Fastest Watercolor in the West

Mornin', y'all!  How's your fine Tuesday going?  I'm hoping that today will be slightly less soggy than yesterday.  I got poured on twice and did swim lessons with the kid, so lots of water.

And also I watercolored for today's card!  Lookie:

This is a QUADRUPLE challenge card too.  First up is the photo inspiration from Just Us Girls:

That's why I chose the flower from Beautiful Day, and I used the colors Grapefruit Grove, watered-down Granny Apple Green, and a little bit of Poppy Parade and Shaded Spruce.

Next up is the Sunday Stamps sketch:

And just to make things interesting, the Inkspirational speed stamping challenge:

Believe it or not, I made this card in 9 minutes and 54 seconds, including cutting the cardstock and doing the embossing and watercoloring.  I had all my supplies picked out and out on my table when I started so I could stamp like the wind.  I intentionally did a very, very fast watercolor on the stamped image (I inked up the stamp with Versamark, then Grapefruit Grove, stamped, and then heat embossed so it wouldn't run when I watercolored) and didn't worry about trying to make it look perfect, and I actually like this style because it feels more organic and spontaneous.  And I always feel like I'm under a time crunch because who KNOWS when my son is going to wake up from a nap.

Finally, the As You See It challenge was easy peasy:

I am TOTALLY obsessed with the Tropical Escape DSP.  It was the #1 thing I wanted when I first got to see the new SU! catalog (is it new still if it's been out for two months?).  I wish this paper was 12x12 because I would use it on ALL THE THINGS in my scrapbooks.  And I love the coordinating Tropical Chic stamp set too, which is where my greeting is from.

Hope you have a great day, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Beautiful Day, Tropical Chic
Ink:  Grapefruit Grove, Poppy Parade, Granny Apple Green, Shaded Spruce, Versamark
Paper:  Grapefruit Grove, Poppy Parade, Shaded Spruce, Thick Whisper White, Tropical Escape DSP
Accessories:  Clear EP, Dimensionals

Bath Time for Sadie

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  And today I have one of my most recent scrappy finishes...

Bath time for Sadie when she was but a wee pup!  Like, 12 years ago.  So I just finished the pages but the photos themselves are pretty old.  At least I'm getting them done?  Anyway, I could have SWORN I had a rubber duck die cut somewhere, from back in the day when we had locally owned scrapbook stores and they had racks and racks of die cut shapes of just about anything you can imagine, but apparently I imagined the duck.  So I found some clip art on the computer and just printed it on Daffodil Delight cardstock.  I hope that the printer ink doesn't flake off the cardstock...

Something else to make you giggle:  see that pink cup the hubs is using to pour water on Sadie?  We're using that EXACT SAME CUP now when we give the kiddo baths.

Today's color palette includes Pool Party, Bermuda Bay, Pumpkin Pie, Daffodil Delight, and Whisper White.  Plus a fair amount of Basic Black on Sadie and the journaling.

Hope your week is off to a good start.  I'm excited to go to the gym in my new workout pants!  ...It's weird what adults get excited about.  Cheers!

Supplies:
Stamps:  Big Deal Alphabet, Big Pieces
Ink:  Pumpkin Pie, Daffodil Delight, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Pool Party, Bermuda Bay, Daffodil Delight, Whisper White, Pumpkin Pie DSP
Accessories:  rubber duck clip art, circle punch

China: Li River Cruise, Part 1

It's China Sunday, y'all!  First up I've got two layouts that I've shared before, and then a new one for this week.

So let's start with Rosemary's Cafe:

Love that bright green page base here (thank you Missy for wearing that green shirt).  Next up was a visit to the pagodas next to a lake:

It's rather unusual that I do scrapbook layouts with fewer than five photos...most of the time I'm trying to squeeze in upwards of eight, so these two are a nice switch.  Plus since we probably won't go back to China again, I didn't want to skip anything in my albums :)

New photos!  This was the hubs' favorite part of our entire trip to China:

See the original pics here.  This is just the first layout of three for the river cruise, I'll share the other two next week.

Today's color palette includes Crumb Cake, Crushed Curry, Island Indigo, Garden Green (mostly in the photos), Basic Black, and Whisper White.  Why is it that so many of my scrapbook pages feature green and yellow together?  I blame Missy for infecting my brain with Baylor colors as the scrapbook default :)  I tease.  It's a bit less obvious on this layout anyway since the green is mostly in the pictures.

I'm going to finish my cranberry orange coffee cake while the hubs is distracting Ryan.  It's okay to eat cake for breakfast if you call it a coffee cake!

