TGF Royalty Contest Final Four Project

Hi!  I can finally share what I made for TGF's Royalty Contest Final Four.  Our goal was to:

CREATE one last "Royal" themed project using:

Ribbon

Only TGF stamps

Your favorite color

At least ONE royal "icon"- crown, carriage, tiara, glass slipper, castle, etc.  (this can be a TGF stamp, or any other brand of embellishment, papers, diecuts, etc.)

Lots of sparkle

Two different kinds of Designer Paper (at a minimum :) 

Your own personal style

(warning: long post and lots of photos)

I decided to make a set of Princess themed activity books.  Each one is 6x6 inches and both front and back covers are chipboard.   I had this idea floating around in my head for a while.  Before I became a full time stay at home mom, I worked as a speech therapist in lots of different settings but mostly I loved working with children especially toddlers.  As a graduate student many years ago, I would make my own therapy materials and incorporate craft activities into my therapy sessions because kids love to craft too!  And when I started working I still tried to make therapy materials that I could use over and over.  So these 2 books really stem from my past experience as a therapist and my love for cute crafty things.  

My first Princess activity book focuses on color.  The cover follows MFT's sketch 25 with TGF's Princess #2.  I used my Cinch to bind both books.  Lot of bling on the covers too with some ribbon and tulle tied into a bow in the corner.

The inside.  Name label on the left and the intro to the first section on the right which I called Color Match.

Little fun directions to Color Match.  The pages in PTI's Raspberry Fizz (one of my favorite cardstock colors) are laminated.  There is a dry erase marker that I wrapped up in washi tape to look prettier and that is attached to the book with velcro.  When I worked in the schools, we laminated a lot of materials. 

Fancy Anya and the frog from Down By the Pond.  Each frog and the dresses on the girls are paper pieced.  So I stamped 24 frogs on white then stamped 24 more frogs on various colored paper and then cut them out and glued them on.  I could've colored them all but I really wanted the colors to match and save some ink in my copics.

Princess #3.  I used a handwriting site HERE to print out all the words.  It's a neat site because you can type in anything that you want to practice on the worksheets.  I printed them out and cut them to size.

Tuesday.  So usually I don't color much black hair.  Mostly it's just light or dark brown.  But wouldn't you know it I ran out of ink in my 2 brown copic pens (and also my skin tone pens too)!  Yes of course that would happen.  I was able to find them at one of our local craft stores (J's).  They always have a great sale if you donate canned goods which is such a great trade off. 

The original Princess Anya.  So I had to have these laminated at Kinko's or I guess they are now known as FedEx Office.  I went there at 10:30 at night thinking they could just laminate them right then for me.  That's how they've done it before (years ago, I guess) but the lady actually wanted me to laminate them myself in those pouches.  Ummm, that's more expensive!  If I wanted the large sheet laminate then I'd have to wait til morning to pick them up.  Trust me, it was difficult to let them take the pages I worked so long on.  I worried they would bend the pages (and there are some tiny bent corners) I've noticed but overall I guess they did a good job. 

Fleur Anya.  See that corner on the green sheet is bent!  Plus they didn't even have my order ready when I went in the next morning!  I had to take a trip down to another crafty store and then go back to Kinko's to pick it up.  That is how I remember Kinko's though.  It's great they are 24 hours but sometimes they are hit or miss.  I hand cut each page out of the huge sheet laminate.

Princess #2 again.  See, told you lots of photos.  Still with me?

My second section is called Color Me Princess.

Mermaid Anya.  Basically I left these images uncolored so you can color them and then erase them and color them over and over again.

Original Princess and Geisha Anya.

Fairy Eva (well, I had to get that one) and Flutter Anya.

Princess #3 waving good-bye.  The next section is Drawings.

Just cut some white pages to size for doodling.  My inside pages measure 5x6 to accommodate the pen. 

The second activity book focuses on writing and numbers.  The cover has Princess #3 and follows the same sketch.

On the left is the name label and on the right the section for name writing practice.  This pen is also wrapped in washi tape.

