CPS Love Letter

With my recent SU! order, I got this lovely Love Letter dsp. I love the mix of vanilla, black and red. I have had these gate fold cards in my stash FOREVER, but never use them because they are so big! They are #10 size and can be intimidating. However, when I saw the CPS sketch for this week, I knew they would be just right.

The main image is from Kim Hughes for CHF (so sad that they closed!). I stamped it in Red Riding Hood, then stamped it again with Versamark (there was still red on the stamp and I probably stained my Versamark pad) and embossed with clear EP. The sentiment is from the same set and I finished it off with some silk May Arts ribbon. I was so happy that the sentiment fit on the lines of the paper!

Here's a close-up of the main image panel:



I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! Have a great day. Thanks for looking!

Thomas Kinkade Christmas, Day 3

I have close to 60 Christmas cards made already this year!!! YEAH!! That means I might have time to make some Thanksgiving cards. And get this - today I am putting 6 cards I have made into the mail for September birthdays and such. (pat on the back)

Later, if Carter takes a good nap, I will tackle the Color Throwdown for this week. I tried to get a little done with him up, but he just creates havoc in my stamp room. I make a big enough mess as it is, I don't need his help in that department. I also have to price a ton of things for our upcoming yard sale. I signed up for the community yard sale, only to realize that DH will be flying home from China that day. Should be interesting. At least Justin will be able to help!

Can you believe it's already Wednesday? Justin has gymnastics after school, so we are running all afternoon. I hope you are all having a good day. Thanks for looking!

Two Fun Challenges!

I had so much fun making this card, even though at the beginning I didn't know quite where it would end up. I pulled out some Chocolate Chip card stock from SU! to start with, and stamped the CHF Tiled Scallops Backgrounder in CC ink. For the bird, I stamped the same backgrounder in CC ink on some Taken with Teal card stock (also SU!). I punched the bird with the SU! bird punch and added a small black pearl for the eye. The flourish is from Colorbok and I picked it up at Joann's a long time ago. I first stamped it with White Craft Ink, then added some Colorbox Platinum and Raw Silk chalk ink on top. The sentiment is mounted on a strip of brown twill from Martha Stewart and the sentiment is from the Mocha Chica stamp set from CHF. Both Teal pieces are trimmed with the SU! Scalloped edge punch.

This card was made with this week's CPS sketch 184 in mind, and also made to fit the Moxie Fab World Offset Scallop Gallop Challenge.

I hope you like it! Thanks for looking!

Thomas Kinkade Christmas, Day 2

Here is another set of Christmas cards I made with the Thomas Kinkade paper kit. I haven't counted yet, but I think most of my Christmas cards might just be done! Yippee!!

Not much to chat about today. Between cleaning, laundry and playing with Carter (and Justin after school), I might have energy to stamp a bit. Carter is a disaster in my stamp room. I gave him a box of ribbon scraps to play with, but he would much rather play with all the magazines on my shelf. He was even so helpful to pull all the sticky notes out of one for me!

I hope you are having a good day and get some creative time! Thanks for looking!

Thomas Kinkade Christmas, Day 1

During the last days of Cornish Heritage Farms, I bought this Thomas Kinkade Winter Wonderland paper pack. It made these cards SUPER easy and fun to put together. I have more to show in the next few days, since I was able to make 14 cards and 8 gift tags using the pack! It's time to take stock of my Christmas card stash, because it's been growing all year long. Usually I like to make and send all the same card, but this year I have a great variety.

I'm still learning photo editing on this new computer, so bear with me. Can you believe it's Friday already? What a week! Thanks for looking!

Bee-lated Birthday Wishes!

My birthday book is updated, I just have to remember to look at it! We missed our niece's birthday earlier this week, and I feel horrible about it. This will hit the mail with a little something tomorrow...

I used Kim Hughes for Cornish Heritage Farms, The Birds and the Bees and some Heidi Grace alphabet rubons. The colors are Melon Mambo and Crushed Curry, along with a bit of Kraft. The bees are embossed with black and the rhinestones are from my stash. These letter rubons were so close together on the sheet it was very hard to cut them out and then place them in line! That is why they are a little crooked. The image panel is cut with Nesties Labels Eight. Love those right now! I offset the Melon Mambo layer on the Crushed Curry so it would peek out just a bit. The dp is from the Welcome Friends pack by SU!

