Thank You

Last night, the girls, their mom and I were standing around talking about my upcoming trip to Papertrix in Indiana. Well, Judy is not a paper crafter at all, so I was trying convince her that this store was worth the five hour drive and telling her about the great selection of stamps that they have and how the stamps are not the stuff that you can find in the big box stores. She mentioned she needed some Thank You notes and wondered if I might be able to find Thank You in Asian characters when I go. I told her that I could find one in my craft room because I knew I had this stamp from Stampendous! Oh the joys of having just the right stamp when you need it. These are business related thanks you cards, so I kept them fairly simple. I stamped with Versa-mark and embossed the image with black embossing powder. I decided to do a little something different with the brads so I made these two trios. Thanks again to my mom, I have a couple of little pots of gold powder that I have no idea what the original purpose was, but I have found that I run the edge of my paper over the Versa-mark pad that it adds a nice touch on the edge of layers. All in all, a pretty simple card, and it fit the Ways to Use It challenge-- to use black. I ended up making a couple of different versions, but they are all pretty much the same, just a couple of slight changes from card to card. Thanks for stopping by today!

Trying Emboss Resist

After watching Gina K's Stamp TV segment a few days ago, I have been wanting to try this technique. I found both of these papers from Jo-Ann's open stock area, I hate not having a computer in my craft room anymore, I always forget something and tonight is is who made the paper! The image was stamped in Versa-Mark and then covered with clear ultra think embossing powder. I then took some giant sponge daubers and sponged the entire white panel  with VersaMagic Mango and Pixie Dust. After that I decided that it needed a little bit of shimmer so I added a little Brilliance Pearl Beige. I used a sponge to wipe the excess ink off my embossed area and that was it. I used a SU ticket corner punch to notch in the corners. Some ribbon from Hobby Lobby and some pearl Dew Drops finished off my card.  This is the card that we will be making at church on Friday night. I will try to find some simple sentiments that we can add for everyone to personalize their cards.

About the stamp I used: I have mentioned that my Mom is the queen of the yard sale. She found me about 10 sets of Stampin Up sets one day. I am not sure what the names of most of these sets are, I have identified a couple from old catalogs, but not all of them. Some were in the clam shells but some were just in plastic sandwich bags. They stamp the same though, so I was happy with them! Speaking of Mom, she is definitely going to be able to go on the Girl's Weekend with us! She has never been to Nashville, Indiana before so she should have a great time. Before she commited though, she made sure she didn't have to take the Copic class. My sis-in-law will enjoy Papertrix, but the moms are not paper crafters and they will be shopping elsewhere. I am still so very excited and counting the days!

Quickly, this is a picture of one the rhododendrons that is in my front yard. They just started blooming on Sunday. Kip lived in this house for three years before we got married and they never bloomed. The first spring after we got married they erupted in blooms. I tease him about that, that love had to live here first. Ahhh, isn't that sweet? I can be so corny at times. Have a great night.

CAS Little One

I am really enjoying making cards that are more on the clean and simple side. The first one, I really struggled with but the more I play with this style the easier and more enjoyable it becomes. Both the image and the sentiment are from SU. For some reason this bird's nest made me think of baby cards so I used the "Little One" stamp from another set to give it a baby feel. The image was stamped with Memento ink and then colored with Prismacolor pencils. I used Marvy punches for the square and the scalloped square. The ribbon is American Crafts and the sentiment is stamped with CTMH ink. Pretty quick and simple but I really like the look of this card. Thanks for visiting tonight!

Doing the Happy Dance

I am so doing the happy dance right now, I'm like a six year old or something, and it's almost borderline obnoxious! I can't help it though and couldn't contain my excitement. Why, you might ask? Well, my birthday is next month and I came up with the perfect gift for myself. I have planned a Girl's Weekend with me, my mom, my mother-in-law, and my sister-in-law to go the Nashville, Indiana for the weekend of my birthday. If you have been reading my blog for very long, you know that Kip and I and his parents went there on vacation last year. That is where I discovered Papertrix, which is the coolest stamp store that I have ever been in. It was there I first learned about Twinkling H20s, Spica markers and many new stamp companies. So not only do I get to go to Papertrix, while on a Girl's weekend, but I get to take a beginner Copic class with Candice! I am amazed with the talent that that girl has, especially coloring with Copics. I am so excited and still dancing and singing around the living room. I actually called and paid for the class before I even asked if anyone would go on my weekend with me. 

