Sunday Ghoulish Greetings

 It is not midnight yet and I am uploading my final card for today. This meets two challenges. The first is Sunday’s Sketch at 365 Cards and the second is a recipe challenge at the Stamp Shack. The recipe called for two brads, ribbon, glitter and using a punch.

The few of you reading this who personally know me are going to say “You actually made 2 Halloween cards on the same day?” You see, since my boys are older now, I really don’t get into the spirit of Halloween anymore. And for me to even make two cards in the same year, let alone the same day is AMAZING!

The paper is by Cosmo Cricket (last year’s again), the cardstock is SU Dusty Durango. The ghosts are my ribbon, the brads are glittered, the bats are Martha’s punch, sentiment by MFT Fright Night, and the main focal image is a rub-on by K & Company. I would like to say that I meant the triangle to look a bit crooked like a witch’s hat, but I have to chalk it up to the late hour and the fact that I just completed my fourth card tonight. All I can say, is thank goodness I work for the government and I am off tomorrow for Labor Day.

A charmed affair

 This card came together really quick. I looked through my stack of Halloween paper and decided to just let that “speak” for itself.

The paper is by Little Yellow Bicycle Frightful. It was last year’s pack. The stamp I just picked up at my LSS. It is part of this month's Great Impression stamps. I stamped it on a scrap of grey with versamark and embossed it using clear powder. The stamp actually had a small spider hanging down, but I clipped it out on purpose when I trimmed it. The charm I picked out at Joann’s on the same shopping spree I mentioned two posts ago. This catches me up with last week’s challenges. Whew! I am going to relax with a piece of Apple pie and a mocha Frappuccino.

Fun flock meets Flower Soft

 This little number was for the Friday Challenge on 365 Cards. Touchy Feely was the challenge. You could use either felt or fun flock. I didn’t own any felt flowers so I went with fun flock.

This cute little hedgie will stay warm with his scarf flocked. I used copics to color him and Polar White Flower soft for the snow. The papers are from last year’s Debbie Mumm Harvest & Holiday pack. This little card is a 4 inch square that was left over from a kit. I have really been trying to use up my leftovers before I cut into a new piece of paper.

I hope to charm you next…..

Eat Drink & Be Merry

 Today I am trying to play catch up on a few challenges. Last week we were trying to find a new bed for our youngest and finally late Friday night we were successful. Saturday was spent rearranging the bedroom to accommodate a larger bed. This card was made for Thursday’s challenge at 365 Cards. A label needed to be somewhere on your card.

I found this with my misc. embellishments. The label is by Remember When. I went with the colors of the label for my card. I tried looking through my paper stash for a checkerboard type but couldn’t find anything that would work. These papers came from a Making Memories paper pack called Poolside & Greenhouse. These two came from the Poolside half *wink*. I know it seems a bit fancy for a floor, but you need to understand he is a very flamboyant French chef. The stamps are from SU Viola and he is colored with copics. 

On my travels the last few days, I stopped into Joann’s for other project material and bought a small table top OTT light for my photo tent. The picture above was shot with the navy backdrop and the light. Does it look better (clearer) than my older shots? I sure hope so. On to my next card…

A new toy

 Today I got a new toy to play with when I take pictures of my cards. I bought a photo tent! My oldest son who is in school for photography kept telling me he would make me “something” but I got tired of waiting. I found this at OBN photo.

So now I just need to try the different backdrops and see which one I like the best. It came with four; white, royal blue, olive green and black.  Here is a new photo of an old card that I took just to practice.

I think I am going to like this tent. Stop by tomorrow and I should have a new card to show you. We spent the evening looking at new mattresses bed for our youngest. He had a blast laying on many different types. We found that he has expensive taste. He loved the Serta Perfect Day Ultra Cushion Top Mattress. Let’s just say I could buy a ton of stamps at what it cost. The salesman assured us we would not have to buy him another mattress for 20 years. My husband looked at him and said, “He is 16. I don’t have a mattress that cost this much and I won’t buy him another mattress in 20 years, he better be out of my house.” We are going to look again tomorrow night.

I hope you have sweet dreams.

Birthday Wishes

 I was able to squeeze in another card tonight. It is Danni’s birthday on Flutter by Wednesday and she is celebrating all month long. For this week’s card we needed to make her a birthday card. I received this Magnolia image in the mail today and felt it would work fine for a birthday card. You might be saying “These are not normal colors for you” well that would be a true statement. I also wanted to play in the Copic colour Challenge and these are the colors for the week.

