I Witch Shoe a Happy Halloween

Here is a simple little Halloween card that I made today. I wasn't really intending it for any challenges, but happened to notice that three of my favorite challenge blogs have Halloween as the theme this week - Cupcake Craft Challenge, Stamp Something and Stampin' for the Weekend.
I found this stamp in the clearance bin at Michael's awhile back and thought it was cute. When I was putting it together, the little pun came to me, so that is what I put on the inside - I Witch Shoe a Happy Halloween. Tee hee... I printed it on the computer and cut it out with my Label 8 Nesties.
Supplies
Stamp: Witch Shoes (Stampendous); Sentiment is computer generated (Blackladder font)
Ink: Onyx Black (VersaFine); Tangerine Chalk Ink (Color Box)
Paper: White, orange and black cardstock (scraps); DP - Spooky Alley (Making Memories)
Embellishments: Label 8 Nestabilities; buttons, twine, ribbon
Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits
Finished card size: A2 (4 1/4" x 5 1/2")

Be Merry - Santa in Blue and Brown

I decided that after a couple hundred years or so, Santa was bored with his red suit and wanted to update his look - so here is is with a blue suit. It may be non-traditional, but I really like it. I might just have to do more blue-suited Santas.

I am submitting this card for four (count them four) challenges this week. The info for each challenge is as follows:

Just Magnolia - Embossing - I used the Cuttlebug Victorian embossing folder for the background behind Santa and I heat embossed the sentiment.

Stamp Something - Something with Your Favorite Embellishment - That was a tough one. I'm not sure I have "one" favorite embellishment. I'm going to say it's ribbon and trim because I use that on almost every card I make. But I like punches and die cuts and pearls a lot too. :)

Sketch Saturday - Sketch shown below. I took a few liberties (fewer "circles" (snowflakes) and a circular sentiment), but hopefully it's still close enough to the original to count.

Cupcake Craft Challenge - Swirls and Pearls - I used my Quikutz Swirls die, plus a swirl in the sentiment and sort of swirls in the background paper and embossed background piece. I used pearls in the center of the die cut snowflakes, the sentiment snowflake and on the folded down corner.

Supplies
Stamps: Santa (Magnolia); Be Merry (Imaginisce)
Ink: Vintage Sepia (VersaFine); Blue pigment ink (ColorBox); clear embossing powder
Paper: Cream cardstock (Hobby Lobby); brown cardstock (scraps); DP - Fruitcake (Basic Grey)
Tools: Circle and scalloped circle Nestabilities (Spellbinders); Victorian embossing folder (Cuttlebug); Swirls die (Quikutz); snowflake die (Cuttlebug)
Embellishments: cream trim (Wright's); pearls (Paper Studio)
Techniques: Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits; heat embossing
Finished card size: 6" square

Keeping Cool - Cupcake Craft Challenge #51

This card is for this week's Cupcake Craft Challenge - Beach Theme. It is also another of the cards I completed for the House Mouse and Friends Merry Go Round Swap I am hosting.

This House Mouse image is called Keeping Cool and was sent for the Merry Go Round swap by Chris/BeachBum - appropriate isn't it? :) I colored the image with Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits. I sponged the sky with blue ink and added Stickles to the ice cube, shell and here and there on the sand. The sentiment is a $1 stamp from Michael's that I bought a few years ago. It's one of my favorite sentiment stamps - I use it a lot. I added some bling to it to spruce it up a little. I embellished the card with white and green ribbon and a lime slice charm. I added Stickles to that to spruce it up a little too. The cardstock I used is Bazzill, and the orange polka dot paper is Kay and Co. The other papers are scraps from my stash.

The finished card size is 6" square. I used the sketch from last week's House Mouse and Friends challenge, which I didn't have a chance to participate in.

Thanks for stopping by!

Christmas Mojo

I can't believe it's been almost a week since I've posted a card! I've just been super busy and the weather here has been so beautiful that when I do have some extra time, I want to be out enjoying it. I'm back with another Christmas card that fits four challenges - well actually five if you count Susan's Christmas in July challenge on the CK message board. The other four are: Mojo Monday, Cute Card Thursday, Cupcake Craft Challenge and Digital Tuesday Challenge. The latter three are all Christmas theme challenges, and the Mojo sketch fit my image perfectly. It's shown at the bottom of this post.

I've been following the Digital Tuesday challenge blog for awhile, but this is my first time to submit a card. I am very new to using digital stamps, but so far I am really enjoying it. The image I chose is called "Not Even a Mouse" and it's from Mo's Digital Pencil. Maurie (Mo) has just recently started creating and selling digital illustrations. I just happened on her blog a week or so ago through a link on another blog that I follow, and I fell in love with her work. All of her illustrations have tons of charm and personality.

Above is a close up of the image. I colored it with Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits.

Thanks for stopping by. I hope it doesn't take me a whole week to make another card!

