It’s Mint-spirational Monday! Time for another dose of creative Mint-spiration:

Beauty | by: nina81

Spring Blooms | by: Mommy2Talesia

Beachy Fun | by: my2monkeys

Sparkly Present | by: Juno

Characters | by: hazels_melody

Sparkle Baby | by: alaina

Royal Makeover | by: CupcakeJamie

Five Years | by: mj.johntson

Keep POSTING!

Don’t miss it! Shop-diddy-shop shop!

Hybrid Papercrafts: Butterfly Card
by: Mary Jo Johnston

Hello Peppermint Creative fans!
Who wants to make a card with me??! Come on! Grab your scissors and glue, print a few of your favorite PC papers and let’s make something fabulous ;)

It’s no secret that I. LOVE. TO. MAKE. CARDS. Have you seen my gallery here at PC? Not a lot of digi going on in there, haha! But, if you could see Miss Mint’s papers printed onto cardstock, you’d understand why! Fabulous!

So, right now, I’m really drawn to this idea of repeating patterns. I’ve been seeing a lot of inspiration on Pinterest, in scrapbook galleries, and most recently Miss Mint’s new Spring Garden Kit with the butterfly patterned paper.
You can recreate the repeating pattern look with anything you like! From circles, to flowers, shaped punches, or how about monograms – repeating letters on the face of your card would be fantastic!

Here’s what you’ll need:
Scissors or Paper Trimmer
Favorite Punch or Other Repeating Shape/Sticker
Glue
Foam Dots
Cardstock Card
Printed Peppermint Creative Patterned Papers

This is a very basic 4.25” x 6.5” card. Cover the lower portion of the card with patterned paper, finish with a strip of coordinating paper across the top of the block.

Using your shape punch (or favorite sticker), punch 9-12 shapes. Align rows across the top of the card in a uniform fashion. Embellish with pearls, stickers or word sentiments.

Be sure to upload your creations to the Peppermint Creative gallery!

You might just find your project here, featured in the Mintspirational Monday blog post! =)

Happy creating! Mary Jo

06/22/2011 – Operation ‘Moving to a Mac’ is 99.5% complete.

It is shaping up to be another productive day. I feel encouraged after reading some of the blog comments on my last post. As it turns out I am not alone in my journey to the Mac. It looks like at least a few of you are also in the process of moving or are seriously contemplating it. It is indeed a daunting task. Kind of like moving to a new city but you quickly find your way around. Maybe we should start a support group:

www.creativeladiesmovingtoamacbecauseeveryonesaysits
betterandtheybetterberightorI’llkicksomeass.org.

Overall it’s going well. I feel confident that I will adapt quickly despite the fact that I don’t like change. Last night I decided to read up on my Mac history. I learn that releases of Mac OS X are named after big cats; the current version of Mac OS X is nicknamed “Snow Leopard”. I believe ‘Lion’ is set to release sometime soon.

Here’s the breakdown:
10.0 ‘Cheetah’
10.1 ‘Puma’
10.2 ‘Jaguar
10.3 ‘Panther’
10.4 ‘Tiger’
10.5 ‘Leopard’
10.6 ‘Snow Leopard’
10.7 ‘Lion’

It’s all starting to make sense. I had no idea what people were talking about before when they said ‘Snow Leopard’. It’s a pleasure to finally be on a computer that functions. Installing and uninstalling programs is so easy I thought it was a joke the first time I saw it done. No more fishing through your computer for c:/directory/user/filesyouwillneverfind it’s all drag and drop. To install a new program you just drop the application into your applications folder and to remove it you delete it or pull it out. It’s all so neat and clean which inspires me to keep it that way.

I vow to keep my files well organized!

I promise not to name my work files akjaseojfrgfr.psd or leave them as Untitled-1.psd because I’m in a rush or just too lazy to make an effort.

