Sunshine for the Nachos

Good morning, Nacho fans!  Are you ready for a fun new sketch from Nacho Average Challenges?  Because it's here right now:

Lots of possibilities with this sketch, so here's the card I came up with:

The card base is Bermuda Bay, but for some reason I could NOT get it to photograph well.  I tried it on three different days, in different places, with two different cameras, with natural light, and it still doesn't look right to me.

Maybe Tangelo Twist is interfering with my camera's sensor :D

So now it's your turn!  Be sure to upload your creation to the Nacho blog so we can all see it.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Ray of Sunshine
Ink:  Daffodil Delight. Tangelo Twist
Paper:  Bermuda Bay, Daffodil Delight, Tangelo Twist, Whisper White, Confetti Celebrations DSP
Accessories:  Circle punch, hexagon punch

The 'Stache

So have y'all heard of Mustache March?  Thank goodness my hubs doesn't participate, I am not at all fond of mustaches.  But when he's on deployment, well...

Pics on the left are obviously fake mustaches, though he does have a real one under there.  I found a pack of silly fake mustaches (see Hulk Hogan's on the upper right?) and sent them to the hubs as a joke, and then I got these pictures back.  Pics on the right are from when he came back home, gave me one mustachioed kiss (scratchy) and then immediately shaved it off.  Thank goodness.

Seems like most alphabet stamp sets don't have an apostrophe, so I used my Sizzix alphabet to make a mask and inked one up that way.  Pretty clever, I thought.

And there's my color palette:  Baked Brown Sugar, Soft Suede, and little bits of So Saffron and Old Olive with Basic Black accents.  Manly mustache-friendly colors.  I told my hubs if he wanted to do Mustache March, then I would do Armpit April...

Cheers, peeps!  I wish I could stay, but I really must dash.

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Well-Worn Alphabet, non-SU smaller alphabet
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Baked Brown Sugar, Soft Suede, Basic Black, Pocketful of Posies DSP
Accessories:  Mustache Framelit, Sizzix die (apostrophe)

Friday Flashback: Whimsical Alphabet

Ok, I really didn't do it on purpose, but somehow I drew the names of three alphabet stamp sets when I was grabbing the next batch of Friday Flashback stamp sets.  So get ready for another scrapalicious (and long) Friday Flashback featuring the Whimsical Alphabet!  And maybe the numbers, too :)

Also features Beyond the Basics

Several years ago there was a challenge on Splitcoast to make a scrapbook layout for a family.  The wife/mom of four had died unexpectedly; she was an avid scrapbooker but like pretty much all scrappers, she had thousands of photos unscrapped.  So I emailed the project coordinators and got a couple batches of photos and made two layouts; I left the journaling space blank so someone who knew the family could write there.

Also features Darling Dragons, Background Basics

Do you remember the TV show Dinosaurs?  With the baby dinosaur who always said "Not the mama!" to his dad?  Welllll, dragons are kinda like dinosaurs, right?

Here's a layout from Okinawa, when the hubs took a cheapo underwater camera with him on a scuba diving trip to see whale sharks.

Also features Simply Spring, Bunch o' Bugs, Bold Basics

There's my kiddos dressed up for Halloween!

Also features Simply Spring, Bunch o' Bugs

Or should I say, HOWLoween!

Also features Ancient Asia

I know you've seen this one before, it does seem to keep popping up.

And here's a funny card for ya featuring the Whimsical numbers.

Also features Happy Hearts, Dream Come True

I don't much like the color scheme on this one, but I think the idea was cute and I do like how I stamped the "love" on it.

Also features Mixed Bouquet

I kinda miss Apricot Appeal.  Or Peach Parfait.  I wouldn't mind having another pale orange in the next set of In Colors.

Also features Lovely Leaves

I did this layout not too long after I started stamping, it's one of the first scrapbook layouts I made with stamps.  So you know I've had this alphabet for a long time.

Also features Wanted, Bronc Buster

I think this is the only time I've ever decorated a gift bag :)

Also features Sweet Treats, Background Basics

And this one was on here recently too, when I did the Sweet Treats Friday Flashback.  So yep, I think I've gotten some good use out of this alphabet, and for today's new project I have another layout:

Yay!  Love happy layouts!  This was from lil girl's first birthday party, and her daddy has a July birthday too so he got his own Over the Hill pie.

Closeup of the title.  Since I didn't do mixed fonts, I did two colors:  Pumpkin Pie and Rose Red.   This layout is also the maiden voyage for Be the Star, which I just got recently.  I think the sketchy style of the stars paired nicely with the alphabet.

And there's my color palette:  Pretty in Pink (retired), Regal Rose (retired), Rose Red, Pumpkin Pie, and Gable Green (retired).  This is why I love my color swatch book, it reminds me to use retired colors for my layouts.  Searching through all my paper scraps for this layout is what made me organize all of them this week.  So glad THAT's done, it was ridiculous.

