ASM - Holiday .....

.....  Morning everyone!  I am very, very late with my DT card for Addicted to Stamps and More!  My excuse is that I've been busy having a fun time with my son, Ben, and his girlfriend, Sophie while they vacation with us here in the States. However, I did manage to get an hour in my craft room yesterday afternoon and have made a card for this week's challenge.  Our challenge this week is HOLIDAY, and I've made a clean, simple card for Thanksgiving:

Stamps: Stampin' Up! - Six Sayings, Lighthearted Leaves
Inks: Memento - Tuxedo Black
Accessories: White Lustre Card; SU Card - Cucumber Crush; Copic Markers; Wink of Stella - Clear

One of the advantages of being late with my project is that I'm playing along with some of my favourite challenges.  I've used the sketch from Freshly Made Sketches - FMS#210 for the layout (although I've turned it to make a landscape card).  The colours are from Colour Me Card Challenge - CMCC#95 - just love them.

I stamped this gorgeous leaf three times on scrap card, coloured them all with Copic markers and used a square punch to cut out different areas.  I added sparkle to all the leaves with my clear Wink of Stella brush.  I adhered the panels flat to the card.  I finished the front with a this fabulous sentiment - love that script.  On the inside I cut a mat layer of green card and on the white panel added another leaf, coloured with slightly lighter tones, and a simple greeting.

I have to apologise to my team mates for not getting my card ready in time.  That's all for now!  See you soon.

Warm my heart ....

....  Hello!  Just made a really quick, clean and simple card for autumn:

Stamps: Stampin' Up! - Sheltering Tree
Inks: SU - Cajun Craze, Hello Honey
Accessories: White Lustre Card

This card is for the following challenges:

• Less is More - LIM#245 - one layer with the theme of autumn
• Colour Me Card Challenge - CMCC#93 - colours are perfect for autumn
• Time Out Challenges - TOC#41 - based on a quote about autumn

This one came together in about 5 minutes!! Using my MISTI, I stamped the tree twice to give extra depth to the colour.  Then I inked up the leaves in yellow and added touches of brown before stamping them.  I grounded the tree using the swish image (second impression) and added the swing to the tree.  I finished the front with the simple, but heartfelt, sentiment.  I've not done the inside yet!

This tree looks like a number of the trees in our neighbourhood - autumn has most definitely arrived!!  Bye for now.

Edited to add:  I finally finished the inside of the card - very simple, some design paper in yellow and another tree and sentiment:

That's it - now up to date!

Happy Birthday Kat .....

.... Hello again!  Today our darling daughter Kat (as she has chosen to call herself) turns 14 years old!  I still can't quite believe just how fast the last 14 years have gone by, it really does only seem like yesterday that she was a tiny baby totally dependent on us.  And now, well, she's a wonderful young woman - confident, bright, funny, sometimes grumpy, but always our special girl.  Here's the card that I made for her:

Stamps: Dylusions - Endeavour, Quintessential Quotes, Which Way Up, Bits of This, Dy's Alphabet, Clearly Quotes, Clearly the Right Word, Clearly Alpha
Inks: Memento - Tuxedo Black, London Fog; Versafine - Onyx Black
Dies: Spellbinders - Glass Effects (S4-451)
Accessories: White Lustre Card; Stampin' Up! Card - Garden Green, Island Indigo, Pacific Point; Copic Markers; SU DP - Pacific Point

 This is a large card - I used a card blank that I brought over from the UK, it's 8" × 8".  Well, it's a special birthday.  I used a few challenges in the making of this card.  I used the sketch from MFT Wednesday Sketch Club - MFTWSC#241, although I did adapt it a bit.  The colours are from Colour Me! Card Challenge - CMCC#89.  And, as I've used a die, I'm submitting this card to Left of Centre - LOC#95.

Kat is very specific about her likes and dislikes, and she has a somewhat eclectic taste in music and fashion.  So I was quite pleased to find that she "lurves" my Dylusions stamps - so I had to use them on this card.  I stamped the image on white card.  I used my MISTI to stamp the image, it allowed me to stamp it three times to give a really black outline - love this tool!  I coloured her with Copic markers, cut her out and then edged the image with a black marker.  The MFT sketch gave me the idea to use my Glass Effect die - first time out!  It took a while to create the panel as I had to cut it five times, make sure I didn't lose any pieces and then inlay the individual bits!  I'm glad I made the effort - looks super.  I finished the front with a fun birthday greeting.

