The Masculine Swap Card is FINALLY done...

Boy oh boy, has this been a tough month trying to put together my masculine card swap for our team meeting tomorrow!! This is what I finally ended up with. The stamp sets I used were Nature Silhouettes, which I got for FREE with my Sale-A-Bration rewards (yippee!) and Sanded, which I finally decided to get after many times first putting it on, then taking it off, my ordering list. The sentiment is from Fresh Cuts. I used Jet Black Staz-On ink on Glossy White card stock. The wolf card was brayered using the Blue Frost retired SU! Kaleidacolor spectrum pad. I got daring on the buck card, using the same colors as the Blue Frost pad (Bashful Blue, Ballet Blue, and Brilliant Blue), but this time brayering on each color individually. I am a frequent visitor to Michelle Zindorg's blog, and after reading her FAQs on how she creates her brayered materpieces, I thought I'd try it. I was pretty pleased with the results. The moon was sponged with Summer Sun ink while using a mask. The hard part is making sure you don't get the yellow on your fingers, then touch the blue! I did that on my first attempt... oops! Other card stock used was Basic Black, Brilliant Blue and Summer Sun. Four silver brads accent the card. This is a timely swap for me, as my Dad's birthday is on Monday and we're going out to celebrate after my team meeting on Sunday. Shhh... don't tell him, but the buck version of the card is his!! Thanks for visiting, and I hope all is well with you and yours!

Masculine Pocket Silhouettes?

I'm still struggling with my masculine card swap coming up on Sunday. I loved the design of this card - it's Beate's Weekend Sketch Challenge #33, from back in February 2008. My original card for this challenge is here. I thought I might try it again as a more masculine card. I'm still not sold that it's masculine enough - what do you think? I'd love to hear your thoughts. I have GOT to get this swap finished so I can get ready for my stamp camp on Friday. Thanks for stopping by today, and I hope it's not as hot where you are as it has been here - we're hovering in the upper 90's after being in the 60's just last week. I'm not ready for it to be so hot yet!

Sunflower Flower Pot Card

I had a few minutes today to do something fun, so I grabbed my scallop circle punch and 3/4 inch circle punch to make some sunflowers for a flower pot card. I loved Patty Bennett's sunflowers from her convention swap last year (see them here). I didn't like the 1 inch circle that she used (I wanted to see more petal), so I used my 3/4 inch circle punch for my flower centers. For card stock flowers, I used Summer Sun, and Bella Rose for the flower centers. The leaves were made using Kiwi Kiss card stock and a paper crimper (see Patty's post, here, on how to make them). The flower pot is in Really Rust, sponged with Really Rust. To hold the card together, I used striped Kiwi ribbon. The sentiment inside is from the retired All Year Cheer set. I think I like this card even better than the Petal Pizzazz one I posted a week or so ago (especially because I didn't have to cut anything by hand!). I'm going to give my stampers on Friday the option on their flower card - stamped or punched. Until next time, have a wonderful rest of your weekend!

Happy Easter!

My upline, Jeanne, made a very cute Easter card last year for one of our team swaps using the A Good Egg stamp set. She stamped the egg on Whisper White and trimmed close, using the egg as the body for a very cute Easter Bunny. I loved the card, but never managed to make some more of it until today. I just love this cute bunny! It's also the first time I've used my Delicate Dots DSP I got FREE through Stampin' Up!'s Sale-A-Bration. I love the soft colors and how well they work for this cute card. My card is basically a CASE (aka Copy And Steal Everything) of Jeanne's, with the exception of the DSP she used (Berry Bliss), adding wiggly eyes instead of dots for them, and how I did the ribbon (hers was just a knot, but I didn't like seeing the seam between the two pieces of DSP so I wrapped my ribbon around that seam to hide it). The cheeks are done with a sponge dauber using Pretty in Pink ink. The strips of Pretty in Pink are tied together with some Linen Thread and tied to the back of the card through two small holes (from the 1/16 inch circle hand punch). His ears were made with the large and small oval punches (Regal Rose and Pretty in Pink), and the tail and feet were using the Three For You flower punch.