There is plenty of incentive to do so. Meet my new best friend, ‘Spotlight’. I know that PC has a search function but it’s clumsy and slow. Spotlight is amazing at finding just about ANYTHING on your computer quickly and efficiently. I’ve already used it a handful of times. You don’t have to fish through your files, spotlight will pull it up for you.

Other things that I am LOVING so far..

1- The Dock – I love having my desktop icons out of the way and I get a real kick out of watching them pop up when I mouse over them at the bottom of my screen.

2- iPhoto – It’s a pretty nifty program. Suddenly I can actually FIND my pictures…easily. I love all the easy to use features. LOVE, love, love the Slideshow feature.

3-Firefox – Ok, I could have had this on my PC but I didn’t. My bad.

4- Thunderbird – Again, apparently there is a PC version but I missed the boat on that one as well. I love the tagging system among other things. Still to new to it to give a full review.

5- iTunes – Yey, it finally works properly. It would not update my iPhone properly on the PC.

6-Polite Errors – I admit that I’ve already encountered an error or two but they are so much more plesasant. It’s more of an “Oopsie, this program is going to close, but don’t worry it will not effect your other programs. Everything is fine.” As opposed to the typical PC error: “OMFG! FATAL ERROR. The sky is falling, your computer is crashing, your anti-virus software can’t help you now. Restart your computer and hope for the best. I hope you know a good tech guy.”

That being said. There are still some bumps in the road. I seem to have enabled something that I *think* is called Hot Corners. When you move your mouse to the corner of your screen it activates a pre-defined action. Apparently mine is set up to either scatter all my open windows across my screen so that I can see everything that’s currently open OR wipe all my open screens right out of view. Both of which are useful if you do them on purpose but turns out to be quite irritating when done accidentally. It’s happened 4 times while typing this post. One accidental nudge of the mouse and windows are flying all over the place. Clearly I don’t have it set up correctly or understand how to use it. Or both.

MOFO, it just happened again…right on cue.

As I open Photoshop for the first time to actually work on a project I am confident. For if there is one thing I know, it’s my way around Photoshop. I open my file and begin.

2 microseconds later…

WTF.

NEW KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS?! What the shit. My fingers are lost on the keyboard. I try my hardest to calculate what the Mac equivalent shortcut would be (factoring in that new COMMAND button) but I CAN’T! I pause in confusion. I can’t even recall what the PC shortcuts are. I realize it’s because I never really had to think about it, my fingers instinctively knew where to go.

Damn you COMMAND button. DAMN YOU.

Thank goodness for Google.

I find this site with a wicked list of keyboard shortcuts for Photoshop CS4 on Mac.

Ok. Crisis averted.

I think I overreacted a little on that one.

I hope to start designing some new products tomorrow. That will be an exciting/frusterating task. We shall see how it goes. All things considered it’s been a much easier transition than I anticipated.

Famous last words…

06/21/2011 – Today is a monumental day.

Operation ‘Moving to a Mac’ is almost complete. I must trust the words of my friends and colleagues when they report with confidence that I will not regret this change. At present time while I can appreciate the clean, modern interface and ease of use, I long for the comforts of my half functioning PC. I can’t help by wonder if I brand new PC would have been an easier and cheaper solution. BUT NO! I must not cave to the desire to revert to what is comfortable. I must push forward and brave unfamiliar terrain. I must feel the fear and do it anyways.

As I type the fire alarm shrieks at a volume so loud it should be illegal. I’m shocked that you can’t hear it right now through the internet. The monthly fire alarm testing is getting old. My ears continue to ring for several minutes after it stops.

A child cries in the distance.

A crazy old man sings the chorus of some 80′s rock song I recognize but can’t identify for about 2 minutes every morning at precisely 9:30am.

That last part is very true.

I successfully transferred my email to my Mac. I’ve been introduced to the wonders of a font manager and I’m blogging to you now using a whole new blogging software. Yes, it is a new day.

Goodbye Internet Explorer.

Hello Firefox.

Goodbye Outlook Express.

Hello Thunderbird.

