Back To Regularly Scheduled Programming!

After my foray into the world of layered patterned paper yesterday we're back with a more Jen-esque CAS card today.  :)  I've used a much more manageable (for me) amount of PP here for a bit of paper piecing on my Unity lamp and some shiny gold paper behind it. These are papers I've had since 2007 (remember those HOTP Sarapapers??) so it's time they got some use I think!  I'm playing along with Unity's Friends With Flair and also the paper piecing challenge at Less Is More.  


The sky is looking a bit dark outside at the moment and I'm hoping it will rain a bit and take away some of this oppressive humidity.  All I want to do right now is sit under the ac unit with a pint of ice cream!  Seems to be the only sensible way to handle this weather really...


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill
Patterned Papers:  (Fresh Citrus Sarapapers) HOTP
Stamps:  (Lamp & sentiment from Shine On!) Unity
Ink: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko
Die:  (Nesties Peony) Spellbinders
Gems:  (Bumblebee assortment) Doodlebug

Teresa Collins Papers

I am in awe of those crafters who are able to put patterned papers together with such ease because it's always a struggle for me even when using coordinating sets.  I recently won two new Teresa Collins collections though and I didn't want to condemn them to the dusty  shelf where my patterned papers go to die!  I figured this sketch from The Paper Players was a good place to start trying to use them.  It has a pretty straightforward layout and I managed to use 3 different PPs, a flower die cut and a brad!  Whoop whoop!  It also has about 5 layers so I'm also going to enter it at the Young Crafters Unite challenge to use many layers.  


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Early Espresso) Stampin' Up
Patterned Papers:  (Fabrications: Canvas collection)  Teresa Collins
Stamp:  (Sentiment from Simple Salutation) Market Street Stamps
Ink: (Early Espresso) Stampin' Up
Diecut & Brad:  (Fabrications: Canvas collection)  Teresa Collins

You Nailed It!

A curse seems to have befallen all the males in my household!  Jem is, of course, still hobbling around on his blown out knee.  Atticus appeared yesterday morning hopping along carrying his front paw where he has what appears to be rather a small but clearly very painful cut.  And finally Luis has walking pneumonia!  Hopefully the bad luck with stick to those with Y chromosomes and in the meantime, since all the boys had to rest, I had a lovely afternoon in the Craft Cave!  


I've had the idea for this sentiment paired with this image for awhile and have finally gotten around to getting it onto paper.  Whenever I have to create a computer generated sentiment I waffle around for ages because the Craft Cave is in my mom's apartment and the computer and printer are in mine so there ends up being a lot of running back and forth.  I used the colours from this week's Dynamic Duos challenge and the layout was CASEd from this card by Debby.   


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Always Artichoke, River Rock) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Hammer & nails from My Guy) Paper Smooches, (Sentiment from Think Big Favourites #5) PTI
Ink: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko, (Always Artichoke) Stampin' Up
Impression Plate:  (Woodgrain) PTI
Die:  (Half & Half) PTI

More Baby Thanks

Couldn't resist adding another one of the cards I made for my friend to hand out to her pediatrician and the nurses from the maternity ward.  I'm going to enter it in the Pretty In Pink challenge at CAS-ual Fridays.  I used some old Doodlebug papers with these PTI stamps.  I actually have the matching dies but my stamping onto the diecuts is never quite straight and it drives me mad!  In the end I just fussy cut them which made me a lot happier.  :)


Supplies Used:

Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Melon Mambo) Stampin' Up

Patterned Paper:  (Pretty Pink Grid, Candy Stripe, Loopy Love Stripes, Bubblegum Plaid) Doodlebug

Stamp:  (Clothes from Hang Ups) PTI, (Sentiment from Pretty Phrases) Paper Smooches
Ink: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko

Punch:  (Corner punch) Marvy Uchida

Grateful Giraffe

CAS-ual Fridays is celebrating National Pink Day this week which is perfect as my friend wants some thank you cards for her pediatrician and the nurses in the maternity ward at the hospital.  She has been to Kenya several times and loves anything with giraffes and elephants so the PTI Sweet Baby dies are coming in handy.  I made a few different cards for her but this one is my favourite as I love those pink polka dots!   


