Thursdays with Lindsay

Good Morning!  I have a couple of cards to share with you today that I have to say were tedious and time consuming and I loved every minute of it!  For the first one, I enjoy puzzles, so this was a challenging puzzle.  Let me show it to you...

Over at my monthly card traders group, the challenge was to create a card using the brick wall technique.  You can find the tutorial over on SCS.  As I said, this is a bit tedious and time consuming, but if you enjoy puzzles, then you must give this a try!

I used the beautiful Iris image from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff and some digi paper that I found somewhere - probably A Cherry on Top.  I also used the sketch from The Pink Elephant having been inspired by my daughter giving it whirl Monday night.

This next card I made to play along with the Digital Tuesday challenge which is to have vellum on your card.  You all know that I am getting ready for a move, so I've been cleaning out stuff.  I literally took this vellum out of the trash (good thing I don't allow food/drink items to go into my craft room trash can).  I threw it away thinking to myself that I am not ever going to use these scraps, so why keep them.  Well, this is why we papercrafters are hoarders.

I pulled out the recently discovered paper piercing patterns and set to work.  This is actually a one layer element, but I cut it apart after doing all the piercing.  I also used a white gel pen to trace the scallops.  I like how I achieved a Pergamano look without all the work of the nibs and ink.  Again I used the beautiful Iris image.  Here's a close up of the focal image....

Supplies:
Card Stock:  Neenah Milled Ivory, Black, Perfect Plum
Paper:  Digi paper by CHaskell, Vellum (SU)
Pattern:  Madjara
Copics:  BV00, BV02, BV04, YG63, YG67
Ink:  Perfect Plum
Tools:  Piercer/Mat, SCAL/Cricut, white gel pen
Embellishments:  Bling by Recollections

I hope you enjoy my cards.  If you try these techniques, let me know.  I'd love to see what you did with them.  Now head on over to Lindsay's blog to see what she has in store for you.  Also, visit the rest of the team and leave them some love.  Lindsay has a wonderfully talented design team and they are sure to inspire you.

Happy Birthday TPE Blog Hop

Hi there! Thanks for coming back to visit me today. I am super excited to be joining in the blog hop fun to celebrate The Pink Elephant's 1st Birthday! Now if you're here just because you like visiting my blog, thank you very much! But if you want to do the hop, start at The Pink Elephant. It's a big one so be sure you have a favorite beverage and kick back to enjoy the fun. You do have until Thursday, Noon EST to finish it.

We were told to feature our favorite challenge from TPE, well, I didn't have a favorite because they are all so wonderful. So I decided to use a challenge that I didn't get to play along with originally. I chose this sketch:


This is TPE Sketch #9 and it's such a great sketch!



Here's my card. I didn't stay completely true to the sketch - I didn't add the 3 embellishments. I tried, but it just didn't work for me.

I used Neenah card stock as my base and then I pulled out some old, very neglected supplies from PaperTrey Ink. I used Lemon Tart as the next layer. I used a piece of black Bazzil Basics card stock and my SU! Scallop border punch. I then wrapped a piece of Summer Sunrise polka dot ribbon (PTI) around the black border and then tied in a simple knot. I used one of the new stamps from All That Scraps, it's one of the stamps that was included in the new Spring Kit. Oh my word, she is A-DOR-ABLE!! I colored her with Copic markers. I did try to add a sentiment and the 3 embellishments and they just didn't work for me - so I kept the card rather simple.

I hope you enjoyed my contribution to the hop. I appreciate your visit. Your next stop on the hop is Mary S. I hope you enjoy the rest of the hop!

Sunshine Monday

OK - My Monday isn't starting off very sunshiny. Hollyanne is home today with a sore throat today... I wasn't able to work on my Sunshine Monday card until after the boys left for school (which is good because I'm able to participate in a couple of Monday challenges)... and I finish my card pretty quickly but the camera battery just died! So... here's a scan of my card and I will take and post a better picture when it's all charged up.

