Happy St Patrick's Day

Well it was really a perfect day for St Patrick's Day.  Sunny and close to 70 degrees.  I remember years when it was so cold and windy that it was actually torture walking up Fifth Avenue, but I wouldn't let the weather keep me away.

Many years have gone by since I marched with the NYC Transit Police Department, which was disbanded in 1995 and merged with the New York City Police Department.  For a few years after the merger we continued with our own Emerald Society.  Those were the days...

This year I broke out my St Patrick's Day stamp and made some cards.  I found some Irish sayings that fit perfectly around the edge of the cards.

Will you be mine?

Valentines day is right around the corner and I wanted to make cards for my husband and two boys.  I recently purchased a heart punch because I had some ideas.  I also found some inspiration from pinterest of course, using paint chips.  You can find lots of shades of colors and they are free.  I took one of each from the red family.

Valentine Banner

Well Valentines Day is right around the corner and I needed to put something festive up since all but one Christmas decoration has been put away. The house looks so barren with all of that stuff put away until after next Thanksgiving.

 I was going to make a banner with heart shapes, but I decided on using this one sheet of paper that had some of the cutest little pictures. The paper was 12x12 and was divided into 24 rectangular pictures, they almost looked like they were meant to be cards. At first I thought I would make a matching game, I got that idea from my friend Meagan she has a shop on facebook called the The Girl Next Door, but not all of the pictures were duplicated.

 I cut out all of the pictures and matted them with a pinkish/lavender card stock, and tied them off with some pink and white bakers twine. I have been dying to use the bakers twine for a project. They came out cute, they look a little small over my back door, they may look better in a smaller room.

Where does the time go?

It has been quite some time since I have posted anything here.  I have been very busy.  We took a family vacation.  I have finished 99% of my Christmas shopping.  I made lots of crafts for a craft fair I did, my very first one.

There were just one of the styles of notepad stands that I had made.  I thought they made cute teacher gifts

I love making these ornaments, paper and glitter, what else does a girl need?  These were very popular at the craft fair, they were my biggest seller.

These Santa Candy Bar covers I saw on another blog and just thought they were too cute not to make a batch.  Plus with the covers on them I didn't eat up all the candy bars, it deterred me ;)

I hope to post a few more times before the end of the year, and I plan on making my New Years resolution to post at least once a week.

Spooky

Francis, my youngest loves holidays, all holidays.  He has been asking for us to make the house spooky for Halloween, when other families out-spook us he gets bent out of shape.  He had seen some bat decorations in the craft store and decided he needed to have some spooky bats in his room.

I gave this a lot of thought, only because I had visions of him waking up at night and being scared to death of bats in his room.  I decided on a bat mobile, not the Batmobile.

I used my cricut to cut out bats of different sizes, and had to dig around up in the attic for an embroidery hoop to hang the bats from.  The biggest problem I had was getting the bats to hang right side up.  As you can see I didn't succeed but does it really matter when Francis LOVED IT!  Then he asked for one with ghosts, that's my boy.

It's been a banner few days.

One thing I love to do is make pretty or fun or pretty fun things out of paper, that is how the whole banner thing started.  My first banner was for a baby shower and it has just grown from there.  Birthday's, holiday's and now most recently a business name banner for a craft fair.

This banner was made for a friend's business Shabby By Chic, she sews some really nice creations.  She is going to use the banner at craft fair before the holidays.  I know she is going to do great there, her stuff is so cute.

One of the other banners I just finished up was a banner for a Sweet 16.  This one was a little more of a challenge as they wanted pink and black with a Halloween theme.  With the help of a fellow crafty friend and her cricut cartridges I cut out some "girly skulls", spooky and fun. to jazz up the banner.

Last but not least was a banner for a first birthday party that I finished up a couple of weeks ago but never got around to posting some photos here.  Lots of times I use the cupcake die cut to accent the birthday banners, but I just love the party hat to I did a combination of the two.