Sorry for the poor scan on this - I messed with the color balance a little, but it's still not quite right, and having the wiggly eyes on it makes it scan a little blurry. You get the idea, though, right?

May you and yours have a joyous Easter tomorrow. We will be spending time with my side of the family for a casual get-together at my brother's. I am thankful for the sacrifice Christ made for us so long ago and it has more meaning this year after hearing a really good sermon last Sunday about the events leading up to Good Friday. He lives!

Other Things I've Been Working On

A while back I purchased two projects from two great SU! demos. The first is Andrea Walford's Fifth Avenue Floral class. Andrea always has the cutest boxes for her card projects, and this one was no different! I made the cards late one night last week, and the box while hanging out at our local coffee shop the next day. That night I got busy on the ever-s0-cute Tote-ally Awesome Tote by Becky Roberts. I haven't tackled the cards or other pieces for Becky's project, but I did manage to get the box done! I had thought about doing Becky's tote for my next stamp camp project, but it would take us the entire stamp camp time just to make the box! So, I think I'll keep this one all for myself. :)

Petal Pizzazz Flower Pot

In my trip today cruizing around my favorite stampin' blogs, I ran across Lorri Heiling's flower pot card (13th and 14th pictures down) and I just had to try one! Lorri's original post of the flower pot, here, also gave a link to Stephanie Luman's blog, where Lorri found the pattern for the card. I used Really Rust card stock for my pot, and sponged over it with Really Rust to give it some shading and shadowing. I used the large flower from Petal Pizzaz and stamped it using Pretty in Pink, Bashful Blue, and So Saffron. I used a 1/2 inch circle punch to make the flower centers, and the five petal flower punch for the leaves, in Certainly Celery. Cream 1/4 inch grosgrain ribbon is wrapped around the pot to hold it together. The sentiment from the slide out card comes from All Year Cheer II, stamped in Pretty in Pink. I think I may use this card as one of my cards for my stamp camp coming up the end of the month. Thanks for visiting!

Great Friend Birthday Card

We're celebrating my niece's birthday later today and although I'm sure I could find a suitable card in my collection for her, it gave me an excuse to use my Great Friend stamp set and Walk in the Park designer series paper that was still out from last night. This is what I came up with. It's loosely based on the Diva Coffee Break Designs challenge that I originally saw on Dannie Graves' blog. I didn't look back at the sketch while making my card, but I remembered the two horizontal pieces that I tied into my card. I finished them off with some of the new larger brads and also used the new oval punch. I hope she likes it!

Earlier today I finished putting the pictures in my mom-in-law's CD folder album. My hubby thought it was great. Now I just need to add some journaling, and then I can send it off to her. Finally, I'm a little bit ahead of the game on something! YAY!

Have a wonderful weekend, and as always, thanks for taking time out of your day to visit my blog.

Walk in the Park CD Folder Album

Before leaving for our trip to Vegas, I had started another CD folder album. This one is going to be sent to my mom-in-law for Mother's Day. Last year she moved over to the Big Island, so I thought I'd make her a present with some pictures of the family from events she missed out on being over there. Well, today while hanging out at our local coffee shop, I worked on it some more and tonight I finished it! I picked some pictures of the family from the past year to put in it, and sent them over to Walgreens to be printed. I'll add them in tomorrow once they're ready to be picked up. I used the new Walk in the Park designer series paper from the Occasions Mini Catalog that you can now order from, along with the coordinating Great Friend stamp set also featured in the new mini catty. My hubby thought it was cute, but wondered how I was going to fit all the pictures in it as it's pretty fat already! That's what the ribbon is for! :) Anyway, I hope she likes it - I enjoyed making it for her. I ordered doubles of the pictures, too, so I can add pictures to one of the CD folder albums I've already made that I'll be giving to my mom. I guess I should have ordered triples - I need one for me!! Thanks so much for stopping by today!