Thankful Bear

Mornin, peeps!  How's the weather where you are?  We might need a canoe by the week's end here.  I don't mind the rain though, there's something lovely about a rainy day when you don't have to go anywhere.  Though I must say my poor hubs was drenched last night from his bike ride home from the metro station.

Anyway, on to other matters....like today's card!

 I love this bear.  Well, my college mascot is a bear, so there's that, and also he's just so stinkin' cute.  And I finally broke into the Into the Woods DSP that I've been hoarding for, like, a month.

I started out with the latest color combo from Fab Friday:

It's been a while since I played along over there and I always hate to miss their challenges, so yay for getting this one done.  I did use Early Espresso for the bear and the sentiment though just to make them more Baylor bear-y.  But the background is Soft Suede.

Speaking of challenges I haven't played along with for a while, how about the Sketch Frenzy Friday crew:

I like it.  I kinda thought I should draw a little flower in the bear's hand so I could make a visual triangle with Rich Razzleberry elements, but I didn't do it.  I was chicken to mess it up I guess :p

Anyway, this chicken is off to go work on some scrapbook pages.  Yep, I started scrapping again yesterday!  Very exciting.  Cheers, peeps!  Or should that be cheeps, peers?

At least I amuse myself...

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Thankful Forest Friends, Petite Petals
Ink:  Early Espresso, Rich Razzleberry
Paper:  Old Olive, Early Espresso, Whisper White, Into the Woods DSP
Accessories:  Oval Framelits, Petite Petals punch, Dimensional, Brights Candy Dots

4, 3, 2, 1...NACHO

Howdy, folks!  Are ya ready for another great Nacho Average Sketch challenge?  Because it is upon us!

I really wanted to use Haunt Ya Later again but I figured I did three cards with it last week so let's do something different.  So here's what I made:

This is a 4-3-2-1 card, which I didn't think about until it was done.  Take a look:

4 colors of cardstock--Mint Macaron, Cajun Craze, Delightful Dijon, Very Vanilla
3 stamp sets--Lighthearted Leaves, A Dozen Thoughts, French Filigree
2 Framelits--leaf and circle
1 color of ink (and also one Candy Dot)

Honestly the thing that took the longest with this card was deciding how I wanted to orient the leaf in relation to the sentiment banner.  I chose the colors on a whim--they just seemed like an interesting combination.  I had to pull French Filigree out of retirement for the background...I looked through the entire current catalog and couldn't find anything that would have worked as well as French Filigree so I went with it.

So now it's your turn!  Take this fabulous sketch for a whirl and show us what you've got on the Nacho blog.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Lighthearted Leaves, A Dozen Thoughts, French Filigree (retired)
Ink:  Cajun Craze
Paper:  Mint Macaron, Cajun Craze, Delightful Dijon, Very Vanilla
Accessories:  Leaflets & Circles Framelits, Dimensionals, Neutral Candy Dot

Baby Books: Twin Boys

Scrappy Monday, peeps!  I'm back with another baby book layout.  My goal this week is to work on scrapbook pages for myself...it would be nice to have a few layouts done before I start the next baby book.  But anyway!

Twin boys...that about says it all.  These boys should be arriving in the next few weeks.  Let's take a closeup look at the journaling block:

The globe is from a stamp set called Love You More that was available for like one month a year or two ago.  I cut it apart from its sentiment ("you mean the world to me") and instead paired it with one from the new stamp set Happy Happenings, which I bought specifically for this layout and I love it.  It has lots of other great sentiments too (I love the "Hello Handsome" and "Bonjour Beautiful" ones!) so I'm sure I'll be using it for lots of things besides baby books.

Today's color palette includes Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Calypso Coral, Pool Party, Basic Gray, and Whisper White.

Well kids, I've got dogs to walk and errands to run.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Love You More, Happy Happenings
Ink:  Basic Gray, Pool Party, Lucky Limeade, Calypso Coral
Paper:  Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Calypso Coral, Whisper White, Sent with Love DSP
Accessories:  Sizzix Alphabet

Friday Flashback: Announcements

Friday Flashback time!  This week's retired stamp set is Announcements, and this Flashback is on the short side.

Ok wow I got some bad pictures of these baby book pages.  It seems like I always do baby books in pairs (and one time I did three at once), but unless I'm doing twin books I don't necessarily make the pages exactly identical.