Disney Countdown

First off I want to say I know it has been a while.  I have been crafting but not blogging about my projects. With the kids starting school this week I should find more time to work on that.

I have been receiving personal requests for different projects.  Most recently I was asked by a fellow member of my mom's group to create some sort of countdown to Disney calendar.  I had never made one before, but I knew it was something I could do.  So without hesitation I took on the challenge and went full steam ahead.  With a little internet search and a browse on my new favorite website, Pinterest, I came up with some rough ideas.

It was only a matter of finding some quiet time to put ideas into reality.  With some fun paper, bright cardstock, ribbon and my cricut expression I was able to put together a cool countdown calendar that any child would look forward to ripping off the next number as there vacation got closer.

Etsy

I have been out of the loop for a while.  The end of July, beginning of August I was wrapping things up at work... FOREVER!  I am moving onto a new phase and I am excited.

I have been working on some new projects to add to my Etsy shop.  I started a Etsy shop late last year, and I had my Mickey autograph albums.  Little by little I have added some more products.

Simply Missy's Etsy

Next I will be tackling the attic and getting my crafting space in order.  Right now it looks as if, as my husband says "Terrorists have been in the attic."  Maybe even an hour a day will make a difference.

Crafting With Friends

This past Saturday myself and Donna put on another crop, we call ourselves "Creative Cuts".  Donna came up with the catchy name last year.  One of my biggest dilemmas when attending a crop is what to bring.  I never have gotten this down to a science, I always bring too much.  Some stuff I end up never opening the bag, you would think I would learn.

I aim to have a plan, this time around I knew I would be working on a banner for Donna's daughters first birthday.  She had picked out some great pink and orange paper she wanted to use.  Between the set up and just greeting everyone I don't think I actually sat down at my seat until 11:30, meanwhile I was there since 8:30 to get ready but that is a whole other story.

I asked Donna lots of questions about what her expectations were because well after all this was for a special occasion.  She wanted the borders to be scalloped, I love that too.  I had a little panic at first though because I couldn't find the scalloped square on the Cricut, shout-out to Heidi for locating it and making me feel better.  Phew.

Once everything was cut out, assembly began.  One of the final decisions was to bling or not to bling.  Bling it was and I am so happy with how it came out.

Horse Theme Birthday Banner

I had a friend from the mom's group inquire about making a banner for her son's birthday party.  She was very specific on the paper she wanted and sent me the link.  They were using  Debbie Mumm paper to make the invitations and it really was cute.

I found the paper in Michael's and bought all they had, as I didn't want to take any chance or running out mid-project and not be able to get more.  That could be disastrous.

While in Michael's I saw these cute die-cut horse stickers and knew they were a must have for the spacers.

This banner did consist of a second strand for the name.  Adding a name continuously to an already 8 foot banner can be too much, plus it gives them more options when they go to hang it for the party.

Ticket to Disney World

I have been on the down low lately, not allot of baking or allot of new crafting.  My oldest son Daniel made his first holy communion and we had a big party, tent and all in the yard.  The preparing consumed allot of my time.

Now I am getting back in the swing of things, so when a friend asked me to put some of my craftiness to work I jumped in with both feet.  She had planned a trip to Disney World and wanted her kids to get a "ticket" from the bank teller when they cashed in their change jar for Disney World.  I thought what a cute idea, but I hadn't made one before and wanted to make sure it looked special.  I wanted it flashy enough that the kids would be excited to get it, but not overdone to where it had allot of embellishments.

I had thought about making an individual ticket for each member of their family, but she wanted to include the dates of travel and the cost: One Jar of Coins.  I had to make it big enough so that the information included was actually readable.

I used a circle border punch, and trimmed it down to give it the look of a tear off ticket.  I downloaded a free Disney font off the Internet, there were plenty out there.  Then I used my Cricut and Cuttlebug to make some die cuts.

I was real pleased with how it turned out... what do you think?