After coloring her in with my Copics, I used my petite oval nesties to cut the image out. I layered a scallop oval underneath in SU So Saffron. The patterned paper is Basic Grey Marrakech. I thought the colors matched pretty darn close. For a different layout, I choose to use triangles. Maybe it was the Geometry homework earlier. For the sentiment I used my stamp from Stacy Stamps. I love how she has the sentiment both vertically and horizontally. I went with the vertical arrangement since my oval was placed lengthwise. A few pearls in the corners and a small MS butterfly near the flower and it is done. Now you diehard Copic fans who have a true color screen will say – Hold on, she didn’t use the three colors we gave. And that would be true. I used E08, YR21 and YG97. I got as close as I could. Here are the rest of my colors:

Now it is off to bed for me. I do hope I don’t dream about math!

Shoes & Friends

The challenge for today on 365 Cards was Ad Inspired.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We were given the image on the left for inspiration. I kept the colors used in the ad and the high heels. I knew that the set Retro Boutique from GinaK would do the trick. I stamped the line of shoes beginning at different points on the white panel. The sentiment is from Penny Black. I layered the white panel onto a black than red panel. The corners were rounded with a punch from EK Success. A thin strip of red ribbon, a score line and one shoe colored with my red Atyou Spica pen with a rhinestone added completes my card.

That’s it for tonight. I am trying to help my son with Geometry and learning about the rotational symmetry of hubcaps!

Feeling Blue with Bows

 Tonight’s card fulfilled three different challenges. The first is for Day 185 at 365 Cards. The challenge was to use three shades of blue on our card. Check!The second challenge is for Just Magnolia Week 20. The card needed to have ribbons and bows on it. Double check! The third challenge is for A spoonful of sugar #67. That one required distressing on the card. Triple check!

I began by coloring a RAK Magnolia image that I recently received. I used the following Copics to color her in: E000, E00, E11, E33, E59, B21, B24, Y21, YR21, R01, R20, R81, R83, R85. I cut her out and placed foam strips to pop her up. I used my SU Top Note die and distressed the edges with my Tim Holtz distress tool. I sponged SU Bashful Blue on the diecut and went heavily on the edges. I also sponged Bashful Blue on the pp and cardbase. I added two strips of ribbon with small white bows to the top of the card. The mini hearts and ice cream cone are buttons by Jesse James Dress it Up. A hint of Crystal Ice Stickles was added to her ice cream scoop. The sentiment is from MFT What’s the Scoop set.  Thanks for stopping by today:)

 

Pretty in Pink Movie Monday

 This morning when I woke up and turned on the computer, I went to 365 Cards to see what the challenge would be. Was I ever surprised to see that one of my cards from last week – Sporty Saturday’s Baseball Anyone was picked as part of the Top Trio! Yay…I was able to add the cool blinky :)

Today’s challenge was to take inspiration from the movie Pretty in Pink. I could have called my sister to have her recite the movie line by line while I worked, but decided against that. It would not have been finished until after midnight. I decided to keep with the colors of the movie poster shown for my card. I began with a scrap of gray cardstock and used my Laugh stamp by Paperbag Studios. On a side note, Robin Marie, (who this is a self-portrait of) autographed it for me when the stamp first came out. She is a local gal here. I stamped it with versamark and sprinkled Tattered Rose Distress embossing powder on it. I added a layer of white and kept them askew. I added white and pink primas across the top with K & Company rhinestones for the middles. I also added two rhinestone hearts near the image.  The base cardstock is shimmery Bazzill.

I hope you had a magical Monday.

Super sketchy – Whatever you are…

I am working at the craft table late tonight, but I was determined to keep up with the challenges at 365 Cards. Today is Sunday so that meant a fabulous sketch by Pam. To see the design and all the other wonderful creations you can click Day 183.  

This was a super fast and easy card to put together. The base of SU Soft Sky was already cut from a card kit that was extra. The patterned paper is scraps from SU Parisian Breeze I believe. The flourishes are rub-ons by K & Company. The focal image is actually a cardstock sticker by Bo Bunny that I fell in love with at the LSS. Ta da… all I had to do was cut the diamond shape. I felt like the top of the card was a bit bare, but the sketch was that way so I left it.

So why was I so busy on  a Sunday that I couldn’t get near my table until this late? Our middle son moved out on his own this weekend. Actually with a good friend of the family. So we had some rearranging to do and some shopping. Tonight will be night two without him home and I hope it is easier on me than night one:)

Baseball Anyone?