That's it for me, peeps.  Cheers to a great weekend!

Supplies, last layout only:
Stamps:  Whimsical Alphabet Upper & Lower, Be the Star
Ink:  Pumpkin Pie, Green Galore, Rose Red ink pad & marker
Paper:  Pretty in Pink, Gable Green, Whisper White, Sweet Always DSP, Party Animal SSK
Accessories:  Stars Framelits

Lloyd the Lumberjack

Howdy, peeps!  I'm feeling much better today, I'm happy to report.  But for the past few days I've been doing battle with my patterned paper scraps...as my DSP collection has edged toward the ridiculous, so too has my stack o' scraps, and it was taking me forever and a day to find the scraps I wanted.  So I fixed that.  Sure, it took three days, but now I'm Organized.

So today's card is one I made a while back, once more for Missy because she still doesn't love Lloyd the Lumberjack.  (Lloyd the Llumberjack?)

My mother is concerned that Lloyd's pants are very tight, and colored in with Coastal Cabana I have to admit they look like manpris.  But I like Lloyd anyway.

This is once again a version of the Nacho Average Challenges sketch from a few weeks ago:

Lurves that sketch :)

That's it for me today, peeps.  Peace out!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wood You Be Mine?  Starburst Sayings
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Coastal Cabana, Crushed Curry, Calypso Coral, Smoky Slate, various Blendabilities which are now discontinued
Paper:  Calypso Coral, Crushed Curry, Whisper White, Best Year Ever DSP
Accessories:  Starburst & Circles Framelits, Dimensionals

Easter Tulips

Man, am I running behind today.  I haven't been feeling too well today; I didn't even get out of bed until very nearly eleven o'clock.  I'm feeling a little better after taking my doglets for a walk...it is beautiful weather today.  And I just finally got a quick CAS card finished to share today.

I used the sketch from Create with Connie and Mary, and I missed the linky cutoff by a few hours, darn.

I knew exactly what I wanted to do with the Painted Petals tulips, so I just picked a punch that would accommodate them and the sentiment, and this card was finished in about five seconds.  Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Cheers, peeps!  Hope you're having a great afternoon.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Painted Blooms, Teeny Tiny Wishes
Ink:  So Saffron, Pistachio Pudding, Wisteria Wonder
Paper:  Whisper White, All Abloom DSP stack
Accessories:  Decorative Label punch

Nachos: Big News, Baby

Happy Nacho day, peeps!  This week, Nacho Average Challenges has a perfectly wonderful, springy, Easter-iffic color combination for you to try:

I thought this combo was so easy to work with, I finished my card in probably about ten minutes.  So here's what I made:

Figured  I might as well continue to stock up on baby cards!  :)  Sure, there's pink on here, but I don't think that keeps this from being a good boy baby card.  The inside says "Congratulations" from the same stamp set; I might need to make a couple more of these.  The button and twine are both SU!, but are retired styles.  I'm very slow about using up buttons in particular.

So now it's your turn!  Check out the Nacho blog for more cute card creations, and then make your own.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Big News
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Pool Party, Blushing Bride, So Saffron
Paper:  Pool Party, Blushing Bride, So Saffron, Whisper White
Accessories:  Sweetheart punch, Chevron EF, Dimensionals, retired button & twine

Last Day in London

It's a rainy day where I am today, so I thought I'd share some London scrapbook pages,  even though the popular belief that England is dull, gray, and rainy 99% of the time is totally not true.  After all, check out what gorgeous weather we had on our last day there:

Sunny with a side of beautiful.  This was the first day of July last year, before the hubs and I flew back to Texas to surprise our parents (and I already scrapped that too).  My mom sent me that cool London stamp so I had to use it for my title here (click the photo to see it bigger, I forgot to take a closeup shot of the title).  And like on my Beijing Hard Rock layout, I did a circle behind the title.

My color palette is sort of like Superman-meets-Christmas.  I'm not a billion percent thrilled with it, but I think it gets the job done, so okay.

Guess I'm driving up to the gym today to run on the treadmill since I don't fancy running in the rain.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Rough Edges Alphabet, London stamp non-SU!
Ink:  Pacific Point, Cherry Cobbler, Night of Navy marker
Paper:  So Saffron, Cherry Cobbler, Pacific Point, Whisper White, Season of Style DSP, Wild Wasabi DSP
Accessories:  Circles Framelits

Friday Flashback: Rough Type

Happy Friday, peeps!  Do I say that every week?  Well, regardless, Fridays should be happy because it's Friday Flashback day :)  This week's retired stamp set is Rough Type, which is an alphabet I've used a LOT on my scrapbooks so today is a longer Flashback and I didn't even include absolutely everything I've ever used it on.  So let's go!

