Saying Goodbye to Sadie

Yesterday was a very hard day for my friend Krissy, who had to unexpectedly say goodbye to her dog Joplin.  I am doing my best to support her in her grief because Krissy's dogs are her babies and I totally understand that.  I ordered a small memorial gift that will be delivered today and I will be sending her many cards in the mail, since that's pretty much all I can do from two states away.

So today I'm sharing my scrapbook layout from when we said goodbye to our own girl, Sadie, nearly four years ago when she was 14 years old.

Man, this was a tough layout to make, but I am glad I have it for my furbabies' scrapbook.  The two pictures on the bottom right were taken just two days before Sadie passed.  I chose that multicolored washy background because it reminded me of a low-key Rainbow Bridge for my girl.  I miss her and Vader still every day, but we are looking forward to adopting a dog or two after we move again this summer.  I miss having furbabies.

I used black for my page base, Cherry Cobbler to match Sadie's collar, and the other colors are in the watercolor wash background, Misty Moonlight, Blushing Bride, and So Saffron.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Back to Basics Alphabet, Happy Tails
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Misty Moonlight, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Basic Black, Cherry Cobbler, Misty Moonlight, Thick Basic White, Sand & Sea DSP
Accessories:  Dog Builder Punch

Sweet Boy

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  Hope you had a good weekend.  I have today and tomorrow off work and I have crafty PLANS so I'd better get started...as soon as I eat breakfast.

So we're kicking off the week with a rather CAS scrapbook layout featuring one of my favorite doggos:

Vader's birthday is coming up (January 15) and I miss him and Sadie all the time.  These were just a couple of random pictures I had of Vader from when we lived in England, he and Sadie will have their own scrapbook album (whenever I get around to actually putting it together, I have a lot of pages made).

Today's color palette:  Pool Party, Pacific Point, Real Red, Basic Black, and Whisper White.  And a sweet dog punch for an accent.

Have a great week, y'all.  Hug your doggo.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Larger Than Life Alphabet & Numbers, Happy Tails
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Pacific Point, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Pool Party, Real Red, Basic Black, Thick Basic White, Pacific Point DSP, Playful Pets DSP, Celebrate Everything DSP
Accessories:  Dog punch

Baby Luke: February

Hey y'all, happy Saturday!  Ready for another baby book layout?

I think that teeny heart pattern might be my all-time favorite Valentine DSP from Stampin' Up!  It's always a fun challenge to do a Valentine layout for a baby boy that isn't really super girly.  Yes I have the heart paper, and several shades of pink and red, but then there's the cute doggo and accessories to make it more boyish.  Looking at this now I kinda wish I'd done a slightly bigger circle for the dog stamp to give him a bit more room to "breathe".

'Nother rainy day here, how's your weekend going?  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies:
Stamps:  Happy Tails, And Everything Nice, Bow Wow, dog from Whipper Snapper
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Crumb Cake, Stampin' Blends in Smoky Slate, Crumb Cake, Soft Suede, Balmy Blue
Paper:  Flirty Flamingo, Lovely Lipstick, Balmy Blue, Crumb Cake, Thick Whisper White, All My Love DSP
Accessories:  Sizzix letters, Layering Circles dies, circle punches

Crate Expectations

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  And it was a relatively scrappy weekend too--I got one layout done start to finish yesterday, and a second one is about 75% done, which will bring my year to date page total up to 90.  Pretty dang good!

Since Blogger got over its snit and is letting me upload pictures again, I can share one of my recent layouts:

The pictures are from the end of December in 2010, so they're not new, but I just finished this layout in the past few weeks and I am *ridiculously* proud of my page title.  We had to get new travel crates for the doggos when we moved to England (even though they hadn't gotten any bigger since we moved them to and from Japan, the airline insisted) and I'm over her still giggling about crate expectations.

Today's color palette is a blast from the past:  Tip Top Taupe, Ruby Red, Brocade Blue, and still-current Basic Black and Very Vanilla.  Very simple layout, and not as many pictures as I usually cram in, but I like how it turned out.

Hope your week is off to a good start, y'all.  We're in quarantine day 156...

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Headline Alphabet, Back to Basics Alphabet, Happy Tails
Ink:  Brocade Blue, Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Tip Top Taupe, Brocade Blue, Thick Very Vanilla, Holiday Lounge DSP
Accessories:  Dog punch

The Pack

Scrappy Monday!  I made some progress on my scrapbook pages over the weekend, but it's still going to be tough to meet my 200-page goal for the year.  I may be making fewer cards and concentrating on scrapbooks for a while.

