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.

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

(source unknown)

*Life is too short!

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Maybe I Got Carried Away ...

Greetings, Stamplings!

I hope this finds you well! 

If you celebrate Easter, you are no doubt walking around the grocery store with fingers that are purple blue green and yellow from dying Easter eggs with the kidlings! If not, and your fingers are normally multi-colored from inks, this is the one time of year no one will look at you funny!

No Easter-egg dying is going on here, but I am preparing for the grandsons to arrive with their parents and dogs on Saturday. Which means I'm knee-deep in candy wrappers as I am obligated to taste-test every other nuglet for quality assurance porpoises prior to placing candy in the plastic Easter eggs to be hidden.

The things grandmothers are forced to do!

I'm also knee-deep and hell-bent on using my SU succulent die and stamp set for all its worth before I put it away. If I put extra bits and bobs in The Box, I never go back in there and use any of it. Slap! So 'using schtuff while I'm using schtuff' is another new leaf I'm trying to turn over this year. 

Let's start with these. To save you a bunch of scrolling, I've collaged them for you:

Sorry about the exposure and shadowing in some of the photos today. I had to contend with intersmitten April showers, sunshine, and clouds. (Since this is a photo-heavy post, I'm leaving off the ingredients of my cards, but please feel free to ask for any details.)

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Then what happened was Hammy and I saw this fun tag Joyce made for the current Tag You're It! challenge:

We thought one of our plump succulents would work for that:

Besides the large pompom, I was inspired by Joyce's kitkat and the encouraging sediment!

I'm also joining in the CASology Challenge where the cue card is "strong." The message conveyed here is for the recipient to stay strong and remain hopeful!

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While I started a new design, Hammy stuck the tag to a cream-colored card base and later I added a ribbon from the stash. 

(Hammy, bless, gets upset every now and then because he can't tie bows so he went off to sulk for a bit.)

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These are the cards I made with the smaller succulents in the set:

I don't normally do a lot of layering on cards, but I really had fun filling these window boxes.

Challenges

• CAS Mix Up: Stamping, inlaid die-cutting, and dry embossing.
• Shopping Our Stash: Use punches and/or dies.

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And the last bits:

I'll leave you with this photo and then I think I'm done with succulents for a minute.

This froggie birdbath is right outside my Playhouse door and yesterday I noticed this! Smell test or taste test?

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Thank you!!

April Fool's Boo Boo Hop and NBUS Challenge #11

Last, but certainly not least, I want to let you know how much I appreciate all of your entries in the challenge, especially considering it is spring break time for a lot of you! 

There were 159 entries and I enjoyed every one of them! 

Kudos to you for sharing your boo boos ~ which were a hoot! ~ and/or sharing the NBUS you are using! Pat yourself on the back! 

Of course now I've ordered all kinda new NBUS thanks to you, so my own Mt. NBUS has gotten even higher! And so it grows! Remember you don't need my challenge to use your NBUS! I love seeing it all over Blogland all the time!! Mwah!!

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Enjoy your day!  No, seriously, enjoy!  LITS!*  And if I don't make it back before Sunday because I'm in a chocolate coma, Happy Easter!!

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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Spring Tag and a Style Epifanny

Greetings, Stamplings!

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

I had an unexpected long lazy Saturday laid out before me yesterday, so I took advantage of it to play in a coupla challenges. I went a little outside my comfort zone and made a multilayered tag!

That little flower center on the bottom right is pink; I don't know why it looks red. And it's hard to see that there is a black tag behind the white one to mimic the black bottom border on the tag I was CASEing. In the photo above, it appears to be just a shadow, so here is a closeup:

I used a NBUS stamp and die set from My Favorite Things called, "Build-able Bouquet" and a NBUS sediment from a 2013 (cough) SSS "Happy Every Day" stamp set which underwent some surgery to fit the design. The triple scored tag is from PTI. I added a few other little stamps I have in my stash and the b/w twine and, of course, lots of winking. 

