Quickie Plaid Christmas Tree

Happy Monday, peeps!  Phew, what a weekend….crazy busy with holiday activities and I got NO stamping time at all.  So, I am sharing a card I made a couple of weeks ago for my local Curves craft show:

All the papers except for the Dazzling Diamonds glimmer paper are from a CTMH DSP collection from a year or so ago,  called Sparkle & Shine; the tree is a chipboard punchout that coordinates with the papers!  So pretty!  The “joy” is from Lil’Inker, and the star is punched with a retired SU punch.  The coordinating papers made this a snap to put together! 

Another aquarium shot:

Hope your weekend was a great one too!  Enjoy!

Paper Players 273

Happy Sunday, peeps!  It’s Sandy’s turn to host the Paper Players this week, and it’s a Tac-Tac-Toe challenge!  Here ya go:

I had a card made for Merry Monday’s challenge, (and also the Can You Case It sketch from last week) which is to use blue, white and texture on your card.  When I checked Sandy’s challenge, I found I had used several of the elements!  SO, here it is:

I think I have almost all the squares except ribbon and tree!!  I used some papers from MME’s Vintage Christmas line; the snowflakes (Taylored Expressions) were cut from white cardstock, covered with Versamark ink, sprinkled and heat embossed with Heat & Stick powder, then covered with various glitters from my stash.  Here’s a closer look at them:

I added some sequins for fun, and both the outside and inside sentiments are from Waltzingmouse’s Compliments of the Season, stamped in Lost Lagoon:

How will play our tic-tac-toe challenge?  There are lots of fun possibilities, I am sure you can find one that will fit your need!  Share your creation with us at the Paper Players, where you can see all the designers’ creations as well!

Enjoy your day!

CCMC383 Thanks

Happy Saturday, all!  I had a few minutes of free time yesterday and played with the Create with Connie & Mary sketch:

I needed several thank you cards this week, and I was feeling a wee bit frugal with my favorite pad of paper, Pretty Petals, and wondered how I could make two cards from one sheet of paper!  I trimmed one edge to 5 1/4”, then cut it in half and mounted it on a 5 1/2” x 3 1/4” Mint Macaron card .  Since I needed several, I wanted to make them simple, so I embossed a circle of Very Vanilla; stamped the dragonfly from Awesomely Artistic on vellum and cut it out; the diecut the word “thanks” from Basic Black using the Greetings thinlets.  Here’s the finished product:

Here’s another one using a different pattern:

They fit in a standard-sized envelope too, and no extra postage!  Love it!  Be sure to stop back tomorrow for a new Paper Players challenge, and enjoy your day!

Our Thanksgiving day was really warm and nice, and the highlight of Cassidy’s day was playing with my SIL’s dog, Jack.  He is an Australian Cattle Dog, and is a rescue dog of sorts…his owners were moving and couldn’t take him, and my SIL’s dog had just died, so she agreed to take him in.  He is as sweet as can be, but full of energy.  Cassidy was afraid of him at first, but she quickly learned how fun it was to throw a tennis ball and watch him leap in the air and catch it.  She had to figure out how to hold his collar and take the ball out of his mouth, though…he hasn’t learned how to “Drop it!” yet!  I am not sure who was more worn out at the end of the day, Cassidy or Jack!

Thanks for visiting!

TMS328 Dad’s Birthday

Happy Black Friday, everyone!  Are you going out shopping today?!  Not me!  I’ll stay inside and do some cooking and crafting, and maybe start decorating! OR maybe do nothing, LOL!  Anyway, I hope you had a great day yesterday; besides being Thanksgiving, it was my dad’s 86th birthday!  I found this great sketch at Tuesday Morning Sketches:

I recently got these little tool dies from My Favorite Things, and since all the men in my family are mechanically-inclined,  I knew they would come in handy!  I found some guy-themed papers, diecut my tools and added some Zig Painty pen in silver to them, and stamped a cute sentiment from SU’s Guy Greetings:

The woodgrain background paper is from Echo Park This & That; the numeric paper is SU’s paper from last year, sponged with Delightful Dijon, and the blue textured woodgrain paper is from Authentique’s Nestled Line.  The schematic paper is some old Basic Grey paper called Wander!  Here’s a close up of the tools:

And here’s the inside sentiment; the Guy Greetings set lets you mix and match so well! 

My sister was up from SC last week and was explaining to my dad that she can take pictures with her phone, and she snagged a selfie of the two of them; my dad doesn’t usually smile, and he has NEVER had a selfie taken of himself, so this is pretty epic!  Enjoy your day!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Best wishes to all my American friends for a happy, healthy blessed Thanksgiving!

SSC114 In Every Thing Give Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!  I hope you have plans to share time with your loved ones, either friends, family or both!  I am looking forward to spending time with John’s family this year….and it is my dad’s birthday so hopefully I’ll get to say “Happy Birthday” to him as well!

