happy holidays!

Hello! Just wanted to pop in and wish you all a wonderful holiday!

My Christmas cards finally went out earlier this week. I made my own again this year. This time I used as many photos as I could to document a year's worth of memories. I went through all my photos of the past year and picked my faves. As you can see most of them are of the girls. But we did include our annual family portrait in front of our maple tree as the main photo.

In a departure from previous cards, I also included my version of the Christmas letter. A top 10 list of our favorite memories. This might be my favorite card yet.

The journaling card and banner are by Paislee Press. Fonts used: Ranger, Kingthings Typewriter, and Pacifico.

 What have been up to besides making and sending out Christmas cards? Well, I've been busy with my shop and everything that goes along with that: making new items, writing tutorials, creating a newsletter, and blogging on my catshy crafts blog. Definitely a labor of love. I love what I do! So I'm sorry I haven't updated my papercat blog in a while. But if you would like to peek at my other blog, here's a peek at what you will find: 4 brand-new tutorials, updates on my new Catshy Crafts items and new features like: Etsy Love Mondays, Thankful Tuesday ands Thrifty Thursdays!

I hope you will check it out!  Here are quick links to keep in touch.

Blog

Shop

Pinterest

Twitter

Facebook Fan Page for Catshy Crafts

One of my new tutorials at Catshy Crafts blog.

I'm on Papernstitch!

I am excited to share with you some news.
I was selected to be on Papernstitch - an exhibition site for indie crafts and handmade goods! And today I am a "Daily Favorite"!

You can read more about how I got picked here. Or if you want to check out my gallery at papernstitch go here. If you're in the mood for a little Christmas shopping, I would definitely check it out and the other artists as well.

And if you have your own craft business, I would definitely check out the Papernstitch blog. Lots of great advice.

Happy Shopping!

sweets, grow and let's celebrate!

I have some exciting news! I have 11 new items in the shop. I thought it would be fun to group them in collections and use my Photoshop skills for these little "ads" of my items. So without further adieu here are the Sweets, Let's Celebrate and Grow collections.

baby cake | pink scoop | vanilla cream | eat

pink/grey bunting | celebrate

grow (no. 1) | grow (no. 2)

It's been so fun experimenting with how to photograph my items. I bought a Lightbox to take photos during those dreary, rainy days that we enjoy here in the Pacific Northwest, but today it was a sunny day so I took some natural light photos as well. While I was snapping away, Zara and Jamie came back from dropping Sofia at school and I had a Eureka moment. Why not get one of my darling daughters to "model" them? So I took these shots today.

Digital frame by Paislee Press.

So do you have preference for the photos? I think I like the Zara photos to draw you in and give a sense of scale, but the staged shots give more detail....

Thanks for stopping by!

tale of two blogs + 10% off

When I launched my hand-made/crafty business and Etsy shop, CatShy Crafts this summer, I created a blog to share all things Catshy. My papercat blog (the one you're reading now) was originally intended to share my scrapbooking pages, both digital and paper and personal photos of my family. But as I dedicate more time to Catshy and less to scrapbooking,* I am posting more on Catshy. And rather than to double-post, I would love to invite you to read my other blog.

And as a little thank you for following me over to the Catshy blog, I'm having a little sale!

All you have to do is one of the following things:

• subscribe to receive an e-mail whenever I post (there's a little box on the right column of my blog "Follow by E-mail")
• become a "Follower" (again look on the right column)
• or "Like" my Catshy Crafts Fan page on Facebook.

Then, let me know at cayla73@yahoo.com and I'll send you a coupon code to save 10% at my Etsy shop! Thanks for your support!







* Before I go, I wanted to share my latest digital page. It's been a long time since I sat down to scrap! But I really love this one. I used One Little Bird's Sweater Weather kit. I took these photos at a local blueberry farm that happened to be selling pumpkins as well. It was the closest thing to a pumpkin patch that we went to this year.

shipping's on me!

It's a dreary, rainy Saturday here in Western Washington, so I'm sure it will be one of those stay-in and do something crafty days (and maybe a girls night out later). In the meantime, I just want to check in and let you know about a special offer I'm having.


