Ink Blended Thank You

Mornin' y'all!  It's 9:30 in the morning and I already feel like I've accomplished something.  I got the kiddo to school, did my workout this morning, and I've got a rather large pile of boxes out on the front porch waiting for a charity to come pick up my donation.  There's so much more space in the front of the house with those boxes out of the way : )

Anyway, I do have a card to share today.

I really like the Inked & Tiled stamp set (I did not get the bundle this time, I didn't think I'd use the punch much) and I need to play with a bit more, so today's card was a good opportunity to do that and play with some pretty colors too.  I used this week's Freshly Made Sketch:

Love this one, lots of "scope for imagination" as Anne Shirley would say.  I paired that with this week's Color Throwdown:

That picture reminds me of when the hubs and I had morning glories at our first house in North Carolina about 18 years ago.  They were growing like crazy...up until he dumped undiluted Miracle Grow on them and they all died, ha!  We had four o'clocks and moonflowers growing with the morning glories so we had flowers all day long and into the evening.  The moonflowers were as big as my hand!  Anyway, for today's card, I used Bubble Bath, Mossy Meadow, and Berry Burst for my colors.

Okay, I'm off to tackle more on the ol' to-do list.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Inked & Tiled
Ink:  Bubble Bath, Mossy Meadow, Berry Burst
Paper:  Bubble Bath, Mossy Meadow, Berry Burst, Thick Basic White, Bright & Beautiful DSP Stack
Accessories:  Decked Rectangles dies, retired Glimmer Dots, Dimensionals

Kuzcooooo!

Boom, baby!

I made this card for my friend Krissy's birthday, because she loves Emperor's New Groove as much as I do and how fun is that Kuzco stamp!  I stamped Boom, Baby! tone-on-tone on the Pineapple Punch square, and I'll put a birthday sentiment on the inside.  I started this card yesterday when I happened to be wearing an Yzma shirt : )

Lucky for me, the current color challenge at Cupcake Inspirations has the perfect Kuzco color palette:

I chose Tahitian Tide, Poppy Parade, and the retired Pineapple Punch for my colors.

And I used the Paper Players sketch:

I rarely buy ribbon anymore because I just don't use it very often, and upon diving into my ribbon stash (which is still large enough to be spread over three photo boxes), I discovered I didn't have any ribbon in the colors I used from the color challenge above, so I settled for a black 3/8" taffeta.  That's my favorite ribbon that SU! has ever come out with, and I still have it in probably twenty colors.

I'm off to either work on my to-do list or take a nap.  It's a toss-up.  Boom, baby!

Supplies:
Stamps:  Boom, Baby! from Ink Road Stamps
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Pineapple Punch, Stampin' Blends in neutrals, Pineapple Punch, Tahitian Tide, Poppy Parade, Cherry Cobbler
Paper:  Tahitian Tide, Pineapple Punch, Thick Basic White, Poppy Parade DSP
Accessories:  Mini dimensionals, black 3/8" taffeta ribbon

SUO Challenges: A Spec-Taco-Lar Sketch

Hey hey it's TACO TUESDAY and also time for a new challenge at SUO Challenges!

This time around, we've got a great sketch for you!  Check it out:

And here's what I made:

A taco with a mustache AND a silly pun sentiment?  Oh yeah, I am HERE for it!  Once again I started with the Bright & Beautiful DSP and just went from there!  Lots of great patterns in this stack.

Hope you'll give this sketch a try and post your card on the SUO Challenges blog.  I think I need to make another card or two with this sketch, it's fun!  And tonight we're definitely having tacos for dinner : )

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Taco Fiesta
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Versamark, Stampin' Blends in Lemon Lolly, Lemon Lime Twist, Poppy Parade
Paper:  Lemon Lolly, Lemon Lime Twist, Blueberry Bushel, Thick Basic White, Bright & Beautiful DSP stack
Accessories:  Deckled Rectangles dies, white EP, Dimensionals

August 2020

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  My in-laws took Ryan for the weekend, so despite not feeling quite up to snuff I was able to get a lot of things done, especially on Saturday.  I'd say I'm at 98% unpacked and organized; the big thing now is to work on doing the claim so we can be reimbursed for the stuff the movers damaged.  So I'll be working on that this afternoon and hope I can sneak in a little craft room time as well.

For this morning I am sneezing like crazy (is it allergies? I don't know) and ready to check out a scrapbook layout.

This is one of my catch-all layouts for an entire month, which is when we were getting moved out of North Carolina and getting ready to go to Germany.  We've lived in I think 9 houses over the last 20 years and I don't know that I have pictures of all of them, so I'm glad I thought to take a pic of our NC house before we left.

Today's color palette:  Daffodil Delight, Granny Apple Green, Shaded Spruce, Tahitian Tide, Pacific Point, and Whisper White.  It was fun deciding which color to use for each photo mat since I mixed them all up.