On the inside I cut a mat layer of blue design paper. On the white panel I had fun adding lots of Dyan's sentiments.  Dyan's stamps are available in lots of formats - red rubber, photo polymer, wooden - and the same images comes in a variety of sizes.  This is great, as the sentiments in pale grey are the small versions (photo polymer), while the large sentiment in the middle is a red rubber stamp.  I added a few decorative details too.  And to complete the package, I added some decoration to the envelope too.

I also added some decoration to the wrapping on Kat's birthday present.  All in keeping!

Beautiful steampunk style necklace, made by Valerie Brinchick.  

And the parcel - done in style!

Finally, here are a few photos to show my our lovely girl has changed!

Kat - taken at the end of August - our Goth Girl!!  Almost 14 years old.

Our very first visit to the States in Novi.  We came to check out the area and find a place to live!

Kat was 10½ years old in this photo.

Kat at school in Northop Hall, July 2006.

She's 5¾ years old here.

If you've made it this far, thank for reading.  I think you can gather that I'm very proud of our girl. She's given us so much joy and so much more to come!  Bye for now.

52CCT - Theme .....

.... Hello, good morning!  It's time for our new theme challenge at 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown and Tanja has picked the theme of snowman.  I had so much fun with this theme, here's my card:

Stamps: Funstamps - Scribble Snowman; Uniko - Stunning Snowflakes
Inks: Versamark; Versafine - Onyx Black; Memento - Tuxedo Black, London Fog
Dies: PTI - Wet Paint Holiday
Accessories: White Lustre Card; Stampin' Up! - Basic Black; Copic Markers; Wink of Stella - Clear; Perfect Pearls - Pewter; Peel Offs

I used the sketch from this week's Freshly Made Sketches - FMS#195 for the layout and the colours are from Colour Me Card Challenge - CMCC#80.  I stamped snowflakes randomly over the card in Versamark and used pewter Perfect Pearls to bring them out.  I stamped the snowman three times on white card and coloured them with Copic Markers.  I cut them out, edged them with a black marker and added some sparkle to the hats and scarves with a clear Wink of Stella brush.  I adhered the first snowman flat to the card, and used dimensional gel for the other two.  I die cut the word Christmas four time in black, glued them together and attached it to the card.  I finished with a peel off which I coloured black.  On the inside I cut a mat layer of black card and stamped a Christmas greeting on the white panel, along with some more snowflakes.

Here's a close up of the sparkle on the hats and scarves - looks so nice when the sun shines!!

Don't forget to visit our blog to check out the inspiration cards from the rest of the team.  It's so nice to be back in the States and play in my craft room.  I did miss playing along for the past few weeks!  That's all for now - have fun!

RSD - Progressive Challenge Team B ....

...  Good morning!  I have to apologise to my team mates, once again, I'm running late with this post.  It's time for Team B to share the projects we've made for the Rick St Dennis Progressive Challenge.   The theme for this part of the challenge is ANYTHING GOES with a RICK ST DENNIS image.  Here's my card:

Stamps: Rick St Dennis Digi - Jocasta Jazz Valentine Girl; CAS-ual Friday Stamps - Love Notes, Big Treble
Inks: Memento - Tuxedo Black; Stampin' Up! - Melon Mambo
Accessories: White Lustre Card; SU Card - Melon Mambo; Kaisercraft DP - Say Aloha; Crafter's Companion - Spray 'n' Sparkle Iridescent; Cosmic Shimmer Mist - Candy Pink; Copic Markers; Wink of Stella - Clear; SU Marker - Basic Black

I used a few challenges in the making of this card.  The colours are from Colour Me Card Challenge - CMCC#71 and the layout is based on this week's sketch at Freshly Made Sketches - FMS#186.  The image is called Jocasta Jazz Valentine Girl and she's just wonderful.  I'm on a bit of a roll with music theme cards - I made one yesterday too.  I printed her on white card, coloured with Copic markers and then very carefully used my scalpel to cut her out.  I ran a black marker round the cut edge to define the image and added some WOS sparkle to her feather, jewellery, makeup and shoes.  I used bright pink card for the base.  I stamped the music diagonally across the card and added a simple sentiment to the side.  I cut the card along the middle diagonal to allow the pink to show through.  Before attaching Joscasta, I used iridescent spray and some Cosmic Shimmer to add some detail to the white panel.  On the inside, I covered the card with green design paper and added a simply sentiment to the white panel.

