SSW #30 - Skating Away...

This week's sketch is sponsored by Squiggle Fly. Go on over and check out their cute digis. My favorites are the ones by Crissy Anderson, but there are lots of cute images available.

Here's this week's sketch:


This is my card using the sketch. I used the cute Figure Eight Snowman.


The SSW DT members have been using a lot of glitter on their cards lately and I've really loved the effect so I incorporated some into my card this week. Arlana has picked some very talented DT members and I'm always inspired by everyone else on the team.

Visit the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog to check out all the other DT members' cards and be sure to play along with this week's sketch. I don't know about where you live, but the weather here is more frightful than delightful - a perfect excuse to stay inside and be creative!

Fab Friday.... belated

If you own a Crop-A-Dile, you know they have a reputation for punching through just about anything - chipboard, aluminum pails, lampshades, etc. But did you know they also punch through rawhides?

I wanted to give my dog, Dixie, a treat in her stocking (yes, my pets all have their own stockings!) and rawhides are her favorite thing. I knew my High Hopes stamp of Santa handing a puppy a Christmas bone would make the most adorable tag, so I pondered how to attach it to the rawhide....

Voila! Crop-A-Dile to the rescue:


It was a big hit with Dixie :)

If you don't have a pet or know anyone who does, hopefully this tip will inspire you to think of another unusual material for your next Crop-A-Dile project!

Blog Hop with Candy!

Check out the Friday Sketchers' Blog Hop. There are seven great cards with a chance for a little blog candy on each stop on the hop. Imagine starting your new year with a free goodie or two? Get hoppin'! :)

Fab Friday

Consider it like the mail these days ... a little slower with increased holiday business! :) I'll be posting a Fab Friday (on Saturday) as soon as I get my glut of Christmas photos downloaded off my camera.

SSW 29 - One Freshly Made Card....

This week's Sweet Sketch Wednesday sponsor is Freshly Brewed Designs. Here's this week's sketch:


Here's my card:


Stop by the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog to check out the other DT members' cards. Hope to see you join us in this week's challenge!

Christmas Crush!

The countdown to Christmas is in full swing, so it has been so hard to find time to post! I have been stamping/creating, though. I made a few gifts for my daughter Jessica to give her friends (several candy bar wrappers and I stamped the plain white mat in a photo frame to make it pretty. My most ambitious undertaking was compiling some favorite Christmas recipes into little cook/scrapbooks for my mother and MIL. I used this adorable image from Mo Manning of Digital Pencil Too. It's called Louis and Bronte and it was just so appropriate for a recipe book of Christmas cookies! I don't know if Mo has this one in the shop or not, but I got it as a freebie for being a member of the Digital Pencil Too group on Paper Craft Planet.

I made one brunette and one blonde Louis:


(I used Paint Shop Pro to temporarily remove the frog on Louis' shorts. I then cut & pasted the image into a Word document without saving the changes to Mo's original artwork.)

After laminating all of the pages, I used my Bind It All to make 2 6X6 recipe books. I'll try to get a photo of one of the finished products. (The one for my mom is wrapped & ready to ship off to NJ tomorrow.)

Under the Mistletoe

It's Wednesday and you know what that means... another SSW sketch and more great cards from the design team!


I just love this Alex and Felicity series from our sponsor, Sally-Ann Hancock's DigiStamp Boutique! You can find this image in the store's Christmas collection.

Don't they make the cutest couple? :-) Be sure to head on over to the Digistamp Boutique and check out the Christmas images - they're all 20% off. And, then come back and play along with this week's Sweet Sketch Wednesday challenge. You may just win a great prize from Sally-Ann!

A Digitally Fab Friday!

I'm back in the groove! I'm posting (semi-regularly at least) and I remembered Fab Friday! :)

I have become a huge fan of digital stamps. They're cheap, they're resizable and they are *instant* gratification. No waiting for the mailman or the guy in the brown truck. :) So, the topic of this week's Fab Friday is digi stamps. One of my favorite digi stamp stores is, of course, DigiStamp Boutique. If you haven't been in the shop lately, be sure to check out all her Christmas images while they're still on sale 20% off. I'll be posting a Felicity card later this weekend.

