Celebrate

Hello,

My bestie, Alison, had a birthday this week. Since she's opened her presents and card now, I can post her card on my blog. I had to wait because I know she does check in here periodically.

For her card, I used the current CAS(E) This Sketch challenge layout. Using Avery Elle stamps, here's what I came up with.

Using some fun patterned papers from Websters Pages, I created the horizontal element. The champagne glasses are from the Avery Elle set Mimosas. They are stamped with Memento tuxedo black and colored with Copics, then cut out with the set dies. The sentiment is Avery Elle too. I cut three, glued them together, inked the top with Distress Oxide ink and embossed with clear EP x 3. Before heating the third layer, I sprinkled some glitter on and then heat set it all. A few enamel dots and it's done. I like the way it turned out. Simple and interesting with the angled papers per the sketch.

The inside is simple too. I used some Concord & 9th stamps for the inside along with more Websters Pages PP.

Thanks for checking in. Have a great Wednesday!
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Mimosas set by Avery Elle and Many Mandalas set by Concord & 9th (inside)
Paper: X-Press It Blending card stock and Websters Pages Recorded patterned papers
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Copics,  and Tim Holts Distress Oxide inks
Other: Mimosas and Sentimental set dies by Avery Elle, Stitched Square die by MFT, clear EP, heat tool, enamel dots, the Big Shot, dimensionals, Wink of Stella

You're On the Nice List

Hi all and happy Saturday afternoon,

It's become a very gloomy afternoon in my neck of the woods. The fog has rolled in off the ocean to make for a dark and gray sky. I spent the morning doing chores and most of the afternoon shopping with a friend for Small Business Saturday. There's a street in Solana Beach with little shops known as Cedros Design Center. A few of the stores are similar to antique stores where there are little individual booths within the big building. Very fun to browse!

When I got home, I made one more Christmas card using this week's Merry Monday theme, which is to use Santa on our cards. I've used an older MFT set called Jingle All the Way.

I stamped the little reindeer using Crumb Cake ink on Neenah Desert Storm paper. Using a red Copic, I colored in their noses. The panel was trimmed down to 3.5 inches x 5.5 inches and placed on a card base that is covered with Lawn Fawn plaid holiday paper. I cut the tree and Santa images from X-Press It Blending paper and then stamped the images. They are colored with Copics and glued to the center of the top panel. The sentiment is stamped in Real Red and cut out with a Die-namics Fishtail Flag die, but I squared off the ends. I cut another from the plaid paper and glued the sentiment on top.

Here 's the inside:

On both the outside and inside Santas, I used some white Nuvo drops on the hats.

Have a great evening and thanks for stopping by,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Jingle All the Way set by My Favorite Things
Paper: Neenah Desert Storm, X-Press It Blending and SU Crumb Cake card stocks, Lawn Fawn Christmas Plaid patterned papers
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, SU Real Red, Copics
Other: Die-namics Jingle All the Way, Fishtail Flags dies, Wink of Stella, Nuvo drops, white gel pen, the Big Shot, dimensionals

Wrapped In the Warmth Of Christmas

Happy Day After Thanksgiving,

Hello all. I hope you had a fun holiday celebrating with family and friends. Our's was fairly low key. We went to friends and had a simple, traditional dinner and we were home by 7:30 pm.

Today I have my Paper Player's card for you. Sandy has a fun CAS theme this week titled Warm and Cozy. I always seem to struggle with CAS, but the design for this card popped into my head and I went with it. Just like many cards in the gallery, I've used the SU Smitten set. One of my favorites from this year's Holiday catalog and perfect for Sandy's theme.

In keeping with the CAS design, I used patterned paper and dies. Just one stamp for the sentiment. The card base is Neenah Desert Storm. The patterned papers are from Lawn Fawn and they are all in knitted designs. The sentiment is stamped with VersaMark and heat embossed with gold EP. The small mittens are die cut and then I tied 6 bows from gold twine and glued them on. Super, super simple! It's a smallish card that is 4.25" square.

