Snow!

When I looked out my window this morning this was what greeted me:

I know it's not the best photo, but I wasn't going out in that until I had to so a quick shot through the window and screen will have do. Mine's the car in the middle. My honey had cleaned a lot of the snow off for me, but I still had a ways to go before I was getting out of there. It seemed like all of the snow had drifted up around my car for some reason.

The good news is that I finally got to work (3 hours late) and was able to get a couple of photos of cards that I've made over the last few days. The first is the weekly challenge from the PTI forum. Jen provided the sketch and I threw the rest together.

I used PTI colors-Lavender Moon, Plum Pudding, Raspberry Fizz, and Fresh Snow. I combined a few different stamp sets for my patterned paper and focal point-Garden of Life, Polka Dot Basics, and Honey Bees. My little white flowers are centered with Diamond Dots stickers from Stampendous and they are pretty sparkly in person.

The next card I is one I made over the weekend. I decided that my Penny Black stamp really needed to see some ink so I stamped and colored and put together this fun card. I really like the combo of PTI's True Black and Raspberry Fizz. I am SO happy that PTI finally released a black cardstock!

Thanks for stopping by my blog. I hope everyone stays safe if they're out in this lovely weather system that has been hitting so many of us. If you can, stay warm and snuggly at home--but if you do have to drive, slow down please. It's not worth risking an accident to get somewhere a few minutes earlier. Take care.

Now I understand

why some people decide to run away and get married in Las Vegas!

After our second official day of wedding planning we're almost ready to have Elvis preside over the ceremony.

Hopefully it gets better. :-)

*Edited to add: The actual wedding planning part is fun. My honey and I are happy with our choices so far. It's the other people who seem to think that it's their wedding not ours who are telling us who, what, where, when, etc. that are bothering me.*

Last Week's Challenge Card

Better late than never, right? I've been trying to keep up with the weekly challenges at the PTI forum and I'm always happy if I complete my card within the next week.

Last week's challenge was from Mary, our quilt card crafter (say that 10 times fast). We were to make a Valentine's quilt card and she had three examples ready for us. I cased her first example, changed a few things and came up with this card:

Of course I used one of my favorite color combos: Pure Poppy, Dark Chocolate, and Vintage Cream (PTI). The stamps are from Quilter's Sampler Additions, Heart Prints (PTI), and Anytime Messages (Hero Arts). The pp is from a pad from Crafty Secrets. I used my Double Ended Tags die from Spellbinders--it has to be a tie between those and the Ribbon Slide dies over which one I like best. They are both great.

Organizing my craft room must have sparked something in me because I've been on a roll ever since. Hopefully I can keep up the pace, or at least something close to it.

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day.

Weekly Challenge Card

This is the 4th card that I made Saturday night. I used the sketch as this week's challenge over at the Papertrey Ink forum, and to make it a little more challenging I added that it should be a masculine card. I have no problems with flowers, bows, butterflies, etc., but when it comes to a manly card I usually have to work a little harder for ideas. Here is what I came up with.

Paper: Classic Kraft, Ripe Avocado, Dark Chocolate, Spring Rain (PTI)

Ink: Ripe Avocado, Dark Chocolate, Spring Rain (PTI), Tea Dye (Distress)

Stamps: Men on Life, Women of Life (PTI)

Thanks for stopping by--I hope you have a great day.

Quick Kitty Post

I just had to post this picture of how Lucy helps me stamp. Please pardon the mess on my craft/computer/kitty table. :-)

She always wants to be in the middle of whatever I'm doing and she LOVES this room since it was where she spent the first week of her new life when we brought her home from the shelter. If she wasn't so cute, she could get herself into a lot of trouble.

Valentine Season Begins

I think I've finally had enough of Christmas and snowy cards for a little while so now I'm moving on to Valentine's Day.

My first card uses some stamps that I bought from Gina K before Christmas, but had never inked up. The set is called Cuddles and Hugs and it was designed by Melanie Muenchinger. The sentiment is from a different set, but I can't remember the name off the top of my head ( I just looked it up and it's from Inkadinkado). The pp is from DCWV's Old World stack.

Next up is another card using PTI's Heart Prints set. I never thought I'd use a set of just hearts, but I love all of the patterns this one has. I got out my heat tool for a little embossing on this one and then sponged a light layer of white ink to bring out the contrast. My colors were all from PTI: Kraft, Dark Chocolate, Raspberry Fizz.

