Trick or Treat

Hope everyone's having a fabulous week so far! It's been a long one... I thought it'd be Friday already but sadly, it's not. Thankfully some of my favorite shows have started again (Parenthood, Castle) and Project Runway is still chugging along -- although if my brother's doppelganger wasn't on it, I'm not sure I'd keep watching this season. Sometimes my husband will watch with me just so we can comment on "my brother's" performance. and scold him when he's mean. (Sorry lil bro... he really does look like you when he smiles and laughs... just please NEVER EVER do the same thing to your hair) 

And there's some fun new reality shows too -- normally I only watch cooking related reality tv (well, and Project Runway) but I've found myself strangely addicted to TLC's Sister Wives. Talk about bad TV... but it's so fascinating... Have you watched it yet?

WMS sneek peeks will start soon again so I can't wait to show you those fun projects! But in the meantime, here's another fun WMS project. :)

This is just another fun little halloween card created with Halloween Party from WMS. The background is stamped with an image from the set (I used a grid stamp to help me stamp it evenly but a pencil line would work as well. I like silhouette images over patterned paper and I think it's fun over a stamped images as well. :)

August Pubs

For some reason, I'm not feeling the craftiness -- actually, I'm pretty much out of whack this whole week so far. On Monday, I screwed up my dates and tried to attend an event that was supposed to be the following Monday. Boy did I feel stupid! Do you ever do that? Man, I'm normally really not like that -- I'm going to blame having to be up at 4am that day.

On the other hand, I just spent some time at Whole Foods walking around. :) Got some tempeh which I'm pretty sure my husband will never even try -- although the only thing I know what to do with it is to fry it (so that's a point in its favor). Anyone worked with this care to give me any hints? 

As much as I love sharing my personal food adventures (and blonde moments), I'm sure you guys want to see something crafty as well. Since I haven't been feeling the crafting bug lately, I'll share my August pubs with CARDS Magazine.  (Thanks, CARDS!)

Loving the kraft! ;-) Hope you all have a fab rest of the week and thanks for stopping by!

Congrats on the Move

This was created for my crafty friend Steph. She and her husband just moved cross country to a nearby state. Steph, I still expect a visit! ;-)

Since they were moving across the country, I thought it'd be cute to have a little house flying through the air, carried with some fun balloons. Kryssi Ng did a similar concept a few weeks ago for Gallery Idol and I thought it was fun idea.  

Sentiment is from none other than Fancy Phrases from WMS. Really, did you expect me to use something else? ;-) The house is from a Hero Arts set.

September WMS Customer Waltz - Diagonal Fun

Note: If you're looking for the Blog for Boobies Bounce, please see below here. If you haven't seen this post, take some time to check it out! All proceeds are going towards the Susan G Koman Foundation.

 

Welcome to the September WMS Customer Waltz! I always love this time of month -- everyone always has such fun projects and with this month's theme of Halloween, it's going to be AWESOME! :)

We have another fun little guessing game for you. Be sure to find the special word on every participating DT member's blog-o to answer the following question: What is the subject of one of the new stamp sets to be released in October? Place your answer in the WMS forum for a chance to win something fun! Good luck guys!

So I'm a flowery girl. I love pink flowers, yellow flowers, all sorts of flowers. However, with a Halloween theme, you can't really do flowers... ;-) So I opted for diagonals!

I've been playing with diagonals recently. It's sort of a fun way to add a little something to your project and use up your scraps! I think it's pretty fun and it adds a modern look to your card with minimal effort.

I started by cutting simple strips of patterned paper. Black patterned paper is Bo Bunny, the other two are American Crafts. I usually have a simple scrap paper to lay my strips on. Once all the strips are laid down, I just go ahead and trim.

For the bag, I actually made an envelope bag. Instructions can be found here. I wouldn't recommend using paper and next time I think I'd bite the bullet and get some fabric tape, no matter how expensive. It's a little hard to fold the seams but with a little persistence...

Stamps are all from Midnight Feast from WMS.

What do you think? Aren't diagonals fun?

Thanks for stopping by! Make sure to check out the WMS forum for the full blog waltz list!

Blessed by You

ETA: Since someone asked, I should mention that the scallops were created with PTI's medium scallop die.

I love short weeks... somehow things seem to go much faster this way. :) Why can't every week be a three day weekend? Hah! But we gotta trek through this week!

As it's starting to be fall, I guess it's time to haul out the fall stamps now! :) The tree and sentiment are from Blessed By You from WMS. Remember with stamps, you don't have to stamp the full image onto your card. Sometimes just a partial image is fun. :)

For the edging on the scallop, I used an embossing pen to doodle along the edge and then added some gold embossing powder. I think it really lets each of the scallops stand out more. If you don't have an embossing pen, just a simple marker would do the trick as well.

I just cut the scallops out from some an old book. You know normally I'm a very rule-based person and I hate when text is vertical but with this card, I really kinda like the vintage text being vertical this time. With the scallops, this works for the Moxie Fab Offset Scallop Challenge. Haven't had a chance to play in awhile... but Cath does have some awesome challenges on the blog so play along if you have the chance!