Time to get ready to walk and meet Justin at school. I am loving these afternoon walks to get him and he loves being outside on the way home! He runs ahead and tries to go faster than the cars passing us - it's too funny. Sometimes I think I have a dog and not a boy. He also likes to push the stroller, too!

Have a good afternoon and thanks for looking!

Mocha Chica Wishes

Each week, I make a list of the challenges I want to complete. Each week, I get to a small percentage of them. Today, I dove in with the CPS Sketch, #156 while Carter took a good morning nap. This stamp set and papers (both Kim Hughes for CHF) have been in my stash for over a year and I knew I wanted to use them today. Maybe it's the anticipation of getting the new bird punch from SU! that had me thinking of birds. They are everywhere right now, it seems.

The card size is 7 1/4 by 3 3/4 inches. I made this size because I have a stash of random envelopes, and it fit the 8x8 inch papers! The green embellies are from Stamping Bella, the swirl is stamped with Soft Suede, and the bird is cut from the green paper. The wing is paper pieced.

Well, I have been saying that I have not been to a craft store since before Christmas, but I just sent a HUGE SU! order in and can't wait for stuff to arrive. I took full advantage of the SAB and am getting 7 free items from the SAB catalog!! Woohoo! Now if only I had more time to play :))

Have a good Monday, and thanks for looking!

The Gift Cards Were Nestled...

...all snug with Nuggets! I can't be the first one to figure out that the 8 short nugget box is the perfect size for a giftcard to be placed on top of the chocolates. I did these for two of our neices, DH's co-worker and Justin's teacher. The snowflakes on the candy wrappers and on the image background are from Verve. The snowman is from Kim Hughes for CHF, embossed with detail white EP and colored with Bic Mark Its.




I hope you are all ready for Christmas, or if you celebrated Hannukah, relaxing before a new crazy year begins! We had a birthday party Saturday for Justin,who is turning 6 on Christmas!! Where DOES the time go? Tomorrow is Justin's last day of school, and hopefully DH will have some time off next week, too. I have tentative playdates with about 8 of J's friends, so he won't have time to be bored :)
Thanks for looking!

Sheetload of Valentines!

Last weekend I decided to tackle the Valentines for DS's class. The party is not for a few weeks yet, but I didn't want to be scrambling at the last minute. Also, I gathered all my Valentine supplies this year and wanted to actually use up some of them! And, hey, I got this cute paper at Target's dollar spot, so I was inspired.

For the layout, I used the January issue of Sheetload of Cards. I used the birds from Kim Hughes for CHF, and the sentiment from Love Ya Much from CC Designs. Ribbon is from Target last year (or was it the year before?).





I hope you have a good weekend. DS is sick tonight and I'm hoping it's only a 24 hour bug that he doesn't share with us. Thanks for looking!

I Just Love This Project!

I often like the projects I get done, but I *LOVE* this one! DH asked me to make a set of gift cards for one of his administrative assistants. I recently ordered the Kim Hughes Nature's Silhouettes from CHF and have been wanting to use it. This was the perfect opportunity!

The card bases and inks are the '07 In Colors - True Thyme, Marigold Morning, Soft Sky and Vintage Violet. These are still some of my favorite colors and I have a ton of paper in each. I used the rectange scalloped and straight rectangles to cut the shapes and ran the vanilla layer through the Cuttlebug with Swiss Dots. The ribbons are all American Crafts and match quite nicely with the SU! colors.

Inside the cards, I attached a sheet of white paper and stamped the coordinating print in the lower right corner. My camera for some reason does not want to take a photo of the inside - I think there's too much white space to focus on. The box is the A2 card box template from SCS and I decorated the top with smaller versions of the images from the cards. In total there are 8 cards in the set - 2 of each color.

I hope she likes it! Now, I'm off to work and this week is filled with final preparations for DS's birthday party on Sunday, then it's off to the last minute Christmas rush. I have not had time to make cookies this year, but shopping is done and I even mailed a few packages this weekend! We put up our tree yesterday and it's finally starting to feel like Christmas around here. My to-do list is long, but manageable. I hope yours is too :)

Thanks for looking!

Mocha Chica Finally!

