12 kits of christmas: january with renee

I am really excited to be telling you about a new group some of us formed just before Christmas. I was emailing with Renee about how sad I was that I didn't get to use all my new Christmas supplies this year. We came up with "The 12 Kits of Christmas" as a way of being better prepared for Christmas next year by making holiday cards year-round. Actually, the "strategy" was all Renee's idea because she is in another group with a similar game-plan.

Here's how it works: There are 12 of us, and each person takes turn hosting the challenge each month by mailing to each of the other group members a kit full of supplies - stamped images, patterned papers, bling, ribbon, etc. Any company, any style...it's all up to the hostess that month. Everybody in the group receives the SAME kit of ingredients, and each of us makes a card (or several cards) in secret using those supplies. On the last day of the month, we all post our creations...the fun is seeing what everyone else made with the same ingredients. We are allowed to supplement the kits with supplies from our own stash, but when I do that I will point it out to you.

This month's hostess is Renee Lynch, and here is a shot of the haul we were sent...her arm must have been killing her from having to crank so many diecuts! Honestly, the amount of stuff she sent us was amazing:

I'm off to a great start for next Christmas. I made a total of five cards with Renee's kit and I could have made more if I hadn't gotten so tired! I'll start with my two favorites; one is totally "my style," and the other is more CAS:

On the next card, I added the sparkle paper from SU! as well as the sentiment from A Muse Studio, which was stamped in PTI Pure Poppy:

I don't know where Renee got the mirror paper, but is awesome!

That red polka dot paper was mine, too. It's from October Afternoon's Holiday Style line. I also added the embossed Santa image from Memory Box through the window:

Here you can see some of my coloring on that cute bird from Memory Box. I used Prismacolor pencils with gamsol:

Here is a list of everyone else in our group. Have fun hopping around and seeing our creations!

Cathy: Empty Nest Crafter

Joyce: Cards-by-the-Sea

Kim: Cupcakes Cards and Kim

Amy: Stamp-n-Paradise

Kara: K and R Designs

Sharron: On Papillion Wings

Marybeth: Marybeth's Time for Paper

Jeanne: A Kept Life

Jessica: The Paper Parade

Christina: Sea Glass & Sentiments

Renee: It's A Patchwork Life

As for me? You may not hear from me for a little while. I am going to be traveling for a few days for work, but I'll also be catching up with a couple groups of crafty friends while I'm there. Hopefully I get some fun pics to share when I return!

Have a great week!

freshly made sketches & a muse studio peeks

I love playing along with Freshly Made Sketches, and today's card is one that I made for tomorrow's local gathering of A Muse Studio Creative Consultants. I am really looking forward to this because it'll give me a much needed break from work and because I really am hoping to get some great ideas from these talented ladies!

This card features two new products from A Muse Studio: the new color called Burano and the new stamp set called Floral Duet. I love them both!

I added glitter to the flowers and mounted everything on Bermuda blue cardstock, also from A Muse. Those sparklers are from Kaiser and they can be found online at Ribbon Carousel.

The new A Muse Studio catalog is being released on February 1, and I am excited to see what other goodies they have in store for us since I haven't gotten mine in the mail yet. If you ever have any questions about A Muse, please feel free to contact me anytime. :)

Happy Saturday!

I'm hosting this week's ribbon carousel challenge!

This week, we’re changing things up in a non-traditional kinda way! I challenged everyone to use non-traditional colors for their creations. Making a valentine card? How about NOT using red or pink, or not too much of it anyways? Creating a gorgeous winter scene? Try it with creams instead of whites. Whatever you’re making….try a non-traditional palate!

So, what else can we do in a non-traditional manner this week? How about a JOINT challenge (one challenge, two sponsors on two challenge sites = twice as many chances to win) with our amazing sponsor this week, the fabulous Paper and Such!

Paper and Such will be giving one lucky randomly drawn participant a $15 gift certificate to their store, which sells their own line of stamps as well as patterned papers and other fabulous crafting goodies...fun fun fun!

RibbonCarousel.com is sponsoring their challenge this week, so there is twice as much inspiration and twice as many chances to win! And yes, you can enter your creation here AND at the Paper and Such challenge.

