I did it!!

phew... I did it! 30 projects in 30 days. This was a great way to make a lot of samples for my workshop and I'm glad that I stuck it out:) Now I have lots of great samples to share. Thanks Anne for the challenge! Here are the last few projects to share. I mentioned that I had made some scrapbook pages on the craft weekend with my sisters and mom and here they are:

I made the following two pages about our chickens Laverne and Shirley using 52sketches52weeks sketch challenge #34 (I'm a little behind with these sketches, I've got some major catching up to do:) I haven't ever done any distressing on a page before, but I couldn't resist doing it for these pages. I love how it looks! And I think the twine from SU! works perfectly!!

I'm still not 100% happy with the bird on the RS, I think I might have to get some orange crackle paint to finish it off:)

I still have to add the journalling...I'm just not in the journalling mood....

I've had this next page planned out for quite awhile and I'm happy that I've finally made it! Thank you Picasa! I'm so happy I can finally print wallet size photos! Finally, no more taking photos from a distance away only to crop them smaller later:) Again...the journalling is missing (as is the case for a lot of my pages....better get on that)

Lazy Days

Sometimes, I'm tapped for creativity.... On these days when I'm not up for making a card off of a sketch or learning a technique, I steal other people's ideas! These two cards I got inspiration off of splitcoaststamper's gallery. I changed up the cards slightly but the basic outline is the same for both.

Supplies: -very vanilla, more mustard, always artichoke, autumn vine dsp, always artichoke dsp.

-scalloped edge punch, circle punches

-watercolour pencil crayons, blender pen

-green buttons

-dimensionals

-green gingham ribbon

-Pun Fun stamp set

Supplies: -basic black, whisper white, pumpkin pie, summer sun cs

-basic black, versamark and dusty durango ink

-orange polka-dot ribbon

-Tasty Sweet stamp set

Death by Chocolate

MMMMM....what a way to go! It seems like everything I touch lately has to have some chocolate chip in it (including my banana loaf and pancakes:) It is actually a really versatile colour but I especially love to pair it up with pink tones! Here are a couple of cards I've made using this colour combo.

I had already made a let it snow card using this same pp and I loved it, but I thought it was a bit too busy with the punched snowflakes. I made this similar card and kept the white brads for the middle of the snowflakes, but added some chocolate chip satin ribbon instead. I used SU!'s word window punch on both cards around the sentiment.

I made this card using Card Patterns sketch #34. The card base is ruby red, with whisper white on top. I used a piece of SU!'s Autumn Vine dsp to bring in both the chocolate chip colour as well as the pink. The stamp I used is from SU!'s Garden Silhouettes set. I stamped the image with rose red ink onto whisper white cs. I Finished the card off with some of the chocolate chip satin ribbon that I'm in love with.

Finally, here's a hostess gift I've made for my workshop this evening. Isn't the satin ribbon to die for? Apparently I can't stop using it! I love the colour, and I especially love how easy it is to tie a bow with! I put some white tissue paper on top of the jar of antipasto and tied the chocolate chip ribbon around it. The "thank you" sentiment is from SU!'s For All you Do stamp set and is stamped in soft suede onto whisper white cs. I punched out the image using SU!'s small tag punch and matted that onto a piece of soft suede. Finally, I set an eyelet into the tag using my cropodile and attached the tag to the ribbon using a small piece of twine.

thanks for stopping by!

Crazy for Autumn Vine Designer Series Paper!

I've got a few more cards today....Can you tell I'm in love with my new Autumn Vine dsp from SU!? The first card I made using Clean and Simple Stamping's FTL #61. I've been dying to use a pin-wheel in one of my projects and Frances' tutorial on 52sketches52weeks is perfect to learn how to make them! Pinwheels are perfect for showcasing your double sided pp, and I love this stuff! Plus isn't that satin chocolate chip ribbon delicious?

Supplies: -very vanilla, chocolate chip, more mustard, autumn vine dsp

-soft suede, versamark ink

-scallop edge punch

-mustard brad

-chocolate chip satin ribbon

-Warm Words, Garden Silhouettes stamp sets

The second card I made using the Criss Cross technique. I used the same Autumn Vine dsp as the previous card. I really like this card and I think it would be really cute for wedding invitations:)

Supplies: -more mustard, soft suede, very vanilla, autumn vine dsp

-soft suede, dusty durango ink

-Beachfront ribbon originals

-Warm Words, The More the Merrier, Garden Silhouettes stamp sets

I really enjoyed Card Patterns' sketch #33 and so I had to make another card using this sketch. I'm in love with this card, it's so little and cute! I used a square dimension for this card and a technique that I've never done with stamping before: Paper Piecing! I think it works really well with this stamp set!

