A Really Retro Birthday

Happy Friday, y'all!  Hope you've had a good week back.  The gym has been TOUGH this week--amazing what taking just one week off will do!  But I'm getting back in the swing of things and also getting in my craft room, so I'm happy.

Retro Rubber is celebrating challenge #100, so I had to pick out some really retro stamps to make my card!  Sweet Treats (the cake stamp) is really REALLY retro, as I've had it since 2006; Happy Happenings (the sentiment) is from 2015.  All the paper is really retro too; all my colors are long-retired as well as the DSP.  That patterned paper is what first popped into my head when I saw this challenge so I went with my first instinct here.  Check out the Retro Rubber challenge:

I did the far right column and the bottom row; I painted the cake with Wink of Stella for sparkle but it doesn't show up in the photograph (and I took several, trying to get it to cooperate).  I used pewter embossing powder (also long retired) to count as a metallic and the heat embossing.  I'm efficient that way.

I also used a retro sketch, this one from Palm Trees & Pogo Sticks:

I love that sketch, would definitely use it again.

That's it for me today, y'all.  I've gotta get the house ready because my in-laws are on their way here for a visit.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Sweet Treats, Happy Happenings
Ink:  Versamark, Regal Rose, Lovely Lilac, Certainly Celery, Smoky Slate
Paper:  Regal Rose, Lovely Lilac, Certainly Celery, Whisper White, Flowers for You DSP
Accessories:  pewter EP, corner rounder punch, hexagon punch, Dimensionals

Christmas Roses

Mornin', y'all!  I didn't intend to miss posting yesterday, but on Tuesday afternoon I ran out of steam and when the little one went down for a nap, so did I.  But now I'm all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and I have a card to share!

I do love the First Frost stamp set, so of course I had to play along in this week's What Will You Stamp? challenge:

I used the Fab Friday sketch:

And the inspiration picture from Fusion:

As much as I love the Frosted Floral DSP that coordinates with First Frost (and I do), I really wanted to get away from the colors in that, so no Blackberry Bliss or Powder Pink or Tranquil Tide.  But I found that Soft Suede stripey pattern in the DSP and loved it to go with this inspiration picture, and that's how I decided to make my roses red.  They're stamped on Shimmery White cardstock and then I painted Wink of Stella on them so they're extra shimmery.

As my card says, I'm wishing you all the best.  Have a great day!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  First Frost
Ink:  Soft Suede, Mossy Meadow, Real Red
Paper:  Crumb Cake, Shimmery White, Frosted Floral DSP
Accessories:  Lots of Labels Framelits (retired), Frosted Bouquet Framelits, Wink of Stella, Dimensionals

Purple Snowflakes

Well, I had to dust off everything in my craft room yesterday after being gone all last week ;) But I got a card made to share today!

After much stalking of the local Target and their website, I managed to pick up some of the 12 Days of Socks packs for my friend Sarah, which I am sending to her as an early Hanukkah present (she got two types of Harry Potter socks and Disney Princess socks, but the name on the Disney Princess socks is misleading since six of the 12 pairs are actually villains, not that I am complaining).  I only have maybe one or two Hanukkah stamp sets and I get tired of using the same ones for Sarah instead I elected to do snowflakes.  Plus it was a great excuse to bust out the Snow Is Glistening set that's a special for November only.  It's most awesome.

Today's sketch is courtesy of Global Design Project:

And I was inspired by the Just Add Ink inspiration photo:

I did a bit of an ombre effect on the Balmy Blue snowflakes by stamping off for lighter layers, which reminded me of the picture.

As we were driving through the mountains last week, we came across an area that had freezing fog roll through--all of the trees were covered in a fine layer of frost and ice, and everything was a soft delicate shade of purple.  I wish the picture showed how pretty it was, but hey, I was taking pictures from the passenger side of a truck going 55 mph down the highway, so this is what I got.  It was gorgeous in person, though.