See, same basic layout with boyish colors first and then more girly colors second.  The umbrella, bear, and little toy conga line are all from Announcements.  And to my consternation that's all I had in the archives for this stamp set; I could swear I'd used it more than that.  But anyway, here's the new card on the block:

And this one is a triple challenge card.  First up, the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches:

I followed the sketch, but I tweaked it to be a 4-inch square card since the image and the sentiment are both pretty small.

Next up, the Global Design Project theme of the week:

And finally, the Just Add Ink challenge to use your three favorite colors.  Green is my favorite color, purple is my second favorite, and hot pink seemed to work with those two and I liked it.  But if you ask me tomorrow you might get three different colors.

One more note:  it took me two tries to get my main banner how I wanted it, and this is a closeup of the first try.  On this one I just used Rich Razzleberry ink and then tried watercoloring, but it smudged the lines (it actually looks smudgier in real life).  So when I redid it, I tried my new favorite trick of inking up the stamp with Versamark first, then the colored ink, and embossing with clear EP.  Voila, no more smudges.

And now I believe I might make like a baby and take a nap.  Cheers, y'all.

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Announcements
Ink:  Rich Razzleberry, Melon Mambo, Versamark
Paper:  Rich Razzleberry, Melon Mambo, Whisper White, Cucumber Crush DSP
Accessories:  Banners Framelits, Itty Bitty Punch Pack, half a Dimensional, eyelet lace border punch (retired), Rose Red grosgrain ribbon (retired), Clear EP

Strawberry the Cat

Hey peeps, how's your Thursday going?  I'm tired.  Since my little boy dog can't go up and down stairs due to his leg injury, the hubs and I have been sleeping on an air mattress in the basement because we're the special kind of dog parents who do things like that.  We have a nice air mattress, but it's still an air mattress, and I don't think the hubs is sleeping any better than I am.  Sigh.

But anyway, you're here to see some stampy artwork, not hear about the trials and tribulations of injured dog care.

Meet Strawberry, who is Stella and Stefan's cat.  Why'd they name a black cat Strawberry?  Who knows why a witch and a vampire (even cute ones) do anything.  Yes, I'm slightly obsessed with this stamp set.  I haven't used the pumpkin stamp yet...

Meet this week's Color Throwdown:

I used Old Olive, Daffodil Delight, Whisper White, and Basic Black.  Sure, it woulda been Halloweenier if I'd used orange, but I was going with the challenge colors here.

And I used this week's Retro Sketch, it's been a while since I played along over there:

Can I just say how much I love those Hello You Thinlits dies?  They're pretty spec-fabulous.  There are some other word dies in the holiday catalog that I like but I haven't ordered, so for now I shall continue to use the Hello You ones and talk about how much I love them.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Haunt Ya Later
Ink:  Basic Black, Pink Pirouette, Smoky Slate & Old Olive Blendabilities (I know they're retired, I just don't care)
Paper: Basic Black, Thick Whisper White, Old Olive, Daffodil Delight
Accessories:  Circles Framelits, Hello You Thinlits, Dimensionals

Special added bonus today!  I finished the birthday party invitations for my friend Sarah over the weekend and mailed them off Monday.  I slightly tweaked the design before I made the whole set, so here is the final product:

I like it.  I inked up my Pale Plum ink pad because it was a bit dried out, and I added in the little flowers on the background and then some Rich Razzleberry sponging around the white panel.  I think it was just the extra touch these cards needed.

That's it for me today, peeps.  See you tomorrow for the Friday Flashback.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Fall Fest, Priceless, A Dozen Thoughts
Ink:  Tangelo Twist, Old Olive, Rich Razzleberry, Pale Plum, Basic Black
Paper:  Rich Razzleberry, Pear Pizzazz, Basic Black, Whisper White, Old Olive DSP
Accessories:  Fall Fun Framelits, Dimensionals

Fangtastic Stefan

Hey peeps.  I'm running a little bit behind with today's card, but I think it turned out pretty cute.

Meet Stella's friend Stefan!  Isn't he adorable?  I've dubbed him Stefan after a vampire in the Mercedes Thompson books; that Stefan has a VW van painted like the Mystery Machine in Scooby Doo and he's friendly and hilarious.  Which seemed like good qualities for our lil friend here.