Thanks for stopping by and have a fab week!

WMS September Release Waltz

Welcome to the Waltzingmouse September Release Design Team Blog Waltz. Make sure to start at Claire's blog to go through the entire waltz! You should have come from Anya's blog and you'll hop to Bonnie next!

This month there will be 5 fabulous sets being featured in the waltz (Teeny Trees, Bountiful Baskets, Half Pint Heroes, Music Backgrounds and Nutcracker Sweet) ! Remember you can win a free stamp set by leaving a comment at each blog along the way! One winner will be chosen from comments on Claire's blog and one winner will be chosen from comments left on one of the DT's blogs!

Today, I'm just going to feature the one set that I haven't featured yet on this blog... Teeny Trees! 

It's a fabulous set that lets you create trees for all seasons....

Like spring:

This is a pretty simple card and I used some buttons on my tree as well for some color. The darker pink border is actually stamped with a simple dot (found in Nutcracker Sweet) and the branch from the Teeny Trees set. Isn't it fun?

You can also create fall trees:

I wanted to let some of the leaves fall off the tree. I also stamped the leaves in red and orange to give it a fall-ish look.

If that's not enough for you, there's even fun little things like birds you can place in your trees.

I had someone ask me recently how I sew straight. Well, I'll let you in on my secret... I cover up my boo boos! See that sentiment piece? That's covering up a sewing boo-boo! Haha. The other thing I tend to do is I sew super super slowly and I slowly adjust the paper if I start to see the sewing go off course. :)

And if you don't want to stamp trees, you can just create flowers and backgrounds instead:

The stems are from Pic-Nic Patterns, otherwise, everything else from the acrylic stamping to the sentiment are from the new Teeny Trees set. I love that circular stamp for bg stamping.

Thanks for stopping by! Be sure to continue along the wonderful waltz to Bonnie who is sure to have some lovely projects to wow you with!

Waltzingmouse Stamps Sept Preview - Day 3

Welcome to day three of the WMS previews!  The DT and I are featuring FIVE new stamp sets that will be available for purchase at the Waltzingmouse web store on Sunday, September 12th.  



I just wanted to remind you all to check out Claire, Anya, Bonnie, Carly, Jennifer, Julia, Laurie, Lisa, Lynn, and Mona, who all have fabulous projects to share with you! In addition, today the WMS sketch team is also able to use some of the new sets so be sure to check out the sketch blog for some more sneak peeks!

Today I'm showing you the fabulous Nutcracker Sweet and Music Backgrounds set. I adore these two sets. In fact, so much that I couldn't put them down. If I colored faster, everyone would be getting these are their Xmas cards this year. However, I'm not insane... unfortunately for my friends and family.

I actually made a few coloring boo-boos while coloring this little buddy.
* A little too much red leaked out from the bottom. Red is a hard color to fix - I tried, I really did but it was just too much leakage. So I decided in an effort to salvage my image, I'd cut the nutcracker out. I also used a gold gel pen to cover some of the thinner lines in the image to cover the red boo-boos.
* The tree shading didn't meet my specifications either -- so what did I do? Yes, I colored another one and added some dimension to the image with a pop dot. Hah -- and you thought that was intentional... ;-)

If this is the only thing you learn from reading my blog-o, I want to make sure you all learn this: It's never how well you color, but rather how well you know how to cover up your mistakes. ;-) And let me tell you, I am the master at making mistakes.

I wanted to create a fun little pleated border but to add some dimension, I went ahead and ruffled the edges a little. My button is actually a white button and since I was copic-happy at this point, I went ahead and colored it to match the rest of my project.  When you color buttons (or any large shiny surface), be sure to let it dry before using. It's a little sticky otherwise.

Thanks for stopping by!

Waltzingmouse Stamps Sept Preview - Day 2

Welcome to day two of the Waltzingmouse Stamps previews for September! Aren't the sets you've seen fabulous so far? Any favorites so far?

Before I get started, I just wanted to remind you all to check out Claire, Anya, Bonnie, Carly, Jennifer, Julia, Laurie, Lisa, Lynn, and Mona, who all have fabulous projects to share with you!

Today I have a fun little set called Half Pint Heros. There's a fun set of little faces you can pick from -- and fun images you can put them in. I let my husband pick which little "boy" to pop inside the sub and this is the one he chose.

Well, when I first saw the sub, I decided I wanted to make a yellow submarine. While I was making this song, I kept singing "We all live in a yellow submarine, yellow submarine, yellow submarine... " And I used a silver gel pen to add some metallic aspects to the sub.

To make it appear more fun, I did cut out the windows and placed some acrylic behind the sub to give it a window look. It's not exactly showing up in the photos well... The small windows work perfectly with the crop-a-dile punch sizes.

