Reindeer Red

My other half got me a bunch of Lawn Fawn for my birthday, including 'Critters in the Snow' and the 'Fa La La' papers. (He knows me well!) I was looking at the red tree paper and thought: this is a Fair Isle sweater! So I ran with it. Red on red on red, and reindeer!

The sketch is DS129 (sketchaholic! you know me...). I <3 this card! It turned out so well. My plans never turn out well. My only change is I wish I had done a better job embossing the sentiment. Or maybe did it in white? No matter. I love it.

Four More Christmas Cards

Too many cards, so not a lot of notes from me. Here goes!

These two for Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge #199.

For Unscripted Sketches #234

For My Favorite Things #153

Square Holiday Cards

I made two cards this evening, trying to get through my Christmas card list. I'm excited because one of tonight's cards is an entry for the Lawn Fawn CHA Catalog contest. The competition is really stiff but I'm throwing my hat in the ring. I hope you enjoy my cards! :)

Sketch from Deconstructed Sketch 128.

Sketch from Mojo Monday 321.

One evening, four Thanksgiving cards.

I had about zero time to create Thanksgiving cards for everyone. I'll be lucky if they get there on time. As always, I turn to my sketch addiction to help me through at least one part of my crafting. That and making multiples of each card!

First set of cards were Lawn Fawn 'Into the Woods' and Deconstructed Sketch 126. I colored the Acorn and Fox forever ago just for fun, knowing I would eventually find somewhere to stick them. Here they are. Love that cute stamp set!

Next, a stash-buster! I've had that leaf paper in my kit for I don't know how long. It's lovely, and I wanted to show it off. The layout is Retro Sketches #91. 

Now the question becomes who gets which cards?

25th and Pine, all mine!

Not too long ago, my name was drawn from the hat for some sweet goodies from Basic Grey, courtesy of Creating Keepsakes. THANK YOU! I thought I was only getting what they showed in the blog, so imagine my surprise when a huge box showed up at my house with most of the line! We're talking transparencies, journaling cards, washi tape, brads, letters... the works! And don't get me started on the wax seals. What a way to get me to buy the matching papers, Basic Grey! (Twist my arm, why dontcha!) I spotted the 6x6 pad at Archivers, and that brings us to today with the beginnings of my Christmas Card Craftstravaganza.

My first card was intended for Cas(e) This Sketch #52, but I buzzed past the deadline. The enamel dots are from MME, and were a last second addition to cover some errant glue. Whoops! Happy accidents... Anyway, this sketch was a great way for me to play with some of the transparent titles which I have never used before. There are two or three more so I might repeat this card in other colors. Maybe. It's not my favorite—needs more dimension, maybe?

I am rather more fond of this card, based on Retro Sketches #89. I fussy cut (wow! I never do that!) the Joy ornament from one of the "snippets" that came in the pack. I was too lazy to power up the Pazzles for the circles, so I did it with my manual circle cutter... not exactly the most perfect circle-maker in the world, but it does the job. Sometimes. (Thanks, Martha.) Here's hoping you wouldn't have noticed if I didn't say anything! ;)

That's about all the paper crafting I've done in say... the past two weeks? I've gone full-tilt beadaholic since starting my new job. I'll have to make a whole bead post to catch you up on that!

Happy Crafting! 

Supplies: All papers and embellishments from Basic Grey 25th & Pine, with exceptions: ink, Tsukineko VersaMagic Wheat; scrap Navy cardstock; twine, Hemptique; ribbon and marker, American Crafts.

It's not really Halloween until there's blood dripping down the walls!

That's what they say, you know. Or maybe, that's what Dexter says. I didn't like the ending. I could have lived without that last 30 seconds or so. I digress.

I'm playing along with Retro Sketches 87. I needed to cram in a few fast Halloween cards, and this sketch fit the bill.

The first up is the design I had in mind the whole time -- which of course I don't like. The second was what I came up with while making the first, and decided it didn't work with those papers, so I ended up making four total (two of each kind) and using the papers I had got out plus more for the 'blood work'. What do you think? Enjoy!

