Another quickie post again today…

I just wanted to pop in to share a sneak peek of my new set for November…Country Shelf.

This set, along with the others, will be available Monday night at ATS!  Go check out the ATS blog for samples of each and a chance to win them!  And be sure to also check out the new Challenge blog…there’s still time to try for one of the DT spots!

This set includes the shelf, lots of things to sit on it, and some country sayings too.  I hope you like it!

I spotlighted the candle with some oval Nesties to add a little interest.

stamps- Country Shelf and Reason For The Season (holly) by Cookie Crumbs; paper- vanilla, Olive, retired SU! dp; ink- Memento Black; accessories- Copics, Oval and Double Ended Tags Nestabilities, ribbon, brads, Stickles.

Hi all!  Super quickie post today ’cause I’m exhausted!

Today’s challenge at ATS is to make a Halloween item.  Go check out the new ATS Challenge Blog for all the samples! 

This candy jar was part of my gift swap on Saturday.  I had a package of chocolate covered sunflower seeds but I didn’t know what to call them.  The only thing I could come up with was….Witches’ Warts!  LOL.  So I just had to use Griselda! 

I had the jar in my stash…I think it may have had something like marshmallow fluff inside?? 

The words were printed from the computer and then masked before I stamped the witch.

Gotta run…have a great day!

stamps- Ollie and Griselda by Cookie Crumbs; paper- white; ink- Memento Black; accessories- Copics, ribbon, jar, Scor-Tape, Chocolate covered sunflower seeds, computer for words.

Today I have another project to share from the gathering I went to on Saturday.  This is the ATC I created for our ATC swap.  If you aren’t familiar with ATC’S, it stands for Artist Trading Card.  They are 2 1/2 x 3 1/2 inches. 

I decided to make mine a bit 3D this time and since I had fun creating a stair step card recently, I figured out the measurements to make it a miniature ATC size.  Here’s what I came up with, using my Ollie and Griselda set once again.  The shoes were paper pieced and boy was I tired of cutting out those curly shoes!  LOL. 

Below is a side view so you can see the folds a little better.  I had to make 24 of these for the swap so I wanted to figure out the best measurements to avoid a lot of waste in scraps.  I pulled out some 12 x 12 cardstock and cut the base of the cards so that I started with a 3 1/2 x 6 piece of cardstock.  Then I scored the 6″ length @ 1 1/2, 3, 4, 5, and 5 1/2.  The scored lines are folded mountain and valley style to create the base.

And the last photo shows how the die cut bat was attached with a small strip of clear acetate.  I sandwiched the bottom between the cardstock and the punched border. 

Tomorrow I have one more project I made with this set…and it is yummy! 

stamps- Ollie and Griselda by Cookie Crumbs; paper- Navy, White, Celery, Black, Pumpkin, retired SU! dp- Halloween Night; ink- Memento Black, Pumpkin, Saffron, Olive; accessories- Long Rectangle Nestabilities, M.S. Drippy Goo punch, clear acetate, Cuttlebug Halloween die, Scor-Tape, yellow glitter pen, Stickles.

Hello!  :0)

I hope you had a great weekend!  I sure did.  On Saturday I attended another fun day of stamping with some of my NY and PA friends.  Fun, fun!  I have a few projects from this gathering that I will share with you this week.  And the sneak peeks for the new ATS sets for November start this week too, so be sure to check the ATS blog each day! 

This card was my shoebox project on Saturday that I prepared for everyone at my table to make.  I used my Ollie and Griselda set, along with the Retiform Grid technique that I haven’t done in a long time.  It was fun to try it out again.  I don’t remember where I first learned this technique, but I learned to make it two different ways…one by drawing in the lines with a marker and the other by sponging without drawing the lines.  I forgot to take some pictures as I was making it, so hopefully I’ll explain it well enough to understand.

First I started with a square of white cardstock.  Then I made a pattern for my grids by cutting a second square into 3 random pieces.  You do not need to make a pattern but I needed to be able to make several cards exactly alike so a pattern was very helpful.  Then I traced the pattern pieces with a Sharpie marker to get the black lines. 

Next I masked off each section, one at a time and stamped the images with black ink.  Then I masked them each again, sponging them with 3 different colors of ink.  It really doesn’t matter if you stamp first or sponge first by doing it this way but if you stamp first, then you have a little more control over where your lighter, highlighted areas are.

