It's May, it's May, the lovely month of May

 

Here, I was having fun color-dipping the layers of this coneflower die from Honey Bee Stamps.  The layers are cut with Spellbinders' Fluted edge dies and the rusty red mat is embossed with a Spellbinders' embossing folder.  I the "hello" die is from MFT, called "Hello There".  Who needs the "there" part anyway??

The card below is made with one of my 5 x 6.5 card bases, using paper from a Michael's 12 x12 pad.  The lovely butterfly is from Honey Bee Stamp's Lovely Layers Bugs.  I'm really loving that die set.  You can't tell by the photo, but the wings are cut from holographic silver cardstock. 

I did a sheetload of cards, sort of.

Well, I did it, sort of. I created the base layout of the 12 cards using the guide provided by Alicia of Call Me Crafty Al.  This layout is the January 2020 sheetload.  I used more paper from the Jen Hadfield 12 x 12 pad that I did for my last attempt at a sheetload.

I failed a little when it came to doing the actual focal point.  I think you are supposed to do them all alike, or close to alike. I just couldn't stick a sentiment stamp in the white square and call it done.  Since I have a bunch of pre-colored and cut critters, I went through my boxes and pulled out the ones that went with the green and yellow backgrounds. Of course I had to go rooting around in the stamp sets to find appropriate sentiments for the images.

The first three images and sentiments are from Simon Says Stamp, Sugarpea Designs' Cuddly Cacti.  

These two are also Simon Says Stamp, only this time they are Picture Book dies. I messed around with the teeth a good bit to get them like I liked them.  The sentiments were in a dish I keep on my desk. I think they are SSS also.

Next up we have the die from Concord & 9th, "By your side". On the first one I used the outline that cuts with the birds, and on the second one I just used the birds. On the second one I also popped up the wings with a little foam tape. Again, the sentiment strips have been in my side bowl for a while.

These next two use bird dies from Paper Smooches.

The sentiment for this one is from The Alleyway Stamps, one of their bird sets.

This funny guy is from My Favorite Things' Monster Sized.  He's been in my critter box for years.

This dragonfly die is one I picked up in Michael's a while back and had never used.  It comes in 2 parts, one to cut and one to emboss. Both of the parts wanted to bend out of shape when I tried to get it off the packaging. I guess that's what I get for leaving in in there for so long.

Next up, the bee is from Spellbinder's The Laurel and the Bee set. The sentiment is from My Favorite Things.

So, what do you think, does this qualify as a sheetload?

Scream! It's Valentine's Day!

Can you tell I have a bad attitude about this? I still have a bunch of stuff in that Simon Says Stamp kit from a year ago, but I am sick of lovey cards. And it's not even February yet. I'm going to give them away, of course, but still, I'm tired of them.

So, I decided to make cards that just say "Happy Valentine's Day". Well, the only sentiments in my stash that say that are mixed sets that cover everything.  I decided to go snarky and pulled out more of these My Favorite Things' "Monster Sized" and I cut up the sentiment that said "Scream! It's your birthday" and cobbled this one together.

It's missing something. More hearts, maybe? I'm still working out if I'll decorate the inside or not.

Cheers, again!

Here we have a couple more cards from the December My Favorite Things' card kit, "A Good Time to Wine".  All die cutting, no coloring. The only stamping was on the sentiment for the second one.

Wine some more?

More wine themed cards using the December card kit from My Favorite Things, A Good Time to Wine.

I made an attempt to use my little Foldio light box to take these pictures. I had to adjust the lighting a lot in Photoshop to keep them from looking dim and sad. I have got to get better lighting for that thing, or give up and get a real light box.

Happy New Year, everyone!

To your continued greatness!

I have a new card kit from My Favorite Things, "A Good Time to Wine". It has the prettiest sparkle gold paper I've ever worked with. OMG it doesn't shed glitter!!  So, what did I do? I added glimmer paste, which actually does shed a little.