So I did make a card today. I am not sure who made this stamp. My mom is the queen of the yard sale. She goes every weened without fail. She finds me cool stuff all the time and this stamp was in a box that she got for me a while back but the label is not legible. It looks like there was at one time a sticker on the area where the manufacture was but it is gone now. The image was colored with Peerless Watercolors. Have you tried those yet? I need some practice with them, I think I diluted mine a little too much. If you are not familiar with these, they are watercolors that come on a sheet of paper and you simply cut off a small piece of the color you want to use and then add water. I got mine at MFT, I think they have three different color selections. The Bible verse is from one of the Tiny Scripture sets from Clear Dollar Stamps, the paper is DCWV and the ribbon came from Target.

Wow this has gotten to be a long post (I am still doing the happy dance though)! I just wanted to show Samantha's back. Jenna had a swim meet yesterday so she stays with me. The parents have to work at the most of the swim meets so it is hard to keep a non-swimmer occupied. If I am in town then she will come and hang out here all day. She saw the treat box I made yesterday and I explained the challenge to her so she decided to create her own thing. This is her bank to use to save up for things she needs. Everything you see was hers, the only thing I did was apply the paper to the container. I love the way she colored Hanna, look at the shading in her hair! This was also her first experience coloring with my Copics/Prismas, normally we all color with our own markers but she needed a skin color and a lighter pink then what she has in her collection. Thanks for stopping by!

Birthday Treat Box

I am so on the ball here, and am so proud of myself! As soon as Jenna saw this Sophie stamp from Hanna Stamps she started planning her next birthday party. In August! Both girls love all the Riley and Sophie stamps and when they make cards those are the first stamps they reach for. The challenge on the Hanna Stamps forum today is to make anything but a card. Since she has been wanting to get started with these, I decided it would be the perfect time to make some plans. Jenna wants to use this stamp for the invitations and on her treat boxes. She decided to go with the manicure/pedicure theme here and plans to give her friends nail polish and manicure supplies. The template for this box came from a technique challenge on SCS a few weeks ago. I cute out the box with bright pink card stock and then coved parts of it with this orange and pink paper. The image is colored with Copics and Prisma markers. I used micro glass beads on the water to look like soapy bubbles.

I had an insane day to finish off my crazy week so I am going to grab my heating pad and crash in front of the TV for the rest of the night. I hope you have a great weekend.

I also want to say thanks to everyone that leaves comments for the girls when I let them post their creations. It means so much to them, so thank you for encouraging their blossoming artistic talents.

Sketch Challenge

This is the card I made using the sketch from SCS today. This was a very fun sketch to play with. I used CTMH's set Rustic flowers. The flower is colored with Copic markers. Paper is DCWV and ribbon is from Jo-Ann's and the decorative accent in the middle of the flower is from Michael's. Quick post tonight!

Added later: I only had about an hour or so this afternoon to craft and that included helping the girls with their project. I stamped and colored a little and went to church with stained hands. I was playing with my friend's daughter and she kept telling me I had beautiful fingers. She also pointed them out to several other people! Little ones are so funny!

Jenna and Samantha (my friend's daughters) are hanging out with me today because Jenna needed to make a birthday card for her friend that is having a sleepover this weekend. Some days we stay at their house after school and some days they want to come here and raid the craft room. It really depends on how much homework there is and what time their mom gets off work. Jenna made this card all by herself, the layout was her idea and everything.

Treasure Friendship

Not such a great photo tonight, sorry! The CAS challenge on SCS was an inspiration challenge using the kids bedding section from the online JCPenny catalogue. I chose the bright set that had these wonderful yellow pillows that had these great wavy lines on them. I used  CTMH sets, Ritzy Ribbon for the ribbon and Geometric Thoughts for the sentiments. The butterflies are punched out using Fiskar's butterfly punch. Each one was punched twice, one was glued flat and the other I bent the wings up. The center of each butterfly is Tulip pearl paint.  

I am having fun playing with the CAS (clean and simple) card style. It is a nice change of pace, plus for some reason, I feel more comfortable using bright colors. I think it is because of using the white background, not sure though. Thanks for checking in with me!

Full Tilt

This was a real departure from my normal color palette. I have a very good friend that has recently had knee replacement surgery and this card is for her. She is involved with the Red Hats so when I make cards for her I normally use these colors. This past couple of years she has had some health issues and in the hospital a couple of times and the last time she was there she said it was almost worth it for all the homemade cards that she knew she would receive. I couldn't disappoint her. It really is so much fun to make special cards for people that you know will really appreciate them. 

