Bodacious Friend

Happy Friday, friends!  I'm happy to report that I had a more productive day in my craft room yesterday than on Wednesday.  Part of my problem is that I *really* want to work on some specific scrapbook layouts, but I'm waiting for my latest Stampin' Up! order to get here with the new In Color 12x12 cardstock.  I convinced myself to work on something else yesterday and I got a couple of cards made too.  So here's the first card:

Bodacious Bouquet is one of my all-time favorite flower stamp sets and I've had it since 2007.  Fifteen years!  And I still enjoy playing with it from time to time.  I knew it was the perfect stamp set for the CAS Colours & Sketches color challenge:

I did use Starry Sky for the sentiment, because it's like a slightly lighter version of navy blue--the ink is, anyway, the paper is a bit lighter.  I love these new In Colors :)

I'll also enter this at the latest Just Add Ink challenge:

Yup, I can do flowers!

Anyway, I have to pick Ryan up early today so he can get his second Covid shot, so I'd better get on up to the craft room and work while I have the chance.  Toodles!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Bodacious Bouquet, My Paper Pumpkin
Ink:  Sweet Sorbet, Parakeet Party, Starry Sky
Paper:  Thick Basic White, Tahitian Tide DSP
Accessories:  Stylish Shapes dies, Dimensionals

China: UDO

Mornin' y'all!  It's time for another China Sunday.  I just finished my orange cranberry muffins and a nice hot cuppa tea so I'm ready to go for the day :)

So, when I left off, we were doing our 8-mile bike ride on the city walls of Xi'an.  When we got to the fourth side, we discovered these:

None of us knew what to call them, so I jokingly said they were Unidentified Decorative Objects (UDOs) and it kinda stuck as a name.  I thought that floral pattern went pretty well with the colors in the UDOs, but that floral pattern is so busy it's best to use it in smaller quantities so I went with one thick strip of it for each layout.

And here is the second layout for you.  I kept these pretty simple since the pictures (and the floral paper) are pretty busy.

Today's very bright color palette is comprised of Summer Sun, Ruby Red, and Basic Black.

And that's all she wrote today.  I'm going to enjoy a few more hours with the hubs before he drives back to Virginia Beach for school.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Rough Type, Love & Affection, Bodacious Bouquet
Ink:  Basic Black, Groovy Guava, Ruby Red
Paper:  Summer Sun, Basic Black, Ginger Blossom & Botanical Gardens DSP
Accessories:  none

Retro Rubber Tropical Friend

Hey y'all!  I was asked to be a guest designer for Retro Rubber this week, so exciting!  And it's a tic-tac-toe challenge:

And here's my card:

I did the diagonal from top left to bottom right:  die cut, green, and leaves.  The sentiment is from Suite Sentiments (1.5 years old) and the flower is from Bodacious Bouquet (11 years old) so nice and retro.  I paired them with the brand-new Tropical Chic (the border stamp) and Tropical Escape DSP (my favorite!).  I saw that sentiment stamp a week or two ago when I was looking for something else and I thought hey, I should use that sometime soon.  So here it is.

Go check out the Design Team's work on the Retro Rubber Challenge blog and give it a try!  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Suite Sentiments, Bodacious Bouquet, Tropical Chic
Ink:  Shaded Spruce, Lovely Lipstick, Granny Apple Green
Paper:  Lovely Lipstick, Granny Apple Green, Thick Whisper White
Accessories:  Stitched Shapes Framelits, Glitter Enamel Dots, Dimensionals

Friday Flashback: Linen

Happy Friday, y'all!  Today's Friday Flashback stamp set is Linen--yep, we're shining the light on a background stamp today.  Let's check it out!

Also features Baby Talk, Petite Patterns

One thing I noticed going through my archives is that I've used Linen quite a few times, but it's hard to see in the pictures because the texture is so fine on the stamp.  So click on the photos to enlarge, and check out the card base on this one.

Also features Heartfelt Thanks, Warm Words, French Script

Or the Almost Amethyst layer on this one.

Also features Fall Whimsy, Print Pattern, AYC3

Pumpkin Pie layer on this one...

Also features Touch of Nature, Print Pattern, Weathered, AYC3

The card base on this one...

Also features Steppin' Style, Print Pattern

And finally, the blue layer on this one.  Uh, Linen is a hard stamp to photograph I guess?  Well, here's my new card:

I think you can see it a little better here; I stamped Linen with Dapper Denim ink on Dapper Denim cardstock and IRL it looks like blue jeans which makes me happy.  I'm entering this at Just Add Ink, where the challenge is to just add "B"--I made a birthday card with a blue jeans background, using the color Blushing Bride and the stamp set Bodacious Bouquet for my blooms, to which I added a bit of bling in the form of rhinestones, and I used my Big Shot to cut out the Lots of Labels die for my sentiment.  How's that for Bs?

This also counts for Retro Rubber's challenge to use flowers:

I've had Linen for 10 years (!!!), Bodacious Bouquet for 9, and Perfectly Penned for 5, so they're all nice and retro for that challenge.

I also incorporated the colors from The Color Throwdown:

I used Dapper Denim, Blushing Bride, and Watermelon Wonder for my colors, and I think they'll forgive me for adding a smidge of Pear Pizzazz because I just needed some leaves for my flowers.

This afternoon, hubs and I are going to see the new X-Men movie (hubs is off work today!) and then we're going out to dinner.  Maybe I can talk him into going to Chuy's for some Mexican food...adios for now!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Linen, Bodacious Bouquet, Perfectly Penned
Ink:  Dapper Denim, Blushing Bride, Watermelon Wonder
Paper:  Dapper Denim, Blushing Bride, thick Whisper White
Accessories:  Lots of Labels Framelits, rhinestones

Friday Flashback: Happy Watercolor

Happy Friday, y'all!  Well, I failed in my goal to have this post up before noon, but here it is anyway :)  Today's featured retired stamp set is the beautiful Happy Watercolor, which debuted in the 2014 Occasions catalog.  So let's take a look through the archives!

Also features Bodacious Bouquet

I think that sentiment stamp is my very favorite stamp in Happy Watercolor.  That stamp makes me happy :)

Also features Postage Collection

I love orchids.  They will forever remind me of living in Japan, where the Make-Man Store had beautiful orchids in a huge variety of colors and some of the plants were as cheap as 500 yen (about five dollars at the time).

Also features Hardwood

And poppies remind me of living in England.  They grow all over the place in late fall and of course they sell plastic ones to put on your jacket for Remembrance Day (which is like the US Veterans' Day).

So even though I post things on here five (and lately six) days a week, somehow I still don't use some stamp sets nearly as much as I might want to....like why isn't this Flashback a lot longer?  So it was fun to play with this stamp set again.  And both of my cards count for the Retro Rubber Challenge:

Easy peasy!  Happy Watercolor is just two years old, so not as retro as some other stamps but hey, it's over a year old so it counts :)

First up is another orchid card!  We have an orchid in our kitchen right now.  I'm very surprised I haven't killed it yet, but it's got three blooms on it so yay us.  I almost called this post a Friday Frustration though because I was all done with this card when I decided to put some Wink of Stella on the flowers (because hey, I've got that pen now so let's wink up everything!) and then the pen BARFED all over my image panel!  So I had to rip that off and re-do all of the stamping and coloring.  Then I was much more carefuller (haha) and managed to give it a little bit of shimmer without having glitter barf all over everything.

Anyway, thank you to the lovely folks at Fusion for this inspiration photo:

Yay orchids!  I love the color on that vase on the left too, I wish we had that exact color in cardstock and ink.  I also used this week's Freshly Made Sketch:

I suppose I wanted to make up for yesterday's lack of motivation, and I didn't realize that it was already pretty late in the morning because I decided to make a second card for today's Flashback.

And darn it all if this one didn't take multiple tries too!  I used the color combination from Global Design Project:

You can probably tell from my two new cards today that I'm kind of in love with that diagonal stripe patterned paper.  What can I say?  It makes me happy too.  I always try to make the stripes point upwards though because that looks "happier" to me.  Maybe I over-think it.

This was attempt #1 on the poppy (I finished up with attempt #3).  The Tangelo Twist came out more orangey in this one which I liked better (it seemed to get a little muddier the more I stamped with it?) but I just didn't like the placement of the sentiment.  If I had stamped the poppy on there first, I would have moved the sentiment up and over a bit, but I stamped the sentiment first and then it just didn't work for me so I had to redo it.  Bleargh.