In my hunt for fun new digis, I've found several rubber stamp artists' work in digital form. If you're a fan of the Tiddly Inks stamps from Stamping Bella, check out Christy Croll's Tiddly Inks store on Etsy. If you're a High Hopes fan, check out Crissy Anderson's digital artwork on Squigglefly. And if you've fallen in love with the cute little Pure Innocence girls at My Favorite Things, be sure to visit Heather Ellis' Digital Stamp Characters shop at Etsy.

Happy shopping! :)

SSW27

It's time for another Sweet Sketch Wednesday sketch challenge! Here's this week's sketch:


Here's the card I made with this cute little bunny from this week's sponsor, Bee Crafty:


We are getting our first real taste of winter today, so this springy little guy is a welcome sight! (How many days until spring is here again? I miss it already!)

The big hit

What has been our most popular item at the craft shows we did this fall? Glass pebble magnets. We sold a bunch of these at Saturday's craft show, as well as at Hatton. I guess they're popular because they're decorative but yet useful and the price fits in just about anyone's budget. (We charged 50 cents each for these at all the shows.)

Here's the board we used to display our magnets:

Sadly, I didn't sell any of these domino magnets. :-( Which just goes to show how fickle the craft show business is. A few years ago, any snowman stamped domino (pin, etc.) was a good seller for me.

Here's the star of the show, the lowly little pebble magnet!


I used a discontinued "all season" set from TAC. The images were the perfect size for these magnets. They were so fun to color and came out so cute!

I'm back....

I survived the back to back craft show and holiday open house. Barely. I will definitely be posting some projects this week, though.

In the mean time, since I missed Fab Friday (again!), I thought I'd share a freebie I found today. If you like vintage images, you can find some really pretty vintage tags on the Peggy Loves Vintage blog.

MIA & SSW

My apologies for not posting these days. I completely blanked on Fab Friday! I'm trying to prepare for a craft show on Saturday and a home business open house on Sunday. Needless to say, I've crafted a lot but just have been too busy to photograph & blog it.

Of course, I made time to play along with this week's Sweet Sketch Wednesday sketch, though! This week there were two sketches:



I chose to make a card with the Double Take sketch and this adorable image from this week's sponsor, Whimsie Doodles:

I adhere the tree with some pop dots. I love the dimension it gives the card when you see it in person.

Be sure to stop by the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog and check out the rest of the design team members' cards.

Supplies: Muffin for Christmas (Whimsie Doodles), greeting from TAC, SU! corner punch, Nestabilities (scalloped circle & label), CM Shapecutting System (circles), Prismacolor pencils with OMS, ribbon from Michaels.

A Furry Favor

If you've read my blog regularly for very long, you probably know that I am a volunteer with my local humane society. I am a foster parent, and my dog, Dixie, is a foster dog whom I adopted. I've entered Dixie in Hallmark's A Dog Named Christmas cutest dog contest.

Part of the prize packages is a contribution to your favorite shelter. I would LOVE to win some money for my local shelter, Central Missouri Humane Society (CMHS). If you could vote for Dixie, we sure would appreciate it! :)

You can vote for Dixie here: Cutest Dog contest

Dixie say "Thanks!".

Christmas Sale

And you thought all the Christmas deals were over with the end of Black Friday! ;-) Sally-Ann is offering 20 percent off all Christmas digi stamps in her shop. Go on over and check it out! :)

SSW's Little Helper

Joni of Inktegrity is sponsoring this week's sketch:


For my card, I used "Little Helper" along with the Christmas pie image:


I used an old version of Paint Shop Pro to resize the pie and then cut & paste it as a transparent image onto the mouse's platter. Next, I used the Erase tool to remove the line where the platter and pie overlapped. Then I was able to print out my image with the pie already on the platter. There are lots of tutorials online on how to cut & paste images, which vary depending on the graphic editing software you use.

Be sure to stop on by the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog and check out the other DT members cards, as well as visiting Joni's shop to see all of her images, including some newly released on 11/15.