Supplies: Paper, mostly Authentique 'Enchanted'; Stamps, MME Lost & Found Halloween; red watercolor; Tsukineko VersaMark Black, Brilliance Starlite Black; Queen & Co. dots; American Crafts Thickers / Amy Tangerine

Whoops! Missed a birthday.

I swore she said her birthday was the 25th. Alas. The 22nd. And I am now overdue. By two days! Oh well.

For my belated birthday in a hurry, I used Retro Sketches #86 and a whole lot of Lawn Fawn 'Dewey Decimal'.

I totally dig the salmon and sea foam color scheme. Accented with brown and white. Love it. I think she will too.

ETA: Lawn Fawn themselves pinned this card with the caption "Perfect belated birthday card by Amanda". OMG can I die now, because that makes me so happy!

Supplies: Lawn Fawn 'Dewey Decimal' (stamps, papers, twine); Stampendous 'Typewriter Wishes,' detail white embossing powder; MME dots; Tsukineko StazOn Timber Brown, Black; VersaMagic Cloud White, Pink Grapefruit; 3D adhesive; vellum.

For the lady whose car I dumped my coffee in...

...whoops, my bad. Sorry. It's a small splatter, but it is on the seat. In my defense, I was up at 4:30 am and it was crappy hotel coffee. It kinda deserved to get dumped out...

...just not in your car!

I can only hope this helps. Enjoy!

Inside the bag:

Two More from World Cardmaking Day

I got two more in yesterday, both on Retro Sketches #84. Just screaming for washi tape, isn't it? But we'll get to that in a minute.

First up, this stamp set I bought with my dad in mind: Tool Time from Technique Tuesday. I like how it's multiple stamps, but it's set up on the sheet like a background, which is how I wanted to use it! I arranged the stamps around the sentiment and stamped with Tsukineko Brilliance Starlite Black. It's black ink with a heavy amount of silver sheen, so that it appears as graphite. Seriously, the ink is like pencil lead: metallic dark gray, but not too shiny. I love the effect, especially on these tools! Sorry that it doesn't photograph as well as it looks. I do feel like the sentiment got a little lost, so I wish I had clear embossed it or used a better ink (my 'Night Sky' is kinda dry).

ETA: This card won a Shout-Out from Retro Sketches!

I am sooooo excited! It's my first call-out/win/blog badge ever!!

 

I said I'd get to the washi tape, and here it is. :) I can't decide if I like it. I go back and forth. The colors (and the lines) are taken from Runway Inspired Challenge #45. The two challenges kind of speak to one another, don't you think? But, again, I think I'm too literal. And I look back at the inspiration cards for RIC45 and I feel so 'blah' by comparison. Oh well! I made something, and someone will like it. It goes in the "I made this and I don't know what to do with it" box.

Happy World Cardmaking Day! I've got two so far...

... and one that I technically made Thursday which makes three for this post. :) I absolutely fell in love with CAS(E) This Sketch #48! It has so much potential. I can see myself using this layout again and again. Which is why I made three!

This winter one is the one from Thursday. My 'mother in law' bought me the whole line of Paper Studio 'Winter Wonderland' last year and I've got soooo much of it, I will probably use this as my holiday card. It would have different papers in the back, but it should work. The stamp is embossed with Ranger Embossing Pearl Silver, which is partially see through: you can use a dark color ink and the silver powder will lighten the ink and add the pearlescence.

And here are the two I made today. I'm disappointed in the bird one. It was a cheap stamp set from the dollar bin that I had never used before. I've since learned that cheap photo polymer does not take ink well. Also, I stupidly used the jelly kind of dimensional dots, as opposed to the foam ones. That said, I love the card, it just looks kind of funny. I think I will make it again with another stamp set.

I've been meaning to use this monkey stamp!!! I love it so much. Rather than repeat the icon in the sketch, I chose to repeat the sentiment, and put the graphic in the sentiment's place. I love it!

