Thanksgiving Leaves

Mornin' y'all, and happy Friday the 13th.  I'm not scared, are you?

I have a Thanksgiving card to share today:

Okay I've been wanting to try this color combination for a while and FINALLY got it out on paper:  Cajun Craze, Pretty Peacock, and Lost Lagoon.  I really like it, what do you think?  I'm entering this at the AAA Cards Challenge:

Arguably I could have three of the spokes on my card, with Nature, Thanksgiving, and Colors, but I've never seen a real leaf in Lost Lagoon and I don't think of these as the stereotypical autumn colors so I chose the Thanksgiving sentiment from Painted Pheasant to hedge my bets :)  That was just the first stamp set I thought of off the top of my head that had a Thanksgiving stamp in it, we really don't get a lot of Thanksgiving-specific stamp sets from SU.

That's it for me, peeps.  It's a beautiful day outside (though far too warm for November if you ask me), so I'm going to take Daphne out and then get some things done in my craft room.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Elegant Leaves, Painted Pheasant
Ink:  Cajun Craze, Lost Lagoon, Pretty Peacock
Paper:  Pretty Peacock, Very Vanilla
Accessories:  Elegant Leaves dies, Stitched Rectangles dies, Dimensionals, Cajun Craze & Gold dots, Wink of Stella

Jolly Holly

Mornin' y'all!  And it's a good one, too.  The hubs got home from a business trip to Germany last night and today is the first day that I've actually felt pretty good since Sunday, I've had a headache and a low-grade fever so I'm glad that seems to be over.  AND I got an itty-bitty SU! order delivered so I'll have some new schtuff to play with after I do some chores.

But first, today's card:

I pulled out a scrap of retired Painted Christmas DSP for a quick card, and Framed & Festive for a quick and easy greeting because I love that stamp set.  I chose patterns specifically to play along with the Inkspirational Challenge:

And I chose a pattern with multiple shades of green for the As You See It speed stamping challenge:

Green is my favorite color so of COURSE I had to play along there.  The DSP I used has Garden Green, Pear Pizzazz, Evening Evergreen, and Soft Sea Foam in it, and the holly pattern is the reverse of the pattern I used for most of the card front.  Yeah yeah I did the same thing I've been doing lately with card layouts but it works for me and I like it, and it worked well for a speed challenge.  I decided to stick to Garden Green for the card base, ribbon, and glitter dots, and here's my time:

Not too bad for under seven minutes, right?  And that includes time spent futzing with the ribbon and I had to stamp the greeting twice because I think my Garden Green ink pad could use a refresh.  And yes, I was listening to the scores from The Lord of the Rings while I worked.  I watched The Fellowship of the Ring last weekend while I was stitching (which is absolutely too long for me to stitch in one day, my wrist was unhappy with my decision) and I'm hoping to start The Two Towers this weekend.

Yesterday though I was watching the latest episode of NCIS and Daphne decided the place to be was IN my armpit:

Makes it difficult to stitch but I loves her.

That's it for now, kids.  I'm off to walk the Daph and do a few chores.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Framed & Festive
Ink:  Garden Green
Paper:  Garden Green, Basic White, Painted Christmas DSP
Accessories:  Stylish Shapes dies, Dimensionals, Garden Green Stitched Satin Ribbon, Sparkle Dot Essentials

Woodland Friends

Mornin' y'all!  How's your week going?  Ryan wasn't feeling good yesterday (and really, neither was I) so I kept him out of school and we had a rot day.  Still went to the grocery store and washed two loads of laundry, but otherwise rotted.  I did manage to make one card though:

And I finally inked up my Woodland Wishes stamp set that I think I've had for several months now.  Let's start with the color challenge from TGIF Challenges:

I figured the Calypso Coral and Pecan Pie were perfect colors for my fox and hedgie, and then a whole lot of Mossy Meadow for a great woodland color and also I just love that plaid.  The year that we had those DSP packs?  Yeah, those are my favorite.  Anyway, Cupcake Inspirations gave me the perfect excuse to ink up two of the little animals in Woodland Wishes:

I want to circle back to this one and make a card inspired by that photo, those cupcakes are the cutest.  Last up, I used this week's Atlantic Hearts sketch:

And this sketch is the reason why I chose to use two of the little single animals in the set; there's a whole stack of animals to look like a tree but I started small : )  Now I need to make a bear card.  I have a bunch of ideas swirling in my brain so I will have to get started as soon as I take Daphne for a walk.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Woodland Wishes, Fern & Flora
Ink:  Early Espresso, Pecan Pie, Stampin' Blends in Mossy Meadow, Pecan Pie, Calypso Coral
Paper:  Mossy Meadow, Pecan Pie, Very Vanilla, Mossy Meadow DSP
Accessories:  Layering Circles dies, Spotlight on Nature dies, Fern & Flora dies, Dimensionals, Painted Patch Dots

It's Wednesday, so time for a WIP Wednesday update on my current stitching project!