Supplies, last layout only:
Stamps:  Rough Type, Best of Shelli
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Crushed Curry, Garden Green
Paper:  Crumb Cake, Island Indigo, Crushed Curry, Whisper White, Perfectly Artistic DSP
Accessories:  lettering template, circle punches

Target Inspiration

Happy Friday, y'all!  I've got a bright and cheery card to help us coast into the weekend.

Last week I saw a cup at Target that said "Squeeze the day" on it, and I actually wrote the phrase down on a Post-It Note stuck to the Lemon Zest stamp case so I'd remember it the next time I came across a good sketch to use it.  And happily for me, Freshly Made Sketches delivered one this week:

My orange was inked up with Mango Melody and then I used a sponge dauber to apply some Pumpkin Pie ink to the outer edges.  And then once I had it on my card front, I put some Wink of Stella on it to give it a bit of citrus shine.  I'm seriously loving the Tropical Escape DSP.  I liked this polka dot pattern to kind of coordinate with the weathered look on the stamps.

Hope you have a great Friday, folks.  Here in a little bit I'll be heading off to the gym to go run and then do yoga.  The lady who teaches my pilates and yoga classes told me on Wednesday that she can tell I'm getting stronger.  Always nice when someone else can tell you've been working hard!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Lemon Zest, Labeler Alphabet
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Mango Melody, Pumpkin Pie, Shaded Spruce
Paper:  Mango Melody, Thick Whisper White, Tropical Escape DSP
Accessories:  1 3/4" circle punch, Everyday Label punch, Lemon Builder punch, Dimensionals, Wink of Stella

Pink Posy

Mornin', y'all.  I was SO tired yesterday, I really can't stay up late like I used to.  I even took a nap when I put the kiddo down for his nap yesterday, so that helped.  And I got myself up in time to squeeze in a card before we had to leave for swim lessons, and as an added bonus, I like how it turned out.

This is another card that I planned out while I was running (I did two miles yesterday, woo!).  I haven't used Painted Harvest in a while, or the Post Script background stamp, so it was nice to dust off both of those.  I used the color combo from Fab Friday:

Even some of the Fab Friday design team was saying that they had trouble figuring out how to incorporate the Mossy Meadow with the other colors.  I think the problem is that it's on the yellower side of the green spectrum, whereas Mint Macaron and Tranquil Tide are on the blue end.  The only Mossy Meadow on my card is stamped off twice to make it much much lighter, and it's on the flower center.  That flower center has some residual purple on it too--there's some Blackberry Bliss or Rich Razzleberry ink on that stamp that I just can't seem to get cleaned off, and it transferred when I stamped it with Mint Macaron here.  Maybe I need one of those cloth shammies...

Anyway, I also used the sketch from Fusion:

I think the color combination kinda jives with the Fusion inspiration photo too.  My circular element isn't in the center like in the sketch, but I think the challenge gods will allow me a bit of leeway with that ;) I liked that this sketch is different from most of the ones I've seen--I like that layer below the circular element.  To make mine, I cut a rectangle of cardstock slightly narrower than a circle die, then ran it through the Big Shot on one end only so it cut only the bottom off the rectangle.

Hope you have a great day, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Painted Harvest, Post Script
Ink:  Mint Macaron, Tranquil Tide, Powder Pink, Mossy Meadow, Whisper White
Paper:  Mint Macaron, Tranquil Tide, Thick Whisper White
Accessories:  Layering Circles Framelits, leaf punch, Dimensionals

Wonderful Origami

Hey y'all!  Here we are already at Wednesday :) And that means another swim lesson for my kiddo tonight.  Except mostly he just likes to let me tow him around in the water without actually putting forth any effort himself.  Well....if our positions were reversed, I'd probably let him do all the work too, so there's that.  Ha!

I busted out some brand new stamps yesterday.

The origami crane and the other two pink shapes are from the hostess set Artfully Folded, which has a bunch of cranes facing both directions and I love that because it's useful to have your stamped object "looking" in the direction you want.  I'm weird like that.  The sentiment is from Rooted in Nature and I've been jealous watching everyone else play with it so I'll be really diving in on that one sometime soon.  I love the fonts on the sentiments, and I'll have to play with the tree images soon.

Anywha, meet the latest CAS(E) This Sketch:

And the color combination from Just Us Girls:

I used Coastal Cabana (so happy it's back!) and Flirty Flamingo for my colors.  Since I had the sketch and colors picked out already, once I decided on stamps this card came together lickety split.  I think my crane stamp has a small flaw on the wing, because I couldn't get ink coverage no matter how hard I tried, and my attempts to fill it in with a blender pen didn't help so I pulled out some retired glitter epoxy shapes from the Occasions Catalog to cover that spot and add a little bling to the other two shapes.  They are sparkly in real life.