The second way I learned to do this technique is to not draw in any lines.  In this way, you must do your sponging first.  Mask off a section and sponge it.  Then move your mask and sponge another section.  Your sections may overlap if you want.  Continue until you fill the cardstock.  Then come back and mask the sections again, this time stamping various coordinating images in each one.  By doing it this way, it is sometimes best to choose only 2 colors of ink that blend well together to avoid the sections looking “muddied” where they overlap. 

I hope I explained it well enough and you give it a try!  It is really a fun technique which is quick and easy when you don’t have time to do a lot of coloring.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

stamps- Ollie and Griselda by Cookie Crumbs; paper- Elegant Eggplant, Not Quite Navy, Olive, Pumpkin, Black, White; ink- Memento Black, SU! Not Quite Navy, Pumpkin, Olive; accessories- Cuttlebug Halloween die and Spiderweb embossing folder, Sharpie marker, Martha Stewart Spiderweb Edge punch, brad, sponges. 

Wow…I can’t believe how time flies.  Yesterday Riley turned one!

In honor of her birthday, and to play along with the monthly DD/DDA challenge over at Splitcoast, I made this card. 

Well, I should say that I kinda screwed up the card!  The challenge this month was set by Jodi (Kharmagirl).  She asked us to paper piece our card.  check.  I got that part right. 

But last night as I was typing up this blog post I realized that I forgot all about the required element…to use fall or Christmas colors.  Ugh!  Do pink, brown and orange qualify?  LOL.  I guess not.  :0(

Oh well…I’ll share my card here anyway.   

When I first saw Christine’s Birthday Bash set, I knew the puppy with a cupcake would be perfect for this occasion…even though Riley could care less!  LOL.  And when I paper pieced the cupcake and party hat, I decided to paper piece the puppy too.  It had to be a pink puppy…because Riley’s favorite stuffed toy (that she even sleeps with) is a pink dog that we call “Pink Puppy”.  Original name, huh?  Pink Puppy lost her eyesight and can’t hear very well since she only has one ear now but she is still well loved. 

Riley must think that cupcake is mighty yummy. 

card deets:

stamps- Pixie Pets Birthday Bash by C.C. Designs; paper- White, Pink Pirhouette, Choc. Chip, Pumpkin, Regal Rose, dp- SU! Sweet Always; ink- Memento Black; accessories- Copic markers, Stickles, felt flowers, brad, ribbon.

Have you seen anything sweeter?  I love this girl!

This is Christine’s newest Swiss Pixie…Birgitta!  She is so cute with her sunflower.  I pulled out some fall papers from the DCWV Indian Summer pack and used the plaid pattern to also paper piece her dress.  There’s a new challenge blog that my friend Lisa is a member of called “Just Us Girls” and their new challenge is paper piecing…check it out!

This is a long card…not the usual A2 size card.  I started with a  6 1/4 x 7 piece of cardstock and folded it to a 6 1/4 x 3 1/2 inch card.  It will fit into a regular letter size envelope. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

stamps- Swiss Pixie Birgitta by C.C. Designs; paper- White, Choc. Chip, DCWV Indian Summer; ink- Memento Black; accessories- EK Success Falling Leaves and Dotted Waves punches, SU! Oval punch, gel pen, pearl stickers.

TGIF!  :0)

I am late posting this today but I finally had a chance to sit down and share my card for the ATS review of my new set…Reason For The Season.  We are also reviewing the Pond Life set today…you can see the great samples for both sets on the ATS blog.  I hope to play with the pond cuties soon. 

Here’s the deets and I’ll be back tomorrow with another fun project.

stamps- Reason For The Season by Cookie Crumbs; paper- Olive, white, red, dp- Be Merry Sweet Sprinkles by My Mind’s Eye; ink- SU! Olive, Memento Black; accessories- Copics, sponge, Circle/Pinking Circles and Mega Curved Rectangle Nestabilities, Stickles.

As promised, I have a new card to share today…with a new set!

Today we are previewing my new set at All That Scraps called Reason For The Season.  This set, along with the other new releases, will be available on Monday at 10 pm. 

I chose to use the “joy” image and the star.  I was going to also add one of the sentiments, but I later decided to save that for the inside. 

Be sure to check out the other samples on the ATS blog and enter for a chance to win this set. 

stamps- Reason For The Season by Cookie Crumbs; paper- White, Black, Basic Grey Figgy Pudding; ink- Memento Black, SU! Baja Breeze; accessories- Mega Curved Rectangle Nestabilities, Copic markers, Burgundy Stickles.

