Rustic Tree Card

It's projects like this that will make you happy you held onto all those tiny little scraps of left over paper~

I just cut up small strips of paper, ran a bit of repositionable glue down the centre of the card to keep them in place, and then sewed them all down.  I capped off my tree with a cute button.

It's a little lopsided but hopefully that just adds to the charm.

Do you hang onto all of your scraps?  What do you do with them all?  I like to make photo corners with mine if they're medium sized.  I have two mason jars full of them!  Leave a comment with your ideas~

Family Rules Winner!

Thank you sooooooo much to everyone who participated in the Family Rules Sign Giveaway! 

I loved reading all of your own family rules.

And of course, extra special thanks to Signs by Andrea for giving away one free download.

The lucky winner is....

Congratulations Kaitlin!

Email me for your special FREE download code

and have fun making your own Family Rules sign~

{etcetorize (at) yahoo (dot) ca}

Meowy Christmas

Mr. Whiskers and Katya asked me to help them make a Christmas card to send to my niece and nephew this year.  I find it very difficult to say no to either one of them so I indulged their request.

They picked out this paper because of the cute background images.

I had some feline embellishments so we put them on the inside.  They'll both sign it later~

I'm going to prove to you with next week's card that I'm not the crazy cat lady that you think I am right now. 

Do your furry friends get or give presents and cards?  Leave a comment below~

DIY Guitar Picks

Here's a great little stocking stuffer for the guitar player in your life!

Here's what you need to make your own guitar picks:

Materials:
-pretty papers, images, magazine cut-outs, etc.
-sharp pencil
-scissors or sharp blade
-adhesive
-laminating folders
-laminator or iron
-guitar pick to use as a template *See step 1 if you don't have access to guitar picks

Steps:
1) If your guitar player is kind enough to leave their guitar picks out and handy for all, grab one on the sly to use as a template.  If your guitar player doesn't live with you, here's an easy way you can make your guitar pick template.

  - go to http://pective.com/pic/guitar-pick
  - once you've determined the size of your monitor the website will create a true to size image for you
  - print this out, cut it out, trace onto some heavy cardstock or lightweight cardboard and use as a template.

   or, you can just try using the image above~

2) Now, every guitar player is different, but I like my guitar picks to be pretty sturdy so I put an extra layer of lightweight cardstock in between my papers.  Some guitar players like really soft picks.  In that case you don't need to add the extra layer of cardstock.  You decide, maybe make a mixture~

If you're adding the cardstock layer, use your template to draw several and cut them out.

3)Now, trace your guitar pick shape onto some beautiful scrapbooking paper, an image from a magazine, a photo, or anything else you'd like to use that's fairly flat.  Cut out one image for the front and another for the back.

 

4) Add a little adhesive and make a sandwich with your papers and cardstock before it goes through the laminator.  This just keeps everything in place, you don't need to cover the entire piece. (pretty images facing out)

5) Arrange your picks inside a laminating pouch, making sure to leave enough room between them to seal in the edges.

6) The first time I did this I tried a little trick I saw on Pinterest and just used my iron at home to melt the laminating folder (in between it's cardboard covering sheet).

This was the result:

At first I thought it was a great big fat craft fail, but they turned out just fine.

I did a second batch in the laminator at work:

There aren't as many crinkles surrounding the picks but I still had to take my iron to the edges to make sure they were all sealed in.  If I make more, I'll stick with the home iron method.

7) Once you're laminated all of your pretty little picks cut them out.  Try to go as close as you can to the edge without breaking the seal.

And that's it!  Now you, or your guitar player, are ready to make some beautiful music!

I started out making this project just for fun, but when I went to look for my store bought picks I couldn't find them, so in the end these are a necessity.  They're so much better looking than what I had anyway~

Any other guitar playin' crafters out there???  Leave a comment below!

Tell a Tale: Memoirs of Cleopatra

“Things do not happen, we must make them happen”
― Margaret George, The Memoirs Of Cleopatra

Summary (MargaretGeorge.com):
Told in the first person — from the young queen’s earliest memories of her father’s tenuous rule to her own reign over one of the most glittering kingdoms in the world–this is a mesmerizing saga of ambition and power.

But it is also a tale of passion that begins when the twenty-one-year-old Cleopatra, desperate to return from exile, seeks out the one man who can help her, the Roman general Julius Caesar — and does not end until, having survived the assassination of Caesar and the defeat of the second man she loves, Marc Antony, she plots her own death rather than allow herself to be paraded in triumph through the streets of Rome.

Review:
Margaret George is known for two things, writing amazing historical fiction, and writing extremely long books.  This one is over 900 pages but it's worth every word.  I was reading another Antony and Cleopatra novel just before this but it was so detailed and tedious that it still sits on my bookshelf with a bookmark at the halfway point.  George's version is much more readable. 

Because the book starts when Cleopatra is just a child, we gain some insight into the events that transformed her life and her personality that make her the character we're all drawn to today.  It's almost difficult to believe she was a real life person, her life was so unbelievably amazing.

It does always bother me that such a strong minded and intelligent woman would eventually be brought down by the love of a man.  I think her love of Marc Antony blinded her and at the wrong times deterred her from her love of power.  It's unlikely that she would have ever had the ability to fight the forces of ancient Rome but perhaps she would've played her role differently if not so deeply in love with Antony.

Theirs is a story as old as time so I don't think I'm giving any of the plot away.  However, this book is worth reading if you want to go beneath the surface of the love story we all know.  The other book I was reading went into great detail about every military battle, which is why it bored me to tears.  This book gives enough information to understand the battles but balances it with all the opulence and romance that you really want to know about.

If you read only one Margaret George novel, this is the one.  However, be prepared, clear a large space on your book shelf, because you will get hooked on her writing and you will need a lot of room to keep your treasury of historical tomes.


Coin minted in 41 BCE, depicting Antony on one side and Cleopatra on the reverse.
Source

Have you tackled any of Margaret George's books?  She's also written about Henry VIII, Mary Queen of Scots, Helen of Troy, and her latest, Elizabeth I.  Leave a comment below~

Match Stick Holder

Poor me, in order to make today's project I had to eat a whole entire can of Pringles.  Somehow I powered through and I did it.  Ooooh, the sacrifices I make for crafting~

Before

After

All you have to do is eat up the Pringles, cover the tin with some beautiful paper, gold doilies, and other embellishments and you're done!  (Notice some of the goodies from my Consumer Crafts haul??)

Obviously, these are the super duper extra long matches you get for lighting fireplaces, bar-b-ques, etc.  I don't have either but with the holidays coming up there'll be lots of candles to light.

Don't forget to remove the strike plate from the box and adhere it to the bottom of your can~

Now I don't have to go searching for the ugly box tucked away in the bottom of some forgotten drawer or cupboard.  I can leave the pretty container out and always be prepared.

Don't forget to enter this week's

fabulous giveaway

for a free download

 from Signs by Andrea

to make your own Family Rules sign! 

*Contest ends Friday, November 30th, 2012.