Silhouettes and Masking

My PTI goodies arrived just in time for me to take part in A Passion For Papertrey's Sensational Silhouettes challenge.  I used a mixture of new and old stamps including stamps from Star of Wonder, Nativity Silhouettes and Mat Stack 2 Collection.  I also attempted some masking (which is something I very rarely try) although I kept it pretty simple - just masking the light beams behind the medallion.  The Mega Mat Stack die is new too and I really like the shape.  I'm also going to enter this over at Simon Says Stamp's Anything goes challenge.    

This picture is for you, Kim S!  You mentioned once that I always only show beautiful pictures of my view so I thought I'd share one from this grey and gloomy day today.  As you can see, the dock was underwater again.  We went across the harbour to our favourite pub for lunch and their outdoor eating area was close to being swamped!  Apparently these tides are due to the moon, earth and sun being in a very particular alignment at the moment.  Pretty fascinating how the world works huh?  

Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (Cream) Stampin' Place, (More Mustard, Not Quite Navy) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Bethlehem & sentiment - Star of Wonder, Beams of light - Nativity Silhouettes,  Medallion - Mat Stack 2 Collection) PTI
Ink:  (VersaMark) Tsukineko, (Early Espresso, More Mustard) Stampin' Up

Embossing Powder:  (Clear) Ranger

Dies:  (Banner, Mega Mat Stack 3) PTI

Hello Card, Goodbye Chicken

***This is my third post for today!  Please scroll down to see what else I've been up to!***

This week at Lawnscaping we're getting texty!  I used stamps from two LF sets for this card - the phone and "Hello" from Just My Type and I spelled out the Blah blah blahs with Harold's ABCs.  I used this fun colour combo from this week's Picture Perfect Creations challenge and I'm also going to enter this card in the Simon Says Stamp Anything Goes challenge.

I kind of felt like I should be making a sympathy card today because last night Atticus caught his first (and hopefully last!) chicken.  There aren't too many places you can go in Bermuda without running into feral chickens or feral cats.  (And yes, they often hang out together!)  This includes our evening walking route.  The boys always make a mighty effort to get ahold of a chicken but usually their leashes are not quite long enough and the chickens are too quick.  Last night however Atti disappeared into the bushes and reappeared with a hen in his mouth!  Of course, once he had it he didn't seem to know what to do with it and dropped it pretty quickly.  It was still alive but not in good shape.  I would have driven it to work to have it euthanised but as Luis pointed out it might not make it that long (30 minutes not including us getting back home to the car) and I didn't want it to suffer any longer than necessary.  Luckily, Luis grew up on a farm and so knew how to take care of it quickly.  I know dogs are hunters and it's in their nature and I wasn't angry at Atti but I still felt pretty bad for the chicken.  And the dogs will be on much shorter leashes this evening!

Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill, (Calypso Coral, Old Olive, Basic Black) Stampin' Up

Stamps:  (Image & sentiment from Just My Type, Letters from Harold's ABCs) Lawn Fawn

Inks:  (VersaMark, VersaFine Onyx Black, Memento Tuxedo Black) Tsukineko
Dies:  (Nesties Standard Circles Large) Spellbinders

Impression Plate:  (Linen) PTI

Copics:  R02, R05

Literary Card

I had to play along with CAS-ual Fridays this week as the challenge was to create a card using black, white and red that is inspired by a book.  Brilliant! The only thing that makes my craft stash look paltry is my book collection!  :)  I have been a lifelong book lover and never go anywhere without one in my bag - just in case!  Anyway the inspiration for my card come from the fabulous kid's book "Where the Red Fern Grows" by Wilson Rawls.  My inspiration is pretty literal as you can see using both stamped and punched ferns and one of the gorgeous sentiments from PTI's Botanical Silhouettes collection.  (I love the mixed fonts).


Hurricane Katia is moving past us today.  Thankfully she's about 330 miles away from us so while it's windy and grey and the south shore beaches are closed, that seems to be the worst we're going to get from her.  Now we just have to keep an eye on Tropical Storm Maria who seems to be on a similar track to Katia.  The last two times we got clobbered really badly (by Emily in 1987 and  by Fabian in 2003) were both in September so it's a tense month for us.  We got really lucky last year when Igor came through.  It was up to a Category 5 at one point but by the time he got to us he'd miraculously downgraded to a Category 1.  Whew!  Let's hope the luck holds out this year...

Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill Basics, (Basic Black & Cherry Cobbler) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Ferns from Turning a New Leaf & sentiment from Botanical Silhouettes) PTI

Ink:   (Cherry Cobbler) Stampin' Up, (Onyx Black) VersaFine

Impression Plate:  (Linen & Canvas) PTI

Ribbon:  Stampin' Up

Punches: Woodware Craft Collection

I Believe In You

I love ColourQ's bold colour palette this week and decided it would be perfect to use with these stamps from Unity's August 2011 Kit of the Month - What I Know.  I think the flower/text stamp is going to get a lot of love - it's awesome!  Since I'm workin' the Unity stamps I'm also going to enter this in this week's All Things Unity challenge - Anything Goes.  

Thanks to those who have expressed concern about me getting battered by Hurricane Irene. However, Bermuda is in the Atlantic about 600 miles off Cape Hatteras so unless Irene does a major right turn we should be just fine.  Hope all of you on the East Coast are battened down and ready!  Be safe.


Supplies Used:
Cardstock: (White) Bazzill Basics, (Pumpkin Pie, Crushed Curry, Old Olive, Island Indigo)  Stampin' Up 
Stamps: (Image & sentiment from What I Know - Aug 2011 KOM) Unity Stamp Co
Ink: (VersaMark) Tsukineko, (Island Indigo) Stampin' Up
Gems:  Doodlebug

My Couch Misses You

Tropical Storm Gert was supposed to pass over us today so I bundled myself into the Craft Cave ready for a lovely stormy day.  And did we get one?  No!  Good ol' Gert passed by to our east and we didn't even get a rain shower out of it - just grey skies and high humidity!  Ah well.  It ended up being a productive day for me.  I started by working on an entry for this week's Play Date Cafe challenge.  I used PTI's On My Couch for the first time.  I've been wanting to play with it for ages and especially love this couch with the fun pattern.  I'm also going to enter this in this week's Wee Memories challenge because even though it has some bling, I still think it has a pretty masculine feel to it.

***ETA:  Just discovered the A Passion for Papertrey challenge site and they are currently running a masculine challenge so I'm going to link this up and hope it's okay that I didn't do it when I posted yesterday.***

Supplies Used:
Cardstock: (White, Yellow) Bazzill, (Not Quite Navy, Early Espresso) Stampin' Up

Stamps: (Couch & pillow from On My Couch, Rug from On My Couch Additions) PTI, (Sentiment from Funky Foliage) WPlus9

Ink: (Early Espresso) Stampin' Up

Gems: Doodlebug

Fighting the Lack of Mojo

I had expected to be posting an entry for this week's CAS-ual Fridays challenge tonight. However, try as I might, I could not get the really cool idea in my head to translate on to paper.  It was SO frustrating!!  I've noticed a lot of people saying their mojo has gone AWOL lately and I think that mine has joined the deserters too.  Everything I tried felt like an epic fail.  I really hate those days...  However, I was determined to come out of the Craft Cave with something at least slightly respectable so I turned my energies to this week's Less Is More challenge to use the colours of your nation's flag.  Since Bermuda's flag is pretty colourful I decided to also enter my card in the latest Wee Memories challenge - to use no less than 4 colours on your card.

So here's the Bermuda flag.  We've got the old flag favourite colours of red, white and blue (we are a British territory after all!) and also some green, yellow, sky blue, beige and brown. Quite a selection!  The picture in the crest depicts the ship Sea Venture running aground on Bermuda's treacherous reefs.  The Sea Venture was on it's way to Jamestown, VA to provide relief to the struggling colony.  Instead, they got caught up in a hurricane and ended up in Bermuda.  Eventually they build 2 new ships and some people carried on to VA while others became the island's first settlers.  But enough of the history lesson - onto the card!

Supplies: CS: Bazzill & misc; Stamp: (image) Unity, (sentiment) Hero Arts; Inks: VersaMark,  Tea Dye Distress Ink; Gems: Doodlebug

With all those colours I wanted to keep things fairly simple so I found this harlequin stripe stamp in All You Need (Unity's August 2010 KOM).  I stamped it in VersaMark on each coloured paper and fussy cut it.  I used the Tea Dye ink on the sentiment and matted the banner on chocolate paper to bring in the beige and brown.  It's hard to go wrong on a card with a rainbow element and finishing this made me feel slightly less useless than I had earlier in the day!  Tomorrow is my long day at work so no carding.  Maybe the break will give my mojo time to find it's way home!