Supplies: Tsukineko inks, Clearsnap inks; Avery Elle 'Funky Monkey' stamp; Inkadinkadoo 'Fun Flake' stamp; W R Memory Keepers 'Tweet Tweet' stamp; Spectrum Noir markers; 3D adhesive; glue stick; My Mind's Eye dots; Recollections 'Honeycomb'; My Mind's Eye 'Magnolia' orange distress; white cardstock.

Happy Mail!

My better half has completely indulged my desire for washi tape. He bought me a huge order of rolls from Cute Tape one day, and I relish getting to use them. I spotted Case This Sketch #47 and decided it needed washi tape, but I wasn't sure how. It seemed too obvious just to run tape lines across the card, so I decided to tear them up a bit.

I kind of like it. I don't know if I should have made it messier or cleaner. Also, I need to start using blending card, because regular ol' card just isn't cutting it. There's some bad use of alcohol marker here -- just be glad you can't see it so much in the picture!

Supplies: Washi Tape; Lawn Fawn 'Quinn's ABCs'; Stampendous 'Typewriter Wishes'; Doodlebug Pearls; Spectrum Noir TB1-TB3; Tsukineko Memento Tuxedo Black.

Sew Happy For Your Birthday!

I happened upon Cosmo Cricket's 'Material Girl' in the clearance at Archiver's and snatched that kit right up. My mother, my grandmother, and a goodly number of people I know are quilters and sewers. First up, Grandma. For whatever reason, her birthday was not on my calendar, so thankfully I mentioned my score to mom who got me right on it!

The layout is from Seize the Sketch #4. This is a card where I actually did an inside! I didn't take a pic, but it's a sewing machine stamp and the words 'For Your Birthday'. I think she's going to like it.

Supplies: cream card; yellow paper and sticker from Material Girl; red button paper from DCWV 'Crafty Stack'; red ribbon and Geranium marker from American Crafts; Stampendous 'Typewriter Wishes'; My Mind's Eye Stella and Rose Mabel 'So Sweet' stamps; buttons, Tsukineko VersaMagic 'Pink Grapefruit' inside.

Creepy. Crawly. Spooky. Skull!

Just a quick one today for CTS 46. As usual, I'm super-literal. But I loved the simple sketch. I'm seeing Halloween stuff on the shelves and on the blogs, so it's rubbed off on me quite a bit earlier than usual this year!

I used Spellbinders Labels 3 to cut the hole out of the card, then I stamped the skull on orange distressed paper and embossed. I used a few dimensional squares to pop the orange off the inside of the card, then added the sentiment and the brad. Using a needle punch tool is a quick way to pierce through both tag and card, marking the spot for the brad.

Supplies: black and orange card; My Mind's Eye Lost and Found Halloween Stamps; Tsukineko VersaMagic Midnight Black; Teresa Collins Fabrications brad; Mr. Huey's Dark Calico; clear embossing powder; dimensional adhesive.

Hoppy Halloween from the Vampire Bunny!

I knew my other half would get a kick out of 'Bunnicula' here. He's also rather fond of my first-ever attempt at an inked background. I've seen plenty of inked night skies, but never built my own. It's a little harder to do, I think, with my chalk inks rather than the Distress inks, but I worked with what I had!

Mr. Vampire was masked out over watercolor paper and the blues and greens were inked. He and his shadow were done with colored pencils. The moon and stars stamps are just outlines. I stamped the outlines in VersaMark, then filled them in (quickly!) with an embossing pen. Then I used white embossing powder over it all.

I like him! I never seem to do square cards, but I felt he needed something solid to sit on, and an A2 was just not cutting it. Hope you enjoy!

Supplies: Black cardstock; ivory vellum; Authentique 'Enchanted' 6x6 papers; Lawn Fawn 'Hoppy Halloween' stamps; Lawn Fawn and American Crafts twine; Basic Grey brad; Doodlebug Designs pearls; white embossing powder; Tsukineko inks -- almost every blue and green VersaMagic Dewdrop plus VersaMark and StazOn black.

