My First-Ever Blog Candy!

THIS BLOG CANDY IS NOW CLOSED.  Click HERE for the winner. :)

Okay all of you lovelies, I have finally gotten my act together and have put together a little package of crafty goodness as a great big thank you to all of my wonderful followers and visitors who give me encouragement each and every day!  I've won some lovely blog candy along the way, so it's high time I return the favor. ;)

So... to have a chance of winning, please leave a comment on this post.  Simple as that.  If you'd like a little prompt, I would love to hear about what your favorite crafting item is at the moment... a favorite stamp, a tool, paper line, chipboard, ink, mist, inspirational site... whatever - I'd love to know.  That's what it's all about - learning from each other. International entries are welcomed - I will ship anywhere.

Now, if you'd like to become a follower (or already are!), I will put your name in a second time. However, following is not necessary - you'll still get one chance at winning just for commenting.  Please leave *another* comment if you are already a follower or if you become a follower, so that I don't mess up the count, LOL!

And... if you'd like another chance.... give my blog candy a little mention on your own blog (sidebar is cool).  And of course, let me know, with a link, in another comment.  I am going to try that Random.org thingy, so I want a clear accounting of entries!

Please leave your comments on THIS post by midnight EST (USA) on October 27, 2010.  I will randomly pick a winner the following day.  Please be sure I have a way of contacting you . :)

So, what's in the package? Stamps, ribbons, ephemera... yummy stuff.  Some of it for fall and Christmas, some just general yum.  A listing:

*Santa Collage stamp by Rubber Stampede
*Angel Stamp (CI - 154) by Crafty Individuals
*The Little Paper Shop topiary set and truck single clear stamps
*Two teensy stamps by Serendipity (one image is of buttons, one is of a stack of postcards)
*Dear Santa and Damask stamps from Hampton Arts
*Rayon seam binding (over 20 yards!) in luscious colors for autumn and Christmas
*Alterable "stuff"... a 7Gypsies accordian kit, a teensy composition book, some library pockets and cards, some tags in little bags
*Vintage paper ephemera - pages from French and German readers, poetry, study questions, storybook pages, and a three-page spread from a vintage German atlas
*A little assortment of inspirational crafty goodies that I am compiling as I go... fave stuff, like buttons, shimmery tulle and frosty fuzzy trim, some posies, little bits of fabric and vintage trim - you get the idea :)

Here are some close-ups.  I hope there's something you like.  Good luck! :)

Play Date Cafe Challenge 50

So, the trickiest thing about the Play Date Cafe Challenge for me this week was photographing my project!  This week the DT challenges us to use a color palette of Green, White, and Melon.  (The melon part was the second trickiest thing... I finally went to the craft store and purchased some cardstock called "Watermelon" to be sure I had the color right, LOL!)  We can use any theme, but it just so happens that the entire team created projects for the holidays, and the sponsor this week, Elusive Images, is donating some gorgeous holiday stamps as prizes.  That totally put me in the holiday spirit!

I've had this idea rattling around in my head for a while - to take vellum, stamp on it, color it on the back, and make a candle surround.  So that's what I did, finally, with this holiday-themed challenge.  I stamped the angel image (from Crafty Individuals) in black on vellum, flipped it over, and colored the image with Copics.  I used very bright colors of melon, green, yellow, and sienna, so that they could shine through the vellum.  I did this twice (for the front and back).  For the sides, I simply took two vellum panels and ran them through a Cuttlebug snowflake embossing folder.  Here's a better view of the side:

And here's a close-up of the image in brighter light.  The middle angel's dress is colored green, but with the votive burning behind it, it's a bit hard to tell. The music border is from a Hero Arts stamp.

The overall size of the piece is a 5" cube.  I wanted to be able to put my large 3-wick pine scented candle inside.  Unfortunately, the light from said candle was so bright it wrecked havoc with my photos!  I switched it out for a smaller votive, and that worked better.  Whew - photography is definitely not my forte!

There's still time to play along over at the Cafe (until midnight tonight).  Check out the beautiful prizes up for grabs this week, as well as a design team call. ;)

Sending Hugs... and a Little Peek

Hello friends! Posting a little card I made for a blogger friend who's going through some health troubles (but is on the mend, thank goodness!).  The image and sentiment are from Crafty Individuals, and the paper is all from Crate Paper's Restoration line. (I will be sobbing when I've used this up. Seriously. But I'm not hoarding it. Seriously.)

And, I have a little sneaky peeky of my first article in Craft Stamper magazine... Yippeeee!  Can't show you the entire thing, of course, but it's the November issue if you get a chance to see.

I'm off to take a walk on this beautiful, sunny, COOL autumn day.  Hope your day is crafty and fun!

Mini Canvas Swap

Yikes! A week since my last post.  Life happens, in a good way, though. :)  I had to make nine 4x4 canvases for our ATC/Mixed Media group this week, and it was definitely a creative adventure, since I'd never made a canvas before.  The theme was "Nature", so I dug out some seriously ancient vellum paper with butterflies on it, some genuinely old sheet music, and my new favorite Stampin' Up! stamp from the Elements of Style set.  (BTW, sorry for the horrible picture... it's been dark and stormy here for the last 2 days, and I had to take these pics with a flash - yuck!) 

First, I painted all of the canvases a gold-ish color, then set to work with my gel medium.  The first layer was the sheet music, then the flowers, which I stamped on white tissue paper and colored with colored pencils before applying them to the canvas.  Next came those devilish vellum butterflies, which really wanted to warp and wrinkle (duh... it's been a while since I've worked with vellum).  Luckily they are smoothing out on their own.  The last addition was Tim's fragments with Graphic 45 tag elements behind them.  I still need to wrap the sides in twine (since they are rather thick canvases, I think they need some textural interest around the sides).  Can't wait to see what the other gals have come up with!

One other little card project..... this incorporated last week's Compendium of Curiosities challenge, but I never posted it (yes, lame... I'll try to be better next time!).  It's a birthday card for my hubby, using a Crafty Individuals stamp, some glimmer mists, some embossing, some of Tim's new papers (lovin' the calendar paper, oh yes!), and the "43" numbers (also Tim's) covered in vintage text - that was the challenge part.

A coupla challenges you may want to check out..... Gingersnap Creations has posted a new color challenge - Yellow, Orange, and Red (celebrating the relentless summer sun, perhaps?).  Louise has the new Tag Tuesday challenge up, which is "Christmas Colors in July" - to use red and green, but NOT in a Christmas-themed way.  And finally, the lovely Linda Ledbetter has the Week 7 Compendium of Curiosities challenge up... and you won't believe the prize!!  I'm hoping to play along in all of these..... after having been such a bad, bad blogger, LOL!!  Happy Craftying, Peeps!