If it's not one thing...

.... it's something else, to quote Roseanne Rosannadanna, Gilda Radner's character on Saturday Night Live.

Last week, my dog Dixie was very sick. I'll spare you the details, but I noticed something wasn't right Monday morning and attributed it to her most recent raid on the kitchen garbage can. It got worse later in the day and we had a rough night, so the next day we were off to my vet, who diagnosed her with hemorrhagic gastroenteritis, gave her some shots & some meds to take home. The medications kicked in by that evening, but she was a very listless puppy & gave me quite a scare.

Now we are in the midst of battling a different kind of "bug" - a computer virus. Our computer's been acting weird lately, but last week I started getting this annoying pop up that would NOT go away. DH has been working on cleaning it up, so computer access has been intermittent the past few days. Something is still not right, so if I go silent for more than a few days, you know what's up!

On a lighter note, I was at Target last week when I spotted this clear acrylic stamp:


It was only $1.49! That even fits in with my (almost non-existent) stamping budget! How can any redblooded stamper pass up this much swirly prettiness for $1.49? I, dear reader, could not! (Of course, I'm not known for my iron will when it comes to papercrafting purchases, lol.)

While cleaning my room, I came across 4 notepads that just needed to be decorated. This one seemed just perfect for my new stamp:

I'm not usually a huge fan of just black & white, but I think this works.

This is possibly my favorite one that I finished, because I love this image and I love PINK!


I used the adorable Marissa from DigiStamp Boutique. I just love her! She's so adorable. She makes a pretty good Arielle wannabe if you give her red hair, too. :)

That's it for me! (I was chatty tonight -- must be computer withdrawal, lol!) Be sure to check back Wednesday for the newest Sweet Sketch Wednesday challenge!

Fab Friday!

It's Friday, so it's time for another Fab Friday feature.

If you're a Michaels customer, you probably know they are having a weekly crafting contest. I checked out the weekly winners here: Homemade Holidays. There are some really awesome entries! Definitely check out the paper flower wreath. If you visit the winner's blog she has a link to her tutorial on how to make the paper flowers.

Check it out and have a Fab Friday!

More Birthday Wishes

Here are a few more birthday cards. I used the same Imaginisce paper pad that I used on these b'day cards. This first card features that adorable George from DigiStamp Boutique once again.


And here's everyone's favorite feline, Fluffles. I just love that saying - Life's uncertain... eat dessert first. Certainly my motto in life! :)

Meet George!

Here's this week's Sweet Sketch Wednesday challenge sketch:


And here's my card, which uses one of the adorable George images from DigiStamp Boutique. (He's part of the October release.) Sally-Ann is graciously sponsoring our challenge this week, so be sure to check out George as well as all the other fabulous images in her shop.


Hop on over to the blog and play along with us this week!

Plum Crazy

No, that's not a statement on my mental condition (although it could be, at times, lol!). Moxie Fab World is having a "Plum Crazy" challenge. Purple is one of my favorite colors so I knew that I had a lot of plum "ingredients" for the challenge. In fact, one of the cardstocks I used on my card is PTI's Plum Pudding. And I knew this delicate image of violets from TAC was the perfect image with all the purples in my card.


I've had these brads for *forever* - I bought them to use on a scrapbook layout, I think, but never used them. I thought they went perfectly with the papers & floral image and was unpleasantly surprised to find some rust on the prongs! Consider that my lecture for the day on the perils of hoarding/neglecting your supplies. ;-)

You have until midnight (Eastern, I think) tomorrow (Monday) to submit something to the Plum Crazy challenge at Moxie Fab World. Join me in playing! :)

Supplies: Flower Collage Trio (TAC), Ivory & Plum Pudding cardstocks (PTI), Grape Damask dp (Deja Views), all other cardstock - Mulberry Meadow (retired TAC), ribbon (Hobby Lobby), brads (Making Memories), Prismacolor pencils & OMS.

TGIF!

This Friday seemed to take a long time to finally get here! It's time for this week's Fab Friday finds. This week the focus is on FREEBIES. (Because free is always fab, right?)