Here's the inside:

Since I'm not a Black Friday shopper, I think I'll do some more stamping today. I'm pretty much finished with Christmas cards, but I need to start on birthday cards. Between family and friends, I have about 12 to make for Dec. birthdays!

I hope you have a great Friday and weekend. Thanks for looking in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Smitten and Hearts Come Home sets by Stampin' Up
Paper: Neenah Desert Storm and X-Press It Blending card stocks, Lawn Fawn Christmas patterned papers
Ink: VersaMark and SU Real Red
Other: Smitten dies, gold EP, heat tool, the Big Shot, SU gold twine

May Your Days Be BEARY and BRIGHT

Hello,

I was up early this morning instead of sleeping in. Maybe because I had two really early conference calls this past week, so I was used to waking up. Whatever the reason, I went grocery shopping by 7:30 am, came home and washed sheets, then made some homemade black bean soup. It's not even 11:00 here yet. I'll have an early lunch then head to the craft table.

I made this super cute card last night while Mr. Personal Chef was making dinner. Another holiday card and fits both the Color Throwdown and the Merry Monday challenges for this week.

All of the stamps are from the Lawn Fawn Beary Happy Holidays set, and all of the dies are Lawn Fawn too except the top snow hill, which is from MFT. I started with a white panel that I stamped with a few of the snowflake stamps from the set using an old SU ink color called Cool Caribbean. All of the rest of the images are cut from the same white card stock. Using a sponge dauber, I sponged along the area behind the trees and the snow hill to add depth and shadow with the Cool Caribbean ink. The tree layer and the snow hill are raised up with foam tape. The bears and ice rinks are stamped with Memento tuxedo black and colored with Copics, and cut out with the set dies. I used the challenge colors of dark blue, light blue and silver to color the images. The skates are colored in with a silver Sharpie pen.


Here's the inside of the card.

The card base is Cool Caribbean and the layered panel is Pacific Point. I used generous amounts of Wink of Stella on the ice rinks, fishing hole and on the tree border. IRL, it really looks great.

Have a fun Saturday. Thanks for looking in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Beary Happy Holiday set by Lawn Fawn
Paper: X-Press It Blending card stock, SU Pacific Point and Cool Caribbean card stock
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, Copics, Pacific Point
Other: Lawn Fawn dies, Die-namics die, the Big Shot, foam tape, Wink of Stella

Bountiful Blessings

Happy Friday all,

I'm "working" from home today. Gotta love those Friday office days. I do have to attend a two hour training class via the internet in about 30 minutes, but after that, I'm calling it a week. It's rainy here in SoCal and perfect for making more holiday cards.

Today, I have a Thanksgiving/Fall themed card made to fit a few challenges. This week's Stamp, Ink, Paper Challenge is a color challenge using Dark Brown, Yellow and Rust. The current Curtain Call Challenge theme is Acorns. Using some older Taylored Expressions sets, I made my card.

I started by stamping the the images using Memento tuxedo black, for the open stamps, and SU inks in Crushed Curry, Early Expresso, and Cajun Craze, for the solid stamps. The open images are colored with Copics.  After the stamping and coloring was finished, I trimmed the panel down to 3.75 by 5.0 inches and layered it onto an Early Expresso panel dry embossed with the TE Fall Leaves EF. The card base is Crushed Curry card stock. I cut the TE label and stamped the sentiment and squirrel, layered it over some copper twine and popped it up on the front of the card with dimensionals. A few enamel shapes in rust finish it off.

I used the TE Fall Wreath set for the inside.

Thanks for looking in today. Enjoy your Friday afternoon.

Supplies
Stamps: Falling For You and Fall Wreath sets by Taylored Expressions
Paper: SU card stocks: Very Vanilla, Crushed Curry, Early Expresso
Ink: Memento tuxedo black, SU Crushed Curry, Early Expresso, Cajun Craze, Copics
Other: TE Label die, TE Fall Leaves EF, twine, enamel shapes, The Big Shot, dimensionals

Season's Greetings

Hello,

I hope your work week is off to a good start. Mine certainly is! The technical organization of my company, which is the organization that I work for, had our Annual Awards meeting this morning (virtual this year) and I learned for the 2nd year in a row, I was a winner for my job category. Whoo-hoo! It's nice to know that your hard work and willingness to help others is recognized.