 Today’s card is for Day 182 at 365 cards. It is called Sporty Saturday and you are required to use a ball somewhere on your card. I looked through all my stuff and didn’t have a single ball stamp, sticker or chipboard. Then I thought, which type of ball could I make the easiest? The baseball won.

I began by stamping the jersey from Just So Sporty by Melanie M. onto a piece of SU Pacific Point cardstock. I stamped the words on the front and added some shading with a blue colored pencil. I trimmed the jersey using a white pencil. Next I stamped the cap adding the star to the middle panel. At first I colored the middle panel white around the star but that didn’t look quite right. So this is take two and I like the look much better. I used my circle nestabilities to cut out a round shape for the baseball. I drew two arcs in grey and then pierced holes on either side. I used a thin red marker to make the stitching effect. Smokey Gray Versafine was sponged on the ball so it didn’t look brand new. For the background layer, I used various words from the stamp set and put them on my acrylic block. I stamped them on an angle continuously on a white piece. This was layered to a piece of Pacific Point that was corner punched. I used some foam tape to pop up the ball, shirt and cap for dimension.

Enjoy your weekend and have a ball:)

Rhinestone Wish

 I went back to work today and wore a sweater to keep warm. I still am not sure what is up, but I wasn’t feeling as  chilled as the past few days. I had to attend a lunch meeting that was about 20 minutes away from the office. I drove with a co-worker who knew I hadn’t been feeling well. That sweet man drove in 92 degree Florida heat, with the windows down! What a great co-worker :) On to today’s card. The challenge over at 365 Cards was called White Space. We had to leave space on the card and could only use the areas where I have my white strips. I choose to use SU Taken With Teal as my card base and add white strips. The top strip was cut with a MS border punch and the bottom was paper pierced with an Ornare template. I added a small word from the SU Small Script set and then teal rhinestones by Kaiser.

The space shuttle is set to launch tonight and the launch pad is only 40 miles south of us. We are going to try and stay awake and drive over to the beachside and watch it take off. Night launches are spectacular to see and feel. We actually feel the ground shake. Enjoy your weekend!

Sweet Memories

I am still not feeling quite up to par today so I stayed home from work. I have the worst chills and living in Florida, this should not happen. It is over 90 outside, I have my thermostat set to 79 and I am wearing a long sleeve shirt, sweat pants and a blanket is draped over me. After watching all the shows that I had saved on my DVR, I brought out my laptop to see what was happening in blogland. The challenge today at 365 Cards was to Go Vintage. I must admit, I have always loved this look and admire those who create the look with ease.

I have finally accepted that I am not a “vintage gal” and have given most of my vintage stash away. I pulled out a few of my embellishments that I still have and stared at them for awhile. They wouldn’t magically jump on the card like I was hoping they would do. Pushing my blanket aside, I set to work. I began by stamping this image from Tin Can Mail with Vintage Sepia ink. Next I tore the edges and sponged on some ink. I used a scrap of mulberry paper to layer the image on. The background paper is by Creative Imaginations. I cut this to fit the card, then tore the edges and sponged them. I used a piece of SU Cameo Coral cardstock to bring out the color of the background paper. I attempted to add the lace around the image also, but that was overkill. I really wanted to use the lace though and finally settled on running it down the edge as shown. I added a frilly corner, vintage buttons and a heart-shaped lock to complete the look.

Thanks for stopping by and enjoy the rest of your day!

Butterfly Love Sketch

I came home early from work today because I was not feeling well. I was extremely cold and I had a headache. I took some Advil then browsed through a few challenge blogs. I came upon two that intrigued me. The first was  sketch # 66 at A Spoonful Of Sugar and Kim’s challenge to use a quote at Flutter by Wednesday. The one requirement at Flutter by is you must use either a butterfly or fairy on your card. NO PROBLEM HERE.

I began by looking at my quotes that pertained to butterflies and choose the one above. It is an um-mounted stamp that I recently bought at Stampfest but I don’t remember what company made it. I began by stamping the butterfly by Sarasota Stamps in Versafine Smokey Gray. I stamped once on a piece of scrap paper so I could get the lightest image possible. I then stamped the sentiment on top using Versafine Onyx Black. I sponged Dusty Durango ink on the edges and used my wide tip Zig glue pen to lay down a nice line of ultra-fine glitter. (The sentiment talks about glitterings so I made sure the card had glitter). The sketch required I also had a small text element so I stamped Sending Love by Inkadinkado on a scrap of white, sponged ink around the edges, used a water brush and ink to color in the butterfly and added glitter on that. I brought out my Basic Grey Ambrosia paper pack and pulled out three sheets from it. I knew I would use the butterfly sheet and picked two others that weren’t quite as busy. After laying them down on my card base of SU Dusty Durango, I popped up my focal image and sentiment with foam squares. The final touch was Prima flowers called Fabric Fancies that have a hint of sparkle on them. I applied Copper Stickles for their centers.

