Cherry Goodness

Mornin' y'all!  Running a little later today and I have things to do so Imma type fast : )  Yesterday was the first time I'd stamped anything in a few days and while my first effort didn't pan out, I did like where this card ended up:

I quite like the Atlantic Hearts sketch this week:

Which I paired with the Festive Friday challenge:

I used brown, cherries, and a sweet sentiment.  I think I'll have to go back and do this one again and focus on chocolate ; )  

To round things out for today's card, here's the Inspired By... challenge:

I used the colors Poppy Parade, Daffodil Delight, and Shy Shamrock based on the photo, and the gingham pattern and fruit motif as well.

Alright, we're off to walk Daph-Daph and then go to the store and then I'm making cookie dough, hopefully before it's time to drop Ryan off at camp.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Sweetest Cherries, All Boxed Up
Ink:  Poppy Parade, Shy Shamrock, Pecan Pie
Paper:  Poppy Parade, Thick Basic White, Gingham Gala DSP Stack, Bloom Impressions DSP
Accessories:  Cherry builder punch, Everyday Arches dies, Stylish Shapes dies, Dimensionals, In Color Flat Pearls

Wilkommen in Deutschland

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  Hope you have a good day off for Labor Day.  Today's scrapbook layout is from our arrival in Germany at the end of August 2020:

This is a mishmash of pictures from the first couple of weeks that we were in Germany, when we were staying in a hotel suite and looking for a house.  Also we were locked in there for two weeks because of all the Covid restrictions, people from the hubs' work had to buy groceries for us and bring them to us, it was a crazy time.  So all those pics are in the hotel room.

Today's color palette:  Crushed Curry, Tangelo Twist, Azure Afternoon, Pecan Pie, and white.  I really liked Tangelo Twist as an orange and I think I'm almost out of cardstock in that color, at least in the 12x12.  Not sure how much 8.5x11 I might have.  Azure Afternoon and Pecan Pie ended up being great matches for Ryan's bear jammies!

That's it for me today, peeps.  I'm going to do my workout and then most likely do dishes because that never stops.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Taffy Alphabet, Calendar Alphabet & Numbers, Sweets & Treats, All Boxed Up, bear from Whipper Snapper
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Tangelo Twist, Azure Afternoon, Pecan Pie, Stampin' Blends in Pecan Pie, Ivory, Smoky Slate, Mossy Meadow, Pool Party, Pumpkin Pie
Paper:  Crushed Curry, Azure Afternoon, Pecan Pie, Thick Basic White, Tangelo Twist DSP
Accessories:  None

Friday Flashback: All Boxed Up

Mornin' friends!  Time for another Friday Flashback, and today's stamp set is All Boxed Up.  I didn't get the coordinating dies that went with it because if I remember correctly it made little milk carton-style boxes and I just don't do the 3D thing hardly ever.  But I loved the sentiment stamps in this set :)  For today's set of cards, I paired All Boxed Up with the Cupcakes & Carousels DSP stack.  Here's what I made:

I think that "happy thoughts" stamp was the main reason I bought the set, I love it.  And I loved the sunburst effect from the DSP on two of the cards.

I used the same supplies for all the cards, just changed where the sentiment went based on the background DSP and what I thought looked good.  Four cards done very quickly, CAS but cute.  Gotta love some good DSP patterns and cute sentiments!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  All Boxed Up
Ink:  Early Espresso
Paper:  Bermuda Bay, Peach Parfait, Calypso Coral, So Saffron, Cupcakes & Carousels DSP Stack
Accessories:  Rectangles Stitched dies, Stitched Shapes dies, Dimensionals

Stars & Stripes

Hey y'all, happy Friday!  It was a busy day today so while I made this card this morning, I just now got a minute to post it here.  And in between this morning and now, this card has already made it to its recipient...my hubs : )

Unfortunately I didn't get a really good picture of it; the circle element is Night of Navy, NOT black.  I have both stars and stripes for the Paper Players challenge:

And I followed the sketch from Make the Cards:

Somehow my simple card design ended up requiring three different sets of dies but only one stamp, ha.  Anyway, I'm very glad I managed to play in both of these challenges today, I always love stars and stripes and a good sketch.

