Two Cards for the June Unity Challenges

Hi again everyone! I'm having some serious fun playing along with several challenges this week. Today I'm showing off what I came up with for both the color challenge and the card sketch challenge over at the Unity Stamp Challenge blog.

For the colors, I had some fun with several of the Unity stamps:

Yes, that might be the bird/french fry stamp...again...

I've had the idea of making a pile of notes for a bit now, like a messy desk. I stamped up several notes to self, then added on various sayings from several of the stamp sets. To tie in the gray, I made a little "don't forget" reminder and popped it up to give the card some height.

Side view

View from above

I like how it came out. The patterned papers add interest and the wood grain embossing on the chocolate brown gives a nod to the desk feeling I was going for.

For the card sketch challenge, I pulled out one of the older SotW sets - butterfly kisses.

You can never have enough butterflies

I pulled out one of my MME 6x6 paper pads and found this lovely butterfly print. The pink banner is actually the reverse of the butterflies. I love it when I can use an entire 6x6 for a card. Less waste! A little ribbon trim and some shimmery punched butterflies finished off the card. Here's a fun trick - to keep the ribbon from fraying, I squeezed some Glossy Accents onto my finger and used it to seal the edges. It works great!

Side view of the butterflies taking flight

View from above

I'm also linking the butterfly kisses up to:
CAS-ual Fridays CFC104, banners and/or flags
Simon Says Stamp Challenge, Simon Says...Transport

Happy Crafting!

Today I Shall Be Happier Than a Bird With a French Fry

 Hello again everyone! I'm in challenge-mode, so I decided to make a card this time with my new favorite stamp ever.

Hello again, little birdie

I was going for a slightly vintage feel, and tried my hand at faux stitching. I like it, but I think I need to practice drawing straight lines...ah well. The watercolor paper the bird is stamped on is actually reused from a craft show sign. How's that for reusing? Of course, then I had to use some scraps so I decorated the inside of the card as well.

Tweet, tweet!

The bird is made with my new Fiskars punch and cut from scraps, then topped with a little pearl eye. Of course, they're craft room photos again. One of these days I'll actually create in the daylight again!

I am linking up to:
CAS-ual Fridays CFC104 - use banners and/or flags

Happy crafting!

A Little Christmas in July

Thanks to the holiday sale I had on Etsy, I've been in a Christmas mood...so when this week's challenges came out for CAS-ual Friday and Pink by Design, I was inspired to combine them. CAS is looking for a black base card while PbD08 is Christmas in July! Too fun!

 Here's what I came up with:

Snowflake 'Peace' card

Sadly, you can't tell in any of the photos but the white for the snowflake is a pretty, shimmery paper. I used black card stock for the base, then added another layer of black that was embossed with snowflakes. The top layer is popped up with foam tape and stamped in white ink with the 'peace' sentiment.

Better shot of the embossing

The flash popped up for this one...ugh!

The snowflake is punched out of the last layer of black paper and I tucked the shimmer paper behind it. Much easier than trying to glue down a punch-out!

Here's where I'm linking up this week:

Second card for CAS-ual Fridays

All right, here's my second attempt at a CAS Easter basket card.

I just sliced up some squares of card stock, stamped on some cute Easter eggies, and popped them off the card base. I think they came out rather sweet.

Come play with everyone over at CAS-ual Fridays!

Welcome to the First of Many Posts Today!

Oh yeah, lots and lots of posts today! I'm entering several online challenges with several different cards...and each one needs its own post! Oh yeah, and most have a deadline of today...eeek! Ready for some creative overload??

First up is the CAS-ual Fridays weekly challenge!

It's all about what you'd find in your bunny basket come Easter morning. I came up with two different cards for the challenge. We'll start with my favorite of the two, and the one I actually gave to my sister & her fiance for Easter. Problem is, I'm not sure if it would be defined as "clean and simple". Any thoughts??

I love this card. I couldn't find a bunny die anywhere, so I wound up finding a template and making my own. That seems to be this year's theme; they don't make what I want, so I'm making it myself! I visualized the patterned paper as wallpaper and have them sitting on a table...the scalloped edge is the tablecloth. Get it? The bunny eyes are just brads with some coloring done to them so they look like those classic chocolate rabbits. Yum...

Everything got inked up and I wrote out the speech bubbles myself. Obviously this is why I took drafting in high school, right? ;)

Back soon with more cards!