That's it for me today!  Yesterday was our first day back at the gym and man, am I feeling it today.  Oyyyy.  Well, gotta get moving to work all the stiffness out of my muscles!  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Snow is Glistening
Ink:  Balmy Blue, Highland Heather, Craft Whisper White
Paper:  Balmy Blue, Highland Heather, Shimmery White, watercolor paper
Accessories:  Snowfall Thinlits, 1 1/4" circle punch, Dimensionals, retired glitter epoxy shape

Happy Thanksgiving 2003

Scrappy Monday!  Since I didn't share a Thanksgiving layout last week, and it's still November since Thanksgiving was early this year, here's a layout from 2003, which our first Thanksgiving after hubs and I got married.  We were living in Pensacola at the time, so my parents came out there for a couple days and then we all drove to Alabama to do Thanksgiving dinner at the hubs' aunt and uncle's house along with his cousins and his parents.

If you click on the photo to enlarge it, you'll see that the couch we're all sitting on is PLAID, which definitely directed my choice of patterned paper for this layout ;)  Also, I used a Becky Higgins sketch I never thought I'd use for this layout; I hardly ever crop most of our photos very much anymore, but the way that these ones were taken I was able to cut off substantial sections without losing the subject of the picture at all.  In fact, I think there's only two photos out of the 10 that I didn't crop at all.

Most of the colors are directly out of the Sweater Weather DSP, with the addition of a Mellow Moss page base that seemed to harmonize with the patterns.  The color palette includes Mellow Moss, Crushed Curry, Dusty Durango, Soft Sky, Early Espresso, and Very Vanilla.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  All-Year Cheer (I forget which), French Foliage
Ink:  Chocolate Chip, Mellow Moss, Soft Sky
Paper:  Mellow Moss, Dusty Durango, Very Vanilla, Sweater Weather DSP
Accessories:  Ovals Collection Framelits

China: Drum & Bell Towers

China Sunday!!  We enjoyed our week's vacation to Tennessee for Thanksgiving.  We stayed in a cabin up in the mountains and had a grand ol' time.  I'll have to get all the pictures downloaded to the computer so I can have them printed to make more scrapbook pages, but for today we're back to China photos!

See my original blog post here.  On our last half-day in Xi'an, it was raining a bit so the Basic Gray page base seemed like a good idea.  We did the drum and bell towers (only went up in one) and then one more tomb before we headed to the airport to fly to Beijing.

This layout is just really super simple but I was looking for a way to scrap 7 horizontal photos so I'm okay with it.

Today's color palette includes Basic Gray, Emerald Envy, Marigold Morning, Basic Black, and Whisper White.  I really wish SU! had come out with more DSP with Emerald Envy, I loved that color!  Of course, I love greens as a matter of course, but there you go.  And also this is yet another color palette to include green and gold because Missy has infected my brain ;)

Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Rough Type, Circle Circus
Ink:  Emerald Envy, Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Basic Gray, Basic Black, Marigold Morning, Whisper White, Naturally Eclectic DSP
Accessories:  letter template

China: Dumpling Dinner

Hey y'all!  It's China Sunday once again.  Are you ready?

After a long day of visiting the tomb and the pagoda, we ended up doing a traditional dumpling dinner and watching a Tang Dynasty show (see the blog post here).  This layout kinda looks like a stoplight but with orange added in....ehh, I like it anyway!  We had a zillion different kinds of dumplings and the show was really fun, too.

The color palette for today is Cucumber Crush, Pumpkin Pie, Daffodil Delight, Riding Hood Red, and Basic Black.

I already shared the Tang Dynasty show layout:

I think this was the only time in all the China books that I used patterned paper for the cut-out letters, but I just really liked it here.

Anyway, I'm taking next week off to spend time with friends and family for Thanksgiving.  Hope you have a great holiday!

