Inky Dinky

Hello Stamplings!

I hope this finds you as happy as I am! The laddies are back! Hammy and Stanley weren't due back until next weekend, but they had to cut their tour short because too many roads were closed due to fires and smoke. The bus company wisely decided to call it a day.

It is the first Monday in August 😮which means I got inky per my I.D.E.A.S. Calendar. And since I wanted to enjoy the wee critters and their tall tales, I quickly inked some dinky bits!

Onefer

You might recognize Kim's fun sketch from Freshly Made Sketches. I immediately thought of these summertime pinwheels from Gina K's "Sunny Days and Breezy Nights" kit. I colored them using my forgotten SAI markers. The NBUS sediment is also from the kit and the embossing folder is from Lifestyle Crafts.

The timing was great because the lads were itching to wink again and I was delighted to have them do it! I think you might even be able to see the schparkle in the photo.

In addition to FMS, I'm playing in Krafty Chicks where the brief is A/G with an optional Summer Mood Board.

Twofer

Next the boys went to work in the Christmas drawers ... they know that once August rolls around, they spend a lot of time in these drawers!

For a QACAS design, they came up with a NBUS die from Penny Black called, "Winter Sprig.

I die-cut the sprig and did a light watercolor wash. Then I simply attached the sprig to a green panel embossed with a folder from Open Studio called, "Gracious Leaves." The gold sediment is from Memory Box.

I'm playing in: Jingle Belles (Tic Tac Toe. Diagonal left to right: die cut or punch ~ red or green ~ and dry or heat embossing); Little Red Wagon (One Thing); and Merry Little Christmas Challenge (A/G Christmas).

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Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! 

Today is National Watermelon Day! Stay safe and cool.🫶 

*Life is too short!

Eclipse It!

Hello Stamplings!

I hope this finds you well wherever you are! So many storms, floods, and fires. 

We had a grass fire only two miles from us last week that scorched a thousand acres. It was scary, smoky, and the acrid smell is still in the air days later. Considering it was such a small fire, I cannot imagine how terrifying and awful it is near the huge wildfires in France, Spain, Italy, and in many America states. Keep safe, my friends. Praying for those impacted and for all the brave firefighters, farmers, and individuals helping in ways large and small.🙏🫶

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This week is A = Anything Goes on the I.D.E.A.S. Calendar. Whoop! I wanted to play with the Eclipse technique at the newly reopened CAS Mix-Up Challenge. It's also known as Hidden Words, or as I like to call it, Camel Flodged.🐪I haven't done this technique for quite a while and it was great fun!

Onefer

This sweet NBUS image is called, "Birthday Presents Wrapping Paper" from Your Next Stamp. The NBUS happy script word die is from The Greetery. I stamped the image in black and colored the presents in red in order to play in the Color Hues Challenge.

I liked the idea that this could be an all-purpose card, but after wards, I decided it needed a second word. I looked through all my word dies, and now I have car pool tunnel but nothing fit the area, so I made another card instead! Go me!

This script die is from Simon Says Stamp. In addition to the above challenges, I am playing in the Anything Goes category at Seize the Birthday

Twofer

This image is NBUS from Spellbinders called, "Christmas Florals and Sentiments." It consists of five stencils and made me question again why I don't stencil more often? I find it very relaxing. The word die is from GKW. The berry nipples are blobs of Lawn Fawn schparkle glaze. (Have I said how much I miss Hammy and Stanley!)

The Eclipsing technique works perfectly for those large pretty images you have which you hate to cover over with a greeting.

To give the design a little extra nubbiness, I popped the tripled image over a panel embossed with a Park Lane e/f called, "Holly Berry." I also miss having a Jo-Ann Store. Actually I miss all of the stamping stores that used to be in my community. And the sweet ladies who ran them. I sound old. Well, duh.

Playing in: 52 Christmas Card Throwdown (Stencilling); Rudolph Days (A/G Christmas); Jingle Belles (Colors: Unicorn Holiday); Inkspirational (Word Prompt: Christmas in July); and Just Us Girls (A/G Stencil Week). This Eclipse card won't go in the CAS Mix-Up Challenge because there is no stamping. However, because there is no stamping, it can go in "N = No Stamping" challenge over at the ABC Christmas!

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Enjoy your week! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Mwah!

*Life is too short!

Sending Love From Our House to Yours!

Hello Stamplings!

Happy Monday from the Playhouse! I hope you are doing well! What a day for watching sports yesterday!

This is E = Embossing week on the I.D.E.A.S. Calendar. Recently, my friend Hilary posted beautiful embossed cards covered with vellum on her blog, Fiddling About. She had gotten the idea from another friend of ours, Leslie, of Running With Scissors. I couldn't wait to CASE their cards!

Onefer

For my summery card, I used a NBUS e/f from Gina K.'s kit called, "Sunny Days & Breezy Nights." I chose a pretty pink color for the strawberry design and I covered it with thin vellum using a double-stick adhesive sheet. I've embossed with vellum before and sometimes it cuts right through in places if the vellum is thin. But I have never thought of adding the vellum to an adhesive sheet first, which not only gives it weight, it is easy to stick to the colored card without any adhesive showing or vellum flapping.