Supplies: -Real Red, whisper white, soft suede and pp from the craft store

-Real Red grosgrain ribbon

-black brads

thanks for stopping by!

workshop door hanger

I'm getting ready for my first workshop this week and here's the third project. I'm stoked about this one! It's not very often that I'm able to come up with my own ideas (I steal other people's 99% of the time) but when I saw this stamp set I thought it would make the perfect door hanger! I'm in love with this stamp set from SU! I can't wait to make goodie bags using the candy stamps!

I used my top night die cut to cut out the basic black base as well as the inner pumpkin pie piece. I used my versamark and inked up the swirl from the Tasty Sweet stamp set from SU! and stamped that onto my pumpkin pie. The sentiment was stamped in basic black onto whisper white cs. I used my cropodile to include the eyelets and the cute Halloween ribbon is from a craft store. Super cute! I'm definetly going to be putting this on our front door this Halloween:)

Thanks for stopping by!

Big on Joy Fold cards!

I've been struggling with how to use my new Big on Christmas stamp set. That was until I saw Renae Wilson's cards on splitcoaststampers using the joy fold technique. Je'taime! They were so cute I just had to case them! I love the joy fold card as it's really simple and it just adds a little bit extra to the usual fare that comes out of my craft room:) Plus it lets you showcase some of that patterned paper we all love so much!

Supplies:

1:) -chocolate chip, rose red, whisper white cardstock from SU!

- autumn vine dsp, snowflake pp

-blender pen

-rose red ink spot

-snowflake punch

-paper piercer

-dimensionals

2:) -rose red, old olive, whisper white cs from SU!

-christmas pp I had on hand

-real read marker

-paper piercer

-Merry Christmas stamp

3:) -old olive, ruby red, whisper white cs from SU!

-always artichoke ink spot

-blender pen

-paper piercer

-christmas double sided pp

Thanks for stopping by!

card patterns sketch #33

I made this cute square card with this week's card patterns challenge and only just now realized that I forgot the ribbon...Ahh well, I have another one planned out:) I thought it would be easier to use a square card for this one, and I had a scrap piece of taken with teal that was perfect for a 4.25 x 4.25 card. I added a 4 x 4 piece of whisper white and then a 3.5 x 3.5 piece of shiny silver paper I had on hand. I embossed the snowflake images onto the silver paper using an embossing folder and cut the paper in half. The snowflake image is from SU!'s The Snowflake Spot. I first stamped it with bordering blue onto a piece of whisper white cs. I then stamped the image again with taken with teal and punched it out with a circle punch. I popped up the circle using a dimensional and added one of SU!'s rhinestone brads to the center. I put my sentiment on the inside of the card. Easy Peasy and cute!

Craft Weekend!

Each year my sisters, my mom and I get together while the boys are out golfing to spend a weekend together. We play with my nephews, eat great food and get a lot of crafting done. One of my favourite things is scrapbooking with my sisters. It's so fun to sit around and gossip, plan trips together, and especially get page/card ideas from each other......and oh ya.....get to use all of their stuff!!:) I got a couple of scrapbook pages done (that I'll share in a couple of days) that I've had planned out for awhile and a couple of cards.

Here are some cards that I've made since my last post:

I wanted to play around with my The More

the Merrier stamp set from SU! but I wasn't feeling overly imaginative and this is what I came up with. It's not great, but the ribbon pleating makes me happy:) I used pumpkin pie and whisper white cardstock and white grosgrain ribbon. I can't to play more with this set, there is so much more it can do!!

I made this card with my sisters using up

some gorgeous pp that I had on hand.

It matched SU!'s rose red perfectly. I

added the let it snow sentiment, some

white brads and some punched snowflakes

and voila! I think I'm going to make some

more cards with this pp. I love it!

