Simple Decor Tricks by Stacey Michaud

If you are anything like me, then your house is full of little vignettes.  I have them everywhere...bookcases, coffee tables and shelves.  I love combining collected antiques with finds from Target.  I also love to shop my own house and determine how I can use what I already own.

For today's home decor project, I am showing you simple, clean and classic ways to use your scrappy goodies to give your ready-made home decor items an upgrade.

I have two shelves in my newly renovation bathroom that were dying to be dressed in simple flowers, towels and candles.  Some things I owned worked okay but after I gave them small enhancements, they were perfect.  Here is my finished project!

See the artwork?  I could not find anything small enough or with the right colors to fit this room.  So I made my own.  I used two of my favorite images from the Now and Then collection to cut 4X4 squares.  The frame was only $14.00 and I had the paper...not bad!

I decided to dress up my glass jar and planter!  I took burlap twine from the Tell Your Story line and simply wrapped it around the neck of a glass bottle.  You could continue this look around wood letters, tin cans or glass jars of your own.  I also covered the top of the planter in washi tape to add a touch of gray. Now the planter fits more with my decor.

Finally, I made an already pretty candle even better!  I simply wrapped a music note border around the tin.  I added a beautiful Teresa gem to the center to hide the seam and to add some sparkle.

In the world of home decor, a little bit can go a long way to helping you create personalized items of your own!

Trying something new with Cheri Piles

Happy New Years everyone!!

I have thought a lot about this project, I have envisioned it for months now. I just didn't really know what to do or how to start.... My own "self-talk" & fear of failure kept me from doing this sooner. I woke up the other day and said enough. I can and will do this, I want to try so badly, so I did it - I took a leap of faith. 

I have to say a HUGE HUGE, THANK YOU to Sesil, I happened to call her as I was in route to buy my supplies and she was a huge help! So Thanks Sesil!!!

This was my first collage art piece. I used all 9 papers from the Now & Then collection. Can you find them? Each piece of paper is represented in one form or another. It's very whimsical and fun!

I love this quote from the die cut banners, I just cut the words out and adhered them.

This is my second piece - you can see I'm starting to get the hang of it, it's not perfect by any means but I LOVE this one the most! It is so inspirational!

Another quote, and it's so true!! I am going to frame this and put it on my desk... I have big plans for this year!!!

This is my third piece, it is using the Vintage Finds Collection. I really wanted you to see this in the frame. It MAKES ALL THE DIFFERENCE in the world to frame these! Wouldn't you agree??

I can never get enough of these flowers layered on one another, I cut them out from the "flowers" paper. I did not glue them "into" the project, I wanted to see what it would look like as a 3-D effect.

What I learned:

• Never not try something new no matter how much it might intimidate you - give yourself a chance to grow. You can see that just after a few tries I am starting to get the hang of the very basics of collage art.
• Go with the flow and use papers that YOU love and that inspire YOU! When you are inspired, your art will reflect it.
• Different mediums may change or alter the hue's of the paper. Project #2 really is bright in real life!!
• Gesso allows you to have a Do-over, lol!!

What I used besides papers from the Now & Then, Tell Your Story and Vintage Finds Collections:

• 8x10 Canvas 
• Gesso - Acrylic, Opaque, Matte, Medium fluid (from the back of the bottle) - I painted this on top of the canvas to give the paint something to stick to.
• Slow Dry blending gel medium - I mixed this with my paint on project #1 & #2. I also used it as a "mod-podge" to apply the layers and over them.
• black pen - I like the look of outlining some of the pieces of paper.

 I hope this inspires you to try something fun and new!

Happy New Year!!!

Happy New Year!!!   Sesil here to bring in the new year with all our Teresa Collins Design Friends!!!!!

We are excited to share some new and exciting things with Teresa Collins in the new year. We are SOOO Excited.

Today's project is my Altered File Folder.  This time using Tell Your Story.
I enjoy having a mini to hold some tags or mini album inserts.

This year I had many favorite creations. But I have to say I am fond of the altered file folder.

Let's kick off the New Year With a wonderful giveaway.  Let us know one of your new year's resolution in the comments below and we will send a Medium Flat Rate Box Full of Teresa Collins Goodies. Directly from my Scrap Cave. I will pick a winner on Saturday morning. Jan 5, 2013. Here on the blog!

Good luck.  Happy New Year!!!

www.sesilcratin.com

Tell Your Story Mini Album by Yvonne Blair

 Hi everyone, Yvonne here with a fun Mini made from Tell Your Story!  I LOVE LOVE LOVE this line.  It is so easy peasy to write and "tell your story" or someone else's story, wink. 

I made this one to actually to tell my story!  I am going to work on filling it with tidbits and this and that that I want Bre to know.  Things that she wouldn't really know unless I take the time to leave it somewhere in writing.  

There are little pockets here and there where I can add some stories or important things, like what my favorites might be! Wink.

There are little fold outs that will be perfect place for more private journaling. 

And more pockets.  Never can you have enough pockets, don't you think?  I love to have lots of pockets and places to stick stuff!  

 I hope you enjoyed today's mini!  I am going to start filling it up with stuff!  Have a great weekend...Check back tomorrow for Fan Friday and see who is featured.  I love seeing what everyone does...it's so fun to see  other's work.  Love seeing how different we all are!  TTFN

Yvonne's Blog...www.yvonneblair.com

Card Craze

Do you ever find that you suddenly get into a card-making groove?  That was me this past week...I seriously could not stop myself.  Today I am sharing three that I made using the Tell Your Story collection.  I knew when I saw the Tell Your Story: Butterfly patterned paper with all the wonderful quotes on it that it would be perfect for cards!

