12 Kits of Ocassions with the Gingham Girl (Kelly)

Wow, I can't believe how long it's been since I made a card let alone had time to do this.  Boy, did I miss it, but Kelly (Gingham Girl) gave me a packet of her "Hello" kit.  Can't you just hear that old Seinfeld episode with "Helloooooo" LOL?  But this is truly an awesome kit!  All the great bright and happy papers, sunshine, embellishment dots, and the stamped images.  It's been such a cold winter here in Western New York that all of the goodies had me thinking that Spring would be right around the corner. 

Of course, I don't want to wish the time away as my first grandson just arrived on January 11, 2015 and I hope to spend a bit of time with him before he's all grown up!  I can't resist so here's a picture of the little boy Colton...gotta brag a bit.  His daddy is hoping he will be a hockey player too!


Aren't those crocheted skate and uniform awesome!  Ok enough bragging and on to what you really came to look at.

For my first card I wanted to try something clean and simple (not sure that it's that clean) and had in my mind those lovely balloons carrying up the "Hello" into the sky.   The Lawn Fawn collection(s) Kelly used are so amazing.  Maybe to be clean I should have left off the paper background that I cut from the Mama Elephant Peek a Frame creative cuts.  I just love that die set.  The balloons were attached to the string which then got attached to "Hello" so it could be lifted into the sky!  MFT Mixables sheer glitter glaze was used to give the balloons some glam.

I have so badly wanted to use the Arctic Penguin Stamps from Mama Elephant and so I did.  I tried to again go with a little simple design.  I stamped the penguin in MFT Black Licorice Ink and colored him in with some cool gray copic markers.  I die cut some squares thinking I would have the penguin coming out from the open spots but realized I really liked him and the gorgeous flowers Kelly provided on the solid squares and those clear Pretty Pink Posh sequins are just to die for.  Just a simple hello from the North Pole.

 

Love you Latte had to be included in this mix and I had so wanted to try my hand at another shaker card.  It's so hard to keep the acetate clear when your house is full of dogs and their hair!  Oh well, I think it's my second favorite next to the penguin.  I'm just so in love with those Pretty Pink Posh sequins!

Last but not least I couldn't resist using the sunshine, bottom bubble talk, and the precious birds.  I also used my stitched landscape dies to cut out the grass.  I think this one is the most springy of them all! 

Have you ever been afraid that mixing patterns and paper would be so awful looking?  Well, that's me.  I see so many people doing that and their designs are gorgeous.  So, my new New Years Resolution is to become more daring with mixing different papers and colors!

Hope you had fun with the 12 Kits of Occasions.  Thanks so much to Kelly for her generous kit!!!  Be sure to check out all of the Hello cards from the 12 Kit members here.  You can always head over to Facebook and  Pinterest for past kit ideas, TOO!

12 Kits of Ocassions

March 12 Kits of Occasions and I am thrilled to be a guest designer again!

Kelly Schirmer is the hostess for the month of March and asked if I would like to join in again for Spring Time fun.  Well, it's definitely anything but Spring in my neck of the woods but anything to help get the winter blues out of the system! I am ready for some sunny days with no snow and rain!  Come on Spring!

There were so many goodies in this kit and I couldn't figure out what I wanted to start with.  The bunny from L'ill Buddies by Waltzingmouse Stamps stole my eye so I hopped on to it (lol)!.  I colored the bunny with some gray copic markers and put some loopy yarn on for the tail.  I used Papertrey ink's in the meadow dies to cut out the grass in leaf green and striped leaf green.  Also used MFT's cloud die to cut out the Easter egg hunt saying.  Easter always reminds me of hunting for Easter eggs and finding the goodies hidden inside.  I also love Robin's Eggs so decided to splatter the sky on the Aqua Mist cardstock with some white, black, and navy acrylic paint.  Added some glitter around the cloud and the eggs. Hope you find some hidden eggs in your back yard too!

