Tuesday, December 29, 2020

Petal Pink Poinsettia

Mornin' y'all!  I got up early this morning and managed to do half my workout before the kiddo got up.  Today was kickboxing, and Ryan actually watched a bit of it which means I got to hear editorial comments from him like "You have to PUSH, Mama!" which was funny.  And I'm feeling pretty good after that workout, it was a good one today.

Anyway, I have a card to share!  Not too long after we moved to Germany, I ordered a bunch of holiday stuff from the holiday mini catalog and I'm sad I haven't gotten to use a lot of it (for some reason I can't seem to get Ryan on a schedule with quiet time since we got here).  But I needed some thinking of you/get well cards when my mom had surgery earlier this month, so I put together a very quick CAS card.


It doesn't show at all in the picture, but I painted over the poinsettia with Wink of Stella so it has a lovely shimmer IRL; the card looks kinda plain in the picture because you can't see the shine.  Sometimes that's how it happens.  I think my sequins are retired but I don't really care, I'm using what I've got.

Have a great day, y'all.  It's Tuesday, if you were wondering--I know the week between Christmas and New Year's is a weird time wormhole (wibbly wobbly timey wimey) in a normal year, and I bet that sensation has only intensified this year.  Almost done with 2020!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Poinsettia Petals, Comfort & Hope
Ink:  Petal Pink, Soft Suede
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Petal Pink
Accessories:  Tasteful Touches dies, Dimensionals, retired adhesive sequins

Monday, December 28, 2020

'Tis the Season (Christmas 2010)

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  Hope you had a good Christmas.  Ryan got lots and lots of toys and games and he's a happy kiddo :)  Yesterday the hubs took him out of the house for a good chunk of time and I wish I hadn't had a terrible headache because I could have done ALL THE THINGS.  As it is, I did work on two layouts, which are both all done except for journaling.

Anyway, the layout I want to share today is one I finished a couple months ago and I'm pretty tickled with how it turned out.


My mom's angels on the right are supposed to spell "Noel" but my brother and I can't help rearranging her Christmas decorations at every opportunity ;)  I made a second layout for this Christmas too but for that one I need to have a 5x7 printed so maybe I'll share it next December.  I also looked through all my pictures I have left to scrap, and I've done all the Christmas pics up through 2018!  I've been doing all my pictures from after Ryan was born pretty much chronologically so I'll get to the more recent ones too.  So starting at the beginning of 2017, I'm up to March of 2019.

Anyway, let's talk about the layout!  I used the Candlelight Christmas DSP and isn't it just so pretty?  I used a fancy pattern for the formal Christmas picture my mom insisted we take together and then most of the other pictures are the rest of us being silly ;) A few years ago, Stampin' Up! ran a promo where you could earn the Merry Patterns stamp set if you had a $300 party/order and by golly I wanted that stamp set and this is only the second time I've used it *rolls eyes at myself* Anyway, the page title and the candles are all multi-step stamps, so the outline is one stamp and then "season" is a fill-in patterned stamp and there's three fill-in stamps for the candles (two different ones for the candles, one for the flames).  I admit I chose the candles as an accent solely because of the name of the DSP, haha.  So somehow I managed to squeeze in nine photos and two different patterned papers and still had room for journaling and page accents.  Yep, I'm good.

 

Today's festive color palette:  Lucky Limeade, Real Red, Very Vanilla, and Early Espresso.  There's a wee bit of Primrose Petals on the patterned paper too.  I need to edit and upload a bunch of pictures to Winkflash so I can order that 5x7 for the other layout from this Christmas, I adore it too (it features our doggos).

Just a few days left until the new year starts.  Woo!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Merry Patterns
Ink:  Early Espresso, Lucky Limeade, Real Red, So Saffron
Paper:  Lucky Limeade, Real Red, Thick Very Vanilla, Candlelight Christmas DSP
Accessories:  None

Tuesday, December 22, 2020

SUO Challenges: Winter Wonderland

Mornin' y'all!  Christmas is in just a couple of days, which means the new year is right around the corner, which means we've almost made it to the end of one very tough year.  We've got time for one more challenge from SUO Challenges!