To make this card, I first started with Papertrey's Guidelines set and CTMH Hydrangea and Holiday Red inks. I really do love love love that set, but it takes me forever to create my backgrounds with it. I think if I used it a little more I would get better, I always have to do a little practice sheet first. The image and sentiment are both from Art Impressions. She is colored with Prismacolor pencils. The ribbon was from my stash, and it finished off the roll, I was happy to find that I had exactly enough to tie that bow.

So I kept Kip's eight year old niece and nine year old nephew last night. We have watched them before, but it is the first time that we have watched them since we go married. I was ready with planned activities! They brought Bolt and we watched that and then we made flubber. Lots of fun at my house. Yes, I am that aunt/friend that will always let the kids do messy stuff. I always give art supplies or books for gifts too. People love me! Well the kids love me and their parents always say thank you with that tone in their voice. You know that tone, the one that says thank you but really means "are you insane for giving my kid a couple of reams of paper!" Hope you have all had a great weekend. Thanks for dropping by, I love reading your comments, they really encourage me.

Olive Flowers

Good Saturday afternoon! It's good here since I have been able to spend the majority of today in my craft room. Part of that time has been cleaning and organizing, but it's still been a good day. This card uses an older Stampin Up set, but I can't remember the name of it. It's Nature something, I think. I stamped the background piece of white using the same stamp, but after inking the stamp with CTMH Olive ink, I stamped off onto a scratch piece of paper and then stamped to my panel here. For the main image I inked the stamp using the same ink but I also painted some Twinkling H20 paint directly onto the stamp. I took the picture at a little bit of an angle so that hopefully you can see some of the shimmer.  I love my H20s and was sorry to see that the company is going out of business. The main panel is popped up with foam squares, paper is DCWV, brads are from Jo-Ann's and the ribbon is from Hobby Lobby.

I had a great time with my sister in law last night. We had our Sushi dinner and then since we were so close, we had to go to Jo-Ann's. I was looking for the newest Studio G stamps and was able to find a few. I am happy to report that since I am on a mission to use the things that I have been hoarding that I bought nothing except a couple of the Studio G stamps and some glitter glue and only the color that I use a lot of and was out of. After that we went to Books-A-Million and looked around for a while. I picked up the latest Paper Crafts magazine so I got to see Jennifer's card in print! When we were done shopping we went to the coffee area and had a frozen Almond Joy Frapachino. Oh my, was that good!

I Wheely Like You!

That was the name of the Limited Supply Challenge on Splitcoast this morning. The challenge was to use 1 wheel, 1 image stamp, 1 embellishment, and one sentiment. I am normally off on Friday mornings and have been participating in this challenge. I enjoy playing along with the different challenges I find because they help me learn new things and keep me from getting in a rut. Since my crafting time is normally a late night activity I don't always get to play along with the SCS challenges.

When I got up this morning and read the challenge I was a little disappointed because I don't own any wheels. Then I remembered this Charlie wheel stamp from Clear Dollar Stamps. I don't have it mounted as a wheel, I use it on a regular acrylic block but it is a wheel stamp. So yippee!! I was able to play along. I stamped my wheel and then embossed it with Ranger expresso embossing powder. The main Charlie image is stamped with Memento ink and then colored with Prisma and Copic markers. Not quite sure what is up with his nose area in the photo, but it doesn't look like that in person! The scallop was punched out with a Marvy punch and then the edges are inked with CTMH Terra-cotta and Brown Bag inks. My one embellishment is that cute little button that I knotted some twine through. ETA, my friend Angela confirmed that the paper is from a Creative Memories pack that she gave me some time back. Thanks Angela!

I am off tonight for a Girl's Night out with my sister-in-law. I think we are going out for sushi at a fairly new restaurant that she hasn't had the chance to eat at yet. Hope you have a great start to your weekend!

Celebrate

Good evening! I had some trouble getting a good photo of this card. I normally only have crafting time at night but prefer to take pictures in the daytime but that doesn't always happen. I have been enjoying making these clean and simple cards. It's funny, when I first started scrapping and making cards, I had a hard time combining colors and patterns and filling up all that white space and now I am trying to do designs that have a lot of that white space.  For this card, I used the Inkadinkado cupcake set for the cupcake and the sentiment. The sentiment is stamped directly onto the card base using CTMH Kiwi ink. I think DCWV made that ribbon, it is from "the stash", so I am not completely sure. I used Liquid Applique on the frosting and Fun Flock on the flowers. I let the fun flock blend in a little with the Liquid Applique to give it a pinkish tint. Thanks for stopping by!

