A little birthday card.

Oh, it's so nice to be creating again!  I've been working on projects that will be posted in a few days... finally had a chance to do something just for fun, so I pulled out this week's Freshly Made Sketches sketch, and my Key Ingredients kit (I think July's?) and made this cheery little birthday card:

Patterned papers are Hello Summer, Echo Park; Cardstock is White Daisy, CTMH and Key Ingredients; Stamp sets are Love Birds & Card Word Puzzle, CTMH; Ink is Rich Cocoa, Memento and Creme Brulee, CTMH; Copic markers; Prima flower; Spellbinder's dies & My Favorite Things border die. 

 

Twenty Dozen Cupcakes

Luckily they were mini ones!  Knowing that my daughter has a little cupcake business, when my niece got engaged, she asked if she would make the cupcakes for her wedding!  So when we flew out to BC this past July, Paige packed all her icing bags & tips and a few random ingredients like meringue powder & clear vanilla.  She'd been researching recipes and making test batches for weeks in advance, and with a few days to go, and in an unfamiliar kitchen, she set out to make 240 chocolate and vanilla cupcakes.

The first day was making 250+ royal icing drop flowers... the second day was baking day...



And finally, icing them all with a swirl, and adding the drop flower to the top. Here's a picture of the tower at the wedding (this is only about 1/2 of what she baked), along with the proud baker. If she can do this at 14, just wait and see what she'll do a few years from now! (very proud Mom speaking!)

 

A CAS card for Heart2Heart

This week's Heart2Heart Challenge is to use Sunset, Pear & Lagoon on a card, so I pulled out our August/September promotional stamp set - It's Your Day to make a couple of CAS style cards.  I used the solid butterfly image to stamp each colour on the base, then stamped and cut out the matching chevron image.  I glued down just the body of the butterflies to give the wings a little dimension.

Cardstock is Black & White Daisy; Stamp sets are It's Your Day, Say it in Style & Stitches; Inks are Black, Sunset, Lagoon & Pear; Black Opaque pearls.

Verve's Card Carnival

I made another card last night to enter in Verve's Card Carnival to celebrate their 5th Anniversary.  I really LOVE coffee themed cards (??) - they just make me smile... so I thought I'd use Verve's Better With You stamp set to make a little coffee card using this week's Deconstructed Sketch:

Patterned papers are Times & Seasons, Echo Park; Cardstock is Black and Colonial White, CTMH; Stamp set is Better With You, Verve; Inks are Tuxedo Black, Memento and Brown Bag, CTMH;

 

Sketchbook Saturday Challenge #73

At long last, I've finally broken into my Avonlea papers (new in the Fall/Winter CTMH catalogue) as well as my first project using my new Cricut and the Artiste cartridge.  (I've been working on some other projects already, but can't post them till September!).  So here is a little encouragement card using the Kudos stamp set that comes with the cartridge, based on this week's Sketchbook Saturday sketch:

Patterned papers are Avonlea; Cardstock is Slate, Colonial White & Avonlea Teal; Stamp set is Kudos; Inks are Slate & Twilight; - all CTMH; Baker's Twine, The Twinery.

 

Happy Anni-Verve-sary!

One of my favourite stamp companies - Verve - is celebrating their 5th Anniversary this month, and as part of their celebrations, they are having a Card Carnival for fans (like me!) to link up a card using some of their fabulous Verve products.  I decided to do a celebratory type of card using the sweet "Carpe Cupcake" stamp set - the sentiment on the inside of the card cracks me up!  This also works for this week's Paper Player's challenge to do paper piecing on a CAS style card:

Patterned papers are Baby Jane Mini-Deck by Cosmo Cricket; Stamp set is Carpe Cupcake, Verve; Ink is Rich Cocoa, Memento; Baker's Twine, The Twinery; Button, CTMH; Copic Markers; Cardstock is Kraft & Colonial White, CTMH.

A Couple of Challenges

I haven't had my Copics out for a while, so I combined this week's colour challenge at The Paper Players with the current Sweet Sunday Sketch - and used a cute little image that I got in a stamp swap.  I tweaked the sketch a little, but hopefully you can still see it in there somewhere:

Patterned papers are Tea for Two, Cosmo Cricket; Stamp sets are (boy-unknown), and Plain Jane, Verve; Ink is Tuxedo Black, Memento; Dies are Verve & Taylored Expressions; All papers Key Ingredients July Kit.  Copic Markers.