The uber talented Nina B has a whole page of freebies on her site. (Nina designs for Gina K, among others.) The desk calendars would make great little gifts.

Sally-Ann, owner of DigiStamp Boutique always has a monthly free digital stamp, but I particularly love this month's freebie, "Eek! Caught a Bug?". Check out this awesome project on the DigiStamp Boutique blog, featuring this freebie.

Have fun checking these out!

Embellish Challenge

I found the coolest blog today - Embellish Magazine. They are having a fun color challenge (coral, green & brown) with a twist - you must also use an owl image in your project. I used TAC's fun "Hip to Be Square" set to make this card:

Fun! I can't wait to see what the next challenge will be!

Sweet Squirrely Girl

Here's this week's sketch:


Be sure to visit the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog to check out this week's beautiful DT samples!

Here's my card:

I used some of my favorite things on this card - lots of pink, TAC's Squirrely girl, Mimi cardstock and dark brown ribbon. (It looks black, but it's really a very dark brown, just like the bottom card layer. I love that shade of brown!)

Supplies: (all TAC): Squirelly Girl, Mimi printed & solid cardstock, Kraft cardstock, Bazzill Monochromatic cardstock in Browns and Red-Violets, Prismacolor pencils, pink Scrapper's Floss. Non-TAC supplies: ribbon (HL or Mikes), American Crafts buttons, odorless mineral spirits.

Sneak Peak....

Don't forget - Sweet Sketch Wednesday's latest sketch is coming soon! Check back tomorrow to see the latest sketch. Here's a sneak peak of my card:

See you Wednesday!

Restocking the shelves...

Several of Jessica's friends had birthdays in October and I found myself very low on birthday cards! I like to have cards on hand for the girls to pick from, so I've been making birthday cards today. Here are two that I have finished. The first card uses the adorable Ruby from DigiStamp Boutique.


This second card uses a Whipper Snapper image that my friend Diana stamped for me:

For both cards, I used a really cute Imaginisce glitter paper stack that I bought from Cindy at StampingScrapping.com. It comes with several different doublesided cardstock weight printed papers as well as chipboard pieces with coordinating stickers. (I'm not sure if Cindy still has it in the store, but feel free to check it out. She always has some cool stuff in stock!)

Fab Friday... a little late

Sorry I'm late! I haven't been feeling well the past two days and have been hitting the sack pretty early.

There is a silver lining, though - I found this great papercrafting event to share with you! They're having a Holiday Sampler Event today over at Scrapbook News & Review. There are a lot of fun projects to check out, including some great mini-tutorials. I can't wait to try making the Hot Cocoa Gift Pack (look under Classes & Inspiration).

You Warm My Heart

Here's another Christmas card featuring stamps from The Angel Company's Fall supplement. This cute little snowman is from "Merriest Wishes" - one of my favorite sets. (I just love snowmen!)
Supplies (all from TAC): Merriest Wishes stamp set, Kraft, Premium White and Brown cardstocks, Catelynn dp, Bazzill Monochromatic cardstock in Red-Violets and Greens, Palette Noir ink, Prismacolor pencils blended with OMS.

Sweet Sketch Wednesday

Hi there! It's time for another Sweet Sketch Wednesday challenge! Here's this week's sketch:




Our sponsor this week is a member of our SSW design team, Teri. For my card, I used this adorable Scottie dog from Teri. Check out her blog, Teri's Cards and Toppers, to see more of her adorable work.


Be sure to stop by Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog and check out the other design team members' cards. We'd love it if you'd play along with us with this week's sketch!

I'm Dreaming of a PINK Christmas...

I needed to come up with a few card ideas for an upcoming stamping get together. I think this one is my favorite. I used two of my favorite things - TAC's "Squirrely Girl" stamp set and lots of my favorite color, pink.


Supplies: Squirrely Girl and Elegant Snowflakes stamps, Uptown Girl dp, Bazzill Monochromatic cardstock in Red-Violets, Prismacolor pencils, Toile Pink and Noir Palette inks, buttons from Lemonade MM Blossoms & Buttons Box, pink Scrappers Floss, all from TAC (The Angel Company). Other: ultrafine glitter, Sakura glue pen.