Have a great weekend!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  All Boxed Up (retired)
Ink:  Night of Navy
Paper:  Thick Basic White, Night of Navy, Real Red DSP (retired)
Accessories:  Layering Circles dies, Stitched Stars dies, Hippo & Friends dies, Dimensionals

2016 Showcase, Part 2

Time for Part 2 of my favorite projects from 2016.  Let's dive right in, shall we?

Love this bright and cheery card for May.

June's pick is this Millennium Falcon card, might not be the prettiest thing ever but I'm rather proud of it given that I don't do much punch art.  And I watched The Empire Strikes Back last night in honor of Carrie Fisher.

For July I chose this flamingo card, love the bright colors and I need to break out that stamp set again soon.

And the last card for today is August's jellyfish.  I admit the main image is a little indistinct with the clear EP, but I loved the idea of it and how the "sand" on the background turned out.

Part 3 coming tomorrow!

2016 Showcase, Part 1

Mornin', y'all.  I have entered the phase of pregnancy when I'm tired all the time but CANNOT SLEEP more than 3 hours a night.  I swear this kid kicked me around 4:30 this morning so hard that I heard a noise when he did it.  Not even exaggerating.

Happily for me, it's time to do the annual look back at favorite projects from the year.  Most challenges are on hiatus until January and I haven't spent much time in my craft room so this is a great time to not worry about making something new :)  So today let's take a look back at cards from January through April.

This card was for my SIL's baby shower in January; my niece's nursery is decorated with ladybugs but I did this card with the colors we used for her Cinderella baby shower.

I loved this card from February, I don't use big bold sentiments like that too terribly often and this one just speaks to me.

For March, this punch art bear wins the prize for my favorite card of the month.  I actually just sent this one to my friend Missy a few weeks ago, how I managed to hold onto it for 9 months before I mailed it to her I really don't know!

And last up for today is this card from April, which was inspired by the color palette of a bathroom in Disneyland.  Inspiration is everywhere!

I'm off to the gym.  Hubs and I made sticky toffee pudding on Monday night and I feel like I need to live at the gym for a week to offset that.  Cheers, y'all!

Bear Book: May

Hey kids!  It's Saturday, so time for another Bear Book layout.

The super-dark color on the page title and accent mats is not black, it's Handsome Hunter but it looks black in the photos.

I used watercolor wonder crayons this time to color in the image, and I wish I'd done colored pencils to do better shading on the bear.  The sky looks good though.

Had to do some bees because this book was for Missy, and Melissa means "honeybee" which is why it's the May layout...May means Mother's Day and it makes sense in my head.

Today's color palette:  Hello Honey (appropriate, no?), Marina Mist, Handsome Hunter, Soft Suede, and Whisper White.

Have a great weekend, y'all!  We've got a fairly sizeable to-do list over here, so we'd better get to doing.

Supplies:
Stamps:  Honeybear from Whipper Snapper, Brushstroke Hummingbird, All Boxed Up
Ink:  Basic Black, Soft Suede, Marina Mist, Hello Honey, Handsome Hunter
Paper:  Hello Honey, Marina Mist, Handsome Hunter, Thick Whisper White
Accessories:  Sizzix alphabet, Watercolor Wonder Crayons

Guest Designer

Guess what?  Today I get to be a guest designer over at What Will You Stamp? because I won their challenge a couple weeks ago :)

Winner winner chicken dinner!  And luckily I had the stamp set to play along in this week's challenge, which is Flower Patch:

Actually I use this one pretty frequently.  Who doesn't love big, bold flower stamps that have matching dies?  So here's what I made:

This was actually the second iteration; on the first card, I got the flowers up too high and the card looked unbalanced, but I'd already glued everything down so I had to make a whole 'nother one.  But this one looks much better and more balanced to my eye.  I was walking with my dogs last week and noticed a whole lot of yards have azaleas blooming (I think they're azaleas?) and they're in all kinds of different shades of pink, so that was the inspiration for my flowers.  On that one in the middle (on the bottom), the center might look orange but really I had stamped the Daffodil Delight flower, and then stamped off with Watermelon Wonder ink before I stamped the flower center and it turned out looking kinda orange.  Which is okay.  I used the sentiment from All Boxed Up because I love that set, I think it's adorable (and cheap!) and I'm a little sad it's retiring.