I'm off to yoga at the Y, then I'll be spending some quality time with Microsoft Excel working on that claim thing.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Full Calendar
Ink:  Pacific Point, Night of Navy marker
Paper:  Daffodil Delight, Shaded Spruce, Pacific Point, Granny Apple Green, Tahitian Tide, Thick Basic White, Pleased as Punch DSP
Accessories:  On Film dies

Sea Turtle Salutation

Mornin' y'all!  After spending two days at home not feeling well, Ryan is back at school today, hurrah!  Unfortunately now I'm under the weather.  Might be moving a bit more slowly today, but I still have things to do.  But first, a card!

Sea Turtle is another stamp set I got in the recent one-day stamp sale.  I thought the larger sea turtle image would be perfect for the 600th Freshly Made Sketch:

Congrats to the Freshly Made Sketches team for making it to #600, that's amazing!  As is my custom, I paired the sketch with the Color Throwdown:

I used Smoky Slate (on the sentiment, I didn't use a lot I know), Lost Lagoon, and Garden Green for the colors.  I started this card last night while Ryan was in the tub, really all I got done was stamping the turtle and the sentiment.  I got up this morning and saw the theme at As You See It:

And my sea turtle fits the theme, serendipity!  One of my favorite ever beach experiences was when the hubs and I were visiting Hawaii, we were driving around and happened to stop at a beach to take some pictures, and we discovered that there were two or three giant sea turtles enjoying the beach as well.  We stayed back a respectful distance (I think there were people there from a wildlife conservation group to ensure the turtles' well-being) but we got some really great pictures of them with our zoom lens.  I think that experience is only trumped by the time that hubs and I were walking along a beach in Florida and that's where he proposed : )

Hope your day is beachy keen!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Sea Turtle, Inked & Tiled
Ink:  Garden Green, Lost Lagoon, Smoky Slate
Paper:  Lost Lagoon, Thick Basic White
Accessories:  Mini Dimensionals, Polished Dots

Rosy Maple Moth

Hey y'all!  I told my hubs I feel like I've got the house about 90% unpacked and organized, but that last 10% might be the hardest bit.  I try to do at least a couple of things every day so I know I'm making progress, but I'm also building in some time to decompress because this has been A LOT.  So I took a bit of time and made a card!

This is for the CAS challenge from the Paper Players:

And the sketch from Sunday Stamps:

Both fun challenges!  I have several options for buggy stamps but I couldn't resist the moths from Night of Flight.  The sentiment is from Softly Sketched and continues with "how amazing you really are" on the inside of the card (that's another set I got during the one-day stamp sale).  Ever since I got Night of Flight, I've seen several pictures of different very cool moths, like this one:

So my moth was inspired by a real-life Rosy Maple Moth, isn't it pretty?  I didn't know moths came in a pink and yellow color scheme : ) I screen-shot a couple of different pictures of the moth from the National Park Service, and I highly recommend you give them a follow on Facebook.  Their social media team is on point and frequently hilarious : )

That's it for me today.  I started writing this post last night, and then the kiddo said his stomach was upset and we spent a lot of last night with him throwing up, poor kid.  So it's going to be a sit-at-home kind of day today.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Night of Flight, Softly Sketched
Ink:  Night of Navy, Bubble Bath, Stampin' Blends in Lemon Lolly & Bubble Bath
Paper:  Night of Navy, Thick Basic White
Accessories:  Stylish Shapes dies, Mini Dimensionals, retired In Color rhinestones in Pale Papaya

Happy Kiwi, Happy Craft Room

Hey y'all!  Usually today would be Scrappy Monday, but after a lot of work last week I got my craft room about 95% ready to rock and I just had to jump in on a couple of challenges before they close.  So here's my first card made since I got my craft table and everything else : )

I took advantage of the one-day stamp sale even though I didn't have a functional craft room, and Hello Kiwi is one of my new acquisitions.  (I am currently awaiting the arrival of my holiday catty preorder, don't tell the hubs on me.)  I used last week's Freshly Made Sketch:

And as usual, I paired that with the Color Throwdown:

These colors look autumnal to me, but I wanted an excuse to use new stamps.  I used Old Olive, Pumpkin Pie, and Pecan Pie for my colors.

So over the last two weeks, I have unpacked the house and gotten things mostly organized.  Every time we move, I pack up my ink pads--a rubber band around each one to keep it closed, and each ink pad goes in a plastic baggie.  (Knowing how often we move, I keep the baggies in a tub, and when I prep for the next move I reuse the baggies and toss the prepped ink pads in the tub for shipment.)  And this is why I do that:

It's a bit tedious getting all the ink pads prepped, especially since I have all the retired colors too, but this is why I do it.