In honor of listing my  new items at my etsy shop, catshy crafts, I'm shipping for FREE! Please check my other blog for the coupon code. Or head on over to take a peek at my new items. Thanks for looking!

new items at catshy crafts (my etsy shop)

I updated my shop with some new items! And a new banner....

hand-stitched felt heart embroidery hoop art

paper flower mini garland

I'm a newbie at Etsy, but trying to learn as I go. Do you have an Etsy shop? Link me up! I'd love to see.


my first sale : wallflowers

Like your first love, you always remember your first sale, right? Well, these little flowers were my first sale for Catshy Crafts. A friend who attended my artist's reception chose these little beauties to come home with her. Well, she actually had to wait a month until the show came down.

The flowers are hand-made by me using scrapbook paper, buttons and embroidery thread. They got a lot of compliments at the shop (or so I'm told by my friend Hannah who works there). Plus, it is the first (yay!)  (and only) thing that got purchased.  Well, that's not exactly true. A week later, I was commissioned to create an entirely NEW set of wallflowers using different papers for another person who attended the show. So I guess these are my lucky wallflowers. I'll be putting more in the shop. Definitely.

I delivered these particular blooms today with a card I made (with a freshly made flower on the front). She loved it! (too bad I forgot to snap a photo of it.) I can't wait to see how she displays them in her home. She might put a few in a frame and the rest in her daughter's room (who happens to be my daughter's BFF).

All the flowers piled in one of my garage sale finds (a crystal encrusted wire basket) which you might remember from this post.

The buttons are from my ever-growing stash of buttons: from clothes, vintage finds from thrift stores/g-sales and scrapbooking supplies.

This is how they looked at the craft show at Cupcake Royale.

sofia's art show

sofia's art show | cupcake royale bellevue, cash register.

In case you missed it, Sofia has her own art show at Cupcake Royale, which will probably last much longer than mine. She made this little pen-drawn and carefully cut out drawings. They are taped to the cash register.

limited edition: my "pretty craft show" flyers

I am relying on e-mail and facebook to get the word out about my artist's reception at Cupcake Royale (which is coming up fast!) But I decided (yes, last minute) that I should create a flyer/postcard. At the very least as a memento of the show itself. At first, I was going to use a scan of a "poster" that I made for the show. The poster is 12" x 12" piece of kraft-colored cardstock hand-stitched, spelling out the name of the show and has a few of my "wallflowers" adorning it. But it wasn't working for me when it came time to put the flyer together. So I fell back to that "purple rain" felt piece that I posted a few weeks ago. So even though I said it wasn't the official flyer....it is now.

I printed them at home on my Epson R1800 and Red River paper (double-sided matte 60 lb). I only had two sheets of this paper. The rest of the flyers will be printed on Epson matte photo paper (not intended to be printed on both sides), but it will have to do. I love how it looks on the Red River paper. My printer was giving me lots of problems lately, but after cleaning the ink heads, replacing the gloss optimizer ink cartridge, remembering to turn off the printer when not in use (the ink head were contantly getting clogged from leaving the printer on!) and finally using this new-to-me brand of printer paper, I think I love my printer again!

what's in a name? introducing catshy crafts

One of the things on my to-do list, my bucket list, my if-I-only-had-more time list, my dream list is to start an Etsy shop. A million excuses prevented me from actually doing anything about this. The usual things that get in the way: no time, who would buy my stuff?, I'm too shy, fear of putting myself out there, blah, blah, blah. But things were somehow falling into place within the several months.  And because of an opportunity that a friend has presented me, I have been making baby steps to make this dream into a reality!

The first thing I knew I had to do was come up with a name for my shop. I knew I wanted it to be represent me - just not what I make, but my personality as well. I love those shops that combine two words that don't go together. like twig and thistle. or names that have a play on words and have to meanings. like sew daily. I like names that have personal meaning to the creator like nana company.

So after many days of thinking and brainstorming and running it by my family....I've come up with my shop name!

Why catshy? #1 It's an anagram of cathys. #2: One of my nicknames is cat. #3 I'm shy. #4 It kinda sounds like catchy. #5 It's me.

I even have a new blog. So please stop by and tell me what you think! I am also giving away one of the first things I'll be putting in my shop. Go here to enter!






p.s. If you have an Etsy shop, link me up! I'd love to see your creations as well.