More Christmas tags

I'm continuing to make tags for my hubby's gift baskets.  Here are three vibrant ones:

After cutting the tags from my Sizzix die, I colored them with Distress Inks and then used a Stampendous music stamp for the background.  Then I used Hero Arts owls and branch and paper pieced their scarves.

Lastly I embossed a Recollections sentiment and added that to the tag. More More More to come!

Thanks for your visit!

SFYTT - Merry Christmas

Happy Monday to you!  Hope you had a really great Thanksgiving and weekend following!  We weren't all that busy and I was actually quite happy with that.   On Saturday - I finally got to craft up a card for the Sketch For You To Try November challenge. I've participated each month of 2012, so I didn't want to drop the ball now!

I don't make a lot of Christmas cards because I actually order photo cards.  I know - hard to believe for a card crafter, but our list is about 150 and the thought of making that many makes me cringe.  But here's one I did make for the season.  I grabbed my Stampendous penguin (and Julie - this card isn't going to your house!), embossed him in black and used my Distress Markers.  I gave him a snowy background with glitter and popped up the present.

I actually turned the inside into a gift card holder too.   Well, thanks for dropping in!  Here's the sketch if you want to join in!

Have a great Monday!

Thanks for your visit!

Father's Day Card

TGIF!  Another week has flown by!!  Today is another Father's Day card I was asked to make by a friend.   I was told the 'dad' is religious and likes music - so that's the direction I went with the card:

I started off by punching out an oval with masking tape.  I adhered that to the panel, then heat embossed the Stampendous music stamp with black powder.  I used my Distress Inks to color the base. Then I removed the mask and heat embossed the Studio G cross with gold powder.  I used a PTI oval stamp to create an outline.

Then I added some gold acrylic accents all around the oval and used an MFT set for the sentiment.  A few brads and finito!

Hope you have a great weekend!

Thanks for your visit!

I'd give up chocolate....

but I'm not a quitter!  LOL   Lent was hard enough giving up all sweets - I don't think I could ever say goodbye to chocolate forever!

Here's a card I created the other day, just for the fun of it. No challenge, no reason.......just wanted to use a stamp I haven't used in a while.  This is a Denami stamp with a Stampendous sentiment.

I stamped out our chocolate-eating gal, then masked her and used a PTI wood floor stamp underneath her.  I used my prisma pencils to color and my Nesties for the card shape and second panel.

I even gave her blue eyeshadow and some silver earrings using enamel accents!

Hope you have a great Saturday!!!


Thanks for your visit!

SFYTT- July "Happy Birthday"

Happy Tuesday!  I had a lazy weekend and didn't blog yesterday - but I'm back today!  Here is my first ever entry in the Sketch For You To Try challenge.  This is the July sketch and I made a birthday card for my friend Rob.  We celebrated his wife's birthday on Saturday, but also snuck in a song for him on Saturday too!

Obviously, it had to be a masculine card, so I got out my 'masculine' paper and this sketch really guided me with the balloons.  I barely squeezed in the PTI sentiment on that panel, didn't I??  You can barely see the music background I stamped out.  I had the Happy Birthday song in my mind while making the card!!

You still have time to play with this sketch. It runs until July 31st!!

Hope you have a nice day!!!  It's cooled off a bit in CT - so we're all happy up here!

Thanks for your visit!

Taryn's 13th Birthday

I was asked to make a birthday card for a friend's daughter.  It was her 13th birthday and I was told she liked the colors blue, green and purple. Likes music, shopping and dancing.  So, I did my best to make a card that both Paula and her daughter Taryn would love.

Luckily, I picked up this music background stamp a few weeks ago. (Since I'm sitting on my patio - I can't remember who makes it and I'm too lazy to go look!).  I embossed it in white, then used my blue, green and purple distress inks to blend the background.

I was given those cute little shopping bags a while back and knew I should use one for the card.  I cut out her name and age with my Sizzix letters and then stamped the cupcake and shoes.  I embossed the background with Cuttlebug swiss dots and put it all together!

This was a fun card to make and I hope they were both happy with the result!!!


Thanks for your visit!

Cupcake Thank You's

Happy 5th of July!!!  Hope you had a wonderful holiday weekend! We sure did. I'm actually sitting out on my patio with my laptop and going to try and get a week's worth of posts done!!!!

