November's Challenge Winner

Hello Everyone,

I hope your Thanksgiving was a day filled with good food, family, friends and a sense of thanks for being able to share these things.

Moving forward to the challenge.  First of all allow me to congratulate those of you that opted to participate in this challenge.  Your creations were unique and I was impressed with them all.  However as I mentioned in my challenge post a minimum of 10 participants was needed to keep the challenge open.  Unfortunately, I only had five participants.

I didn't want this challenge to be wasted and I know the effort, time and patience required to follow a tutorial therefore, I decided to show my appreciation by awarding a consolation prize to one winner chosen by the random number generator.

THAT WINNER IS ENTRY NUMBER 3......CHERYL!!!  YEAH CHERYL!

Please contact me with your mailing information so that I can get these goodies in the mail to you.

SNEAK HINT:
December's Challenge will soon be posted and I hope everyone will take part.  During this time of year I am usually hanging out with family and friends sipping hot cocoa with a few marshmellows in front of the fireplace, or gathering in the kitchen to bake my favorite German Chocolate Cake with coconut icing.  My bowls are filled with fruit and peppermint throughout the house.  On the warmer days we might take a stroll to the city park to see if the lake has frozen yet. I find it amazing how the water becomes a bright teal color just before it freezes and reaches that deep blue.  On these days you can hear the laughter of the children playing and enjoying the white blanket of snow unaware that their noses and cheeks are now more pink and rosy resembling Santa Claus himself.  Yep, there's lots of activities happening this time of year. The more I thought and envisioned these events, it became obvious that..............

.....for December's Challenge we will color it CHOCOLATE plus 2....look for more details when I post December's challenge.

Again congratulations to November's winner.  Before you leave please take the time to tell me what you think or thought about the tutorial and my challenges.

Your comments are always appreciated....as always..
                      find beauty in all things and then go create.

This has been a great weekend and I hate to see it end but if I want to keep scrappin' then I must keep working.  But I managed to hit the Mother Lode today. A co-worker decided to give up scrapbooking and was selling all her goodies at very reasonable prices and I couldn't pass up a good deal so I ended up with stuff that I must now find a place for..Ummm gonna be hard to do, so I'll do that later.  I entered three challenges this weekend and below are my creations for these challenges plus a card or two that I did on a whim. Well I have a few so lets get started before my bedtime pops up...yes I have a bedtime and I usually stick to it rather well.  At my age I make sure I get the recommended eight hours and sometimes I can throw in an additional hour or two. Well here are the cards:

I created this card to meet the Tuesday Color challenge over at "The Outlawz."  The colors were white, lime green and izmir purple with a November Novelity (the novelty was to add a flower).  Finding izmir purple was a lot harder than I thought it would be especially since regardless to whom I asked they had no clue what color izmir purple was and I wasn't sure either, but finally I found it and then I prayed that I would recognize lime green when I saw it. 

This is another challenge from The Outlawz.  This challenge comes from "Wednesday Sketch Challenge" group and I really like this group. The sketches are neat and you can play with so many different ideas. The plaid paper I used for this card I found at Tuesday morning for $3.00 and fell in love with it.  While I would have used it for a masculine card I think it worked well with this particular stamp.  I used copic markers to color my lady, spellbinders fancy tags, die-namic flourish die and a couple of pearl brads. 

Next is what the inside of the card looks like. I used the scraps that were left and designed the inside to follow the outside.  I ran out of plaid paper so I created a pocket with the black cardstock and then covered some red cardstock to make a tag for the pocket.

The next card although it is a Christmas card I am using for the Sketch Challenge over at Sketch Saturday.

First let me show you my take on the sketch and then the sketch.

Designer Paper Favorites

The last few cards I am sharing are just a couple of cards I wanted to make and maybe drop in the mail to a couple of friends.

As usual I created them using my favorite designer paper; Graphic 45 and Bo Bunny.  Everything these companies put out, I fall in love with.

Well this is all I have for today. I hope you enjoyed your visit and will come back often.  Don't forget to check out my challenge and perhaps take a chance on winning some wonderful prizes. 

