Dies Through the Seasons

Hello Stamplings!

I hope this finds you well! Well in health, well in spirits, and well in creativity!

This week the I.D.E.A.S. Calendar is D = Dies/Die Cuts (which can also be fussy-cuts). Dies are having a heyday right now and I got so charged up, I did a threefer. Sorry, I didn't mean that to sound naughty.

Onefer

For this card, I was inspired by the photo at the 

Inspired By Challenge ~ specifically the frame and the colors of the leafy spray on the mantle.

I found papers in my stash that have a lightly embossed feel, so I used a creamy one for my background here. I used a woodgrain paper to cut my stitched rectangle frame. The vases are dies from Paper Smooches. The stems are a combination of dies from SU and MFT. The sediment is from Gina K's, "A Little Love." 

I'm also adding my card to Cut It Up, where the brief is to add a sentiment and to Snippets Playground, where the brief is to use your scrappy snippets.

Twofer

Here is another piece of the pretty paper I found ~ this time in a beige color. Nothing original about this design, but I can't remember ever doing it before and I love the simplicity of the scene.

Looking at it on my monitor now, the lads and I are karacking up because it looks like we tossed a coupla dog turds on the grass beside the pile of leaves!😂It's okay because the recipient is a dog-loving friend with a fall birthday and a wonderful sense of humor!

Challenges

Addicted to Stamps and More: Birthday.

Cardz 4 Galz: Create a scene.

Krafty Chicks: Birthday.

Threefer

And, thirdly, the challenge at Color Hues schparked another Christmas card for the stash. The poinsettia is an old beauty from Waltzingmouse, colored with my Ziggies in all pinks, even though it came out a bit rusty rose in the photo. Hammy and Stanley were thrilled to have a big field upon which to use their new winkers and when they were finished, I fussy cut it. 

The gray background paper was decorated with a Dotted Scallops cover plate die from Pinkfresh Studio and gold bling and a simple sediment finished it off.

Other Challenges

The Flower Challenge: Add embellishments.

The Holly and Ivy Christmas: Anything Christmas goes.

Just Us Girls: Die Cuts - Florals.

      

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💐I don't say it often enough ... Thank you very much to all the card challenges out there who provide us with endless inspiration and challenge us creatively!👏

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I.D.E.A.S. Calendar: D = Dies

You will find a linky tool below for you to share your creations using your dies! Your card may help motivate someone out of their creative schlump! I love seeing what you create, visiting you, and pinning your designs! 

Thank you so much to everyone who shared their designs last week! Mwah!

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!

*Life is too short!

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Sunglasses, please, folks!

Hello Stamplings!

When I woke up last Sunday morning, there was a whole new week laid out in front of me, like my outfit on the first day of the new year of school. Then I turned my back to go find my shoes and when I turned around again, my clothes had been worn, laundered, and put back in the drawer before I knew what happened. 

That's my metaphor for how fast this week went by. And now, since Christmas will be here before we turn around again, let's get after it.

Onefer

I painted this card with metallic watercolors while at Brenda's retreat in Indiana. I think I borrowed them from Kara? The stamp is Mondo Holly by Julie Ebersole (Ellen Hutson), which I also borrowed from someone. You can't really appreciate the awesome glimmery glimmerness of the paints unless you tilt the card towards the light and then it looks like a magnificent stained glass design:

Back home at the Playhouse, I added a platinum-embossed sediment from GKW. I attached the art to a glittery pale green panel, which glitter you maaay be able to see if you click to enlarge. And that's it. I could have made it an OLC, but I have all this beautiful glittery and glimmery paper that is crying out to be used this year.

Hammy? Remember he was busy with Cassie Kitty at the retreat so no hard labor from him for today's cards!

Challenges

• The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge: Anything Christmas Goes.
• Rudolph Days: Anything Christmas Goes.
• Watercooler Wednesday: Helen's All About Occasions.

Twofer

This card was also made at the retreat. Colleen taught us this technique of scribbling color onto a snippets panel in an ombre' fashion. Once dry, you swipe Nuvo Glimmer Paste (or some other brand) over the colors with your spatula. 

Once that is completely dry, you can die cut it, or use a negative die-cut overlay ~ as I did here with this mondo snowflake die. The snowflake die was also borrowed, along with the sediment. (We were one big happy family using each other's things and I wasn't good about making notes.) I added the bling and glittery matching aqua panel at home. Thank you, Colleen! That was fun!

Challenges

• Cards for Galz: Something beginning with an "S." In this case, it's Snowflake.
• Crafty Cardmakers: Sparkle.
• Just Add Ink: Add a technique.

The Guys

While looking at photos of Miss Nellie in my camera, I came across this handsome photo of the Mister and the grandtwins taken in September on the Mister's birthday. They and their big dogs are here entertaining us again this weekend. I'm going to try and get a photo of the big dogs with the little dog.

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You may have heard that once again we are dealing with devastating fires in our area and in other parts of California. It's heart-wrenching to watch the news and it's unpleasant to smell and breathe in the smoke, but thankfully, we are safe where we are. Please keep those who have been impacted by the fires in your thoughts and prayers. ❤

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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 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 wallah, no more car pool tunnel! Mwah! (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!)

Schparkly Wishes

Hello Stamplings!

Welcome to the weekend and the second day of summer for those in this spherical part of the world! I hope those of you slogging through weeks of rain get some relief soon.

The handsome grandtwins arrived yesterday for a four-day stay and they brought the granddogs with them, so when you include The Mister and Hammy, that's a whole boatload of Testosterone going on! We're off to the County Fair and the horse races today, so let's get toit.

