Holiday Cards And More - Around The World

I was super excited to discover that a card of mine was featured on the Paper Crafts Connection blog yesterday!  (Thanks for the heads up Jocelyn and JJ)  The card appears in Holiday Cards and More Vol. 7 and yesterday PC Connection was highlighting all the international designers who appear in the issue.  One of the best parts about joining the crafty blogosphere is all the amazing people I've gotten to know from around the world.  It's pretty incredible what some cardstock and the internet can do huh?

And speaking of amazing people I wanted to share some RAK I've received in the last few months.

After telling Emily how much I loved this card she sent it to me for my birthday.  How awesome is that bold yellow card base and those bright and happy banners?

Ages ago I admired some cricket stamps that Christine used on some cards and she kindly offered to stamp some images and send them to me.  This is the gorgeous card they came with.  Love the warm colours and that sweet little Hello tag!

I was touched to receive this sympathy card from Lynn after the loss of Jem.  I always admire Lynn's layered stamping and this gorgeous card is no exception.

After Jem I was pretty much just hiding in the Craft Cave and trying to distract myself from my grief.  Lindsey sent me this perfect support card which put a much needed smile on my face.

Thanks for all the crafty love, ladies!  You sure know how to make a girl's day!

Twinkle Twinkle

I haven't played with Unity's Friends With Flair in ages so I'm excited to join in this week and especially excited to be using such a new stamp.  I find that my latest purchases tend to sit for ages before I ink them up which is really silly so I've used the star stamp from April's KOM.  It's such a sweet image and could be used for so many occasions but my first thought was for a baby card.  Handy since I needed one for a baby shower!  ;)  I've matched it up with one of my favourite Hero Arts background stamps and a Paper Smooches sentiment.  And this is another one for Simon Says Stamp's Anything Goes Challenge!  

How cute is this little sheep?  I admired one that the wonderful Kirsty of 365 Days of Pinterest Creations gave away a while back and she very kindly sent me my own!  Also included were candies for Luis and I, treats for the hounds and some beautiful chopsticks that Kirsty's lovely mum brought back from her travels to visit Kirsty's sister.  If you've never checked out Kirsty's blog then you must go now!  Not only does she share a fabulous new recipe/craft/home decor/etc idea every day but her brilliant, funny family is also fully involved in the Pinterest mania.  There's never a dull moment in the Colquhoun household!  :)  
Cardstock:  (White) Handy Hippo, (Rustic White) PTI, (Yellow) Bazzill, (Night of Navy) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Stars from April '12 KOM - Follow Your Own) Unity, (Background) Hero Arts, (Sentiment from A Little Lovin) Paper Smooches
Inks: (VersaMark, VersaFine Onyx Black) Tsukineko
Embossing Powder:  (Clear, Seafoam White) Ranger
Dies:  (Die-namics Stacking Stars) My Favourite Things
Copic:  Y17
Gems:  (Bumblebee Assortment) Doodlebug

Best. RAK. Ever.

You may remember a couple of months ago that CAS-ual Fridays challenged us to make cards inspired by movies.  In this post I talked about how my two favourite movies are "The Silence of the Lambs" and "Love Actually" and how "Silence" was perhaps not so inspirational in the card department.  The fabulous Jessi of OneCraftyMama apparently shares my love of this movie and said she wanted to make a "Lotion in the basket" card.  I told her if she made one she would be my favouritest person in the whole world.  Well, she did and now it's official who my favouritest person is.  Check out this brilliant and hilarious creation!

How awesome is this??  The fabulous weaving on the basket, the extra long twine for lowering it into the well, the wonky letters (perfect for an extremely wonky Buffalo Bill) and most of all the skin vest which you have to feel to believe.  And not only did Jessi slave over this amazing card but she also sent me a ton of pearls (because I lamented having none) and some of her fabulous crochet mats.  Our little blogging community continues to amaze me.  I am always stunned by the caring and generosity of everyone out there.  Erin of Homemade Cards by Erin is another example of how generous bloggie friends are.  She saw a comment I posted on someone else's blog about needing to get my hands on some SRM stickers.  So what did she do?  She sent me some.  Just because.  I just want to say thank you to all of you wonderful ladies out there who I am so grateful to have had the chance to get to know.  I am so thankful that some cardstock, glue and computer magic has brought you all into my life!  Have a wonderful day! 

I'm A Lucky Girl

I haven't played along with the Lawnscaping Challenge in a while and promised myself I'd tackle their latest.  And, of course, it turned out to be a sketch challenge.  *Sigh*  They really want to challenge me don't they?  I had to keep my promise though and to help myself out I used the colours from The Paper Players (another challenge I've been neglecting).  I used stamps from my trusty Just A Note set.  (It's one of two LF image sets that I have.  All the rest are sentiment sets.  Must invest in some new LF stamps... )


Actually, I shouldn't have to invest in much of anything anytime soon after this week's bounty.  I have been a very lucky girl as it's been like Christmas at the post office!  Lots of goodies and wonderful cards:

My good friend Jenny from Crafting in the Country sent me the most awesome word bubble dies!  She also included a selection of die cut shapes for me to play with and, of course, there was a fabulous card.  :)  I love bird images and even though I have plenty of Lawn Fawn alphabet sets I still want the one Jenny used here!

Another adorable birdie and a rockin' chevron card!  I was lucky enough to win a whopper of a prize at Flashback Friday recently.  The challenge is the brainchild of the fabulous Amy Tsuruta and as well as the bounty of goodies I also get to be the latest guest designer - so get over there and check it out if you haven't already!

I also won goodies from Vanessa Menhorn as part of a recent Paper Crafts blog hop and they turned up as well.  How fun is this spiral card?  And I love the bold, yellow cardstock.