The kit contains a shaped bubble that creates the body of the wine glass (die included), so I filled it with a small amount of white wine colored beads. The wine glass is cut from some of the Mercury Glass paper I've been using for Christmas cards. I love that stuff.  The background is an embossed swirly pattern that I've only used horizontally to indicate wind before, but it's very festive here vertically, right?  I used Tonic moonstone glimmer paste through a spotty stencil. Stingy old me only used tiny strips of the gold glitter paper on the side and bottom of the card.  The sentiment was gold embossed on a kraft strip, and the card base is kraft, also.

I have notice that I only do 4 or 5 cards from a kit before I "quit".  My goal is to do more than 5 with this one.  I may even go back to the Festive Flamingos and do more there, too.  I think they may still be in the bag. Except for the stamps and the dies, that is. Oh who am I kidding, it has been broken down into components into the stash at this point.

Oh, and those beads?  Well, they are just barely a little too thick for the shaker pouch. I had a little trouble gluing that glass down flat to the card. My bad, I know that sequins are better for shaker cards for a reason. Oh well, live and learn.

Green for the Season! With some gold thrown in, too!

I made a lot of green and gold tags, and wanted to feature one on a card. This specialty paper from Tonic is made from cotton, and is very soft, with hints of gold under the green. I love it and you will be seeing more of it in coming projects!

I didn't embellish the tag, I just put the "fa la la" and the music over top of it. The "fa la la" die is Simon Says Stamp (I think, I can't find the packaging), the tag is My Favorite Things' Tagbuilder Bluebrint 5, and the music is something I got at Michael's quite a few years ago.

My stash has reached the point where if I don't label things, I forget where and when I got them and exactly what brand they are. Dies, unlike stamps, look a lot alike under the packaging. Is this my subconscious telling me to stop buying stuff?  If so, no thanks.

The deer tag is one of several I'm working on. I'm loving the shiny gold "Mercury Light" paper.  It's also Recollections from one or 2 years ago. Also, it's hard to see in the photo, but the "fa la la" is covered with glittery shimmer paste from Tonic.  It's messy and fun.

Layered snowflakes will always be fun.

Last year I got a card kit from My Favorite Things that had layered snowflake dies. While I only made one card with them last year, I made a bunch of the snow flakes and put them aside.

Today I used round tag dies and made a bunch of tags with the layers of snowflakes. What could be more fun?  The sentiment is from an old Alley Way set, stamped and silver embossed on a mini tag from MFT.  The white panel is embossed with snowflakes, with a folder that has been in my stash for years.

Nontraditional colors can be fun, right?  I will decide later if these shall remain tags or if they will go on cards.

Deck the Howls

Today, 2 new cards featuring the cute Christmas dogs from My Favorite Things' Deck the Howls set. The dogs are so cute, but I learned this time that when using Copic markers, the paper REALLY matters. For these cute dogs, I stamped them with MFT's Extreme Black ink on MFT's Smooth White card stock. It came in the flamingo kit, and it feels wonderful. But, I won't do that again as the Copic colors bled, a lot. I  had stamped them 2 times, so the next group will be some other color medium, like pencils. This card stock will make great bases, though.

Anyway, for the red card, I die cut the word Joy from 3 different fonts, and had the dogs (and a bone) coming through the "O"s.  On the green card, I used the new free word die, and added a couple of dogs. I will stamp an appropriate dog-themed sentiment on the inside.

Yes, another flamingo card! This flamingo is colored with my Polychromos pencils on some very inexpensive children's watercolor paper from Walmart. I like it because it has a pretty good texture for colored pencils.

I love flamingos! Here they come!

Yes, it's the Festive Flamingos from My Favorite Things' October card kit. I was (virtually) standing in line when these became available earlier this week. I ordered on Tuesday and they came on Thursday.

I wanted to get one of these made up as soon as I could, so I basically copied this design from their website. Thank you, Rachel Alvarado for your simple and charming layout.