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill
Patterned Paper:  (Quite Contrary collection) My Mind's Eye
Stamp:  (Sentiment from Chit Chat) Paper Smooches
Ink: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko
Die:  (Sweet Baby) PTI
Gems:  (Beetle Black assortment) Doodlebug

My One And Only

Lawnscaping is also hosting a colour splash challenge this week but this time I used red as my splash of colour.  I was lucky enough to win the entire set of June new releases from Lawn Fawn and they arrived on Friday - just in time to play with over the weekend!  Actually Friday provided quite a haul as I also received the Teresa Collins papers I won from Moxie Fab and the latest Unity Kit of the Month.  It was like Christmas!  For this card I broke open the Belinda's Borders stamps although it was the last set I expected to play with.  I was all ready to go to town with the Critters Down Under but this idea popped into my head so off I went with it.  The Critters will have to wait for now...


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Real Red, Basic Black) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Hearts from Belinda's Borders) Lawn Fawn
Inks: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko
Punches:  (2" & 2 1/2" circles) Marvy Uchida
Font:  (Traveling Typewrite) Dafont.com

Blue Car

It's Colour Splash time over at the Play Date Cafe and this time the splash colour is blue.  I pulled out my Paper Smooches stamps and some blue embossing powder that I've never used before.  It melted a lot brighter than I expected but I really like it.  I also like the fact that there was no EP drama today.  Whoop whoop!  Finally, I used a piece of my lone roll of washi tape which I won from Amy a while back.  More washi tape is definitely on my wish list!


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Basic Black) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Car from My guy, Fire from Spiffy Scooters, Sentiment from Perpetual Bliss) Paper Smooches
Inks: (VersaMark) Tsukineko
Embossing Powder:  (Blue Glass & Seafoam White) Ranger
Smash Tape:  (Black Dots) K & Co

Sorry For Being Prickly...

**This is my second post for today!  For my Paper Smooches Sparks post please scroll down or click here!**

I love punny cards and this one made me giggle while I was making it.  :)  I used the colours from the Market Street Stamps Paint the Town Challenge and the cactus from Travelscapes.  The cactus is my favourite image from that set - so cute!


It was another humid, grey day here today so I holed up in the Craft Cave again while Luis braved the elements and cut the lawn.  Thanks to the rain we had last week (yay!) it was looking a little wild out in the yard but now it looks lovely and I love that fresh mowed grass smell!


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (Textured white) Bazzill, (Smooth white) Pacon, (Real Red, More Mustard, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Cactus from Travelscapes, Cane background) Market Street Stamps
Inks: (VersaMark, VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko
Punches:  (2" & 2 1/2" circles) Marvy Uchida

Smoochy Boob Tube

This week at Paper Smooches Sparks is a colour challenge.  This one definitely had me scratching my head for a while yesterday but I finally pulled out the Boob Tubes set and came up with a little love card.  I think you could maybe get away with this for a guy even with the lavender.  What do you think?  I'm now going in search of a hamburger having just read Kim's post.  Don't look if you're hungry!!






Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (Off-white) Pacon, (Cherry Cobbler, More Mustard, Wisteria Wonder) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (TV & sentiment from Boob Tubes, Heart from Vegtastic) Paper Smooches
Inks: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko
Impression Plate:  (Sunshine) PTI
Die:  (Nesties Standard Circles Large) Spellbinders

Confetti Wishes

Aside from a surprise visit from my friend and her new baby, I spent most of today in the Craft Cave.  How blissful! Especially as the humidity is really kicking in outside and it's been rather grey all day.  Blah!  A good day for hiding out.  


I decided to play along with the latest ColourQ challenge.  I was initially inspired by the graphic design on the bag but as seems to be the usual case these days I ended up going in a totally different direction.  I made a flower using one of the petals (butterfly wings?) from PTI's Modern Basics and dressed up the PTI sentiment with some matching confetti.  This was a tricky colour palette as 3 of the colours are retired.  Crushed Curry is the only one of the three I have so I had to substitute the Soft Sky and Cameo Coral.  Why does SU retire colours anyway?  Aside from it being a good way to get AR/OC people like me to buy up enough product to last me a lifetime!

Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White, coral) Bazzill, (Light blue) Pacon, (Island Indigo, Crushed Curry) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Petal from Modern Basics, Sentiment from Think Big Favourites #7) PTI
Inks: (VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko, (Island Indigo) Stampin' Up

Punches:  (1/2" circle punch) Marvy Uchida, (5/16" & 1/8" hole punches) McGill

Celebration

Hi there!  Popping in with a red, white and blue celebration card for the colour challenge at Just Us Girls.  I love this skyline stamp from Paper Smooches and it looks great embossed.  And yes, there was an embossing powder incident this time.  Tip of the Day:  Put the lid on your embossing powder BEFORE you blow the excess powder off of your card!  *Sigh*  One day, drama-free embossing sessions will become the norm!  


Thank you so much for all your good wishes for Jem.  He's being a little trouper and enjoying his private swimming sessions with Luis every evening while I walk Atticus.  He's finding ways to entertain himself too.  I caught him lolling around on his bed throwing his toy in the air and catching it.  He's also taken to grabbing Atticus by the hock whenever he walks by Jem's bed in a desperate bid to start some wrestling!  :)  My funny boy...


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Night of Navy) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Skyline and fireworks from Metropolis, Sentiment from Pretty Phrases) Paper Smooches
Inks: (VersaMark) Tsukineko, (Riding Hood Red) Stampin' Up

Embossing Powder:  (Seafoam White) Ranger

Punch:  (Corner punch) Marvy Uchida
Gems:  (Ladybug assortments) Doodlebug

Here's To A New Week!

Boy am I glad that it's a new week.  Last week was a bit of a nightmare.  Along with having two migraines, Jem completely blew out his knee.  There's no one on the island to fix it and the specialist who comes in from Boston a few times a year to do those sort of surgeries isn't due to come back until August or September so poor Jem will be running around on 3 legs until then.  We're trying to keep him as quiet as possible but he's bored silly and looks so depressed that we won't play ball with him or take him for walks.  Poor guy!


Between dealing with Jem and taking care of my head I haven't been in the Craft Cave or on the computer since Wednesday.  Today I finally feel better and am playing a bit of catch up. I gave the Craft Cave a good tidy and made a card for two challenges.  I was inspired by the layout and the flower on this card by Joy over at CASE Study and I used the colours from Dynamic Duos.  I also managed to use the Dessert Option from DD and used a ribbon threader punch and wove some ribbon through the white card.  Whoop whoop for using ribbon! Must dash but hopefully I'll be around a lot more this week.  :)


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Melon Mambo, Basic Black) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Flower & leaves from In Bloom) PTI, (Sentiment from CL340) Hero Arts
Inks: (VersaFine Tuxedo Black) Tsukineko, (Melon Mambo) Stampin' Up

Die:  (In Bloom collection) PTIPunches:  (Corner punch) Marvy Uchida, (Ribbon Threader) Martha Stewart
Gems:  (Beetle Black assortments) Doodlebug
Ribbon:  Hot Off the Press

Crown Jewels

Good morning all!!  After losing most of yesterday to a killer migraine I am so happy to be feeling back to normal.  Good thing too as I've got a busy day ahead.  To start it off I've got a card for the Simon Says Stamp challenge to use crowns and/or gems in celebration of the Diamond Jubilee.  I love this Teresa Collins crown stamp that I got from Amy and it goes perfectly with this Unity sentiment.  After trying a few different backgrounds I finally settled on this one from Market Street Stamps.  Added a few gems and voila!  A card fit for a Queen!  :)  Hope you all have a lovely headache free day!  


Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (So Saffron, Perfect Plum) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Here Comes the Sun background stamp) Market Street Stamps, (Crown from Freestyle) Teresa Collins,  (Sentiment from May '12 KOM - Love In An Instant) Untiy
Inks: (VersaMark, VersaFine Tuxedo Black) Tsukineko
Dies:  (Bookmark) PTI, (Nesties Labels 4) Spellbinders
Gems:  (Bumblebee & Lavender assortments) Doodlebug