Happy Birthday

Hello to all, and Happy Super Bowl Sunday (if you're into that),

Can't say that FB is something that I watch, but later we are going to our friends for a little SB party. It also happens to be his birthday today, so of course, I needed to make a card.

Using inspiration from this week's Freshly Made Sketch, and the color theme at Seize the Birthday, here is my card.

For the three diagonal lines in the sketch, I used some patterned paper, matching the lines with the same paper on the card base. I added the happy birthday in Real Red and some SU candy dots for embellishment. The stamps are from a variety of sets, all are listed below in the Supplies section.

Here is the inside.

I'm off to Denver for the week bright and early tomorrow morning. The weather app keeps changing. Now it's saying snow on Wednesday, but yesterday snow wasn't in the forecast. It's currently warmer in Denver than it is here in San Diego. We've had some wild, rainy weather the last few days here.

Have a great day!
Thanks,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: All Inside, Up the Happy, and Pure Magic by Julie for Ellen Hutson, Birthday Basics Turnabout set by Concord & 9th and Party Animal by Lawn Fawn
Paper: SU Basic Black, Whisper White thick, Whisper White and Botanical Butterfly DSP
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Copics, SU Real Red
Other: Ellen Hutson set dies, Lawn Fawn set dies, SU Candy Dots, Gemini Jr, SU mini glue dots, fun foam

Hope Your Birthday is the Sweetest

Hey and Happy Friday Peeps,

It's a very, very light work day for me, whoo-hoo! I've been doing some rearranging of my card stock storage and a few other supplies and doing some general craft room pickup. Now that is done and I can actually do some stamping.

First, I wanted to get this card posted. I made it last night after dinner. It's a birthday card as I have several friends with birthday's this month. The sketch is this week's CAS(E) this Sketch! and the new Seize the Birthday topping is sequins, and this card fits perfectly.

This is a pretty simple card. The card base and layer are Neenah Desert Storm. The top layer is embossed with a TE Burlap embossing folder. The stamps are from Avery Elle, one of the newest sets. The ice cream cone is stamped on X-Press It Blending card stock with Memento black and colored with Copics. The pink element is X-Press It Blending card with Distress Oxide pink ink blended on it using a blender tool. After it was dry, the sentiment from the same stamp set was stamped using memento black ink. After popping the ice cream cone on the card I used some Expresso dimensional paint for the chocolate sauce. Finally, the pink sequins were added for embellishment.

Here is the inside:

Images are also from the new set. The sentiment is from another Avery Elle birthday set.

I hope you have a great weekend. My craft group is getting together tomorrow. As usual, I'm bring supplies and card examples for them to work on. I usually cut all of the paper so they can concentrate on the stamping and creativity. It should be fun.

Thanks for stopping in. Stay cool everyone!
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Sweetest  and Birthday  Bus sets by Avery Elle
Paper: Neenah Desert Storm and X-Press It Blending card stocks
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Distress Oxide, and Copics
Other: Sweetest Element dies, Taylored Expressions Burlap embossing folder, Die-namics Fishtail Flag die, ink blending tool, Gemini Jr, Express Dimensional paint, sequins, SU dimensionals

PARTY ANIMAL

Hello all,

I've been away from my craft room the past two weeks due to work travel, and a little weekend away for fun last weekend, but after Saturday chores were done yesterday, I had some time to get back to it.

The new CAS(E) This Sketch challenge layout looked fun, so I decided to see what I could do with it. Also, the Seize The Birthday blog has an "anything goes" challenge, so I'm linking up there too.

I recently got some new sets from Concord & 9th, and one of them is this super fun Furry Friends set. I thought that the animal faces would fit with the "threes" challenge concept. The background paper is from a SU 6 x 6 pack called Tutti-frutti. It paired well with the black card stock used to cut out the circle elements. The sentiment is heat embossed with white EP and trimmed with scissors. It kind of got lost in the background paper. The solution was surrounding it with black enamel dots.

Here's the inside:

I'm looking forward to staying home for a few weeks as there is no work travel planned. I hope your Sunday is going well.