A Smile is a Laugh That Bursts

Good morning, Crafters!  I have a card for two challenges today - Jay Gee's challenge and Picture Perfect Creations.  Lots of purple going on in both and for some reason purple makes me think of laughter so I though this little quote would go nicely with the colours.  I stamped the background with a few other stamps from the set and used embroidery floss to attach the tag.  I wanted to use a ribbon but it turns out I have no cream coloured ribbon.  Pretty scary considering how much ribbon I do have. Might need to rectify that situation...

Supplies:  CS: SU; Stamps: Fiskars; Inks: SU & VersaMark; Embossing Powder: Ranger; Gems: Doodlebug;  Dies: Nesties; Embroidery Floss: DMC

Got a bit of carding in yesterday afternoon during which time we had a fantastic thunderstorm and lots of wonderful rain!  After all those months of nothing we've had quite a bit of the watery stuff these last few weeks and our once charred lawn is now growing faster than Luis can mow it!  :)  It's a beautiful sight! 

Birthday Wishes

After all that fabulous rain the last two days the water trucker turned up today to deliver the water we ordered 2 weeks ago!  Ah well, the tank is now almost full and if we're careful it should last us the rest of the summer.  It's still cloudy outside and I hear some thunder rumbling (Jem is sitting at the door barking at it).  Maybe more rain to come!

Supplies:  CS: SU & PTI; Stamps: Unity & PTI; Ink: VersaMark & SU; Embossing Powder: Ranger: Threat: DMC; Buttons: Craft stash

A simple colour blocked card for the Inkspirations colour challenge this week.  I used another uninked Unity stamp (from KOM Aug 2009) and a sentiment from PTI.  Off to try and get one more card done before Luis gets home!    

Sweet Rain

It's not very often that I create a multi-challenge card but today the stars aligned and I came up with a card for the following:
CAS-ual Fridays Sweet & Treats Challenge
The Play Date Cafe Challenge #90
Less Is More Circles Challenge
Unity Circles, Circles, Circles Challenge

Supplies:  CS: Bazzill, SU; Stamps: Unity; Ink: VersaFine; Die: Nesties Circles; IP: PTI

I love the PDC colours this week especially that yummy creamsicle!  I didn't have any Bazzill cardstock that worked for the eggplant colour so I used SU Elegant Eggplant.  It looked a bit plain next to the other textured colours so I used a PTI impression plate to give it some pizzazz.  The ice cream stamps are from Unity's March 2011 Kit of the Month and the sentiment is from their August 2009 KOM.  The paper piecing on the ice creams was a bit fiddly but I like how it came out.  The thin stripes were inspired by Cristina's Round 1 Gallery Idol entry.


Guess what?  All that dancing finally paid off!  Here's what I woke up to this morning:

Look at that rain!  Whoo hoo!  It lasted about 20 minutes and I could hear the water pouring into the tank - music to my ears!  :)  Then there was another shower a few hours later.  It's still looking pretty grey out there so maybe there will be some more.  The only ones who are not impressed are Jem and Atti as it has cut into their ball playing time.  I promised them an extra long walk later and gave them a treat at lunch time but they're still looking a bit hard done by!  Oooh!  It's raining again!  Whoo hoo!

Carefree Summer

How is it Sunday evening already??  A minute ago I was going to sleep on Friday night and now the weekend is almost over.  Crazy.  Managed to squeeze a few cards in around running errands, working in the yard, a birthday party and a few swims with the hounds.  This one is for two challenges.  I used the colours from this week's Colour Throwdown and the theme from this month's Unity challenge - Sun and Fun.

Supplies:  CS: Bazzill & Stampin' Up; Stamps: Unity; Inks:  VersaFine & Memento; Gems: Basic Grey; Die: PTI; Copics: YG63 & R46

The clouds have been building all day and finally at 6:15pm the heaven's opened... and then closed 3 minutes later.  *Sigh*  What a tease!  It's still looking pretty dark out there so maybe we'll get a bit more rain later.  Apparently rain dances don't work here.  Or it could be that my horrific dancing is confusing the weather gods and they are not quite sure what I'm asking for!  Maybe I need to find a professional rain dancer...