Supplies

Image: Not Even a Mouse (Mo's Digital Pencil)

Paper: Pink cardstock (Bazzill); green cardstock (DCWV); DP - Christmas Stack (DCWV)

Embellishments: Circle and scalloped circle Nestabilities (Spellbinder); border punch (Fiskars); ribbon, buttons

Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits; paper piercing; digital art

Charming Blossom Fairy Charlotte

I did it again - four challenges met with one card! This card is for this week's Cupcake Craft, Spoon Full of Sugar, Whiff of Joy and Cute Card Thursday challenges. I try to do the Cupcake Craft and Cute Card Thursday challenges most weeks. This is my first time to submit a card for the Spoon Full of Sugar and Whiff of Joy challenges.

The theme for this week's Cupcake Craft challenge is Fairies. I chose to use one of my favorite stamps from Whiff of Joy - Blossom Fairy Charlotte. She is colored with Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits. I added some stickles to her wings.

The Spoon Full of Sugar challenge this week is a sketch, which is shown below. I followed it pretty closely. I used my Nestabilities to cut the circle and also the image and mat. I ran the green circle through my Big Kick with my Floral Fantasy Cuttlebug folder, then inked the edges and raised areas with Lime Pastel Chalk Ink. I used flowers with gem centers for the embellishments where buttons are shown on the sketch. Since my DP is swirly, I didn't use the swirl stamp/embellishment shown. Instead of a stamped or printed sentiment, I chose chipboard word, which was coated with a shiny silver metal. I used my Alcohol Ink to color that because I didn't like the shine.

For the Whiff of Joy challenge you are required to use a Whiff of Joy image - which of course I did. :) This week's them is charms. I used a siver heart charm tied with a ribbon.

Finally, this week's Cute Card Thursday challenge is called "nip and a punch". The objective was to use punches and/or die cuts. I used lots - Nestabilities dies, a border punch and daisy punches in two different sizes. I rarely make a card anymore without using some sort of punch or die, so it was pretty easy to meet that challenge.

Supplies
Stamp: Blossom Fairy Charlotte (Whiff of Joy)
Inks: Tuxedo Black (Memento); Lime Pastel and Lavendar Chalk Inks (Colorbox); Adirondak Alcohol Inks - Lettuce, Wild Plum, Eggplant (Ranger)
Paper: Lavender cardstock (unknown); pink cardstock (unknown); green cardstock (Archiver's); DP (Paper Studio - Hobby Lobby)
Embellishments: Circle, Scalloped Circle, Square and Scalloped Square Nestabilities (Spellbinder); border punch (Fiskars); metal word (ColorBok); Floral Fantasy embossing folder (Cuttlebug); daisy punches (Marvy); heart charm (unknown); gems (unknown); ribbon (unknown); Stickles
Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits
Finished Card Size: 6" square

Make a Wish

I have mentioned several times that I love doing the challenge blogs. I could happily spend my days making cards and doing challenges. But I also must work and take care of my family, so I can only do so many challenges in a week. This week I got lucky - I managed to do four of them with this one card - House Mouse and Friends, Mojo Monday, Cupcake Craft Challenge and Simon Says Stamp Challenge.

The theme for this week's House Mouse and Friends Challenge is birthday. There are so many great House Mouse, Happy Hopper and Gruffies stamps with a birthday theme, that one was kind of tough to choose for. I chose Make a Wish - it's super cute, and it's small enough to fit the sketch I was using.

This week's Mojo Monday sketch is below. I don't think there has been a Mojo Monday sketch that I didn't like, This one is very versatile and super simple to work with. I think I will definitely use it again.
My third challenge for this card is the Cupcake Craft Challenge. The theme for this challenge is called "2-2-2". We were to use two colors (plus a neutral), two ribbons and two shapes. Technically, I don't know if I met the two colors or not. I mainly used green and blue, but I had to use a couple other colors for the mice :). For the ribbon I used a wide green ribbon and a more narrow blue and green ribbon in the center. I also created a bow with both. The two shapes are rectangles and circles.

The final challenge is Simon Says Stamp, which was just posted today. The theme this week is animals. That was probably the easiest of the challenges to meet.

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies
Stamps: Make a Wish (Stampabilities); Sentiment (My Sentiments Exactly)
Paper: Cardstock (DCWV); DP - Wild Asparagus (My Mind's Eye)
Embellishments: Circle and scalloped circle Nestabilities (Spellbinders); ribbon (unknown); blue brads (unknown)
Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits
Finished card size: 4 1/2" x 6"

Wish Big!

I made this card for my husband Bret. His birthday is next Tuesday. I know he won't see it early because he never looks at my blog. :) I'm also submitting this card for this week's Cupcake Craft Challenge, which is to make a card for a man or boy.

Of all the House Mouse stamps, I think the Gruffies lend themselves best to the masculine theme. I chose Cake Walk because it best fit the layout I wanted to do. The image was a little too big for the oval Nesties that I wanted to use, so I cut it out. Because of the fur, I couldn't cut the image closely, which left quite a bit of white. To get rid of that I used some Distress Ink. I also distressed the ivory oval and the sentiment to make them match. I thought it went well with the distressed look of the DP. I used foam squares on the Gruffie to pop him up a little.