As always "find beauty in all things" then go and create.  You're always welcome here and your comments are appreciated.

November's Challenge Is Here

Criss-Cross Card Color Challenge
It's another month so time for another challenge which I hope will fair better than my last attempt to give away goodies. For this challenge I selected a photo that had beautiful fall colors and decided that the next challenge should be inspired by these colors.  As usual my challenge is a "step-by-step" tutorial challenge, so read the rules below and join for a chance to win some really neat goodies.

1. To enter this challenge you must first be a follower of my blog
2. No backlinks are permitted
3. Select your colors from the photo shown below for your card
4. Print the tutorial found in the tab above "Criss-Cross Card" and create your card following the step-by-step instructions or watch the video below
5. Link to your entry using inlinkz (currently photos are not available)

This photo represent the beautiful colors of fall and I think it screams to made into a card, so why not allow the colors to inspire you to create.

 I will need 10 participants in order to keep the challenge open, so tell your friends to come and play along.

Winners will be selected on November 30th and the selected winner will receive items having a total value of $25.  This includes names such as Recollections, Prima, Hero Arts and more.  Check back to see if you've won or visit Feline Playful for a listing of winners for this and other challenges.

For those of you that would prefer a video instead of written instructions I have included a video uploaded from youtube featuring Bev Rochester demonstrating the Criss-Cross card.

Here are a few sample criss-cross cards to generate ideas.

This card has a computer generated sentiment and graphic and on the front instead of a band and the insert worked with a simple rooster.

Another version of the criss-cross card but just a little bigger.  To create the insert pull tab I used the Tim Holtz "Tab Die" instead of a circle.






Hopefully these cards will get your creative juices flowing for the November challenge.

Hello everyone.  I don't have a lot to blog about today because it was just another day at the office. Let me see...well we finished our 17th week of Weight Watchers and the results weren't too bad although I don't think I'm going to go another 17 weeks, at least not with the holidays just around the corner.  Maybe for the New Year I'll be more inclined to sign up again after I've put on a few extra holiday pounds. Strange how we really add the pounds at the end of the year only to vow to lose it the following year. Wonder if pounds are recycable?  Well here is my newest card that took me longer than I thought it would to make.  I kept getting the sequence of steps wrong in applying this technique.  I had to get it right if I was going to enter the challenge over at The Outlawz .  This particular challenge required you to create something with Fall colors or Harvest being the theme of the card.  The twist however was you had to include a technique and spell it out in your description of the card.  There was a bit more but you can hop on over to The Outlawz and join in for a bit of fun.  This particular challenge came from Saturday's Paper Ala Mode Challenge group.  So without further ado here is my card:

The base of the card is SU Chocolate Chip cardstock
The first mat layer is from "Me and My Big Ideas" speciality cardstock pack
I added the stamp "Autumn is in the air" directly to the paper using Saddle Brown Stazon Ink
The brads are from Recollection
I used a SU die to cut the shape from plain white cardstock I picked up at Michaels or Hobby Lobby.

So now for the technique: Using walnut stain distress ink I stamped the leaf (Inkadinkadoo) in the corner of the shape.  I proceeded to mask the leaf using Glossy Accents (that is my masking technique using glossy accents).  Once the glossy accent dries it will resist ink and if you do get some ink on the glossy accent you can easily remove it with a baby wipe.

As you can see I overstamped mine with some writing, and then again with a flourish. To finish it off I added a few buttons in the fall colors and some twine to draw attention to the leaf. Lastly to make the shape stand out a bit I adhered it to a piece of white cardstock and then cut, distressed and inked the edges to soften it up.

As always Thanks for stopping by and I hope you'll come back often.  Don't forget your comments are welcomed and appreciated.  Go out and find beauty in all things...then come back and craft it!

Cooler Weather in the Forecast

As usual by the time I got home from work, I barely had time to turn on the lights in my craftroom before it was bedtime..at least it seemed that way to me. Thank goodness I did cut my paper and sketch my design earlier in the week.  There's a new sketch challenge over at "The Outlawz" and needless to say I will enter as often as I can because I really do like sketch challenges.  The results are just endless even with the simplest of sketches.  What you will see below is the challenge sketch and my version of it.  I also wanted to share with you a card that is not square.  I didn't realize that I haven't made an A2 or A4 card in so long I wasn't sure that I still remembered the measurements for one, so I wanted to share one with you.  Lastly before I give you the cards is a reminder that my November challenge will be posted this weekend with great goodies to go along with it.  So make sure you check back often to get in on the fun.

