The Message in the Hollow Oak

Welcome to the Nancy Drew Challenge!  Today's book is number twelve, The Message in the Hollow Oak.

This time, the revised text is completely different from the original and both of them are a trip.  This is where the revised text covers start going with more of a collage effect rather than a scene out of the book.  Let's take a look at them, starting with the original text.

Quick side note:  I love the horse playing peekaboo by Nancy's hip, I didn't notice him at first and now he makes me giggle every time I look at the cover.  Peekaboo!

Case file:  Nancy wins a radio contest and the prize is the deed to some land in a super remote part of Canada, so she, Bess, and George head for the border with an older lady to chaperone them.  They're involved in a pretty serious train accident but keep on going anyway, only to discover that unscrupulous men are digging for gold on Nancy's land.  She manages to trick the thieves and ends up with a bag of gold and along the way she saves a kidnap victim and reunites two people who had been separated by a misunderstanding years before.  Those two used the titular hollow oak as a letter drop to pass notes to each other.  Lots happening here.

Here's my card for the OT:

We have lots of big, burly lumberjack and gold prospector types in this book, but I was thinking of the one whom Nancy reunites with his long-lost sweetheart when I made this card.  And it was a great excuse to bust out my Wood You Be Mine stamp set!  I put some Cajun Craze Faux Glass Dots on there for accents but they kinda fade into the background. 

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wood You Be Mine?
Ink:  Early Espresso, Old Olive, Stampin' Blends in Old Olive, Neutrals, Pretty in Pink, Cinnamon Cider, Cajun Craze, Crumb Cake, Gray Granite, Boho Blue
Paper:  Bumblebee, Old Olive, Boho Blue, Beauty of the Earth DSP
Accessories:  Dimensionals, Faux Glass Dots

Now let's look at the revised text:

Case file:  Aunt Eloise's PI friend dares Nancy to solve an old mystery that he and his buddies couldn't crack on their vacation--find a message left by a French missionary in a hollow oak tree and follow the clues to find a treasure.  She stays with Ned's cousin as part of a university archaeological dig and not only does she do some digging with them, she does find a series of hollow oak trees and finds the treasure despite another treasure hunter harassing her.  No gold prospectors in this one but it's still pretty wild.

Here's my card:

The cover of this one looks super spooky and Halloween-y, but the book isn't set around Halloween and the only skulls in it are the fragments that the archaeological dig find.  Still, I couldn't get the idea of a skull card out of my noggin so I made this one.  I did cover up the jack o' lantern on this stamp with a flower that's meant to represent Nancy on the cover.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  From the Crypt, Thoughtful Expressions
Ink:  Versamark, Island Indigo, Timid Tiger, Whisper White
Paper:  Island Indigo, Basic Beige, Beauty of the Earth DSP, Beautifully Penned DSP
Accessories:  Thoughtful Expressions dies, black EP,, Dimensionals

Since the book doesn't really have much to do with skulls despite the cover illustration, I made a second card:

Pretty sure that's Nancy's family motto right there.  I happened to see Textured Timber when I got out Thoughtful Expressions for the first card and I just had to use the tree images for a second card.  Still have orange flowers for Nancy though.

What's funny is that when I first sat down to make a card for this book many weeks ago, I hit a creative block and couldn't figure out what to do.  That's about when I snapped up the OT versions of the books and went back to reread from the start, gave it a few weeks and when I came back to this one I ended up with TWO cards for the book that was giving me a block.  Hooray!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Textured Timber, Thoughtful Expressions, Feathered Flight
Ink:  Early Espresso, Pecan Pie, Island Indigo, Stampin' Blends in Old Olive & Timid Tiger
Paper:  Island Indigo, Pecan Pie, Early Espresso, Crumb Cake, Basic Beige
Accessories:  Thankful Labels, Thoughtful Expressions dies, Dimensionals, In Color Flat Pearls

I'd be delighted to have you play along, just drop a link in the comments to your Nancy Drew inspired creation.  You can check out Hey, Nancy Drew for more chatter about the books, and stop by next week for lucky #13, The Mystery of the Ivory Charm!