My sister’s birthday is coming up soon and I just might send this to her. She loves butterflies as much I do. Thanks for stopping by……

Checkerboard Flowers

 When I checked the challenge this morning on 365 Cards, it was to create a checkerboard background. As I made lunches for my two sons, my mind immediately thought of my scor-pal to make the lines.

I don’t have any really tiny stamps that I could use in the squares, so I went with my Primas. I alternated colored pearls in the centers. I used my Fiskar’s decorative scissors in the Imperial pattern to cut the edges of the card. The tiny sentiment is from a set of self-inking stamps. That’s it, CAS - clean and simple or my initials if you paid attention to my monogrammed card the other day :)

Happy Hump Day!

Knowledge is Power

It is time for Back to School at 365 cards. I took a quick look at my stamp sets and decided to ink up my new set by MFT I heart books.

Nothing to fancy to put this together. I stamped her and colored with copics. Went to my paper stash pile and found this yummy 70ish paper. When I look at this, I think of shows like Laugh In or The Brady Bunch. My color choices came from that scrap, just simple layers of Cool Caribbean, Pink Pirouette Chocolate Chip. I also sponged a bit of Cool Caribbean ink on the circle. I added a paperclip embellishment because teacher’s always have them on hand! Enjoy your Tuesday I am off to work :)

Monogram Monday

 Today over at 365 Cards the challenge was to make a card with a monogram on it. Usually I stamp these, but today I thought I would dig out my rub-ons and use them. This was the fourth attempt at getting the letters to stick to the paper.

I began by first running the card base through my cuttlebug using a Swiss dot border folder from the Just My Type set. Next I scored lines with my Scor-Pal. The black Label 9 die is left over from my shaker card the other day. The white oval is from the petite scallop set. I tried adding a strip of ribbon, vintage brads and buttons to the card but nothing looked right. Finally, my eyes rested on this set of Pewter pearls by Kaiser. I eyeballed the line up so if they aren’t straight please don’t mention it :)

It’s time for dinner so I will catch ya later.

Basic Grey Week 2 color challenge

 Tonight I looked over a few of my other favorite challenge blogs and saw that Basic Grey had posted their second challenge. It was a color challenge to use Brown, pink and yellow and at least one BasicGrey element.

Since I am still trying to use my new nesties, out they came. This time I used the Labels 5 set. I rarely make a card that has a sentiment as the focal point, but felt it would work well tonight. The sentiment is by Stamp Oasis. I began by looking through my BG paper and decided to use Urban Prairie. The bottom pink, and both patterned papers are from the pack. The brown and yellow are SU Close to Cocoa and Crushed Curry. The brads are also by BG (made for Bittersweet but I thought they matched ok). I used a corner punch by EK Success to keep the curved edge look flowing. I tried adding flowers and other embellishments, but in the end left it simple.

 Here is a close up to show the embossed layers and how I popped them up with foam squares for dimension. Being a short gal, sometimes we like a little height in our lives :)

I hope you have a great week and if you get bored, stop by again, there may be something new to see.

Hooga Booga Love

 I am really hoping that I can participate in a few challenges this week. I like working with them as it can sometimes push me to try ideas I normally wouldn’t consider. It is Day 176 at 365 Cards and the challenge today is a Super Sketch. Instead of looking through my tower of patterned paper, I went through my scrap binder.

I found this piece of paper by My Mind’s Eye and designed the card around it. The stamped image and sentiment are by MFT Hooga booga set. The ribbon is also a scrap that seemed to go well with the colors. The button is by Tres Jolie that I have had for a few years now. Nothing fancy about putting this together. I think I will put this in my hubby’s back pack tonight where he will find it tomorrow at work!

Playing with my Nesties

 Today I went to my LSS Stamp and Deliver to play with my Cuttlebug and my nesties. We practiced cutting and embossing the Spellbinders dies. We also practiced using the Cuttlebug with just a border folder and not creating the dreaded indent line. After an excellent lunch of a meat-lovers pizza with caramel fudge brownies for dessert, we set about making a few cards. There was lots of laughter and a few moments of concentration as we searched the store for the color or paper we needed.