The theme this time around is WINTER!  I don't know about you, but I enjoy snuggling up in some nice cozy blankets with a cuppa tea and either a good book or a good movie in the wintertime.  I do love all the snowflakes and snowman images too though, so that's what I went with for today's card:

The hubs asked me for a birthday card for his coworker yesterday and I thought this snowman was just the ticket.  I didn't have much time, so I embossed the snowman in white on Pacific Point cardstock and then die cut--I thought it looked a bit like a snow globe when I added the sentiment underneath.  Super easy, doesn't take much time, but people who don't do papercrafting are always impressed with embossed stuff.  I kept trying to add more stuff to this card, but it insisted on staying CAS to let that amazing snowflake paper show off.  I did add just a little to the inside of the card:


Ya know, just in case you missed the snowflakes on the front :)  I also made the white panel the same size as the DSP panel on the front of the card; usually if I line the inside of a card I just make a little border all the way around but I liked this.

Your turn!  Make something winter-inspired and share it on the SUO Challenges blog here.  Peace, joy, and let's all yell JUMANJI! as soon as midnight hits on New Year's Eve, k?

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Snowman Season, Zany Zebras
Ink:  Versamark, Pacific Point, Balmy Blue
Paper:  Pacific Point, Balmy Blue, Whisper White, Snowflake Splendor DSP
Accessories:  White EP, Stitched Shapes dies, Tasteful Labels dies, Dimensionals


Monday, December 21, 2020

Deck the Halls

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  And this time it's ON a Monday!  Hope your week is off to a good start.  Today's plan:  bake cookies for our neighbors.  And also try not to eat them myself ; )

So today's  layout is me and the hubs' very first Christmas tree in 2004 I think?  It's been a while.


I took pictures of some of the ornaments we hung on the tree that year.  I have a large collection of Hallmark ornaments (but still a tiny fraction of what my mom owns) and the hubs' reaction was quite amusing.  All the ornaments are in the original boxes and carefully stored and yeah it takes the whole day to get them out and on the tree and even longer to put it all back up again.  Since Ryan arrived, we have one package of those supposedly unbreakable ball ornaments and it takes 20 minutes to decorate the tree, with no worries that he's going to break the fancy ornaments.

I'm not really sure which way I like the pages though.  This is one of those layouts that you could put either page on the left and both options flow pretty well.  Here's the other way:


What do you think, the first option or the second one?  Right now I'm kinda leaning towards option #2...also kinda wish I still had that Queen of the Universe shirt.


Today's very festive color palette:  Very Vanilla, Real Red, Garden Green, Night of Navy, and Old Olive.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Merry & Type
Ink:  Real Red, Night of Navy
Paper:  Very Vanilla, Night of Navy, Garden Green
Accessories:  None

Friday, December 18, 2020

Merry & Bright (Christmas 2006)

Welp, I missed Scrappy Monday by a lot, but I have so many Christmas layouts in my draft posts that I couldn't skip this week entirely.  Last week was really tough and this week started out a bit rocky, and then on Wednesday Germany went into lockdown again until mid-January BUT I discovered that the playgrounds are still open which makes me ridiculously relieved and I've taken Ryan there every day.  And yesterday afternoon I got a tentative job offer for work at the local arts & crafts store.  The pay is beans but it would be an excuse to have Ryan in daycare and it would be fun for me :)

Anywha, let's get to the scrapbook pages!


I really worked hard last year and this year to scrap older photos, so these are from Christmas 2006.  The paper is from a year or two ago though, I seriously love that reindeer print and I'm a sucker for a good plaid, so it makes me happy to use both of them on one layout.  The accents are poinsettias stamped and embossed with white EP on red cardstock, then cut out (because that stamp set was from before we had so many dies for different stamps).  I love that Christmas Deer stamp but I don't think I've hardly ever used him, so it's nice that he got to shine here too.


Today's color palette:  Crumb Cake (textured, even), Real Red, Shaded Spruce, Balmy Blue, Early Espresso, and Whisper White.  Nice and Christmasy.