Instead of having purple ink all over everything, I was able to easily rinse off this one ink pad and move on with getting everything organized.  I think I've only had two or three ink pads leak like this while in transit, but again, I didn't get ink all over anything but one ink pad each time.  So there's your moving tip.

And here's what my craft room looks like this morning:

Big difference from the picture I shared last week!  My file cabinets have been quite beat up and one is missing a drawer handle, so I think I'll be getting new ones in the next couple of months.  And this is the last house for those three bookshelves too, the movers finally damaged them terminally.  The top of one is totally broken, but I can use the shelves for the next year.  So when we get ready to move next summer, I'll buy some new bookshelves but I'll just leave them unassembled until we get to wherever we're going, and these shelves will get tossed.  I'm pretty sure I've had them since before I got married, so they're over 20 years old and have weathered about 10 moves now (including 3 different countries).  So they've had a pretty long life.

Anyway, I took a bit of time this morning to make one card, and now I'm going to the Y to take a yoga class.  I've been working very hard for the last two weeks, so it's time to do a bit of self-care.  I'll be back to work on the last bit of organization this afternoon.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Hello Kiwi
Ink:  Old Olive, Pumpkin Pie, Pecan Pie, Memento Tuxedo Black
Paper:  Pecan Pie, Pumpkin Pie, Thick Basic White
Accessories:  Deckled Rectangles dies, Dimensionals, Classic Matte Dots

SUO Challenges: Back to School Blues and Bird

Happy Tuesday and hope you've got your backpack and books, 'cause it's time for a new challenge from SUO Challenges!

Yep, we're doing back to school cards for this challenge!  And my kiddo starts school tomorrow, woohoo!  There are actually several great choices for this theme in the current catalog and of course you could use retired SU! stamps too.  Here's what I made:

One of my besties is starting a new teaching job this school year, after being a SAHM for several years and then substitute teaching for a while.  So this card is for her to wish her luck with her new 4th grade class!  I love that Apple Harvest has carried over from last year, I don't know why they didn't make the coordinating dies a permanent thing.  The dies were on the clearance rack for quite a while, don't know if they still are.

And I have a bonus card for today!  As luck would have it, my last SU! order before leaving Germany arrived right before I had to start packing up my craft room, and I made time to make one more card for this challenge because I fell in love with the Bird's Eye View stamp set.  Here it is:

The sentiment is from Rhino Ready, and the papers are from the Inked Botanicals DSP Stack.  In the same order, I got the Nested Essentials dies, so I had to give those a try too (the die around the bookish bird).  So glad I got to make this before everything got packed up.

So let's see your back to school cards!  Post 'em over on the SUO Challenges blog.  And have fun, this is art class : )

Supplies, all SU!, apple card:
Stamps:  Apple Harvest, Sending Smiles
Ink:  Night of Navy, Stampin' Blends in Sweet Sorbet & Soft Sea Foam
Paper:  Boho Blue, Thick Basic White, Countryside Inn DSP
Accessories:  Apple Blossoms dies, Sending dies, Dimensionals

Supplies, all SU!, bird card:
Stamps:  Bird's Eye View, Rhino Ready
Ink:  Night of Navy, Stampin' Blends in Petal Pink, Calypso Coral, Daffodil Delight, Pool Party, Lost Lagoon
Paper:  Petal Pink, Night of Navy, Pool Party, Thick Basic White, Inked Botanicals DSP
Accessories:  Nested Essentials dies, Stylish Shapes dies, Dimensionals, Milky Dots

P.S.  This is what my craft room currently looks like:

And this is the loft area next door to the craft room, where the *rest* of my stuff currently is:

Okay, not quite all of it is craft room stuff, but a lot of it is.  So these two areas are my next area to tackle in the house; I've got the downstairs about 80% unpacked and organized (including the garage, even!), and I need to work on these two places next before I can figure out where I'm storing certain things from downstairs.  I'm hoping that my craft room might be workable by the end of the week.  With Ryan starting school tomorrow, I think I can do it.  Wish me luck!