I decided to make a non-traditional Valentine's Day card this week:

There are boatloads of goodies on here from Ribbon Carousel, including the lace ribbon, the twine and the stick pins {{swoon}}! Please see below for a list of the other supplies... and have a great day!

Supplies: Stamps: WPlus9 (Love You More); Paper: Jillibean Soup; Ink: A Muse Studio (French Roast); Other: PTI felt, heart dies from PTI and WPlus9, ribbon, twine, stick pins from Ribbon Carousel.

freshly made sketches #18

I've got a fresh and clean card for the Freshly Made Sketches Challenge this week. Here is the inspiration photo:

And here is my take on the challenge:

I used A Muse Studio inks in Currant and Eucalyptus on these WPlus9 stamps, and the patterened paper is from Echo Park. That fantastic shimmer cardstock is from SU!; it was trimmed with a rik rac die from A Muse. It all came together pretty quickly with the help of that sketch - you've gotta check this challenge blog out.

The truth is that this card almost "didn't make it!" I had a huge collapse of my photo setup last night that left a few dents in the wood floor and in the card...so I gave up and got up this morning to try again. Now it's snowing and I am about to head back to work...have a fun day!

2012 Valentine's Day Card Drive

I just wanted to let you all know about a really awesome card drive that is going on through the end of this month. Winter Sims is collecting cards for St. Jude Hospital, Vanderbilt, Texas Children's Hospital, and St. Louis Children's Hospital.

I stamped a stack last weekend and I am hoping to mail them off by Saturday:

It would be great if you could participate too! Please be sure to read the list of guidelines found in this post, which is also where you can find the mailing address. Winter is giving away prizes that have been generously donated by many companies; if you would like to donate too, please contact her at  wintersims1 at aol dot com.

mojo monday #224

I whipped a card up in a jiffy last night before bed for the Mojo Monday Challenge this week:

Using my Crate Paper designer paper, and a Jenni Bowlin stamp that I picked up at my LSS a while ago, here's what I came up with:

The image was stamped in black ink from A Muse Studio; that's also where I got the sentiment stamp...in their Essential Sentiment collection. I love the font on that one. The seam binding ribbon is from my friend, Renee, and the button is from SU!. Those awesome star stickpins are made by Maya Road, but I bought them from Ribbon Carousel. The bling is from Hero Arts.

I love the colors of these papers! My paper pack is nearly gone now. Hope you are having a great week! We're halfway through!

an intermission of sorts

It has been a little bit of an overwhelming week, mostly because we lost heat for a couple of days, it snowed, and my husband has been away for over 2 weeks. I am still trying to catch up, so I just wanted to pop in and say hi and share a few happy photos from the last few days. They're all of Teddy, of course:

"Why all the confusion around here?"

"I'm just gonna sit here and do this until you figure it out."

"I liked it better before I had static electricity problems."

Hope you're having a fun weekend! I hope to be back with some crafty stuff soon. Many thanks to my little buddy for keeping me company and making me smile when I needed it most this week. I showered him with a couple extra treats tonight as a thank you.  :)

ribbon carousel challenge #35

It's time for another Ribbon Carousel Challenge! This week's hostess is the fabulous Laurel Seabrook, who issued this photo inspiration challenge:

Our sponsor this week is Whimsie Doodles, who is so excited to be sponsoring the new challenge! In March of 2009 Melyssa Connolly, artist and owner, began turning her whimsical hand-drawn images into digital files for sale online. Whimsie Doodles' digital stamp line features images that range from cute little boys and girls, to punny stuff, and everything in-between. We enjoy sharing lots of samples on our company blog, where we also post challenges and tutorials.

We are huge fans of Melyssa at the RCC because she is the designer of the carousel in our logo! The prize this week is One (1) winner will receive a $10 Gift Certificate to the Whimsie Doodles Online Store.

I decided to use the colors from the inspiration photo paired with their Cut Out for You digi image to make a Valentine's Day card:

That amazing ribbon is the brown sheer two-tone ribbon, which can be found in the Ribbon Carousel store. It is so beautiful! I love how it pairs with their cream jute twine, too.