Well, I've got lots of errands to run today and my little girl dog Sadie just came in and reminded me that today is her 10th birthday and I owe my birthday dog a walk.  A long walk she says, not like yesterday's short one.  Who am I to deny the birthday dog?  So off we walk.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, orchid card:
Stamps:  Happy Watercolor
Ink:  Basic Black, Blushing Bride, Rich Razzleberry, Tip Top Taupe
Paper:  Blushing Bride, Rich Razzleberry, Thick Whisper White, Blushing Bride DSP
Accessories:  Wink of Stella glitter pen (clear), Dimensionals, hexagon punch, Party Pennants Bigz die (still available on the clearance rack)

Supplies, poppy card:
Stamps:  Happy Watercolor
Ink:  Tangelo Twist, Bermuda Bay, Early Espresso
Paper:  Bermuda Bay, Early Espresso, Shimmery White, Tangelo Twist DSP
Accessories:  Hexagon punch, rhinestones, Dimensionals

We're All Mad Here

I've been working on this for the past two days:

In March, I'll be hosting a Mad Hatter tea party like I did last year.  I had ideas for decorations last year that I never got around to, so I'm starting early this time and I've got two helper bees this year where I did it all by my onesies last year.

So anyway, I'm mad here because I hand-cut every single letter and almost all of the flowers (the smallest pink and yellow flowers were punched out), which is why this took me two days to make.  But I like how it turned out, what do you think?  I once again used my favorite Bodacious Bouquet and a variety of other bold flower stamps, and the letters are a template from a company I kinda think is no longer in business (at least, that's what Google seems to be telling me).

Have a great day!  I'm off to my next mad idea...which is probably walking the dogs :)

Supplies:
Stamps:  Bodacious Bouquet, Eastern Blooms, Fabulous Flowers, One of a Kind, Paradise
Ink:  Daffodil Delight, Garden Green, Melon Mambo, Pacific Point, Pumpkin Pie, Rich Razzleberry
Paper:  Tempting Turquoise, Melon Mambo, Basic Black, Whisper White, Kaleidoscope DSP (the old one, not the one that's out in the Occasions catty now)
Accessories:  non-SU lettering template

ETA for Mom:  The frame size is 16 by 20, and the opening is 11 by 14, so I started with a 12x12 piece of cardstock and added the patterned paper to the top and bottom to get 14 inches.  I happened to have this empty frame sitting around because I'd planned to do some kind of home decor with it and just hadn't gotten around to it, so it's been put to use now!  I can always switch this out for something else later if I want to.

Friday Flashback: Bodacious Bouquet

Happy Friday!  I wrote this post from the wifi hotspot last night and it was a bit of a pain but I was BOUND AND DETERMINED to get this up because it's my birthday!  Then sometime around midnight last night, the Internet returned--it's a birthday miracle!  And to add to all that happy, today's featured stamp set is one of my all-time faves, Bodacious Bouquet.  So let's take a peek through the archives!

I think I used a coordinating wheel on the left side of this card but I can't remember the name of it.  The sentiment is from one of the All Year Cheer stamp sets.

This one's a newer creation and was on the Best Yet Friday Flashback.

This was one of my absolute favorite cards with this stamp set; the sentiment is from Polka Dots & Paisley.

I made this one for a Hawaiian-themed baby shower!  The sentiment is from Warmest Regards.

Here's a tent topper card; birthday greeting from It's Your Birthday.

Another favorite, I think I'm one of the few people who *liked* Glorious Green.  This one also features Happy Everything (another all-time fave) and Paisley.

An Okinawa scrapbook page : )

And a bold baby book layout; I really liked that primary color scheme and used it several times.  These bold flowers just cry out for bold colors!

Haha!  I love this layout, it was our first house in Okinawa.  Don'tcha love the Indiana Jones-style letters?

So that's it for the Flashback, and it would have been longer if I'd posted every single thing I've ever made with Bodacious Bouquet but I picked my faves.  So here's today's new card:

The original sketch had the banner on the top pointing down, but it just didn't quite work once I had everything else on the card front so I did a horizontal one instead.  First time I've used Happy Watercolor, too!  I chose some of my favorite colors for this card--Bermuda Bay, Elegant Eggplant, Strawberry Slush, Garden Green and Daffodil Delight.  Quite the vivid bouquet.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed today's Friday Flashback, and have a great weekend!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Bodacious Bouquet, Happy Watercolor
Ink:  Bermuda Bay, Elegant Eggplant, Strawberry Slush, Garden Green, Daffodil Delight
Paper:  Bermuda Bay, Strawberry Slush, Whisper White, retired Elegant Eggplant DSP, Attic Boutique DSP, Quatrefancy DSP
Accessories:  Circle Framelits, Dimensionals