Mermaid Anya

Good Morning! My card today uses the Mermaid Anya from The Greeting Farm. She is colored with Copic/Prisma markers. I used paint for the pearls in her hair. Paper is DCWV. All those circles made me think of water bubbles. I was almost finished with this card and inked the edges of the patterned paper and the blue card stock with white ink, but decided it looked too plain. Then I saw this wonderful glitter that I decided to use around the border of my card. I wish I knew where that glitter came from! I have it in this color and one that is a purple blue mix and would love to have more of it. I am very proud though, that I am continuing to use items from my huge stash of supplies rather than purchasing anything new right now. I have used up a couple of rolls of ribbon and lots of paper scraps. I also stocked Jenna and Samantha's card boxes with supplies for them to use. I am very slowly starting to see some reduction in the boxes and drawers. Have a great day!

Happy Easter

I hope everyone has had a great day so far. Here is one more Easter card that I made. I used the CTMH set Little Treasures. It's so cute, there are several different items that you can stamp inside the jar. I even masked some of those jelly beans to make the jar appear to be fuller. After coloring the jelly beans with Copic/Prisma markers, I covered the entire jar with Glossy Accents. The lid was colored with a silver gel pen and I cut out several different layers of paper and glued them one on top of he other. Paper is DCWV and I'm not sure of the ribbon.

We are having dinner at Kip's sister's house this evening and here is my main contribution: 

I just had to take a picture of all these beautiful colors in my salad bowl. It is a bag of mixed salad greens with blueberries, strawberries, Mandarin oranges, pineapple tidbits and chopped pecans. It is dressed with a homemade lemon poppyseed dressing. Here's the recipe for the dressing: 

Lemon Poppyseed Dressing

1/2 cup of frozen lemonade concentrate, thawed

1/3 cup honey

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 teaspoon poppy seeds

 1 teaspoon lemon juice (optional)

Combine all ingredients and mix well. With some salads I prefer the extra tang of the lemon juice, but not normally with this one.

Bunny Parade

This is the card that I made for my sister for Easter this year. Every year I make her some type of card that references bunny ears being eaten. It's been a running joke for years. I found this pattern in the Paper Creations magazine last year and have been waiting to use it since then. This is also my card for the Limited Supply Challenge on Splitcoast today. It was a Triple Play challenge: three colors (plus a neutral), three layers and three focal points.

I think this is the first card that I have ever made that has no stamping on it! I cut the bunnies out of brown paper and then drew the eyes on using a white paint pen and a Sakura glaze pen. I used a Fiskars Threading Water border punch and a Stampin Up Word Window punch. My sentiment was handprinted with a gel pen.

We are having some very rough weather right now. The tornado sirens have been going off and on for part of the morning. I think the worst part has passed us right now. Be safe!

One More Spinner Card

I decided to make another spinner card the other night. These cards are fun and seem to always be appreciated by the recipient. I used the Bee Happy stamp set from Sweet 'n Sassy stamps. My friend Angela gave me a couple of these sets for my birthday last year. I really love the flower in this set. Image is colored with Prismacolor pencils and a Sakura glitter pen on the bee's wings. The background paper is from DCWV, Samantha helped picked out the color.  It's a little hard to see the sentiment, but it says "Been thinkin about ya!" I like to use sentiments like these on cards that I keep on hand because they can be used for a variety of reasons.

That's all I have for tonight. I am beat and heading to bed. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are my longest days of the week. Wednesdays are especially tough and long, so see you tomorrow!

Wee Hanna Pirate

This is the other card that I made to go along with the Hanna Stamps challenge. The challenge was to use the Wee Hanna set and to stay within an eight box of crayons for your color palette. I was excited that I actually won this set at the last release party.  This was actually the first one I stamped and colored, then got stuck. For some reason I decided I wanted to use stars and found the star brads but couldn't decide on the layout or the paper. Then I was sorting through my paper stash this weekend and found this great paper in a Christmas pack of paper. I am not sure of the company that made this, someone gave it to me and the cover was not on it when I got it. I thought it was perfect since I had already decided that I was using red and yellow. The card stock is DCWV, image was colored with Copic and Prisma markers and the brads are from Jo-Ann's. I'm off to the Hanna release party, have a great night!

