Gossamer Blue ~ November +Color Wire & Etsy

I'm really liking this theme idea each month. It makes the creative process go a little faster. The hardest part though this month was coming up with the name. Believe it or not, 'Southwest Pastels' actually took some time to think of... my brain is on a creative overload this week from Halloween preparations, class parties, and time spent looking at houses, there is no creativity left. I used it all up this week. So, I'll throw it out there, feel free to leave me an idea for a better name for this post. 

The concept however, is one that I love. A clean Southwest feel with lots of pretty pastels and tiny potted cactus plants! Keep scrolling down to see what I came up with this month for Gossamer Blue!

I'll start with my favorite project first! This past weekend our friends daughter turned one and had a little birthday party to celebrate. I always like to show up with at least one gift that is hand made. (I think people might expect it to) but it makes gift giving seem a little more personal. So, I took a photo album that I've had stashed away for years and decided that I would make a simple photo book. Just a place where mom could add photos to, but not necessarily have to scrapbook them. Quick and easy! 

This month's kits use lots of Maggie Holmes products like these cute embellished tags! I pre cut about 20 small pages and embellished half of them with tags, typed sayings, a few journal cards and a couple of sewn sequin packets. 

I let the kids each pick out a gift for Kinsey as well. True to form, Chase went with a toy and Alaina chose little girl clothes for her. (I forgot how cute baby girl clothes are!) Wrapping the clothes was as easy as finding a box and I wanted the gift wrap to match: light muted colors and simply embellished. Just some vintage lace, a few tags and a pair of feathers. 

and the tiny birthday card I made 

More Maggie Holmes stuff! I love brads and if you break the prongs off of the backs, you can glue them to almost anything! I made a little memory board using one of my favorite color combos right now: coral-navy blue-gold and turned the brads into push-pins. 

There are still a few more projects to post but they'll have to wait until mid-month. I also want to do a few Fall craft tutorials throughout the month in a similar style. I was telling a friend of mine that I think I'll finally embrace of Southwest Fall season (or lack of one) and add a twist to all of the traditional themed crafts. Kind of excited about seeing all these ideas I've been scribbling down coming to life this month! 

It's back! My color wire that is. It's been quite some time since I've put one together but last month I started playing around with some color ideas and decided to put together some different combinations. Ultimately this is the one I would use and one that inspired a collection of new products for my etsy shop: Citron Faire. 

black raspberry ~ peach sand ~ carnation pink ~ army green ~ spiced gingerbread

Thank you so much for stopping in today! Hope you had a wonderful Halloween and enjoy your weekend! ~ Tara

sweet november: inspiration

When I think inspiration, color comes to mind. Of course. I have alot of fun putting together my color wires, I start with a stack of magazines and a clip board. Usually, I have a color combination already in mind that I want to use, but sometimes I'll see an photo in a magazine that is so pretty or inspiring that it will shift the initial color combination. 

For this color pallet I chose warm tones inspired by traditional Fall colors with the addition of a rich berry color. It's always been one of my favorite colors to use, finding scrapbooking papers in that color isn't always easy but I can almost always find it in fabric! 

dove grey - warm pumpkin - black raspberry - cedar brown

The next time you have a project to complete, or even just a scrapbook layout, try putting together a 'project board.' Just grab a clip board and add things that you find inspirational to help you with the creative process! I love making these little fabric charts - I take small snips of fabric and sew them together. Seeing a combination of fabrics helps me decide on the colors I want to use or the patterns that I want to combine for my own projects! 

Color is what inspires me to create, what inspires you? 

xo ~ Tara

Saturday Color Combination - Project Life

Hi there! Ready for another summer inspired color combination this weekend? Here's a slight twist on the traditional red-white-blue palette that we see this month.

 

petal pink - boysenberry - midnight blue - linen - ash grey

While I was working on the wedding book, I had this idea to do a color combination and instead of just a single layout I would do a Project Life inspired layout (not sure what else to call it!) and use some of those page protectors since I'm the proud new owner of an entire box. I'll admit I have no plans to actively participate in doing Project Life spreads each week, but I think every once in awhile, it could be fun to use the layouts to hold smaller scaled scrapbooking projects. 

 

I made these 2 pages about our very short brief stay in Oceanside, CA  back in May. I was able to use all of the extra photos that didn't make it onto a traditional 12x12 layout! 

Hope you enjoy the Color Combination! If you decide to create a little something, feel free to leave me a link so I can have a look at your work! 

Happy Saturday! 

xo ~ Tara

Saturday Color Combination

Hello again! 

 I thought this weekend needed a pretty color combination! Since summer is in full swing here, it means I'm spending more time inside and that means more time to be creative! Jessica asked me last month "Tara, I miss your color wires, when are you going to do another one?" (Sometimes even the best ideas just need a break!) So, I put one together last month, completely forgot about it until yesterday when I wanted to do a little scrapbooking and needed some color inspiration.

 

coral - peach - sea glass- dove grey 

Black and white stripes, pastels and a gold nautical embellishment - sure, why not! There are so many fun trends going on in scrapbooking right now, I love the randomness of it all and how un-matchy things are. Then there are some trends that I think I will never grow tired of; black & white stripes, ink splatters my type writer and sewing machine. What are your most loved trends right now or ones that you've held onto over the seasons? 