Hopefully, Laurel's photo inspires you to play along with us this week...And just for participating, Whimsie Doodles is giving a special offer to you! Use the discount code (Ribbonrocks) at the Whimsie Doodles online store and receive 10% off your next order! Code is good until February 8, 2012. Your creation can be anything from cards, quilts, sewn items, paper crafts, paintings! Just be sure to have ribbon, bakers twine, jute twine, lace, thread (basically anything that comes on a spool).

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies: Stamps: Whimsie Doodle; Paper: SU! (crumb cake), PTI (vintage cream), PP by October Afternoon (Farmhouse Collection); Ink: PTI chamomile ink; Other: SU! corduroy button, ribbon from Ribbon Carousel, corner chomper, mini clothespins, Copics

Lucy's sketch week: day 5 & inspiration

I am back (a little bit late) with a quick post for the final day of Lucy's Sketch Week...and here it is:

And here's my card, using Crate Paper papers, a sentiment from A Muse Studio and two Jenni Bowlin butterflies...I chose the butterflies because they were inspired by Lucy's Inspiration Week Day 2 photo...I am posting this too late for the Day 5 sketch, which is very similar to one earlier this week:

That's all! Off to make some more fun stuff. Hope you had a great weekend!

Lucy's sketch week: day 4

YAY for Day 4 of Lucy's Sketch Week! I think this sketch is my favorite of them all:

I started off with some patterned paper from October Afternoon's Farmhouse collection, as well as the Love Birds and A Pocketful stamp sets from WPlus9 to come up with this card for today:

The house was created using the small pocket stamp and die from WPlus9, and the sentiment was created using letter stickers from Echo Park's A Walk in the Park collection. All the edges were distressed with PTI's Chamomile Tea Dye ink, but the bird was stamped in A Muse Studio Cranberry; the house was stamped in a dark brown SU! color that I borrowed from Jessica (thank you, Jessica!). The cork paper was trimmed with my paper trimmer and handcut to make the upside down pocket look like a house:

Lastly, I used a small circle punch from SU! to punch out the brown cardstock piece to make a "door" for the birdhouse. Cute, I think!

Well, off to do more work now! Have a great day!

lucy's sketch week: day 3

Here is another card for Lucy's Sketch Week: Day 3! Here is the sketch:

And here is my take on this sketch, using more Crate Paper Papers and a sentiment stamp from WPlus9's Sweet Nothings set, as well as their cloud dies and stamps from Heartfelt Mix:

I used A Muse Studio inks in latte and cranberry on this card, in addition to the crumb cake cardstock base from SU!.

So far, this is my favorite of all the sketches! Can't wait to make something for Days 4 and 5. :)

Lucy's sketch week: day 2

I am back with another card for Lucy Abram's Sketch Week; this time for Day #2. Here is the sketch:

And here is what I came up with using some WPlus9 stamps, which are quickly becoming my favorite!

The card base is an amazing shade of gray from American Crafts. I used the Love Birds dies to mask the birds images when I was stamping the BB: Hearts images in Winter Sky A Muse Studio ink, then the birds and sentiment were stamped in Cranberry ink, also from A Muse Studio. The clothesline image, from Heartfelt Mix, was stamped in Slate (a|s studio), and the twine is from The Twinery.

All in all, a pretty easy and FUN card to make!

Hope you all enjoyed your day. I go back to work tomorrow...I am certainly going to miss all the days off, yummy foods, and family time. {sigh.}

Lucy's sketch week: day 1

Happy New Year, everyone!

Hope you had a great weekend! I found lots of time to craft this weekend, among other things, so I am here today to share with you the first of a few cards that I have made for Lucy Abram's Sketch Week. I really admire Lucy's work, and her sketches are very clean and simple, which is a little out of my comfort zone; therefore, I thought it would make for the perfect start to the new year, trying something new. Here is the Day 1 Sketch:

Here is my take on the sketch...I used patterned papers from the Crate Paper "Paper Heart" collection, along with this really adorable image from Memory Box. I have actually had him for months and months but it was a stroke of luck that led me to finding the coordinating die in my LSS this past weekend! The sentiment is from WPlus9's collection called "Love You More," and I tinted parts of the elephant's body using a Copic marker.

That's all for today! I am off to take down the Christmas decorations and to do some laundry. Enjoy the day!