I printed these out from that same site I mentioned above.  You can make block letters or dotted letters.  There are a few of these pages to practice.

On the right is the section My Numbers.

Dragonfly from the Sunshine Kit.  Same site for these printed out numbers.

Dresses from the original Princess Anya and Princess #3.  I cut them out.  Flowers from Sunshine Kit.

The birdie is also from the Sunshine Kit and the butterfly from the Spotlight Kit.

Fairy from Never Ever set.  I cut the bows out from 80s Anya.

The piggy from Fly Away is not really princess related but still pretty cute!  I'm so glad I found him. He is holding 8 balloons and was my inspiration for making this numbers section.  The wands on the right are from Princess Anya.  Yes, I cut them all out!  Even the skinny stick part! 

The crowns from the 3 Princesses and CC Tuesday all hand cut.

The last section of this book is Princess Notes with some blank pages for scribbles.  I really had meant for this to be one huge activity book but when I made all these pages and tried to bind them it was just too fat.  So I had to decide whether to cut some sections out or make a set of books.  In the end I didn't want to take anything out especially since I had all the laminating done so one huge book turned into 2 activity books.  

Some last tips on laminating.  I was warned by the Kinko's guy that my pages were too thick and may bubble.  So maybe may skip the PTI cardstock next time.  And use thinner paper.  But I didn't notice much bubbling so they did do a pretty good job just had to go there 3 times in less than 24 hours. 

So this was a fun challenge!  I got to use more bling.  I definitely will need to get more of those.  Finally used some of my velvety soft scalloped ribbon too and a whole lot of my TGF stamps finally saw some ink.

Thank you so much for reading this long post and looking at all the photos which my husband worked so hard to take.  I so appreciate it.

Now please go to TGF's facebook page and VOTE (5 am - 11 pm CST)!  Thank you!  

Every Girl Born a Princess

Hi!  Well, that's how it should be anyway.  That's the theme I wanted to convey with this project I created for TGF's Royalty Contest week 4.  I'm kind of addicted to these contests, I think.  Umm, might be the competitive side of me although really I'm a laid-back, calm kind of person.  What do you think, Cheryl?  Anyway, week 4 asks us to use one of the 4Cs (castle, crown or tiara, carriage and/or carats or bling).  I know it says one of the 4 but I did manage to get in all of the 4. 

So, I've been seeing these book card boxes in blogland and wanted to try to make one too.  I saw a tutorial HERE.  If you do a search for them you're likely to find one tutorial or another.  But I wanted this book card to be more than a card because I like functional and practical gifts.  I thought well it's a pretty fancy card to give a person but then what would the person do with it?  So I thought about if for a bit and came up with this baby memory book/box idea. 

A view of the "pages."  Looks like a book doesn't it? 

Another view.

The cover.  I used TGF's girl baby from the Oh Baby set and placed her in a blinged up carriage.  Ha!  I know TGF probably didn't mean baby carriage but it's a carriage.  My DP does have carriages on it as well though.

A little tag to welcome the baby princess into the world.  I found a tutorial and a template for the carriage and a 3D carriage from HERE.  This is one spoiled baby!

A while back when I was planning a friend's baby shower I found this poem (HERE--scroll down a bit) and thought it was a really cute idea so essentially that is what I turned this book card into--a memory box for a baby princess.  I wish I had this when my daughter was born.

A crown that I ended up placing rhinestones on.  It looked like it was missing something so I used my liquid glaze and stuck some rhinestones to make it look more regal.  The crowns were a gift with my order from Stamp and Create.  Isn't that nice of them?  And it came in handy with this project.

Inside.  I should mention my book card is 8x8 inches.  I followed the tutorial but changed the dimensions to the size I wanted.  I think scoring and folding the "pages" accordian style took the longest.

The pages create a pretty sturdy box.  It's just a bit more than an inch deep.  

I created a pocket on the left side to hold some paper that I die cut (from PTI) to jot down simple notes.  The original TGF princess too.