Thanks for looking in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Furry Friends by Concord & 9th
Paper: X-Press It Blending card stock, SU Basic Black card stock, SU Tutti-frutti DSP
Ink: MFT Hybrid black ink pad, SU Sahara Sand, Crumb Cake, Going Gray, Cajun Craze, Hero Arts Soft Brown, Distress Pumice Stone, Copics, VersaMark
Other: Furry Friends dies, Die-namics Wonky Stitched Circle die, white EP, heat tool, enamel dots, Gemini Jr, dimensionals

Happy Birthday

Hello and happy Monday,

Today is my first day off for a three week vacation. Whoo-hoo! On Thursday morning my sister and I are headed to Quito, Ecuador. We'll be in Ecuador for a week, then fly on to Lima, Peru and be in Peru for a week. We have our train tickets, hotel reservations and park tickets for two days at Machu Picchu.  That should be one of the highlights of the trip. We have many other excursions planned for the two weeks in each country. It may be one of those vacations that you have to go back to work to rest up. I've been finishing up my list of things to buy this morning, now it's down to laundry and packing.

Of course, I have to make time in my craft room before I leave it for two weeks. Yesterday I made a couple of birthday cards. This week's Paper Players Challenge is brought to us by Joanne and she has a fun Tic-tac-toe challenge. These are always so fun and I usually have a hard time deciding on which way to play. Also, the Seize The Birthday Challenge this week is "anything goes," so I'm posting my card there as well.

I ended up going the middle horizontal row. Birthday, Ribbon, Masculine. What threw me was the ribbon on a masculine card. Something I probably wouldn't normally think to do. Full disclosure, I thought of what ribbon to use first, and then picked my papers to go with the ribbon. Kind of crazy! Looking through my box of ribbons, I came across this SU naturals and decided it should work fine on a masculine card.

The small coffee containers are from the Lawn Fawn Love You A Latte set and the large coffee container die is Paper Smooches. I stamped the small cups randomly onto Neenah Desert Storm card stock with Memento brown ink and colored them with Faber-Castel Polychromos pencils. I stamped the coffee bean with Memento brown ink as well.  The large cup die is cut from the Desert Storm paper and a piece of MFT orange gingham patterned paper. The circle, heart and card base are SU Handsome Hunter card stock. I colored the large cup with the colored pencils to match the small ones. IRL, the Handsome Hunter shade is much closer to the green shade used on the cups. In the photo, it looks way more blue!

The inside greeting and image are from the same LF stamp set.

It's a super gloomy day here on the San Diego coast. In fact, we had a smidgen of rain this morning. A good day to be inside. I need to get a Mother's Day card made this afternoon so that Mr Personal Chef can mail it for me while I'm in SA.

Have a great Monday afternoon all! Thanks for stoping in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Love You a Latte set by Lawn Fawn
Paper: Neenah Desert Storm, SU Handsome Hunter, MFT gingham patterned paper
Ink: Memento brown, SU Handsome Hunter, Faber-Castel Polychromos colored pencils
Other: Paper Smooches Coffee Cup die, Die-Namics Pierced circle die, SU naturals ribbon, SU green enamel dots, Gemini Jr, dimensionals

Happy Birthday

Hi stampers,

I have another card that I made using the current CAS(E) this Sketch! layout. I actually made this one before yesterday's card. This one took a little longer as there are more layers and I used a craft knife to cut out the windows of the bus.

 

This is such a fun and cute stamp set by Avery Elle. I stamped the bus and it's party goers, and the other images using Memento tuxedo black ink and colored them with Copics. After cutting everything out using the corresponding set dies, my plan was to pop them up over the cloudy paper. I decided it would look great if I cut the windows out. It wasn't difficult, just took a little patience. The orange panel is cut with the Avery Elle Burst Elements die. I used a Die-namics Stitched circle die to cut the circle in the Burst die. The Stitched cloud die is from Lawn Fawn.

I'm also posting this birthday card to the current Seize the Birthday challenge, where the topping is Vibrant Colors.

The inside is super simple with a piece of the cloudy paper and a sentiment from another Avery Elle set.

Supplies
Stamps: Birthday Bus and Beside the Sea sets by Avery Elle
Paper: SU Whisper White and Calypso Coral card stock, X-Press It Blending card stock and Echo Park patterned paper
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black and Copics
Other: Birthday Bus set and Burst Elements dies from Avery Elle, Die-namics Stitched Circle die, Lawn Fawn Stitched Cloud Border die, Studio Calico puffy sticker arrow, Gemini Jr., diemensionals

Woo Hoo! Let's Go Eat Cake

Hello,

I made this card yesterday morning for the Seize the Birthday #13 (masculine card) challenge. I really like doing this chalkboard technique. I was noticing that on the cards that I was making however, the white embossing was looking rather dingy. I think that my white embossing powder was too old. I bought some new and this is nice and bright white. Much better!

I used one of the newer single stamps from Stampin' Up to make this birthday card. It's a perfect stamp for this technique. After heating the EP, I colored some of the images with my Prismacolor pencils to look like colored chalk. Love the look!