Have a good weekend, peeps.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Christmas Deer, Watercolor Winter, Jolly Jingles (unmounted wheel)
Ink:  Crumb Cake, Early Espresso, Whisper White, Early Espresso marker
Paper:  Crumb Cake, Balmy Blue, Shaded Spruce, Thick Whisper White, Under the Mistletoe DSP
Accessories:  white EP

Tuesday, December 8, 2020

SUO Challenges: Holly Jolly Trio

 Mornin' y'all!  It's SUO Challenges day once again!



We're continuing our last challenge and sharing Christmas cards, so here's my new project for today:


The Gnome for the Holidays stamp set is so cute, I couldn't pick just one gnome to feature.  I had the same problem with all the Christmas and winter DSP options, so I made a set of cards :) I used the same layout for each card, but different colors/DSP, and the last gnome is a mirror image just because he's facing the other direction and I didn't want to cover up the mistletoe on his hat.  I think some of my embellishments are retired, but I decided to use what I had since I never seem to use up all of a pack of embellishments before they get replaced with something new.


Because of the snowflakes on his hat, I had to pair this gnome with the Snowflake Splendor DSP.


This girl gnome and her very nice Christmas tree hat got paired with the Poinsettia Place DSP.  Also, I didn't have red rhinestones, so I used a Stampin' Blend to color clear rhinestones red to use as an accent here.  Easy peasy and it didn't make a mess!


Mr. Mistletoe here got paired with the Heartwarming Hugs DSP, which might be my favorite.  It's classic red and green and some lovely seasonal patterns that will be great for my scrapbooks.

So now it's your turn--make a Christmas card using your Stampin' Up! supplies, and share it on the SUO Challenges blog.  Cheers to the holiday season!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Gnome for the Holidays
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Versamark, various Stampin' Blends
Paper:  Balmy Blue, Pacific Point, Bumblebee, Real Red, Mossy Meadow, Thick Whisper White, Snowflake Splendor DSP, Poinsettia Place DSP, Heartwarming Hugs DSP
Accessories:  Rectangles Stitched dies, Stitched So Sweetly dies, white EP, Dimensionals, Gold Glitter enamel dots, rhinestones, Frosted & Clear Epoxy Shapes

Monday, December 7, 2020

Merry Christmas 2009

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  I have an interview for a part-time job this morning and I was doing fine up until like 30 minutes ago and now I'm nervous.  Wish me luck?


So here's a real flashback scrapbook layout, 2009!  You can see some of these pictures here.  I love that patterned paper with the Christmas lights and I think I only have some teeny scraps of it left.  We just put up stockings and the Christmas tree here yesterday, Ryan was very excited about it all.


Today's color palette:  Mossy Meadow, Pear Pizzazz, Hello Honey, Soft Sky, Real Red, Basic Black, and Whisper White.  I probably would not have put those two greens together if not for the patterned paper but I do like the effect.

Okay, Imma go be nervous some more.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Signs of Santa, Christmas Greetings, Whimsical Numbers
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Real Red, Mossy Meadow, Basic Black marker, assorted Stampin' Blends
Paper:  Mossy Meadow, Hello Honey, Pear Pizzazz, Soft Sky, Real Red, Thick Whisper White, Season of Cheer DSP
Accessories:  Santa's Signpost Framelits

Friday, December 4, 2020

Snowflake Blues

Hey y'all, how's it going?  It continues to be very difficult for me to get any time in my craft room...I'm not sure what it is, but I can't seem to get Ryan on a schedule and back to doing quiet time every day.  Yesterday I let him watch Paw Patrol for 15 minutes while I went upstairs to make a birthday card for hubs' coworker...yeah Ryan turned up all the floor heat controls as high as they would go on the entire bottom floor.  Heated floors are totally amazing, but when you turn them up to the max it really does heat up the house quickly.  Last time he did that, they were on overnight and basically I had a hot yoga class the next morning. *eye roll* I caught it quickly this time but it was still pretty toasty downstairs all evening.