Ugh! This looks awful. I don't like scans! Sorry about that friends. I promise I will post a better picture as quickly as possible.

Edit to add photo. Hmmm... not sure it looks any better.

I did use the new Skier stamp from Sunshine & Giggles new winter line. I'm not a skier, although a native Coloradan where the skiing is some of the best around, but this little guy looks like he's having no difficulty at all. He probably doesn't even have to do the bunny trails.

The challenges I participated in are: TechnoStamper (the sketch) and The Pink Elephant (black, hardware & distressed). It really is very cute and very masculine - I'm not linking up until I have a better photo.

Thank you for stopping by! Have a Sunshiney Monday with lots of giggles! (corny - heehee) Don't forget to stop by Janice's blog and the rest of the team. They are all linked in my sidebar.

It's Dreary, but the colors are AWESOME!

Good Morning Everyone! It's really overcast and rainy looking today, but the trees are changing into their vibrant hues. I love that.

I have a card to share with you that I made for my November kit for my monthly card swap group. I am not worried about posting it here since none of them read my blog anyway - well, sometimes my sister does. Anyway, it is also perfect for the The Pink Elephant Challenge which is to create a Fall card.

I used Pumpkin Emma from CC Designs. The pumpkins and sentiment are also from CC Designs, September release.

This is a double flap card that is inspired by the video tutorial from Dawn that you can find here.

Then you open up the front flap and you see the sentiment.

Then open up that flap and reveal this little cutie! I absolutely loved this design so I had to give it a try! I am very pleased with the results.

Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your day.

Thursdays with Lindsay

Good Morning! It's rather unseasonably warm here the last couple of days... yesterday was just downright HOT! Makes it rather difficult to display Fall cards and talk about a crisp chill in the air. So I went with an All Season type card today. I did use the sketch from The Pink Elephant.



This is Oriental Poppy and I have to say that I'm very intimidated by this image. Not an easy one to color and give it the glory that it deserves. I does look much better in person than it does in this photograph. I think I need to quit being so cheap and just get another lamp for my "studio" or get my rear in gear earlier in the day and use natural light for the photo.

Anyway, as I said, I used the sketch from The Pink Elephant and the color combo was inspired by this week's challenge at The Sweet Stop but I can't enter that one because it has a sketch to go along with it. The paper is something I probably picked up at AC Moore a year or so ago and I love that shade of red! Gorgeous!! The sentiment is computer generated.

Thanks for stopping by and be sure to visit Lindsay and the rest of the team for some great inspiration.

Card for Paige

Hi All! I hope everyone had a good day back yesterday. Back... to school... to work... to job hunting.

I wanted to share my card that I've sent to Paige as part of the card shower I was telling you about yesterday. Please send a girl who needs all the smiles she can get a card. It's easy. Just visit my post below for the links, stories, and Sunshine & Giggles pre-order.


I created this card for my challenge sketch on Tuesday Morning Sketches, but it was funny that I started making this card and was just about done when I decided to take a computer break to see what my favorite blogs had to show me and I saw that The Pink Elephant had a color challenge going on with colors I'd already chosen which is red, yellow, black and white. I had almost completed this card with a blue ribbon, I changed it to black and voila! I had a card to enter into The Pink Elephant's challenge.

I hope you enjoy my card, send Paige a smile and join me over at Tuesday Morning Sketches. Have a wonderful day!

Clean and Simple

Hi there! I have a late post for you because I was waiting around to see what fabulous challenges were being issued today.

I'm playing along with The Pink Elephant and Digital Tuesday with my clean and simple card. What do you think?


I used Kraft cardstock as my base, Old Olive for the mats and Neenah white cardstock for the image and the sentiment. The frog image is from The Greeting Farm, Down by the Pond stamp set and the sentiment is this week's free digi from The Digi-Shack.

The challenges:

The Pink Elephant - this awesome sketch!
Digital Tuesday - make it hoppy.

I hope you enjoy my card and I'm sending this one to my former boss, she LOVES frogs. Well, hoppy Tuesday!




