Starting early on Christmas, for once.

Yes, for once I'm going to have at least some of my Christmas cards done before Thanksgiving. That last minute scramble may mean cool things coming out of the craft room, but it also means the cards go out the week before Christmas. That in turn means they will spend less time on refrigerators and get trashed even sooner. I'm realistic enough to know they don't get saved like precious works of art, so there you have it.

These cards have very little coloring and no fussy cutting, so they go together quickly. I did several of each design.

The green card features the dog from Avery Elle's "Happy Howidays" set. 

The red card below features the snowman from The Alley Way Stamps' Melt Your Heart Out" set from a a couple of years ago.

Both also feature My Favorite Stamps' "Hand Lettered Christmas" greeting in gold embossing. 

Believe it or not, my new Halloween stamp is coming via FedEx later today, so I may even get a few of those done before the spooky holiday, too. Shh, don't tell anyone, I only bought it for the frog and the pumpkins. 

Call anytime. Really.

So, this week I played with my new Distress Oxide Inks. The first thing I did was this tri-colored panel. I used a Gina Marie die for the panel. I played around with a lot of different white die-cut sentiments, but ended up liking these simple palm trees the best. The palm trees are one of the no-name dies from China that I recently got. More on that story later.

I used a sentiment from an older set from The AlleyWay Stamps.

I have decided that I will go and use most of the stamp sets that I HAD to have, but have never used. And to make the challenge even greater, at least one stamp should come from a set that is no longer for sale. Then it will truly be archaeological.

Of course, I haven't stopped buying new stamps, what do you think I'm capable of here?

Hey, fishy fish!

So, for my next white on white adventure I used these rainbow trout dies from Gina Marie Designs. I die cut a bunch of them and glued them all down. The center fish is colored with Copic markers and covered in sparkly Wink of Stella.

The sentiment is from an old Alleyway Stamps set called "Gill Friend". I mounted this panel onto some brown card stock, then put that on a top-fold Kraft card base.

As I'm gazing at it, I'm thinking it could have been a pretty good masculine card except for that sentiment. Oh well.

My deer friend, and my new toy.

I did it and I'm happy that I did. I gave away my semi-crippled* Silhouette Cameo and bought a Brother Scan N Cut 2. For cutting out stamped images, wow. Just wow. I can't tell you how much easier this is. But I can show you the first images I cut with it!

The tree, the stump and both critters were stamped with Versafine onto Bristol card stock, cut with the ScanNCut2, and then colored with my Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers. The background is from a 6x6 pad of impressionist type images that I got several years ago at Tuesday Morning.

The tree, stump, and critters are from The Alley Way Stamps. Gosh I miss them.

* For the curious, my Silhouette Cameo got it's USB port fried, so all designs to be cut had to be saved to a memory card. Plus, to cut stamped images I had jump through several hoops first, and even then only one side of the page would cut correctly. I had to guess if it was going to be the right or left side today.

You've got this.

Sometimes I know exactly what I want to do, and sometimes I struggle with using the ONE thing I started out to use.  Sometimes the ONE thing is the only thing that really doesn't work on a card.

These birds from The Alley Way Stamps' set "Bird Brain" have been in my colored images box for over a year now, just waiting for the inspiration to strike. I also wanted to use the frames from Lawn Fawn (Flirty Frames) with a mirrored center piece behind the birds. The shiny silver card stock centers just didn't look right, and I lost the impact of the green striped paper, too.

Sometimes it isn't what you thought it was going to be. This is one of those times. LOL at me.

Oh, the other idea I had was to use the "You've got this" sentiment with coffee, somehow. Scratch that, for now.

More flowers

Yes, more flowers. And brace yourselves, because even more are coming! I got my order from Jo-Ann's yesterday with 2 new old sets from Woodware with doodle-y type daisies and sunflowers.

In the meantime, enjoy more messy water colored flower cards:

The flowers are from The Alleyway Stamps Petal Pushers and Wispy Wishes. The "thanks" is cut with a die from Paper Smooches.

Happy bird-day!

Not much more to say about this one. It's a great big watercolor plop with the chicken from The Alley Way Stamp's "With Wondering Awe", and the sentiment from TAWS' "Birds of a Feather".

Happy birthday, February kids!