Anyway, I did at least manage to make this card:


On Wednesday, I tried putting Ryan in quiet time for a while but all I got to do in my craft room was sit down and stare at my supplies for about 3 minutes before Ryan decided quiet time was over and came in there and started messing with my paper trimmer.  Sometimes it's just not your day.  Anyway, as luck would have it yesterday, I saw this card by Brian King and I loved the layout of it.  But since I had limited time with my ticking time bomb supposedly watching TV downstairs, I made mine a little simpler.  At least I got it done?

Have a good weekend, peeps.  Hope you get some crafty time for yourselves!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Itty Bitty Birthdays
Ink:  Night of Navy
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Pacific Point, Pool Party, Snowflake Splendor DSP
Accessories:  Rectangles Stitched dies, So Many Snowflakes Dies, Dimensionals, rhinestone

Monday, November 30, 2020

Friends & Family

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  Hope you had a great Thanksgiving.  We still have tons of food :) and somehow I managed to have everything ready right on time!  Prepping the pies and casseroles a day or two early definitely helped me not feel stressed on Thanksgiving Day.  Our neighbors came over to eat with us and we had a good time.

So, now for today's scrapbook layout!


The pictures span fall 2010 right on up to Christmas, but I used fall colors because I loves them.  I adore the Into the Woods DSP and somehow I did *not* use the coordinating Thankful Forest Friends stamp set on this layout, which is a surprise since I dearly love it ;)  I did have it out on my table but I decided that it would be too much to add anything else considering I have three different patterned papers going on here already.


Today's color palette:  Concord Crush, Daffodil Delight, Tangelo Twist, Old Olive, and Whisper White.  The page base (Concord Crush) is a super deep dark PURPLE, not black; it's not in the patterned papers but I thought it played well with all the other colors.

December starts tomorrow (WHAT) and I have quite a few Christmas layouts ready to share.  See you soon, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Taffy Alphabet, Larger Than Life Alphabet
Ink:  Old Olive, Daffodil Delight, Concord Crush marker
Paper:  Concord Crush, Old Olive, Daffodil Delight, Whisper White, Tangelo Twist DSP, Into the Woods DSP
Accessories:  None

Tuesday, November 24, 2020

SUO Challenges: Christmas Coo

Hey hey stampy friends!  It's time for a new challenge at SUO Challenges!


I know Thanksgiving is this week (if you're American), but we're looking forward to Christmas!  Show us your Christmas cards :D

Since I have, unfortunately, not had much time in my craft room of late, I have lots of Christmas stamps that haven't seen ink and lots of gorgeous patterned papers that I haven't used on anything yet.  I used this opportunity to ink up Yuletide Pasture for its maiden voyage:


Aaaaahhhhh it's a Highland Coo!  It is 100% Helen Read's fault that I bought this stamp set; awhile back she shared several cards she had made with Yuletide Pasture and wouldn't you know, it just sneaked on my next stamping order after I saw what she made.  Oops.  But this Highland Coo and his friends the cat and the sheep are super cute so I'm glad they're in my stash.  Now I just need time to actually USE all the stuff I have...

So now it's your turn.  I hope you'll use this challenge as a reason to ink up some of your holiday stamps too!  Don't forget to share on the SUO Challenges blog.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Yuletide Pasture
Ink:  Cinnamon Cider, Shaded Spruce
Paper:  Bumblebee, Cinnamon Cider, Thick Whisper White, Plaid Tidings DSP
Accessories:  In Color Enamel Dots, Dimensionals, Nature's Thoughts Dies


Monday, November 23, 2020

Ops Group Thanksgiving

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  Since Thanksgiving is this week, I have to share a Thanksgiving layout today!  I made this one earlier this year, though the pictures are from 2009...I, uh, have to work hard not to have pictures that are over 10 years old still waiting to be scrapped. #needmorescrappingtime


Pretty sure this is the Thanksgiving that I was first introduced to sweet potato casserole and I absolutely fell in love.  Hubs and kiddo aren't very big on sweet potatoes, but I'm still planning to make a casserole for myself this week just because I can.  Anywha, for the layout, I pulled out some old, old patterned paper called Autumn Vines and the longtime favorite scarecrow stamp from Happy Fall Y'all to make this.  The thing that took the longest was coloring the scarecrow.


