Baby Girl Wishes

Mornin, y'all.  I'm tired this morning, but I'm fighting the urge to go back to bed :)  Lucky for me, I finished the card for today's post yesterday when I was fully awake and hopped up on chocolate, which is the only way to craft.  Note to self:  need more chocolate.

It's a soft and sweet baby card!  All the patterned papers are retired; I was using scraps of older patterns because I've got a lot of them in those colors and I don't have the new DSP stack in Subtles yet.  So what inspired this card?  The inaugural challenge and a new blog, the Global Design Project:

Seems like it's been a long time since I used a palette that was only soft subtle colors.  Guess I like my bright, vivid tones :)  Anywha, I paired the colors with this week's Mojo Monday sketch:

This one has so many layers that it's a little out of my comfort zone, but I gave it a shot after seeing what Mary Fish did with it.  Somehow she can take even the most complicated sketch and make it look easy to work with, much to my consternation.  But I keep trying :)

In other news, I finished the last few pages in the twin boy baby books yesterday!!!  Woohoo!!!  Now I just need to take pictures of those last few, and put the books together so they can go out in the mail.  I'll have a little bit of a break before I start the next one, but as of right now I've made FIFTEEN baby books, not counting smaller albums I've made for baby showers.  That's a lotta babies.

Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU! (some retired)
Stamps:  Something for Baby, Lovely Amazing You
Ink:  So Saffron, Pink Pirouette
Paper:  Whisper White, Smoky Slate, retired DSP in So Saffron and Pink Pirouette
Accessories:  Baby's First Framelits, corner rounder punch, Dimensionals

Nachos: Bunnies, Bunnies, It Must Be Bunnies!

Happy Tuesday, Nacho fans!  How was your holiday weekend?  I hope you're ready to start the week off with a Nacho Average Color Challenge:

I must confess something.  Have you ever seen two colors together and thought wow, those should never go together?  My mom is like that with navy blue and black.  Confession time:  I'm like that with gray and brown.  They just don't go together in my brain!  The only way I can sorta wrap my brain around it is to go with nature images, 'cause trees are brown and some animals are gray.  So that's what I did for today's card.

Both the bunny and the sentiment stamp are from Thankful Forest Friends in the new holiday catalog, aren't they cute?  I have the Into the Woods paper too but I thought I'd use the Woodgrain embossing folder for a bit of texture.  I will admit that the cardstock is Soft Suede, not Early Espresso, but I thought it needed to be a little bit lighter and I did sponge Early Espresso ink on it and you're allowed to add neutrals if you wanna.  Neener neener.

So now it's your turn to give it a shot!  Then share your creation with us on the Nacho blog.  Happy stampin', y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Thankful Forest Friends
Ink:  Island Indigo, Soft Suede, Early Espresso, Smoky Slate, Always Artichoke
Paper:  Island Indigo, Soft Suede, Whisper White
Accessories:  Woodgrain EF, Deco Labels Framelits, Dimensionals

P.S.  Ten million life bonus points if you're extra cool enough to get the reference in my blog post title!

Baby Books: September

Hey peeps!  Are you having a good Labor Day holiday?  We were caught by surprise this morning--the trash was running despite the holiday.  Really didn't expect that so the hubs had to run it out when we heard the truck coming down the way.

Anyway, enough about trash.  Let's talk baby books!  I'm hoping to finish the twin boy baby books I'm working on in the very near future (like, this week would be great) because I won't have much of a break before I start the next book.  So today I'm sharing a layout from the almost-done books :)

I mentioned in last week's Friday Flashback post that I'd done more or less the same layout for September quite a few times with the apples, so this time I did something different:  my old buddies from Fox & Friends.

Aren't they super cute?  Love them.

And ze turtle!  Love ze turtle.

And there's my color palette for this layout (which I duplicated for the second book, they're going to be identical books even though the boys are fraternal twins):  Old Olive, Hello Honey, Marina Mist, Cajun Craze, Chocolate Chip, and Very Vanilla.  And nary an apple in sight.

Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, mostly SU!
Stamps:  Fox & Friends
Ink:  Old Olive, Hello Honey, Cajun Craze, Chocolate Chip
Paper:  Old Olive, Hello Honey, Cajun Craze, Chocolate Chip, Very Vanilla, Woodland Walk DSP
Accessories:  Circles Framelits, scalloped circle punch, Sizzix Alphabet

Friday Flashback: One Smart Cookie

Happy Friday, peeps!  This weeks stamp set du jour is a cute little set called One Smart Cookie, which has teeny tiny little images and punny phrases to go with.  So let's flash back!

Also features Tart & Tangy

Here you see what I mean about the punny phrases.

Also features Fruit & Flowers

I admit:  I bought One Smart Cookie for the wee apple, which I used on baby books (look in the corner of the journaling square).

Also features Perfectly Preserved

So the larger apple images might have changed a little bit...

Also features Tart & Tangy

But that tiny apple stayed the same.