Happy Halloween!

The jack-o-lanterns have been carved, Halloween candy bought and the weather should cooperate for trick-or-treating!

This is probably my last Halloween card for this year. My friend, Jenny, is on the Squigglefly design team. When I saw this Halloween card on her blog, I had to go check out the store. I bought the kitty version that Jenny used as well as this adorable puppy version. (I love how the green Scrappers' Floss mimics the look of the pumpkin vine!)


A fellow Angel, Julie, posted a link on her blog to this fun site: Candy Corn Treats. (Julie's Candy Corn Pudding is featured in the article.) There are lots of fun recipes! I'll be making more of my friend Courtney's Pumpkin Bars today. They disappear, well, like Halloween magic! :-)

High Hopes Challenge 50 - All About Kids

I thought this cute Santa with a puppy would make a cute kids' card. (In fact, it's probably going to be Ali's Christmas card this year.) So, here is my entry for the "All About Kids" challenge on the High Hopes blog:

Supplies: red cardbase is made from red PTI cardstock - Kraft cardstock from TAC - green swirl paper and red ribbon from Michaels. - Santa stamp from High Hopes (purchased through 7KidsCollegeFund) - "enjoy" is a stamp from TAC - image colored with COPIC markers.

Fab Friday

Welcome once again to Fab Friday! When I was blog hopping this week, I discovered an awesome blog, Simply Stamped. I love the clean & classy look of her projects. They are so pretty! I love how she uses unconventional colors like kraft in her Christmas cards. I'm going to have to try that out, too.

This morning I just finished assembling the Halloween card I was going to post last night. So, expect a few last Halloween cards tonight and tomorrow. Then, it's back to Christmas crafting for the December 5th craft show at Our Lady of Lourdes!

Yummy, Yummy!

Are you tired of Halloween and pumpkin cards yet? I hope not because I've got another Halloween card on tap tonight and I'm working on another one for tomorrow! :) I bought this adorable digi stamp, Yummy Frogs, from Pink Cat Studios.


The cute little circle image is one of the freebies I mentioned last Friday. You can find it here. (Note: I resized these quite a bit to have them fit the largest of my CM circle punches, which fits nicely inside the SU! scalloped circle punch.)

I got to use my new Mallow COPIC marker on Betty's dress. (It's blended with Amethyst for shadows.) Thank you, Diana, for recommending this color. I love it!

Sweet Sketch Wednesday #21

It's Wednesday, so you know what that means... another great Sweet Sketch Wednesday sketch! This week is a double challenge - a sketch and a color challenge.


In celebration of Halloween, you can choose between two different color challenges. This "traditional" color challenge or a Halloween color challenge:
I chose to do the Halloween color challenge, so I used a lot of orange in my card.


The pumpkins are from Inkadinkadoo. I just love anything swirly!

Now that you've seen my take on this week's challenges, be sure to stop by the SSW blog and check out all the other cards!

Pawprints on my heart

If you know me, you know I have a gigantic spot in my heart for animals. A fellow stamper & animal lover, Suzanne Dean, is offering some awesome blog candy if you help support her local animal shelter. Please check it out and consider helping her support this cause.

Hope Fights

I ran into a former scrapping & stamping buddy at the Hatton show and she told me that her cancer had returned. (She's been cancer free for several years.) I wanted to send her a card and when I ran across this image last week, I knew it was the perfect one for my card:


Hope Fights is one of the freebies that I shared with you on Friday. While she's not a freebie anymore, you can purchase her for a mere $2.50 on the Whimsie Doodles site and all proceeds go to support breast cancer research.

I'll be keeping my friend, Laura, in my thoughts. If you could send a few good thoughts her way, I'm sure she would appreciate it. Thanks!

Skiing Santa

No, this isn't your typical skiing Santa - he's on waterskiis! I just bought this stamp from 7 Kids College Fund. They just started carrying High Hopes stamps, so now there's a convenient vendor for those of us in the U.S.


