Spooky house!

 

It's a start on Halloween!  I've had these generic, no-name dies in my stash for a few years now and finally broke them out! I think the glue behind the vellum ghosts adds to the creepy factor, don't you?

The "BOO"s were cut with Lawn Fawn letter dies.

Whimsical Forest - an interim kit for me.

 I opened up the Spellbinders' Whimsical Forest kit to play with until my January kit arrived (which it did on Sunday evening).  I put together 6 cards before I realized I can't find the stamp set. Where could it be?

Here is where I gave up and looked for sentiments in other stamp sets. I love these kits but the included sentiments don't often make sense for the kinds of cards I send, or the kind my friends do, either. 

This little snail riding gnome is my favorite image in the die cut pack that's part of the kit.

Sometimes I think the only way to find something is to buy it again. But with something like a stamp set, that just bugs me. At least with tools or consumables it makes a little sense. 

Ten cards, one kit--Spellbinders Heart Hands

 

I'll confess, I was not very excited about this month's kit from Spellbinders. The colors are just too muted and subtle for me.  I do like the hand dies, and will be using them again. But I need some cards to give away as a set for a late Christmas present so I opened this one up and proceeded to copy the examples provided almost exactly.  Then I copied a couple of them from a user on YouTube (thanks, Stamping with Jill). Then I made a few "pile on" cards. 

I don't know if the person I am giving these to can use a bunch of note cards that say basically, "you are beautiful, great, etc." but that seems to be the theme of a lot of card kits these days.  If I want to make birthday, sympathy or thank you cards I need to look elsewhere for the sentiments.

One more for the swans!

Another card from the Spellbinder's card kit, "Golden Swan", which was the February 2019 kit of the month.

Spellbinders Kit of the Month for May 2019 -- two more!

There is just so much to work with in this kit that I went on and did two more! I was pleased to remember that I had copper "bugs" in my die cut cup on my desk, so those came out to be added. On the second card I used the birds, flowers, and flourishes from the older small die of the month kit called "Little Birdie".  On both cards, the sentiment came from the ephemera pack or the included journaling cards.

I used Nuvo drops in copper, vintage purple and Dream Drops in soft pink. 

Does coffee give you wings, too?

Yes, I confess, I just couldn't wait to give my coffee cup wings.  The coffee cup die is from Simon Says Stamp, and the wings are from Spellbinders.

This was from the "use it up" spree I had back in March. I love the polka dot envelope I made to coordinate with it.

Thanks for everything, you all.

Like many other people, I am home, hiding from other people. I go out once every 2 weeks for groceries, and once this last week I ordered a take-out meal from an actual restaurant.  I'll admit it, I was tired of my own cooking.

I am so grateful to everyone who is making social distancing possible. Personally, I'm glad I can work from home, and still order stuff online and have it delivered to my home.  So, yay US Postal service.  They are being threatened, so everyone do your bit and buy stamps!

This week I made 2 thank you cards using newly acquired dies. 

I wasn't going to get the Spellbinders' Truckin Through the Seasons die because I already have the Queen & Co truck die.  But I'm a subscriber to Spellbinders' Small Die of the Month kit, and this month's die set are add-ons to their truck die.  Sure, they can be used alone, but what's the fun in that?

So, with the new truck die (and additional tailgate sentiments), I made a thank you card.  I embossed the tree background with a Darice embossing folder, added flowers to the bed of the truck, and, my specialty, rhinestone tail lights.

Then, I made a quickie card using the patterned paper that was lying around on my table.  The birds are unbranded, and the "thanks" word is from Lawn Fawn.  The birds have the tiniest rhinestone eyes!  

Funny thing, I watch a lot of YouTube videos, and several of them are about assembling trucks. There are videos on both the Queen & Co. trucks and the Spellbinders truck.  For some reason, no one is using the words "tailgate" or "fender" .  Several of the crafters have called the tailgate a license plate, and more than one have referred to fenders as wheel covers. I can't wait to hear what they are going to call the trailer hitch on the bumper.

My dad used to yell at the TV, now I'm yelling at YouTube. Ok, so maybe I have been home alone too long. I'm not going anywhere and YouTube can't hear me.