However, then I had my usual comedy of errors with basic embossing. For some reason, I am embossing-folder challenged. I look at a folder and decide which side is the embossed side and which side is the debossed side, run it through and more often than not, it comes out backwards. I do wish all manufacturers would put their company name on the front. Or maybe, "this side up." I wouldn't even mind if they added the word, "dummy." 

I'm not sure why, but some of my embossing folders looked better debossed in vellum and some looked better embossed in vellum, but either way, no loss. If the vellum gave me a bit of a blurry image, I just made a card using the other side of the panel face up, even though it does waste a piece of vellum and adhesive sheet. (I think of the person who decides to upcycle one of my cards and finds a pretty white slip underneath the front panel! Erf?)

Speaking of slips, I still have a full-slip and a half-slip in my "You Never Know" drawer. Styles change, history repeats itself. There are also old swimsuits, bras, and pantyhose. And knee socks for the day when I stop getting flushed and I'm cold all the time. Don't tell The Mister about this drawer or I'll never get him to clean the garage!

Where was I? Sorry. Anyway, that's why the above card is debossed. This one happened to be prettier debossed than embossed. I chose a simple NBUS sediment from Simon Says Stamp called, "Simple Sending Love" to finish it off without covering up too many juicy strawberries.

Playing in: Little Red Wagon (Pretty in Pink); Just Us Girls (Mood Board Week: Strawberries in pink = Summertime); and Allsorts (A/G).

Twofer

Using the same process for my Christmas card, I chose a NBUS e/f from Simon Says Stamp called, "Poinsettia Oval." The sediment is from Creative Expressions by Sue Wilson. This card is much prettier in person, but looking at it now, I'm thinking I might run off another one in just vellum or in white to match the sediment and then fussy-cut the poinsettia to pop it on top. Mmm?

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This vellum embossing process was so fun and addicting! As Hilary told me, "You will love the thrill you get when you open the embossing folder." (Even if it is accidentally debossed!🙃)

Playing in: Inkspirational (Christmas in July); ABC Christmas (N is for "No Stamping"); and 613 Avenue Create (A/G, option of "Any Holiday").

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Enjoy your week! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Mwah!

*Life is too short!

Die-Cuts Through the Seasons

Hello Stamplings!

Welcome! I missed you last week! I hope you are enjoying summer/winter and keeping well! 

I also missed Inky week on the I.D.E.A.S. Calendar, but I got a wee bit inky anyway for my Onefer for this week's D = Die Cuts.

I think this is self-exploratory, but I will lay out the ingredients because it's a lot for a CASlicious design. The corduroy-effect card base is from the last century and you know from past posts that I have to spend some quiet time fondling the ridges before I can finally get to work on the card. For the frame and waves, I used hammered card.

The frame is NBUS from Papertrey Ink called, "Reflections: November Dies." The little Ziggie-watercolored sailboat is from a set of two dies called, "Marina Sailboats" from Poppystamps. The "friend" die is from Sissix. The waves are from a set by Simon Says called, "Border Waves." With all these ingredients, it really made itself with just a bit of glue from me.

Playing in the sketch (by Donna) challenge at Freshly Made Sketches; Just Us Girls (Word Week: Play); Time Out (Water); and Cardz 4 Galz (For a Friend or Friendship).

Twofer

This design is very QACAS. While I had the frame dies out, I wanted to use the largest die and I wanted to play in this month's CAS Christmas challenge (and others), so the spotlight image inside the frame had to be a snowman. 

The only hard part of the card was deciding which of my snow peeps to use, especially without my helpers here. In the end, I chose one of my favorites from Purple Onion. I don't know if the snowman has a name, but I think we should call him Button. (I'm not known for the most original names when I'm anthropomorphizing.)

But I digest. I stamped and gold-embossed Button onto a panel of creamy, lightly speckly paper. I used an ancient gold glitter pen to color the scarf, nose, button, and a bit of grounding. I decided not to use a sediment stamp. It seemed repugnant.

Playing in: CAS Christmas (Snowman); Color Hues (Cream and Gold); and Time Out (Water. Because, I mean, snow is made of water, right?)

BTW

Do you have any hacks for getting rid of ground squirrels? We've had some ground squirrels fledge, or whatever you call it when baby ground squirrels grow big enough to come out from under one's deck.😶

Luckily there are only three of them, but they (and their parents) are enough to cause a lot of tunnels to suddenly appear ... including through and under our beautiful retaining wall which I'm afraid will collapse. And we certainly don't want these young'uns having their own babies here some day! 

We have called several exterminator companies to trap them or help us convince them they don't want to live here. So far all of them have said, "Nope. We don't do ground squirrels!"  

But, golly, they sure are cute!

Oh, sorry, that's a bunny we saw on our walk. 

Here you go:

While they look like baby regular squirrels that have bushy tails, this is as big as ground squirrels get. They are little guys with enormous claws ~ little digging machines! 

And in case you are wondering, Nellie isn't phasing them a bit! They are lightening fast and just dip out of sight when she appears. (I hope they are gone before Hammy and Stanley get back!)

Speaking of Nellie, she turns 15 years old today!! Happy Birthday, fluffy girl!

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Enjoy your week! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower!

Mwah!

*Life is too short!