So that's it for me today!  If you missed Scrappy Monday, fear not--this week it will just be Scrappy Tuesday :)

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Flower Patch, All Boxed Up
Ink:  Cucumber Crush, Watermelon Wonder, Daffodil Delight
Paper:  Thick Whisper White, Cherry on Top DSP Stack
Accessories:  Flower Fair Framelits

Bathroom Inspiration

How's it going this afternoon?  I couldn't get my act together this morning and get down to the ol' craft cave, but I finally got something made to share today.  Before we get to that, though, let's talk about how inspiration can strike at the weirdest times.  So hubs and I were at Disneyland last week with friends, and on the last day I had to go to the bathroom (the one closest to the Haunted Mansion, they're all done in different colors and styles).  So I'm in there paying my water bill when I look at the floor tiles and think HEY, that's a fun color combination!  It was Lost Lagoon, Perfect Plum, So Saffron, and Very Vanilla (I did not take a picture while I was in there because that would have been weird).  And today I made a card with those colors, except I used Shimmery White instead of vanilla.

The whole background panel and the main image panel are Shimmery White, which sorta shows up on the top of the card.  I used this week's Global Design Project theme challenge:

And since I was gone last week and missed out on doing the sketch, I used that too:

I was also thinking of this week's Retro Rubber Challenge:

I'm not 100% sure my card qualifies though because two of the stamp sets I used I've had for under a year (All Boxed Up and Timeless Textures).  I've had Gorgeous Grunge for two or three years I think, and By the Tide since it debuted in 2013, so 3 years there.  Does that average out to a year for all four stamp sets?  Anyway, since shells originate in the ocean I thought that fit the water theme.  AND, to make the background, I scribbled on my biggest acrylic block with markers, spritzed it real good with water, and then stamped the color smoosh on my paper.  So that part was watery too.

Anyway, maybe I'll continue working downstairs and actually have tomorrow's card done on time...cheers, y'all!  And don't forget to look at the bathroom tiles next time you're in there.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  By the Tide, Gorgeous Grunge, Timeless Textures, All Boxed Up
Ink:  Lost Lagoon, Perfect Plum, Sahara Sand
Paper:  Lost Lagoon, Perfect Plum, Shimmery White
Accessories:  Regals Candy Dots

Best Wishes Butterflies

Mornin' y'all, how's it going?  My little girl dog is desperate to go on a walk this morning so I'd better type fast :)  This past Sunday was the first day of spring, so I have an appropriately springy card for today:

Orange and green were my parents' high school colors :)  But the inspiration for today's color combo comes from Cupcake Inspirations:

I used Pumpkin Pie, Cucumber Crush, and Pear Pizzazz for my SU! colors, which would be the world's weirdest salad:  pumpkin, cucumber, and pear.  I hate eating cucumbers but I like the SU! color.

Anywha, I also used the latest sketch from Fab Friday:

And the latest CASE the Designer challenge from Global Design Project:

I kept the neutral card base and black mat (though the inspiration card used patterned washi tape and I just used plain ol' black cardstock), and my colors are kinda similar.  I thought the asymmetric mat on the Fab Friday sketch would correlate nicely with the ribbon placement, and since I don't have any wreath stamps I thought that sentiment from All Boxed Up (which I just got recently) would work well because it has a circle around it.

Okay, I must succumb to puppy dog eyes and take my lil' girl and her brother out for a walk in the nice spring weather.  Wait, it's in the 40s and windy.  Well, it's not raining so we're going anyway...cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Watercolor Wings, All Boxed Up
Ink:  Crumb Cake, Pumpkin Pie, Cucumber Crush, Pear Pizzazz, Memento Tuxedo Black
Paper:  Crumb Cake, Basic Black, Thick Whisper White, Pumpkin Pie & Cucumber Crush DSP
Accessories:  Linen thread, Dimensionals