Happy Thanksgiving! Meet Chrissy Lux

Canada is celebrating Thanksgiving today.

The Fall colours are beautiful right now and I got to think about things I am grateful for while driving through the countryside yesterday.

The most important item in my life is my family, which inspired me to do this layout. I arranged the “Thanks” from the “You name it” set and leaves from “All year round” as if they were swirling around in the wind in the upper part of the LO and arranged them more neatly in the bottom part. I added a few hand made photo corners and matched the stitching to the layout: tidy in rows on the bottom and swirly on the upper part. I decided to leave out a big title, as I have  16 mini titles and tucked the journaling behind the largest photo, written on a hand made tag.

I love making everything from scratch and let the stamps speak for themselves. The colours and motion make me think of a Fall hike on a windy day.

And now I would like you to meet our guest designer for the month of October – we are super excited to have Chrissy Lux with us.

My name is Chrissy Lux and I am thrilled to be joining you as the Guest Designer for October!  I live in NC with my husband of two years and am a full-time teacher.

I have been into paper crafts seriously for about two years now and I really love that this hobby allows me to make inexpensive, but thoughtful gifts for friends and family in a realistic amount of time for my busy life. I have always been into crafts and have done everything from cross-stitching to card making to scrapbooking to quilting over the years.  Needless to say, my office is pretty packed with paper and fabric!

I would describe my paper crafting style as being cute and simple.  One thing that I couldn’t live without is plain, colored cardstock. I almost always make my own patterned paper, so I love having stamp sets that I can use to make interesting and customized designs to work with my cards and projects.  I also enjoy finding ways to use stamps for backgrounds that maybe weren’t intended to be!  (You will see a few examples of this in my projects this month!)  During the school year, most of my crafting happens on the weekend or later in the evenings and I often start with a color or sketch challenge (there are many great challenges online) to give me a jump start. I was very excited to find out that I will be published for the first time this January in CARDS magazine.

Chrissy will share a couple of projects this week. For more of her work, check back next Monday

Over the past year or so, I have been working on building a collection of holiday and seasonal themed accordion tags.  They are cute to have around the house.  When I saw the Boo! stamp set, I immediately thought it would be great for just such a project!

I really like making my own patterned paper using my stamps.  You can see that I made some really cute paper with the spider web circle image, solid circle image (for the pumpkin background) and the jack-o-lantern face circle image.  Whenever I am making patterned paper, I like to have all my pieces cut and stamp each image on all the parts before moving to the next image.  Doing this in an assembly line process makes quick work of your project!

Actual assembly of the tag was really easy – just adhere all the layers together; punch some circles; dip adhesive chipboard letters in ink and add them on top of the card stock circles.  Then punch some holes and finish off with some ribbon!  The tag measures 4-1/4″ tall and each scored segment is 2-1/2″ wide.

Supplies Used:
Stamps: Boo! from my Stamp BOX
Ink: PTI Orange Zest, Fresh Snow, Palette Noir Black
Paper: PTI White, True Black, Orange Zest
Accessories: PTI Orange Zest grosgrain; Heidi Swapp chipboard alphabet letters
Tools: Scor-Pal, 1-3/4 circle punch, 1-7/8 scallop circle punch

Tags can be really fun to make and they are also very versatile – you can add them to a card, a wrapped gift, or gift bag …or just about anything else!  I really wanted to try to think outside the box and use my Boo! set for something other than Halloween … this sure was a challenge, but I discovered the solid circle image in the set can used in many different ways.

One of my favorite color combinations is pink and green.  So, I started by stamping the solid circle image from Boo! in bright pink ink.  Then I cut out the circle, and notched out some triangles with a pair of scissors to create a funky flower shape.  I trimmed a few of these flowers further to vary the sizes so my finished project would be more interesting.

I used the Everyday Lines set to stamp out the “Happy Birthday” sentiment, which I cut out and distressed with ink and an edge distresser tool.

To assemble my tag, I covered a chipboard tag with green polka dot paper and stitched some hot pink ribbon along the bottom – I love this technique.  It’s girly and fun!    I sanded and inked up the edges of the tag to age it a bit before adding the sentiment and flowers with foam tape.  Curling the petals up and adding a few rhinestones in the middle of the flowers really jazzes up the tag.  Finally, I added some ribbon and twine at the top of the tag to finish it off.

Supplies Used:
Stamps: Boo! and Everyday Lines from my Stamp BOX
Ink: PTI Hibiscus Burst, Chamomile; SU! Chocolate Chip
Paper: PTI White, Bitty Dot Paper; chipboard tag
Accessories: PTI Raspberry Fizz grosgrain; Martha Stewart adhesive rhinestones; twine
Tools: sewing machine, foam tape. Heidi Swapp edge distresser tool