This was released as a 12-part Christmas stich-along (SAL) a couple of years ago by Shannon Christine Designs, the same designer who made my Halloween buckets SAL.  I do really love her designs, they're so full of personality and fun colors.  Anyway, this is the top middle design of the SAL and will be a Santa mug, I just did the frame and background snowflakes first.  The fabric is a cornflower blue called Reflection from Mystic Fabrics, I love it.  Shannon Christine showed this design done on gray, but it's got a bunch of brown in it (reindeer mug coming up to the left of Santa, plus gingerbread) and I don't like gray and brown together.  I love how the colors pop on this blue though, I'm very happy with this start.

So this was supposed to be December's new project start but I hit a snag with the leaf mandala I had intended to work on this month (see last week's WIP Wednesday update).  I ordered some more variegated floss that I just got in the mail yesterday, so I need to experiment a bit with the colors on that one while it's daylight so I get a good sense of what works together.  So I might flip back to that one for the rest of the month, we'll see how it goes.  This Christmas SAL will definitely be my project for December and then in January I'll swing back to the Halloween buckets.  Rotating projects helps keep me from getting project fatigue, especially on very large stitching projects.  I was ready for a break from all the black on the Halloween buckets!

Anyway, I'm going to take Daphne for her walk and then get up to my craft room.  Cheers!

Falling for Autumn with SUO Challenges

Mornin' y'all!  It is time for a new challenge from SUO Challenges, and here it is:

Okay, so I had A Plan for what I wanted to do but then I was digging through my DSP and this pumpkin pattern leapt out at me and here's what I made instead:

Isn't that patterned paper cute?  Still loving the Painted Pumpkins suite and this time I elected to color in my pumpkin with Blends, so we have a lighter version of Timid Tiger on the DSP, regular Timid Tiger cardstock, and then darker Timid Tiger on the pumpkin.  I've done similar card layouts several times recently but I just really like this idea for showing off a piece of patterned paper!

So let's see what you've got to celebrate my favorite season.  Upload your creations on the SUO Challenges blog and don't forget, it's Stampin' Up! only BUT retired stuff is A-okay.  Have fun!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Painted Pumpkins
Ink:  Secret Sea, Versamark, Timid Tiger Blends
Paper:  Timid Tiger, Secret Sea, Painted Patch DSP
Accessories:  Painted Pumpkins dies, white EP, Mini Dimensionals, Radiant Gems 

Time to Cross Stitch

Mornin' y'all, how's your Monday?  I was down with a nasty headache most of the day yesterday but happily I am feeling better now and I have a card to share that combines a brand new stamp set with some older stuff, take a look:

The new Time to Unwind stamp set has this floss bobbin for cross stitching, plus a couple images of yarn and both knitting needles and a crochet hook, they really tried to cover the bases for fiber arts and I love it.  No dies, but should be pretty easy to fussy cut if I want to.  I had to ink it up for the first time when I saw the Inspired By... inspo pic:

I used Misty Moonlight, Tip Top Taupe, and Copper Clay for my colors.  I could have used the yarn stamps, but I'm a cross stitcher so the floss bobbin had to be on my inaugural card for this stamp set.  I'm sure I will make some yarn-tastic cards for my mom who does do crochet.  After I finished this card, I did go work on my current stitching project, pic to come on Wednesday.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Time to Unwind
Ink:  Early Espresso, Copper Clay, Tip Top Taupe, Misty Moonlight, Copper Clay Blends
Paper:  Tip Top Taupe, Very Vanilla, Copper Clay & Misty Moonlight DSP
Accessories:  Stitched So Sweetly dies, Dimensionals, Very Vanilla taffeta ribbon

And here's my darling girl asking me to toss her Scooby-Doo toy for her yesterday:

My girl's name is Daphne, *of course* I bought her some Scooby toys.  She has perfected the art of puppy dog eyes to get me to do whatever she wants and I adore her.  Even though she tried to murder me last month and my knee still hurts.

Karma Chameleon for The Paper Players

Happy Sunday, y'all, which means it's Paper Players day!  Hope you enjoyed Claire's plaid challenge last week (I always love a good plaid), and get ready for a new color challenge courtesy of the joyful Joanne:

So my brain kept singing the snippet "red gold and green, red gold and greeeeeeeen" over and over and it took me an embarrassingly long time to shake loose more of the song and figure out that it was Karma Chameleon.  I always tell Ryan that my brain is at least 83% song lyrics and movie quotes.  Anyway, these colors immediately made me think of the Wrapped in Plaid DSP Stack so here's another Paper Players card featuring a healthy dose of plaid!

Since I was using a retro paper stack, I figured I would use some retro stamps too and take a stab at the card sketch from Retro Rubber:

Christmas Season (the holly and leaves) is four years old, and More Merry Messages (greeting) is really retro at 14 years old.  I've been a Stampin' Up! demonstrator for over 20 years now and I tend to keep just about everything, so I have a LOT of stamps : )  And paper.  Much as I love new schtuff (and you know I do), I also love having another look at something from the depths of my collection and sometimes combining new and old.  But today it's all retro, ha!