I also wanted to share this last month, but time got away from me! I sent off a little package of collected things, all inspired by a color combination. This one went to Jessica, a belated birthday present that included some of the brightest fabric I've ever seen! It's a fun way of sending crafty stuff to a friend!  

and here's a little peek of a page that I did for a fun sketch challenge! I'll be posting the details this coming week on where to find the challenge. I'm excited about this layout too, I typically have a hard time using sketches and I don't think I've ever created a layout that uses 5 photos, so it was a double win for me with this layout! :) 

and now that school is out and I'm not in the classroom anymore, I've been filling my days with going to the gym (yep, never thought I'd hear those words out of my mouth or that I really like it too!), summer cooking (super light healthy meals and tons of salads) scrapbooking and playing with some new products for etsy. 

The newest collection for the shop is called Market Place, lot's of vintage and office type supplies for scrapbooking and journaling. I'm working on some simple summer office paper journals for this summer's vacations, just little places to take notes and record the happenings from each day. 

I've also taken on the largest scrapbooking venture ever (for me anyways): a custom wedding scrapbook - 20 pages of dark blue - white - kraft - and light teal and just a tiny bit of red. (I love those colors together!) I figure I need to spend all of next week working to finish it up in time for the kids and I to go on vacation. Just 15 more days til vacation ~ let the count down begin.

Enjoy your weekend! xo~  tara

a hazy shade of Winter

Want to see one of my favorite color combinations right now? :)

I'm not much of a purple kind of girl. I like it but I never seem to use the color in any of my work and it's not a color that I wear..... but this combination reminds me of Winter and January. What do you say, thumbs up or down to Purple?

 I have a girls day planned for Grandma and myself tomorrow, I think I may try to pick out something in an amethyst or lilac shade.... even if it's only a sheet of paper. I'm always up for a color challenge! 

xo ~ T

Sweet November: Welcome to Autumn

Hi there and welcome to day one of Sweet November! Just like the previous Sweet November, Jessica from the crafty Scrumdillydilly blog and I have an entire week full of Autumn inspired projects and posts that we hope you'll enjoy! Since Autumn is my favorite season I thought I would start our first post with some of my favorite things! 

Let's begin with a color-combination. It's no secret that color is always my main inspiration. For me, all projects begin with a simple color combination. I usually spot various embellishments on my work desk and it sparks an idea, or a concept and this year Jessica gave me the challenge of incorporating teal into our palette. So I gladly accepted Jessica's challenge and set about  creating a very neutral nature inspired color palette. 

Some of my favorite things: Color Combination

dove grey - apricot peach - teal blue - chocolate brown - taupe - gold

What can you find on your desk today that would make a spectacular color palette? 

Some of my favorite things: decor

I'll admit that I don't have very much in the way of Autumn/harvest themed decor and most of what I have collected I've made myself - with the exception of this collection on squirrels & chipmunk. The chipmunk was given to me by my Grandmother. As a little girl I remember this little figurine displayed on an end table at Granny's house. I never knew the back story of where she acquired it, or why she loved it so much and even with a chipped ear and broken tail (which Grandpa glued carefully back together) she still really wanted me to have it. So, Chippy came home with me last summer and found a place to stay in my craft room, perched on my dresser to watch over my creating. I'm thinking this chipmunk will be one of my more treasured Autumn decor pieces. 

Some of my favorite things:  Pumpkin Seeds

Need an idea for what to do with all those pumpkin seeds from this week? I love roasting just about everything, and pumpkin seeds are no exception! I've already made a spicy batch of pumpkin seeds but I also wanted to make one that was on the sweeter side. Here's my recipe for Sweet Cinnamon Pumpkin seeds! 

Cinnamon Sugar Pumpkin Seeds

2 1/2 cups pumpkin seeds, rinsed & dry 

2 Tbls. butter, melter

3 Tbls. sugar

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

directions:

- Preheat over to 220 F. 

- In a mixing bowl, combine pumpkin seeds and butter, stir to coat. Sprinkle on cinnamon sugar to stir again to cover pumpkin seeds. 

- Cover a baking sheet with foil and spray with non-stick cooking spray

- spread the pumpkin seeds evenly on the baking sheet and roast in oven for about  90 minutes, stirring every 30 minutes

- when the pumpkin seeds are finished cooking they should be dry, crunchy and no longer sticking to one another

I like to cook at a low temperature because: 1. I've been known to forget about what I have in the oven and 2. cooking at a lower temp can be more forgiving.... which is good because of #1. I tend to use the old cooking rule: when you can smell what's in the oven throughout your house, you'll know it's done and your house really will smell like cinnamon sugar, or like doughnuts as my son told me today! 

Some of my favorite things: music

When Peter and I were dating, we would take weekend roadtrips as often as our schedules would allow. Peter had a stash of cd's set aside just for our outings together and an old Frank Sinatra cd ended up being on of my favorites. It seemed like the perfect fit too as the theme music as we wound our way down Oak covered roads and through the historic mining towns of Northern Arizona. I can almost picture a black and white movie filmed in Sedona or Jerome with this song playing in the background. Frank still reminds me of date afternoons in the Fall!




I shared a few of my Fall favorites and I'd love to hear some of yours! Don't forget to pop into Scrumdillydilly to see how Jessica is starting her Sweet November -  Thanks for stopping by!