The card above is one we made for ourselves and as a display for the store. It took a little bit of engineering skills as we extended the middle blue nestie layer. The card base and bottom layer is SU close to cocoa, the next layer is a teal, the pp is by Bo Bunny. The flower stamps is by Just For Fun and the sentiment is Penny Black. The ink is Versafine Vintage Sepia for the stamping and Colorbox chalk Celadron. We used the Labels 4 die set.

After dinner tonight, I browsed the Spellbinders Design team blogs for inspiration with my new Labels. This card uses the Labels Nine. The card base is SU black and the next layer is gray. I used my Textile CB embossing folder and ran a piece of white and a piece of Coredinations Black Magic through it for the top layer. I sanded the black piece so the hidden color would show through. My SU scallop border punch was used to edge the two layers. Next I cut out the second largest die from a piece of coredinations paper. I then went down two sizes and cut out the middle flipping the die on its side ninety degrees so it wouldn’t be identical to the outer design.  I sanded just the edges of this piece. I wanted to create a shaker with this so I placed a small piece of acrylic over the hole. Rose colored beads were dropped inside and the sentiment by Hero Arts was placed as the bottom piece of the shaker. I carefully placed foam squares all around the edge so the beads would not fall out once the card was held up. Unfortunately, I had a few gaps and some beads did escape. Not to worry, my cat Smokey is actively looking for them in the carpet :) The final touch was to lay a piece of ribbon across the front to cover the seam of the top embossed layers.  I think my youngest son wants to claim this card to give it to his special girl.

My new Spellbinders arrived!!

 Sorry I have been MIA lately, but it has been a busy week for me with work and other appointments. But the end of the week had wonderful email….the new Spellbinders dies were in at Stamp and Deliver! I made a quick lunch run over to the store to pick them up. I do have a few more that I purchased that are not pictured, but these are the ones I hoped would arrive first.

We are getting tomorrow for a lunch playdate to try them out. I promise I will have a few cards to show you over the weekend.

Reindeer gift tags

Here are my gift tags that I gave you a sneak peek of this morning. Every year on the Stamp Shack, Sherri (Iloveflipflops) holds a gift tag swap. We each pick a holiday image and create 20 tags to  swap. As you can see, this year I choose a reindeer for my image. The stamp is by Stampendous from the Snowy Short Stacks clear set. The set is wonderful because you can create your own character. The heads, bodies and feet are interchangeable. This gives you endless possibilities for winter projects.  

After cutting out the tags on PTI cardstock, I stamped the image and colored it with copics. I stamped the TO/From and A gift from you with black ink. I sponged Adirondack Meadow around the tags for a softer look. Polar white Flower soft was glued along the bottom edge and Glistening Snow Writer on the scarf and cuffs. The fibers are by Making Memories that I have had for a few years in my Christmas stash.  Now I have to wait until November to see what the other ladies created.

Second time around…

If you have been reading this blog for a few months you aren’t seeing double, I had to re-do my ATC’s as they got lost in the USPS. I mailed them over 6 weeks ago, but the hostess never received them. Since we still had time before the due date, the she graciously stamped the images again for me (she provided the hippo). I used a different stamp for the sea grass this time, and some of the small bubbles are not the same.

I will also give you a small sneak peek on another project I have been working on. It is holiday related -

  The lighting is not the best this morning as it is a bit cloudy here today. Hopefully I will finish these after work and give you more details. Enjoy your day :)

Monogrammed Toile

 I finally got a chance tonight to sit down and see what the challenge was on 365 Cards. Day 168 was about using a touch of toile. I knew I didn’t have any traditional toile paper in my stash. I began looking through my various sections and found this piece that came from a floral pack ages ago. I thought it would work well for the challenge. After staring at it for awhile wondering how to use it, and looking at all the other cards posted so far, I decided to make it a monogrammed card.

I used a piece of black cardstock for a layer to make the pink pop a bit more. The strip of pink silk ribbon is by May Arts that just came in to my LSS from her CHA order. It feels so divine, it was hard to actually cut a piece. I used my JustRite DIY Monogram stamper and my nesties to cut out the circles. I considered adding some half pearls or rhinestones, but in the end left it simple.

I am thrilled that I was able to complete my personal challenge to finish all 7 cards for this week at 365 cards on the day they were posted. I don’t know if I can keep it up every week though. 