Supplies, first layout:
Stamps:  Rough Type
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Cucumber Crush, Riding Hood Red, Pumpkin Pie, Basic Black, Greenhouse Gala & Summer Picnic DSP
Accessories:  Letter template

Proud Merry

Y'ALL.  I am completely incapable of passing up a good pun!  I was trying to think of a title for this blog post, and since the sentiment on my card is so large I was going to say "Loud & Proud" and then...

PROUD MERRY, Y'ALL.  I'm not even sorry.  And even if no one else thinks it's funny, I'll sit here in my little corner and cackle maniacally to myself because I think I'm hilarious.

So yeah, this started with the Just Add Ink challenge:
 

I think I have that covered.  In fact, the Large Letters Framelits are SO large that this is a 5x7 card to accommodate them.

Add in the CAS(E) This Sketch challenge:

Once again, turned on its side (I rotated the sketch I used for yesterday's card too).  Last up is the Color Throwdown:

I used Real Red, Coastal Cabana, and silver foil for the colors.  It took me a few tries to get a picture of this card (not least because it was rainy all day yesterday so not much natural light), so here's one where the silver foil isn't reflecting the camera flash:

This is the maiden voyage for Signs of Santa, which has lots of other cute little images and such in it, and also Birthday Backgrounds (on the red strip) which I got during the Stampin' Up! birthday sale in October.  The "Christmas" stamp is part of a longer sentiment in Snowflake Sentiments; I just inked up the word I wanted with a marker and stamped it.  I'm kind of in love with this card, it turned out exactly how I imagined it.

Well, I've gotta run.  Cheers and happy Friday, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Signs of Santa, Snowflake Sentiments, Birthday Backgrounds
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black & Coastal Cabana markers, Stampin' Blends in Real Red, Smoky Slate, and Petal Pink
Paper:  Coastal Cabana, Real Red, Thick Whisper White, Silver Foil
Accessories:  Large Letters Framelits, Santa's Signpost Framelits, Dimensionals

Stay Frosty, Kids

Hey!  Didja miss me yesterday?  I admit, on Tuesday afternoon I kinda had a headache and I sat in my craft room and just stared at my stamps for about 20 minutes before I gave it up as a bad job and took a nap instead.  Hence no post yesterday.  But I got back in the saddle yesterday and made this...

Which I'm not, like, super thrilled with, partially because I couldn't get the straight line stamps above and below the word to actually lie STRAIGHT no matter what I did.  I don't know, I feel like my mojo has taken an early vacation?  The rest of me is going on vacation next week but apparently the mojo went early.  The stamps are in the set Warm Hearted, which is a hostess-only set and I got it just because I love the font on this thanks stamp.  Isn't it pretty?

Anyway, I started with Freshly Made Sketches:

I rotated the sketch 90 degrees, and then paired it with the colors from Fab Friday:

I love these colors together, and I love that they're in a couple of different DSP packs.  Today I used the Frosted Floral DSP that has that lovely shimmer to it.

And that's all she wrote today.  In a little bit Ryan and I will be off to the Y so he can play in the nursery and I can take a piyo class.  The instructor is pregnant (not hugely, but still) and she can absolutely run circles around me, but I enjoy the class.  I told my mom it's like cardio yoga on steroids.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Warm Hearted
Ink:  Blackberry Bliss, Mint Macaron, Cajun Craze
Paper:  Blackberry Bliss, Cajun Craze, Shimmery White, Frosted Floral DSP
Accessories:  rhinestone, Dimensionals

A Pop of Green

Hey, kids!  How's it going today?  It was rain, rain, rain all yesterday afternoon, and cold to boot, but I got in my craft cave and I made this!

My mother-in-law's birthday is later this month, hence the fall leaf, and her favorite color is green, hence the green leaf.  And a bit of glitter just because why not.  This is, I believe, the first time I've used Merry Merlot too.

I started with this week's CASE the Designer challenge from Global Design Project:

Louise's card is all soft and delicate with pale colors and mine...is not ;)  I kept the basic layout and the idea of leaves/foliage for the main image; my card base and the stripey pattern are pretty light, but I think it balances out with the leaves and the bit of Merry Merlot.