My last card for today isn't necessarily a Valentine's card, but it's still bright and cheery. This card uses PTI's Garden of Life set for the main flower image. The corners are from a Build A Frame set from Prima and the sentiment is from Hero Art's Anytime Messages set. I used Raspberry Fizz and Ripe Avocado (PTI).

I did make another card this weekend, but I'm saving it for Wednesday's weekly PTI challenge. (I had a very productive night Saturday--4 cards in one sitting!)

Thanks for stopping by and checking out my latest cards. I didn't get as detailed on the descriptions, but if you have any questions I will be happy to let you know.

Have a great rest of today.

Bright & Cheery

It's got to be some sort of record, but I finished another card last night. :-) I was inspired by all of the bright, cheery cards on Dawn McVey's blog (See "My Favorite Things" on my sidebar). Dawn has such a way with color that her blog is a must see!

I hate to admit that this the time that I've used PTI's yummy color Raspberry Fizz from last month's release. I mixed it with Dark Chocolate (PTI), and some orange paper I had in my stash. I'm not sure who made it, but it seemed to go pretty well with Spiced Marmalade distress ink and I was glad to be using some supplies that I've had for a long time.

I took the flower stem image from Women of Life (PTI) and topped it with a few of the smaller hearts from PTI's Heart Prints set. (I was glad to finally get it inked up too.)

I think the fact that I spent a little time reorganizing my craft area is helping me to be more productive. I hope to be able to post new things a little more regularly now. Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day.

A couple of challenge cards

For the first time since I made my Christmas cards I finally had time in my stamp room to catch up on the last two PTI weekly challenges.

First up was a coloring challenge from Jen. We could do whatever we wanted with the card, but it had to involve coloring of some type (markers, pencils, etc.)

I pulled out Butterfly Kisses (my very first PTI set) and my Copics and got to work. This was the result:

Next up was a color challenge from Tracy. We could design the card however we wanted as long as we used Ocean Tides, Aqua Mist, Berry Sorbet, and Sweet Blush from PTI (or whatever colors we had that were closest). Since it was cold and we had snow flurries I was inspired to go with a snowflake theme. I also thought the blues would lend themselves pretty well to snowflakes.

The only stamping was the sentiment from PTI's Merry & Bright. I used that set for my Christmas cards this year and can't seem to put it away yet.

For both cards I used my new Ribbon Slide Tags from Spellbinders. I am slowly building my collection of Spellbinders/Nestibilites and I love, love, love them! Thank you for stopping by today. I'm glad I finally had something new to post besides my cats. :-)

Organization, more organization, & a side order of stress.....

Sorry I don't have much to post lately--I decided to really get my craft area organized so I've been keeping busy with that and haven't made a card since my Christmas cards. On top of that we had been doing some ring shopping and that has been slightly overwhelming.

We found THE ring, put down a deposit, and then started to think that maybe we went a little overboard because it was more than we had originally planned to spend. I'm pretty sure it actually costs more than any car my sister has ever owned, but she's had some real hoopties. LOL!

We've been stressing out a little bit over the whole process and I've probably tried on 100 rings, but I am totally completely in love with the one we picked. I can't wait until we get everything finalized and I can have it on my hand. I promise to post pics as soon as I can.

Thanks for stopping by--I promise to have some updated cards soon.

After Christmas Blow Out!

Last week I received a gift card to Walmart for Christmas from one of my customers. I was very touched by the gesture and it gave me another excuse to do more after Christmas shopping--as if I really needed an excuse. LOL (Seriously, someone stop me before I buy another spool of $0.50 ribbon--I'm running out of room!)

While shopping I saw that all of the special Holiday Martha Stewart crafts products were 75% off. We're talking clear stamp sets (5.5" x 7.5" sheet), paper punches, and 6-packs of glitter all for $2.20 each. I was in heaven! I ended up with 2 punches, 2 stamp sets, and 2 glitter packs all for under $15. I need more Christmas stamps like I need a hole in my head, but I couldn't pass them up.

I was especially excited to find the dove paper punch that is the same as the one in the regular craft section, just in Christmas packaging so instead of $9 it was $2. I've had my eye on that particular punch ever since Annapurna showed on her blog how easy it is to crop off the bottom wing to make 2 different birds with one punch. I don't think I would've ever thought of that on my own unless I accidentally cut off a wing. :-)

I hope everyone else is having as much fun finding after holiday bargains! Thanks for visiting and have a great weekend.