Pinspiration Sunday

I love days when I don't have to leave my flat at all; I mean at all!  Today was one of those days - bliss!  Autumn has definitely been setting in here in Sweden - the leaves have been changing colours, the Rowan trees are loaded with berries and the conkers and acorns have already started falling.  The weather has also been turning to cloudy, rainy and a brisk, cold wind.  So all in all, a great day to stay inside and hermit.  So join me with grabbing your hot beverage of choice and curling up with some photo love.

Currently:

* watching - Bones
* reading - Papercraft Inspirations, August issue
* eating - fajitas
* drinking - water
* wearing - PJs, socks & cardi (my flat is pretty cold)
* weather - raining, 15C
* feeling - very full
* wanting - the weekend to continue
* needing - to find someone to cat-sit Oskar during bathroom reno
* planning - next several LOs with new photos ordered today
* loving - playing in my new box of scrapbooking goodies
* enjoying - a lazy, quiet day at home

And now onto the pins...

Log Cabin Bed Runner

I'm really diggin' the bed runner trend that's picked up in the last year or so; it's like the perfect fit between making a full-sized quilt and making smaller home decor items.

Lucky Quilt Pattern

This pattern caught my eye and the whole website and quilt pattern selection is great, too.  Definitely worth checking out, especially if you love modern quilts.

Sashiko Repair Technique

Have you heard of sashiko?  It's a traditional Japanese stitch technique used on kimonos.  Here in Malmö, we're lucky enough to have a talented Japanese quilter and teacher at the local quilt shop so sashiko features in a number of quilt projects regularly at my guild.  However, I've never thought of using it for patching and I love the idea, especially given that the purpose of sashiko is to strengthen fabrics.  Just cool.

Herringbone Haul-It-All Tote

Just saw this pattern this morning on Moda Bake Shop.  It's a great pattern and very detailed instructions with plenty of photos to help guide you.  I also laughed out loud at the 'OCD' comments - a quilter after my own heart (and OCD quirks).

Crab Fishing

Saw this LO on 2Peas this morning and just loved everything about it.  I've been slowly working through my Down by the Shore collection and found this very inspiring.

LO by Stepanie Bryan

I love using photo enlargements on my pages.  This one caught my eye because of the white space along the left (and a little on the right, too), the soft colours that seem to melt into the white cardstock and the fun line of tags.

Fotor.com

I've been searching for a good photo collage programme for my computer.  I have one on my mobile phone and have gone through several for my PC but I haven't liked any.  Until I found this one today.  It's free, ridiculously easy to use and available as either an online or installable version, available for desktops (Mac & PC) and mobile phones (iPhone & Android).  I made the above collage for my monthly photo order, which I should have within a few days and will let you know what the quality is like.

Shoes of Prey

And now for something truly fun and awesome - design your own shoes!  Squee!  I love shoes - heels, platforms, wedges - basically anything but flats.  I'm going to have to be very careful with this site, or it could become very addicting (and likely expensive).

In an Octopus' Garden

I've been working on getting back into a regular scrapping routine since having returned to work recently.  It's not been easy - especially the work; but we won't get into that.  But I do have another new LO to share with you today; this time returning to my Barcelona holiday photos.

In an Octopus' Garden

I am totally in love with these CP retro slide frames.  Not only do they look great and are a great eye-catching feature on a page but I love just how quick and easy they can make a page come together.  I also especially like that these chipboards have a smooth texture, unlike many of the matte/pixelated chipboards used by many companies.

I started by blotting some blue and green spray mists onto my cardstock base, then sprinkled on more blue, green and some white mist and stamped some 'bubble' shapes around the page.  There was a dicey moment when my acrylic block somehow flew out of my hand and landed stamp-side down in the upper right-hand corner but I just rolled with it.

For the title, I reached into my basket of current supplies and just grabbed the first thing that called out to me - Amy Tan's vellum sticker alphas from Yes, Please.  I decided to mix things up and use the orange letters, since there were pops of orange in several of the photos and I liked the idea of using a complimentary colour palette.  I knew I also wanted to use this cute wave border strip so layered it up in the title along with the circular letter stickers and I really like the effect.

I took my time fussing cutting this little octopus from FP's Down by the Shore.  Got to use a new SC cork embellishment and added another pop of orange and some enamel dots.

I've had these adorable fish buttons for a while now, just waiting for the perfect project and when I saw the little fish paper in Down by the Shore, it inspired me to use them here (even though I didn't use that paper on the LO in the end).  A few white enamel dots add some textured air bubbles to each fish.

And I was so thrilled when I discovered that yes, I did have bright orange enamel dots and sprinkled a few in the topmost cluster, along with a piece of flair from a package I hadn't yet broken into.

To finish everything off, I decided to back the page up with some distressed orange watercolour paper, do a little machine sewing around two of the corners and really distress the inner border for some depth and interest.  I also think the distressed edge gives a little impression of an old 'message in a bottle' feeling.

Whale of a Birthday

I needed to make a birthday card for my step-father so yesterday I set to work on it.  I knew I wanted to use some wood veneer numbers I'd recently bought but was struggling on which papers to use.  Long story short, I (finally) decided on the FP Down by the Shore collection.  I've been wanting to experiment with the new corrugated cardstock and the maritime portion of the collection has an especially nice masculine feel to it.  Prepare yourself for extreme cuteness - no, seriously, this chubby little whale gets me every time:

Whale of a Birthday

Isn't he *adorable*?!  My initial inspiration actually came from the central pennant, where you can see I layered up the wood veneer numbers (my step-father's age) and like I said, I just can't resist that whale and thought he'd be cute layered over the pennant, too.

 

For the corrugated cardstock, I simply stitched it with my sewing machine - the pressure from the presser foot did flatten the area I'd sewn but I also went over it twice so...  If you want to sew your corrugated cardstock and want to prevent it from flattening, I would recommend seeing if your machine has the ability to adjust the height/pressure of your presser foot (check the manual if you don't know this yourself).

I felt more pennants would help support the design and decided to use the anchors, since that's one of the challenge prompts in the current Stash Busters Challenges over on the 2Peas forum.  Then I fussy cut the whale and cut reverse scallops into the striped paper to help ground everything.  Lastly, I wrapped some twine around from which the pennants could hang and tied little knots in the ends.  I wasn't going to add a sentiment to the front but the 'happy happy day' sticker fit so nicely and I really liked how the pennants helped to lead the eye to it.

And yes, if you look closely in the above photo, that *is* lobster/crayfish fabric under the card.  :P

And just because I truly can't resist, I'll leave you with this: