I've got the blues!

Okay, I don't really have the blues but this card is very blue! I've decided that monochromatic cards are just not me. Then again, that's what the whole idea of challenges is, isn't it? To do something that you don't normally do. If it were easy, it wouldn't be called a "challenge".

Anyway, I made this card using an absolutely adorable digi from Phindy's Place. I love, love, love using her digis. The kids especially are just too adorable and look so real (not all cartoony). For this one, I paper pieced the had and outfit and then used watercolors over the paper piecing. I also printed out multiple images and used tiny bits of paper so I could raise up the stick and the bird to give the image a 3 dimensional look. I think it turned out pretty cool.

The sketch for this card is from the Happileigh Scrappin' Challenge. Sometimes it's so hard to come up with a different idea for a layout, it's nice to have a sketch challenge to use once in a while. I liked this one because they had 2 sketches, a simple version and one that was a little more fussy and showed you where to embellish. I followed the simple one but added my own embellies. Actually, the flower is one that I completely made myself using a circle punch. I just fiddled with the circles until the looked flower petal-ish. It was fun to make.

This card is for a few different challenges:

Phindy's Place Challenge Blog: Monochrome

Totally Paper Crafts: Do it with a digi

Stampin' For The Weekend: Monochrome

Stampin' B's Design Team: Use a Flower On A Card

Paper Crafting Journey: Anything Goes

Happileigh Scrappin' Challenge: Sketch Challenge

*This picture is horrible, I would LOVE to re-take it but I just mailed out the card. I probably should have checked the photo BEFORE doing that!*

Spring Friendships!

Hello all,

It's been a crazzzzzzzzzzzzy week here! While poor little Johnny is feeling much better, Mommy is still exhausted and trying to catch up on sleep! He gets to nap during the day, I have to work!

I did manage to get this one card done this week. I used a Phindy image, it really is, I swear! It doesn't look like a Phindy Image but that's because it's one of her "'lil Gems". I enlarged just one of the 4 garden gems and made that the image on my card. I then did a search for quotes about seeds and friendship and came up with, "Plant a seed of friendship;reap a bouquet of happiness." by Lois Kaufman. It fit my purposes perfectly!

This card is for a few different challenges:

Phindy's Place Challenge Blog: Spring is on the way!

Scrap-Creations: Spring Fever

Creative Card Crew (sponsored by Phindy this Week): Friendship

Grammy's 87.....well darn close!

Hello All!

Did you think that I'd let a week go without a post for Phindy's Place Challenge Blog? Not likely!!! Well, it almost happened this week because my internet just randomly went out - not good! Luckily, it was just a momentary problem and we're up and running again!

Well, this week's challenge is "Embossing". My own personal challenge was to come up with a birthday present for my soon to be 87-year-old Grandmother "Grammy". Now, she's going to be 87 on Saturday, she has everything she needs/wants, and has a house full of "stuff". What do you buy for her? She also has 10 living children and several grandchildren. The majority of the kids will get her a sweatshirt, seriously, how many sweatshirts can a woman own? The rest of the kids will get her gift certificates to go out to lunch with. Again, how many gift cards can a woman who gave up driving use? So, I was stumped. Then I remembered a Christmas gift that I had made for my boyfriend's grandmother, a picture frame. I was on to something there especially since Grammy has been complaining that she only has one picture of my son (he's now 6 months old!).

So, to "make" (I should say alter) this picture frame, I needed an image. I decided to combine two Phindy Images "Reading Chair" and "Big Sister at Work". I deleted parts of the Reading Chair image and added the Big Sister and her Baby Brother. It was the perfect for my two kiddos. I paper pieced the chair and pop-dotted the kids on the chair to give it a little bit of dimension. I used a Stampin' Up punch to make the flowers in the top corner and added "pearls" to their centers. The pearls are from a bracelet of Trinity's that Alex destroyed. (While lecturing her about being careful of her big sisters things, I was secretly doing the happy dance about getting more "stash"). I then added some foliage using the MS Branches Punch. Here's where the challenge comes in, I "gilded" some of the branches by embossing them with a copper embossing powder (sneaky way to incorporate the challenge). It gives that corner some shiny interest.

Hopefully tomorrow I will get the kids to cooperate so I can take a picture of Alex "reading" to Johnny to add to the frame. Though, with digital cameras, I could even get it done Saturday morning! Gotta love technology!!

Hope you enjoy my project....have a great weekend and can't wait to see what those girls at Phindy's DT have in store for next week!