Enough of that, on to my card for today. I made this card for Nance's color challenge on The Paper Players blog. This week is white on white. Classy and elegant is what I think of for this color theme. Viewing the cards already in the gallery, the PP ladies are going to have a tough time choosing winners because they are all gorgeous!

Here is the card that I made.

I used some MFT, Mama Elephant and TE dies for the card front. No stamping! ( I just realized that part). The Die-namics tree die was cut from X-Press It Blending white card stock and from SU silver Glimmer paper. The Falling Snow die is Taylored Expressions and the Stitched Scalloped panel underneath is a Mama Elephant die. The sentiment is also Die-namics. I cut out the words twice and glued them together. I then heat embossed them with white EP 3 times for a thick coating to make them stand out. I wanted a little variation in the white shades, so the card base is made with Neenah Solar White 100 lb card stock.

I'm also entering this card in this week's Inspired By All the Little Things challenge. The white, sparkly tree fits their inspiration photo this week.

The inside is stamped and heat embossed with silver EP and I've added a Paper Source snowflake sticker.

I don't know where that air bubble came from, but I'll fix it before sending. The sentiment is from SU Hearts Come Home set.

That's it from me today. Thanks, as always, for stopping by,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Hearts Come Home by Stampin' Up (inside sentiment)
Paper: X-Press It Blending  and Neenah Solar White card stock, SU silver Glimmer paper
Ink: VersaMark
Other: Die-namics Tree and Season's Greetings dies, Mama Elephant All Prettied Up die, Taylored Expressions Falling Snow EF, Silver and white EP, heat tool, the Big Shot, SU silver twine, foam tape, Paper Source snowflake sticker

Merry Christmas

Hello,

It's a gloomy-foggy day at my house today. A little chilly too, although I know some of you will laugh at me for saying that. But really, it's damp, breezy and cold. A perfect day to stay in and work on more holiday cards. Later this afternoon, we have our weekly Little League Fall Ball game to attend. I plan on wearing my Uggs.

I just received my latest Concord and 9th order and I love everything. I couldn't wait to play with the Christmas CheerTurnabout set. So, so fun! I've made several panels experimenting with colors, embossing, and filling in the images with the stamps specifically designed for the purpose. I've used one of those panels to make this card for the Freshly Made Sketch this week.

The images are stamped using black ink and the Misti Stamping Tool. After the four turns, I filled in the images with Distress Oxide inks in greens and pinks using an acrylic block, not the Misti. I trimmed the panel down to size and trimmed off the lower left corner following the sketch. For the corner piece, I dry embossed some X-Press It card stock wth a Taylored Expressions Snowflake EF. Before gluing it to the larger panel, I cut the TE Scalloped Border to use as a divider piece.

The card base and scroll die are SU Regal Rose. I stamped the greeting with VersaMark and heat embossed it with Hero white EP, then popped it up with dimensionals. Finally, since I HAVE to embellish, I used tiny rhinestones, red for the deer's nose, yellow for the tops of the trees and clear in the center of the mittens.

I used the same layout on the inside with my new favorite Christmas sentiment from the SU Hearts Come Home set. The border here is TE Snowflake border die.

Have a great Sunday evening and thanks for looking in,
Colleen

Supplies
Stamps: Christmas Cheer Turnabout set by Concord & 9th, SU Hearts Come Home set (inside)
Paper: X-Press It Blending and SU Regal Rose card stock
Ink: MFT Hybrid Black, Tim Holtz Distress Oxide, and VersaMark inks
Other: Misti Stamping Tool, Taylored Expressions Snowflake Embossing Folder, TE Small Scalloped Border die, TE Snowflake Border die, Christmas Cheer Turnabout die, Hero White EP, the Big Shot, Heat Tool, dimensionals