Hope you have a great day, kids.  It's a running day for me...after about two months at the gym, I can once again run a mile and a half like it's no big thang, so now I need to work on upping it to TWO miles.  Hey, cardiovascular health is important for running after a small child.  Kid is FAST.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Artfully Folded (hostess), Rooted in Nature
Ink:  Coastal Cabana, Flirty Flamingo
Paper:  Thick Whisper White
Accessories:  retired glitter epoxy shapes

Birthday Boy Octopus

Mornin' y'all!  It's supposed to rain every day this week so it's possible that by the weekend we'll all be underwater.  So maybe that's what the What Will You Stamp? crew was thinking of when they chose this week's featured stamp set? ;)

You KNOW I'm gonna play along with this one!  Any excuse to bust out the as-yet-nameless octopus.  So here's my card for today:

Tiana was telling me when she was here that she doesn't have any birthday cards for boys (she's got two girls, and I gave her a ton of cards but let's be honest I like girly stuff so that's a lot of what she got from me), so that's why I chose to make this a more boyish birthday card.  I thought the bright Mango Melody made a nice contrast with the Tranquil Tide/Soft Sea Foam pattern.

I followed the basic layout on this week's CAS(E) The Designer challenge on Global Design Project:

I kept the patterned paper layer and the circle element, and let the linen thread stand in for the horizontal strip.

I'm also entering this at the Paper Players:

It might be difficult to tell in my photo, but the circle is actually cut out of my card front and the octopus and greeting are stamped on the inside of the card.  That's how I was able to wrap the linen thread around the sides, and then I tied each piece in a knot and cut it off right at the knot so there's no loose threads.

We'll see you here tomorrow, peeps.  Have a great day!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Sea of Textures, Lemon Zest
Ink:  Mango Melody, Memento Tuxedo Black
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Tranquil Textures DSP
Accessories:  Layering Circles Framelits, Linen thread

Cocok's Toes 2010

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  Today's scrapbook layout is the very LAST of the Cocok's toe photos from when we lived in Japan, so if you're foot averse then that's good news for you :D

I always took photos of my friends' toes as well as my own when we got our super fancy pedicures, so the white circles have the initial of whichever friend those toes belong to (all the toes pointing upwards are mine, because that's how my toes look when I look down, heh).

These were all the toe photos for 2010 minus what I had on the Last Call at Cocok's layout.  Also, I'm glad I bought the Number of Years stamp set and matching Framelits, I've been using those and the coordinating (and still current) Letters for You alphabet pretty regularly since I bought them.

This was another layout that I did when I was on my Barely Banana streak, but this time I didn't pair it with Poppy Parade.  Today's color palette includes Barely Banana, Pretty in Pink, Cool Caribbean, Lavender Lace (looks funky in that palette picture), and Whisper White.  That Petals & Paisleys DSP (the Cool Caribbean polka dot strip) is one of the earliest DSP packs I ever bought from SU!  Actually a lot of things I used on this layout are pretty old, like the Simply Said stamp set.  This is why I hold onto stuff though, never know when it will turn out to be just the thing for a scrapbook layout.

I'm going to go tackle the mountain of leftover waffles from yesterday (I'm sure you feel sorry for me, haha!) and then tiny child and I are going to the gym.  Hopefully he won't lose his marbles like he did on Saturday; I didn't get to do yoga because I had to come get him when he wouldn't stop crying.  So here's hoping today is better.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!

Stamps:  Number of Years, Sweet Shoppe Alphabet Upper & Lower, Beautiful Peacock, Simply Said

Ink:  Pretty in Pink, Cool Caribbean, Lavender Lace

Paper:  Barely Banana, Pretty in Pink, Cool Caribbean, Petals & Paisleys DSP, Berry Bliss DSP

Accessories:  Large Numbers Framelits

China: Mountain Descent

Happy Sunday, y'all!  Our friend and her girls just left so the house is (relatively) quiet and I'm still making waffles because I did a double batch and apparently when one batch makes about 8 waffles, a double batch makes 8,472 waffles.  Good thing I like waffles.

So!  More China pictures, and another layout that I somehow FORGOT to take a picture of when I put the books together.

I wanted to use Poppy Parade since I had used that as an accent color on all the other mountain pages, and I found this Sahara Sand pattern with blue accents and it was just PERFECT for what I wanted.  It's hard to tell, but the photo mats are Night of Navy, so they're slightly darker than the Midnight Muse letters on the title.