Today's very retro color palette includes More Mustard, Really Rust, Chocolate Chip, Sage Shadow, and Whisper White; every single one of those colors is retired except, of course, for the white.

We have a teeny-tiny oven in this house, so I need to strategize my Thanksgiving plans.  I think it's just going to be the three of us, but I'm still planning to do it up right...at least I'm limiting myself to only two pies.  And of course sweet potato casserole.  But I did get both turkey and ham...

Have a great holiday, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Brushwork Alphabet, Back to Basics Alphabet, Happy Fall Y'all
Ink:  Chocolate Chip, Really Rust, Sage Shadow, More Mustard, Close to Cocoa, Soft Sky, Buckaroo Blue, Versamark
Paper:  More Mustard textured, Really Rust, Chocolate Chip, Sage Shadow, Thick Whisper White, Autumn Vines DSP
Accessories:  Clear EP

Wednesday, November 18, 2020

Polly, Put the Kettle On

Hey y'all!  Wonder of wonders, I actually made a card today, my very first one since we moved to Germany.  I got up early this morning to do my workout, and by the time I finished that the hubs was already in the shower but Ryan wasn't up yet so I snatched a few minutes in my craft room and made this:


The teacup stamp set (A Nice Cuppa) is retired, but I had to use it (or one of its other tea-related friends) because of the Global Design Project theme challenge:


The inside of the card says "You are tea-riffic", but I chose a birthday sentiment for the front of the card to fit in the Retro Rubber Challenge:


The birthday sentiment is from Blossoms in Bloom, which is only six months old; it was just the first birthday sentiment that I came across that fit my card design.  A Nice Cuppa is nice and retro though, it's four years old.  I even dug up the matching Have a Cuppa DSP!

Aaaaaaand now I need to go make myself some tea.  Have a great day, peeps.

Supplies, all SU! (many retired)
Stamps:  A Nice Cuppa, Blossoms in Bloom
Ink:  Bermuda Bay
Paper:  Bermuda Bay, Daffodil Delight, Melon Mambo, Thick Whisper White, Have a Cuppa DSP Stack
Accessories:  Cups & Kettle dies, Dimensionals, glitter enamel dots

Monday, November 16, 2020

Lake Bled, Slovenia

Hey y'all!  How's your Monday going?

Today's layout is actually the very first one I made after arriving in Germany, after not getting to stamp or do any paper crafting for about three months.  If you ever have a spell like that where you can't stamp or scrap, do you feel like you need to do a warmup layout or card or something?  Because I feel like this is kind of a warmup layout for me.


I mean, I like it.  I love these pictures from Slovenia (read about our day trip here) and that patterned paper is one of my all-time favorites.  But since this was my first time scrapping in so long, I turned to my very favoritest most trusty sketch to put my layout together.  More on that in a minute.


Today's color palette includes Basic Black, More Mustard, Ruby Red, Always Artichoke, and Whisper White; all the colors are retired except black and white.  And honestly why did SU! get rid of black 12x12 cardstock?! So technically it's retired too.  Brown might be more expected for a fall layout, but I felt like the photos just needed that start black backdrop.
 
Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Empire Alphabet Upper & Lower, Make a Difference, My Paper Pumpkin (leaves)
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Always Artichoke, More Mustard, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Basic Black, More Mustard, Ruby Red, Thick Whisper White, Autumn Traditions DSP
Accessories:  None

Okay so back to that sketch thing.  I own this Becky Higgins book of sketches, I bought it in 2008 according to Amazon and I use it all the freaking time when I scrap.  There are some sketches that I doubt I'll ever use, and there are some that I've used two or three times, and then there's my very favorite sketch.  I'm not sure what makes this sketch so special, but I've used it a lot.  Because I was curious, I went through all my pictures of past layouts just to see how many times I've used this same sketch.  (Honestly I thought I'd done more!)  Since I typically scrap whatever strikes my fancy rather than chronologically, I can use this sketch several times in a row even and know the layouts won't be all together in my books.  But here, for your viewing pleasure, is a parade of layouts using the same sketch :)


This was one of the first layouts I did when we moved to Japan!  And I think it might have been the very first time I used this sketch.  America Town is a place in Okinawa.