The inside:

Two more SU sets were used for the inside images.

Supplies
Stamps: SU Woo Hoo single stamp, SU Patterned Party set and SU Happiest Birthday Wishes set
Paper: SU Real Red, Basic Black and Tempting Turquoise card stock and Summertime by Echo Park patterned papers
Ink: SU Craft White, Real Red, Pumpkin Pie, Tempting Turquoise, Daffodil Delight, Old Olive
Other: SU corner rounder punch, Die-namics notched border die, Kaiser red pearls, SU white EP, heat tool, the Big Shot and dimensionals

Thanks all,
Colleen

Birthday Celebrations

Happy Monday all,

Here's a card that I made for the current Seize the Birthday challenge. This week is feminine.

I pulled out one of my old, and favorite, Stampin' Up sets and combined it with some new DSP.

This is a mostly SU card. I did use the Die-namic Fishtail Flag dies for the banners.

Supplies
Stamps: Upsy Daisy set by Stampin' Up
Paper: SU Melon Mambo and Whisper White card stock and SU Sunshine and Sprinkles DSP
Ink: SU Melon Mambo and Pacific Point
Other: SU Polka Dot and Vine Street embossing folders, SU ribbon, SU Edgelits die, SU Labels Framelits dies, Die-namics Fishtail Flags STAX dies, sewing machine, the Big Shot, and dimensionals

Thanks for looking in today. Have a great work week,
Colleen

Big Birthday Fishes

Hi stampers,

Here's a quick and simple card that I made using the Seize the Birthday sketch #11. The challenge is to make a masculine card. I went for juvenile masculine. Hopefully, some little guy will like it.

After coloring the shark with Copics, I used dimensionals to give him some lift in the waves. I covered him with Crystal Effects to give him a wet look.

Supplies
Stamps: Under the Sea set by Taylored Expressions
Paper: SU Whisper White card stock and Echo Park Splash patterned paper
Ink: Memento tuxedo black and Copics
Other: TE wave die, Crystal Effects, the Big Shot and dimensionals

Thanks for looking in,
Colleen

Let's Celebrate You

Hi again,

I thought I'd do one more post today. This is a card that I made for the Seize the Birthday #7 challenge, feminine birthday card. I pulled out some really old SU DSP to go along with this fun Pure Innocence stamp set to put this one together.

Supplies
Stamps: Pure Innocence "Hula Girl" set by My Favorite Things
Paper: TE pink card stock, X-Press It Blending card stock, SU River Rock card stock, SU Ginger Blossom DSP
Ink: Memento tuxedo black and Copics
Other: Labels 9 Nesties, Die-namics flower die, SU Fans EF, red Stickles, the Big Shot, and dimensionals

Thanks all,
Colleen

I Didn't Forget Your Birthday. . .

Good Sunday evening friends,

I'm just wrapping up a fun day of stamping and watching the Golden Globes before I have to get busy packing for a work trip to Colorado Springs. I leave tomorrow morning and I'll be gone all week. At least the weather channel isn't predicting snow during the week. Being from San Diego, I don't feel very comfortable driving in snow.

I have a couple of cards to share for this post. I wanted play along with Lesley's first Seize The Birthday Challenge. I made a card, got ready to post it, and discovered that the challenge was to make a feminine card, so I made another one.

Here is the feminine card:

Here is the original (not so feminine) card:

Both cards use Taylored Expressions Belated Birthday mini stamp sets. They are colored with Copics.

Supplies
Card 1:
Stamps: "I Didn't Forget Your Birthday" mini set by Taylored Expressions
Paper: TE Pink and Choice Snow White card stock, X-Press It Blending card stock, and Soho Garden by American Crafts patterned papers
Ink: Copics RV52, RV53, YG07, YG09, YG67, R21, R27, Y32, FY1, N0, N1, N2, N3, W3, W5, W7, W9, E81 and Memento tuxedo black
Other: TE Impressions Circles Plate, TE Label die, oval Nestie, SU oval and scalloped oval punches, Kaiser pink pearls, the Big Shot and dimensionals

Card 2:
Stamps: "Birthdays Are Like Shooting Stars"mini set by Taylored Expressions
Paper: SU Crumb Cake and Basic Black and X-Press It Blending card stocks, Soho Garden by American Crafts patterned papers
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Copics W0, W1, W2, W3, Y21, YG23, YG25, YG93, and SU Night of Navy
Other: Labels 1 Nesties, SU black button, Fiskers corner rounder, TE Stars  Impressions Plate, the Big Shot, and dimensionals

Thanks for looking in,
Colleen