Blah blah blah...

I'm house/cat sitting this week so I don't have my crafting stuff with me. I've been doing some coloring with my Copics, so it'll be nice to have some images already colored. I'm not sure which is worse...not having my crafting area or not having my hubby here lol. He's not far away but an hour each way adds up with gas prices going up and up and up. We text and talk on the phone, but I'm looking forward to seeing him tomorrow for the first time since Tuesday night.

I do have a card to share with you, though. This is an invitation I did for a friend's 40th birthday party:

I was stuck and had to put a call out to my stamping friends when my friend's wife said she wanted a "classy beer" invite. Thank goodness Sheila has an A Muse set with a beer mug in it! The card uses a couple of different embossing folders plus lots of layers. The black circle layer is popped up and the glass has Glossy Accents. There's a snappy little poem on the inside that I found online and adapted to this special occasion. I've never made so many of one card. Whew! It was a lot of Cuttlebugging and paper trimming. Plus it wasn't easy to find the right Copic colors for beer lol.

All in all, it's a card I was happy to make for my dear friend.

Hope you all had a good week and a wonderful weekend!

Cherie

Let's Fly Away

Today is the second Saturday of the month and that means a new challenge over on Crafty Contagion. This time we're being challenged to "Take a Flying Leap!" All you need to do is make a project with something that flies. It can be anything from a bat to a fairy to a hang glider. What can you come up with?

Here's my interpretation:

My Cuttlebug was very handy on this one. I embossed the background and the clouds. I dragged a Studio G white ink pad over the background because the sky was too impossibly blue. Then I used Momento London Fog to add some color to the clouds. Living here in Washington, we tend to have more grey clouds than white! The airplane chickies are from DeNami. I colored them with Copics, cut them out and added some clear Stickles. The clouds are layered three times to give them some depth and the planes are popped with dimensional adhesive. I left a sentiment off of this one so I can put it my stash for an emergency.

Now go take a flying leap!
Cherie

VCMP Challenge 4, 6 and 7

The VCMP is still going strong over on Stars and Stripes. Have you been playing along? I've fallen behind a bit, but we have until Sunday to complete them all.

This is for challenge 4 (beachy thinking of you) and 6 (sand and sea):

I colored the image with watercolor pencils and used a water pen to finish it. The stamp is Beachfront Boat from Stampendous. The sentiment is from DeNami. I added a few Pearl Pen dots to make it stand out more. The background is Cuttlebugged with Forest Branches. Both images are popped with dimensional adhesive.

Challenge 7 is CAS (clean and simple). I decided to try a new technique I saw here. It's really simple but makes a gorgeous impact. It's not often I don't do any layering or popping of images.

I used a cotton ball and spun suger distress ink for background. The flowers are from Our Crafty Lounge and the sentiment is Studio G. I used Dixie's bow tying technique for the bow.

I hope you have time to play along.
Cherie

Funky Fun

Time for VCMP Challege 3...Funky Fold! I was dreading this one a little. It looks so dang complicated, even after watching the video. I was pleasantly surprised to discover it's pretty easy.

The first paper I saw when I opened my drawer was the gray and black animal print. Zebra popped into my head and I went searching through my digis. I found this freebie one that printed a bit fuzzy so it took a bit of time to use a fine black pen to fix it. The sentiment should be a bit bigger next time and was printed from MS Word. I used Nesties for the circles and added some googlie eyes for my bit of bling.

Do you ever use googlie eyes?
Cherie

Masculine Nautical

VCMP challenge 2...a masculine nautical card. Oh boy! This one made me stop and think. I have lots of beach type stamps but nothing even remotely masculine. My first thought was "it's time to go shopping!" Then it popped into my head to use nautical alphabet flags. I pulled up a chart and did a little playing around. I came up with this:

The background is Cuttlebugged and inked with grey. I cut 1/2" squares and colored them with Copics to spell "hello." I hung them from some twine and stamped a small hello inside the card to help with the translation.

To do the inking on the background, I gently dragged a grey stamp pad over the embossing. Imagine my surprise when the pad popped off the plastic! It was a $1 Studio G pad I got at Michaels. My replacement will be a better quality lol. Thank goodness it was a light color since I got it all over my fingers finishing the inking!

Have a good night!
Cherie

Hot Tropics!

OWH is having a VCMP (virtual card making party) this week! Every night they will post a couple of challenges and so far there has been blog candy for both. The first one tonight was to make a card using hot pink, green and yellow.

My first thought was the polka dot paper from Bella Press.  It has all of the colors in it. If you didn't catch it, this is sketch 107, as well. I embossed the yellow and layers some adorable DeNami stamps. It's a great spring-y card.

