My Guest DT and Inspiration from Stockings

I've been honored to have my good friend from Germany, Vanessa Menhorn, as my Guest DT this month. Did you see her beautiful card from the Lovely Shelf Blog Hop? She is an amazing artist and I'm not the only one who has noticed! Check out her blog to find out all the numerous awards and recognitions she's received. I'm so thankful to her for designing with my Lovely Shelf set amidst her busy schedule. Thanks, Vanessa!

I asked her a few questions, so you can get to know her better.

1. How long have you been paper crafting and how did you get
started?
* I started making cards about 10 months ago - I thought it would be nice to make my own birthday cards and saw the beautiful creations on some company and challenge blogs, so I joined a flickr group and started taking part in their challenges

2. What are your current favorite:
* Techniques : distressing, layering, stamping

* Tools: die-cutting machine, sewing machine, border punches
* embellishments: pearls, gems, buttons, ribbon
* coloring mediums: distress ink, colored pencils

3. What inspires you to create? Define your crafting style.
* other designer, challenges, images in magazines
* my style is changing, I love trying new techniques and prefer the vintage/shabby chic/elegant style. My crafting is chaotic and not organized...

4. Tell us something about your family. Where are you from? Other
interests besides paper crafting.
* I am married and have a 16 months old sweet daughter. I live in Germany and I am half Italian. Besides paper crafting I don`t have much time for other hobbies - but I love cooking, baking, sewing (cute stuffed animals for my daughter), reading and gardening. I used to do a lot of sports before I had my girl.

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I also want to encourage you to check out and participate in Cath's Moxie Fab Tuesday Trigger uses my inspiration from Arts and Soul:

Aren't these stockings so soft and pretty? My girls would love them! And here's my card:

Stamps: Lovely Shelf, Warm and Wonderful (GinaK)
Paper: GKD Creme de Menthe, DCWV La Creme, Basic Grey Eva, GKD Vintage Holly digipapers
Accents: ribbon by Michael's, lace from a local store here, buttons from my stash

Come back tonight (or tomorrow morning for me) for the Life is Good blog hop.