And last but not least, this is actually a card I made that was published in the February issue of Cards.  Because it used a Hero Arts background stamp I got a publication incentive from them and those free stamps also arrived this week!


Given all of that I probably won't win anything else for another year or so but I'll have plenty to work with in the meantime!

Lawnscaping Card

Cardstock:  (Crumb Cake, Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party, Wisteria Wonder) SU

Stamps:  (Phone & sentiment from Just My Type) Lawn Fawn, (Envelope pattern) Hero Arts

Inks:  (VersaMark) Tsukineko, (Pool Party) SU

Embossing Powder:  (Seafoam White) Ranger

Gems:  Doodlebug

Punch:  (Corner punch) Marvy Uchida

Very Belated RAKs

I spent a lot of time at the beginning of the month merrily scrolling through people's Christmas RAKs and thinking about how I must post mine.  But have I done it yet?  No. Why? Because I'm a bit useless really and not a very good bloggie friend!!  I was at the point where I wondered if posting them now would be insulting but I decided I was going to post them anyway so everyone else can enjoy them too.

The first Christmas card I received was from Emily of Art From The Heart.  I love the non-traditional colours of this card and the subtle touches of colour on the leaves.  So sweet! (Excuse the holes in the corners of the card.  I pin them to the board above my desk in the Craft Cave so I always have inspiration on hand.)

Next up are more fabulous non-traditional colours from Amy of Tsuruta Designs.  Her stitching always blows me away as well as her bold and bright style.

I won some blog candy from Lindsey at Bashful Blogging and she sent it along with this sweet little mini card.  How cute is that polka dotted penguin??

This card came with some stamps that I bought from Amy (again of Tsuruta Designs). She's trying to dehoard so I thought I'd be a pal and take a few items off her hands!  :) More lovely stitching and polka dots on the house!  Love me some polka dots!

Hope you enjoyed seeing these fabulous cards and if you haven't checked out any of these ladies' blogs then you must take a minute and do so.  That's an order!  :)

Autumn Beauty & RAK

I really don't know what possesses me to decide to fussy cut and paper piece such tiny designs but here I've done it again!  I cut lots of little leaves, popped them up on Pop Dots and added Glossy Accents to them.  The colours I used are from this week's ColourQ challenge and I'm also going to enter this over at Unity's monthly challenge (Autumn Harvest), Picture Perfect Creations (Fall/Halloween Specialty Challenge) and Create's Fall challenge.  


I had a lovely surprise arrive in the mail yesterday.  Awhile back Amy Tsuruta had asked for some crafty storage ideas and I linked her up to my Craft Cave pictures.  As a thank you she sent out a little care package with stamps, notepaper, buttons and, of course, a fabulous card!  I was so excited although I'm not happy with Bermuda Customs.  They opened the package to "inspect" it and clearly just crammed everything back in and bent the card.  :( Typical.  I still love it though - especially the delicate stitching! 

 I also realised that I never posted a picture of the fabulous card Lynn Mangan sent when I won some blog candy from her.  Love all the layers and PTI goodness!  

  

Supplies Used:
Cardstock:  (White) Bazzill Basics, (Lucky Limeade, Pumpkin Pie, Rich Razzleberry) Stampin' Up
Stamps:  (Image from Beauty Tree Itty Bitty, sentiment from August 2010 KOM - All You Need) Unity Stamp Co
Ink:  (Early Espresso, Rich Razzleberry) Stampin' Up

Dies:  (Nestabilities Labels Eleven) Spellbinders

Other:  (Glossy Accents) Ranger

Back on the Rock

Hello hello, Bloggie Friends!  I've been back on the rock for about a week now and am only just getting back into carding.  Work has been a little nuts this week as a new computer system was installed last weekend so we're all scrambling to get the hang of it and work out all the kinks.  On the home front, there's something about coming back from a trip that always sets me on a bit of a cleaning frenzy so the apartment has been getting a top to bottom scrub down and clear out.  Only the kitchen left to complete...


Our trip to Toronto went well and I had a better time than I expected given my dislike of dresses and weddings!  LOL!  The wedding and reception were events to behold. Portuguese bride + Italian groom = 1 huge party and enough food to put a Carnival cruise to shame!  :)  Luis got to catch up with family he hadn't seen in ages which he really enjoyed and I got to meet those I hadn't on met on the last trip.  


The best part of the trip was last Friday which was my birthday.  Luis and I went into Toronto and spent the morning puttering around and shopping.  Then later in the day we went to meet Emily Leiphart!  It was so cool to finally meet in person after becoming blog buddies.  Emily presented me with this gorgeous card using the Twinery's new colours.

She also gave me a sample pack of Twinery twine as I only have a few strands of it (that, ironically, I won on Emily's blog awhile back) so now I have some of each colour!  So sweet of her.  We hung out with Emily and her adorable son for a while.  Emily and I chattered away about cards and blogs and such while I poked around in her craft stash and we played trains with the little guy.  Once hubby came home we all headed out for a bite to eat and we got to watch Little Speedracer on his awesome bike.  Boy can he move!  He was all decked out in his helmet and fingerless gloves and looked too cool shooting off down the sidewalk.  Then at dinner he entertained up with a one man dance party!  It really was an awesome evening and hopefully the next time we're in Toronto we'll be able to spend a little longer together - not to mention we'll get to see the new house!  :)


Before I go I also wanted to also share this adorable card I got from Jenny.  We recently did a stamps for die trade when we realised we each had doubles of some items and tucked in with the Tim Holtz die I received was this adorable card:

 I love how the embroidery floss is threaded through the little needle!  Awesome!


Okay, off to produce some cards of my own.  See you again soon!  :)