Here's a trip to Amsterdam...


Oh look, same sketch in Wales...


Another Japan layout but it's in a different album from the first one.


Old pictures but I think I made this layout earlier this year or maybe last year.  I've been on a kick of using the Taffy Alphabet stamps.


Another Japan layout, I was extremely proud of this one at the time (I still like it).  It took a looooong time to hand-cut those letters for the title.


Hey, here's one from our honeymoon cruise in 2005.  But it gets its own album so won't be with that December 2005 layout above.


Here's a layout from St. Petersburg in Russia, and now that I think about it, it will go in the same album as the Beaumaris one from Wales.  But there's still lots of pages in between.


Aww, here's the little church that was half a block from our house in England.


Ooh hey, a Thanksgiving layout and another fall patterned paper that I adore.


As soon as I see the picture in the top left corner on this layout, my brain starts singing the Indiana Jones theme because that's the church they go in where X marks the spot in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.


Last one because I uploaded these alphabetically, I was surprised to discover I only used the sketch once in my China albums.

I did find a few more where I might have started out with something similar to the sketch, but then moved things around so it wasn't as recognizable.  But this was a fun excuse to look at the pictures of all my past scrapbook layouts.  Hope you enjoyed it as well!

Tuesday, November 10, 2020

SUO Challenges: Thanksgiving

Hey y'all!  It's time for a new challenge from SUO Challenges!


This time we're doing a theme:  Thanksgiving!  You know how much I love making cards in fall colors, and honestly Thanksgiving is probably my favorite holiday (even over Christmas).  I think it's all the pumpkin baked goods ;). Here's what I made:


The Gilded Autumn Specialty DSP is gorgeous and features both gold and copper foil.  I chose a pattern with gold on it and paired it with some gold foil paper and a gold embossed sentiment.  I'm glad that Gather Together came back for another fall season, I love this stamp set.

Upload your Thanksgiving project at the SUO Challenges blog and we'll save you a piece of pumpkin pie.  Have a great day, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Gather Together
Ink:  Versamark, Early Espresso, Cajun Craze, Mango Melody
Paper:  Cajun Craze, Early Espresso, Very Vanilla, Gilded Autumn Specialty DSP, Gold foil
Accessories:  Clear EP, Gold EP, Gathered Leaves dies, Rectangles Stitched dies, Dimensionals

Monday, November 9, 2020

Leaf Walk, Part 2

Mornin' y'all, and happy birthday to my brother Adam, who doesn't read this blog but I'm saying it anyway :)  I did get a little bit of time in my craft room over the weekend, but I have yet to make a single card since we moved here--I'm focusing on scrapbook pages.  I'm about six or eight layouts away from my goal for the year, and since my crafting time has been limited that's what I'm aiming for.

So for today I have the second layout from my fall in Virginia photos.


I kept the Early Espresso page base and the chevron patterned paper, but I changed up most of the other colors:  Lovely Lipstick, Pumpkin Pie, and Crushed Curry instead of Cajun Craze, Delightful Dijon, and Soft Suede (I did use Granny Apple Green and Very Vanilla on both).  And this time I made the mats all the same color, but the leaf accents are multicolored, which is the opposite of what I did on the first layout.  They look like they go together without being exactly the same.


As I mentioned, here's today's palette:  Early Espresso, Granny Apple Green, Lovely Lipstick, Pumpkin Pie, Crushed Curry, and Very Vanilla.  Lovely Lipstick is such a bold color that I'm always surprised when I use it on scrapbook pages, it really does play nicely with other colors.  I've been using a lot of bold, bright colors on the pages I've worked on lately too.  It makes me happy.

