Linkay Partay! And You're Invited!

Today is the kick off of my first Creative Muse Linky Party!  Yea!  A new party will start every Monday and themes will coincide with the Cool2Craft TV show for that week!
Sooo, the first theme is That's Yummy!  This is how we do it:

I had a ball visiting Vintage Cupcake Company in Ogden, Utah!  Many thanks to the owner, Michelle! 

Now, how do you get your work seen?  Follow this link:

You'll find another link on that page so you can link up your project.  Then tell your friends so they can vote for your project!

See you there!

Year Round Celebration Tree

 After the holidays this year, I got an awesome deal on a small lighted tree in an urn.  I've wanted one for years!  I decided to celebrate my year of harmony and robots by keeping it decorated! 
Right now it's a Valentine tree!  See the jar in front of it?  It's a Scentsy warmer.  In fact it's Scentsy's warmer of the month!

 What I love most about it is that the small glass heart on the front is lit by a hole in the jar, AND if you look up and to the right of the jar, you'll see the feint  heart shaped light.  I wish I could have picked it up better because it's so cool!  It casts heart shaped lights all around on the walls! This is the kind of thing that makes me want to sing!  My Sister-in-law sells Scentsy if you're interested (https://debbiesimmons.scentsy.us/).

I made an ornament for the top of the tree with my new Sizzix die cutter, card stock, beads and tissue paper.  There's a light right at the top of the tree, so it shines through the tissue paper!

The best part of this morning was my hubby making me heart shaped bacon and heart shaped pancakes!  Yea!  Have a fabulous Valentine's Day!

Burlap Chic

This week on Cool2Craft TV, the theme is burlap!  I wasn't sure what I would do, so I let my imagination go and decided I wanted to try burlap jewelry.  I did rolled burlap beads and textured embossing pewter with burlap, punching colored and antiqued coin beads.  It was a learning experience!  Here's the video tutorial:

If you get the chance, watch the whole show, because Tiffany and EcoHiedi did way cool burlap projects!

2012 The Year of (insert your goal here)

 

Click here to watch The Crown Song

The coming year is going to be the year of harmony for Candace the Muse. January's Cool2Craft Creative Play Theme asks you to consider what you want for yourself in 2012.  What do you want to work on, embody, attract or do this coming year?
This is my Harmony Crown.  It's made from a plastic tote, fuzzy yarn, colorful chain pulls, star garland, gems and my own mix of riot beads.  I would so love to see what you can come up with using things you have on hand to create a crown or anything else that represents where you want to be in 2012!  Your submission can be a photo of ANYTHING that shows what you desire!
Don't forget that you earn CoolCash for every theme you participate in!  Four CoolCash points get's you something handmade from my studio.  Last year I gave away some of my favorite projects to fabulous folks who sent me  photos of THEIR favorite projects.  Some of them have earned TWO handmades!  Check out my Creative Play page on our website, cool2craft.com for more details and past theme videos.  On the front page of cool2craft.com you'll find a link to see Creative Play Muse Archives.  This will show you some Creative Play submissions as well as many of my posts.

This is your year to shine online!  Be a Cool2Craft Creative Play Contributor as often as you like and earn my handmade goodies!

Reindeer Remnants

Some cookies never made it to the cookie trays this year. Without my daughter helping me, I ruined a whole batch of reindeer cookies because they were under done. Those poor, poor cookies.

Merry Happy Jolly

We wish you and yours PEACE

This was among the first photo ornaments I made for our tree.  It's Joe goofing off on our first Christmas together.  My favorite from that batch!

Holiday Cookies

Here is your virtual tray of cookies from me to you.  There are the perennial favorites as well as some newbies.  The box below tells what each cookie is.  My daughter usually helps me, but working 12 hour shifts at the U of U Hospital and nursing prerequisite classes kept her busy this year.  We create a theme for the cutout cookies because they are the stars of the show.  The baking take about 3 days.  We do them each year for our family and friends. Peace is the theme for this year.  Have some!

We use the old Wiltion recipe for the cutouts.  They added more flour a few years ago.  The old recipe uses 2 3/4 cups which can be tricky in the handling, but stays very buttery tasting even to the last roll out.   We decorate with royal icing which dries very hard.  The reindeer is everyone's favorite.  Janice helped me bring character to them with those awesome eyes.  She's a wonderful cartoonist!  Below are her designs for the tropical Christmas theme we did a few years ago.  

That was a turning point for our process.  Folks so loved the different designs that it uped our game AND our enjoyment of the process. 

 

It is not in the nature of artists to produce the same thing over and over.  It's so much fun to begin the design challenge!  Blue crabs for Christmas is a Maryland thing.

 

My favorite art professor told me that art begins with a problem and ends with a solution.  That's how we approach a theme - we ask "What if.."  Then the fun begins.

 Once we decide on a theme, Janice starts sketching.  She's learned the basic decorating from me, but she doesn't have my patience.  She'll do the first one, then I do the basics and she'll go behind me to do details. 

 

 We look for new recipes to try and edit our collections accordingly.

  

 The year we did these cookies, we were all about bling.  We wanted to use melted candy accents where ever we could.

 

 They were lovely, but found that the "work to looks to taste" factors was out of balance.

 

 The Christmas Margarita was inspired.  I was psyched to use this cookie cutter!

 

I can't resist buying a new cookie cutter!  I always check them at the craft and kitchen stores.  I have a separate set in my studio to use with clay media.

 

Sometimes you can use a generic shape, like the one above to make a cool new design!  
This year I made extra reindeer.  I was flying through them so fast that I had a whole pan that was underdone.  I lost half of them trying to move them off the tray.  Normally that's not a problem, I would set them aside for Hubby to eat.  But the carnage was so great that I just went with it. Sooo, Janice got a tray of roadkill cookies, from one warped soul to another.  She gets me.

 

We finally started keeping a cookie book last year.  We hope to hand it down to the next generation of cookie makers.