Today’s quick card uses the sketch from Sunday Stamps, which happens to be my favorite sketch, turned upside down:

I knew I wanted to use Banner Blessings for my card, which is a combination thank you/Thanksgiving card!  I used some papers from Farmers Market and stamped my verse in Rich Razzleberry on Very Vanilla, (although I think I should have used Blackberry Bliss):

My simple embellishments are a few stitched leaves (Lawn Fawn) and some crochet trim! 

And here is my little pilgrim, showing the hat she made in kindergarten!

Happy Thanksgiving!

SSSC296 Birthday Bird

Happy Wednesday, peeps!  I have a 80th birthday card for a sweet lady at our church….she had a nice little open house party which we couldn’t attend because of a funeral, so I wanted to make a pretty card for her.  I knew which stamp I wanted to use, but needed a fairly large element to accommodate the image.  I found a great sketch from the Sweet Sunday Sketch challenge:

I got this bird image from Red Lead stamps; it’s actually larger than this, but I had to cut off some of the definition!  He is stamped in Smoky Slate on Very Vanilla and the papers are from the Pink Paislee Indigo Bleu line. 

I added a scallop in Smoky Slate as well as an embossed banner, accentuated with a twill ribbon and some enamel dots: 

My final embellishment was an organdy rose, which I thought was a pretty accent! 

Thanks for stopping in today!
A little watercolor play:

and Grampy even got into the act (with Lambie supervising!):

Enjoy your day!

Try Stampin’ On Tuesday 246 Peace

Hey, peeps!  It’s Tuesday, and Try Stampin’ On Tuesday has another fabulous sketch for you to try this week!  Here you go:

The twist/theme is Christmas Colors/Peace on Earth as well!  I had this lovely CTMH set with a peace-inspired definition tag that I thought would be perfect:

I stamped the tag in Garden Green, did some sponging, then mounted it on a mat of Garden Green and added the “peace” from SU’s Christmas Greetings.  It’s hard to see, but the banners are embossed, and my embellishments feature silver stars, shabby seam binding, punched greenery and silver twine!  Designer paper is from MME’s All is Bright line, mounted on a Garden Green card:

You can never go wrong with traditional red and green! 

I hope you’ll play along with our sketch this week!  Check out the really pretty cards the other designers created at the TSOT blog, and share yours as well, or add it to our FB page!  Thanks for visiting today!

Another shot from the aquarium….there is a bubble that extends up into the water and you can pop inside and get a fish-eye view!  VERY cool!

IMC225 and MTS099

Happy Monday, peeps!  I usually try to do a Christmas card on Mondays, but I wanted to play with this color challenge from Inkspire Me, and I needed a sympathy card:

I used the Match The Sketch sketch as well:

Truthfully, I don’t think I did either of them much justice, but after fooling around for a couple of hours, I just had to let it go:

I used a verse from Our Daily Bread’s Scripture Collection 2 along with some embossing, pearls and a cut-out flower from a past Paper Pumpkin kit.  It needed some grounding, so I added a black mat and black ribbon:

I hate to have to make these, and this past week, I needed four of them!  Yikes!  Be sure to come back tomorrow for my Try Stampin’ on Tuesday card!

A trip to the Camden, NJ,  Aquarium was on the agenda this weekend!  Lamby and Dominic went along too!

They had a blast…more pix to follow!  Enjoy your day!

Paper Players 272

Happy Sunday, peeps!  Laurie is our hostess at the Paper Players this week, and she has a lovely sketch for us.  I think I might have to pin this one for future reference!

I am still making Thanksgiving cards…..I can send them out tomorrow and they’ll still arrive in time, right?!  I pulled out the lovely, sadly retired, Truly Grateful set and some retired DSPs and went to work:

I stamped the wheat bundle in Hello Honey on a stitched tag from Simon Says Stamp, then stamped it again and cut it out, sponging it and popping it up with dimensionals:

It looked a wee bit plain, so I added a little Soft Suede ribbon tied with some Linen Thread to match my Soft Suede banner.  I cut out a stitched banner (same die set) in Pool Party and isolated just the word “Thankful” with a marker to stamp on top.  My Hello Honey panel is matted with some Cajun Craze cardstock and the whole shebang was mounted on a Hello Honey card.  I found this sentiment in my Harvest Home set, stamped it in Soft Suede on the inside and used my Versamark pad to stamp the wheat again in a lighter tone.  I love this look:

The “Happy Thanksgiving” is from last year’s Paper Pumpkin kit!  I have gotten a lot of use from that little set!  I am also entering this in the Papercraft Crew Challenge #171, which is a theme challenge of giving thanks!

 I hope you’ll join along with us and create something with this wonderful sketch!  You can see everyone’s creation here, or visit us at the Paper Players!

• Claire
• Jaydee
• Joanne
• Laurie
• Nance
• Sandy
• Amy
• Jodi
• Lisa

Last week we found a slate-colored junco and a wee little mouse, both of whom had met their demise somewhere near our house…thankfully not IN the house!  After a few tears (Grampy told her the mouse went to mouse heaven, at which she replied “There is NO mouse heaven, Grampy!”), we had a little burial for both of them, complete with blanket!  She insisted on digging with her own shovel, although Grampy did have to help her with that:

Never a dull moment!  Enjoy your day!