I stopped by my LSS this morning as I began my errands. I picked up my pre-ordered goodies – Polar White and Autumn Flower Soft, some Christmas toppers, taglets and sentiments by Flower Soft, and the stamps by My Favorite Things: Chocolate Flopsey and I {heart} books. As I left the store I walked past a hair salon that is in the same plaza. I haven’t been happy with my hair style for awhile so on impulse I walked in and had my hair cut short. Really short. So far it is a hit with my friends and family. We will see if they still like it once I try to style it tomorrow :)

It’s a Card…It’s a Gift

It is Day 167 at 365 Cards. The challenge today was to make your card look like a gift. This comes at a good time because my hubby’s birthday is next Wednesday. I looked through my “excess” papers and found this piece from SU. The multi-colored dots looked perfect as wrapping paper.  

I choose to enhance the red dot in the paper and used Riding Hood Red for cardstock, ribbon and ink. I used my Zig glue pen and outlined the sentiment so I could sprinkle glitter on top. Very quick and easy after a long day at work. TGIF :)

Tomorrow I get to go and visit the Store Owner at Stamp and Deliver. She has some goodies waiting for me…new stamps by MFT and Polar White Flower Soft!!! Yippee Skippy!!!

A Recipe Challenge

 Today is Day 166 on 365 Cards challenge blog. We were given a recipe to follow:

Ingredients -
4x7 card
5 blossoms
glitter
wet embossed sentiment
3 different patterned papers

Before I headed off for work today, I went through my Basic Grey paper packs and decided to use Bittersweet. The SU Cool Caribbean went well as a base cardstock. The flowers are by Prima Nursery Tales collection. I quickly perused my sentiments and settled on this by Stampabilities (which is embossed). I ran my glue pen around the sentiment and sprinkled microfine glitter. The flowers have a bit of glitter also. I used a corner rounder on the sentiment and the three paper panels to dress them up a bit. So far I am keeping up with my personal challenge to complete an entire week of challenges on 365 Cards. Keep your fingers crossed for me:)

My second star

 After coming home last night and thinking about the star card, I remembered that I had this saying I had purchased at a stamp convention a few years ago. I don’t know what company it is from because I bought it unmounted. I made it into a book mark with this piece of fabric. Gold fibers were added that I had bought from Michael’s ages ago. The sentiment is sponged with with yellow and gold ink. A corner punch was used to dress it up. Simple but I think someone will enjoy this while the cozy up with a good book!

Wish upon a star

 Good morning! The challenge today on 365 cards was to use a star shape. As I got ready for work my mind was on creating the card. Luckily I have the star embossing folder for my Cuttlebug. I ran a piece of Vintage yellow Coredinations through and lightly sanded it. SU Pacific Point cardstock and ribbon were used for a contrasting color.

The image is from Penny Black and colored with a few copics. I used my Labels 1 by Spellbinders to cut out the two shapes. I lightly sprinkled glitter on the stars in the image and hit one or two on the background. That’s it…a quick little one today!

It’s a Cupcake kind of Day

 This morning when I looked at 365 Cards the challenge was to use a color scheme of purple, yellow, red, blue and goldish orange. I thought on this scheme all day long at work. Also going through my head was the challenge from BasicGrey week 1 which was a sketch. Once I decided to make cupcakes in the various colors needed, I knew I could combine the sketch also. If you click on the picture, the image will get larger.

Now that I knew I would use colored cupcakes, it was only natural to pull out my BG Cupcake paper pack. The solid bottoms of the cupcakes are all punched from the solid sheets in the paper pack. The punch is by Martha Stewart. I popped them up on foam squares and placed them at quirky angles. The sentiment is by IO and the large cupcake stamp is by Hero Arts. The large glittery purple dot is a Jesse James button from the Snack Pack. I was so hoping a cupcake would have been in there, but sadly it wasn’t. I did use Frosted Lace Stickles on the frosting for added dimension. Here is a close up:

The fiber wrapped around the card (a requirement for the sketch) is from the BG Cupcake line also. So, are they good enough to eat? That is all for tonight as it was a late one with a meeting after work.

Cheers!

Magnolia Week 17 Ladybug Sketch

 This week on the Just Magnolia challenge blog was a sketch to follow. I had not used my Ladybug Tilda yet, so I inked her up and began to color. For a larger image, please click on the picture. I pulled my paper pack of Basic Grey Lemonade out and choose the papers I wanted to use.

After coloring the image in created some hand doodling around the edges and touched them with copic marker R81. The sentiment was cut with my Double Ended Tag by Spellbinders. The flowers were punch with a Marvy flower punch and the greenery is a punch by McGill. You can see that I don’t favor any one brand of punches or die cuts :) The small heart buttons are a new pack by Jesse James called Ice Cream Soda (doesn’t that sound delicious?).  Here are the copic markers that I used to color in my sweet Tilda:

With all my talk about Lemonade and Ice Cream Soda I am going to get a snack while I finish watching The Closer. And for those of you who know your Copic colors, yes there is one of the new sketch markers up there…..I got my shipment today in the mail from Eclectic Paperie. The girls over there are the sweetest and they sent a cute stamp set by Stampendous with my order!

