Long time between posts

I can't believe it had been over a month since I last crafted. I have missed it greatly and was excited when I had the chance to create again the other night. I was able to catch up and complete the WMS Christmas Card Challenges for 2012 and was excited to do so as I greatly enjoy these challenges. The November challenge was to include a light of some kind so I used my new WMS Little Lantern set to create a rather simple card. the sentiment is from a PTI stamp set.

The top and bottom layer of washi tape was created by my stamps and some tissue paper. The red washi I had laying around. I would love to get more of this stuff as I only have two (same pattern but different colors).

The December challenge was to use green. I used one of my favorite WMS stamp sets: Festive Foliage. The banners were created with spray inks, stains, stamps, alcohol inks, and embossing folders. The each have a little something on them even if it is hard to see the details on the white ones.

Time for a baby break

I have a dear friend who is expecting a precious little girl around the start of the new year. That being said, she just had two baby showers and I wanted to make something special for her. I really enjoy making things for my family and friends so this was perfect. First shower I made this sweet little card and a little frame with a printed "I love your _____" behind the glass so they can change it to whatever, whenever they want to. A kind of special little message board for her from them. After my own boys saw they have since put in a request for their own.

This second card was a card for the wee one from me noting how she would need a special announcement for when she comes into the world. Behind the card were 26 matching announcements that I made the soon-to-be parents. And now I need to start working on Christmas presents for them and my two boys :)

Christmas for Caring Hearts Card

Here are the latest cards I made for the Caring Hearts Card Drive. I totally CASED these cards; however, I so don't remember from whom or where. I am very sorry. I am start to come to the conclusion that so long as I am working during the school year my crafting/blogging time is more or less put on hold. While I don't really like that (this is one of my stress release), it is only for a season and I do see a light. All but one of these cards uses PTI's Winterberry (the other card uses PTI's Snowflake Melody).

CAS Christmas

I have discovered that when I am crunched for time CAS is the way to go for cards. In under a total 4 interrupted hours this week I was able to create 12 cards. Now for some this isn't all that fast, but for me when I haven't been really focused this is lightening quick. This post is just a quick one so that ya'll can see most of the cards. My favorite ones I created were the Holy Night cards (I created two of these) and you can see that one in the post below this one.

 I made three of these

 Made two. To get the blue I used glossy accent to cover the ornaments and heat embossed the sentiment. I also used a white pen to add a touch of snow to the branches.

These were fun to create and color. Here are the close up of the cute little images too.

Holy Night

When this set (Star of Wonder) first came out from PTI last year, I knew I had to get it. Then I never played with it. Well, after their last release where several cards used this set, I knew now was my chance to play with it. Perfect timing too as it went perfectly with several challenges.

To create my banners I simply cut strips of different widths from white c/s and for two of them (the wider ones) I swiped Chipped Sapphire to color my c/s to match my inked image. Then I mied Perfect Pearl's spray in perfect pearl with white ink and flicked/splattered it onto the now navy strips. Love how you could use this for either snow or stars. For the top banner I stamped and embossed Hero Arts Lattice bg stamp and used a water brush and Chipped Sapphire ink to color a few random spots. To carry my navy over to the other side so it wasn't so heavy on one side I simply stamped the simple sentiment on the flip side in the same color. LOVE how this turned out.

Challenges used:
Clean & Simple sketches
Charisma Cardz: clean & simple
A Blog Named Hero: clean & simple
CASology: night

LET It Snow

Went with a very non-tradtional Christmas card for this Retro Sketch challenge. Since I've been playing with snowflakes, I saw snowflakes instead of the hearts found in the sketch. These sweet little flakes are from PTI's In The Meadow and the sentiment is from Tremendous Treats: Christmas. I embossed the flakes and sentiment so they could stand out more on the kraft c/s. The clouds are die cut out with PTI cloud dies and before I used pop dots on the clouds out sponged Weathered Wood and Stormy Sky. The edge of the card was sponged with Fresh Snow ink.

