Valentine #1

Bear with me, I am working just on the laptop, with the whatever photo editor that is in here... and it's awful, lol... so this week's Valentines might not have the photo quality I am used to. Will go back to the Microsoft editor!

I just love these two stamps by A Muse. My all time favorite Valentine stamps!

Background paper by Carolee's Creations, layered on an unknown card (still working on using up all of the premade cards I have!). The little Piggy is colored with Copics.

That's a MS punch along the edges, with the matching A Muse sentiment stamp Fun!!

January Papertrey Pages: Spring Rain

Our challenge this month was to use three different Spring Rain items. Lol, of course, PTI has buttons, ribbons and paper... but that's it! I went shopping and found Spring Rain brads (Core-dinations) and close enough Stickles, but lol, never used them!

One more set of pages for DD #2's Baby Westley album. Lol, I gave her the album for Christmas, with lots of empty pages!!

The papers are from Best Creations, the Transportation line. Lots of circles, and lots of sparkle!!

The photos are mounted on Spring Rain, then I punched the corners with the SU tag punch and added brads from SU's Bold Brights.




I used a 12 x 12 sheet of Bazzill paper that was close enough to Spring Rain in small amounts for the clouds. The clouds were die cut with Papertrey's medium scallop die, then sponged with some Enchanted Evening ink.

The title is done with Thickers brown felt letters (where are the alphabet dies, Papertrey???). The letters are sitting on a double ribbon layer- SU's Bashful Blue wide stitched and Papertrey's Spring Rain gingham. Man, I wish I had that gingham in Sweet Blush!! Another request!



Those cute little cars and tractors are buttons from the craft aisle in Joann's.


PTI has never offered Dark Chocolate Saddle Stitch ribbon; this is an Offray version- the white stitches are colored blue with a Prisma marker, Sky Blue Light #202. To my weary eyes, the Prisma is a better Spring Rain match than any of the Copics.


Layered on top of the Offray ribbon is Papertrey's Black and White Stripes, I colored the white lines with the Prisma as well.




Buttons are from the Spring Rain, Enchanted Evening, and Blueberry Sky collections, but I also tossed in some odds and ends of buttons. The DMC floss I tied some of the buttons with is number 800, a perfect Spring Rain match!

I forgot I have a journaling piece to add, dang nab it! I just was too excited and took the photos too early!

So! I used Spring Rain paper, gingham ribbon, and buttons. I used the Prisma marker #202 to create Spring rain matching ribbons.

My goal is to inspire you to get creative with your photos (well, and inspire myself to finish some pages), but if the baby pictures just make you smile or laugh, that's a good thing, too!

January Papertrey Blog Hop

Here's the challenge, issued just 10 days ago:

'This month's blog hop challenge involves you challenging yourself to use a Papertrey stamp set that has yet to see ink or even one that might be collecting a little dust!'

Lol, I started the challenge on the 16th, but only got two of them done. Then I failed in the photographing of one of them (Snow days are no different than rain days for photographing near as I can tell. It has snowed off an on for the past, well, 77 years, I think.). Today I will show you one that is done, and one still being worked on!

This is a pretty momentous card- does it look clean and simple? I used 2 sets never used before, one sentiment never used before, and stamped directly on to a card from a box of cards never used before! How's that?

It is, of course, Banner Builder, with BABY spelled out with Fresh Alphabet, and the sentiment from Inside and Out Baby. I stamped directly onto the card with Versafine Onyx Black, and the banners are in Memento inks. One try, and I got this perfect card!

Here's the one that is not quite done: Lily of the Valley. The paper is shimmery, but without any sun today, I couldn't get the glitter to show without glare from the flash. The green layer is Leaf Green, a color I have not been using much- but am so happy to have when the right moment comes along! Cut with Nesties, I hand cut the bottom of the stem first, then put it over the edge of the nesty to finish the cut and have the stem stick off the edge. Colored with Copics, and glitter applied to the bottom of the flower cups. Sentiment comes from another unused Year of Flowers set: Sweet Peas.