Play Date Cafe Challenge #144

This week's Play Date Cafe colours reminded me of my Echo Park Hello Summer papers that came in my July Key Ingredients kit.  I snuck a little green in there to go with the flowers to make a simple birthday card:

Patterned papers are Hello Summer, Echo Park; Cardstock & Ribbon, Key Ingredients kit; Dies are Charming Oval, Verve and Butterfly Duo, Taylored Expressions; Stamp, Verve; Ink is Rich Cocoa, Memento.

Deconstructed Sketch #64

I had the perfect papers for this week's Color Throwdown colours (as did a few of the designers!) and used Deconstructed Sketch #64 to make a square card tonight:

Patterned papers are Amrosia, Basic Grey; Cardstock is Black & Colonial white, CTMH; Plain Jane stamp by Verve; Organdy ribbon, Just Blooms paper flowers & Red Sparkles, CTMH; Ink is Tuxedo Black, Memento.

Freshly Made Sketches #47

I'm sticking with my Miracle papers that are still sitting on my desk!  I haven't used this stamp set all that much, and thought that the little circle image would fit nicely on this week's Freshly Made Sketch:

Patterned papers are Miracle; Carstock is Kraft, Bamboo & Colonial White; Stamp set is Salutation Seals; Ink is Bamboo; Mocha Opaque Pearls - all CTMH.  Spellbinder's die.

Heart2Heart Challenge - Sympathy cards

This week's Heart2heart Challenge is sympathy cards, which are always good to have on hand - and my stash is getting low.  I made some similar cards a few months ago, and really liked using the Miracle papers for sympathy cards, as they're so soft & pretty.  I've done two version, the first one is pretty straight up:

For the second one, I made the cream oval a negative die cut through all the layers, so you're actually seeing the sentiment and butterfly on the inside of the card.  I used my metal die as a template and sponged bamboo ink inside of it to leave a bit of an oval shape on the inside as well:

and here's the inside:

Patterned papers are Miracle; Cardstock is Colonial White & Kraft; Inks are Bamboo, Heavenly Blue & Desert Sand; Just Paper Blooms, Butterfly; Mocha Opaque Pearls - all CTMH.  Stamp set is Blessings, Verve; Dies are Spellbinders & Taylored Expressions.

Mojo Monday #253

This week's Mojo Monday sketch is an interesting one... and took a while to plan out.  I love the end result, even though this is WAY more fussy-cutting than normal for me :o)

Patterned papers are Tea for Two, Cosmo Cricket; Stamp set is Bloom & Grow, Verve; Circle Flower Die, Verve; Inks are Rich Cocoa, Memento and Blush, Hollyhock & Olive, CTMH; Mocha Opaque Pearl, CTMH.  Cardstock, paper & ribbon, Key Ingredients kit.

Sketchbook Saturday Challenge #71

Back to something fun & bright today... I used these fun little pop-up flower dies from Taylored Expressions for Chupa's Sketchbook Saturday sketch:

Patterned papers are Hello Summer, Echo Park; Ribbon, Buttons, Cardstock all Key Ingredients kit; Cloud Duo, Petal Pop-Ups 1 & 2 dies all Taylored Expressions.

August SFYTT for CASE Study

Well after just getting the July Sketch For You To Try done in the nick of time... I'm jumping right on the bandwagon for August and getting it done early!  I had my new Key Ingredients kit to work with, and since Verve is the SFYTT August sponsor, I pulled out some Verve goodies to make it all happen.  Now this week also marks the start of the CASE Study Challenge blog's 2nd Anniversary... and in addition to a great blog hop (check it out!) they asked us to show everyone our Signature Style.  I definitely like colour & patterns in my cards, with a fairly clean style, nothing too overly embellished.  But one thing that is definitely a trademark of mine, is to do several little "X" stitches using hemp or waxy flax - I can't tell you how many times I've added little x's to my cards - I just love the look of them?!  So here is my Aug SFYTT showing my signature little x's:

Patterned papers are Tea for Two, Cosmo Cricket; Cardstock is Colonial White, CTMH; Stamp sets are Words of Wisdom & Bloom & Grow, Verve; Floral Circles die, Verve; Inks are Rich Cocoa, Memento, Olive & Honey, CTMH; Natural hemp, CTMH; Cocoa button, CTMH.

Superhero for the Inspired By challenge

Lauren has a cute superhero themed inspiration photo for this week's Inspired By challenge... so I went back to my favourite guy papers Superhero, and my Super Powers stamp set, along with this week's Deconstructed sketch:

Here was our inspiration:

Patterned papers are Superhero; Cardstock is Sky, Moonlight & White Daisy; Stamp set is Super Powers; Ink is Grey Wool & Black; - all CTMH; Copic Markers; Baker's Twine is Martha Stewart; Charming Oval dies by Verve.