Today's color palette:  Poppy Parade, Sahara Sand, Midnight Muse, Night of Navy, and Very Vanilla.  This is one of very few layouts (in fact, it might be the only one) in the China books where I used Very Vanilla.  Guess Whisper White is my default.

After we finished our tour in the mountains, we drove back into town and went to Elephant Trunk Hill.  This layout is a rerun:

But I'm posting all the layouts in order on Sundays so here it is again.  Ooh!  The very last waffle just finished cooking.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, Mountain Descent layout:
Stamps:  Asian Artistry, Rough Type
Ink:  Night of Navy
Paper:  Poppy Parade, Night of Navy, Midnight Muse, Very Vanilla, Blueberry Crisp DSP
Accessories:  Lettering template

Birthday Balloons

Happy Friday, y'all!  It's been a busy week and kiddo has been highly uncooperative with naptimes and my crafting and I had to get this card done really fast and I wish I could have taken more time on it.

I did a watercolor wash on the background and sprinkled it with salt, then dried it with my heat tool.  I don't think the salt really worked how I thought it would but it did bring out a green undertone in the Coastal Cabana ink.

I'm entering this at Inkspirational:

And I used this week's Freshly Made Sketch:

And this week's Color Throwdown:

I used Blueberry Bushel, Coastal Cabana, and Smoky Slate for my colors.  I feel like I could have done a much better job with this color combination (and the sketch) if I'd taken longer than 20 seconds to think about it.  Oh well.

Have a great weekend y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Lift Me Up
Ink:  Coastal Cabana, Blueberry Bushel, Smoky Slate
Paper:  Coastal Cabana, Thick Whisper White, watercolor paper
Accessories:  Up & Away Thinlits, Dimensionals, Wink of Stella

Greatest Dragonfly

Mornin' y'all!  It's a bright shiny morning here and we've got friends visiting and the house is loud :). How about a fun tropical card?

I'm entering this at SUO Challenges, where the challenge is to use your favorite Stampin' Up! stuff from the new catalog.  Tropical Chic and the Tropical Escape DSP were two of my favorite things in the new catalog and I couldn't wait to get them in my hot little hands!  Dragonfly Dreams and the Wink of Stella pen are two long-time favorites :)

I also used this week's color challenge from the Paper Players:

Very fun!  I love that the Tropical Escape DSP has a lighter version of Granny Apple Green in it.  I stamped off the flowers in Highland Heather to kinda match the saturation of the patterned paper and let the greeting shine.

Last up is this week's sketch from Retro Rubber:

Of course Tropical Chic is new, but the star of today's card is Dragonfly Dreams, which I've had for a year and a half.  I thought that dragonfly paired well with the tropical theme.

That's it for me today.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Dragonfly Dreams, Tropical Chic
Ink:  Granny Apple Green, Highland Heather, Memento Tuxedo Black
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Lovely Lipstick, Tropical Escape DSP
Accessories:  Detailed Dragonfly Thinlits, Dimensionals, Wink of Stella

Hello Orchids

Mornin' y'all.  Man, kid has been doing his best HULK SMASH this week and I'm worn out.  Here's hoping that today goes better than yesterday.

So let's start the day with a card and new stamps!

I think I'm going to have a lot of fun with the Varied Vases stamp set (and coordinating punch, although I didn't use it for today's card).  I had to use a Stamp-a-ma-jig to line up the scalloped "shelf", but other than that I was able to eyeball everything since it's a photopolymer stamp set.  And there's my Magical Mermaid speckles again, which I used here because I've seen (and owned) orchids with freckles.

I used the Fab Friday sketch:

I think my Tranquil Tide ribbon is retired, but oh well.  Everything else is current and I just needed something on that side of my card (I was going to skip the ribbon right up until the end of the creative process).

I also played along with this week's Just Us Girls trend:

I did a quick watercolor wash on watercolor paper and then hit it with my heat gun to dry it because I have no patience and I also have a 1-year-old who wakes up at the least opportune moment while I'm crafting.

Last up is the Sunday Stamps color challenge:

I read it as Basic Black, Tranquil Tide, Crumb Cake, and So Saffron.  I guess the last color would be a cross between Gray Granite and Whisper White but I concentrated on the other colors.  I also added a teeny pop of Berry Burst because my orchids needed it, and I've discovered that my Berry Burst ink pad is succumbing to the Dreaded Gold Sheen.  Dang it.