Oklahoma, Part 4: S'mores

Scrappy Monday!  I'm continuing with the Oklahoma layouts from 2019 when Ryan was much smaller than he is now.  I keep telling him to stop growing but he just won't!

Coincidentally, last week I finished another layout about making s'mores on a different trip :) I chose Daffodil Delight as my page base color because the letters on Ryan's shirt are that color.  I tried Real Red, but decided the red looked better as an accent color instead (the red overpowered everything when I tried it as the page base).  I use a lot of Real Red and Blueberry Bushel on my scrapbook pages now--gotta love the bright colors on kids' clothes, right?

Today's color palette:  Daffodil Delight, Blueberry Bushel, Real Red, Granny Apple Green, Cinnamon Cider, and Whisper White.

Don't forget this also goes along with this week's Paper Players theme challenge!

Supplies:
Stamps:  Pure & Simple Alphabet, Wood You Be Mine?, Eat Chocolate, other stamps by Lawn Fawn
Ink:  Pacific Point, Real Red, Early Espresso, Cinnamon Cider, Cinnamon Cider Blends, Early Espresso marker
Paper:  Daffodil Delight, Granny Apple Green, Real Red, Thick Basic White, Berry Delightful DSP
Accessories:  None

Friday Flashback: Starburst Sayings

Happy Friday!  It is time once more for the Friday Flashback, and today's featured stamp set is Starburst Sayings, which seems kinda appropriate to kick off the 4th of July weekend.  So let's take a whirl through the archives, and if all you want to see is today's new card then scroll to the bottom :)

Also features World Map

Starting off with this lovely map card.  I wish that SU! had done some more stamp sets (or even just one more!) to coordinate with the Starburst dies before they retired them all, but oh well.

Also features Perfectly Penned

That little starburst stamp on the left is covering up a booboo on the embossing powder at the bottom of the H :)

Also features Something to Say

Ahh, my favorite stamp from this set.  What's not to love about a giant Happy Day stamp!

Though apparently that little starburst stamp is the runner-up for favorite stamp from Starburst Sayings.

Works on any color combination!

And lots of different card layouts.

Also features Alphabet Rotary, Gorgeous Grunge, Positively Chevron

This is quite possibly my favorite card in the history of ever.  The inside says "You know the rest!" and I sent it to my dad :D

Also features Wood You Be Mine?

And here's a little lumberjack thank you card.

Also features Too Kind, My Paper Pumpkin (tiny chevron stamp)

Last one, another brightly-colored thank you card.  Now for today's new creation!

My SIL's birthday is on July 5th, so I'm going to send this out to her ASAP for her birthday.  Hey, it looks like this is the first time I used the little celebrate stamp so woohoo for me!  The fireworks and star stamps are from a stamp set called July Fourth.

And I stamped on the inside of the card too.  My patriotic color combo is courtesy of Fab Friday:

And of course I re-used the Freshly Made Sketch that I used yesterday:

And that's it for today.  See you back here tomorrow for another baby book layout :)

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Starburst Sayings, July Fourth, Happy Happenings
Ink:  Tempting Turquoise, Pacific Point, Night of Navy, Real Red
Paper:  Temping Turquoise, Night of Navy, Pacific Point, Shimmery White, Whisper White (just for the inside)
Accessories:  Starburst Framelits, Dimensionals

2015 Showcase, Part 2

Part 2 of the card showcase, so July through December.

July's pick features the fantastically-named stamp set Awesomely Artistic, which I need to use a whole lot more in 2016.  Sometimes having so many stamps is a problem ;)

July's other pick is this ax murderer card, which is quite possibly one of my favorite cards in the history of ever because of a joke I share with a friend, whom I have referred to for years as "my online friend, the ax murderer".  She thinks it's funny too.