Little Things Make Me Happy

Last month I missed the challenge deadline at Jay Gee's Nook by a few hours.  I was so annoyed at myself but was determined not to miss the next one and am getting my card in nice and early.  I was inspired by the picture in the lower right corner of the photo collage - love that white octopus on the turquoise background.  I also wanted to join in with the challenge at All Things Unity which involves using butterflies.  It seems like almost every Unity set I have has a butterfly but I hadn't inked up this one yet so I thought I'd dust it off and try it out.

Supplies:  CS: PTI; Stamps: Unity & PTI; Inks: VersaMark & VersaMagic Cloud White; Embossing Powder: Ranger Seafoam White; Nestie: Lacey Circles

I was so excited earlier today to see a manta ray swimming around down by our dock!  I haven't seen one in our bay in years and he spent quite a while tootling around down there.  They really are gorgeous creatures and I am so blessed to have an aquarium in my back yard!

It's Krafts-men, Dude!

Squeaking in at the last minute here with an entry for CAS-ual Fridays Krafts-men challenge.  I'm getting a little better at planning my cards out in advance.  Before I would often sit at my desk, pick a challenge and then draw a blank.  Now I'm finding I have ideas simmering in the back of my mind and I'm managing to hang on to them instead of forgetting them altogether.  (Making notes now and then helps too - when I can find the notes that is!)  So here it is, pretty much as I envisioned it, and I'm quite pleased with it!

CS: PTI; Stamps: PTI; Inks: SU Cherry Cobbler, Early Espresso, Soft Suede, Crumb Cake; Punches: EK Success, Marvy Uchida

We continue to be desperate for rain.  We put in an order for 4 more loads of water which we'll get in 7 days if we're lucky.  Today was really frustrating because it was thundering all morning and I could see all these dark clouds and knew that it was pouring with rain out over the water but not on the island.  It's like we have an anti-rain force field around us or something!     

My issue of Stamp It arrived today (along with a few other back issues I've missed) so I'm off to peruse them.  Have a lovely evening!

Inkspirations & Terrapins & Cats!

The challenge at Inkspirations this week is a colour challenge.  I've had extra work shifts this week so haven't had much time in the Craft Cave but managed to whip this up this afternoon.  I've had this Hero Arts stamp for a while but this is the first time I've inked it up.  I love those birdies and I have a few other ideas for them that I'll hopefully get to sooner rather than later!

A few interesting moments at work today.  We have a specialist from Boston who comes down a few times a year to do big orthopaedic surgeries.  (His name is Dr. Nick Trout and if you like animals and you like books then you should check out his book "Tell Me Where It Hurts").  Anyway a lady happened to turn up with a terrapin that had been run over by a car and the bottom half of his shell was split in half.  Since Dr. Trout was here he agreed to repair it.  The vet from the local aquarium and zoo came by to help get the little guy under anaethetic and then Dr. Trout, using pliers, heavy gage wire and Krazy Glue, patched him up!  Apparently it was his first terrapin surgery and despite taking ages to wake up the little guy came through just fine.

I also met a cat named Morris and thought I'd share a picture of him - all 22lbs of him!  There's a lot of Morris to love.  Amanda, the nurse in the picture with him, is barely a hundred pounds and she looks lost behind him!  LOL!  Never a dull moment at Endsmeet Animal Hospital!

Awesome Circles

I love the colours of this week's Play Date Cafe challenge and the cool picture that goes along with it.  This PTI impression plate was the first thing that came to mind when I saw the picture and the card came together pretty quickly after that.  Some Cuttlebug action, some fussy cutting, a few gems and voila!  Awesome.  :)

Despite the heat we took the dogs for a short walk this morning.  There are a ton of feral chickens in Bermuda and we usually pass a few groups (flocks?) of them when we go for our walks.  Normally they take off at the sight of us.  This morning, however, we came across a momma and her chicks.  As usual, Atticus was straining at his leash, wanting to check them out.  This momma didn't run though.  She did not appreciate the looks Atti was giving her babies and before I knew it she was in his face squawking and pecking and slapping him with her wings.  The look on Atti's face was priceless!  He had no idea what to make of this pissed off female and finally jumped behind me for cover!  Satisfied that she'd made her point, momma hustled her babies across the street, tossing a few choice clucks over her shoulder.  I'm guessing Atti got the message though as when we passed a few more chickens later on, he slowed down and graciously let me lead the way!  That's my boy - 90lbs of wimp!    