Check out the other design team creations on the Paper Players blog, and you can hop through their individual blogs to leave some comments too:

The Paper Players Design Team

Jaydee

LeAnne Pugliese

Claire Broadwater

Joanne James

Ann Schach

Jan Clothier

Stef Perry

you are here --> Christy Stanford

And then upload your card at the Paper Players blog!  Keep in mind a few simple rules:
1.  Create a new paper project
2.  Upload your creation to your blog with a link back to us and provide a direct link to the post featuring your challenge submission
3.  Please link your card to no more than four challenges, TOTAL
4.  Have fun!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Christmas Season, More Merry Messages
Ink:  Cherry Cobbler, Shaded Spruce, VersaMark
Paper:  Cherry Cobbler, Shaded Spruce, Basic White, Wrapped in Plaid DSP Stack
Accessories:  Seasonal Labels dies, gold EP, Iridescent Foil Gems

Enemy Match

Happy Saturday and welcome to another Nancy Drew Challenge!  Today's book is #73, Enemy Match:

The cover on the left is weird...why is there a river of lava?!  I like the creepy feel to it though, with that floating face behind Nancy and the Addams Family-style mansion/castle/place.  As for the two checkerboard covers, you can tell that Nancy is going to get into yet another boating accident.  I've had the middle one for years and bought the other two in the last year or so.  I think I like the middle one the best, I like the brighter colors and it's a very energetic composition.  The third one is high energy too, I do like the colors, just not as much as the second one.  I'm glad they didn't continue the river of lava on the later covers, that was such a weird artistic choice.

Case file:  Nancy is contacted by her old friend, tennis ace Nina Ford, who asks her for help in finding her father who was convicted of fraud but disappeared on his way to prison.  She's also receiving threats related to her tennis matches.  George is off visiting grandparents in California and Bess pops in and out of this one, so Nancy's sidekick is 14-year-old Midge Watson who attaches herself to Nancy like a limpet and insists that she's the Watson to Nancy's Holmes.  I actually kinda like her, she's spunky.

Here's my first card:

I scoured my whole stamp collection and came up with exactly ONE tennis-related image, the tennis ball from Pets & More, which I had to fish out of my To Sell? boxes.  And since I don't do sportsball, I had to ask the Google what phrases are associated with tennis, and then I used my alphabet stamps to make my greeting.  That lattice die is brand new and it reminded me of a tennis racquet so that's a good enough excuse for me to use it.

I used Sweet Sugarplum, Lemon Lime Twist, and Old Olive for my colors; Mossy Meadow was a better match for the border color on the cover but I thought that would have looked weird with tennis balls.  And I just realized that I did NOT use the Everyday Arches dies for this one!  Oops.  I've done the arch dies for every other arch cover.  Oh well.

Supplies:
Stamps:  Pets & More, All-Around Alphabet Upper & Lower
Ink:  Sweet Sugarplum, Old Olive
Paper:  Sweet Sugarplum, Lemon Lime Twist, Basic White
Accessories:  1/2" circle punch, Stitched Shapes dies, Woven Lattice Texture die from Spellbinders, Dimensionals

On to my next card:

Nancy and Midge get followed by a green Chevy several times in the book (that's the first time I've noticed that they use an actual car brand in the Drew mysteries), but my card features Nancy's blue sports car.  Midge is also a bit of a mechanic and stops one of the bad guys from tampering with Nancy's car, so the Geared Up Garage bundle seemed like a natural choice for this book.

My colors are Azure Afternoon, Calypso Coral, and Crisp Cantaloupe, which turned out to be a fun combination to play with.

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Geared Up Garage
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Calypso Coral, Stampin' Blends in Azure Afternoon, Smoky Slate, Calypso Coral, Crisp Cantaloupe
Paper:  Azure Afternoon, Calypso Coral, Crisp Cantaloupe, Calypso Coral DSP
Accessories:  Garage Gears dies, Layering Circles dies, Dimensionals, Glossy Garden Dots

And for my final card:

Midge is Most Insistent about being Nancy's assistant detective so I thought this "What would Nancy Drew do?" card would be perfect for her.  Yes, I have Nancy Drew stamps, but I have no idea who manufactured them as there was no company name on the package when I bought them probably more than 15 years ago.  I found some watery DSP in the perfect colors to coordinate with this book cover.

I used Merry Merlot, Tranquil Tide, and Mint Macaron for my colors, with some Cherry Cobbler since we never got Merry Merlot Stampin' Blends.

Supplies:
Stamps:  Nancy Drew stamps, unknown manufacturer
Ink:  Merry Merlot, Tranquil Tide, Stampin' Blends in Cherry Cobbler & Pool Party
Paper:  Merry Merlot, Basic White, Tranquil Textures DSP
Accessories:  Stylish Shapes dies, Mini Dimensionals, Matte Decorative Dots

This book isn't one of my very favorites, but I do quite like the character of Midge and there are some very fun elements, so I give it four stars.  I had a good time reading this one, and it's fun to see Nancy be a mentor to a very precocious sidekick.  It's a solid entry in the Drewniverse.  If you're inspired to make a card, please leave me a comment--I'd love to see!  I'll see you next week when Nancy investigates The Mysterious Image.