I hear it's your birthday!!!

 A card for the challenge over at Totally Stampalicious this week. The challenge is to make a birthday card. Mine uses the Mouse Balloon image from Totally Stampalicious. The papers are Sweet and Sour from SU! with some pumpkin pie, regal rose, and very vanilla card stock for the base and layers. I used a border punch from EK Success for the right hand edge. The mouse was colored with Copic markers. I'm happy with my blending, but the placement of colors needs a little work. It's definitely a learning process to coloring with these markers!

Purely Sentimental

 I needed a card for a swap in which the sentiment was the focus of the card. Thought this would be an easy one to come up with, but as it turns out, all the sentiment stamps I have with big images were for sympathy cards and I just didn't want to use that for a swap card....KWIM? I ended up using a sentiment from a sheet of vellum that had a gazillion of them printed on it and cut out the one I wanted to use. I had purchased these sheets at one of the stores like Michael's years ago when I first started stamping and didn't have a collection of sentiment stamps and thought this would be an inexpensive way to have a bunch of them on hand without the expense of purchasing stamps.
The card stock I used is Garden Green and the dsp is Origins from Basic Gray. I made windows using Nestabilities Label 1. The subtle pattern on the vellum is actually the bottom layer of dsp showing through. Added a few buttons from my stash and a little bow and my simple card was done.
I will be away for the next week. I will be visiting my dad in Ohio and taking my daughter-in-law and granddaughter with me. I'm pretty excited about the trip. I have a challenge card for Totally Stampalicious scheduled to post on Monday morning, but other than that, I doubt you will see any blog posts from me as there is no internet connection or land line phone at Daddy's house. I'll be lucky to find some wifi along the way to check my emails and keep the box cleared out to a reasonable level! See ya'll in a week or so!!

The Great Outdoors

 I made this card for a swap I participated in for an on-line group I belong to. The theme for the swap was The Great Outdoors and as much as I love nature and the outdoors, this was a tough challenge for me. Heck, I was even the one who posted the swap for the group thinking I could handle it!!! Well, there are at least two other attempts in the junk pile!!! I tried using some other stamps for my card and eventually came back to a pair that I had used on another card a few years ago, but used greens instead of blues. This card measures 5 x 7 inches. I believe the I used Pear Pizzazz for the base and image layer. The rest of the layers are Early Expresso. The birch trees are a background stamp I got from a friend who was selling off some of her excess stamps (she's not getting it back, but I will let her borrow it...LOL!) and added some white gel pen highlights. We don't have any of these trees here in Florida, but I remember them from growing up in Ohio and Pennsylvania. So pretty!!
The buck is from SU!'s Nature Silhouettes. Brayered Pear Pizzazz and Always Artichoke on the image layer and sponged with Soft Suede. The twine is from a roll of the cheap old binding twine you buy at the dollar store. I separated it into three separate threads like you would do with embroidery floss to get it to the thickness I wanted. (couldn't find the good stuff...I may be out....GASP!!)
Well, I must get busy with the all the things I still have to do before I leave for Ohio on Saturday morning. Thanks for stopping in!!

New Vintage Toys

 I got some new goodies yesterday from an SU! order I had placed and couldn't wait to get into these papers. I think they are my favorites from the new catalog and the first I have ordered! Had to get some of the other vintage accessories to go with them, like the crochet trim and skinny taffeta ribbon. I am completely lovin' the look of dsp when it is embossed with texture folders. I used two on this card, the square lattice and the damask wallpaper. Don't know if those are the right names for them, but that's what I call them in my world! I'm very pleased with how this came out. Haven't done a card this "vintage" in a long time. I think I'll have to get more of these papers!
Stamps: watercolor trio
Paper: vanilla, crumb cake, soft suede, baja breeze, dsp
Ink: soft suede, baja breeze, soft suede, crumb cake
Accessories: ribbon, crochet trim, oval punches, sponge, embossing folders

Tilting Pumpkin

Looking for the Totally Stampalicious challenge card? Scroll down to second post for today.

 I made this card for the technique challenge on Splitcoast Stampers this morning which was to make a tilt card. It was super easy and turned out to be a cool technique I will be using again! It's kinda like a slider card where the image rolls across the front of the card, but in this case, it just jiggles in one spot. The pumpkin on my card jiggles around in place like he's shaking and trying to scare someone. I really wanted to cut into some of the new papers I got at Priceless this weekend, so my card is Halloween themed. Also got to use one of my new border punches....hehehehehe!! I'm so addicted to these things!!
Stamps: Rubbernecker
Paper: GP white, perfect plum, cajun craze, Graphic 45 halloween in wonderland
Ink: Momento tuxedo black, basic black, crumb cake
Accessories: pennies, dimensionals, craft knife, sponge, border punch, sponge

Card for your best friend challenge

The challenge at Totally Stampalicious this week is to make a card for your best friend, whoever that may be....your girl friend, hubby, the dog....whoever!! Instead of trying to pick a BEST friend, I decided to make a card in honor of all my girls.....You're the best!!!

 For my card today, I used Cafe Scarlette, one of the newest Bugaboo images released by Totally Stampalicious in an acrylic stamp. She comes with some of the cutest sentiments and I added mine to the inside.

 

Other little details include the crocheted flower which I made with white crochet thread and then dyed with Regal Rose reinker diluted with water. I knew I wanted to use the flower on my card, so that influenced my choice of papers, but the placement was dictated by an embellishment opportunity. You see, there is a huge ink smudge under the flower that happened after the image had been colored and cut out......uuuugggghhhhh!!!! The saffron oval layer may look a little wonky if you look too closely, but be gentle, please. That oval was hand cut because I didn't have an oval die the right size to get this last layer!

 Stamps: Cafe Scarlette by Totally Stampalicious
Paper: Rich Razzleberry, Regal Rose, So Saffron, GP white, Basic Gray Lemonade
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, Regal Rose
Accessories: Scallop border punch, round tab punch, label punch, nestabilities, ribbon, pearls, pearl brads, crocheted flower, reinkers, Copic markers, square punches, sponge

Playing with my owl punch and a cool butterfly image!

I just got the new owl punch from Stampin' Up! and just had a blast messing around with some scraps. I made several cards with it. The leaves on this card are from a Martha Stewart punch that arrived at the LSS while I was there. Hehehehe...it didn't even make it to the shelf!! Here are two more cards I made with the owl punch...

 I found a really cool clear stamp set from Inkadinkadoo last week and played with that, too! The set has a butterfly, a dragonfly, a hummingbird, and a beetle and all of them have all these wonderful birds and fairies hidden in the design....so cool. Here is a close up of a card I made just playing with the butterfly image and some black sparkle embossing powder. The card doesn't wow me, but just had to play with my new stamp! I tried to take a picture that let some of the sparkle come through.