Wish Upon A Star Birthday

Happy Saturday, peeps!  My card today is a little out of my norm, but I needed a card quickly and just sort of threw this together!  A sweet church friend is a dog lover....I mean a REAL dog lover, and her birthday is coming up.  The challenge at JUGS is to use stencils, and the Seize the Birthday challenge is to use red as the main color:

I pulled out the retired Happy Tails and its matching punch, some star stencils I received as a gift, and here is my quick card:

I remember experimenting with red inks on red cardstocks but I forget what I ended up thinking was the best color...this was Cherry Cobbler, and I don't really like the muddy effect it created, but I needed to get this in the mail, so I'll have to experiment again!  Anyway, I stamped my pup on Crumb Cake and punched him out:

The sentiment on the front of the card is a from Lawn Fawn's Upon a Star:

and on the inside, the sentiment is from Spellbinders, along with some paw prints from Happy Tails:

I hope she likes it!  And just to show you how special my friend is, she volunteers for an organization called Canine Partners for Life.  They train service dogs for people with disabilities and are seizure-prone, and besides the regular trainers, they use people like Sue who raise and foster puppies to be service dogs. They also use prisoners who train them as well.  It's a pretty cool setup! She brings her dogs to church and sometimes we can hear them as they are napping and dreaming, LOL!  Check it out at their website!

Thanks so much for popping in today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Happy Tails (ret), Upon a Star (Lawn Fawn), Greetings (Spellbinders)
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Crumb Cake, Real Red
Ink	Real Red, Versafine Black, Cherry Cobbler, Crumb Cake
Accessories	Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Nested Essentials Dies, Dog Punch (ret), Star Stencil (A Color Life Designs), Blending Brush

Ruff Ruff Birthday

Happy Tuesday, peeps!  The Atlantic Hearts Sketch this week was a bit of a puzzler, but once I began working with it, it turned out pretty well!  Here's the sketch:

I needed a birthday card for my niece and she loves dogs, so I decided to make another wobbler card using the same image as I did on this card that I made a couple of weeks ago.  She's not a little girl, but who wouldn't love to get a wobbly little pup on your birthday card?  So here we go:

I used the colors of Granny Apple Green, Balmy Blue and Daffodil Delight from the Sunday Stamps challenge:

I stamped my little puppy in Stazon Black ink, then watercolored him in (don't look too closely, it wasn't too good of a watercolor job!), then used Balmy Blue and Daffodil Delight DSPs in the background.  The lower panel was embossed with the Dotty Hearts embossing folder.

The "ruff ruff" is from the retired Happy Tails set, embossed in white and diecut with a small stitched heart die from Give It A Whirl to match the Dotty Hearts embossing!

And finally, on the inside, a birthday sentiment from Perennial Birthday and some hearts from Country Bouquet!

And it's off in the mail it goes, wagging its way to the Windy City of Chicago!  Thanks for popping in today--enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Country Bouquet, Happy Tails (ret), Perennial Birthday (ret), Paper Pal Pets (Close to My Heart)
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Balmy Blue, Daffodil Delight, Granny Apple Green, Balmy Blue DSP, Daffodil Delight DSP
Ink	Stazon Black, Balmy Blue, Granny Apple Green, Daffodil Delight, Craft White
Accessories	Dimensionals, Wobble Mechanism,White Embossing Powder, Enamel Dots from my stash
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Dotty Hearts EF (ret),  Heat Tool, Give it A Whirl Dies, Stylish Shapes Dies

PP456 Poinsettia Tree

 

Hi peeps!  Time for another Paper Players challenge!  Laurie has a GREAT sketch for us this week...I even made two cards with it!  So here's the sketch:

And here's my card---a combination of new and old goodies!!!  I used a new set from the Holiday catalog called Shine Bright, and I stamped it in Mint Macaron ink, then used Light and Dark Mint Macaron Blends to color it in:

I used a gold Zig Painty pen to fill in the little berries, then added a Gold Foil scalloped mat, embellished it with a flower punched from the Triple Flower Punch and anchored with a gold brad.  For the lower panel, I used some Mint Macaron gingham DSP, stamping a partial sentiment (Christmas Pines) with the new Golden Glitz Delicata ink and mounted everything on a white card base that was embossed with the retired Petals A-Plenty embossing folder.  

For my second card, I pulled out some printed papers gifted to me by my friend Teri, stamped a cute little pup from a CTMH set, colored it with some Blends and added sentiments from Happy Tails and Picture Perfect Birthday:

This went to my nephew....he might think it's a little juvenile, but he always likes my cards, hopefully he'll like this one too!

Thanks for popping in today---I hope you'll play along with Laurie's wonderful sketch and share your creation with us at the Paper Players blog!  While you're there, check out what the DT created as well!

We have had a bumper crop of green and purple beans this year....our garden just keeps producing them and we couldn't eat them all, so I decided to freeze some earlier this past week.  Cassidy was itching to play a new game she got, so she actually pitched in and helped so that I could finish up and we could play!!

She was a good helper, and we had a lot of fun playing Sleeping Queens....I highly recommend it!

I am going to be taking a little bloggy vacation, spending time with hubby, so I will see you next Sunday, when I am the hostess at the Players!  Enjoy your week and be blessed!

TGIFC218 Sympathy Bella

Hi peeps!  A late, late start today...I was sad to hear that a stamping friend lost her beloved pet, and since the TGIF challenge this week is sympathy, I decided to send her a note of encouragement!

I mixed two sets for my card:  the retired Bella and Friends, and Happy Tails.  So here we go:

I found some pretty muted plaid DSP (Authentique Grateful) in my stash, so I used that as my color palette; I stamped Bella in Early Espresso and colored him in with SU Blends, the added the sentiment in Terracotta Tile and a little heart in Rococo Rose and Terracotta Tile, embellished with a little button die from Arts and Crafts:

And here's the inside:

I hope it brings some comfort to her!