My pick for August is this little stellar card, I love the bright colors and all the white space just seems to make it work.

September's pick is the faboolous Stella, who got sent to my friend Sarah who loves all things Halloween and even managed to have her daughter on her favorite holiday.

October's pick is this jellyfish card, just because I think it's funny.

November's pick is this beary thankful card, because I just couldn't get through an entire showcase without that Thankful Forest Friends bear.

November's other pick is this Star Wars birthday card, which I somehow neglected to sign when I gave it to my brother.  Oops.  But I was pretty proud of how Artoo turned out...maybe I should give BB-8 a try?

And to finish up the showcase, December's pick is this sparkly blue poinsettia card, which I sent to my mom because she loves sparkly and blue and all things Christmas.

Happy New Year, peeps!

The Funniest Card in the History of Ever

Good Golly Miss Molly, did we get a storm last night.  We went to bed at 10:00 last night and woke up around 12:30 because it was raining so hard.  I've never seen a storm with so much lightning that it looks like a flickering fluorescent light bulb!  The thunder was mostly a low rumble instead of loud cracks like we get in Texas, but it still took me almost two hours to get back to sleep.  And now it's all pretty and sunny outside.

Anyway, on to today's card, and I'm not over-selling it to call it the funniest card in the history of ever.  Take a look.

This was mailed out a few days ago to my online friend, the axe murderer.  Okay, she's not *really* an axe murderer, but we were friends online for several years before we met in person when she came out to London a few years ago.  The hubs and I told our British neighbors that we were going to meet my online friend in person, and Ness was like, "How do you know she is who she says she is?  She could be a sixty-year-old male axe murderer!"  So then I had to email my friend Vicki and ask her if she was an axe murderer, which she admitted to.  And now every time I talk about her to people who don't know the story, I refer to her as my online friend, the axe murderer.

I'm just sad that I had Wood You Be Mine? and that adorable lumberjack for MONTHS before I had the brain wave to make this card.

Cheers, peeps!  My goal is to have an all-new card ready to share tomorrow, rather than something I made in Alabama before we moved.  Wish me luck.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wood You Be Mine?, My Paper Pumpkin welcome kit
Ink:  Real Red, Tempting Turquoise, Memento Tuxedo Black, Smoky Slate & Crumb Cake Blendabilities
Paper:  Whisper White
Accessories:  Rhinestones

Lloyd the Lumberjack

Howdy, peeps!  I'm feeling much better today, I'm happy to report.  But for the past few days I've been doing battle with my patterned paper scraps...as my DSP collection has edged toward the ridiculous, so too has my stack o' scraps, and it was taking me forever and a day to find the scraps I wanted.  So I fixed that.  Sure, it took three days, but now I'm Organized.

So today's card is one I made a while back, once more for Missy because she still doesn't love Lloyd the Lumberjack.  (Lloyd the Llumberjack?)

My mother is concerned that Lloyd's pants are very tight, and colored in with Coastal Cabana I have to admit they look like manpris.  But I like Lloyd anyway.

This is once again a version of the Nacho Average Challenges sketch from a few weeks ago:

Lurves that sketch :)

That's it for me today, peeps.  Peace out!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wood You Be Mine?  Starburst Sayings
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Coastal Cabana, Crushed Curry, Calypso Coral, Smoky Slate, various Blendabilities which are now discontinued
Paper:  Calypso Coral, Crushed Curry, Whisper White, Best Year Ever DSP
Accessories:  Starburst & Circles Framelits, Dimensionals

Deep in the Heart of Texas

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  I just got a bunch of photo prints from all the stuff we did in 2014, so today's scrapbook layout is a pretty recent vintage.

All the pics on the left page are from my mom's birthday in July, the day the hubs and I got back to Texas from England and surprised her at her birthday dinner (she was expecting us three days later, but we pulled a sneaky trick on all the parental units).  The pics on the right are from the next few weeks we spent there, and you can see 'em close up here.