Ok, I'm bad. I make cards and didn't have a single one to send out for a birthday. Except a really bad one I made in 2010 when I first started. I should throw it out, but I want to keep it around to show myself how far I've come. Yeah, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Anyway, I got a set of Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers and I've been going to town playing with them. Then I pulled out some Distress minis and water colored with them, too. The turtle is from The Alley Way Stamps "It's My Birthday", and the papers are so old they have whiskers.

My desk is such a mess that I have been working in this little space in front. It's about an 8" by 7" spot. Time for a major clean up before I get my spring card kit and the madness starts again.

Sort of Valentine's Day (ish)

Well, it's as close to a Valentine as I'm going to go this year.  That's all I'm saying.

Happy new year!

You know, I can't get it together to give my coworkers their Christmas gifts before they leave for their Christmas vacations. Really, I do need to get it together.

Anyway, they are all getting these quicky new year's cards instead of a Christmas card.

Each one is a little different, but they were all done with the same 6x6 paper pad, and die-cut numbers from Lawn Fawn's Finley's 123s. The accent critters are all from The Alley Way Stamps. 

The "happy new year" and "hello there" are heat embossed in white detail embossing powder.

Here's something I learned. If your embossing is not crisp, don't blame the static until you check your stamp. Mine was fuzzy from the baby wipe I had used on it previously. Go figure.

Happy New Year, everyone!

Special Gold Wishes

Today is the last day of the Holiday Coffee Lovers Blog Hop. For this last day I have another teacup card, and a bonus card that is a variation on my last post's card.

The cups are both The Alley Way Stamps' Tea Par-Tea or Swee-Tea. The holly leaves and berries are Paper Smooches dies, as are the scalloped frames.

The "Merry Christmas" sentiment is from a Paper Smooches Christmas Words die. Wowza, nobody warned me how hard it is to glue down letters that tiny!!!! I thought it might be easier today, but, no.

Today's Christmas music is old-school. Elvis, baby! 

Happy Christmas Tea

It's still Tea Day for another hour and a half, so I'm just in under the clock on this one!

The teacup is paper pieced from The Alley Way Stamps' Tea Par Tea set and coated with Glossy Accents. The little tag is from TAWS' new set called Swee Tea. I still am bummed that they are going out of business. The tag has a little piece of baker's twine that goes "into" the cup.

The scalloped frame and the words are my newest toys, I mean dies, from Paper Smooches. The letters, and the tea tag are covered with Wink of Stella. I finished it off by adding the white dashed lines around the edges.

Today's Christmas music is Al Jarreau. He's so smooth.

Warm robot wishes.

Today is day 3 of the Holiday Coffee Lover's Blog Hop. For today's submission, I have a very skinny robot/alien holding a large cup of cocoa with marshmallows.

The robot is from The Alley Way Stamps' Oogles set (2nd day in a row!), the coffee cup is from Your Next Stamp, and the greeting is from Lawn Fawn's Winter Fox. The white panel is mounted on a gold glitter panel, and his horns are gold glittered too (Wink of Stella gold). The snowflakes are die cut with Paper Smooches' snowflake die from glitter card stock. The robot's eye is coated in Glossy Accents.

Well, tomorrow it's back to my day job at the library. I may or may not have another card. Wish me luck!

Today's Christmas music is Asleep at the Wheel's Merry Texas Christmas You All. Fine music.

Let's get merry!

Today is Day 2 of the Holiday Coffee Lovers Bloghop.

I just love the little monster from TAWS' Oogles set. I masked off his horns and added the "antlers" and a cocoa mug, colored him up, cut him out, and put him on this very simple landscape background.  The sentiment is from an older set by Hero Arts. I fell in love with the typewriter font and sentiments on it, and I use it at least once every year now. I used my white gel pen to add snow to the trees and a few marshmallows to his hot drink.

Stamps used: TAWS' (The Alley Way Stamps) Oogles, TAWS' Penguins on Parade, Your Next Stamp's Perk Up! and Hero Arts'CL463 Get Merry.

Dies used: Lawn Fawn's Forest Hill border and Lawn Fawn's Puffy Stitched Cloud border.

Tomorrow is national cocoa day, so I'm just barely ahead of the curve here. Can't say I've ever done that with a card before.

Today's Christmas music is Brian Setzer's Orchestra -- Rocking Rudolph.  Who knew the Flintstone's theme music would make a great Christmas song?