I have to scoot, so I will post one last photo; this is a sweet card I got from my friend Wendy, who used some "vintage" SU stamps to create this patriotic treat!  This card just makes me SMILE because it reminds me of the images that were popular when I first started stamping!  I love how she created the background as well as the main image...I love it all!  Thanks, Wendy!

Off to karate!  Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Two Masculine Cards

Happy Wednesday, peeps!  Another crazy busy day and not much time to stamp yesterday, but I needed a couple of masculine cards, so when I saw the Stamp Ink Paper challenge (cute graphic, too):

as well as the In(k)Spire Me sketch/color challenge:

I got right to work, and created two cards; one a birthday, and one a get-well:

The challenge colors are Mango Melody and Granny Apple Green, but I found these papers in an Echo Park Fall is in the Air 6x6 pad, so I decided to go with them, adding touches of Crumb Cake and Early Espresso.  The birthday one uses the soon-to-be-retiring-I-thought-it-would-be-around-forever Lovely as a Tree stamped lightly in the background, with a leaf from Rooted in Nature and a sentiment from Beautiful Bouquet:

It's hard to see, but the leaf is stamped on some printed paper as well:

The get-well card uses Happy Tails and the matching punch, including a little Early Espresso heart:

And the inside sentiments are from Happy Tails and Apron of Love:

Need to pop these in the mail ASAP!  Thanks for popping in today!

Last night was Cassidy's third grade curriculum night, where family members come and visit the classroom and see what their children are learning.  Cassidy's class is learning about the thirteen colonies, particularly Jamestown, and so they put on a game show called "Who Wants to Be a Colonist?", although it was more like Family Feud, LOL!  Cassidy had a main part; she was Fred the Colonist, and she played against Dr Joe Jackson.  My friend Sharon just happened to vacation in Jamestown last week and brought home a hat for Cassidy to wear, my SIL had some boots that looked the part, and Grampy made her a corncob pipe:

She nixed the pipe once she got to school...they did grow tobacco in Virginia but I guess she thought it might not be a good influence on the other students, LOL!  Here she is, answering questions about the early colonies, and soundly beating Dr Joe:

All the kids did a great job and we learned a lot about the colonies!!!

(I love the name tag!!!)

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Sad Card Today

Hi everyone!  Today, I am sharing probably one of the saddest cards I have ever made; my cousin's 8-year-old grandson died yesterday after discovering he had an extremely aggressive case of a rare cancer.  Sadly, I have never even met my cousin or any of his family....he lives several states away and as siblings, my mother and his father were never close.  That does not mean the pain is any less....I just can't imagine their loss.  I know they are a very closely-knit family and they will rely on each other, friends and the Lord to get them through.  I recently got these cute vintage-style stamps from 100 Proof Press, and since Owen had just gotten a little puppy, I thought they were ideal for a sympathy card for the family:

I used the black & white challenge from Inspire.Create, and the sketch challenge from Case This Sketch:

I used some plaid papers from My Mind's Eye's Winterberry line and stamped my images and sentiment in Stazon:

On the inside, I stamped a sentiment from Papertrey along with another little puppy image:

Hug your family members today....you never know what the day will bring!  Be blessed, my friends.

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Happy Tails, Puppy and Bowl, Boy with Dog on Leash (both 100 Proof Press), Inspired Prayer (Papertrey)
Card stock & Papers	Whisper White, Basic Black, Winterberry DSP (My Mind's Eye)
Ink	Stazon Black
Accessories
Tools	Big Shot, Stitched Shapes Framelits, Layering Circles Framelits

Happy Tails and Nine Lives Mirror Stamping

Happy Monday, peeps!  Last week was my club week, and my girls learned how to do mirror stamping along with a punch!  I finally found the video tutorial by my friend Cindy Brumbaugh; you can see how she does it HERE.  (She actually shares the whole process for the card she made, so if you just want to see how she does the mirror stamping/punching part, it's around 9 minutes into the video!)  So I wanted to use the dogs from Happy Tails for our card, and this is what we made:

I have to say that this is one of my favorite cards ever!  Everyone nailed the technique beautifully, and it was so much fun to make!  Here's a closeup:

The front panel was embossed with the Subtle embossing folder, and the heart diecut is from the Be Mine Framelits.  We used Call Me Clover for our accent colors for the dog house, collars and DSP, and we even stamped some dog prints on the inside for fun:

I couldn't let the kitties from Nine Lives be left out, so as a sample, I also created this card, using some Twinkle Twinkle and Woodgrain DSPs:

Be sure to check out Cindy's video, she explains everything so well, I know you'll want to try this technique too!  Thanks for popping in today!

On Saturday, our church had an "Everybody Birthday Party".  We decorated twelve tables, one for each month, and everyone had to sit at the table of their birthday month!  We had two big cakes, ice cream and toppings, we sang happy birthday, and played birthday bingo! Cassidy sat at the August table with our friend Dale.  Dale has been to our house many times and is a special friend of ours; he has suffered a couple of strokes lately and it is a real struggle for him to get out to church, but last night John brought him over from the nursing home so he could celebrate with us.  He and Cassidy ate their cake and ice cream together:

Cassidy's table had a tablecloth on it that looked like an ocean, along with lots of beachy things:

You can see my vintage lunch pails in the background for September's table too!  And my friend Sara, whose birthday is next week, decorated the March table:

Lots of cake and ice cream (and that's my friend Sara in her signature green!):

It was fun getting to know people that we might not normally interact with on a Sunday morning!  (Ooh, and there's me behind Wayne, passing out cake, LOL!)

Thanks for indulging me a little today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!