What happened was I found out that this business of die-cutting and stamping and coloring and layering flowers and leaves is HARD and I almost had a complete metal breakdown! I sure do love the style when other people do it and I have several more NBUS stamp and die sets like this, but geez-loo-eeze, what a lot of fiddly time-consuming work it is!

So my epipfanny is that I'm just plain lazy. My style is LAZY QACAS OLC and that's the twoof.

And my desk? Please!

For ONE TAG!!!!!!!! ONE! Hammy just laughed and laughed. Oh, look, there's another wee flower that I could have used. 

Sure, fine, laugh your own ephifanny off! I don't know how you do it. Seriously, how DO you do it? Practice? I think I need to watch some videos. Or is the secret to spend a coupla five days doing nothing but cutting and stamping and that way you have a pile of them for when you need them? Let me know because I have to admit, it sure is a cute and happy finished tag so I might stray out of my lane again!

Challenges

• 30-Day Coloring Challenge.
• Double D Challenges: Think Spring.
• Shopping Our Stash: Spring color palette below.
• Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge: Tag you're it.
• Tag You're It!: To CASE the talented Maureen Merritt.
• The Flower Challenge: Anything goes.

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I have been meaning to share this education information sent to me by several of my bloggie friends. Who knew there was a name for this?? Thank you Janis, Val, Donna, and Sue!

And here I thought Mrs. Malaprop and I were the only ones who miss poke!

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

... And More Holiday Makes

Hello there!

I hope you realize you've whooshed through another week already and here you are! No, don't bother turning around. Monday through Thursday are long gone.

I'm knee-deep in signing cards, but I had to stop and play in a few challenges! They draw me in like honey to a bear about to hiberventilate . . .

Onefer.

I used my NBUS "Pinpoint Dome Tag Decorations" die by Poppystamps to cut the tag elements. I didn't even notice until now that the foo-foo bow completely covers the lovely rounded shoulders of my tag. You'll have to take my word for it. I sponged the snowy sky top and tore the bottom hills. The "Evergreen Trees" are also dies from Poppystamps. The sediment is from My Favorite Things set "Seasonal Sentiments." I used a white organza ribbon for the bow and colored it by skating my blue and green ink cubes over it on both sides to give it the same Hugh as the sky. 

The trees and torn hills are covered in Smooch and glitter. You can see that better here:

Now, if your first reaction when you saw the photo was to think to yourself, "That looks like one of Loll's tags," I would be pickled tink! That's prezackly who I was trying to channel! She is the Featured Stamper on the current Tag You're It challenge and this is her beautiful tag:

Made by Loll Thompson (Stamping With Loll)

Challenges.

• Jingle Belles: A Christmas card or Anything But a Card.
• SSS Wednesday Challenge: Anything goes.
• Tag You're It: Loll Thompson.

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Twofer. 

I do a few cards with this image every year because I never cease to love it. It's a old-timey wooden stamp from The Rubbernecker stamp company. I heat-embossed the image in platinum and then watercolored it with my Ziggies. The shimmery paper and the sediment are from PTI.

Challenges.

• Addicted to Stamps and More: Make your mark.
• CASology. Cue card: Candle.
• Less Is More: Emboss resist.
• CAS on Sunday: Christmas.
• CAS Watercolor Card Challenge: Watercolor resist.

~~~

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

Thank you for your good wishes about the plumbing. Of course, by the time we could get a plumber, the water was flowing fine. There was no sign of any leak so no one has any idea what happened. All we can do is wait for it to happen again. Wait. What? How's that? Perhaps it was the Elf on the Shelf? Hammy? I guess we'll have to install cameras and motion detectors. 

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 and 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 a pop-up box opens.
Click "Jump to Comment Form" and walla, no more car pool tunnel!
Mwah!
If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me
your email address so I can respond. Thank you!