Waltzingmouse Stamps Sept Preview - Day 1

Welcome to the first day of the Waltzingmouse Stamps September Release previews! The DT and I will be sharing projects over the next several days featuring FIVE new stamp sets that will be available for purchase at the Waltzingmouse web store on Sunday, September 12th. This is such a fun release -- lots of great all-season sets and fun Christmas sets!  Be sure to check out Claire, Anya, Bonnie, Carly, Jennifer, Julia, Laurie, Lisa, Lynn, and Mona, who all have fabulous projects to share with you!

Today I'm using a fab new addition to Spring Baskets called Bountiful Baskets Additions. Bountiful Baskets has many fun fall and Xmas images. The best part is that the baskets/images between Spring Baskets and Bountiful Baskets Additions are interchangable! How fun is that? There's so many fun images in just the additions set - which is a jam packed mini set. For today's post, I used only the images from the new set. :)

I love pumpkins! I managed to snag some pumpkins last year after a holiday work party. Hoping I'll be able to snatch some more this year. Apparently I'm the only crazy person who's willing to bring a few pumpkins home.

So it only seemed natural to pick the pumpkin image to color first. I did a subtle outline in a warm gray to give it a little highlight. The sentiment does come from Spring Baskets -- but I thought it was perfect for fall!

I love gingerbread men during the holiday season. I tried making them from scratch once but you can ask my old roommates -- they tasted like bbq sauce... something was just off.  But stamped gingerbread men never taste like bbq sauce. ;-)

The image was colored and then when I stamped the sentiment, I made a little boo-boo. I got a little ink on the top of my block and it hit the side of my basket. No worries... I used my copic multi-liner pen to add a little subtle table image. :) Fixed!

Thanks for stopping by! :)

Friend

Hope everyone had a fabulous Labor Day weekend break (at least my US and Canada friends)! :)

I learned about a little bakery near us that sells red bean buns, zongzi and other tasty Asian eats. However, every time we stopped by, they were closed. Grr! I will get me some soon!  I don't know what it is, but the older I get, the more I crave Asian food... it's like going back to my roots.

For this card, I had a make and take pin created at the PTI booth at CHA Supershow. I took the pin part off and incorporated it into my card. It's really just a card of scraps and pre-made embellishments. Ah, 10 minute cards -- gotta love them. I didn't get the cleanest stamp on my woodgrain pattern but I decided that it's woodgrain -- it's not perfect... :)

Thinking of You

Happy Saturday! It's a 3-day weekend here so we're totally just chilling. I told my hubs that because it's Labor Day weekend, we could relax on the veggies (and enjoy some burgers). He then asked if every weekend could be Labor Day weekend... geeze!

Anyways, on to the blog candy announcement: Giesle and Karen, come on down!
Email me with your addy (click on the contact me for my email) and I'll get the magazines out soon!

So I had cut a leaf image with my Slice. And I was sitting here staring at the negative, wondering what I might be able to do with it. And then I stared at the sample Tattered Angels mist that I got at CHA. And then I wondered how easy it would be make my own "masks". And so a few tries later, I ended up with this lovely leaf image sprayed onto my cardstock.

As an FYI, I tried using the original image and sprayed over it to see if it was a fun effect as well.... no. Or maybe my spray technique sucks. But either way, using the negative is fun and lets me use my scraps effectively.

The sentiment comes from Fancy Phrases -- I think every card I've made recently has a sentiment from that set. :) It truly is a versatile set. I tried to make it manly so every edge is inked and the edges are also distressed.

Ok, I think that's all. :) Have a grand weekend everyone!

Sweet Turtle

So sorry I haven't blogged in a bit but I do have 2 copies of the Paper Crafts Special Issue Card Style to make up for it! :) Leave me a comment and I'll draw two names this Saturday, Sept 4 at 6pm EST.

I was out last week but I've been home -- just slowly trying to get back into the swing of things. :) I slept pretty much all weekend. I woke up to eat and then went right back to bed. 

I have an unhealthy obsessions with cute turtles. I think my obsession comes from when I was little and my mom always told me I was the little tortoise like "The Tortoise and the Hare" fable. Yeah I was a slow little kid. Haha!

This card is two-fold. I wanted to show my favorite small-handed crafty friend that even I can do crazy layers in my card and it works for the Bellariffic challenge of using animals. While making this card, I remembered why I stopped doing these types of cards. This took me FOREVER to pick my patterned papers, to pick my image, to layout my card, then relayout my card... yeah... keep it simple kids!

At CHA, I finally got a chance to take the Copic Certification Class. I've been waiting for years for them to come to a town I live in. Of course, after I signed up, I learned that they were coming to Da Burgh a month later... But anyways, I really wanted to get some more coloring experience in. I need to keep practicing - but I was happy with how this little critter turned out. I think I needed to take a little more color green from his belly to give it more of a rounded appearance. But eh...

Thanks for stopping by and have a grand day!

Just a reminder that I'll draw two names from the comments to win a copy of the Paper Crafts Special Issue Card Style! :)