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies
Stamp: Gruffies - Calk Walk (House Mouse - Stampabilities); sentiment is computer generated
Paper: kraft, red cardstock, DP - all from Hobby Lobby
Embellishments: Ribbon (unknown); scallop border punch (Fiskars); oval and long rectangle Nestabilities (Spellbinders); buttons (Sticko)
Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with mineral spirits
Finished card size: 6" x 6"

1-2-3 Challenges in One

Well, it may be just 2 1/2 challenges. :-) I'll get to that in a bit. This is for this week's Cupcake Craft challenge, Simon Says Stamp Challenge and Cute Card Thursday challenge. I apologize in advance for my photography. I still need to put that light box together. :)

The Cupcake Craft challenge this week is a sketch and this is the one where I'm not quite sure my card fits right. The sketch is below. The image is a bit too big and my circle is a bit too small so I kind of rearranged a bit. I'm submitting anyway because I was trying and I think it's close.

This week is the first Simon Says Stamp Challenge. The theme for their first challenge is yellow and green. I will tell you right off the bat that this is my most dreaded color combination. I usually go out of my way to avoid it. So I thought that was a good reason to give it a shot. I'm not sure why I'm afraid of this combination. I think it's because of the bedroom I had when I was about 10. This was 1974 and it was very bright yellow and very bright green. So every time I put these two colors together that's what I see. For this card, I tried to keep the tones a little softer and the image helped bring them together for me too.

The final challenge for this card is today's Cute Card Thursday Challenge. The challenge this week is to use citrus colors. As soon as I saw the challenge I knew what image I had to use.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see you again soon!

Supplies

Stamp: Citrus Puckers (House Mouse - Stampabilities)

Paper: All paper and cardstock DCWV

Embellishments: ribbon (unknown); brads (Making Memories); classic and scallop circle Nestabilities (Spellbinders)

Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with turpenoid

Mojo Monday 78 and Cupcake Craft Challenge 31

I really enjoy participating in the various challenge blogs, but with working full time and being mom to a very active five-year-old, I don't have time to do all of the ones I like. It's great when I can combine a couple. For this card, I used the sketch from this week's Mojo Monday Challenge and the Cupcake Craft Challenge, which was to use brown with one other color - pink, blue or green. Obviously, I chose pink. :)

I chose one of my new Magnolia stamps for this card - Tilda Blowing Hearts. I must confess that when I first saw these images, I did not like them. But those cute little kids with no faces kind of grew on me. I am really enjoying working with them now. I put some Stickles on her little hearts and wings. I'm not sure how well it shows up in the picture.

I did make a couple of variations to the sketch. I moved the vertical panel from the left to the right side. On the left it looked like Tilda was blowing her hearts off the card. That variation was intentional. The other one wasn't. For some reason, I had it in my head that the ribbon was tied on the top of the center horizontal panel. It wasn't until I scanned the card and then looked at the sketch again that I realized it was on the bottom. Ooops - again.

Thanks for taking a look. Please be sure to stop by Mojo Monday and Cupcake Craft challenge blogs to see all the great cards submitted this week.

Supplies

Stamps: Tilda Blowing Hearts (Magnolia); Sentiment (Hero Arts)

Ink: Onyx Black (VersaFine); Pink Pastel (ColorBox Chalk Ink)

Paper: Cardstock (Bazzill; DCWV); DP - Bohemia (My Mind's Eye)

Embellishments: ribbon, Prima flowers, button, brad, border punches

Technique: Prismacolor pencils blended with turpenoid

Cupcake Craft Challenge #30 - Spring

I decided to try Rosette's spring challenge on the Cupcake Craft Challenge blog this week. This is my first time to try this challenge. I have thought about participating several times, but didn't seem like my cards were the right style. I feel like my cards are very plain and simple compared to most of the ladies on the Cupcake DT, as well as most of those who post their cards for the challenge. I hope that you will enjoy it anyway.

I just bought this adorable Magnolia stamp and thought it was perfect for the spring theme. I have to say that my card seems a little "naked" to me. I can't remember the last time I made a card that didn't have any ribbon on it anywhere. :) I just couldn't figure out where to put it. I used some Diamond Glaze on the rain drops and splash on Tilda's hand, but that was not picked up well by the scan.

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you will check out the other cards for this week's challenge. I also encourage you to visit Rosette's blog. She does some beautiful, very elaborate cards. The insides of her cards are even beautiful! Her style is so very different from mine, but I always love seeing what she has done. She has inspired me to try some of these different styles of images, colors and embellishing. I think you will enjoy seeing her work, too.

Supplies

Stamp: Rain Regniga Tilda (Magnolia); quote is computer generated

Ink: Onyx Black (VersaFine)

Paper: yellow cardstock (DCWV); pink cardstock (Bazzill); DP (Daisy D's)

Embellishments: Prima flowers, brads, nestabilities

Technique: Prismacolor pencil blended with turpenoid