Casing Laura

Laura Frederickson's blog was one of the first I visited when I began blogging, and she was just as sweet as could be when I emailed her for some advice!  Her blog is almost at 300,000 hits, so she & her friend Julie Koerber (another warm & friendly blogger!), whose blog is also around the corner from that milestone, are giving away blog candy!  To qualify for Laura's, you have to check out her SCS gallery and CASE one of her cards.  You can see all about it here.  I chose this card, but since I have been seeing all the cute Whippersnapper cards Danielle has been making, I went back to my Good Dog set for images to make this card:

I changed a few things, but I liked the layout and I hadn't used my spiral punch for a while, so that was fun!  I do not have Copics, so I had to make do with inks and an aquapainter.  Make sure you check out Laura's blog--her work is just lovely!  And be sure to come back tomorrow for the Color Throwdown Challenge--it will knock your socks off!

• Stamps:  Good Dog, Whippersnapper
• Paper:  Riding Hood Red, Naturals Ivory, More Mustard, Earthy Pad, Crafty Secrets
• Ink:  Basic Brown, More Mustard, Close to Cocoa, Riding Hood Red, Real Red, Creamy Caramel
• Acc:  White Gel Pen, Aquapainter, Brads, Spiral Punch, RHR Taffeta, lots of dimensionals, Going Gray marker, Silver Painty

I've Been Tagged--a Non-Stamping Post

Feel free to ignore this post if you are a stamping purist. It is not about stamping!  I have seen this tag going around and it is a fun one!  The tag is to open the My Pictures folder on your computer, open the 6th folder and then post the 6th photo.  I cracked up when I saw my photo.  The folder name is "Bad Cakes".  I am an average baker, but I was having a really bad time baking a cake--so bad, I had to take pictures of it:

 

Now you might say, "Gee, her oven is so dirty, that's why the cake has fallen in a perfect rectangle in her cake pan." I guess that could be, but I don't think so.  (We have since gotten a new oven, nice & clean!)  To this day, I do not know why this cake turned out this way. 

 I ended up crumbling up this cake I had made earlier,(which was already crumbling) and "filling in" the center of above cake and icing the whole kit and caboodle!  They both tasted fine, they just would not behave.  And this was supposed to be a birthday cake for a friend!  Bakerella would be so ashamed of me!   (If you have never met Bakerella, you MUST visit her website.  Plan on a couple hours--no kidding!)  Here are six others I am passing it along to:

• Kim 
• Renee
• Stacey
• Melissa
• Kimberly
• Maria

If you ladies have already been tagged, or don't want to play, that's okay!

Struggling.....

I decided to do a different Monday challenge today, and TechnoStamper had a wonderful one!  But oh, how I struggled with it.  I had an idea in mind, and I finished it, but I don't see me sending it out unless I am desperate!  No photos of that one--ick!   So I regrouped.  After seeing Kelly's beautiful Sage Shadow & Basic Gray card here, I thought I would try one of my own!  I am still not sure of this one either....the bow wouldn't lay right, and it has a little bit too much white space, even for me:

But I was getting tired, frustrated & cranky (I sound like a two-year-old!), so I just let it go....maybe tomorrow my creativity will return!  I hate spending so much time and all for naught.  Perhaps I will try this one again and stamp the flourish lightly over the sentiment. 

• Stamps:  Pocket Silhouettes, Friends 24-7, Hugs & Wishes
• Paper:  Sage Shadow, Basic Gray, WW
• Ink:  Sage Shadow, Basic Gray
• Acc:  Circle Punches, White Organdy Ribbon, Sage Grosgrain Ribbon, Gray Taffeta Ribbon, SAMJ, dimensionals

Pair of Challenges

I was able to complete a couple challenges between yesterday and today.  The first one was a sketch challenge from the Diva Coffee Break Design girls:

For this we were to only use SAB products.  I think I have od'ed on SAB stuff because this card just doesn't do a thing for me. I am cravin' a change!  Anway, here it is:

 

I altered the sketch a tiny little bit in order to use the scalloped image from Polka Dot Punches.