Have a great week, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Lighthearted Leaves, Touch of Nature
Ink:  Early Espresso, Granny Apple Green, Lovely Lipstick, Pumpkin Pie, Crushed Curry, Versamark
Paper:  Early Espresso, Granny Apple Green, Pumpkin Pie, Very Vanilla, Painted Autumn DSP
Accessories:  Rectangles Stitched dies, Leaflets dies, clear EP

Tuesday, November 3, 2020

Leaf Walk, Part 1

Mornin', y'all!  Before we left North Carolina, I set up a lot of blog posts to cover for a while until we got settled in Germany.  I just realized that I ran out of Scrappy Monday scheduled posts this week, and of course we finished Ryan's baby book too :)  Well, we're here, and pretty settled in (you can see pics of our new house and some travels around Germany on my other blog) but I haven't gotten to spend a lot of time in my new craft room yet.  My hubs kindly took Ryan out for a while on Sunday so I got a few hours that day, and I've been working on new scrapbook pages rather than cards.  I need to take pictures of the layouts I've done so far, but for today I thought I'd share a seasonally appropriate layout from fall in Virginia.


It looks black, but I promise the page base is deep, dark Early Espresso (brown).  I thought it made the colors in my leaf pictures pop.  Where I grew up in Texas, "fall" consists of all the leaves spontaneously turning dull brown and then falling off the trees overnight.  We don't get the fun colors, so I enjoyed fall in Virginia.  Fall in Germany has been pretty glorious too!  We're past peak colors now, but it's still pretty out there (when it's not raining buckets). 

Anyway, back to today's layout, I used retired favorite Lighthearted Leaves for my page accents.  I didn't particularly like the die for the one on the right page (the die set was originally designed for Vintage Leaves, but fit the stamps from this set as well) so I ended up fussy-cutting it a bit.  And just for funsies, I used three different colors for the photo mats.  I inked the leaves with Versamark, then colored ink, and stamped, then embossed with clear EP.  That let me watercolor the leaves without the ink running.


And here are my colors:  Early Espresso, Granny Apple Green, Cajun Craze (deep orange, it looks red in this picture), Delightful Dijon, Soft Suede, and Very Vanilla.

Well, it's cloudy right now but not raining, so I'm going to take Ryan out to a playground for a bit.  I'm getting a lot of reading done while he's on the playground, but I don't know how long I'll be able to do this...I'm not going to sit outside slowly turning into a popsicle when it gets really cold!  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Notable Alphabet, Lighthearted Leaves
Ink:  Early Espresso, Granny Apple Green, Cajun Craze, Delightful Dijon, Versamark
Paper:  Early Espresso, Soft Suede, Granny Apple Green, Cajun Craze, Delightful Dijon, Very Vanilla, Painted Autumn DSP
Accessories:  Layering Circles dies, Stitched Shapes dies, Leaflets dies, clear EP

Tuesday, October 27, 2020

SUO Challenges: All Things Autumn

Hey friends!  October is my favorite month of the year, how about you?

Another favorite:  it's SUO Challenges day!


Our theme this time is to make fall cards.  Fall is my favorite season so you know I was all over this :)


I ended up with an autumn rainbow here and I love it.  I picked a pretty plaid from the Plaid Tidings DSP Stack and then chose some warm colors that I thought would pop on the plaid, so altogether my card has Bumblebee, Pumpkin Pie, Cinnamon Cider, Cherry Cobbler, Pretty Peacock, and Shaded Spruce on it.  Once again I turned to my trusty catalog for inspiration, take a look at page 55 for the original card.

Your turn!  Upload a fall card on the SUO Challenges blog, and enjoy something pumpkiny if that's your thang (iced pumpkin coffee cake, here I come!).  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Love of Leaves
Ink:  Bumblebee, Pumpkin Pie, Cinnamon Cider, Cherry Cobbler, Versamark
Paper:  Bumblebee, Cinnamon Cinder, Thick Whisper White, Plaid Tidings DSP
Accessories:  Stitched Leaves dies, Rectangles Stitched dies, white EP, In Color Enamel Dots, Dimensionals