PP468 CAS North Pole

Happy Sunday, peeps!  Hope your weekend is going well!  It's Jaydee's turn to be our Paper Players hostess and she has a fun CAS challenge for us:

I love it!  Have you ever seen the northern lights?  We had some one night, very faint, but normally we are way too south to see them.  They sure are beautiful!  I had to be satisfied with using some frosty colors and snow on my card today:

This is probably a little less CAS than I normally make; I thought of making it one layer, but I would have had to make some masks, and I thought if I am going to be cutting things out, I might as well just stamp my little images and cut them out instead of masks!  I used thick white cardstock, stamping my little critters with Memento ink and coloring them with Blends.  I embossed the card with the Softly Falling EF, then added (the dreaded) Stickles to the ice, Wink of Stella to the ice cube, and some Martha Stewart chunky glitter to the hats:

It's very fun and sparkly in real life!  I stamped the sentiment in Balmy Blue and added a little glimmer snowflake:

as a sentiment from a Flourishes stamp on the inside!

I am also entering this in the Jingle Belles challenge where they're highlighting cold weather wear--gloves, scarves, hats, etc!  I think this could fit the bill!

So how will our challenge inspire you?  I hope you'll play along and enter your creation over at the Paper Players blog...while you're there, check out what the other designers did!  Remember to keep it clean and simple too!  Thanks for popping in today!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Cool Yule (My Favorite Things), Vintage Santa (Flourishes)
Card stock & Papers	Thick White, Sparkle Glimmer
Ink	Memento Black, Balmy Blue
Accessories	Dimensionals, Wink of Stella, Stickles, Chunky Glitter Snow (Martha Stewart)
Tools	Big Shot, Blends, Layering Oval Dies, Softly Falling EF (ret), Snowflake Dies (Taylored Expressions)

CTD566 Prim Pumpkins

Happy Saturday, peeps!  I have a friend who likes primitive decor, so when I saw the challenge at Color Throwdown this week, I knew I not only had to play with the colors, but those sweet little pumpkins as well:

So, I went pretty literal, with four different grays, Very Vanilla and Grapefruit Grove:

Look at those dour little faces, LOL!  I diecut my pumpkins from Grapefruit Grove, Very Vanilla and Grey Granite with an Impression Obsession die set, then sponged Smoky Slate on the edges and gave each one a little "stitched" nose.  I drew the eyes on with a Basic Black marker and used the CTMH Stitched Border Essentials to stitch their mouths with Smoky Slate ink:

The card base of Sahara Sand was stamped with a starry border stamp (MFT Primitive Pumpkins), and the sentiment is from the same set, stamped in Basic Gray:

I added a stitched Frame of Smoky Slate, backed it with an embossed panel of Basic Gray and adhered it all together!  The inside features a few more sentiments and stars from the same set, as well as some more stitching!  It's in the mail ready to go!

Thanks for popping in today!  Be sure to come back tomorrow for a new Paper Players challenge too!

So here are some photos of the bamboo displays from inside the Conservatory at Longwood....very interesting and impressive!  The pictures really don't do them justice...they are looped and braided and very, very big!

Here's an archway that people can walk under:

And interspersed throughout the grounds are arrangements using bamboo:

Very eclectic!  Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Primitive Pumpkin (My Favorite Things), Stitched Border Essentials (Close to My Heart)
Card stock & Papers	Sahara Sand, Basic Gray, Smoky Slate, Grey Granite, Grapefruit Grove, Very Vanilla
Ink	Smoky Slate, Basic Gray, Grapefruit Grove
Accessories	Dimensionals
Tools	Big Shot, Stitched Rectangle Dies, Woodgrain EF (ret), Basic Black Marker, Soft Suede Marker, Grey Granite Marker, Sponge Daubers, umpkin Dies (Impression Obsession)

Pink Snowflake Christmas

Happy hot Saturday, peeps!  I have another Christmas card today to try to cool us off, LOL!  It fulfills three challenges:  the FMS sketch, the CTD color palette and the CAS Christmas Card Challenge:

I found the FMS sketch a little tricky, hopefully it is CAS enough for the Christmas challenge, too!  So here we go:

I happened to have a few strips of this beautiful Photoplay DSP in my "hoard", and I backed them with some silver foil strips for the background.  Can you see the angels?  Aren't they pretty?  I then diecut three snowflakes from the Seasonal Layers dies using Rococo Rose cardstock.  They were a little too dark for my liking, so I used my aquapainter and some white craft ink to give them a white wash, then once they were dry, coated them with Wink of Stella:

I put a pretty SU Metallic Silver Pearl in the center of each one, then I did a little creative combining of some of the huge stash of Christmas sentiments I have to stamp the inside:

Thanks for popping in today--be sure to come back tomorrow for a new Paper Players challenge!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Hand Lettered Holiday and Stitched Stockings (My Favorite Things), Joyous Noel (Verve)
Card stock & Papers	Naturals White, Silver Foil, Rococo Rose, Luke 2 DSP (Photoplay)
Ink	Rococo Rose, Craft White
Accessories	Metallic Silver Pearls, Wink of Stella
Tools	Big Shot, Seasonal Layers Dies, Aquapainter