I was searching through Pintrest for some Spring inspiration and came across this.  Hmmm....wouldn't this be cute?  Well, I started it and ended up messing up the squiggly lines and the small hearts and butterflies.  So, rather than trashing it as a whole, I decided to fussy cut around it and added some of the houndstooth paper, pink bakers twine and the jillybean soup wooden etched button.  This is probably one of my favorites and I'll have to try again.  Somehow my images in my mind just don't happen on the paper when I get down to it.  

 I really wanted to use the Horizontal Striped Card Face and had an image of Navy and Red in my mind.  I was looking through the stash and found some red polka dot paper and loved how it looked through the slats.  I wanted to try something simple and without a ton of embellishments (I don't know when to stop) and used the Papertrey Ink Butterfly die, the MFT rectangle stax die to cut out the sentiment.  I decided that it still needed a little umph so I cut out some circles on navy paper from the Papertrey Ink movers and shakers die and used glossy accents all over them to give them some dimension.   Hmmm, maybe too much red,    

For my last card, I used the cream cardstock, antique linen distress ink, Waltzingmouse Stamps Harlequin border, and the embellished elements from Take Three Spring by Papertrey ink.  As I was in the middle of the Clean and Simple 3 Card Class I was trying my hand at lots of white card space and a clean look.  I think it turned out fairly well if I say so myself.

Take a look at all of the other great designs with this kit on the 12 Kits of Occasion blog here. There is also a complete list of supplies that were included in Kelly's kit.  Kelly, included so many great items that I'm going to keep on making Spring cards until the first day it hits 70 (Seriously, I'm hoping it's within the next week or two as I'll run out of supplies by then).

Happy Spring!!!!

Happy Anniversary and new technique

I recently signed up for Clean and Simple Online Card Class 3.  One of the first lessons they had was creating a Faux layered diecut to make a one layer card.  Oh, that's the one I had to try and it's really the only one out of 11 lessons that I've been able to accomplish.  Ok so it's not really layered but it is pretty cool how they lined up so easily LOL.

When I saw Papertrey Inks challenge for the month it was the perfect opportunity to create something using this technique with bright cardstock and some shiny accents.


It's also my parent's 49th wedding anniversary so perfect time to also give them a homemade treat from their favorite (only) daughter.

The chevron stripes and sentiment are from MFT Stamps but the paper is all Papertrey ink.  I really love their cardstock.  I used the chevron die and cut strips of individual colors and adhered them to some plain copy paper and pieced them into the card front.  I used another piece of cardstock on the inside of the card to hide the messy gluing I had done.  No one will notice now...

I'm so looking forward to trying the other techniques this class had to offer.  Also hoping these bright colors help to hurry Spring along.  It's still so cold here in Western NY.

February Challenge with the Challenge Chicks

Well, I didn't have my card done in time for Valentines day, but at least with the sentiment it can be used any time as a special message.  I saw this deer on Cathy Weber's blog and fell in love with the deer.  It's from Fresh Squeezed stamps.  So many men in the family are avid hunters and I could just picture another deer head hanging on the living room walls. Good thing I'm a good sport lol.

Hope the man in my life likes this from his trophy wife!!

The 12 Kits of Occassions

Kelly's Kreative Kit----

 

Take a look at this kit.  Isn't it just the greatest?  I was asked to be a guest with the 12 Kits of Occassions member Kelly Schirmer.   It is so exciting and such an honor to be a part of this month's kit.  Kelly really outdid herself with all of the color coordinating papers, ribbon, embellishments, and all of the chalkboard sentiments.  I fell in love with them and ended up using most of those in my images.



Of course many of these goodies came in red gingham bags which were so cute.  I saved mine and want to incorporate it into something else.

I couldn't decide where to start because I wanted to use every piece of this kit.  So, first I created a card using the Scotty dog image.  He became something really fun to use and I decided to glitz him up a bit by adding some red crystal embellishments as his collar.  I then fussy cut him out and popped him on a piece of ribbon and look at the matching paper.   The green sweater for him was too cute, love the argyle.  The sentiment was white embossed on black cardstock (like a chalkboard).