Finally I made this last card using an old sketch from Card

Patterns. I still like the idea, but my execution is pretty bad. I used an embossing folder for the snowflakes in SU!'s taken with teal and used white embossing powder with my snowflake image from the Snowflake Spot on Night of Navy cs. I didn't get rid of the static on the paper first and so of course I ended up with embossing powder everywhere!! I thought that it might have ended up looking kind of cool, but I'm not digging it. The sparkle sentiment is from SU!'s Warm Words stamp set. I finished it off by punching a snowflake out of whisper white and popping it off the top layer of the card. I think I'm going to have to try this one again....but with different colours:)

catalogue case

Just a quick post today to show you a card I made with a lack of creativity:) I cased the card on page 197 of SU!'s new catalogue. It's not exactly the same as I changed up the paper colours slightly and used a different pp for my leaves, but other than that, it's a dead ringer:) I started with a 5.5 x 4.25 piece of chocolate chip cs. I used my SU! scalloped edge punch to create the scallops in the chocolate chip. The pp is always artichoke for both the bottom portion of the card and the die cut sizzlit little leaves. The letters were die cut from always artichoke cs. To finish the card I paper pierced the very vanilla panel. Isn't the catalogue great for inspiration....or in my case direct stealing:)?

thanks for stopping by!

Paws for a Cause!

The Pharm Dogs had a great day yesterday walking our paws off! Amie, Jen, Laura, Jennifer, Tika, Gunner, Lucy, Peanut, Maggie and I all had a fun day with gorgeous weather, and a lot of money was raised for our local SPCA branch. Having adopted our two dogs from the SPCA we've been able to witness first hand everything that the SPCA does. They work so hard to protect our 4 legged fur-babies! Here are some pictures from yesterday:

doesn't Maggie look so cute with her pink bandanna?

I also got a couple of cards made over the weekend. I made this one, and I'm hoping to give it out soon to a certain friend who's trying to get pregnant...keeping my fingers crossed:) I used Brenda Weaver's technique of paper folding to make the flower out of some pp I had. I stitched on a white button I had and pleated some white grosgrain ribbon. I stamped the cheers sentiment from SU!'s The Snowflake Spot with versamark onto Elegant Eggplant and then used white embossing powder to kick it up a notch:) I'm not in love with this card.....it's still missing something....

I wanted to christen my Big On Christmas stamp

set so I made this card. I used Not Quite Navy for my base and whisper white on top. I stamped the two snowflake images from SU!'s The Snowflake Spot with versamark onto another piece of Not Quite Navy and then heat embossed some white embossing powder on top. The snowflake in the sentiment is from SU!'s All Through the Year set and is stamped with Night of Navy and punched out with my circle punch. I added some bling with a rhinestone brad from SU! to the middle. I'm loving the versatility of all the snowflake images from SU! (there may be a lot of these types of cards being delivered from my house this season:)

Thanks for stopping by!

"How Do You Do?"

"I see you comb that hair, gimme that grin...." So...I've recently re-discovered my Roxette cd (much to DH's dismay) so needless to say, when I've planned to sit down at my craft desk, I actually spend more time dancing! Good times....Between my dance moves I managed to get a couple of cards done. The first one is a christmas card that I made using my The More the Merrier stamp set from SU! I started with a Not Quite Navy piece of 5.5 x 4.25 cs and put a 5.25 x 4.25 piece of very vanilla cs on top. I followed that with a 5 x 3.75 piece of Not Quite Navy that I embossed with a snowflake image. The snowman image was inked with Not Quite Navy on very vanilla cs and matted with a piece of 3.5 x 2.5 piece of Not Quite Navy cs. I punched the edges with my ticket punch from SU! and put that on a 3.75 x 2.75 piece of sparkly silver paper that I had on hand. The Sentiment is from SU!'s Warm Words stamp set. The white ribbon and silver brads I had on hand from the craft store. I finished the card by adding sparkly stickles to the snowflakes that I embossed. It's hard to see in the photo, but the card is very sparkly!

The second card I made for sketch challenge # 241 at splitcoaststampers. I used a 5.5 x 4.25 piece of pumpkin pie as my card base. I used very vanilla to mat my 2 pieces of really rust dsp. I stamped the truck from Loads of Love onto watercolour paper and matted that with a piece of 3.25 x 2.75 pumpkin pie. I used my watercolour pencil crayons and my blender pen to colour in the truck and pumpkins. I finished it off with some ribbon that I had on hand. I love that thick ribbon!