CASCS300 and FF0022 The Stockings Were Hung

Happy Saturday, everyone!  And happy December!! The CAS Colours and Sketches challenge is celebrating six years--what a milestone!  Here's the sketch they have to celebrate:

I had these red stockings stamped and cut for another challenge, so I just did three more in green to create my Christmas card; I love the country feel of these images!  Not quite sure if it's CAS enough, but I am giving it a go anyway!:

The stamp set I used is called Stitched Stockings from My Favorite Things; sadly, I believe it is retired.  It has a lot of great country Christmas images, and I stamped a bunch of them on my Crumb Cake background, then stamped and diecut the stockings, "stringing" them on some red and white baker's twine:

I overstamped a Papertrey sentiment on the front, then added this on the inside:

Since my card is larger, 4" x 8", I created a custom envelope using my Envelope Punch Board.  It's a great help when you want to create cards that are different-sized!  And since the Festive Friday challenge this week is Christmas, I am entering it there as well!

Thanks for popping in today!

Not the clearest of photos, but Cassidy was all decked out in red for her Christmas program!!  She is on the end on the left...there were so many people at the concert, Grampy and Grammy were not able to get tickets.  But we did see a video!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!  Be sure to pop in again tomorrow for the next Paper Players challenge!

FMS364 Vintage Santas

Happy Black Friday, peeps!  Are you a BF shopper?!  Not I!  Maybe online but I will stay in the cozy warmth of my craft room today, too cold out there!!  The FMS sketch today fit (sorta) with a vintage Santa image I have had in my scrap bin since last year when my friend Peggy lent him to me!  So here's the sketch:

And although my Santa is a rectangle, hopefully they won't toss him out:

He's stamped in Garden Green and I did some brayering with Hello Honey ink to give him a vintage feel to complement these pretty Graphic 45 papers.  I added a gold glimmer paper snowflake and a little "ho ho ho" sentiment:

I went ahead and made another one with a different vintage Santa; this one is from a retired Crafty Secrets set:

I stamped a silhouette image at the bottom and added some more sponging to the image and sentiment:

And since the TGIF challenge this week is sponging, I am entering this card!  

That's it for today, two easy peasy cards!

Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!  Armed with apples and carrots, we took a walk on Wednesday in the brisk temps to feed the horses down the road:

This poor guy had only one eye...it freaked out the kids a little bit, but eventually they were less afraid.  I think he might have been a rescue horse...the next time I see the owner, we'll ask him!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Santa Face (unknown), Vintage Christmas (Crafty Secrets ret), Night Before Christmas (Cornish Heritage Farms ret), Santa (Katy Sue Designs), Stitched Stockings (My Favorite Things ret)
Card stock & Papers	Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake, Garden Green, Gold Glimmer, St Nicholas DSP (Graphic 45)
Ink	Garden Green, Shaded Spruce, Hello Honey (ret)
Accessories	Dimensionals
Tools	Big Shot, Stitched Shapes Framelits, Layering Circles Framelits, Itty Bitty Banners Framelits (ret), Snowflake Die (Taylored Expressions), Stitched Banner Die (My Favorite Things), Scalloped Rectangle Dies (Nestabilities)

RRCB99 Anything Goes Christmas

Happy Tuesday, peeps!  Time for another Retro Rubber Challenge where we use stamps at least a year old!  Today it's "Anything Goes"!!

I thought the sketch at CAS(E) This Sketch was fun:

And I had SO many ideas!  Ultimately, I went for Christmas because these My Favorite Things Christmas Seasonal Sentiments, that I have had for at least three or four years, have big, bold sentiments:

I paired them with some Poppy Stamps pine bough dies and a wonky-stitched mat, then added some red glimmer paper stars:

Fun and festive!  While I was at it, I stamped another one, same sentiment, but this time I used a Lawn Fawn stamp from 2013 called Peace Love Joy:

I stamped the little lights in Smoky Slate and colored them in with markers, then mounted it on a Real Red card base! You can't see it here, but I also added some Wink of Stella to the lights for fun!  Easy peasy, especially with my Stamparatus!

Come on and give those older stamps some love--you know you have lots of them!  Share your creation with us at Retro Rubber--be sure to read the guidelines--can't wait to see them!

After my confession of not liking to eat anything colored blue, two of my Paper Players teammates recommended a book for Cassidy to read called Droo; it's about an imaginary creature who can only eat blue things!  It was a challenge to find it, but ebay finally came through! It was quite charming and she read it it to her mommy as well as to me!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Christmas Seasonal Sentiments (My Favorite Things), Joy Peace Love (Lawn Fawn)
Card stock & Papers	Shaded Spruce, Whisper White, Real Red, Cherry Cobbler, Adhesive Sheets, Red Glimmer
Ink	Cherry Cobbler, Smoky Slate
Accessories
Tools	Big Shot, Wonky Stitched Rectangle Die (My Favorite Things, Pine Boughs Dies (Poppy Stamps), Star Die (Verve), Markers and Blends