So, then I decided I wanted to do something clean and simple, which is never as easy as it looks.  Well I took one look at the white embossed christmas tree on black cardstock and decided black and white was the way to go!  So I layered black and white all the way.  I loved the way it looked and couldn't justify putting a sentiment on the front of the card so added one to the inside of the card.  I received some retro stamps free with my latest cardmaking and papercrafts magazine and loved the sentiment.  The first layer of white paper was embossed with Snowflakes.  Yay!

 

 

 

Now the next one was really easy as Kelly included lots of things to make tags.  The Spellbinders Opera Tag was diecut and stamped with a sentiment from Waltzingmouse stamps (sorry I don't know which set it's from).  There was also a gift card pocket from Memory Box and I tied the tag onto the pocket with red ribbon and viola!  A gift card holder and you can slide the tag front over to easily get out the wonderful gift card.  The one I have in there is from our local grocery store Wegman's which is a huge travel attraction, if you come to Western NY you'll have to check it out.  I can never walk out of there without grabbing things I never intended to.

 

 

 

 

Hang in there with me, I'm almost done. I really had to use this sentiment as it's one of my favorite Christmas Songs.  I can only ever remember the one line, but when I hear it, up goes the volume.  Drives my family crazy. 

 

Since it was so cold here today and I was outside for so long, I really wanted to warm up.   And the sentiment was exactly what I said when I got home. This stretchy snowflake sock was just what I was looking for to dress up this bottle and to add this cute little gift tag to it.  I used the square stax dies from My favorite things and added a snowflake to the corner.  Easy Peasy.

 

Last and not least I really, really, really, wanted to use the jingle bells that Kelly had packed into the kit.  Whenever someone opens this card, they'll jingle all the way!

 

 

 

The snowman is from Tremendous Treats by Paper Trey Ink and the chalkboard frame is from My Favorite Things Stamps. I also used a candy button and popped up the snowman and jingle sentiment with foam tape.  The snowman was colored with Copics.  I just completed a class and have been practicing, practicing, practicing.  I love using a white gel pen to make the dots on the scarf and hat.

 

I have so many things left, that I can't wait to use from Kelly's kit. She is hosting a prize giveaway this month! Leave a comment on the 12 Kits of Occasions blog Here for your chance to win the Echo Park 6 x 6 Tis The Season Paper Pad !    You have until December 5th at 11:59 P.M.  to leave your comment. You will also see the blog links for all of the kit team members, as well as a supply list for Kelly's kit.

 

Thanks so much to Kelly for asking me to be her guest with this lovely kit! Don't forget to check out their Pinterest Board HERE and the Facebook page HERE for more 12 Kits inspiration!

 

Hope you enjoyed visiting today and thanks for stopping by.  

 

 



Wow, it's October already!

Hi everyone.  Can you believe it's only two more months until the holidays?  It seems like summer was never here, of course in Western NY, it's usually short lived anyway, It's been busy the last couple of months as I had my son's wedding at the end of September.  Now that the wedding went off without a hitch, it's time to get back to some crafting.

Not sure what I was thinking when I offered to host a month for the Christmas Card Challenge as I'm quite a newby at this but what does it hurt.  All for fun and having lots of cards to send out in December will make it all worthwhile.

So here's what I came up with for a challenge this month.  Let's go for a Whimsical Card.  When I thought of whimsical, the first thing I thought of was a Snowman on a beach with palm trees and a surf board.  Coming from a snowy state a beachy holiday is not anything I see.

Join me in the challenge here and have fun with it. I can't wait to see how whimsical and silly we can all be this month!

Waltzingmouse Pajama Party

Have a quick second to get this card uploaded before I have to leave. Needless to say it wasn't a pajama party for me as I didn't stay up all night.

However, I love the new rope and nautical sets that Waltzingmouse released last month and had purchased one and borrowed another. 

I went for a framed masterpiece and used the rope for the frame border.  Plus it's nautical so I will use it for two of the challenges.