There's a closeup of the title.  I bought the Texas stamp and horses stamp at a rubber stamp store in Salado, Texas, several years ago but I think this is only the second time or so that I've used it.  Still, I loved it for my title on here, and the teensy letters are from the SU! Rough Edges Alphabet.  And the wee heart is from Wood You Be Mine.

I was totally inspired by the color combo at the Color Throwdown for my layout, though I swapped the Coastal Cabana aqua for Pacific Point.  I kinda had to because that was what was in the patterned paper I used.

There's my color palette:  Real Red, Pacific Point, Night of Navy, Sahara Sand, and Whisper White.  Love me some bright colors.

Anyway, I need to get moving and decide if I'm going to run or take the dogs for a walk first.  They both gotta get done though, so cheers, peeps!

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Rough Edges Alphabet, Wood You Be Mine?, other stamps from Deadbeat Designs
Ink:  Real Red, Night of Navy (ink pad & marker), Sahara Sand
Paper:  Real Red, Whisper White, Night of Navy, Blueberry Crisp DSP

Hearty Lumberjack

Well, Missy agreed that she liked my Baylor-iffic lumberjack, so we'll see what she thinks of a Valentiney one.  He'll be going postal quite soon:

I think he's so stinkin' cute no matter what color he's wearing.  And 'tis the season for Valentines, right?

I wanted this to be on the front of the card, but it was a little bit too big for the sketch I was using so I stuck it on the inside instead.  Speaking of the sketch, it's from Freshly Made Sketches:

And my color combo is from Colour Me...!

Perfect for Valentines.  Beautiful picture too.  I thought about doing something on the Pink Pirouette card base, but I decided to just leave it as-is so my cute little lumberjack can be the star of the show.  I need to think of a name for him.

Hope you're having a great day.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wood You Be Mine?, Hardwood, A Dozen Thoughts
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Cherry Cobbler, Crumb Cake, Whisper White, Blush Blossom & Pink Pirouette markers, Blendabilities in Crumb Cake and Smoky Slate
Paper:  Pink Pirouette, Cherry Cobbler, Crumb Cake, Whisper White, Trim the Tree DSP Stack (from the Holiday mini)
Accessories:  Sweetheart punch, Dimensionals

This One's For Missy

I'm late posting again today, but this time it's because I went shopping with a friend before I got my card completely finished.  Oh, and Sadie seems to be doing better today; she was asking to go for a walk and I was like hahahahNO, you're still moving kinda slow and I don't want to hurt you more.

But anyway, there is a stamp set in the Occasions catalog that I love.  My friend Missy....does not.  And I don't know why, because I think it's awesome and hilarious and fun and different and so when I got it yesterday (birfday present to me!) I had to make a card to send to her featuring....

A lumberjack!

Heeee's a lumberjack and he's okay, he sleeps all night and he works all day!  Oh wait, that's a whole 'nother song.  Anyway, how could you not love this lumberjack?  He's awesome!  And I broke open the first of my new firm foam ink pads to stamp his Garden Green shirt (green for Baylor, obviously, also why his hat is Crushed Curry).  And I used some of my new Blendabilities, but I didn't, you know, blend them.  Anyway, I used a slightly modified version of the sketch from Retro Sketches:

The lumberjack image was big enough that I couldn't make this a 4.25" square card, and I didn't want to do a 5.5" square and have to pay extra for postage, so I stretched the sketch to an A2 size.

Anyway, it's pretty much dinnertime so that's it for me today.  Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wood You Be Mine?  (buy iiiiiit Missy!)
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Garden Green; markers in Blush Blossom (I know it's retired but it's less pink than Blushing Bride), Crushed Curry, Cajun Craze, Calypso Coral; Blendabilities in Crumb Cake and Smoky Slate
Paper:  Garden Green, Basic Black, Crumb Cake, Whisper White, Gold Soiree DSP
Accessories:  Itty Bitty Accents punch pack