Thank you to those who wished me well and sent me notes to ask how I was feeling.  I am feeling better - thankfully, but still waiting on a few blood tests to come back.  I got a B-12 shot on Friday and will be getting more the next few weeks, so hopefully those will help too!

Starting next week, I'll get back to working out too! I miss sweating!

Anyways..........on to the cards!! My cousin Carl is a fabulous baker!  He lives in DC and he runs an annual bake sale at his office desk to raise money for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. He makes all sorts of items, from brownies, blondies, pound cakes, etc.  I believe he raised just about $700.00 this year.  We ordered his brownies and blondies. YUMMY!!!

To thank those who ordered from him, he asked me to make him some Thank You cards.  I made him 12 cards - six of each style below:

Since I had to make 12, we kept the designs pretty simple.  Oh, did I mention my cousin loves the color purple??  Could you have guessed that yourself?

Well, I hope you have a wonderful week...........and a special Happy Birthday shout out to Carol!!!

Thanks for your visit!

TKT#50 - Happy Birthday!

Today's card is for That's Krafty Thursday Challenge #50.    The Spotted Chick puts out Thursday challenges and the requirement this week (and maybe every week) is to use Kraft cardstock!  What a great coincidence that I made my father-in-law's birthday card using PTI kraft cardstock!

I knew I wanted to use woodgrain for his card and the woodgrain stamp I had wasn't big enough for the outside of the card -so I grabbed my PTI impression plate.  I 'impressed' 75% of the front, leaving the bottom clean for the PTI sentiment.   I added some ribbon and some distress inks to bring out the woodgrain.

For the inside of the card, I stamped the PTI sentiment first. Then I cut a Nestie die out and taped it down over the sentiment to create a mask. I inked up my Hero Arts woodgrain stamp with distress inks and stamped over the sentiment and mask.

The inside was still pretty dull, so I decided to stamp a Stampendous cupcake.  I made a few layers and popped them up.

So, this is the card we gave to my father-in-law on Friday for his birthday!  What do you think?

Thanks for your visit!

Lucy's Cards - Sketch Week Day#5

And, I'm back....three final days to go finishing up my cards for Lucy's Cards Sketch Week (which was over two weeks ago, mind you)...but it's Day 5 for me!!

I've been having fun using up my Papertrey Ink paper. I've hoarded it for TOO long and it feels good to use it!  I paper pieced a Stampendous cupcake and added Glossy Accents to the candle so it has some stability (thank you Jennifer McGuire for that tip!).

Here is the sketch!

Thanks for your visit!

Joy Tag

Another one-layer tag!  Gold is really elegant - right?  I still haven't bought gold embossing powder but I have gold ink - so it's a close second.  I started this tag off by embossing a Stampendous 'Joy" stamp and some Inkadinkado holly scrolls in white.  Then I embossed resisted with the gold ink and finished the edges with Vintage Photo distress inks.

I finished off this easy tag with two gold ornaments and some gold ribbon!  I could of done all 15 like this....but then I would of gotten bored!!

Thanks for visiting!!

Editing: Just a note....it's going to be a crazy Sunday for me: CT Humane Society, then volunteer brunch, then 2pm theater, sadly - a wake, then dinner - so I'll get to my 'return' blog visits on Monday!! (thanks!)
Maria

Trying to catch up....

on some overdue posts. Now that our one and only craft fair is upon us and I'm not frantically crafting tonight (Friday)....I can set up some automatic posts for the next few days!!!

Actually - the post that went out yesterday (about Paula's birthday) was supposed to go out today - but that's how I've been lately - a bit flakey! Oh well.........here are two cards!!

This was the birthday card I made for my hubby. I based it on the Clean & Simple FTL #115.

I cut out the hearts with my Sizzix die and then punched the pawprints (Lily, Nolie & Layla). I stamped a Stampendous present and colored in with markers. I added a PTI sentiment.

Here is another card I made using the same sketch:

I started with my Denami sympathy circle stamp, added some Studio G butterflies and a few buttons.