Hexagon Kind of Christmas

I found a new CAS(E) Challenge blog and it is all about sketches. It is called CAS(E) the Sketch! Since it is their first challenge, I thought I would play along. I had the idea to make the circle with the image in it a peek-a-boo window. I also wanted to use my hexagon stamps and large die. After combing the two, this is what I came up with. At first, it was a little too simple (not CAS simple...more ugly simple) to me. As I was trying to decide if I should chunk it or try to salvage it, I saw my glitter glossy accent and inspiration struck. I decided to save my card and coat a few select hexagons with the glossy stuff. Not perfect but much better.

Time for a Card Drive

Vera from Ling's Design Studio is hosting her Caring Hearts Card Drive and I knew I had to join in. Even with work being crazy busy and then coming home and being wife/mom I just have to create and this would be a perfect thing to create for. She collects holidays cards (all directions on on her blog) and then sends them to various nursing homes around the country. Since I have most if not all of my cards made for family and friends this would be easy to do.

For my cards today I was inspired by Danielle's card here. First I just had to recreate her card. It was so easy to do with the Mistletoe & Holly stamp set from PTI.

After playing with that set, I decided to try to get the same look with Snowflake Medley stamp set (also by PTI). To get my layers I stampe a large snowflake first in Kraft ink, then a medium size one in Vintage Cream, and the smallest one in Fresh Snow. I then heat embossed the sentiment (from WMS's Compliements of the Season) in white. To achieve the white paint frame I simply used my Snow Cap Dabber. This came together so quickly that I went ahead a made three of them :)

It's a pink Christmas

For many I know pink is the color of preference for the holidays. I don't mind it, but truthfully I am more of a traditional cal. However, I do like to play with different colors for the holidays. This particular color challenge is for WMS's Christmas Card challenge on their forum. I knew I wanted to use my Dainty Dolies for this challenge, but I wasn't sure how it was going to play out. Whenever I get stuck I look for a fun sketch challenge to play along with too. This one came from Mojo Monday and I had lots of fun with it. It seems that I am loving my Festive Foliage WMS stamp set this year too as I have been using for almost every challenge this year. The sentiment is from WMS's Compliements of the Season and the banners our stamped with a wee little banner from Bitty Banners. I really love the touch of green on this card with the holly leaves.

Paper Smooches fun

I don't have many Paper Smooches stamps (ok, really I only have one, but I have several of their free digis), but I have always loved the cuteness of them and wanted more. I figured since I am trying to watch my budget more I would through caution to the wind and try out for their Guest Designer spot for Novemeber. I really love the little bee and it became the foundation for my card. While looking through their digis I got the brillant idea to see how many I could merge together. Here's my card, can you figure out how many I used?

I used four (did you get it right?). I used the bee twice by flipping it and making the second one a little smaller, the heart came from the I {heart} you sentiment, the word "bee" came for the bee sentiment (and I copied the "b" and then flipped it to make the "d"), and the word "love" came from the Love You Bunches sentiment. I had lots of fun piecing them together. I decided my bees need to flying in the sky so I cut some white c/s and sponged three shades of blue onto it and then flicked water onto it to create my sky. To ground my card I used banners. I used washi tape to create the red banner to pull in the color of the heart, printed my pieced together sentiment onto white c/s, and created the yellow one to mimic the color of the bees with my copics. After putting the banners on I went to my sewing machine and added the zig-zag stitch to anchor them. To add the the cuteness of the bees I added glitter the wings and goggle-eyes for the ubber cuteness. To make sure my little girl bee looked like a girl I added the eyelashes. I then coated the heart with some glossy accent.

