Color Throwdown 622 - Let's Be Merry!

 I was in awe of the beautiful poinsettia cards by good friend Michele shared on Instagram last week - like the kind of card that stops you in your tracks and makes you wonder "how in the heck did she do that" kinda beautiful! Needless to say, I was within a few clicks of buying a new set of poinsettia dies to CASE her when I remembered seeing an old Die-namics Poinsettia set from MFT in my stash. I dug it out, added in this week's Color Throwdown palette (red, burgundy, cream and kraft) and stamps from Kerri Bradford Studio - Merry & Wrapped.

 

These stamp sets from KBS are so fun, so graphic and so easy to use! It's hard to see, but I used three of the Wrapped stamps to add interest to the red and burgundy layers, as well as to the reindeer die cut. 

 

And now for a bit of inspiration from the CTD Team...

Color Throwdown Blog

Amy Rohl

Amy Rysavy

Barbara Anders

Broni Holcombe

Lisa Henke

Lori Tecler

Lynn Put

Vickie Zimmer 

Wanda Cullen

 

 

Color Throwdown 578

Hi and welcome to this week's Color Throwdown Challenge! This week's colors include light and dark grey and red. I love this wintry combination and hope you'll find it inspiring as well. 

smitten mittens |  falling hearts | sending & wishing | knitted sweater

And here's a bit of inspiration from the CTD team and guests!

Color Throwdown Blog

Amy Rohl

Amy Rysavy

Barbara Anders

Broni Holcombe

Jodi Collins

Lisa Henke

Lori Tecler

Lynn Put

Vickie Zimmer 

Wanda Cullen
Amy Tsuruta - Tsuruta Designs - January Guest Designer

CTD 559 - Hello

Hello! And welcome to this week's Color Throwdown Challenge featuring a fall-ish color palette of mustard, coral and navy. I hope you'll be inspired to play along with us. My card uses retired Blueprints dies from My Favorite Things and a sentiment from one of my favorite scripty sets from Right At Home - Script Greetings.

#ctd559 | #ctd | CTD559

Click on through the rest of the team links below along with our guests for more dreamy inspiration with this week's colors...

Color Throwdown Blog

Amy Rohl

Amy Rysavy

Barbara Anders

Broni Holcombe

Jodi Collins

Lisa Henke

Lori Tecler

Lynn Put

Vickie Zimmer 

Wanda Cullen

MFT Die-namics Design Challenge

Happy Friday and welcome to a fun new challenge hosted by My Favorite Things called Die-namics Design. This month's Die-namics Design focus is on using word Die-namics to get your message across.

I have two cards to share with you today using a yummy color combo of Coral Crush, Insulation Pink and gold along with word Die-namics from Celebratory Greetings & Thank You.

you ROCK. Seriously, you do.

I doubled and offset 'you' to focus attention on my die cut sentiment.
Such a powerful word, isn't it?

Coral Crush + gold + Insulation Pink is my version of spring break!

Say 'cheese'. 

Just like on Sesame Street, I took the word 'cheers' from Celebratory Greetings, and turned it into 'cheese' by cutting a third 'e'. My punny.

To pull the colors together, I added a sideline background of stripes using Pink Insulation dye ink and Striped Backgrounds.

Now it's your turn to pull out your Die-namics words and make them the centerpiece of your projects. The MFT Design Team is on hand with more inspiration, so stop over at the MFT Blog for links and full details on this month's Die-namics Design Challenge.

~Amy

SUPPLIES:

Die-namics Thank You	Die-namics Celebratory Greetings	Die-namics MP3 Player	Die-namics LLD Cute Cameras 2
Coral Crush Prestige Card Stock	Heavyweight Card Stock Insulation Pink	Premium Dye Ink Pad Insulation Pink	Striped Backgrounds
Die-namics Fishtail Flags STAX	Keep on Rockin'

InLinkz.com

MFT Organization Event Day 5 - Ink Pads & Refills

Welcome to the final day of a week filled with ideas and tips to get your crafty area organized! Today's focus is on ink pad and refill storage, and I'm going to show you how I currently organize mine.

You're probably tiring of these rolling cart photos, but here again is where I store my ink pads and refills. I have three bins committed solely for protecting my beloved inks, broken into three sections: dye ink, hybrid ink and pigment ink.

You can seriously store a ton of MFT's Dye Ink pads in one 12x12 bin...like 40+. That's a huge space saver, and while I sometimes have to rummage through my bin to locate a desired color, I love that they're tucked away and out of sight when not in use.

MFT's Hybrid Ink pads are slighter larger but still fit neat as a pin in my covered bin.

I'm building my collection of yummy MFT Pigment Ink pads, so there's extra room for a box lid that holds my ink refills.

This is the most 'organized' thing I've ever done with my crafty supplies - labeling each refill bottle! I punched a 1/4" circle of coordinating card stock and glued it to the top of the bottle cap with a drop of Glossy Accents for sure-stay power. 

I hope you've enjoyed this week of crafty stash organization posts as much as I have. Always remember to use the ideas that work for YOU. If you're just starting to think about organizing and it seems daunting, start small. Baby steps!

Finally, check out all of the great organizational ideas linked from the MFT Blog along with today's prize package in honor of the 5 Days to an Organized Crafty Stash event and have a great weekend!