Thanks for stopping by today!!!
Maria

Stamping Bella - 8/20 Sketch Challenge

Well, it's week three of the Stamping Bella search for a new Babe. This week, the challenge was a sketch from Paulabella.  Here is her sketch:

I decided to turn the sketch on it's side and I ended up with this:

I started off with paper from a DCWV paper pack.  I like the combo of orange, pink and fuchsia.  I then stamped up Harriet, from the Lulu collection and colored her with prisma pencils and gamsol.  I added some crystal effects to the cupcakes and some glitter to her hem. Her hair is highlighted with a black embossing pen.

I cut her out with a Nestability, but as you can see...only part of the white layer is cut with it (mainly because my paper wasn't big enough - but I actually really like how it came out!). I cut the second layer with the same Nestie and it peeks out from behind the white.

I finished it off with some ribbon and a Stampendous sentiment.  So, that's my entry for the Bella Babe contest for week three!!!  Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a terrific Friday!!

Oh - make sure you go to Emily's blog to see ALL the awesome entries! They have been amazing each week!!!

Maria

Hey There Sweetie

So, I guess I'm feeling fruity! I've had my Hero Arts Simply The Best set out and have been coloring up a lot of fruits! Cherries, pineapples, apples and strawberries!  Yup - feelin' fruity!

Here's one of the cards I put together using the cherries.  I stamped the cherries with Versamark to create a subtle background.  I then stamped the cherries out on my white panel and again on a second sheet. Now this is an extreme side angle shot of the card - just to show the cherries popped up. Once I popped them up, I added glossy accents to them.

The sentiment is from Stampendous. I really have no "fruity" sentiments - so it really blocks me when I get to that part of the card.  You'll notice I used a Friskar's border punch too!

Just a quick post! TGIF! Hope you have some great weekend plans!
Maria

Tilda with Cherries

Here is a semi-quick card I made last week and forgot to post. I believe I received this image through a swap and colored it in about a month ago. When I was coloring it, I noticed Tilda had cute little cherries on her boots. I didn't have anything else "cherries" in my stock - so when I attended a stamp convention in July, I picked up a DeNami cherry stamp, which I used for the background. Tilda is sitting on some ribbon and the sentiment is from Stampendous.
Tilda and the cherries are colored with prisma pencils and gamsol. Thanks for visiting!

Maria

"Just Magnolia" Birthday Card

Happy Monday everyone! Hope you had a great weekend and are looking forward to the 4th of July! Here's a card I made following the Just Magnolia Week 11 Sketch. My friend's daughter (and my God-daughter) celebrates her birthday on the July 3rd so I wanted her to have a red/white/blue birthday card.I used my new Tilda with hearts and colored her with prisma pencils and gamsol. I used Cuttlebug swiss dots and circle embossing folder. Sentiment from MFT. Ribbon I bought from Michael's last year and embellished with Stampendous cupcakes and a few bling rhinestones. Thanks for looking!

Fourth of July Birthday

Hi! Happy Father's Day!! I'm (Maria) back in the craft room after taking a few days to reorganize my stamps and clean up my room. Here's a card I made today for a friend's child whose birthday is July 2nd. I wanted to make a Red/White/Blue birthday card - so this is what I came up with. I used Stampendous stamps colored with prisma pencils. The "white" cupcake is done with puffy paint. I used the birthday candle punch and ribbon from Michael's to finish off that panel. All of the cupcake tops are pop dotted up. This would probably be considered a Clean and Simple (CAS) card - lots of white space too - but I like it. What do you think?

40th Birthday Shutter Card

I (Maria) was asked to make a Tri-Shutter 40th birthday card by my friend Gisela for her friend Jon. She told me he loves golf and camping - so I worked along those lines for the card. I used the full card front template with Rob & Bob "Remember When" paper. More details below:
For the front of the card, I used Stampendous cupcake stamp. I embossed the candle and then used glossy accents. The sentiment is from Inkdadinkadoo and the "40th" from Martha Stewart. I also added brads on the corners.

For the inside of the card - I used Sizzix Roundabout for his name and added a button in the middle of the "O". There is a mix of Studio G, Amuse and Memory Box stamps and sentiments. All colored with Prisma pencils. I paper pieced the penquin's golf outfit to match the card too. The cake and the beer bottles are also finished with glossy accents.

I hope both Gisela and Jon like the card. What do you think??