Best Wishes in Navy and Champagne

I was scrolling through all the blogs I subscribe to when I stopped, dropped, and made a card. I just had to when I saw Runway Inspired Challenge #44! I've always wanted to play along with them, but haven't for whatever reason. I saw the champagne and navy blue dress and thought: this needs my navy blue spray mist! Bam! Have a card...

This card was fast to make, but kind of messy. To get the big ink blobs from a spray, don't spray! Take the lid off the bottle, and whack the lid against the bottle so big drops come off the sprayer straw. When I had a few big wet drops, I shook and tapped the card around so they would smear and run. Then I hit it with a regular misting.

There's two layers of vellum on there as one layer was too see-through for my tastes. The stamp took six, yes six runs to get a clean impression. My ink was too wet, me thinks, and the sides swirls (which I ended up cutting off) would not impress or would ghost. I think it turned out pretty well though! I was hoping for 'an elegant mess' and I think I got there (and in record speed to boot!).

~Happy Crafting!~

Supplies: Bazzill Basics Walnut Cream; vellum; American Crafts navy ribbon, cream sateen ribbon; Paper Studio Gemstones 'Jeweltones Mosaic'; Inkadinkadoo 'Vintage Expressions'; Tsukineko Brilliance 'Mediterranean Blue'.

Oh Deer! Get Well Soon...

I finally have in my possession the stamp set I've been dying for since its announcement date! It's Lawn Fawn's "Into the Woods", and it's mine, and you can't have it. (I also got the Yeti set, a vampire bunny, and a few other things in my order... but enough about my poor shopping habits!)

My significant other's mother just had an overnighter in the ER. Not cool. She'll be fine (she always is), but since she loves my cards, I'll take that as a reason to rip open the package and start stamping. Enter the most adorable deer to ever be stamped on paper!

This is one of the Shadow Box Cards. I highly recommend the collection. Particularly because they fold flat for mailing, which is about the awesomest thing ever. I've used them before... just not on this blog! ;) :P I'll leave you to figure that out.

I wanted a bit of a 'rainy day' feeling, so I tried for a muted blue-gray color scheme. The paper of the back panel (Amy Tangerine Sketchbook 'Indigo Inspiration') really does the work. I also thought pale woodgrain would be neutral and not overwhelming; it's a technique I saw on this card and really wanted to duplicate.

I got the inspiration to 'bookplate' the title at the last minute. I contemplated die cutting an inverse corner tag for it, but I thought that might be overkill. (Plus, I had already stamped the sentiment three times, so I quit.) I still think it kind of looks like a label you might see on a wall plaque or diorama anyway.

The tree is my favorite trick of the whole thing. I stamped one tree from Lawn Fawn 'Critters in the Forest', colored, and then cut it in half down the center. You can see how it's popped off the back panel with the cut edge hidden in the side pic. Saved coloring and cutting another tree! I adhered them at different heights so they would look like they weren't two halves of the same tree. But they are... and now that you know my secret, I'm going to have to kill you.

Just kidding.

~Happy crafting!~

ETA: My card was included on this Lawn Fawn Fawny Flickr Monday post! I am so honored!

Supplies: abovementioned plus: pale blue, sky blue, white cardstocks; Lawn Fawn 'On the Mend'; Hero Arts 'Designer Woodgrain'; Tsukineko Memento Black and VersaMagic Niagara Mist; Spectrum Noir DG2, 3, and 4; Copic Blender; Paper Studio 'Crackle Round' gray gems; Fiskars corner rounder; 3D adhesive and a metric crapton of liquid glue at the seams.

Make a Wish Pin-Up Birthday Card

Well, it's that time again. I need a birthday card for my 1950s-loving friend. She was over the other day using my die cutter to cut twirled flowers from her old pin-up calendar pages. She gave me a page to use for my own purposes. I knew what to do!

Here's her card. I used the sketch from Just Us Girls Challenge 205. I made the oval frame in my cutter software by welding some wingding twirls with an oval and adding an inline layer. I tried distressing the edges, but I used metallic inks and I'm not sure how well I liked it. The Tsukineko Brilliance 'Lightning Black' shows up really super gold on the black. It's interesting, but not exactly what I was hoping for.

