Coffee Loving Papercrafters

Hello!  We’re up to our final installment of our new feature…Design Team Q&A.  We are interviewing the team throughout the summer so that you get to know them!   Today we’re chatting with Becca Cruger!  She blogs every other Monday and her feature is called Monday Espressosions.  In case you’ve missed it, we’ve interviewed Kathy Schweinfurth, Dana Warren, Laurel Seabrook, Dana Gong, Erin Thiem, Kerry Urbatch , Helen Gullett, Amy Tsuruta ,Terri Burson and Chaitali Narla.

Tell us a little more about yourself!

I’m from the barren and beautiful tundra of North Dakota, where all things are flat and windy. While the flatness can be a drag, it definitely makes it less likely for people or bears to sneak up on you. By day, I work as an Assistant Director for a Career Development Center at a University, by night I work as a crisis advocate for a domestic violence agency. By late night, I work around the waning light available in my craft studio. 🙂

I began making cards when I discovered I was old enough to attach glitter to paper. My grandma was a papercraft artist and she taught me all sorts of techniques. In 2014, I discovered the amazing world of blogging and have met SO many incredible bloggy friends. If you can’t tell by now, I have a quirky sense of humor. I am a lover of all things hilarious and design my own pun-filled stamp line called Big Grins by Becca Cruger for STAMPlorations.

When did you join the CLC Design Team?

According to seismology records, North Dakota had an uncharacteristic blip on the Richter scale on the evening of January 8, 2017, When Amy sent me an email and I decided to celebrate with an effusive happy dance.

What is your favorite coffee/tea or cocoa card that you’ve designed?

Just one?!? The horror!

It’s like asking me to pick between my favorite children…. If I have to pick just one, I’ll go with this sweet Valentine I designed. Valentine’s Day is my favorite cardmaking holiday, and I love how this one is both sweet and funny at the same time.

What is your favorite color/color combo?

I’m a big fan of all things purple and teal.

We would love a peek into your crafty space, tell us a bit about it!

I bought a house about a year-and-half ago and that gave me the space to create the craft studio of my dreams (ok… ok.. I’m not Jennifer McGuire, but hey, I’m happy with what I created). The garage of the house I have has 700 square feet of living space attached to it – separate from my house. It has a big theatre room, and also had a poker room, which I promptly claimed for my own.

On my blog, I’ve got a whole post about how I turned it from a masculine space into a bright and airy craft studio.

I designed and created a 6 foot by 10 foot custom craft table so I have plenty of room for guests (hint, hint for all you traveling bloggers out there – come to North Dakota and chill in my studio!). The foundation of my table is made of ikea bookshelves turned sideways and my embellishments, ribbons, and 6×6 paper packs are stored in cheery red cloth baskets.

I teach cardmaking classes from time-to-time and have used my craft studio for the smaller, more intimate groups.

I’ve come up with unique ways to organize some of my favorite supplies.

My Distress Ink pads and refills are all stored in clear nail polish display stands, which I found for $18 on Amazon.

I store all of my stamps in little cloth baskets in a cupboard… although I’m slowly running out of space for my polymer stamp addictions and may need to invest in some more cupboards haha.

The smaller cupboards hold all of my mixed media essentials (texture paste, beads, paint, etc.) and stencils.

I really wanted to make Distress Products be a decoration in my room, so my back wall has floating shelves that display my Spray Stains, paints, and Distress Crayons. It’s such a happy rainbow whenever I walk in!

Arguably my favorite feature about my craft room is that display wall because I rotate out and display cards and art I’ve received from bloggy friends all around the world – talk about a way to stay inspired!

My latest addition to my craft room is a framed magnetic wall hanging that holds all of my die cuts.

I plan to do a tutorial on how I made this baby up at my blog in the next couple of weeks, so stay tuned!

What are your ‘go-to’ crafty tools?

Definitely an embossing gun. I use it for embossing (of course) but also to quickly dry any mixed media stuff I put on my cards. I’d also say that in terms of adhesives I HAVE to have Beacon 3-in-1 craft glue. When I was using the roller tape adhesives, my cards would frequently fall apart if they sat for a couple of months or went through the extreme temperatures of the North Dakota mail. Since I’ve switched to Beacon 3-in-1 I’ve never had this problem. It’s like super glue!

Inspiration can be found on Becca’s blog and you can keep connected via Facebook,  Instagram,  Periscope & Pinterest.