Goodbye Windows BlogWriter.

Hello MarsEdit.

With each passing hour I grow more and more comfortable with this foreign machine. Applications appear to function where they didn’t before. I can now enjoy the pleasures of PINTEREST without my machine freezing. I can PIN with ease.

I see a light at the end of the tunnel.

I can’t wait to be ORGANIZED and not have to shuffle between computers. With half my life on one computer and half on the other I feel quite unsettled. It’s like living in a new house with moving boxes stacked around me.

I can’t wait to be fully unpacked.

Until then, I will rejoice in my small accomplishments.

(1) transferring and organizing over 1TB of files from the PC
(2) exporting and importing 5 years worth of emails all by myself with relative ease
(3) figuring out what the h*ll to do with a font manager
(4) updating my iphone and ipods on my mac instead of PC
(5) making my first slideshow (and exporting it as a cross-platform .MOV) in iphoto
(6) importing all bookmarks and favorites from IE on PC to Firefox on Mac
(7) downloading and installing new drivers for all my junk! (tablet, Silhouette, mouse)
(8) POSTING MY FIRST BLOG POST FROM MY MAC!

Hopefully by the time I post again I will fully Mac-ified.

(FINGERS CROSSED THIS ACTUALLY POSTS)

CAUTION: High levels of MINT-SPIRATION ahead! Keep a pen and notepad handy in the event of a creative emergency.

Easter Eggs 2011 | by: hmlentz
I always love seeing kits used for their non-intended purpose. I just think it’s a fun exercise in creativity and it also goes to show you just how versatile a kit can be if you let your mind wander outside the box just a bit. This hair cut themed kit works perfectly for these Easter pics. Who would have thunk it? LOVE the overall layout and design.

game| by:keeela
There are a few things that I really love about this page…ok I love EVERTHING about this page. From the fun angles of the photos, to the clean and compact layout, to the unconventional placement and design on the title, to the splatter in the back using a striped paper as a clipping mask which gives the splatter a fun rainbow effect (run on sentence much?) I just love it ALL!

apron | by joscie
Seriously how cool is this? This page features an apron that Joscie embroidered with rain bow thread. I love the simple design and the cool way she did the date at the bottom! Fun cropping of the self portrait too!
 

*Eltern-Shooting* | by: birgit
These pictures are just scrumptious. I just LOVE them along with the fun feeling of this page. Really great use of elements as well.

New Do | by: therapy97
This is pretty dang cute a really fun variation on this months Pimp My Page Template (as also shown above). I really love the creativity to alter the template in this way.

Seaside Serenity | by: Cherry Limeade
This page is so soft, cool, calm and collected. I love the vintage feel of it along with the great title work.

*Mixed Bag 59* | by: brigit
This gorgeous page is so rustic and beautiful. I love the quote as well as the photo. The color choices are quite striking as well.

And now for some hybrid AWESOMENESS!

Canvas Dress | by: alaina
OMG. How amazing is this? I  mean WOW. I have NO idea how she did this but it’s awesome. Let’s just look and say ‘oooohhhh, ahhhhhh’.

CLOSER VIEW:

Cowboy Page using ‘Little Buckaroo’ | by: samw1984
Again I need to ask, how COOL is this?! It’s just SO much fun for me to see my digital products turned into something tangible. This layout is amazing. I love the details from the great photos to the burnt edges and everything in between.

New ‘Do’ Kit | by samw1984
Another amazing hybrid page from Sam this week, who apparently, has an incredible amount of patience to have cut out all these embellishments by hand so well. I LOVE the overall design as well as the depth created with the elements.

CLOSER VIEW:

MY YORKIE | by: Ike
This sweet hybrid is a real standout! I LOVE the little touches like the bow on the pup’s head and the layering and dimension in the flowers that were printed, doubled up and decoupaged. Beautiful work!

This concludes this week’s edition of Mint-spirational Monday!
Have a crafty week and keep on posting!