I was in such a hurry to get this one done that I forgot to add the white gel pen highlights. Oh well, we'll get back to these.

Side note: I find it kind of hard to work with Barbie purples and pinks for Christmas. I think I may save these tiny plaid papers for something else.

The flamingos are Copic colored, and the card is tinted with Distress Oxide ink in Spun Sugar and Faded Jeans. The spots are Nuvo Jewel Drops in Periwinkle.

I'm a big fan of the flamingos. Did you know that all the flamingos at Lion Country Safari are named for presidents?

Another fun flamingo fact: their color depends on their diet. The more shrimp they eat, the pinker they get!  The flamingos at Lion Country Safari are well fed:

Let's ink up a book!

I took a page from an old book, and inked it up with Distress Oxide inks and a stencil, then cut out a raggedy panel with a die.

I really love the look of text backgrounds, but sometimes I find myself trying to read them. What's up with that?  It's like always noticing the tune in the elevator and trying to identify it.

The butterfly, dragonfly, and botanicals are from My Favorite Things' Fluttering Friends, and are colored with my Polychromos pencils and cut with my Brother Scan N Cut 2. I finished it off with a circle die cut and some Nuvo drops in gold.

Now, back to more Christmas cards when no one is looking.  I'll share them all in November/December.

It's your hippo day!

Today's card is a simple card with lavender hippos. Why not? The hippos are colored with a combination of Copic markers and Spectrum Noir markers. I really don't like the Spectrum Noir purples. They are very hard to blend.

The hippos are My Favorite Things' Happy Hippos. The yellow dots are Tonic Nuvo drops. I've never had issues with the bottles before, but I guess you need to start somewhere. I think lumpy dots give the card character, don't you?  That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
 

Pig humor

Today I challenged myself to use up some supplies or throw them out already. So, going through my box of pre-colored images, I found this cute pink pig. I think I may have done this 2 years ago when I was at my brother's house. I remember that because I bought this stamp set at the store in the town next to his, Eustis. I colored him using my sister-in-law's Crayola colored pencils. 

So, use it or toss it?  I don't want to toss it, so I started the search through the stash for the paper that would make it look better.

In real life the pinks do not clash. I wish I could photograph colors better. Sigh.

I also used the current sketch challenge at My Favorite Things, Sketch 400.

Here's the inside, with a cute flying pig peeking out from behind another strip of patterned paper. 

The stamp set is Hog Heaven from My Favorite Things, and the background paper is from the MFT set, Roses All Over.

I did end up throwing away most of a pack of paper from October Afternoon because I realized I pull it out and try to use it often and end up putting it back on the shelf. Now that it's gone I won't have it cluttering up the paper tray. It's not like I don't have 50 others to look at. Really.

Birthday Gang

Well, it started off as an entry into a challenge, but before it was done it disqualified itself.

All of these critters had been previously colored and cut, and were sitting in my "critter bowl". All of them are from various My Favorite Things stamp sets. The challenge, from MFT, was to use stamps from 3 different sets. No problem there. I had most of it glued together when I realized I had used another company's sentiments. These are from TAWS. Also, that tall spiky grass is from a die I cannot ID by company. And, I'm sure the paper is from Lawn Fawn.

Oh well, when I mix it up I really mix it up. I should have put the shark in, after all.

The giraffe, lion and monkey are from MFT's Sweet Safari. The frog is from Witch Way Is the Candy, the llama is from Llama Love, and the moose is from Warm and Fuzzy Friends. Most of the animals were colored with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers, except the llama, which I really don't remember how he's colored.

I still have a lot of critters in the bowl. I have room for another short critter there on the left, so I may be back with a revision, later. Watch this space.

Wild about it!

