Chalkboard love ... get organized using chalkboard signs and labels!

Do you have a passion for all things chalkboard right now? I do! I have made a number of projects for Creative Bag over the past few months with all of their amazing new chalkboard products. During our last few days at the cottage this summer we were blessed with a few rain days (yeah rain days ... an excuse to stay inside and spend time crafting) and I ended up reorganizing my cottage craft supplies using a bunch of my recent chalkboard purchases.

I picked up the metal buckets in my craft cabinets a number of years ago from the dollar store. I was using tags with strings on the bucket handles to organize the items stored in the buckets but the tags would flip around every time I opened the cabinet doors and I was just tired of dealing with them any more. These mini chalkboard signs with clip backs from Creative Bag are perfect for helping me to organize my supplies. I used a fine chalk marker to write on each sign. I like chalk markers for projects like this because the words will not rub off easily every time I touch the sign. You can use water to wipe the marker and re write so it is possible to change your mind ... for a while. Once the marker has dried and set it does not wipe clean with water ... but you can always add a fresh coat of chalkboard paint yourself and start again!

I also used these adorable chalkboard labels from Creative Bag to organize some of my other supplies in vintage glass bottles. I love how my mini letter stamps are now organized and ready to be used. I picked up a bunch of these mini stamps in different fonts a long time ago and was struggling to find a way to store them. The stamps were packaged in individual boxes by font and I knew that they would always be out of sight, out of mind and never used unless I could find a way to store them so that it would be easy to see at a glance. I used the stamps and a chalk marker to "stamp" directly onto the chalk labels. I can tell what font is in each container by simply looking at the label. 

If you would like to see how I used the chalk markers with my stamps you can see my full tutorial here on the Creative Bag blog.

Looking for some awesome chalk fonts to use for digital scrapbooking or crafting projects? Here's ten of my favorites and all are free to download!

janda safe and sound (Lorrie Everitt’s), 

made with B (favourite) 

sketch serif (chalkboard fonts to download)

sketch rockwell

appleberry 

chalkhand lettering 

eraser 

handy George

kg strawberry limeade 

 sign handwriting 

Looking for more blackboard inspiration? Follow me on Pinterest!

The kids are back to school. I hope that you can find some time this week to have a little "me time" and get creative with your own chalkboard projects!

Christmas {post} cards and chalkboard art

I am so excited ... my Christmas postcards arrived this afternoon! 

I knew that I would not have time to create 80 handmade Christmas cards like I normally do this year. Instead, I designed a holiday postcard and had it printed at moo.com.  I have designed and print my business and family cards with moo many times over the past few years and I have always been happy with the quality of their products. The stock they print on is so nice and everyone always comments on how beautiful they are. The colour on the girl's photo turned out great and the digital chalkboard and vintage postcard backgrounds that I created look even better than I thought they would.

I paid for quick delivery turn around but it took the courier 4 days to get them to me after they were cleared from Canadian Customs ... long story short ... DHL Express should not have the word "express" in it's company name. Oh well, at least I have my cards now and I looking forward to writing on the backs and mailing them out to our families and friends.  

By the way, I am really glad that I made these as holiday postcards instead of cards. No envelopes to be thrown away and I had our return address printed on the back of the cards so I don't have to add return address labels. 

I have been on a bit of a chalkboard art phase lately. I have been pinning lots of chalkboard art and graphic inspiration on my "chalkboard" Pinterest board. And I think that I am going to use a number of chalkboard elements it in my holiday decorating this year. I'll share more about that later ... I'm still painting "things" with black board paint.

 I just finished this large chalkboard artboard on the weekend.  I was hoping to pick up a couple of large wood canvases but I was only able to get one in the size that I needed. My original plan was to create a piece that I could hang over the fireplace in the livingroom with a Christmas saying for the holidays. I ended up designing what you see above because I was missing my oldest daughter who is off to University this year and I thought that she would like these graphics instead. I loved reading "Guess How Much I Love You" to both of my girls when they were small and this quote was just so much fun to work with. Now I just have to figure out where we will hang it ... but not until I have the Christmas cards addressed!!

 If you are interested in making chalkboard art piece like mine, you can see my chalkboard tutorial on Creative Bag's blog over here. 

happily ever after ... wedding inspiration

Don't you just love fairy tales and happy endings ... I do ... and I was so happy to attend the wedding of our friends' daughter recently. Breann married her Prince Charming {Kyle} and their wedding and reception was amazing.

I collected a number of old frames to use at the reception as part of the decor. We removed the glass, painted the frames white and added chalkboards. The sign pictured above was a gift I made for Breann and Kyle. I hand painted the words so that the "happily ever after" will never rub off or go away. I also made another one with the words "thank you" ... it was used in the wedding day photography and I am just waiting to see the wedding photos so that we can print the thank you notes.

One idea that we had was to set up a photo booth at the reception. Breann fell in love with this yellow and grey fabric {which ended up being our inspiration for the wedding stationery} and we knew that it would make a beautiful backdrop for photos inside the hall. We purchased enough fabric so that I could sew two 8' panels together ... we wanted to make sure that we had enough width for group pictures. We hung the fabric in the reception hall, added some chalkboards and chalk, a big white frame and lots of silly props and that was all it took to "get the party started"! This would be great for a kid's party too! ... just let the fabric and props set the party theme.

Here's a picture of myself, two daughters and a friend's daughter ... can you tell we were having a lot of fun at the wedding?

I had a case of vintage mason jars that we filled with fine beach pebbles & candles to use at the bar. I created the paper flowers using extra* papers from Breann and Kyles' stationery. A little bit of Tim Holtz's distress ink in yellow (scattered straw) and grey (weathered wood), some pop dots and a ribbon to tie the flowers to the jars was all it took to make these candles complete.

I think that these would be cute for an anniversary or birthday party too ... just remember to keep the paper decorations away from the flame!

*Just have to tell you that we had "extra" stationery because a few weeks after we printed the invitations we found out that Breann's youngest brother was going to be representing Canada in the World Junior Swim meet in Peru ... and he would be swimming in Peru on her wedding day. Long story short ... the wedding date was moved ahead by two weeks, I made new invitations and I we have 200 extra wedding invitations to "play with".

I hope that you find these ideas inspiring whether you are planning a wedding or a party!

Have a great week.