Welcome to today’s SPRING blog hop! It has been quite some time since we had a blog hop, and a spring theme seemed like just the thing to get us started again. Today I’ll show you my latest version of the Word Tags for All Seasons. I have been procrastinating getting more versions of my seasonal tags done. Not because they take long, but because there are so many options! For a little more background information, you can read this previous post about the Word Tag Blocks, or see the February/love/family tags.

Here are the papers I selected to use for this project. I had them on hand from an old Close to My Heart kit. I’m sure you have some kind of patterned paper that you could use, too!

One sheet patterned paper, three sheets of colored cardstock.

I also tore off the back of a 12×12 paper pad to use as the base for my tags. It was perfect to make a great foundation for the tags. Plus it was free! Who doesn’t like free!

The back of a 12x12 cardstock pad - lightweight chipboard

The back of a 12×12 cardstock pad – lightweight chipboard.

To get the most from this backing, I found that cutting it into three 2.75″ wide strips would work best. The following photo shows how the cuts were made for the tags.

Three 2.75″ strips worked perfect to cut the tag bases.

Next, I cut my decorated pattered paper in the same way, to maximize my paper and have as little waste as possible. Then I used adhesive and stuck the patterned paper to each of the base pieces. The piece was double sided, and I could have easily alternated the paper, but I really like the springy look of the pattern, so I just stuck with the one side. You can see I also inked the edges. If you ink your edges, you may prefer to use a sponge and create a softer look. I just drug my edges across a coordinating ink pad to create a more messy, inky, imperfect look.

Patterned paper adhered to the base pieces and edges inked.

I cut letters out with my Cricut electronic cutting machine. You could use large die cut letters, stencil the letters, or even just draw them on. Whatever you have for supplies or tools! I even added a flourish to a couple of the letters in a way that changed them up a little.

After adhering each of the letters to the tag, I put a coat of Liquid Glass over the top of each letter, to give it a glossy finish and add a bit more dimension. At this point, I had to go run an errand, so it was a perfect time to let the glossy finish dry. Try not to get the Glossy Accents on any heavier than will cover it, as it will just add to the drying time.

A bit of a flourish attached to the basic letter. Then a coat of Liquid Glass.

More dimension added to the long 7.5″ tag.

The long tag was perfect for a bit of spring grass and flowers. The little flowers were sized into three sizes and cut on the Cricut. The grass was just a strip of green that was fringed by scissors.

Each tag got a loop made of bakers twine and attached with more Liquid Glass on the back. Allowing time to dry.

That’s it, the spring word tags are done! Now they are ready to set out to display. I hope you’ll try some and share a photo of yours with us!

Spring Word Tags

Thank you for joining us on the Spring Blog Hop!

Next up is Alice Boll. Let’s see what she is up to!

Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures!

Artful Adventures

Ideas for scrapbooking, art journaling, mixed media, card making and stamping projects.

Category Archives: Art Adventures

Wednesday Wonder – Keeping Memories in Travelers Notebook Inserts

Tool Tip Tuesday – Duck Duct Tape

Wednesday Wonder – Painted Globe Project

Baby Shower Adventure

Spring – Word Tags for All Seasons

Next up is Alice Boll. Let’s see what she is up to!