The second challenge was Dawn McVey's Raspberry Suite Color Challenge:

I don't have any of Papertrey's colors, so I used SU's colors of Chocolate Chip, So Saffron, Pumpkin Pie & Regal Rose for my card:

 

 

I think Pink Passion probably would have been a closer match, but I had this Sweet Always DP that had the same colors and I wanted to use it! The only problem was that the DP had no So Saffron stripes, so I took my SS marker and colored in some of the white stripes and made my own "designer" DP!  Verve's Petals & Stems provided my butterfly (and the little dots on the pink panel); the twill is from Taylored Expressions and the little blings on the antennae is from my stash!  The sentiment is also from Verve, Here For You.  Oh, and I almost forgot...this uses Beate's Weekend Sketch!  This is another card for my friend who is back on chemo treatment.

Finally, my DH surprised me with this when I came home from a party Friday night:

Ah, so nice to have these up on the wall and off my stamping area!  I had a few spare moments to organize and clean up some of my other bins, but I have a long way to go before it is totally organized.  Just one step at a time!

A Couple of Things....

Just a couple quick things to share today, no challenges, just things laying around on my desk after playing with my new Big Shot.   The first is a card for a hostess who had a party over the weekend. My upline always told me to "treat my hostesses like queens"!  So they get lots of stuff from me at their party, plus cards before and after! So this is my "thanks for everything" card--I leave it blank inside so they can use it themselves!  This customer loves purple, so I try to make sure something I give her is purple:

This card uses the Flower Layers #3 die, along with the scallop circle punch and the new scallop oval punch, which will be in the new Occasions mini!  I also used the Sizzlets die Birds & Blooms for the leaves.  Do you recognize the little flower stamp?  It is the tiny poinsettia from Season of Joy!  A Christmas set!!  Ah, the versatility of stamps!

The next one uses the "negative" portion of a piece of cardstock after I used the Sizzlets Little Leaves die:

You can't get much simpler than this!  I backed the Baja Breeze piece with a scrap of Bella Rose DP, rounded the corners and shaded them a bit, then added my sentiment and one of those yummy new corduroy buttons (again) from the new Occasions mini!  I thought this would be a great masculine get-well card. 

Last, I just had to share with you another one of my little Scallop Envelope treat holders.  I saw this post on Flowerbug's Inkspot and just had to use that little bunny as an embellishment.  This will be a door prize at my Stamp Camp on Saturday:

I do have a tutorial written up on how to make these treat holders, so again, if anyone wants it, email me!

I Got Carried Away...

I was so excited when I saw Sharon Johnson's Stamp Simply challenge today--to use ribbon as tabs on your card! I love that! I got a little carried away with my ribbon, but the card makes me smile, so I am happy with it! And it was shot right on my stamp desk because....

once again, pretty Pumpkin chose my photo area as her nesting place. I just couldn't disturb her....look at her little paws folded together....awww!

Anyway, back to the card. I used the yummy Urban Prairie DP on a piece of Regal Rose and an Apricot Appeal card. This is also the SCS sketch #220, turned on its side. The image is Verve's Petals & Stems, sentiment from My Favorite Things. I cut two panels of Basic Black with my Nesties, then pieced them together to fit my longer white rectangle. Thanks for visiting today and have a great weekend!

• Stamps: Petals & Stems, Verve; Essential Sentiments, MFT
• Paper: WW, Basic Black, Regal Rose, Apricot Appeal, Soft Sky (ret), Urban Prairie, BG
• Ink: Palette Noir, Soft Sky, Regal Rose, Taken with Teal, Certainly Celery
• Acc: Ribbons from SU, Taylored Expressions, and Michaels, Nesties, lots of dimensionals

Stamp Camp Cards

I had a Stamp Camp a couple days ago for some of my customers where we made five birthday cards. I always have fun chatting and stamping with this group! This was a lady's card using Raspberry Tart DP, Polka Dot Punches and Cute & Curly:


This was a men's card, using Manchester DP and Loads of Love & Accessories:

This was an "all-purpose" card using Crazy for Cupcakes:


And a little girl's card, again, using Crazy for Cupcakes:
And finally, a boy's card, using Sanded and A Little Somethin':



I hope I have time to post in the next couple days, as it is one of those whirlwind weekends! Thanks for visiting!