~Amy

MFT Organization Event Day 4 - Card Stock

Welcome to day 4 of a week filled with ideas and tips to get your crafty area organized! Today's focus is card stock, and I'm going to show you how I currently organize my card stock collection.

Remember to check out all of the great organizational ideas linked from the MFT Blog along with today's prize package in honor of the 5 Days to an Organized Crafty Stash event.

 A hand labeled swatch book gives me quick access to the yummy MFT Card Stock colors and whets my appetite all in one. Get in my belly!

Can you read upside-down? Me too, and I prefer to think that it's like doing brain gym while I'm stamping - stimulating and strengthening my brain all in one!

I store my card stock inside the open clear packaging with the label end open and sticking out for a few reasons. First, it keeps my paper clean and crisp; second, it provides me with the label already intact; and third, I continue to have that flexibility to move my card stock colors around as needed without re-labeling the slots.

Here's a full view of my card stock cabinet. Nothing fancy about it, but it's strong, sturdy and sure looks purty with all those MFT Card Stock colors in rainbow fashion, doesn't it?

WARNING: the last two photos are my scrap collection which I'm sure will make some folks cringe...but (say it with me) it works for me. Ü

I love this scrap basket and have used it for years. It also works perfectly for my crafty son, because the rule is: anything in that basket is fair game! I like to be able to quickly grab a scrap from it because I'm honestly too lazy to file my scraps and too impatient to pull a scrap from a file. I  humbly bow down to you crafters who have the patience to do it that way.

Finally is a bin with all of my die cut scraps. I love to challenge myself to look through this bin and use up a few scraps for a 5 minute card, or set it out for the crafty son, niece or nephew. Keeping these scraps in a covered bin allows room to push things around to get to the good stuff, AND keeps everything in one place! It's sort of like a 'parking lot' so to speak, because when a project just isn't going the way I'd envisioned, I can park the die cuts here to be used sometime down the road.

I sure am having fun seeing how the rest of the MFT Design Team organizes their crafty supplies and hope you're getting inspired, or maybe patting yourself on the back because you're already organized! Either way, I'm so glad to have you here, thanks for stopping.
~Amy

MFT Organization Event Day 3 - Die-namics

Welcome to day 3 of a week filled with ideas and tips to get your crafty area organized! Today's focus is Die-namics, and I'm going to show you how I currently organize my growing Die-namics collection. Always keep in mind that you have to find what works for YOU, not because someone else is doing it this way or that.

Not only are you going to find a ton of ideas linked from the MFT Blog, you're going to be eligible to win a prize package on each of the 5 Days to an Organized Crafty Stash event.

Yep, you guessed it, I store my Die-namics in the same style bins as my stamps and stencils. Actually, the majority of my crafty supplies are stored in these rolling carts. I use a few of the same Die-namics categories as the MFT Store and a few of my own hybrid categories which are labeled with my trusty washi tape and black Sharpie, keeping my organization system very low cost and easy to implement.

I can't tell you enough that I love the flexibility they allow me. I can easily switch bins in and out, sort and split collections that become too large for a bin and change the label with little to no effort. They also keep everything out of sight when needed.

Here's a peek inside my borders bin. Magnetic strips keep these long and narrow dies in an orderly fashion where I can quickly scan and grab what I need. The thing I don't mind about scanning through my bins is that it allows my creativity to be sparked by seeing another product that I might not have considered combining with my current idea had I not seen it.

Die-namics collections, such as the Blueprints line, are housed on magnetic sheets placed inside clear pockets.

My last photo shows another Die-namics storage solution that works for those dies that you want within reach at all times.  My Fishtail Flag collection is one that I use consistently enough to warrant table top status!

Thanks for taking a tour with me today. Come back tomorrow for more ideas to get your crafty space in order. Now, head on over to the MFT Blog to see what's in today's prize package. Good luck!

~Amy

MFT Organization Event Day 2 - Stencils

Welcome to day 2 of a week filled with ideas and tips to get your crafty area organized! Today's focus is stencils, and I'm going to show you how I currently organize my stencil collection. Always keep in mind that you have to find what works for YOU, not because someone else is doing it this way or that.

Not only are you going to find a ton of ideas linked from the MFT Blog, you're going to be eligible to win a prize package on each of the 5 Days to an Organized Crafty Stash event.

 As you saw yesterday with my stamp storage, my stencil storage starts out on the same page in these 12x12 bins housed in rolling cart.

A simple strip of washi tape and black Sharpie keep bin labeling a cinch. This method also allows me to make changes as needed in minimal do-over time.

These carts allow me much flexibility to pull out an entire drawer and carry it here or there while keeping everything in one place which is vital when the crafty space blows up, know what I mean?!

You can see a few of my stencil-techniques supplies also call this bin home which is entirely possible because stencils don't take up much room at all! There are 40+ stencils in that little pile.

 Once I'm ready to work with my stencils, I simply grab and move that bin from the cart to my work table and away I go, everything in one spot.

Full disclosure: I don't label my stencils! But, for me, it's easy to look it up on the MFT Store site and gives me an excuse to do a little shopping while I'm there.

Thanks for taking a tour with me today, I hope you enjoyed your stay and will come back tomorrow for more ideas for getting your crafty space in order. Now, head on over to the MFT Blog to see what's in today's prize package. Good luck!

~Amy