I made a second card. Actually this was the first card, but I didn't like how it turned out. I thought I would share so ya'll can see that my first ideas aren't always the best for me :)

World Making Card Day 2012

Yesterday I wasn't able to play along, but I found sometime today. School work is still taking over most of my time, so I had to do some work yesterday. As a reward for my hard work I did get to celebrate my 11 yr annv with my amazing DH. Actually, we celebrated Friday by going to a Love Worth Fighting Fo marriage conference. Last night we took our oldest to a Toby Mac Concert. It was so much fun getting to hear one of my favorite Christian artists sing songs that I love live. Opening for him were Jamie Grace and Christ August; both of which were equally amazing. A loved it so much that he "taught" his younger brother how to put on a Toby Mac concert this morning. While they did that, I decided to create a few cards. Up first is the Ellen Hutson and Lawnscaping challenge. It was an inspiration challenge. Here is the picture:

My take on it was to focus on the wood and texture I saw in the pictures. I embossed my card base with a woodgrain impression plate, but first I lightly coated the plate with a light tan color to highlight the grain and then sponged with edges with Antique Linen and Old Paper distress inks. To add more texture I wraped some twine around the top. For my little scene I used LawnFawn's Say Cheese for the amazing picture frame, Say Cheese 2 for the sentiment (love how the sentiment works well for cooler weather), and the picture itself was created with Critters in the Forest. I sponged the background of the picture and then used a PTI cloud stamp in Vintage Cream to complete the sky. Nothing too fancy, but I love it none the less.

A Rustic Christmas

So I got a chance to craft this week. It took me a couple of days to put this together but I am glad I did. I really miss my crafts. To help me get back into a crafting mood I decided to check out this month's Chrsitmas card challenge from the WMS forum. It was a countdown challenge. As in 3 different WMS stamp sets, 2 embellies, and 1 circle. This one was a challenge too. I wasn't able to wrap my brain around it at first. I had it in my mind that I wanted to go rustic but wasn't sure how to pull it off with the challenge at first. I think the hardest part was the circle. Since I am not all that great coming up with sketch on my own I decided to go through the WMS Sketch challenges to find one. My three WMS sets are Festive Foliage, Musical Background, and Complements of the Season. My two embellies is the twine I wraped around the stem of the misletoe I had stamped and cut out to make the little bow and the three blinged berries that I colored with my copics. My one circle was used to hold my sentiment. I really love how the whole card is in shades of browns so that the sentiment and misletoe can shine. I even found a couple of other challenges for my card making event, lol: Charisma Cardz - Something for the Guys (I like to think rustic is very boyish, esp since I have two that will be going camping soon), CCEE - Make your own pattern paper, and Simon Says Stamp - Anything Goes.

It's a big day

I don't remember the last time I worked so hard in the first four weeks of school and I've been at this for 12 years. I don't even want to know how many hours I am pulling. It is really starting to drain me and my family which is NOT good. Lots of talking between me and God going on right now to see what we need to do. My stress relief is my craft and I only today got a chance to create a couple of cards. Actually I made the time because today is a big day for my oldest and his friend. Today they get their bible from the pastor. It is another step along their journey of knowing who their Heavenly Father is, and a journey that will last a lifetime. I thought PTI's Heavenly Medley would be good for these cards. I wanted to keep these cards simple with a simple reminder that they are children of God. I also stamped a verse on the inside: If any of you lack wisome, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. James 1:5

I will try to come back as soon as I can with another card :)

A Buzzing Celebration

Here is my last card for last week's challenges over at TSG. I had so much fun stretching my TSG stamps into being used for birthdays. The fifth challenge at TSG was to use three embellies on our birthday card. I loved my sky scene so much that I used it again on this card, and of course I just had to use those sweet little bees from Bee Happy. I couldn't find a sentiment that I like thought I used my computer to create one. The inside says "so we decided to come a celebrate too. Happy Birthday!" The orange is some pattern paper I had laying around. The flowers were sprayed with Perfect Pearl mist: Perfect Pearl to mimic the shine/glitter of the bees wings. The pearl just fit nicely into the flower and made for a nice touch on the card. I am excited to have been able to play along (the three embellies: Flowers, Pearl, Bling: perfect pearl and glitter). The sketch is from Sketch Saturday.