PS - Don't forget to check out my challenge on Tuesday Morning Sketches.

Tim n Shells plays well with The Pink Elephant

Hi! I am almost myself. I went to bed early last night and I think I'm going to recover from the weekend's goings-on.

Did you know that there are blogs that issue new challenges every week, daily? Did that make sense? OK, so I'm compiling a list of my favorite challenge blogs and when they post new challenges and I will share that with you when I'm done. But to give you an example... Mojo Monday and The Pink Elephant are a couple of GREAT blogs that issue new challenges on Mondays. Then there's Sweet Sketch Wednesday that has a new sketch challenge every Wednesday. And then another favorite called Friday Sketchers. Yep, you guessed it, new challenges every Friday!

So it was time to do another card for Tim n Shells Digi-Downloads and I've been waiting to use this sweet image, which I adore, on the perfect card sketch. The Pink Elephant had one that fit the bill! I love it! This is my entry for TPE#20.


This card reminds me of my friend Joni - her favorite color is orange. I just got this really fun paper from All That Scraps, so I had to pull the fun polka dots in on the turtles. Cute, huh! Not the traditional color of a turtle, but it's fun!

I used Prismacolor Markers to color and used the same color on face and body, but then went back to lighten the color on the faces with the blender pen. I'm not super happy with the results, it caused bleeding. Humph! I also did all faux stitching, which I managed to make those stitches just as straight as I do on a machine. LOL Not!!

I hope you enjoy my card and that it put a little smile on your face or a twinkle in your eye. Thanks for visiting me today!

Sweet Little Geisha

One of my favorite movies and books is Memoirs of a Geisha. Although my card doesn't come near the beauty of Sayuri or even Hatsumomo but I do love this sweet little Geisha image from The Greeting Farm. She's not available at the moment because she was a digi-image and recently voted to be immortalized in rubber. I created this card for a swap that I'm participating in. I have trouble with Asian design so I signed up for this swap to break me out of my box. And I decided not only is it for the swap but as my entry for The Pink Elephants next challenge: ribbons and die cuts.


The decorative paper is American Crafts purchased at Michaels. I printed Geisha Anya out wallet size and used my prismacolor pencils to color her pulling the colors from the paper into her Kimono. Then, with the help of my friend Joni teaching how to look up Kanji, I found the Kanji character for "love." This card displays the simple elegance that I like. I hope you enjoy it, too.

The Pink Elephant Challenge #3

I missed The Pink Elephant Challenge Blog Challenge #2. Actually I did it and hated the results. But this time it's a sketch and I love sketches. They are sooo helpful!!


So this is my interpretation of the sketch. Don't you just love this adorable fairy? Actually this card contains lots of new.

For the base, I used Whisper White, not new, a trusted old friend. The new is the decorative paper which is digi-dp. How cool is that! I have never played with digi-paper before and GinaK is giving away 2 yummy designs for FREE. This one is from the Floral Elegance paper pack. It's so pretty!

Then the other new is my Lauren in Love stamp from Paper Makeup Stamps. She arrived on Saturday and I just think she's adorable. I've always been a fairytale kind of girl - love fairies, unicorns and other mythical creatures. I colored her using my Copics and Stampin' Up markers. Then used Iridescent Ice embossing powder on her wings and trim.

I hope you like my card.

Another Challenge

Happy Valentine's Day everyone! I have another card to share with you that is my submission for The Pink Elephant Challenge first challenge. This is the cutest blog ever!!


The challenge was to create card that is pink, black and white in honor of their signature colors. This card didn't quite come out as I envisioned, but still cute. I used an image from one of my swaps, Rachelle Ann Miller "Enjoy the Moment" that I colored with Prismacolor pencils and then added a bit of glitz with Copic Spica pens and Diamond Dust glitter on the butterfly. Black grosgrain, a white gel pen and a Cuttlebug embossing border along the bottom This was a lot of fun to put together.

I hope you like it!!