This is my entry for High Hopes Challenge 49 - Non-Traditional Christmas. I think a waterskiing Santa is pretty non-traditional, don't you? :)

Fab Friday

Well, my own Friday did not start out so fabulous... I got rearended on my way to work this morning. Fortunately, there wasn't any damage to my car (can't say the same for the person who ran into me), but it still was not a good way to start the day.

Anyway... since my stamping time these days is pretty limited, I thought I'd try a new weekly feature, Fab Friday, where I share something fabulous (of course!) with you.

This week, I've got a bunch of FREE digital downloads to share. Free is always fab, right?

While blog hopping, I found these great Halloween digis. They would be cute as embellishments on a card or tags on Halloween treats.

Next up is an awesome download of black and white paper from The Angel Company. Check out their downloads page to find other great freebies, including their first set of free black and white digi paper.

My last find, Hope Fights, is fabulous... and not. It's a free digi image for Breast Cancer Awareness. It's fab that Whimsy Doodles is giving this cute image away. It's not fab that there are men and women facing this disease. :-( Today is the last day to download this freebie, so hopefully you're reading this in time.

Go check out these links and create something wonderful with your new FREE goodies! :)

Stamping Fun

Last night I had some local stamping friends over for a little Christmas card making session. As hostess, I had to come up with 3 cards ideas. I used 3 favorites from The Angel Company, including two new sets from the Fall supplement, Inspiration Avenue.

My first card was a simplified version of Jan Tin's beautiful snowflake card. I had intended to try her resist technique, but could not find my white gel pen. (Of course, you'd be lucky to find anything in my craft room, but that's another story...) So, necessity being the mother of invention, I simply stamped some white snowflakes with my Opaque White Staz-On (which unfortunately, didn't turn out very opaque -- it was really not my night!)

The little snowflake in the corner is a clear, iridescent Jesse James "button". (Can you really call them buttons if they don't have holes are were never meant to be anything but decorative?) Stamps: Ornamental Snowflakes, greeting from a previous hostess set (TAC)
Ink: Ranger Distress Ink in Faded Denim, Opaque White Staz-On

I knew I wanted to use Joyful Ornaments on my second card since I think it's so pretty and yet so quick to stamp with. (As much as I absolutely LOVE to color, it is time-consuming so a bold stamp is a nice alternative.) I was going through my supplies looking for a neglected item and found these premade cards from K&Co. I wasn't happy with the way these cards worked when I first tried them, but after scoring the layer at 5.5" and gluing the punched end together, the card opened up much nicer. I used some of my favorite papers on this card - Scarlet cardstock (the BEST red), Brown cardstock, and Reece dp, all from The Angel Company. The Joyful Ornaments are stamped in Moulin Rouge Palette ink and I used some Burnt Umber Palette ink to sponge on edges of the layers.

Since this card is large (the rectangular part of the card is 5 X 6 inches), I think this card would be perfect for putting a photo inside.

This was the last card that we made, which is based on Sketch 17 from the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog. I love snowmen, and this set, Merriest Wishes, has the most adorable snowmen & snowladies ever!

I used more TAC Scarlet cardstock, as well as some green Bazzill Monochromatics cs. The dp is from Hobby Lobby and the pink paper is just something from my scrap pile. (This card layout is good for using up those little strips of paper we stampers often find ourselves with.) The hearts are more Jesse James buttons and I used my COPIC markers to color in this snowlady. (I have to assume anyone wearing a hat with flowers and a shirt with ruffles is NOT a snowman, lol!)

Sweet Sketch Wednesday Sponsored by DigiStamp Boutique!

Yay! Sally-Ann Hancock of DigiStamp Boutique agreed to be one of our regular sponsors at the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog. I know you will all love her designs as much as I do!

Sally-Ann is sponsoring this week's sketch, #20:


Here's my take on the sketch using the adorable new Izzy the witch with her little feline friend:


The "Happy Halloween" stamp is from Inkdainkadoo. The Simple Spooky Stripes paper is from K I Memories and the orange dp is from The Paper Studio.

Be sure to visit the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog and check out the other DT members' cards!