Friday Flashback: Best Yet

Happy Friday and welcome to this week's Friday Flashback!  Today's featured stamp set du jour is Best Yet, a cute little set of six greeting stamps that was a hostess set back in 2008.  I thought the Splitcoast gallery for this set would be pretty small since usually cards get filed under the name of the image (i.e. flowers or whatever) rather than the name of the sentiment set, but if you click that link, the Best Yet gallery is huge!  So let's flash back.

Made this for hubs for our anniversary one year : )  The grass is from Inspired By Nature.

That was a weird sketch challenge, lemme tell ya, and it was before circle Framelits but I tried to get it to look right.  I love this sentiment stamp to make cards for babies or little kids.  The flowers are from Eastern Blooms, and the background is my favorite Bella Toile.

Eastern Blooms again and another baby card.  And every color on this card is retired except for the white.  Harrumph.

And this was a first birthday card for the daughter of a friend.  It matched the colors in the outfit I got her, which included a tutu because what one-year-old girl doesn't need a tutu?

How about a cool blue and white Christmas card?  The Scandinavian Season Christmas tree was stamped with Bashful Blue craft ink (retired, wah!) and embossed with Iridescent Ice for some sparkle.

Ooookay so that "little someone" stamp definitely wins for most used in this set, right?  The bear is from Bundle of Joy, awesome baby set.

And here's today's card:

Lemme just pat myself on the back for coming up with that color combo:  Strawberry Slush, Coastal Cabana, Rich Razzleberry, and a bit of Midnight Muse (I tend to use any really dark color kinda like a neutral).  The flowers are from Bodacious Bouquet (another longtime fave) and I lightly sponged the flower panel with some Pink Pirouette ink to make the bit with the sentiment stand out a little bit more.

The sketch is from Retro Sketches:

I LOVE this sketch.

So that's it for me today, I kinda want to go start on another scrapbook layout.  I've already got probably four or five layouts done that I haven't even shared here yet, I'm on a roll!  Thanks for stopping by today and have a great weekend!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Best Yet, Bodacious Bouquet
Ink:  Coastal Cabana, Strawberry Slush, Rich Razzleberry, Pink Pirouette
Paper:  Coastal Cabana, Midnight Muse, Whisper White, Strawberry Slush DSP
Accessories:  Curly Label punch, Dimensionals

Friday Flashback: So Happy For You

Happy Friday everyone!  Today's Friday Flashback stamp set is So Happy For You, and I admit when I pulled that stamp set name I thought "uhh...what?"  Obviously not one that has gotten a lot of use at my house, but it was a Sale-a-Bration stamp set in 2011 so at least it was free?  Today's Flashback actually has no flashback part as this is its maiden voyage...

Sorry the colors in my photos are a bit off today; not sure what the deal is but I took a pic of another project using Pumpkin Pie cardstock and it came off looking like Real Red on crack.  So on this one, the stripey pattern is Melon Mambo, not some eye-searing shocking pink monstrosity.  It looked better IRL than it does in that picture, and I still wasn't thrilled with it; I thought I should have switched out the Crumb Cake and Basic Black layers.

So I did some card surgery.

Well, it's a little better, but I still think this Flashback is a bit of a dud.  It happens sometimes, and not every card can be as awesome as yesterday's (I really like yesterday's card, so anything else was bound to pale in comparison).  I think the *idea* for today's card was okay, but my execution is off.  To change the card, I peeled off the black polka dots and stamped the chevron pattern on Whisper White and stuck it on there, though the proportion of the black piece was a little better.  Instead of trying to peel apart the layers under my main image, I colored the Crumb Cake cardstock with a black marker.

At any rate, I'm gonna shake this one off and go try to work on something else.  Have a great weekend, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  So Happy For You, Bodacious Bouquet, My Paper Pumpkin (the chevron stamp was from a couple kits ago, forget which month)
Ink:  Melon Mambo, Crumb Cake, Basic Black
Paper:  Whisper White, Crumb Cake, retired Melon Mambo & Basic Black DSP
Accessories:  Deco Label Framelits, Circles Collection Framelits, Dimensionals, Rhinestone