3R Scrapping: Carboard and Spoolies

I've been thinking a lot about making more eco friendly choices lately, and it just so happens that ecologically friendly ideas are also ususally economically friendly too. With our planet and our wallets in need of TLC, I present 3R scrapping.  The idea is to reduse, reuse and recycle

Using carboard boxes to creat book covers is pretty straight forward and a great way to repurpose boxes, it's something I've been doing for a while now. Here's a recent example

Other cardboard throw away items you may have laying around are ribbon spools like these

This idea comes from Fiskars TV video tutorial (Spoolie Albums by Sandy Redburn from1/15/2007) they are easy to take apart, cover with paper or paint and then glue back together.  They make great little boxes to store small things like a micro mini scrapbook like this:

More spoolie books here and here.

More Yellow

A little more yellow.

these photos are from 1995, that baby is now 14 years old

yes time flies, I'm still "thirty something" even though it's my birthday today

shh! don't tell!

Inspiration Friday: Yellow

 

In South Florida where it is always green the change of seasons is subtle.

But you can always tell when spring is here by the wonderful yellow blooms of the Caribbean Trumpet Tree. 

It just so happens that Pantone announced their 2009 Color of the Year: Mimosa (yellow). Mimosa is a warm and inviting color. “The color yellow exemplifies the warmth and nurturing quality of the sun, properties we as humans are naturally drawn to for reassurance,” stated Leatrice Eiseman, executive director. These qualities of hope and optimism fit perfectly with the current economic uncertainties that we are going through.

While I'm not a huge fan of yellow, I do like it's warm sunny optimistic feel especially when paired with my favorite color Tiffany Blue 

All that was the inspiration for:

More More More

Ever get a stupid song stuck in your head?

I was watching Life on Mars the other night, they play lots of 70's music, 

so now I have More, More More stuck in my head, what you thought disco was dead?

Well it probably should be! 

But more more more is my theme for the week.

I'm making more mini books, I just can't stop!

They are so fun to make and little and cute in your hand, so portable.

I really love the 4x4 size,  

so here's another two I finished this week..

On a Roll

I spent all morning yesterday making distressed tags, I was on a roll, I had so much fun that I decided to try and make a completely distressed book. I had this vision of sun and surf soaked memories, hot days spent by the sea searching for shells, cooling off in the water...I know the spring equinox hasn't passed yet but I'm already anticipating the heat of summer.... 

Revisiting Techniques

I can't believe it's Friday again already! This week just flew by! 

I cruised over to Tim Holtz's Blog and was inspired by to revisit the Distress Ink Techniques I used to love playing with.  So I pulled out the craft sheet, some Distress Inks, an old craft iron, some of the tons of new clear stamps I've been collecting lately and a couple of my favorite old rubber wood mounted stamps and spent a day just making tags.

Fun fun! I love all the new images in clear stamps but they don't take ink as well as the rubber ones do.  I did get great results with Versa Fine from Tsukineko. They work great with the clear stamps and preserve all the fine detail.  I think this ink is comparable to Archival ink from Ranger.  Sometimes you just have to experiment with all those different inks.  They all have different properties and are good for different applications.