Be Merry and Bright and Thinking of Dawn

Hello, Stamplings!

I hope you are having a lovely weak end! I understand there are exercises for that but as I always say, I can't see back there so it doesn't bother me that mine is fluffy ~ as long as it can hold me up for hours and hours of crafting! 

Let's start out today with this schparkly number:

Really? A zebra pattern for a Christmas card? You'll see why in a minute. 

This is my week to be hostess of the Inspired By All the Little Things challenge. As hostess, I get to pick a talented card artist to introduce to you and she, in turn, will make you an inspiring work of art! 

For this challenge, I have chosen my friend, Colleen of One Smile Lifts A Spirit! For all the details on the rules and to see what Colleen and the amazing Design Team have created to inspire you, please click over to the challenge! We all hope you can join us this week!!

Here is the fantastic photo inspiration that inspired us all: ⇨

There are LOTS of goodies in this photo to get your creative juices flowing! I think you can quickly spy that I was attracted to that awesome zebra chair and bright red pillow! I've had the zebra paper in my stash since the last century, waiting for this moment to shine! The MFT stitched star was cut from glittery foam paper.

Challenges

• Pixie's Snippets Playground: AG using your snippets.
• The Merry Christmas Challenge #41: Anything Goes.

I loved the way my design used a lot of pp, so I made a few more. Some of the stars are cut from fun foam adhesive sheets which adds a puffy soft dimentia, like the card on the far right. You can find them online in many places. Here is a link to Mike's to see what I mean. The sheets also come glittered, like the star on the second card from the left.

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My twofer today was made specially for designer Dawn McVey. 

Here is a closeup of all the white glossiness.

Many of you know Dawn from her beautifully designed Raspberry Suite line of stamps for Papertrey Ink. Dawn recently underwent a small intestine transplant. It is very rare. The surgery was a success, but she has a long recovery ahead of her. The ladies of Papertrey Ink are holding a one-week blog hop in honor of Dawn to send her our love and best wishes for a full recovery and to let her know she is in our thoughts and prayers. 

The only stipulation for joining in the hop is that you use one of Dawn's many incredible designs for your card. You can find Dawn's complete line of stamps here and find her works of art using them over on her Raspberry Suite blog. For my simple card, I used Dawn's Meadow Greens set. ETA: Oops, I just found out the Meadow Greens set was designed by Nicole. I will make another card for Dawn.

Julian Rad Photography                  

Challenges

• Cardz 4 Galz: Favourite Flower and Why. If I'm honest, I don't care for dandelions in their flower stage, but when they mature and go to seed and form their fluffy perfect circles, I love them. Even as an adult, I will stop and pluck them when I can, blowing their seeds to the wind! I took this photo at our local park this past spring.
• Watercooler Wednesday: Feminine AG.

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

You're a trooper if you made it to the end, especially this time of year when you are extra busy and I appreciate it very much! 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!  Please let me know you came by so I can be sure to return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling: Click CTL + Home. Click the Home tab under my blog banner which resets the post. Click page down to reach  the end of the post. Click Comments and the pop-up box opens. Click "Jump to Comment Form" and wallah, no more car pool tunnel! P.S. If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me your email address so I can respond. Mwah! 

Fall is in the Air! Time to Celebrate WCMD!!

Hello, Stamplings!

I am popping in with a coupla fall makes before this brief season whooshes by altogether. It also happens to be the time when we celebrate World Card Making Day!!

(source unknown)

Wow! Really? A whole day to celebrate our hobby? What happens now? Do we have a parade in Times Square? Do we have a representative who will make the circuits of the television talk shows? Is there a contest? Does .... Wait. What? Nothing? 

Well, heck then, we'll just celebrate among ourselves. Pour out your favorite beverage and your favorite coloring medium, paper, stamps, and dies and I'll show you mine, if you show me yours! How fun that I'll know that you'll know that I'll know that wherever you are in the world, we are making a card at the same time! Here's to us!

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First up for me today is a card I made for this week's Inspired By All the Little Things challenge #67. It is my turn to be the hostess and I have invited my dear friend Bonnie Klass to be our Featured Designer! I hope you can join me and Bonnie and the very talented Design Team this week! 