On the right side is her castle of course!  It's a page from Imaginisce Enchanted paper pad.  I covered the top edge of the "pages" with PTI satin ribbon and placed corners with bling too.  I actually used lots of bling on this project.  Must remember to buy more!  Hehe.

The back cover.  I thought I only had one sheet of this cardstock and was really bummed that I didn't have enough for the back.  I thought to myself why did I buy only one sheet??  Usually I buy 2 of every cardstock just in case I want to make a big project.  But I found the 2nd sheet in between some other paper.  Thank goodness!

This ended up being a pretty big project for me since there were so many details.  Hopefully I'll be able to let it go to a nice home.  I do have an idea of who I'd like to send it to.  I hope it survives in the mail.

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!

Our very own ...

Princess!

Hi!  That princess would be our daughter.  I used her one year old studio photo (taken by Owen & Owen Photography) for TGF's Royalty Contest Week 3.  It's a sketch challenge.

But I thought I'd use the sketch as a layout for a scrapbook page.  I had to stretch it a bit since my page is 12x12.

My mom bought that cute little princess dress for her and most of the baby jewelry she is wearing in the photo.  I love that dress.  I still have it. 

I thought Princess Anya #3's dress was really similar to my daughter's one with the bow on the front and decided to use her.  I recently bought all the princesses including the original one.  Yes, I didn't have that one yet but when the 2 new ones came out, I had to get them all!  Sigh, they are so adorable!  I added rhinestones (that I colored with my copic marker) to her crown and stickles on her dress.

I printed her name out and added all the rhinestones around it, not individually though.  That would have been tedious but used the ones that are all linked together and just wrapped it around.  I colored these rhinestones too.

This is my handmade bow embellishment.  I used some sterling silver chain and beads from my jewelry stash.  The tags are PTI's Tiny Tags dies.

Closer up.  I haven't made jewelry in a while and I had a hard time wrapping the wire.  It takes some practice.

I love this part the most.  I had made this ring years ago as a pendant but never got around to giving it away so I used it as a ring for the ribbon.  It is a sterling silver ring that I wrapped with SS wire and Swarovski beads.  Added a stick pin here and on the ends of the ribbon below the photo of my daughter. 

It's hard to believe my daughter will be 10 this year.  That was fast.  Another 10 years and she'll be grown up already!

Also entering this in Paper Sundaes Challenge #73--Girly Girl.

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!

Kiss the Girl!

Hi!  After being on vacation for so long I think I've forgotten how to craft and take pictures and blog.  I couldn't remember my set up for taking photos.  Hopefully, it'll come back to me.  Anyway, while away I did see that TGF was having a super fun looking Royalty Contest.  I missed week 1 but thought I could try week 2 which is to use a photo posted on TGF's site as inspiration.  I went with the wedding/wedding cake/couple theme for the inspiration for my card. 

And because I have Disney on my mind, I wanted to portray Ariel and her Prince Eric having a beach wedding. I used my reverse wonky rectangles (cut from some sparkly Stampin' Up cardstock) to make a cake and placed a shell sticker on top.  (The stickers were from Cheryl to my kids but I borrowed a couple).

Here is Mermaid Anya. 

Here is Prince Eric made up of Prince Ian's body and Dress Me Ian's head.  I had Prince Ian's whole body and head all set to go when I got his face all stained so decided to chop his head off and replace it.  And since Prince Ian is digital and I am running out of ink in my printer it wasn't printing very well.

The heart diecut is from Cheery Lynn Designs.  I embossed the letters using my Taj alphabet stencil to spell out kiss the girl (one of the songs from the Little Mermaid movie).  I've had that song in my head all day so decided to go with that.  I rubbed some chalk over the embossed letters to look a little sandy.  I glued the little hearts that were punched out onto the wedding cake.  I also added a little love charm at the top of the card with some twine cause it looked a bit bare on top. 

I'm not sure if I totally love the placement of everything on this card but I think it's still cute.  Definitely need some time to get back into the crafting groove.

Thanks for reading!