Here is my first card:

And another one with a beautiful sentiment cut out from that same paper:

And for my third card, I used the fabulous chipboard quote:

I was thinking I might make a few more and give card sets as gifts this year for Christmas!  Off to make more cards!  Thanks for stopping in!

Jamie Harder

Xyron and Teresa Collins Designs - Final Day

Final day with the Xyron and Teresa Collins Designs

We hope we have inspired you throughout the week of this amazing blog hop.  For our final day Julie Jacob:

_______________________________

This book started out as something else.  Do you ever have that happen?

I WANTED to do a cute book with different sized pages, that was sewn down the middle...to hold it all together.
So.
I cut all my papers...patterned papers...dictionary paper...story book paper ( a .25 copy of Guess How Much I Love You found at a garage sale)...scored them down the middle, and went to my sewing machine.
I sewed right down the middle.
And realized after I was done, that either I had some setting wrong...or my machine/needle wasn't meant to sew through all those layers.  Because instead of nice, even stitches...I got tiny, super close together stitches that ended up perforating all my pages.
So.
Instead of a mini book...I got a mini book with tear out pages.  That all tore out.
{Insert naughty words/thoughts here.}

So I went to plan B.

I cut my papers again.  The cover is 10x10...the inner pages are a variety of sizes (7x9, 9x9, 8x8...go a little crazy, it's up to you!)  Score them all down the center, and DON'T sew.  (If, however, you are a sewing ninja...please do.  You have my utmost respect.)
Decide how you want to order your pages, and lay them down...lining up the folds.  (Watch for upside down papers!)
Using a hole punch...punch a hole at the top and bottom...right on the fold.  Bind with twine.
{Insert happy words/thoughts here.}

I feel I need to warn you.  If you are a lay-flat kind of scrapper...this is NOT a lay flat kind of book.  I happen to like them that way...but I know that's not for everyone.

Here's the first couple of pages...the whole book is on my blog...

I sewed around that flower.  By then I was on speaking terms with my sewing machine again.

Morals to this story:
1.  Just because you don't end up with what you thought you would...doesn't mean it's not a success.
2.  Sometimes Plan B is better than Plan A.
3.  Don't yell at your sewing machine...you might need it to cooperate later.
4.  Teresa Collins + Xyron adhesive = book I love.

Thank you for joining us today. Make sure to head over to XYRON's BLOG HERE to see what they have done with Tell Your Story.  And we have our final give-a-way!!!  A Teresa Collins X sticker maker and a goodies bag with Teresa Collins Designs product.  

To enter to win 

• "like" us at facebook.com/tcdesigns and let us know you saw the BLOG HOP Post for the FINAL DAY.  Leave us a comment that you left a comment on the Teresa Collins Designs facebook page.
• For an additional chance to win the goody bag head on over to xyron's facebook page at facebook.com/xyroninc and let them know you are enjoying the blog hop. leave us a comment on this blog post that you left a comment on XYRON's facebook page. 
• Then finally for a third chance to win you can just leave us a comment on this blog post and xyron's blog post to enter to win.

Thank you for joining us. We will announce the winners next week on the facebook page. Make sure you "like" us to see if you are a winner.

Xyron and Teresa Collins Designs - Day 4

Xyron and Teresa Collins Designs - Day 4

Are you ready for Day 4

First lets check out this amazing layout from Jamie Harder.

We love Jamie's simplistic style with just enough pow to enjoy the layout.

THANK YOU JAMIE!

To see more of Jamie's work check out her blog at: 

http://ahappyscrappyplace.blogspot.com/

Next up we have STACY RODRIGUEZ:

Hello everyone, Stacy here today sharing my creation using Teresa's Tell Your Story line of course with all of the AMAZING embellishments that go with this line and the fabulous Xyron products.

So you should all know that i'm a mini album and altered project girl....these are my two favorite things to create.  For this project I created a fun mini album with a super cool way to use twine to bind your album.  You also may want to head out to hubby's shed or garage and if he has any drywall mesh grab it, run to your studio and hide it cause you are going to want to keep it!!!

Okay so let's start with a photo of the complete cover. For the cover I cut two pieces of chipboard and cut the pattern paper to the same size.  I corner punched the two outside corners of both the chipboard and paper then ran the pattern paper through the Xyron Creatopia which makes this super fast and an easy way to adhere your paper to anything. I used the Xyron 510 or my fabulous Teresa Collins 150 for all of the smaller pieces. 

I will also give you a little close up pic for you to see all the detail on the cover.

Now for the fun binding technique...I did not come up with this technique but do have a utube video to share of Marion Smith walking you through this so YES you to can also give this a shot.  You can pause the video anytime to make sure you get it just right and believe me I did my far share of pausing :)  The inside of this album contains 11 pieces of pattern paper 12" x 8" in size and folded in half....so yes that is 22 pages for you to save all of those great memories!  The chipboard cover is 8 1/2" x 6 1/2".

A close up of the binding.

This is what the inside of your pages will look like of course before you do all of your creating.

Here is the link to the utube video for you :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZnp-JE9QGg

I'm using this album for photos of everything that my daughter and her friends have done which is why this is My Story 2012.

Thanks so much for stopping by today and I hope that you give this a try.  It would be a fabulous way to document anything!

~Stacy http://stacy-scrappinqueen.blogspot.com/

Thank you for joining us today. Make sure to head over to XYRON's BLOG HERE to see what they have done with Tell Your Story. Make sure to check back everyday this week for more inspiration with our blog hop with XYRON!