Enjoy your evening..

Christmas in August

 I got ready for work extremely early this morning, so I hopped on to see what the challenge was at 365 cards. It was a technique challenge to use masking. My first thought was to make one of my favorite Christmas cards. It uses masking and reverse masking for the oval and tree.

I have kept my templates so it took just a second to put my materials together. The stamps are by SU Lovely as a Tree set. The ink is SU Not Quite Navy, Baby Blue,  Mellow Moss, Old Olive and Chocolate Chip. To begin, lay the oval cut out on the front of your card and stipple inside it with Baby Blue. Stamp the line of trees inside the oval. Lay the reverse mask down and stamp the single tree. Stamp the sentiment. Lay the tree mask and the sentiment mask down along with the inside oval mask and stipple Not quite Navy around the outer rim to get the dark oval. This step takes more pressure to get the dark color so don’t be afraid to press hard. I took a glue pen to dot the trees and sprinkle Crystal Blue Violet glitter. If the Polar White Flowersoft had come in to my LSS I would have added some of that, but alas, the shipment isn’t here yet. I glued the natural white card to a base of Not quite Navy. When I make these for Christmas, I start an assembly line process so I can make a dozen or so at one sitting. Have a great Monday!

The butterfly knows sketch

 This is my third and final post for today. It is also a record I believe for me. I wanted to get this in for the Sunday sketch at 365 cards. It is Day 162 for them already. It is also the start of Art Glitter week. It is not required to include glitter on your work, but why not? Glitter is a girl’s best friend :)

This card literally came together as I was on the phone with my stamping buddy Char. (I know I didn’t tell you this Char as we were speaking). I started with SU Dusty Durango cardstock, added a layer of Handsome Hunter and the top sheet if from My Mind’s Eye Complete Boy collection. I purchased the sentiment at Stampfest earlier this summer and it was unmounted so I have no idea who it is by, sorry. The glittery butterfly is by K & Company. A prima flower and black brads complete the card. The top layer on the butterfly is acetate and it is glittered to highlight the wings.

I have some images to stamp, so this post is going to be short. Enjoy your evening!

life’s simple pleasures….

 All week I have been trying to get this card finished for the 63rd challenge at A Spoonful of Sugar blog. All you had to do was make it a floral card. I knew I wanted to use my image from Sarah Kay again.

I colored her in with copic markers (I will show the colors at the end). I found this piece of patterned paper by Foof-a-la called Autumn Stripe. Personally I don’t see Autumn when I look at but more lighter colors. The blue in the paper matched perfectly a retired SU color Buckeroo Blue. I also used SU Real Red and Certainly Celery. I cut these out and the image with my Spellbinders curvy rectangles. The flowers are by Prima and have a mini button by Jesse James in the center. The sentiment is by Amuse and I cut the label with SU modern label punch. I felt it still needed something, so I found the thin orange ribbon in my basket and wrapped that around the image panel only. As promised, the colors I used are shown below:

 For those of you who read my blog often, remember the brayered hippo atc’s I made for a swap a month or so ago? Apparently they got lost in the mail and were never received by the hostess. AAACCCKK. She is sending me more images and I have to re-do them. Luckily, I posted step by step instructions here so I can hopefully get them finished quickly.

August Make and Takes

Yesterday was M&T day at Stamp and Deliver. I was demoing how to double emboss using the Cuttlebug. I first saw this shown at Stampfest and fell in love with the technique. For the card below, I used Coredinations cardstock which really shows off the embossing technique. I ran the red panel through the CB using the swiss dots folder. I then ran the same panel through the CB using Stylized flowers.

I took a sanding block and lightly touched the cardstock where I wanted the inner color to show. I layered the red panel onto a metallic silver panel then to black cardstock. Sheer silver and red ribbon were layered to the front. The tag was stamped with black and sponged with Rhubarb stalk Memento ink. I threaded the tag through a black button and added rhinestones as the finishing touch.

As a second card, I used the same two embossing folders, but on  white cardstock. I took metallic paste and rubbed the embossed image to color it in. This panel was layered to copper metallic cardstock and onto a white card base. Two different ribbons were wrapped on the card and a bow was added.

Here are two of the other cards that we demoed yesterday. I still have one more card to finish.

