Playing in Leaves Tag

Happy Friday and happy fall everyone! In my neck of the woods it has definitely turned into sweater and boot weather and the leaves have started changing colors. The perfect mood-setter for today's tag!

I'm playing along again with Unity Stamp Co.'s Friends with Flair Friday hop, and had to ink up this little cutie this morning:

Leaf me alone; so punny!

 Yup, a little snowball playing in the fall leaves. Too. Cute. I stamped her up in Memento Espresso, aka my new favorite ink color EVER. It's nice and dark for coloring, but not as harsh as the Black. I say 'her' as when I reached for my colored pencils I decided to color the hat & scarf set in sage green and pink. Hey, it's not often around here that I get to use pink, after all! The tag is actually one of the freebies that Unity likes to toss in with their orders that I inked up with Rusty Hinge and Wild Honey Distress Inks. The background is a leaf stamp from the dollar bin somewhere (worth it) stamped in Memento Toffee Crunch (another awesome color). The sentiment was stamped in Memento Tangelo and mounted on some chocolate brown cardstock I had in my scraps pile. Ta da! A cute, simple, quick & easy fall tag.

View from above, taken while I tossed cats out of the way...

I used some twine and yellow/green trim I had in that stash pile for the topper and called it awesome.

I'd love to see what YOU have made for fall! Feel free to share on our Facebook page, via Twitter, or tag us on Instagram at #caffeinatedpapercuts.

Happy fall and happy crafting!

Lawnscaping Blog Hop!

Good morning everyone! Welcome to your next stop on the Lawnscaping Blog Hop trail. You should have come here from Kelly's blog. This month's theme is all things fall, as you can see by our inspiration photo. Changing leaves, pumpkins, apples, pie...mmmm, pie...ahem. Where was I? Ah yes, prizes! The hop runs from Friday, October 5th all the way through Sunday, October 7th. Be sure to comment on all the blogs to be eligible for some fantastic prizes! All of the details can be found on the Lawnscaping page along with a list of all the blogs participating in the hop, in case you get lost along the way.

Now then, before I go dreaming about homemade pie again, let me share with you what I made for the hop. I decided to go completely outside my usual realm of crafting and see what I could come up with for a home decor project. While I've been avoiding jumping on the burlap bandwagon, I finally took the plunge and am hooked. That burlap wreath and the drapey curtains in the photo were just calling to me! Couple those with the pumpkins and fall colors, and you get (in my personal opinion) one really pretty, rustic wreath.

The leaves, acorns, and pumpkins are all paper pieced and fussy-cut from the Lawn Fawn Bright Side 6x6 paper pad. I love that paper so, so much and the smaller pad is perfect for smaller images. I cannot wait to get my hands on the new holiday set!

Of course, when I went to take pictures of my work in progress, BOTH camera batteries were dead so you'll just have to take my word on how I made it. If you really don't believe me, I believe some in-progress shots are up on Instagram. :p

To make the wreath I found what they call a 'craft wreath' at Michael's; it's a 12" diameter piece of wood that's made to be altered. Right next to it was a roll of 2.5" wide burlap webbing. Perfect! I brought them home and while my glue gun was warming up, I started wrapping. Once I had the spacing the way I liked it (I'm picky like that), some hot glue to the back was all it took to hold the burlap down. While it does fray when cut, the line of hot glue acted as a sealant as well - no fray shall pass! (Come on, tell me at least someone giggled at that.) I will warn you; burlap has holes. Hot glue is liquid. Hot glue will bleed through the holes and try to burn you. No, that did not happen to me and you cannot prove that it did. I don't care what it says on Facebook, it's all LIES!

Now then, while the hot glue set I got stamping and cutting. Once all of the pumpkins, leaves, and acorns were created I laid them out on the wreath to decide upon an arrangement. I've learned that doing that before you start gluing really works better in the long run. It also let me decide that the wreath needed something...like GLITTER! I pulled out my Distress Stickles and highlighted the veins of the leaves, the dots on the acorns, and the little flowers on the pumpkins. Funny thing about Stickles - they take eons to dry. No, I'm not exaggerating. I walked away for, I kid you not, 1-1/2 hours and they still weren't set! So I busted out my embossing heat gun to try and speed things along. I think it mostly helped, and it gave the leaves a really pretty, gentle curl. Satisfied that I could successfully avoid the still-tacky spots, my glue gun and I got to work attaching all the pretties. The final touch was some sheer ribbon I had on hand and my wreath was done!

Here are some close-ups of the embellishments:

Leaves and acorns

Just look at that sparkle! Well worth the drying time

Pumpkins in a little pumpkin patch

My fussy-cut, paper-pieced, glittered pumpkin. Totally worth it!

View of my door now - it's never looked so festive!

Thanks for stopping by on the hop! I hope you like my fall wreath. If so, it would be lovely if you started following my blog to see what other crafty things I come up with. There's usually coffee involved, too. Ooo, which goes so well with pie!

All right, you're next stop is Joe Shien Shien's blog! Don't forget, if you get lost along the way head on back to the Lawnscaping blog for directions.

Happy Crafting!