Onefer

I borrowed a stencil and made this card front at ESCR 2019. The talented Lolly taught us how to use Pearl Ex powders through a stencil. In order for the Pearl Ex to stick to your card, you Versamark your image through the stencil and then pour on a heat and stick embossing powder, which you then heat set until the powder melts. Then you brush on the Pearl Ex and heat set it again to make sure the Pearl Ex sticks to the heat and stick layer. It's fun to watch the magic happen!

Once home I added the sediment from Simon Says, added some Brilliance gold speckles, and attached the panel to a white card base.

Challenges

• CAS Stencil: Perfect Pearls / Pearl Ex.
• Sparkles Monthly Challenges: No patterned paper.
• STAMPlorations Mixed Media: Must use a stencil.

Twofer

Next is a QACAS card made with a DSP panel (bordered with a lime green panel) and a die cut present from Avery Elle's "Holiday Glass" set which I colored with my Ziggies and popped up on the card. Simples, but not nearly schparkly enough, so Hammy took care of that! Good boy!

Challenges

• CAS Christmas Card Challenges: Gifts.
• Christmas Kickstart Challenge: Glitter, sparkle, and shine.
• The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge: Anything Christmas goes.
• Pixie's Snippets Playground: The Playground gates are about to close so I need to hurry and get my snippets make in there!

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Witness Protection or What?

I found the photo I was talking about in my last post. If you look closely, you can see that he has both hands covering the side of his face and he remained that way as the waitress took a few minutes to take three photos! It's been fun reading your comments about what you think his story is! What shall we call him? Floyd? Peter?

~~~

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 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 wallah, no more car pool tunnel! Mwah! (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!)

Classic B/W and Red for Christmas

Hello, Stamplings!

Thank you for stopping by today, seeing as how you're exhausted after all that post-Thanksgiving shopping you did over the weekend. When you weren't eating leftovers. Or is that just me?

I won't keep you cuz you know I have tons to do. I mean, I know you have tons to do.

You can count on me for mostly uber-doober QACAS inspiration as it gets closer to Christmas. My cards today took minutes to make. The beautiful image above is NBUS from Unity. I had to buy it (cough) months ago after seeing it on my friend Shelly's blog and I finally got around to inking it up for Christmas. It was stamped onto a corner-chomped OLC base and clear-embossed. The Christmas flower was colored and shaded with Ziggies and the sediment is from Penny Black. Hammy winked the heck out of that flower. Hmm, maybe that's why the colors all blended. Bless his heart.

Challenges

• Less Is More: OLC Holiday.
• Rudolph Days: A/G Christmas.
• TIME OUT: Black, white, and one colour.

Twofer.

Another uber festive card. This full-front text image is an old wooden stamp from Stampendous. I inked it in black and embossed it in clear ep, which you can just make out in the shine here and there. I found a NBUS roll of pretty SU ribbon to tie around the card front. Tip: This is a cheater's bow you tie after you've tried twelveteen times to tie a bow. It's less bulky to mail, too.👏

Challenges

• 52 Christmas Card Throwdown: Ribbon & glitter.
• Fusion: Photo inspiration.
• The Holly and Ivy Christmas: Anything goes.

~~~

Enjoy this busy time of year for us card arteests! 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 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 wallah, no more car pool tunnel! Mwah! (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!)

Christmas in Aug -, erm, September!

Hello Stamplings!

I've bookended my posts this week with a Monday wake-up call and now here we are once again whooshed straight into Friday! When you have a paying job, the weeks seem interminably long, but look out, when you're retired and slow down with your bad self, the weeks fly by like a bat out of a bag of biscuits!

Up til now, bloggers who make Christmas cards all year long advise their readers to turn their heads if they don't have the stomach for it, especially during the summer. Helluuuu! It's gonna be the first day of September tomorrow! It might even be September where you are already! You're going to have to suck it up now, ladies, cuz if you want your Chrissy cards in the mail by the beginning of December, you've only got three months. That's twelve weeks.

I'm sorry. Steady on. Someone get a cool washcloth.

When you're ready, here's your Onefer inspiration for today:

If you don't bother with the slim mat of gold, this is a super QACAS card. If you attach the gold mat, it's still a QACAS card, just not super so. The NBUS poinsettia banner is from STAMPlorations, called "Poinsettia Row." I colored directly on the stamp using Memento markers, gave it a quick spritz, and stamped it on mixed media paper.

Then I gold-embossed the Noel and let Hammy blow gold paint all over the front with his itty-bitty paper straw. (I made four of these while I was at it, so it took him ages, even with the rest breaks required by law. Don't yell at me, the strong-willed little furball insisted, and now I have to puree all his food because he can't get his mouth unpursed!) 

Challenges

• Rudolph Days: A/G Christmas.
• Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge: Anything goes.
• STAMPlorations: Never-ending anything goes.

Twofer

I bought a pack of the SU stained glass vellum and I just love it. This is my first time using a piece. I colored it from the back and it was so satisfying I was able to cancel my therapy for the week. I attached the vellum to the diamond-embossed card base at the point where the PTI greeting was added.

When making this card, I was following the current sketch from LIM. After the card was finished I realized that I had covered up the middle section so that it looks like one big square stained glass, instead of four windows like the sketch. So here's a piece of the vellum so you can see it is four squares:

Well, I mean, it's any number of geometric shapes ~ squares, diamonds, rectangles, hexagons, but if you step back over by the bookcase, and squint your eyes, you can see the four large squares, with dividing lines ...? 

Oh, never mind. Wodka?

Challenges

• Less is More: Sketch week.
• The Holly and Ivy Christmas Challenge: Anything goes.
• Watercooler Wednesday: Anything goes.

~~~

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 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 wallah, no more car pool tunnel! Mwah! (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!)