The card on the left used two new stamps by Great Impressions. It may be hard to see in the photo, but I did take a glue pen and added glitter to the dragonfly’s wings. The card on the left used a stamp by Magenta. To begin, I sponged Broken China and Peeled Paint distress inks around the image. Colored pencils were used to color it in. I ran my clear Atyou spica pen on the butterfly and flowers for shimmer. A strip of pp was laid down and the image glued on top. I added a couple vellum butterfly stickers by The Paper Studio.

Being that it is still summer, the snow birds have not returned so it was not a large crowd and no one felt rushed to make their cards. They had time to chat and catch up with friends they may only see once a month. Stamping is a very social event :)

New Basic Grey Challenge blog

Are you a Basic Grey lover like I am? Do you hoard their paper and embellishments? If that is you, then check out this challenge site that will start tomorrow, August 8th. They have an awesome prize to start out that includes items from Prima flowers, to stamps, to fibers and papers....well it is a long list that you must read. I actually dug out one of my older paper packs last night, Sugared, to use in a challenge on 365 cards. I am sure by now you have seen the 4 new designs coming out this fall. I can't wait for Indian Summer and Eskimo Kisses to make it to my LSS, Stamp and Deliver!!

Setting the scene and Pamper Yourself

 Today’s challenge on 365 cards was to create an indoor scene. I took a look at my stamps and decided the best choice would be to use one of My Favorite Things sets. I choose Time for Bubbly and a part of Window Shopping.

Once I had choose the stamps, I began looking at my paper packs. I decided that Basic Grey Sugared would do the trick. Both the “wallpaper” and the “floor” came from the pack. I stamped the bathtub and mirror, cut them out and colored them in. I used my copic markers to color the items in. I popped up the tub with foam dots and added Baby Blue Stickles on the bubbles. I re-stamped the mirror on silver metallic cardstock and cut the inner circle out. I added mini pearls around the outer edge to give it a more feminine look. The table, wine bottle and glass were stamped, cut out and glued. I used my scallop border punch with two shades of pink for the top edge. Finally, using the modern label punch, I inked the sentiment. I would love it if my bathroom looked like this!

In case you were wondering about the Holiday Open House last night, it was absolutely beautiful. They had 6 tables decorated each with a different holiday look. From traditional, Victorian, blue toned, gold toned, etc.  The trees were breath-taking! And the food….Oh my. It began with appetizers, bacon wrapped scallops, mushroom pot stickers, spicy beef with jalapeño corn relish (not my favorite) and baked brie with raspberries. Yummy. Then there was baked ham with cranberry relish and turkey with three different toppings. They had a luscious salad with raspberry vinaigrette dressing, dried cranberries and glazed walnuts. For dessert, apple strudel with home-made vanilla ice cream and a variety of cookies. It looks like we will definitely be holding our holiday dinner there this year. After re-living that meal, I am now going to eat a piece of home-made cinnamon bread. Enjoy your evening.

Inspired by…..tulips

Still trying to play catch up with the challenges this week at 365 cards. Day 156 (or Monday for you and I ) showed us an ad and you were to create a card with it. Here is what the ad looked like:

 And here is what I created from it:

I began with a piece of Old Olive SU cardstock and ran it through the CB using the Distressed Stripes folder. I sponged black ink on the embossing to give it the distressed look of the table. I found this stamp, that I hate to admit I didn’t know I had, by Northwoods. I stamped it with Memento Tuxedo Black and colored it with these copic markers:

 After coloring the image I placed various Spellbinders dies on top and found that the only one that fit was the Small Labels, which coincidently has the same corners as the ticket corner punch. So I punched the corners of all the layers so they would match. I wanted to somehow bring the picture shown on the table in the ad into my card. After dragging out all my Basic Grey paper packs, I finally found a sheet in Lime Rickey that worked. I know you can’t see too much of it, but it suits me. To incorporate the black knobs on the drawers I used black dew drops. I didn’t have any black ones, so I used my Copic marker to color them. They need a bit of time to dry as they were still very sticky when I glued them to the card. I now have black tipped fingers. The final touch was to add a piece of twine with the Inspire tag. The tag was made with my SU Window Word punch.

I was hoping to catch up and actually work on Tuesday’s challenge tonight, but no such luck. I know it won’t happen tomorrow night, as I have to attend a Holiday Open House for work at the swankiest Resort in town. They have a new chef and want to present various holiday menus. We (my employer) were invited as we hold most all of our dinners and social events at the Resort.  Since it is from 5:30 to 7:30 I hope they have what I consider “heavy appetizers” which translates into dinner for me:)