Plaid Thank You

I'm officially ready for fall.  The heat and humidity have really kicked in - we broke down and left the air conditioner on in the bedroom last night.  It's nice to sleep in but walking out of the room in the morning is like a slap in the face!  Blerg!


For this week's ColourQ challenge I tried to not only incorporate the colours but also the picture so I worked a little plaid into the card.  I thought this Hero Arts flower would be perfect and I tried to make the stripes plaid-esque.  I'm also going to enter this in the Moxie Fab stamping challenge.  

CS: Bazzill & SU; Stamps:  Hero Arts & PTI; Inks: VersaFine & SU;  Gem:  Doodlebug; Other: Glossy Accents

Tomorrow we'll be installing a new sink in our laundry room and then heading down to the dock to cool off.  I think we'll be spending a lot of time floating around the bay this summer!  Hope everyone in the US and Canada are enjoying their long holiday weekends!  

Whale of a Birthday

No challenges today but thought I'd post this card I made for one of the bosses at work.  
He's in his fifties but has more energy and zest for life than anyone I know.  He's a fantastic vet and an avid deep sea fisherman.  He skin dives and spear fishes.  He's made his own shark cage and is involved in a local tiger shark tagging program.  He swims with the tiger sharks and with whale sharks.  And he plays the saxophone.  He's currently off from work as he's on the Isle of Wight representing Bermuda in windsurfing at the Island Games.  Dr. Neil Burnie is an inspiration.  Have a look at this little clip about him.


When I saw this Unity stamp I thought it was a whale's tail.  I've since realised it's a bracket but the whale's tale made me think of Neil so I made this card for the staff to sign for him.  Happy birthday, Neil!

Starry Congrats

Supplies:  CS: Stampin' Up; Stamp: Paper Smooches; Ink: VersaMark; Embossing Powder: Ranger; Impression Plate: PTI; Gems: Doodlebug

I wanted to get in on the ColourQ challenge this week with it's bright, fun colours.  I'm loving my PTI star dies and have been using them a lot.  They make life much easier in the star department.  Remember this card when I was complaining about trying to cut stars to size by hand?  They were pretty rough looking now that I check them out again!  LOL!  I'm going to add this to the Gallery Idol line-up as well.   

The photo inspiration for ColourQ prodded me to finally have my first swim of the year.  I think I'm getting old though.  As kids, my brother and I would race down to the dock and leap right off the end of it into the water.  We'd then tease my mom mercilessly as she eased her way down the steps into the water, stopping on each step for a moment to "acclimate". Why not just jump in and get the initial shock over with quickly?  Well, I am now officially an "Acclimator".  I caught myself going in one step at a time today.  I was horrified although not horrified enough to just leap in - maybe when it's a bit warmer.  Once we were all in (Luis, dogs and I ) we paddled around for a good hour or so.  Luis and the dogs are now crashed out on the sofa and I think I may go join them...  Have a great evening! 

Bright and Bold Birthday

We had a public holiday today for National Heroes Day.  Unfortunately it was a yucky day. The sky has been dark and threatening all day but instead of rain it's just been disgustingly humid.  We took the hounds for a long walk this morning and all four of us came back looking decidedly wilted.  After that we broke down and turned on the air con and watched a movie ("Easy A" - pretty good I thought).  Later on we ventured back out.  Luis puttered around and did a few odds and ends while I escaped to the Craft Cave to put together a card for this week's Play Date Cafe challenge.

Supplies:  CS: Bazzill Basics; Stamps: Hero Arts & PTI; Inks: SU, VersaFine, VersaMark; Punches: McGill Creativity & Marvy Uchida

Love the bold and bright colours this week!  I pulled out a Hero Arts flower stamp that I hadn't used yet.  It's calling out to be coloured in but for this challenge I just wanted to use the outline of it in the challenge colours.  Some PTI polka dots in VersaMark to jazz up the colour panels, a bit of bling and voila!  A cheery birthday card.  :)
Hope you all have a lovely evening.  Tomorrow I have to work in the morning and then have the joy of going to the dentist.  Blerg!  How did I get so lucky!  :S  

Goodnight, Sunshine