That's it for me today, y'all.  Have a good 'un!  And also happy birthday to my dad, who doesn't read this blog anyway :p

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Varied Vases, Magical Mermaid
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Tranquil Tide, So Saffron, Crumb Cake, Berry Burst
Paper:  Basic Black, So Saffron, Thick Whisper White, Watercolor paper
Accessories:  Layering Circles Framelits, retired Tranquil Tide ribbon, Dimensionals

Farm Livin'

I used to watch Nick at Nite a LOT when I was a kid.  Green Acres, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, The Patty Duke Show, Dobie Gillis...but my favorite was Mister Ed.  I was a horse-crazy little girl so no wonder.  Anyway, the stamp set Bareback was one of my early purchases in my stamping career.

I put this card together in no kidding ten minutes, but I still think it looks pretty good?  Everything on the card is retired other than the Very Vanilla cardstock and the adhesive.  Bareback has been retired for years and years, and Blue Bayou was I think in the second year we had In Colors?  Vintage stamping stuff here I tell ya.  At first I was going to make this a birthday card, but that horse has always looked kinda contemplative to me, so I went with "thinking of you" instead.

I used this week's Fall-To Layout:

Great sketch, and also why I was able to put my card together so fast.  Plus I'd kinda planned it out in my head when I was running yesterday morning (I'm not the only one who plans out cards and scrapbook layouts in her head while doing other things, am I?).

Next up, and the reason I chose the horse image, is the Global Design Project theme this week:

Guess what else I discovered when I checked out the GDP blog yesterday morning?  My lemon card was a winner for their last challenge!  Squee!

Anyway, I was trying to think of country and farm life images while I was running yesterday, and somehow using Lemon Zest again did not occur to me, but that horse image from Bareback popped into my head so that's what I did.  But I feel like I didn't put enough effort into that card since it was done in under 10 minutes (we were almost late to kid's swim lessons yesterday) so as a bonus, here's a scrapbook layout that I recently finished and finally got photographed yesterday!

I've been working a lot on pictures from the last time we lived in North Carolina, about 10 years ago or more, and this is one of the layouts from that time period.  I think it was October of 2007?  Indigo Farms is pretty much on the border between North and South Carolina and these pictures are so old they were taken on a non-digital camera with FILM.  Haha!

My color palette is straight from the Orchard Harvest DSP, which I loved and bought like six packs of when it hit the clearance rack and I'm hoarding it.  Anyway, the colors are almost all retired now, and include More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Early Espresso (I know it looks black), and Very Vanilla.

That's it for me today, y'all.  Gotta go to the gym and start cleaning up the house to get ready for some friends to get here on Wednesday!  Cheers!

Supplies, Bareback card:
Stamps:  Bareback, Teeny Tiny Wishes
Ink:  Chocolate Chip, Creamy Caramel, Wild Wasabi
Paper:  Wild Wasabi, Thick Very Vanilla, Blue Bayou DSP
Accessories:  retired Candy Dots

Supplies, Indigo Farms layout:
Stamps:  Taffy Alphabet, Perfectly Preserved
Ink:  Island Indigo, Raspberry Ripple, Lucky Limeade, Early Espresso marker
Paper:  More Mustard, Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Thick Very Vanilla, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  Cannery Framelits

Hotel for Dogs

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  I have a simple layout for you today that I actually made last year.  I'm terribly far behind on taking pictures of the layouts I've been working on more recently because the lighting in our house is such that it's best to take the pictures in the morning.  Somehow I never think to do it until the afternoon, when I know the pictures won't turn out well, and so now I've got a good dozen layouts waiting to be photographed.  But anyway, on to today's layout!

These pictures are from when we lived in Japan; during one month we watched two different dogs for some of our friends and we have two of our own.  Since three of the dogs are black and one of them is white, I kinda had free rein to choose colors for my layout, and I ended up with the In Colors from a few years ago:  Strawberry Slush, Crisp Cantaloupe, Pistachio Pudding, Coastal Cabana, and Baked Brown Sugar.  I did like all of those colors, but if only one can ever come back I'm glad it was Coastal Cabana ;)

I made this not long after I acquired the Taffy Alphabet (still love it).  I wanted the title pieces to all be the same height, so I had to do the "g" this way instead of the standard way.  A bit unusual from a typographic standpoint, but it didn't bother me on the finished layout so I'm calling it a win.

My paw print accents were simple to make from an upside-down hear punch and four punched ovals.  Simple but so cute!

I already talked about the color palette, but there it is anyway, along with black and white for the doggos.

Hope your week is off to a good start.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Taffy Alphabet
Ink:  Strawberry Slush, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Strawberry Slush, Baked Brown Sugar, Whisper White, DSP in Crisp Cantaloupe, Pistachio Pudding & Coastal Cabana
Accessories:  retired heart & oval punches