Also features Tart & Tangy

I'm very proud to say that the baby books I'm close to finishing right now have September pages that are completely different, with nary an apple in sight.  But I didn't want One Smart Cookie to feel left out, so I made a couple of cards for today's Friday Flashback.

How do you like them oranges?  All of the stamps in One Smart Cookie are tiny, so I was a little worried about what I was going to do until I saw the sketch at Create with Connie and Mary:

I thought it worked out so well on the orange card that I made another one:

I used my Color Coach (why did this retire again?!) to come up with the color combo on here--Soft Sky, Rich Razzleberry, and Old Olive.  This card will go to my hubs' cousin, who had us over for dinner last week.  That means that this also qualifies for The Male Room challenge to use fruit:

Actually I think the orange card will go to a little boy, so they both count (Mom, I will put that card in a pile for you to send to your little penpal).  So that's it for me this week, peeps.  The hubs is off work today so I think we're going to drive out to Monticello, but I need to go get cleaned up first.  Cheers!

Supplies, orange card:
Stamps:  One Smart Cookie, Tart & Tangy
Ink:  Pumpkin Pie
Paper:  So Saffron, Old Olive, Whisper White
Accessories:  Brights Candy Dot, hexagon punch

Supplies, grape card:
Stamps:  One Smart Cookie
Ink:  Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Soft Suede
Paper:  Soft Sky, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Whisper White
Accessories:  1" and 3/4" circle punches, 7/8" scallop circle punch, hexagon punch, Dimensional

Iridescent Dragonfly

Man, the days are just flying by here!  It occurred to me that I hadn't done a card with my beloved Awesomely Artistic dragonfly in a while--oh my gosh it's been an entire month!--so I had to fix that today.

I stamped the dragonfly with Night of Navy ink and then again with Versamark, then embossed with Iridescent Ice.  Which is of course nearly impossible to photograph, check out my first effort:

Well, you can tell it sparkles, right?  And you can kinda see the stamped background on the card front; I used the splatter stamp and stamped it off twice so it's very subtle but just gives an extra little bit of texture.

I used the colors from this week's Color Throwdown:

I added in Smoky Slate for the card base; I couldn't use more Crushed Curry or Whisper White because it would have been too much of either of those colors.  Balance, y'all.

And here is this week's Freshly Made Sketch:

I think buttons are cute, but sometimes the post office gets all picky about that so I used the dragonfly instead of the button element on the sketch.  My card is eminently mailable, it doesn't even have Dimensionals.  Speaking of mailable, it's already in an envelope and ready to be sent off today, so that qualifies it for the SUO challenge to make (and mail) a card to a friend.  Oh while I'm at it, I should send out the two cards I made for Tuesday's Nacho challenge...off to go do that now, so cheers peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Awesomely Artistic, Six-Sided Sampler
Ink:  Smoky Slate, Crushed Curry, Night of Navy, Versamark
Paper:  Smoky Slate, Night of Navy, Whisper White
Accessories:  Iridescent Ice EP

Sympathy Leaves

Howdy, folks!  How are you this afternoon?  I usually try to make a card the day prior to posting it, but yesterday afternoon I was busy posting other stuff (read:  I mailed packages at the post office) so I made this card today (hence the late post).

The good:  I really like how the leaves turned out; I stamped them with Mossy Meadow ink and then used my AquaPainter to paint in a little bit of ink on the floral design.  The bad:  I think the sentiment is too small for the space and kinda gets lost there.  It looks stark.  Dangit.

I used this week's Colour Me...! monochromatic challenge:

And the Mojo Monday sketch:

Though I kept my card the standard A2 size.  What, I already have envelopes that size.

That's it for me today...I've got to get to work on tomorrow's card and I'm very close to finishing the baby books I'm working on, so no rest for this wicked stamper.

Cheers, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Lighthearted Leaves, Thoughts & Prayers
Ink:  Mossy Meadow, Early Espresso
Paper:  Mossy Meadow, Early Espresso, Soft Suede, Very Vanilla
Accessories:  Leaflets Framelits, 1 1/4" circle punch, Dimensionals

Nachos: Let's Hear It For Fall

Hey Nacho fans!  You're in for a treat this week, just check out the latest Nacho Average Sketch Challenge:

Do you lurve it?  I do, I do!  And I used some new stampy goodies.

Vintage Leaves is in the regular catalog, but it's new to me, as are the gold doilies.  The package has silver doilies too, they're awesome.  But don't get glue on them where you don't want it, because it smudges.

And here's a bonus card for you, I wanted to see how it would look with the sentiment in Rich Razzleberry.

So now it's your turn!  Link up your sketchy project on the Nacho blog and have fun, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Vintage Leaves
Ink:  Lost Lagoon, Tangerine Tango, Rich Razzleberry Early Espresso, Soft Suede
Paper:  Lost Lagoon, Rich Razzleberry, Early Espresso, Very Vanilla
Accessories:  Hello You Thinlits, gold doilies