About 2 months ago, I just HAD to have this Mocha Chica paper from the Kim Hughes Collection at CHF, and the stamp set to match. It has been sitting by the wayside since it arrived, and finally I had a chance to use it! Thanks to Angel's bird challenge for Day 16. The card is 5x5 to accomodate the tree from the Mocha Chica paper pack. I love that the background and tree were already printed on the paper and all I had to do was stamp and cut out the cute little birds and mount them on the branches. The tag is a Cuttlebug Die stamped with the hello sentiment from the set. It is attached with some twine and glued to the bird's beak. Ribbon is American Crafts.

Here's a close up of the tag:

I know I'm going to go back to hording this fantastic paper, but I promise to TRY to use it more. Why horde paper when it looks so pretty on a card? We can always buy more, right? I just hate to cut into pretty things...

Thanks for looking!

Angelosity - Day 3 (I'm Already Behind!)

Angel posted a sketch yesterday for Day 3 of 18 Rainbow Days of Angelosity. You can see it here. I chose to use Daisy Jar by CHF for my card, because it's so fun to watercolor. I am quite pleased with how it came out, and I hope you like it, too. The papers are Marcella K, pearls from Target and base cs is Bazzill. I am already behind one day, and hope to catch up this weekend. DH will be home by then, so after I take DS to a birthday party, I will have some time in my stamp room! With him gone this week, I had to tackle all the household stuff, child care and my to-do list on my own. So I'm going to retire early again tonight to make it through tomorrow!

Have a good night and thanks for looking!

Happy Bird-Day!!

Allison's Suggestive Sunday challenge this week is to make a flap card. I love these little cards! It so happens that we have another birthday party to attend Saturday, and this is perfect to tuck a gift card inside.

I used SU! Pun Fun and We R Memory Keepers White-Out dp. The sentiment is from CHF. I am going to need birthday cards and presents for each of the next 4 weekends! Then it's time to plan DS's birthday party. This is the first year we are throwing a party for him (since his birthday is Christmas day and who's usually around?), and the trend is to invite all kids in the Kindergarten class. That's about 20 kids! But he is excited to have his turn, so here we begin...

I hope everyone's week is off to a good start! I am going to retire now and finish my book. Take care and thanks for looking!

Trashy Snowmen

Over at Stampin Links to Love, Theresa issued a challenge titled "Trash to Treasure" last week. Here is my take on it. The frame around the snowmen is from the library cards we give at work. It's a coated plastic frame that the card was punched out from. The acetate window is also recycled - from clear stamp packaging. I will try to get a better photo tomorrow in daylight - I couldn't use the flash because of the glare and the colors aren't right in this picture...

The snowman image is from Winter Wishes, part of the Kim Hughes Collection at CHF. The sentiment is from CHF, Hugs and Kisses from Kim Hughes. The snowman on the right is the original image, and the one on the left was stamped onto acetate and then pressed onto the paper to get them facing each other. I colored them with my white Prismacolor pencil to make them stand out a little more. Their eyes and buttons and arms are traced with my black glaze pen and their noses are colored with an orange gel pen. The snow is Martha Stewart white glitter, and I think I used a little too much! Of course, the paper is from the Holiday Slab IV. I WILL use up all that paper with my Christmas cards this year!!

I hope everyone is having a good start to the week. Take care and thanks for looking!

ETA: I updated the photo with one taken this morning in natural light - what a difference!

Daisy Jar Sympathy

Before I went on vacation, I placed an order with Cornish Heritage Farms and this Daisy Jar was one of the stamps I ordered. I think CHF is my new favorite stamp company! Stamps are great quality, beautiful images and great customer service!! Not to mention a frequent shopper club :)

Since I keep getting caught without sympathy cards, I thought I should bulk up my stash in this category. This is one that will be added and hopefully not used very soon. I embossed the image with black ep, then used my water brush and inkpads to color the image. The flowers are Groovy Guava and the water is Bordering Blue. The jar is Going Grey and the flower centers are Summer Sun. I used Always Artichoke for the stems.

The image is layered on a piece of green and then Groovy Guava card stock. The dp is Basic Grey but I'm not sure which pattern - it was in my stash and I was very glad to find it because it had the perfect color combination. The tag is one of the Cuttlebug dies and edged with GG ink. Sentiment is from Little Paper Shop, stamped in Always Artichoke. Ribbon also from my stash.

Well, sadly it's already time for me to get ready for work. Although I'm going in late today, I have already done laundry and gone to the grocery store. Now my time is up and it's back to reality. Let's hope nothing catastrophic happened while I was away...

Thanks for looking!