Swim Jenna Swim

It wasn't until I was typing the title of this post that I realized that Swim Jenna Swim sounds just like Run Forest Run! Forest Gump is one of my favorite movies of all time so I guess it was in the back of my head somewhere. Hanna Stamps is having their release party tomorrow night and there is a challenge to use one of the sets released last month. The set to use was Wee Hanna, which is a set similar to paper dolls. Included with the set is a Hanna doll and a pirate outfit, a ballerina outfit, a cheerleading outfit and this wet suit. Oh yeah, and you could only use primary colors or the colors that come in an eight box of crayons. Using the set wasn't difficult, staying within that color palette was for me. I used a Cuttlebug folder and then flipped it over to the reverse side and then sanded just a little so you could see some of the white core of the paper. I stamped wee Hanna and colored her in with Copic/Prisma markers. The clothes were stamped and colored separately, then cut out and glued to the body. I used Glossy Accents on the face mask. I glued down some of the pretend dew drops because they reminded me of air bubbles. The sentiment there was generated not by my computer, but by my label maker! I hate not having a computer in my craft room anymore. I saw the label maker there and knew it had a font that I could color in so I decided to try it. I liked the way it turned out.

Jenna has a swim meet in a couple of weeks. Samantha usually hangs out with me on those days because she gets bored hanging out at the pool all day and if she is with us, Kip will sometimes take us to eat sushi for lunch. I'll give this card to Jenna for good luck.

Well, our good weather didn't last, we have storms on the way and a chance of snow tomorrow. The saying around here is, "If you don't like the weather here in Tennessee, just wait a couple of hours and it will change". How crazy is that! Have a great week.

Angel Anya

Good afternoon! It is absolutely beautiful here in Tennessee. The sun is shining and it is warm enough to wear shorts and flip flops which makes me one very happy girl. My card today uses the Anya angel from The Greeting Farm. She is colored with Prisma and Copic markers. with a Sakura glitter pen on her wings and halo. Paper is DCWV and the pearls and ribbon are from Hobby Lobby. I love these tiny little pearls but they aren't the easiest things to get in place.

We had our monthly craft night at church last night. We have had a couple of young girls, ages 10 and 6 join our group for the past couple of months. Last night they both came in carrying their own scrap/totes and tool storage items, it was too cute! They are also so very well behaved and are a great addition to our crafting group. Thanks for stopping!

Daffodil

I hope all is well with everyone. We have been having some severe weather pass through the area this afternoon, including reports of a tornado not too far from here.  Right now, it is just raining so all is well. My card tonight uses the March Flower of the month from Clear Dollar Stamps. The patterned paper is from Making Memories and the card stock is DCWV. Image was stamped with Memento ink and colored with Prismacolor pencils. I used some little decorative accents from Mike's to finish off the card,

Clear Dollar Stamps released two flower of the month sets with the March release. March's flower is the daffodil and April's flower is the daisy. Daisies are my favorite flower, but I also love daffodils, in part, because they are my favorite color. More importantly though, they remind me of my Grandmother. She always had these planted along her sidewalk. I remember walking up to her house passing daffodils they whole way, I remember finding Easter eggs hidden in them when I was a little girl and hiding eggs in them as I got older. Every time I see one of these flowers, I smile because they remind me of an amazing woman. I learned so much from her; compassion, gentleness, faith, acceptance and so many other qualities, like patience, that I am still working on! She gave me a love of words, of writing, of peppermint and holidays. I miss her most this time of year. Easter and spring were her favorite times of the year. And daffodils make me smile. Thanks for listening to my memories.

Little Lady Bug

Okay, I had a lot of fun making my CAS card for the challenge earlier in the week. Enough fun that I wanted to make another one! This is another Studio G stamp from Michael's.  I love daisies, they are my most favorite flower in the world. When I saw the lady bug with the daisies, I had to have this stamp. And since it was only $1.00, it was worth the splurge. I colored the ladybug with Prisma/Copic markers and then cut out the image. I used a Marvy Punch for my green scalloped square and attached the lady bug with a pop dot. In the top right corner are brads from the Paper Studio. To finish my card, I used my paper piercer to make the flight path of the lady bug.

Lately, the Studio G stamps have been cuter each time a new set is introduced. The last time I was in there I was looking for Easter Stamps and found a couple of those, plus some barn animals and so cute little cupcakes, all wooden stamps. In clear stamps they had more cupcakes and some little fairies. I like the way they stamp too. Have you ever used any? Have a great evening!