I also used the inspiration photo from Fusion for my colors:

I picked out Sahara Sand because that's what's in the background, some Cajun Craze and Crushed Curry for my fall leaf, and the aforementioned Merry Merlot for the wine bottle.  But I just loved that pop of green on the photo, and that's why I used green on my card.  Plus, MIL's favorite color.

Hope you have a great day!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Colorful Seasons, Varied Vases
Ink:  Crushed Curry, Cajun Craze, Merry Merlot, Granny Apple Green
Paper:  Sahara Sand, Merry Merlot, Thick Whisper White, Tropical Escape DSP
Accessories:  Seasonal Layers Thinlits, Dimensionals, Wink of Stella, glitter enamel shapes

Russian Selfies

Scrappy Monday everyone!  It's a gray day here, pretty chilly and we're expecting rain this afternoon, so I chose a gray layout to share today but it's one that makes me giggle.

See my original blog post here, I pretty much copied what I wrote on that for my journaling here.

Today's color palette includes Basic Gray, Daffodil Delight, Cucumber Crush, Night of Navy, and Whisper White.  I think I subconsciously put green and yellow on at least half of my scrapbook layouts now...I blame Missy! ;)

Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Letterpress Alphabet, Rough Edges Alphabet, Mosaic Madness
Ink:  Cucumber Crush, Night of Navy, Daffodil Delight, Basic Gray marker
Paper:  Basic Gray, Cucumber Crush, Night of Navy, Thick Whisper White, Quatrefancy DSP
Accessories:  Mosaic punch

China: Big Wild Goose Pagoda & Pagoda Gardens

Hey y'all!  Have you hugged a veteran today?  I have.  You should try it, it's fun.

In addition to Veterans' Day, today is China Sunday!  First up are a couple of repeat layouts:

I posted these 3 1/2 years ago, you can see it all here.  Still loving this layout, that Cherry Cobbler page base is really working for me.

And one more with lots of photos...this one is a really simple layout but hey, it works.

And now for a new layout:

I wanted this layout to coordinate with the other two since the pictures were taken at the same place, so I used another pattern from the same pack of DSP and this time I used Marina Mist as my page base.  For some reason that blue is very hard to photograph, it often looks more gray than blue.  But IRL it works well to set off the pinks and reds on the flowers, and the warm colors of the pagoda.

I needed a smaller title so I could squeeze in more photos, so I just stamped it with Rough Type instead of doing any letter templates.  But I stamped it on a Marina Mist pattern from that same DSP pack so it's still got some interest.

Today's color palette is straight from the DSP, Paisley Petals:  Marina Mist, Cherry Cobbler, Old Olive, Night of Navy, and Whisper White.

Well, our task for this morning is to clean up the house, so we'd better get to it.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Rough Type
Ink:  Night of Navy
Paper:  Marina Mist, Paisley Petals DSP
Accessories:  Lots of Labels Framelits

Thankful Fall Bouquet

Happy Friday, y'all! And it IS a happy Friday because my hubs will be home for a 3-day weekend, then just 4 days next week and he's back home for good!  YAY!  So I made a card about being thankful :D

I don't have all the Stampin' Blends yet, so I thought I'd try a different technique to color in my image:  stippling.  I just tapped a blender pen on my ink pad and then used it to make little dots and kept dotting until I liked the color on my image.  I used Bermuda Bay for the pitcher, and the Coastal Cabana stripe is supposed to look like a highlight but for some reason it came out looking a lot more green than I expected.

Country Home is this week's stamp set at What Will You Stamp?:

And my card started with the sketch from CAS(E) This Sketch:

 Both the sentiment and my image ended up being much larger than the original sketch, oops.

Finally, here's the photo challenge from Inkspirational:

I used the colors from the photo:  Bermuda Bay from the napkin in the front, and the oranges and yellows for the decorations on the table.  I even did the "berries" on my image with Lovely Lipstick because of that one really pink apple (side note:  Pink Lady apples are my favorites!).