I used the latest ColourQ challenge:

Only I switched out Going Gray for Smoky Slate, Really Rust for Cajun Craze, and Summer Starfruit for Delightful Dijon so I only used current colors (they're really not too far off of the colors in the swatch above).  But then I used retired ribbon and the retired skintone Blendabilities *rolls eyes*

I also used this week's Mojo Monday sketch:

Heyyyy, I stuck really close to the sketch this time, yay me.

Well, my friend Tiana challenged me on Fitbit to get more steps this week, so I've got to go kick some booty.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Haunt Ya Later
Ink:  Basic Black, Basic Gray, Smoky Slate, Cajun Craze, Delightful Dijon, Skintone Blendabilities
Paper:  Basic Gray, Cajun Craze, Thick Whisper White, Delightful Dijon DSP
Accessories:  Circles & Lots of Labels Framelits, Basic Black taffeta (retired), Neutrals Candy Dots, Dimensionals

Nachos: Faboolous Stella

Howdy, peeps!  Does it feel like fall where you are yet?  We're starting to get there, I love the cooler temps.  And Halloween candy has already made its appearance in all the stores, which is trouble ;)  Far less trouble is today's Halloween-inspired color combo brought to you by the Nacho Average Challenges crew!

Do you love it?  I love it.  It doesn't *have* to be for a Halloween project, but I just got what is most likely the cutest set of Halloween stamps ever so I had to use them.

Meet Stella.  I heart Stella.  She's from the holiday catalog stamp set Haunt Ya Later, which also has a cute vampire, a kitty, a pumpkin, and several sentiment stamps, but I had to pair her with the "faboolous" stamp from Six Sayings (also in the holiday catalog).

I used my blender pens to color in Stella, and then added some Dazzling Details to her star necklace because what's more fabulous than sparkles?  I cut Stella out and put her on one of the Lots of Labels Framelit shapes along with my fabulous sentiment.  Some polka dot paper and the card was done, woohoo!

Your turn now!  Let's see your Nacho-riffic creations...upload to the Nacho blog for us to ooh and ahh over.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Haunt Ya Later, Six Sayings, Be the Star
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Tangelo Twist, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Smoky Slate, Skin Tone Blendabilities (I know they're retired, but mine work!)
Paper:  Basic Black, Whisper White, Tangelo Twist DSP
Accessories:  Lots of Labels Framelits, Dazzling Details, Dimensionals

Baby Books: November

Welcome to the start of another week, peeps.  Here's hoping this one starts out better than the last one ended...our lil boy dog hurt his leg and we found out he needs surgery (the same surgery our lil girl dog had a few years ago...twice) and *then* we found out he's got some kind of liver dysfunction we have to figure out how to deal with before he can have any kind of surgery.  It was an expensive weekend.

But let's talk baby books.  We're truckin' right along with the layouts here since I still haven't done any scrapping for myself since we moved.  But hey, I did make 64 total pages for the two baby books and the mama has received them and she likes them, so whee.

And here's the layout for November.  I used some of my favorite fall paper, Orchard Harvest.

And there's my favorite scarecrow from Happy Fall Y'all.  I got him the first year I started stamping and I have used him several times in baby books because he's just so cute.

There's the embellished journaling block with another fave, Falling Leaves.

And the rather large color palette: Cajun Craze, Island Indigo, More Mustard, Early Espresso, Raspberry Ripple, Old Olive, Soft Sky, Soft Suede, and Very Vanilla.  It happens that the patterned paper I used has a lot of different colors in it, and then I added a couple more to color in the scarecrow.

So...next up we take Vader to the vet for a sonogram, and let's hope we get some good news today.  Cheers, peeps.

Supplies, almost all SU!
Stamps:  Happy Fall Y'all, Falling Leaves
Ink:  Versamark, Cajun Craze, More Mustard, Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Raspberry Ripple, Early Espresso, Soft Suede, Soft Sky
Paper:  Cajun Craze, More Mustard, Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Very Vanilla, watercolor paper, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  Labels Framelits, Festive Paper Piercing Pack, Early Espresso EP, Sizzix Alphabet

Friday Flashback: Choo Choo

Howdy, folks!  It's time once again for a Friday Flashback, and this week's stamp set is Choo Choo.  Let's take a look, shall we?

Also features Big Deal Alphabet

I've done a few name frames, but not a lot.  The ribbon is actually the denim ribbon SU! sold a few years ago, it's not black like it looks in the picture.

