Candice Windham Design Studio

This is the last day of the Sizzix Triple Play Blog Hop, featuring Sizzix dies created by multi-talented designers Brenda Pinnik, Eileen Hull and Karen Burniston. This has been so much fun and has made me push the creative envelope. These dies have been so easy to work with and, in a time of year that is extremely hectic, they have made me slow down and relax with the thing I enjoy most, creating art. This final die, by Eileen Hull, is one that truly stretches the imagination. It is designed as a baggie topper, but the elements can be used for so many other items. The embellishment pieces alone (hearts, scallops, nameplates) conjure up a variety of ideas for future projects. I used three toppers and one embellishment, all cut from mat board, to create a traditional bag topper, a book and a little storage space for stray postage stamps. Here's how I made them: Valentine Bag Topper You don't have to wait for Valentine's Day. Show your love anytime! Supplies Sizzix ScoreBoards...

I can't believe we are almost through with this blog hop. Each week has been an adventure in creativity! Be sure to click on the Sizzix button on the left side of this page to see what 60 other amazing designers did with this die! Between this event, my 3X weekly posts at the Memory Keepers blog, and Christmas shopping, I am just about created out. When I took Brenda Pinnick's lovely fabric and Sizzix diecuts out of the bag, my brain malfunctioned. There were so many possibilities, but also 60 other designers using the same materials. I always like to push the envelope, but how could I top what I had done in the past few weeks without spending days on the project? I read somewhere that when you are writing a novel and you get your hero stuck in one of your mind blocks, you should turn him around and go in the opposite direction. If it works for writers, it should work for crafters, so I turned backwards and went to my crafting beginnings, which was scrapbooking. Brenda's fa...

Welcome to this week's edition of the Sizzix Triple Play Blog Hop! Today, the featured die is Karen Burniston's Sizzix Pop-up Gift Card Holder Die ( #656740 ). Sometimes gift cards are the only way to to make sure you give what the giver wants, but when it comes to presentation, we are limited to a gift card envelope or pay way too much for a special holder. This die comes with the holder and several extra pieces, and when assembled, your gift card will pop out of the greeting card enclosure as a little extra surprise for the recipient. I chose to make the pop-out portion a book title rather than a card holder by just placing the extra little label cutout portion over the words to create a permanent title page for my 2010 Christmas album. Supplies Sizzix Pop-up Gift Card Holder Die, #656740 Christmas Cardstock, 2 sheets 12" X 12" Chipboard, 3 sheets 5 1/2" X 6 1/2" Green Card stock, 8 1/2" x 5 1/2", folded to 4 1/4" X 5 1/2" Black Card s...

Welcome to the Thanksgiving edition of the Sizzix Triple Play Blog Hop! Today, I am thankful for my friends and family, my freedom, especially my freedom to worship God as I please, and the talented designers, Eileen Hull, Brenda Pinnick and Karen Burniston, and the people at Sizzix who made this blog hop possible. This week's die is the Frame Die, designed by Eileen Hull. This die has so many great components that I took several days just to decide what I wanted to do with it. I ended up with not one, but three projects with only one cut from this die (except the additional backing sheet for the book): a candy box with see-through top, a recipe book with a framed cover and a tiny little frame to hold a picture of one of my all-time favorite guys. Be sure to click on the Sizzix icon to the left to continue through the blog hop to see what other designers have done with this die. Candy Box Supplies Square Box Sizzix Bigz Die, Frame (Scallop Frame and Heart) Krylon Red Spray Paint St...

Welcome to week #3 of the Sizzix Triple Play Blog Hop! This week we are using Brenda Pinnick's Beauty Bloom Flower die. This versatile die has large flowers, small flowers and some in between. You can cut them from paper, fabric, cork or whatever you like. I have to confess, I looked at these long and hard trying to decide what I wanted to use them for. My first thought was to decorate a frame or shadowbox, then a recipe card box, then little ducks. That's right. Little ducks. The selection of diecuts I received had several yellow felt flowers that looked just like...you guessed it...duck feet. If I could felt like Debra Quartermain (also participating in this blog hop), you'd be viewing a collection of fuzzy little yellow ducks with big flower petal feet. I had to visit the physical therapist office Monday, and while I waited for my tri-weekly dose of pain, I thumbed through a Better Homes and Gardens magazine. There was an ad that had a mask in it, and it hit me: I just...

Actually, it started looking like Christmas in September, at least in our local discount stores. Today is the second round of the Sizzix Triple Play Blog Hop, featuring Sizzix dies by Eileen Hull, Karen Burniston and Brenda Pinnick. Each Thursday for the next few weeks, you can start here at my blog and click on the Triple Play Blog Hop button on the left to see more than 50 projects using the same die each week. Today's die is by Karen Burniston and is designed to be a pop-up box inside a card. This clever design folds flat and pops up when the card is opened, so your card will be remembered way past Christmas. I chose to make my diecut into an ornament, rather than a pop-up. All designers were sent the diecut in black cardstock. I toyed with the idea of covering the black in a patterned paper, but then remembered the cool new Marvy Uchida snowflake punch in my punch stash. This punch gives you a large (approx. 1 1/2") snowflake as well as a tiny one (approx. 1/2"). Her...

It's time for another round of the Sizzix Blog Hop with a little twist. There will be a different die each Thursday for several weeks, each by one of three different designers, and there will be more than 60 designs each week using the same die, so you'll get a huge variety of possibilities. Just click on the Sizzix button on my blog and you'll be on your way! Since I went to see Wicked Halloween night, you know what mode I have been in all week. I had actually started my design, which would have been just a simple little house using patterned papers and some lace to create a charming cottage. Well, THAT didn't happen. I started ripping the thing apart bright and early Monday morning and this is what I came up with: a perfectly wicked little house, deserving of Elphaba, who you can see peeping out the upper window. Supplies Sizzix Scoreboard Pro house die by Eileen Hull(Product #656836) Mat board, 6" x 13" Patterned paper, two coordinating sheets Smooch Spri...