Sunny Adventure

Mornin', y'all.  It has been a really busy (and stressful) few days here--all our household goods were delivered on Friday, I had a pair of people come help unpack stuff all day Saturday, and Sunday was pretty much spent trying to get the kitchen unpacked and organized.  Hubs and I have been married for almost 20 years (our anniversary is coming up in October), and in that time we have moved 8 times, including to 3 different countries (really we moved 9 times, because once we moved from one house to another one about a half a mile away, but I usually don't count that one).  But this was the worst packing job I've ever seen.  I always keep my stamps on six-foot bookshelves and rather than putting all the stamp cases in boxes, taking the shelves out and wrapping up the bookshelf frames for transport, they just wrapped a bunch of cardboard around the shelves with all the contents still on them.  So of course when I got them here, we ripped open the cardboard and it was like a volcano of stamp cases coming out, quite a few of them mangled.  More than one fully-loaded bookshelf and one of my filing cabinets full of cardstock arrived here upside down.  I have a vintage sewing machine that I got from my great-grandmother, it's one of those that folds down into a table--they snapped a leg off of it and the hubs said he doesn't know if that's fixable (I only ever use it as a table, I don't know if the machine works but that part isn't important to me).  And of course they didn't pack any of our picture frames properly--in one case, the packers taped together two flattened-down boxes and then shoved in 8 frames--with glass!--without wrapping anything in paper.  I'm shocked and amazed that more stuff wasn't completely destroyed, though they did put scratches and dings in several of the expensive frames that I had done in Germany.  At least we got the stuff here though; the hubs was supposed to receive a small shipment where he is, which included a lot of his clothes, a very nice bike, golf clubs, and a lot of his work-related stuff--yeah, they have totally lost that entire shipment.  First time we've had that happen.

On the upside, we have our own beds back to sleep in, and after wrestling with the kitchen all day Sunday it's in fairly good shape.  I unpacked Ryan's room on Saturday night but it looks like a disaster now because he had to drag out all of his toys since he hadn't seen them in 2 1/2 months.  And his books are all over everywhere too because the bookshelf in his room has to be replaced, but I'm fairly confident I can get a shelf from Target and put it together to fix that.  Most of the day yesterday was spent picking up my car and getting it all set for me to drive here in Texas, and happily that whole process went like buttah.  My dad drove with me to pick up the car, it got here just fine and only took us about 20 minutes to do all the paperwork and stuff before we were driving off, then we got the car inspected and that only took 15 minutes, took a break for lunch (I am still happy to be so close to a Chuy's, I missed good TexMex!), and then got the car registered with the state so I'm all legal and everything.  So yeah that process took most of the day, but every piece of it went very smoothly.  I had a lot of help from my dad (he was here all day Friday and Saturday, and helped me with the whole car process yesterday), my mom (taking care of my spawn while I was doing all the other stuff), and my brother (he helped with the delivery on Friday and spent a couple of hours yesterday setting up our TV which has suddenly decided it's schizophrenic and only talking to the remote when it feels like it).

Sadly, setting up my craft room will have to wait until I can get the downstairs of the house unpacked and organized, but I did make a few cards in Germany that I haven't posted yet.  So here is one I made just to play around with the Next Destination stamp set.

Next Destination has a few travel-related images and some nice sentiments, which is useful for me since most of the people we know are semi-nomadic like we are.  We have friends all over the US, Europe, and Asia, which is pretty cool.  Yeah the semi-nomadic lifestyle has some downsides (this move has been our worst and most stressful yet, but we're dealing), but it does have some pretty incredible upsides.  It's always an adventure.

Anyway, I need to pick an area and start unpacking.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Next Destination
Ink:  Tahitian Tide, Calypso Coral
Paper:  Tahitian Tide, Thick Basic White, Inked Botanicals DSP Stack
Accessories:  Nested Essentials dies, Dimensionals

SUO Challenges: Gettin' Fancy

Happy August, y'all!  Not gonna lie, I'm looking forward to school starting so Ryan is occupied for a while each day and I'll have some time to stamp.  I have a big project in mind that I'm itching to get started on.  But for right this minute, we have a new challenge at SUO Challenges!

This time it's all about fancy folds.  Umm, I'm pretty much allergic to making 3D items and nonstandard folds, so this is definitely a challenge for me!  After looking through alllllll the tutorials on Splitcoast, I finally decided that the Twist Gate Fold might be doable, and here's what I made:

Thanks to Dawn's awesome tutorial, I was able to put this card together with no trouble at all!  So here's what it looks like unfolded:

Cute, right?  And if you angle it right, it should still fit in a standard envelope.  And once again I used the Bright & Beautiful DSP stack...hey, I was making a whole bunch of design team cards back in April, trying to make them with all current products, and Bright & Beautiful is what I had at the time for DSP.  (And Countryside Inn, but I think Bright & Beautiful is a bit more flexible.)

Hope you'll give the fancy fold of your choice a try and post your creation on the SUO Challenges blog.  Hey, if I can do it, you definitely can do it!  If you're like me and not real comfortable with fancy folds, I'd recommend taking a look at the tutorials on Splitcoast for a starting point.  Or ask my old pal Google for ideas.  Have fun!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Playing in the Rain
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Berry Burst, Stampin' Blends in Gray Granite & Bubble Bath
Paper:  Berry Burst, Thick Basic White, Bright & Beautiful DSP Stack
Accessories:  Playing in the Rain dies, Stylish Shapes dies, Dimensionals