I keyed on the creams, beiges, and metallics of the inspiration photo (below), as well as the lovely mums. I cut my Poppystamps "Delicate Mum" twice, once in a creamy gloss paper and once in copper in order to give it a shadow. I did the same with the "Enjoy" word die from Penny Black. They were both attached to a panel of pp from SU matted to a copper panel. It seemed a little unbalanced to me (takes one to know one!), so I added a thin copper border on the right side. The mini leaf die from Impression Obsession was triple cut and layered. 

Here is a closeup:

And here is the inspiration photo for you:

Challenges

• Pixie's Snippets Playground: anything goes, but use must your snippets
• Uniko: Autumn/Fall, optional twist: Halloween.

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Next I have a coupla Halloween tags for you. I want to support my friend Bev who is the Guest Designer for the current Tag You're It! challenge. Bev, who lives in the frozen tundra of Wisconsin wants winter to stay away as long as possible, so she made a darling summery tag with the hope that summer may linger:

Isn't that so cute?! How could you not want to play along?! I know lots and lots of you love a black/white/pop of color/ design to play with! Where I live, I'm so over summer, so I made Halloween tags using Bev's cute inspiration:

Both tags were cut from Lawn Fawn products: the die is "Tag You're It!" and the stamp is "Winter Gifts." The skeleton in the top tag is cut from a section of Washi tape and the R.I.P. is a portion of an old wooden stamp from Whipper Snapper Designs. On the second tag, the mummy is from SU and the Trick or Treat bag is from Stampendous. I drew the BOO, Boo.

Other Challenges

• Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge: A walk on the dark side.
• Stinkin' Inkers: Monster Mash.

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NBUS #12 Update

In other news, I have visited all 355 entries in my NBUS Challenge #12 and I can't tell you how much I enjoyed every creation you made! You all blow me away with your talent and your enthusiasm for using your new and sometimes forgotten schtuff!

I'm happy to report that I have received a text from Dr. Random and his Missus Org. They have safely checked into the WCMD Convention Hotel. Of course, because of the convention, there will be a delay in holding the NBUS drawing, but Doc was quick to remind me that it's not their fault I held my challenge so late in September this year.

Hammy is situated in the north floor walkup with all the entry information. He is ready to spring into action whenever the Orgs have a break. I'm just hoping he doesn't lose focus like he did last year, over-indulge in the locally grown donut liquor, and fall asleep in the Lost and Found bin! 

I'll keep you posted.

~~~

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!  Please let me know you came by so I can be sure to return the flavor!

(source unknown)

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

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p.s. If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me your email address so I can respond.  Thank you!

From Classic to Ooh-La-La

Hello, Stamplings!

It's so lovely to see you with your bright, shiny faces! And lots of you have inky fingers and glittery bosooms, too!! That's the way we like it!

We had a quiet Labor Day weekend staying inside where it was cool. Our temperatures are finally dropping, but the skies are still really smoky from all the fires blazing throughout the western United States and Canada. It seems ridiculous to ask this, in light of the horrendous rain that fell in Texas and Louisiana (and now with incoming Hurricane Irma), but please pray for rain -without lightening - to fall where the fires are raging.

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This simple classic hydrangea is dressed in a style that could have been made years ago, except for the pierced scallop edging which adds a modern touch. I like how the rounded edging mimics the blossom clusters. It would pair well with a crisp Pinot Grigio.

Challenges

• The Flower Challenge: Tic Tac Toe: Sentiment/CAS/Blue.
• Less Is More: Royal blue and lime green.

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Hammy has been good at reminding me to use my patterned paper more often and my next set of cards features pp predominately. Ooh-la-way-to-go!

Isn't that a fun pp design! I've had it forever. I think it might be from DCWV. I've also had the NBUS shoe stamp for a long time and I'm happy to finally ink it up. It is from STAMPlorations and it was designed by my friend Shirley Bee (The Bee's Knees). The NBUS sediment is from The Alley Way Stamps. 

It's hard to tell from the photo, but the paper has embedded glitter and the shoe and sediment are stamped and cut from metallic paper. I'm not sure why this happened, but IRL the blue metallic paper is the same color as the blue in the pattern. Promise.

I liked it so much, I made two more.

The above pp showcases bobby pins. Raise your hand if you know what bobby pins are! Oh, good, most of you have at least heard of them! I don't even have any in my junk drawer any more.

The spark for my shoe cards came from seeing that my friend Linda of Lin's Craft Corner is the September GD for Just Us Girls. Congratulations, Lin! This is Word Week and the word is ... shoes! 

I'm also heading over to Pixie's Snippets Playground because I've used lots of snippets like a good girl!

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Something New and Different

You might see my mug up on the Inspired By All the Little Things blog today. Most of you know that Blogland's venerable Queen of Challenges, Lesley Croghan, recently had a wee baby girl named Maeley! Lesley would like to spend as much time as possible with Maeley, so she asked me if I would take over her Admin duties for the Inspired By All the Little Things challenge. Always one to recognize how short life is and how fast children grow, I was happy to help a girl out!

As one of the administrators, I will host the challenge one week each month and introduce a guest card artist. (Love this idea of Lesley's!) In addition, Lesley has put together a remarkable Design Team to provide you with fantastic inspiration each week! 

The Inspired By All the Little Things Challenge has been on summer break and will return this Saturday, September 9th. I hope you will come by to see who my guest artist is and play along with the new challenge!

See you on Saturday! Thank you!!