My Captain America layout from my brother's return home from deployment, probably one of my mom's all-time fave layouts I've ever shared here :)

Also features Grunge Rock & Extreme Elements

You saw this one recently, from the Beijing Hard Rock Cafe.

Also features Bronc Buster

Oh hey, a card!  And I made it in my dad and brother's college colors (orange and black for Oklahoma State).

Also features Ocean Commotion

More scrapbook pages, this time from the aquarium in Okinawa.  I love Ocean Commotion...but I digress, today's Flashback is for Rough Type!  So this was actually I think the first time I punched out the letters with the 1/2" circle punch, but I did it again on the Hard Rock layout above.

Also features Ancient Asia

You'll notice I use this alphabet on my China pages a lot; to make the pages feel like they all "go" together, I'm using that calligraphy letter template and the Rough Type alphabet on each layout.

Also features Out West & Wanted

It's just a coincidence that the only two cards on today's Friday Flashback feature cowboys and the word "howdy".

More Okinawa pages, and again with the circle-punched letters.

Also features Circle Circus

This was the very first layout I did for my China scrapbooks :)  Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

Wow, lots of Okinawa pictures here too.  Actually this layout has been modified since I took this picture, I added some of the dragons from Ancient Asia on the left-hand page.

Also features Letterpress Alphabet, Carry On, Toxic Treats, Elementary Elegance

Finally a layout from England!  And also one of my faves, I love the crowns and the ravens on here.

Another China layout you saw pretty recently, and that's the end of the Flashback part.  So here's today's brand new scrapbook layout, this time from Wales:

And here's a closeup of the Rough Type bit:

The top part is a Sizzlits alphabet, which is a total pain to use because it's always got little cling-on bits on the edges that you have to clean up and it's so tiny that it's hard to glue down without having extra glue everywhere but I just needed to use it for today's layout.  I kinda wish they'd made an uppercase version of Rough Type, though as you can see it bothers me not at all to use just the lowercase letters.

And there's my springy color palette:  Crisp Cantaloupe, So Saffron, Wild Wasabi, and Night of Navy.  I kinda wondered about using Crisp Cantaloupe for the page base, and no idea why I thought of it, but I did like how it looked with the other colors once I finished the layout, nice and springy.  And now I'm almost out of So Saffron cardstock :)

So I hope you enjoyed this scrappin' queen-sized Friday Flashback.  Have a great weekend and cheers, peeps!

Supplies, last layout only:
Stamps:  Rough Type Alphabet
Ink:  Night of Navy
Paper:  Crisp Cantaloupe, So Saffron, Afternoon Tea DSP
Accessories:  Sizzlits Alphabet

Birthday Confetti

Mornin', peeps!  It's a rainy day here in Alabama but that's okay, I think my card today could be a stand-in for the sun it's so bright.

Am I right?  That, my friends, is Tangelo Twist in action.  It should almost come with a warning label ;)  But I do like it for birthday cards.  This one is a triple threat too, the confetti paper on the bottom means it counts for Around the World's confetti challenge:

And I used the color combination from The Color Throwdown:

Tangelo Twist, Night of Navy, and a bit of a stretch to call that Calypso Coral (really, it looks more Regal Rose to me, but I was going with the Birthday Bash papers).

I also used the Mojo Monday sketch for this week:

Yep, triple challenge.  So that's it for this rainy Thursday, but I'll be back tomorrow to finish off the week with the Friday Flashback.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Big Day
Ink:  Tangelo Twist, Night of Navy, Calypso Coral, Smoky Slate
Paper:  Tangelo Twist, Night of Navy, Whisper White, Birthday Bash DSP
Accessories:  Stars Framelits, Itty Bitty Punch Pack star, Dimensionals

Yeah Baby

Seems like half my friends are announcing pregnancies on Facebook, and just about all of them are having boys (probably the rest are too, they just don't know it yet).  So I need some baby cards!

I admit, I wanted to do the Yeah Baby card because of that bitty stamp in the long-retired A Little Love.   I don't have any current SU! baby images, so I broke out my old fave Baby Tees for this one.

My perfectly boyish colors are courtesy of Colour Me...!

And I used this week's sketch from Freshly Made Sketches:

Well, time to get back to the ol' craft room and create something else :)  I need to do a card for tomorrow but I've got ideas for my next scrapbook layout, so we'll see which one I do first.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Alphabet Rotary, Baby Tees (retired)
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Sahara Sand, Marina Mist, So Saffron
Paper:  Whisper White, Sahara Sand, Marina Mist, So Saffron
Accessories:  Labels & Banners Framelits, Alphabet Press EF, Dimensionals