So that's it for us today.  Hope you have a great day, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Country Home
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Pumpkin Pie, Bermuda Bay, Coastal Cabana, Crushed Curry, Cajun Craze, Lovely Lipstick, Mossy Meadow, Early Espresso
Paper:  Thick Whisper White
Accessories:  none, unless you count my blender pen :)

Oak Leaf Thanks

Hello crafty people!  It may not feel like fall outside (it was 77 degrees here yesterday, WHAT THE ACTUAL HECK it's November for cryin' out loud!) but at least it LOOKS like fall in my craft room!

This is like the card equivalent of a cozy sweater, isn't it?  I started with the Color Throwdown colors:

I used all retired colors:  Buckaroo Blue, Marigold Morning, and Chocolate Chip.  Whisper White is, of course, not retired :p Anyway, I paired that with the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches:

And the theme challenge from the Paper Players:

And finally, the Retro Rubber Challenge:

This card is so retro, everything I used is retired except the white cardstock, the adhesive, and the linen thread.  The leaf images are from Gently Falling (possibly my favorite ever leaf set), which I've had for 7 years; the sentiment is from One Big Meaning and is 2 years old; and the Linen background stamp (look closely at the Buckaroo Blue layer, it's subtle but it's there) has been in my stamp collection since dirt was new and it's 12 years old.  It's been fun to hunt through my older stamp sets and actually *use* them this week, though of course I use them all the time on my scrapbook pages.

Hope you have a great day, peeps.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU! but mostly retired:
Stamps:  Gently Falling, Linen, One Big Meaning
Ink:  Marigold Morning, Chocolate Chip, Buckaroo Blue
Paper:  Marigold Morning, Chocolate Chip, Buckaroo Blue, Whisper White
Accessories:  Dimensionals, linen thread

A Bright Birthday

Mornin' y'all!  How's your week going?  We're still trying to get used to the time change here...I'm working on sliding Ryan's schedule to the right, so hopefully by the end of the week we'll be back to a regular schedule.  Can we please not ever do Daylight Savings Time again?  'Cause that would be great.

So for yesterday's card I brought out a few old favorites; for today, I've got one brand-new stamp set only available this month, plus a few newer faves.

The floral images are from Happiness Surrounds, which is part of the Snowflake Showcase promotion and obviously it's more versatile than just snowflakes (though the snowflakes are to-die-for gorgeous!).  I'm looking forward to playing more with both of the stamp sets *and* the super awesome Thinlits!

So for challenges, I'll be entering this one in the SUO Challenge to use die cuts, which is ridiculously easy because I love my Big Shot and all my dies and I have a LOT of dies.  Next up is the Just Add Ink color challenge:

I'll probably be too late to enter the challenge but that's okay, I liked these colors together so much that I couldn't let it pass me by.  I really loved the old Brilliant Blue, and Blueberry Bushel is pretty close to it so it's fun to see it used in a color challenge.  On the bad side, I've discovered that my Berry Burst ink pad has succumbed to the Dreaded Gold Sheen, ugh.  I'll have to buy a new one before the color retires this summer.  And technically the glitter dots I used on my flowers are Melon Mambo, but I thought they worked pretty well here (they look better in person than in the picture).

Next up is the Fall-To Layout:

I was very tempted to use the snowflakes and the Snow is Glistening stamp set for the main image panel, but that color challenge from above made me change my mind :)

Last up is the Just Us Girls challenge:

I don't use the Sheet Music background stamp nearly often enough, so it was nice to have an "excuse" to ink it up for today's card.

And that's all she wrote, folks.  Have a great day!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Happiness Surrounds, Beautiful Day, Sheet Music
Ink:  Lemon Lime Twist, Blueberry Bushel, Berry Burst
Paper:  Lemon Lime Twist, Blueberry Bushel, Berry Burst, Thick Whisper White
Accessories:  Snowfall Thinlits, Glitter Enamel Shapes, Dimensionals