~~~

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!  Please let me know you came by so I can be sure to return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

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p.s. If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me

your email address so I can respond.  Thank you!

Babies, Easter, Christmas, Fourth of ... Wait. What?

Greetings, Stamplings!

Don't forget the April Boo-Boo Hop/NBUS Challenge #11 is coming soon!➠

Coming Saturday, April 1st!

Not only is spring in the air, but Easter is almost in the air, and not only that, there's a new baby in the air! Well, I mean, not right now. This baby girl isn't even born yet and, of course, one should never throw a newborn baby up in the air, for goodness sake. But after a few months, she'll love it! 

The new baby girl I'm talking about belongs to my friend Lesley Croghan and her husband Corey! Many of you know Lesley because of her own blog (Always Playing With Paper) and as the owner of several of the challenge blogs that we all participate in week-after-week. In order to celebrate the upcoming birth, the thoughtful Lori is holding a Welcome Little Miss Croghan Blog Hop on her blog. There are still a coupla days left if you'd like to join in!

I made this:

This beautiful NBUS "Bunny" image is from Stacy Stamps. I colored the image with my SU markers directly to the stamp and then stamped it on the cream card. I used my colored pencils to give the bunny a pink hue. The heat-embossed fussy-cut sediment is from Hero Arts, "Hey Dey Sentiments." The panel was attached to a burlap panel and I added a pink heart for punctuation.

Of course, Hammy insisted that Miss Bunny needed a bit of twinkle in her eye and shine on her nose! 

This was so cute and easy, I made a few extras for Easter cards.

Challenges/Hop

• Inspired by All the Little Things: Featuring the talented Nancy Penir and bunny photo.
• Uniko: Spring with an optional twist of Easter.
• Welcome Little Miss Croghan Blog Hop.

Twofer.

Speaking of Easter Christmas, who hasn't made very many Christmas cards in spite of the fact we are fast approaching the Fourth Month of the year already? That's right, you and me. Well, me, fershur. So I took a few minutes to play with Christmas:

Poinsettias are such a classic Christmas image and, for me, they never get old. I had a lot of fun watercoloring two cards using this poinsettia from Waltzingmouse Stamps with my KGT watercolor paints after heat-embossing them in white. The NBUS sediment is from Skipping Stones. You can't see it, but Hammy blinged the poinsettia with Stella.

In spite of using my MISTI, you can see that the sediment is WAAAY up under the skirt of the poinsettia. What happened was I put the first stamped image on the tool to stamp it, removed it, put the second one in and stamped it without even looking. Well, hellooooo?!! Seeing as how I used my old-fashioned acrylic block to stamp the poinsettia image with Versamark for the embossing, I didn't stamp the image prezackly the same way both times ... well, you get the picture. 