So, here's a sketch challenge I can really get into. Pretty simple, actually. Here's the sketch:

And here's my entry:

Yes, it's pretty bland, but I kind of like the softness of it.  The water colored zebra is from My Favorite Things' Sweet Safari, and the main panel is MFT's Gift Box Coverup.  The heart is part of a very old set from Little B.

The window panels and the heart are lightly inked with Distress Oxide ink in Worn Lipstick, on the bottom halves. The whole panel is mounted on black and white zig-zag patterned paper from MFT.

Here come the Valentines! Almost.

Yes, I have climbed up onto the Valentine wagon, sort of. Although I'm kind of wondering why. I presume I'll mail a small amount of these and donate the rest, somewhere.

The monsters above are from My Favorite Things' Monster Sized, again. Yes, I DO have a lot of them already colored with Prismacolor or Polychromos pencils, all cut up with my Brother Scan N Cut 2, ready to go, so why not?  A strip of black and white striped paper, a couple of die cuts, some ink, and it's good to go!

The cat below is from Tim Holt's Crazy Cats collection. A bright pink cat? Why not? He is colored with my Spectrum Noir markers, and mounted on double stitched hearts (diecuts from Gina Marie Designs), The sentiment, and striped paper accents are from My Favorite Things. 

Are these really Valentines? Probably not, but what the heck. They will have an appropriate "Happy Valentines' Day" greeting inside, to redeem them.

MFT Sketch Challenge 367

Wow, 2 sketch challenges in a row! I must be on a roll here.

This is for My Favorite Things Sketch Challenge 367. Here is the sketch:

I used My Favorite Things' Meant to Bee stamp set, with a beehive, clouds, and bees. I used a kraft card base of 100 lb Neenah Desert Storm card stock, and used an old background stamp from Red Rubber. The bees and beehive are colored with Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers. The white frame is from MFT also. The background is stamped directly on the kraft with Versamark. This background stamp is a few years old, and isn't big enough to cover the front of an A2 sized card. That's why I was excited to see MFT had a full-sized honeycomb background. You could say that it was a companion stamp to the Meant To Bee set.

Here's my whine:

I tried to get a couple of MFT items in mid-December, but I hesitated and they went out of stock. But wait-- they are in stock over at Simon Says Stamp! So I ordered from them on December 9th.  That was a big mistake since they were out of stock on at least 2 of the MFT items I ordered from them. Did their online store mention this? No. Long story short, they cancelled 2 of my items, and the ones they didn't cancel came in on January 11th.  Yes, one of them was a Christmas stamp, which I'm betting wasn't one of the ones they were holding up for. So, that'll show me, don't be so impatient or it will come back to bite me. My impulse purchases don't always work out.

Fun fact:

My brother is a beekeeper and I got the BEST honey from him, ever.

Catitude, part 2

Just a quick card for the latest MFT sketch challenge, # 365. I did it from memory, and got it all backwards, of course.

Most of the cats are from My Favorite Things' Cool Cat, except for one from Catitude. The sentiment is from Catitude, also.

I used the inserts from MFT's Tiny Tags for the cat squares, and used MFT Blueprints 27 for the scalloped panel and sentiment strip.

I may try this one again. Next time I'll do something with coloring, LOL.

Believe in cocoa.

I might just sneak in under the deadline for this one. This cup of cocoa is from a die from Gina Marie Designs, as is the die that I cut the "Believe" from. The reindeer is sporting Doodlebug Erie Eyes. This will be my second entry into the Winter Coffee Lover's Bloghop. 

The second card is a bonus, designed with patterned paper and MFT's Blueprints 27 dies.The greeting is from MFT's "Snowfall of Blessings" sentiment set. 

Coffee Lover's Blog Hop! It's here!

Yay, it's here! Let the coffee/tea/cocoa themed cards begin, again!

Here's my first card for the bog hop:

Another cute example of My Favorite Thing's Polar Bear Pals, on a background of Lawn Fawn's Let's Bokeh in the Snow paper. The inside sentiment reads: Have a Beary Merry Christmas.