Peppermint Everything!

Yay! It's time for the Holiday Coffee Lover's Bloghop! I'm actually on time for it this time, so here we go. I copied this design more or less, from Holly Endress. The coffee mugs, puffs of steam, and the small holly sprig are from The Alley Way Stamps' set Breakfast Club. The large sprig, candy cane and sentiment are from TAWS' Mistletoe Kisses set. I topped it off with a few Cranberry sequins from Pretty Pink Posh. I don't know if you can tell,but the cups are paper pieced, and the holly and candy cane are stamped, fussy-cut and applied on top. I used paper from an old My Mind's Eye Christmas 6x6 pad.

True story : I'm obsessed with most things peppermint. It is so yummy! Several years ago I found this  mint coffee in Target, and it was my favorite mint coffee until I discovered the mocha mint sugar-free creamer.

This year I saw these. What can I say? I haven't even cooked any yet but I have eaten a good-sized chunk of the dough. Yum.

Be your old wonky self!

Another too-late coffee card for the Fall Coffee Lover's blog hop.

I did some masking for this one. I masked the coffee cups one by one in order to stamp them in a stack, and I masked the original face of the monster so I could use this crazy face on him. Then I used my Spectrum Noir and Copics to color them.

Here's a tip for you all. The tip-to-tip blending trick doesn't really work all that well with the Spectrum Noirs. I'm just saying those purples are hard to work with. That's all.

I am definitely wonky before my coffee, so I can relate.

I used stamps from The Alley Way Stamps: Breakfast Club, Oogles, Face It, and Unique Peek.

Coffee gives me wings to fly

Once again I'm a day late (or 3) and a dollar shy.  I finished my coffee cards for the Fall Coffee Lover's Blog Hop too late to join in the fun. Hiss, boo on me.

My first card was water colored with my Gansai Tambi watercolors, and a cheapo set from Michaels. The dragonfly is painted with the beautiful iridescent colors from the cheapo set, and the coffee cup is painted from the Gansai Tambi.

Here's a closeup of the iridescent dragonfly:

After I saw this closeup I went back in with a multliner and drew the outlines again where I had over-painted.  The glitter spots were made with some liquid glitter glue that was a gift last Christmas from a coworker. Somehow I expected the glue to dry in dimensional dots, but no, they went flat on me. Oh well. It's interesting to be able to work with glitter again. I couldn't do that when making cards for Operation Write Home.

The stamps are from the Alley Way Stamps, Fly By and Breakfast Club.

On an orange fence

The entire reason for making this card was to use the picket fence die I got from Simon Says Stamps over 4 weeks ago. Actually, I think I got it just before I went on my cruise in August.

Since I never have enough birthday cards, and I just happened to have a cute birthday themed turtle stamp set (It's My Party from The Alley Way Stamps), I was off and stamping. And die cutting, and Copic coloring, and gluing. I couldn't help myself, I had to use the googly eyes on the turtle, too.

The inside greeting is "Hip hip hooray!". Simple, and it does the job, right?

Watercolor fun

Well, I am back to playing with my watercolors again. Watercolors are so much fun, and very forgiving. I love playing with them.

The first card was a belated birthday card for my sister, and the second one is just because. I chose the "Oops!" sentiment for the first scene since it looks like the maraca is falling on the short cactus. Unfortunately the explanation point looks like an "I", so it appears to say "oopsi". Oh well. 

Both are from stamp sets from The Alley Way Stamps; the first card is from Cha Cha Cha and the second one is from Oinkers. Both are delightful sets.

Water coloring for amateurs!

I gotta tell ya, I LOVE to watercolor images. It looks good no matter how you plop it down there.  I waited to get this cactus and roadrunner image from The Alley Way Stamps, (Cha Cha Cha set) and boy is it a lot of fun to put faces on the cactus. Yes, there is more to come later. (TAWS' Neener Neener again).

I used my Gansai Tambi watercolors for this image, and you can't tell by the picture, but the ground is actual metalic gold. Oh my! I need to work out better shading for the ground, but still I think it looks so cool!

The sentiment is from TAWS' Chick Magnet set. It is so much fun!

Another 2 previously unused sets that are now used. Does it matter that I ordered them and got them after I set my goal? I guess I can make up my own rules now, right?