Thanks for stopping by!

Fall to Layout sketch #58

I made this cute little card using the newest sketch from cleanandsimplestamping. I'm going to send it to a friend who has just gotten pregnant, yay! I used a 3.5 x 5.5 piece of whisper white for my base. I stamped the butterfly image from SU! For all you do stamp set in bermuda bay onto whisper white and cut them out. I matted a piece of 3.5 x 2.5 piece of whisper white on a piece of 3.5 x 3 piece of rich razzleberry and snuck in a piece of melon mambo underneath that I had made a scalloped edge on using my SU! punch. I added small black brads to the butterflies and popped them up with SU! dimensionals. I used my SU! bone folder to lift their wings to make it look like they were in flight.

Thanks for stopping by!

Weekend Sketch Challenge #96

I made this card for Beate's weekend sketch challenge. Surprise, Surprise, I used the Loads of Love set from SU! again. I can't get enough! Between that stamp set and my old olive cs, my cards are all looking fairly similar:) I used a combination of old olive dsp as well as some pp that I had from another project. I thought that the tree pp would be so cute combined with the truck with a tree in the back. I used a piece of old olive grosgrain ribbon to hide the space between the pieces of pp. TFL!

Loads of Love

I've got loads of love for the upcoming fall/winter season, and all of the cards I've made recently have been made using this theme. A friend has challenged me to make 30 projects this month (one for each day) and with Christmas around the corner I just might be able to do it! I made these 2 cards yesterday (when I was supposed to be at boot camp:(

I love using the trees in this set from SU! I think they are so cute and versatile! I used a 5.5 x 4.25 base of always artichoke. I stamped my trees in always artichoke on a 5.25 x 4" piece of very vanilla. The ribbon, dsp and larger circle are all real red. I stamped the warm winter wishes sentiment (from The More the Merrier) onto very vanilla with real red. I'm still working on my watercolouring, but I think I prefer using my pencil crayons with a blender pen (the ink/aqua painter combo doesn't seem to offer as good control and is a little bit more dramatic:) I like the subtlety of the blender pen. I've never torn paper before for a card, but I think I'm going to be doing it more often.

After making the above card I had to make a slider card with my truck. Not my best card, but I still think it's pretty cute. I mixed up the paper a little bit for this one, using a 5.5 x 4.25 piece of real red instead of the always artichoke. The dsp is always artichoke this time. I'm not loving my job of tearing the paper this time, but it works:) I used some white ribbon I had on hand for the slider. The snowflake and "Merry Christmas" sentiment were stamped with Not Quite Navy onto very vanilla and matted with NQN. The Snowflake is from SU!'s The Snowflake Spot And the truck and sentiment are from SU!'s Loads of Love. Don't be surprised if you get a christmas card from me using this set this year.....I'm obsessed! TFL!

Raspberry Suite Challenge #16

I may hear some boos out there in cyber space for what I'm about to say, but here goes......I'm ready for fall. I know, I know, summer is not over yet, how can I be ready for the colder weather and darker days? I'm ready, because after fall, comes winter! I'm already getting excited for the first snowfall of the season, and I'm looking forward to curling up in my chair with my blanket and a nice cup of tea. I'm ready to not have to blast the A/C every time I get in the car, and most of all.....I'm ready for my craft room to not be smoking hot anymore:)Needless to say, I was stoked to see Dawn's colour selections for this week's challenge, because of how much they remind me of autumn. I made the following card using her colour inspiration as well as sketch #242 over at splitcoast stampers. I used a 5.5 x 4.25 piece of chocolate chip for my base colour. I matted a piece of scrap pp, that I had left over from a scrapbook page, with a piece of more mustard. I stamped the acorn image from The more the merrier stamp set onto a piece of very vanilla with some dark brown chalk ink that I had and matted that onto a paper pierced circle of more mustard. The brown leaves are from the All through the year stamp set. This piece was matted with a piece of Creamy Caramel. The golden brads I had from a craft store. I thought the ribbon was the perfect touch, seeing as my family is what I give thanks for everyday. Can't wait to make more fall cards.....but more so, I can't wait to start getting my christmas cards ready! Winter is going to be here before I know it:)