So here's a layout I made a few months ago, from when I moved temporarily back in with my parents prior to moving to Japan in 2008, and my brother and sister-in-law moved in at the same time because they were buying a house.  So we had my two dogs, their one, and my parents' dog all in the house at the same time.  (Sadly, my girl Sadie is the only one of these dogs who is still alive, and she's 13.)

Anyway, the advantage of scrapping pages with four dogs who are all neutral colors is that I was free to pick ANY colors for this layout.  So I chose a wild print from the Confetti Celebration DSP pack (on the bottom) and used it to pick the colors for my page base and mats.  And I used the dog punch and Happy Tails stamp set for an accent on the right page.

So here's my fun color palette for today:  Bermuda Bay, Strawberry Slush, Tangelo Twist, Crushed Curry, Basic Black, and Whisper White.

Have a great day, y'all.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Taffy Alphabet, Headline Alphabet, Happy Tails
Ink:  Bermuda Bay, Strawberry Slush, Tangelo Twist, Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Bermuda Bay, Tangelo Twist, Basic Black, Thick Whisper White, Confetti Celebration DSP
Accessories:  Dog punch, Stitched Shapes Framelits

SUO Challenges: Summer

Mornin' y'all!  It's time for another challenge at SUO Challenges!

This time around we've got a theme challenge:  SUMMER!  Here's my card:

I pondered the theme for quite a while before I decided to go with dog days of summer :D I picked the fun stripey paper from the Bird Ballad DSP pack and built my card colors around that.  I tried to do a little shading on my doggo, so she's lighter on the belly and darker on her back because that's how my real-life doggo girl looks (except she's black with a lot of gray hair).

Don't forget to whip up your own summer-themed creation and share it with us at the SUO Challenges blog.  Can't wait to see!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Happy Tails
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Pear Pizzazz, Crumb Cake Stampin' Blends
Paper:  Petal Pink, Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party, Thick Whisper White, Bird Ballad DSP
Accessories:  Stitched Shapes Framelits, Dog Punch, Dimensionals, Wink of Stella

Sympathy for Cleo

I was talking to my dad this weekend and he said this has not been a good year for dogs.  First my Vader died in February, my friend Amber's senior dog died a few weeks ago, and a week ago my almost-sister and her husband had to put down their dog because of kidney or liver problems.  Then on Friday my sister-in-law got home to discover that their dog Cleo had been attacked by another dog--no idea how the other dog got in their backyard, but she rushed Cleo to the animal hospital immediately. Sadly, the damage was too extensive and she died on Friday night.  Poor Cleo was a 13-year-old dog with just 3 legs.  I feel so badly for my SIL and brother.  And of course Cleo.

Hey, I used the dog stamp instead of just the punch.  I watercolored the dog in about the same color that Cleo was (though paper Cleo has four legs instead of three).  I know she frequently wore a purple color because that's SIL's favorite color, so that's how I chose Highland Heather.  Smoky Slate just seemed to go with the other two colors.

I used the sketch from CAS(E) This Sketch:

The elements in the corner of the sketch reminded me of All Adorned, which was a later Sale-a-Bration offiering this year.

I'm also entering this at Just Add Ink:

I hate making sympathy cards, and I'd much rather do it when I don't need one rather than having to make one for a specific thing.

Poor little Cleo.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Happy Tails, All Adorned
Ink:  Basic Gray, So Saffron, Highland Heather
Paper:  Smoky Slate, Highland Heather, Thick Whisper White, Watercolor paper
Accessories:  Dog punch, Stitched Shapes Framelits, Labels Collection Framelits (retired)

Paw Print on Your Heart

Mornin' folks!  Once again, Scrappy Monday will be delayed...because today I'm a guest designer at What Will You Stamp?!  And I'm particularly excited to be doing it this week because of the featured stamp set:

Being a long-time dog mama, I loved this as soon as I saw it in the Occasions catalog, but I didn't actually buy it until just after Vader died.  I did make a sympathy card with it, because I need one, but this will also be great for yay new puppy cards or just hi friend cards.  And it's carrying over to the new catalog!  So here's what I made:

I puffy heart love the coordinating dog punch, so rather than using the stamp I just punched out the doggo on some lovely patterned paper (All My Love from the Occasions catalog).  I even managed to get it so one of the darker pink hearts looks like the doggo's nose :)  I love how the sentiments in this are justified to follow the contours of the dog.  I think the dog would look great punched out on some pretty floral paper too.  And one of these days I'll have to stamp him too.

Hope you can play along at What Will You Stamp?.  Thanks to the WWYS crew for letting me be a guest designer this week, I really enjoyed making this card!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Happy Tails
Ink:  Powder Pink, Call Me Clover, Soft Suede
Paper:  Powder Pink, Call Me Clover, Soft Suede, Thick Whisper White, All My Love DSP
Accessories:  Dog punch, Stitched Shapes Framelits, Dimensionals