This is the sketch as presented by the folks over at "The OutLawz" and below is my interpretation of this sketch.

I used SU cardstock as my card base
Paper Studio was used for all my layering
Martha Stewart PATP Rings provided the border
A Sizzix embossing folder was used for both mats
The image was printed on Neenah paper and colored with Copics
Florals are from Wild Orchid
The card is 6 x 6 square

This next card was just a card that reminded me of the trees in North Carolina in the Winter time.  I imagined how the trees were at this time of the year with their many autumn colors weaving a blanket of colors when seen from up above and then the leaves fall and the trees are bare and appear naked against the night sky.  But with the stars in the sky they seem to carry just a hint of sparkle as seen on the following card.

Thanks for stopping by and hope you'll come back real soon.

Holiday Season

The holiday season is just around the corner and now is the time to prepare.  First thing is turning the clocks back one hour...whoopee! a whole hour extra to sleep but beware it will now be dark before the dog is let out for her daily stroll.  Anyway my weekend didn't start out so well...sometimes having a caring boss isn't all that great.  I had a little problem on Friday, nothing major to me but for my boss it was major and therefore long story short I ended up in the emergency room where I laid for hour after hour while the staff proceeded to stick me over and over in their attempt to put in an IV and draw blood.  They never got the IV started so I had to suffer the sticks for the blood and that was hell.  By the time I left the hospital I was in more pain than when I went, my arms were bruised so bad I looked as if a dog had mauled me.  All of this to be told that I needed to see a cardiologist...well guess I should be glad I was told that what I had was called PSVT, which was a good thing because I have no clue what that means. Anyway I didn't get to scrap or crop at all on Friday so today I spent all day creating Christmas cards.  My grand-daughter and I decided to see what variations we could come up with from the sketches found on pagemaps.com.  They have wonderful sketches for those of us that find ourselves faced with scrappers block due to unknown forces.  Anyway below are some of the cards we finished today.

You will note that my grand-daughter and I didn't stick with the traditional Christmas

colors, although the spirit of Christmas was high on our creativity list.

This CrissCross card I watched on "YouTube University" and found it to be a very cute way to send a card.  It criss-crosses in the front and has an insert that pulls out to reveal your greeting or room for the individual to personalize their own message.

This card we are calling the "Lego" card because of the paper we used to create it.  I have had this paper for a rather long time so today it was decided to make this paper part of something better.

Another thing we attempted to do today was to create our own ornaments. We used everything from a heart shape to a light bulb for the shapes and then added a bit of UTEE for that extra shine and ribbon as the hanger.  It was fun and now we're just creating from things you would never have thought to use.

These two cards were done using the same stamp but with very different paper. The blue one represents the snow and softness of winter on gentle snowy day and the other one used traditional colors and a touch of black for interest.

Well thats all for today.  Thanks for stopping by and be on the lookout for my next challenge.  As always stay creative and be inspired by your inner artist.  Your comments are welcomed and appreciated.



Reflecting Back

Hello, here we are approaching the end of another year. Have you ever stopped and thought about the things you did in the past year...did you accomplish anything...what major events took place (personal and worldly). Is there anything about this year that make that will stand-out in your memory.  A promotion, a divorce, a birth, a marriage, or perhaps a new friend or even riding the "Titan" at Six Flags.

Another year..whew! it zoomed by and what did I accomplish...well I lost one pants size and 15 pounds.  Yeah Me..

Tonight I want to share a card I made to enter the Wednesday Sketch Challenge over at The Outlawz. I do love sketch challenges so withour further ado here is my card.

This isn't my best work but I didn't want to start over and I did need to hurry if I was going to make it in time.

Well that's all for now. Don't forget to leave a comment, take a challenge and keep creating.

Find beauty in all things and then.....create it!