So there's a lesson for you: the MISTI is not the most incredible stamping tool invented if the operator is an idiot!

Challenges

• Jingle Belles: Bling on the holidays. 
• Make My Monday: White embossing.
• Merry Monday Christmas Challenge: Red, green, and white.
• Rudolph Days

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Reminder!!

My boo-boo card above is a smooth way to seque into this reminder! (I didn't plan it that way, but there you go!)

COMING SATURDAY!!

APRIL FOOL'S DAY HOP AND NBUS CHALLENGE #11
(Never-Before-Used-Schtuff)

The deets:

• The challenge will run from April 1 to April 11.
• Enter any new creation that:
• is made from something NBUS, or
• has a boo-boo on it, or
• BOTH!
• There will be no prizes other than: 
• The self-satisfied sense of well-being you'll feel having used some schtuff that you have ignored until now. 
• The self-effacing sense of amusement you'll feel having shared your big fat boo-boo with us! 
• The self-congratulatory sense of accomplishment you'll feel having done BOTH!!
• Because there will be no tangible prizes, there will be no other customary rules! I know you all know how to play well with others.

I can't wait to see what you share!! Mwah!

~~~

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

On a personal note, I want to again thank you for all your kind thoughts and prayers for the Mister. He is continuing to improve by leaps and bounds! Well, okay, by small steps, but they feel like leaps and bounds compared to being flat on his back!

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.  Please let me know you came by so I can be sure to return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

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Mwah!

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Birthday Butter Flies

Hello! Hello!

How are you? I hope this finds you doing great!

I'm sorry I haven't posted for almost a week and thank you for your inkuiries. I did manage a coupla cards, so let's start with my onefer:

These Altenew magnolia flowers were started a while back, so all that was needed was some "finish" watercoloring (which I always overdo!) and then some fussy cutting and mounting. And, of course, winking. The sediment is from Waltzingmouse's "Compact Sentiments." 

Challenges

• Inspired by All the Little Things: Photo inspiration.
• Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge: Show us your metal.
• Time Out Challenge: Celebration with the twist of fussy-cutting.

My twofer:

This retro card was sparked by Mrs. A's Butterfly Challenge, which I've been neglecting lately. The current challenge is a butterfly, of course, plus we are to include texture and/or teal. 

For texture, I heat-embossed the butterfly image (SU) in white and then I watercolored her using my Zig KGT paints in shades of teal. Next I did a watercolor wash of the background. The lace edging (SU punch) mimics the butterfly wing. The twine and butterfly charm are from my stash. The sediment, part of which is NBUS, is from Uniko's "Classic Numbers" stamp set.

Challenges

• Addicted to Stamps and More: Anything goes.
• Butterfly Challenge: T is for texture and/or teal.
• CAS on Sunday: Tic-Tac-Toe. Top row across: punch, girlie, floral.
• Creative With Stamps (CWS) Challenge: Butterfly. Their first challenge!
• Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge: Anything goes.
• Uniko Challenge: Use metallics.

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So, What's The Dealio?

Where have I been? I could tease you, but sad to say, I've been mostly in bed since Saturday. After much dithering about with medical tests of this sort and that, a course of action was decided to increase one of my medications in the hopes it would calm things down. That's all well and good for the basic intent of it, but I have been hit hard by one of the side effects, which is extreme fahteeg. I mean I am exhaustipated to the max, Jax.

I am hoping this will simply be a matter of a few days or a week or two during which my system will adjust to the change and I'll be back to myself. The hardest part, besides not posting and visiting you as much as I'd like, is the lack of mojo and seeing six dejected and wound-up hamsters staring at me. For all our sakes, Hammy and I have decided the time has come to adopt out the furballs. Some of you have made requests over the past several months, so I will try and remember who you are!

Thank you for understanding and being patient with me. Be well and 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! Please let me know you came by and I'll return the flavor as soon as I'm able.

(Don't forget the current Giveaway ends tomorrow, April 29th! 

See the tab at the top of the blog!)

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

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Mwah!
If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me
your email address so I can respond. Thank you!