Also features Loads of Love

A friend of mine wanted to use the Choo Choo train to make Christmas cards one year so this was the idea I came up with to help her out.  The packages from Loads of Love are sized just right for this train :)  But that's all the archives had to offer, so let's look at today's new piece:

It's a baby book layout from the books I just finished.  My friend the mama asked for one layout to document all the twins' milestones like first tooth, first laugh, etc. so this is what I made.  I thought the train was cute and slightly punny with *mile*stones and I used some patterned paper that kinda reminded me of train tracks a little bit.  The white tags with the stars aren't stuck down, so mama can use them to label each picture if she wants or she can choose to only write on the journaling block.  Options.

And there's a closeup of the train.  The animals are from the stamp set I Dig You, which comes up on another baby book layout (but I didn't use the animals on that one).  I got the new Basic Black ink pad from the holiday mini catalog and it is a nice crisp black!  And non-smeary.  Love it.

There's my color palette:  Crushed Curry, Real Red, Pacific Point (I tried Coastal Cabana first but it just didn't work), Basic Gray, Soft Suede, Basic Black, Smoky Slate, and Whisper White.  Of course a few of those colors are only used on the train but hey, they were used.

That's it for me this week, peeps.  We're going to the baseball game tonight, woo!  Cheers!

Supplies, baby book layout only:
Stamps:  Choo Choo, I Dig You, Banner Blast (small stars)
Ink:  Crushed Curry, Real Red, Pacific Point, Soft Suede, Basic Black, Smoky Slate
Paper:  Crushed Curry, Real Red, Pacific Point, Whisper White, Confetti Celebration DSP
Accessories:  Sizzix alphabet, medium star punch, key tag punch

Pumpkins, Two Ways

The day after I finished the baby books, a friend of mine asked if I would make invitations for her daughter's birthday party...and said lil girl is a Halloween baby.  She requested purple and pumpkins, so here's what I came up with first:

Halloween colors, and a pumpkin, but still girly with the swirls in the background.  I used this week's new Global Design Project sketch:

Buuut that wasn't exactly what Sarah was looking for so here's my second try:

Sarah really liked the pumpkins I did on her daughter's baby book, so she wanted something similar to that.  I think this needs some sponging around the white panel though...I did sponge on some Pale Plum ink but it's too pale :)  Anyway, baby book.

And a closeup of the pumpkins and swirls:

The space is much smaller on a card front, and I used the pumpkins from last year's Fall Fest instead of my old favorite Carved & Candlelit because of the matching Framelits.  But anyway, there isn't room on a card front to do the swirls the exact same way so I just did them on the entire panel, and we'll see if that meets with her approval.

Anywha, for the second card I used the new Freshly Made Sketch:

So that's your two-fer today, and now I'm craving pumpkin coffee cake.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, first card:
Stamps:  Fall Fest, A Dozen Thoughts, Soft Swirls
Ink:  Pumpkin Pie, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Whisper White
Paper:  Rich Razzleberry, Basic Black, Pale Plum, Whisper White, Cottage Garden DSP
Accessories:  Circles & Fall Fest Framelits, Dimensionals

Supplies, second card:
Stamps:  Fall Fest, A Dozen Thoughts, Priceless
Ink:  Tangelo Twist, Old Olive, Rich Razzleberry, Memento Tuxedo Black
Paper:  Rich Razzleberry, Basic Black, Pear Pizzazz, Whisper White, Old Olive DSP
Accessories:  Fall Fest Framelits, Dimensionals

Trees Can Be Blue

I've said this before, but one of the fun things about stamping is that you're not bound by anyone else's rules for what colors things can be.  Bright purple leaves?  Sure, why not!  Green-skinned witches?  Totally!  How about a blue tree?

I LIKE IT.  Fun and different, right?  So here's the Create with Connie and Mary color combo that inspired my blue tree:

I really wanted to make something with these colors because I haven't hardly touched Delightful Dijon since it debuted.  But it is a fall color to me, so it'll probably get more action now.

My original idea was to stamp more of the leafy bits around the edges...

But then I thought it made my card look like it has measles, which isn't really what I was going for.  And not until I saw the photos on the computer did I think that maybe I would have liked this better on a So Saffron card base.  D'oh!  That happens a lot, I think of something I might have wanted to do differently when I'm uploading on the computer.  But a.) I'm lazy and b.) it's two flights of stairs from my computer to my craft room.  So the card base is staying Delightful Dijon, but at least it doesn't have measles.