Supplies: calendar page; red, black, and cream cardstock; die cutter (Pazzles); red ribbon (American Crafts); sticker (3 Bugs in a Rug 'Celebrate'); black rhinestones; inks (Tsukineko Brilliance).

Wow, You're One!

I have a little friend who is turning one tomorrow. I wanted to wrap his present in a way he would actually open. So this is a white lunch bag with a custom topper. He can rip it to shreds pretty easily. There's no tape or anything.

It's pretty easy to make a lunch bag topper. I made a large rectangle in my cutter software, rounded the corners by 2", and added a scissor border. After cutting, I folded it in half and glued it on top of the closed bag. Then I added all the embellishments.

Supplies: Die Cutter (Pazzles Inspiration); Paper (Bazzill Basics green; Martha Stewart 'Baby Boy'); Stamps (TPC Studio 'Baby'); Inks (Tsukineko VersaMagic); Pearls (Recollections); Twine (American Crafts); Colored pencils; Copic Multiliner; sticker.

More craftiness from yesterday

After making one challenge entry yesterday, I kind of kept going. And going. And going...

This card is intended for a friend's birthday. As she and I both love books (she's a librarian, so she kinda trumps me on the book love). It's also my entry to Lawnscaping's 'Favorite Things' challenge. What are my favorite things? Paper, books, stamps (Lawn Fawn!), and sweet embellishments. (The little orange rose for example, from Webster's Pages). Most everything on this card is Lawn Fawn Dewey Decimal. I 'stole' it from Scrapbooking Steals (seen a shopping trend?) and was thinking I'd end up making cards for this particular librarian friend...

Picture frame for the coworker of the significant other. She said 'animals', and so she receives.

I also did some serious craft area organization. It was a lot of work, but totally worth it!

Best Wishes and a triple-scoop of challenges

Since I have all this time on my hands (having been laid off, did I mention that?) I'm continuing with my personal challenge to use and do things that I don't normally do. Add two more challenges: I'm playing with Mojo Monday 309 (sketch) and Stamping Royalty 192 (patterned paper). I decided I'm going to use a coordinating patterns (does washi tape count?) and go as whole-hog as I can into freestyle collage. My friend Michelle is really good at this, particularly with combining patterns and adding dots in random places, which sets off my OCD sensor most of the time.

Bonus: these papers were a freebie from an Archivers deal I got forever ago. Shop the stash, y'all! The 'washi tape' on the bottom left is actually part of the paper. Even more fun: using coordinating colors I had no idea where or how they'd be used! (Looking at you Lawn Fawn Retro twine!)

ETA: Not-iPhone photo!

Supplies: Studio Calico 'Take Note' and Mr. Huey's 'Cameo; Bazzill Basics 'Vanilla Cream'; Anna Griffen 'Modern Graphic' stamps; Tsukineko VersaMagic 'Pink Grapefruit'; Ranger Distress Ink 'Antique Linen'; patterned Washi tape; 3D adhesive; My Mind's Eye 'Sky's the Limit' enamel dots; Hemptique and Lawn Fawn twine.

Love Is the Gift of Oneself

Rarely do I make a card from only one kit. I usually combine pieces from across lines. So I tried to do this from all in one. Bonus, it gets me to use the stickers with the kit, which again I rarely use—I'm after the papers and the stickers are just a bonus! This was all Teresa Collins Fabrications Linen. The sketch is from My Favorite Things, #139.

Birthdays everywhere!

Late August is full of birthdays, so it seems. I've got two friends in the need of cards. These came out way more colorful than I thought they would. I had planned on an all-white background, but the white sentiment and mostly white pastry-image squares were getting lost. So I busted out the spray inks (most of which I 'stole' from ScrapbookSteals.com) and got a little overzealous. I was a little overwhelmed at first, but I think it worked out. I decided to run with the color bomb, and I think the washi tape and pearls help!

Happy Birthday, RR and AS! Sorry if your cards are late. I've had one heck of a week!