I hope you have time to play along.
Cherie

Sketch 107, more Mother's Day and ODBD

The new sketch at OWH today is pretty basic and easy to use for a CAS card. It also works nicely for some more Mother's Day cards. Not only that, but it fits the new ODBD challenge. I saw it and immediately knew it needed to be done with some double-sided papers.

The card back is silver and if you look closely you'll notice the black paper has a pattern on it. I added some cute Studio G polka dot ribbon I got from my secret Santa and popped the Fiskars sentiment. I have just enough of the paper left to do two more of these. But they'll have to wait since I'm off to watch the Super Bowl!

Here's the sketch I used:

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!
Cherie

Mother's Day Challenge

Today is the kickoff for the Mother's Day Challenge at OWH. This is the perfect thing to get me started on those cards. It's been awhile since I've made any cards for a specific holiday and now is the time. I wanted them to be shaker cards since everyone seems to love receiving them. Here is what I accomplished today:

There are 19 of these. I'm not sure why it came out an odd number. The purple and pink have differend background papers and different bead colors. I used the Geo Flowers embossing folder from The Paper Studio and the hearts Nestabilities. I wanted to get at least one card completed so I'd know if I needed to make any adjustments.

That's dark purple paper on the top, not blue. For some reason my camera isn't fond of purple. The sentiment is from Fiskars and is edged in black and popped. I flipped through the sketches and found 36 fit my needs for this card.

Happy creating!
Cherie

Go Red for Women's Heart Health!

Today is Go Red for Women's Heart Health Day. You were supposed to wear something red...I chose a sweater but it could be a pin or scarf or anything. Over on OWH's Facebook page, we were challenged to make a card with red to spread awareness. Here's what I came up with:

It's a bit blurry because I'm in a bit of a hurry for a date with hubby and friends tonight. I'll try again tomorrow. I used Nestabilities for the heart and oval. I don't know if you can tell, but this is a shaker card. I forgot how much fun they are to make! The stamp is from Little Yellow Bicycle and everything else was in my stash.

UPDATE: A clearer picture.

Have a great night!
Cherie

Dies & Punches...Oh My!

It's that time of the week again...mid-week throwdown at Operation Write Home. This week our challenge is to make a card using die cuts or punches. This didn't pose any problems for me since I love using dies with my Cuttlebug!

I did two of these banner cards, one masculine and one feminine.

The pennant bits and circles are Nestabilities. On the first one, I used my Scor-Buddy to add some texture. It just didn't look manly enough when I added ribbon. The banner paper is from Graphic 45. On the second card, the background paper is from Bella Press. I used Studio G dollar alphabet sets for the letters. I wanted the "T" to be a "2" but it only came with letters. I think they'll still get the message. I pierced holes for the twine and added ribbon to the girl version. The letter circles are all popped up with dimensional adhesive.

I also worked with a sketch and used some dies. I was on a roll last night! Moving on down the list, sketch 8 was next.

Both of the polka dot papers are Bella Press. I bought them at the DeNami warehouse sale last year. I simply love polka dots! The ribbons are from my stash. I actually used up the last of the dark pink ribbon. Yay! Both pink ribbons are layered on white ribbon. I used, what else, a Nestability to cut out the circles. The sentiment is from Fiskars "Laugh With Me Quotes" embossed with black. The piercing was done at the last minute and helps pull the papers and quote together.

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Cherie

My Resolution Continues...

One of my resolutions this year is to empty out a box of cards that need re-vamping. (To see the box, look here.) Most of them just have a single embellishment slapped on and it was called good. Wow! I have learned so much since those days. I can't believe I used to send cards like that to family and friends. Last night I spent a few hours working on the box. I have four of them for you today.

This card started out with just the ribbon and buckle on grey paper. I added a birthday digi one of my friends gave me and layered it a few times. I love the bottom layer. It's such pretty silver paper. The only problem with it is that it's so thin I have to double it. The layers were all done with my Cuttlebug. A few dabs with a Pearl Pen and the card is looking much better.

Here's another one. It originally had the embellishment placed in the lower right hand corner on the green card base. I found some matching blue paper in my stash and Cuttlebugged it with the Spots and Dots folder then used my white pen to color in a few random spots and/or dots. I edged the blue on the embellishment with a bit of white ink. This is definitely a card I would send to someone I know.

This one started out with just the friends sentiment on it. Sigh. What was I thinking? I actually did this one twice. The first attempt I added the DeNami layered chickies and the two stones on each side. Then, while looking at the picture to download it, it just wasn't quite enough. So I deconstructed it again and added the ribbon. Ribbon does so much to dress up a card!

I didn't do much to this card. I love the design of the stamp. The top image is stamped on glossy paper so the ink is a slightly different color than the background. All I did was add some black Pearl Pen to the ends of the curls. It's my version of CAS.

Have a wonderful Wednesday!

Cherie