Is it Friday yet? 

hmmmmpf.  Anyone else get soooo frustrated when you try to deal with medical insurance?  grr.  I’ll spare you my bad mood and share a quick project…LOL.

I needed to make a quick notebook last week for a sweet little girl.  This came together rather quickly since I had the Butterfly Kitty image already colored.

And since I had two images already colored, I went ahead and made an extra card to keep on hand.  I really liked the simplicity of this. 

I hope you are having a good day!

stamps- Itzie Inkies Chasing Butterflies (Butterfly Kitty) by C.C. Designs, SU! Typeset Alpha Lower, AmyR Beach sentiments; paper- white, black, Galore, Baja; ink- Memento Black, SU! Pacific Point; accessories- Copics, Spellbinders Mega Curved Rectangles and Double Ended Tags, buttons, linen thread, ribbons, eyelets, spiral bound notebook.

Wow…it’s another beautiful day again today!  We have had a great weekend weather-wise!  I hope you are enjoying your Sunday wherever you are! 

Today is another challenge day for the SCS Dirty Dozen and Alumni.  Betty (gbedwright) challenged us with the theme of Dirty Dinners!  Yum…I enjoy checking out new recipes so I knew this was one I wouldn’t want to miss!  I also enjoy scrapping our favorite recipes in a 6×6 format and Betty’s challenge was just the incentive I needed to get another one done.  ;0)

Here’s Betty’s info:

Challenge: Dirty Dinner Recipe paper project. Share at least one tried and true prepared entree recipe in decorative paper crafting format of choice.

Restricted Element: There are NO restrictions…bring on the calories, carbs, fat grams, and sugars!!!! We can alter it on our own if need be.

Required Element: It must be something you have cooked and your family LOVED it!!!! Also, share a little bit about the history of this recipe and how it came to be.

Well, it wasn’t hard to think of which recipe to scrap!  This is one of my family’s favorite dinners.  I think I started cooking it a little over a year ago (can’t remember where it came from) and we have had it so many times that I’m surprised they aren’t sick of it yet.  LOL.  They keep requesting it and it’s so easy.  I wanted to try making the recipe in a Crock Pot shape since that is how the dish is prepared.  So here’s what I came up with…I hope it looks like a slow cooker! 

I tried printing the recipe title onto acetate to resemble the glass lid but it wasn’t turning out very well in my printer.  So I pulled out some cardstock weight vellum instead and I think it worked pretty well.  First I drew a quick pattern and then I printed the recipe on red cardstock in the size I needed.  It was cut out in a rectangle and the bottom corners were rounded.  Then I used the SU! Word Window punch to make the handles and round the edges of the black rim.  Next I traced my lid pattern over the title and cut it out.  The top edge was lightly inked with black and I added a punched circle for the handle.  A smaller circle and a square brad were used for the knob to adjust the temperature.  (I could swear I had some triangle brads but where they are I don’t have a clue!)  To finish it off, I added a small strip to the base which I’m hoping resembles the cord.  The stamped images are from my Create A Recipe and Cupcake Occasions sets. 

Here’s the recipe if you’d like to try it.  I always leave out the mushrooms since I’m the only one who cares for them but someday I might just sneak them in.  ;0) 

Italian Chicken With Cream Sauce

Ingredients:

4-6 boneless chicken breast halves

2 envelopes dry Italian salad dressing mix

1/2 cup water

8 oz. cream cheese, softened

1 can Cream of Chicken Soup

4 oz. can mushrooms, drained

16 ounces frozen broccoli cuts

fettuccine noodles or rice

Directions:

Place chicken in the crock pot. Mix the salad dressing mix with the water and pour over the chicken. Cover and cook on low for 3-4 hours (on high if frozen).

Mix the cream cheese and soup. Stir in the mushroom and pour over the chicken. Add broccoli and cook for about 1-2 hours longer on high.

Prepare noodles or rice according to package directions.

Serve chicken and cream sauce over noodles or rice.

stamps- Create A Recipe and Cupcake Occasions by Cookie Crumbs; paper- red, black, white, Wasabi, Bordering Blue, vellum cardstock, dp by Flair Designs; ink- Memento Black; accessories- SU! Word Window punch and Oval punches, circle punches, corner rounder, square brads, Copic markers, Stickles, gel pen.