It's snowing big flakes out there. The radio says we are just going to get 'about' and inch during the day. There is at least an inch and a half on the porch, with no signs of letting up. Craig says life is all about contradictions, I say I need a ticket to somewhere sunny and warm. He says it is warm, it's above 0 F for the first time in days.

CAS with Alcohol Inks

Maybe it's a contradiction to use 'Clean and Simple' in the same sentence as 'alcohol inks'. Ha! I find alcohol inks easy-albeit messy- to use, and always come up with some beautiful papers.

The inks used are blue and purple with just a tiny bit of gold, I then edged the piece with a gold pen, and layered it on black and purple. The purple paper is textured; you can see little 'strings' of paper in it. It's a bright joyous purple, not an easy color to find.

The sentiment was embossed in gold on Papertrey's Enchanted Evening, edged in gold, then layered on a piece of purple.

Easy!

Happy Birthday!

Today is my birthday! I want to remind you of my birthday present last year- see it here- Ha! Wasn't that the sweetest thing?

Now it is a year later... and it's a Penguin party!!!!

I made the card with the Cricut Create a Critter Cartridge, the penguin was made in the 4 inch setting. The sentiment is from the Opposites Attract cartridge, with a 1.5 inch setting. The '1' is a Penny Black stamp, colored with a Copic and blinged up with white glitter. The little guy's hat is a purchased embellishment, from K&Co, but a few years ago.

The card base is 5.25 inches square, made from green Amuse tiny check cardstock. it's great paper for cards since it is plain white on the back, and a heavy stock, so it makes into a perfect printed front card,

Inside-the sentiment is from Opposites Attract, with Liquid Applique (to replicate icing).


See the bag behind the Penguin gift holder? I glued on a new copy of the movie, 'March of the Penguins', then added a few more 1's around on the bag. The Penguin gift holder is an After Christmas special purchase, lol, .99 cents at Hallmark yesterday!!!

I gave Alex the cake pops book for Christmas, and look what she came up with! I didn't get any great close up pics, but if you click on it to enlarge, I think you will get a better view.

She was so sweet to make Wes and I both cakes!

Lol, he hasn't had much in the way of sweet things in his short life!!

As soon as he brought his head up from the first lick, he laughed loud and long!! So did the rest of us!!

He definitely loved the cake, and was quite the ham!

It was a fun, fun, day; it will make me smile on my birthday for years to come to share it with such a happy little boy!!

New Year's Baby Card

I was cleaning out the camera and realized I did not share the New Year's Baby card with you- shame on me!!

I used Mrs. Grossman stickers and a Studio G. $1.00 stamp. It's on a silver shiny card, but the Nesty scalloped oval is from a more sparkly silver paper. the 'oh baby' is done in detail silver embossing powder.

The ribbon is silver from Papertrey, and I tied on a while tiny baby rattle.

I did the inside on the computer- I don't generally do that, but it seemed the easiest way to do a sentiment that is so wordy.

Twins!

A colleague of mine had 2 wee baby girls on Friday morning, so I needed a special baby card for her! I took the Great Impressions duckie stamp and made a second duck on a tube using a Stamp-a-ma-jig. I only had to do it once; that's a record for me for this kind of alteration!! I drew in the missing line to link it to the first tube.



I used Copics to match the papers (Pebbles, Inc.) and used a funny edged Nesty to make the first layer using Papertrey's hibiscus Burst as my background solid.



The sun is a Boss Cut die with a cute little face drawn on and some 'glitter glue around the edges. Truth be told, that little sun is hiding a blip from a Copic when I pulled the lid off over the colored image- lesson learned- those Copics can have juice in the caps- beware!!



Some glitter glue on the tubes flowers, then some Papertrey Silk 1/4 inch ribbon colored with the matching Copic of the ducks to tie two bows.



Jess has a youngster at home, and I thought I might add the three little girls names to the bottom of the ducks. Will have to think about that!

The finished card us a business size, I think it came out to be 3.75 x 9.0 inches.