Best get the bunnies outta my system.

Yes, bunnies again!  The bunny die is from Spellbinders, "24 Carrot", and the paper is an old one from American Crafts.  I must have gotten it from Tuesday Morning, then.

More bunnies!

I'm at home but I'm still working 40 hours a week. There's not any EXTRA time for card making, but I did put another bunny card together.

This bunny, and his big carrot are cut with Spellbinder's Small Die of the Month for March 2020 called "24 Carrot".  The scalloped panel behind the carrot is from an older Spellbinders die, big scalloped ovals, large, I think.

The pattered paper is old and the cover is gone, so I don't know what it is. The gems I stuck on are from Amazon.  The card base is part of the old Paper Studios set that I'm trying to use up. And finally, the bunny stamped on the envelope is from an old Lawn Fawn set. The inside says "Happy Easter", of course.

Bunnies!

Bunnies!  These bunnies are part of the March Spellbinders'Small Die of the Month.  They call it a kit sometimes, but it's really just the dies. And what dies they are!

This is the first time since I've been subscribing that I've used the dies in the same month I got them. Heck, it's the same week, too!

The paper is left over from a Simon Says Stamp kit from several years ago.  I seem to recall there were bunny peeps in that one.

I have had the photo realistic grass in my stash since my scrap booking days, about 10 years ago.

I was so inspired that I brought out some paper I've had that long and used some of it up, too.  Actually it's leftovers from the "throwing them together" post from the last time. Who am I kidding?

I made the envelope with the printed side inside so that it would be easy to address and put through the mail.

 

Back to flowers, again

When all else fails, crafty-inspiration-wise, go back to flowers.

These flowers were created from My Favorite Things' Stitched Flowers Dies. The centers on most of the flowers are Nuvo drops.

The greenery is cut with Paper Smooches' Foliage 1 and 2 dies. The Darice embossing folder with the text has been in my stash for a while, and the lumpy embossing folder is from Sizzix. The sentiments have been in my desk cup for a while also.

So, over the weekend I ordered ANOTHER Christmas card kit.  While I was on the site I also ordered more embossing folders and a few small die sets.  One of the sets I ordered is for layered flowers, and since I can't wait for them I pulled out these cuties from MFT and started layering them up. I hope I don't burn out before the new set gets here.

The card kit was ordered because I couldn't figure out any other way to get the particular die that comes with it any other way. I'm a little obsessed, I think. I took a few minutes to finally put the parts of the "Merry Everything" kit back in it's box, where it can rest until next time I need to do a bunch of Christmas cards.  I have enough for the next 3 years already, but who's counting?

Maps make great masculine cards.

I used up the rest of the Florida map pages from my very old 12 x 12 paper pad. I even cut out one of North Carolina, since my brother owns a cabin there. Fun fact :  the mountains in North Carolina are so full of Floridians in the summer that it is sometimes referred to as "Upstairs Florida". 

 

I used up the last of the navy card bases from the Paper Studios card set, and cut both the maps and red mats using a Sizzix rectangle die with perforated edges.  The sentiment is from Spellbinder's Favorite Fonts sentiments which was from the December small die of the month.

I can always use more "thank you" cards.

The geotag die is from an old Mama Elephant die set called "Index Card".  It is roughly positioned at the small town I grew up in, Bartow.

Working in the archives

Just kidding, I only mean that I'm working with stuff so old that it could be in the archives.

In this case, I'm pretty sure I got the paper pad at Tuesday Morning in 2014 or earlier.  The front cover is gone, so I cannot say what brand or pad it is. I have been hording the sheet with the map on it.  The map is most of the east coast of the US but I'm only interested in Florida. The yellow background is from the same set.

I used a Mama Elephant die set called "Index Card" for the geotag, and Spellbinders "Favorite Fonts" for the sentiment. It is from the December 2019 Small Die of the Month Club.  Fun fact: I've subscribed to the Small Die of the Month Club for several months and have only used one of the dies before this. That was the snowflake die from November. The rectangles are from a set from Kat Scrappiness.

The card base/envelope set is navy blue, from a big box I got for Christmas in 2017 or 2016. It's from Paper Studio, so someone must have visited Hobby Lobby that year.

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?