Hold up a minute...

Theeeeerrrre it is, much mo' bettah.  And this time I did the little splotches more spread out instead of covering everything, and I like it better now.  It's like Goldilocks, and this one's juuuust right.

Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Sheltering Tree
Ink:  Delightful Dijon, So Saffron, Night of Navy
Paper:  Delightful Dijon, So Saffron, Night of Navy, Very Vanilla
Accessories:  None.  Really!  It's a flat card and I hand-cut the flagged end of the sentiment.

Nachos: Let's Rope Some Sea Turtles

Happy Tuesday and welcome to another fabulous Nacho Average Sketch Challenge!  Apparently I'm not the only one who's scared of gray and brown together, we only had one brave soul take on our last color challenge.  So I hope today's sketch is more approachable:

Keep it simple or gussy it up, this is a great sketch.  And so I broke out a brand-new-to-me stamp set and made this:

Squee!  I love it.  It's a little hard to tell, but the sea turtle is stamped on watercolor paper (I did that thing where I inked up the stamp with Versamark and then a colored ink, stamped, and then heat embossed) and then I used an AquaPainter to paint him and the background.  Yep, the whole image panel is painted with Pool Party ink, though it's hard to tell in the picture.  I tried to give it some different shading here and there so it wouldn't be just flat blue, it looks better IRL.  The sentiment is from the August My Paper Pumpkin kit, I love that font and it fit just perfectly under the sea turtle.  But then I needed something to balance it out on the other side, so I grabbed a few Candy Dots and done!

I like how the Pool Party panel works too, I stamped off Old Olive ink and then stamped the splats from Gorgeous Grunge on it, and it reminds me of the turtle's pebbly skin.  The banner is made from some retired Island Indigo DSP because why shouldn't I use up some older scraps (and also because I've ordered the new DSP stack in Regals, but I don't have it yet).

This sea turtle image reminds me of everyone's favorite pirate captain, whom I once met in Tokyo.  Don't believe me?  Take a look:

Captain Jack Sparrow was marooned on an island and roped a couple sea turtles to escape.  : D

Okay, now it's your turn to take on this sketch challenge!  Don't forget to upload your creation on the Nacho blog.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  From Land to Sea, My Paper Pumpkin August 2015, Gorgeous Grunge
Ink:  Old Olive, Pool Party, Soft Suede, Versamark
Paper:  Old Olive, Pool Party, Watercolor paper, Island Indigo DSP
Accessories:  Clear EP, Deco Labels & Banners Framelits, Brights & Regals Candy Dots

Baby Books: October

Mornin', peeps.  Why do Monday mornings have to come so much earlier than other mornings?  Oy.

Anyway, let's start the week off with some more baby book pages, since those are the only scrapbook pages I've done since we moved to Virginia.  But I should have 6 to 8 weeks to work on my own books before the next baby book kicks off.  Anyway...

Yay October!  This was the first layout I did for the twin boys' baby books (which went out in the mail last Friday, thankyouverymuch).  Their mama told me that "Pastels are for wussies!" so I decided to go very bold for this layout.  How much do I love that orange and black mosaic pattern!!

And there are three of the Googly Ghouls for you.  This time around on the books, I tried to incorporate more circles and shapes on the layouts rather than sticking solely to squares and rectangles.  I think it makes the books more visually appealing.

Also appealing:  the very bright (really, this picture doesn't do it justice) Cucumber Crush on black cardstock.  That green is awesome for Halloween!!

One more detail shot, there's a bat from Spooky Bingo Bits.

And the color palette:  Basic Black, Cucumber Crush, Pumpkin Pie, Rich Razzleberry, and Whisper White.  Love it.

Something else I love:  it's starting to feel like fall here.  The hubs and I spent several hours wandering around Old Town Alexandria yesterday and I didn't feel like I was going to melt!  I think I'll be making some pumpkin coffee cake for breakfast on October first.  Pumpkin cheers, y'all!

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Googly Ghouls, Spooky Bingo Bits
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Pumpkin Pie, Cucumber Crush, Rich Razzleberry
Paper:  Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie, Cucumber Crush, Rich Razzleberry, Whisper White, Creepy Crawly DSP
Accessories:  Circles Framelits, Sizzix Alphabet