The rest of Team B have some fabulous projects over at Sparkle and Glitter - do pop by and check out their work.  If you want to play along with us, you need to use a Rick St Dennis image on your project - 3D art, scrapbook page, art journal or cards - the choice is yours.  Rick has over a 1,000 images available at his Zibbet store, to suit all tastes from sweet, cute, fun, funky to downright scary too.  Have fun!!

52CCT - Technique Take 2 ...

....  Hello and good morning!  I made a boo-boo yesterday and my post for this week's 52 {Christmas} Card Throwdown challenge went up early - silly me!!!!  So, those of you who've seen the post have a head start on the challenge.  I decided that I had to make another card - Louise has given us the challenge of using the Triple Stamping technique, and this is my Take Two card:

Stamps: Waltzingmouse - Warm Fuzzies, Flurries, Tis The Season
Inks: Stampin' Up! - Lost Lagoon, Night of Navy, Crushed Curry, Melon Mambo; Versafine - Onyx Black; Memento - Tuxedo Black, Grey Flannel
Dies: Spellbinders - Ovals Lg (S4-110) #3 and #5, Ovals Sm (S4-112) #3 and #5
Accessories: White Lustre Card; SU Card - Lost Lagoon, Night of Navy, Crushed Curry, Melon Mambo; Copic Markers; Wink of Stella - Clear

This card is quite different from the one that went up yesterday.  I've used the colours from this week's Colour Me Card Challenge - CMCC#68 - totally non-traditional and the layout is based on the sketch over at Jingle Belles - JB:15:09.  I'm not sure whether this works with the Triple Stamp technique, but I had fun.  On the inside I cut a mat layer of yellow card and on the white panel stamped the larger robin and a Christmas greeting.

Don't forget to visit our blog and check out the cards the rest of the team have made to share with you.  That's all for now - have fun!!

Shades of green ....

... Morning!  This is going to be a quick post as the deadline for submission to Colour Me Card Challenge - CMCC#62 is fast approaching!  I had to play along as I just love all shades of green.  I've made a fun little birthday card:

Stamps: Inkadinkadoo - Humourous Birthday; Uniko Studio - Simply Said Birthday
Inks: Memento - Tuxedo Black; Stampin' Up! - Garden Green, Pear Pizzazz
Accessories: White Lustre Card; Copic Markers; Wink of Stella - Clear

This one was really quick and easy to make.  I found this cute lizard in my stash - he comes with a sentiment attached, but I cut it off and just stamped him.  I coloured him with Copic markers and added some sparkle all over with my clear Wink of Stella Brush.  I cut the little sentiment that comes with the lizard in half and used only the top portion which I inked in Pear Pizzazz.  I finished the front with a bold Happy Birthday greeting.  I'm submitting this card to Less is More - LIM#215 where the challenge is a one layer card (yes) and features and animal (yes).

I took a close-up of Mr Lizard to show the sparkle.  I've not done the inside yet, as I want to make sure that I submit in time for CMCC - I'll add a photo of the inside, once it's complete.

Edited:  At Kylie's suggestion, I'm also submitting this to the current Addicted to CAS - ATCAS59, where the cue word is GREEN. Sarah has suggested I add this one to the current AAA Cards Games - AAACG#35 where they want a "bare naked CAS" card.  By that, they mean lots and lots of white space.  Thanks for the suggestion Sarah!  I'm in!  Somehow I've managed to miss this challenge before - I won't again.

We have a fabulous day yesterday taking photos of the gorgeous Natalie.  The theme of yesterday's shoot was "Bohemian Style" and Natalie has a fabulous wardrobe.  Here's one of the photos from yesterday - just a quick edit:

I hope to get the rest of the photos edited in the next couple of weeks!  That's all for now - see you soon.