FMS711 You Make My Heart Smile

 Happy Thursday, peeps! A busy day today, so this will be short and sweet! Kim's sketch at FMS is an interesting one:

That is a big circle! My mind immediately went to my Dotted Circles embossing folder, so I combined it with a little wreath from the retired Cottage Wreaths set:

My wreath is stamped in Crumb Cake, and I added some additional leaves in Pecan Pie and some "blueberries" because I had already stamped and embossed my sentiment on some Misty Moonlight cardstock:

After running a piece of Basic White through the embossing folder, I trimmed it out, then mounted it on another embossed piece, this time using Gathering Leaves.  My final addition was a wee bit of twine, tied into a bow, and a few silver pearls.  I left the inside blank, because there are several occasions for which I could use this card, so I'll stamp something when I need it!  Thanks for visiting today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!

"In his disciples' presence Jesus performed many other miracles which are not written down in this book.  But these have been written in order that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through your faith in him you may have life."  John 20:30-31

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Cottage Wreaths (ret)
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Misty Moonlight
Ink	Craft White, Crumb Cake, Misty Moonlight, Pecan Pie
Accessories	Silver pearls (ret), Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Country Wreaths Dies (ret), Dotted Circles Embossing Folder, Gathering Leaves Embossing Folder, Banner Dies (Pink & Main)

PP755 Lovely Lemon Thank You

Hi, stamping friends! I am the hostess at the Paper Players this week, and it's color challenge week: 

I know most of us are thinking fall hues but I wanted to challenge you to use a more spring-like palette!  I needed a thank you card for my SIL since she took care of my flowers while we were on vacation, so what better stamp to use than Layers of Beauty?!  Here we go:

I stamped my florals in Soft Sea Foam, then stenciled in Lemon Lolly, Soft Sea Foam and Lost Lagoon on the petals and leaves.  I found a piece of Lost Lagoon bokeh print from some Christmas DSP we had a few years back and mounted it behind a Penny Black double scalloped fram.  The floral diecut extended beyond the edge of the card, so I just trimmed them off.  

A sentiment from Everyday Greetings was heat-embossed in white on a banner of Soft Sea Foam, distressed a wee bit, and then I added a little Lemon Lolly baker's twine behind it as well as a couple of pearls:

Edited to add:  I am also going to enter this over at the Flower Challenge, where their sketch this week is very similar to mine:

I hope you'll play along with our colors this week, too!  The design team came up with some very interesting designs as well!  Be sure to check them out over at the Paper Players blog! Can't wait to see what you come up with!  Thanks for visiting today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!

TSOT676 Rustic Centerpiece

Happy Thursday, peeps! My card today uses a partial image from the Online Exclusive Rustic Centerpiece along with the sketch from Try a Sketch On Tuesday:

So here we go:

I stamped a partial image on watercolor paper in Stazon ink, then did some creative diecutting with an Everyday Arches die. I colored the image with some reinkers and an aquapainter, and added a wee bit of Linen Thread for an embellishment.  I snagged a piece of plaid DSP that matched my fall colors and ran it through the upcoming Gathering Leaves embossing folder and sanded it with a sanding block:

I added a little sentiment with an enamel dot from Layers of Beauty, and put everything on a Cajun Craze card base:

I know my image is a wee bit larger than the one in the sketch but hopefully it's okay!  I really love this centerpiece set and hope to use it some more!  Thanks for popping in today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Rustic Centerpiece, Itty Bitty Backgrounds (ret)
Card stock & Papers	Watercolor, Cajun Craze, Timeless Plaid DSP
Ink	Stazon Black, Cajun Craze, Poppy Parade, Crushed Curry, Old Olive, Gray Granite, Basic Beige
Accessories	Linen Thread, Dimensionals, Enamel Dot (ret)
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Textured Notes Dies, Everyday Arches Dies, Aquapainter, Sanding Block (ret)

In(k)spire Me 564 Floral Hello

Happy Friday, peeps! Happy weekend! The sketch challenge at In(k)spire Me is a lovely one:

This is my favorite pattern from the Beautiful Gallery DSP, made even better because the flip side is that pretty Cloud Cover!  I used another favorite, the Layers of Beauty bundle!  Here we go:

The rose was stamped in Smoky Slate, then sponged with the stencil in Timid Tiger and Cloud Cover.  I added some Cloud Cover ribbon and a few stitched lines, then a sentiment from Simply Said:

To give the rose a distressed look, I overstamped it with the retired Sanded background stamp  in Basic Beige.  The inside was left blank until I need it for a certain occasion!  

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

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Simply Said, Sanded (ret)
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Cloud Cover, Beautiful Gallery DSP
Ink	Smoky Slate, Cloud Cover, Timid Tiger, Basic Beige
Accessories	Cloud Cover Ribbon, Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Stylish Shapes Dies, Layers of Beauty Dies, Layers of Beauty Masks, Blending Brushes, Finishing Touches Dies (Spellbinders)

AHSC630 Hello

Happy Monday, everyone! We have a nice easy sketch for you at Atlantic Hearts this week: 

I've been playing with Layers of Beauty and I wanted to try to create a blue/gray pottery-styled floral. So here we go:

I stamped my flower in Night of Navy on Smoky Slate cardstock and used various shades of blue to stencil in the colors.  I added an embossed circle for the background, then layered it all on some Country Woods DSP.  Sentiment is from Choose Happy!

Hope you have fun with our sketch! Share your creations with us at the Atlantic Heart Sketch Challenge blog and give some love to the other designers there as well!  Thanks for visiting today! Enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Choose Happy
Card stock & Papers	Smoky Slate, Basic White, Country Woods DSP
Ink	Night of Navy, Balmy Blue, Azure Afternoon, Misty Moonlight, Pecan Pie
Accessories	Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Stylish Shapes Dies, Layers of Beauty Dies, Layers of Beauty Masks, Blending Brushes, Distressed Tile Embossing Folder (ret)

You Make My Heart Smile

Happy Tuesday, peeps! No challenge today, but I have been playing with some of the new papers from the catalog that went live today!  Beautiful Gallery has some stunning artwork images as well as some vintage-style backgrounds.  This one uses my favorite blue and orange tones and I had to use it first!

The sentiment panel is the opposite side of the printed paper, and the sentiment is from  Layers of Beauty, stamped in the new In Color Secret Sea.  The little flower stamped on the arched panel is from Spring Corners:

The card base is another new color called Cloud Cover---LOVE it!  I love how this particular design looks like vintage fabric!  Now I need to make some samples with some of the other prints as well!  Thanks for visiting today!

Speaking of orange, I glanced out my craft room window last week and saw this orange fellow on my hummingbird feeder!  I knew they were around, as I had been hearing them, but it was a treat to see him so close!

We have had orioles at our hummingbird feeders before, but I never get tired of having them visit! Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Spring Corners
Card stock & Papers	Cloud Cover, Secret Sea, Beautiful Gallery DSP
Ink	Secret Sea
Accessories	Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Everyday Arches Dies

JUGS772 God Bless

Happy FRIDAY, everyone! Woohoo, the weekend is here.  I had a wee bit of time to spend in my craft room yesterday and I was excited to see that the JUGS challenge for this week is to use stencils! Since I was playing with my Layers of Beauty bundle, along with the new Painted Stripes stamp, it fit right in!

So here we go....have you ever seen a flower this color?!

The whole inspiration for the card came about because I stamped the Painted Stripes stamp on a scrap of  Basic White cardstock with Coastal Cabana ink!  And since it looked pretty good, I just went from there....I stamped and stenciled the single flower in Coastal Cabana, Lost Lagoon, Soft Sea Foam and Granny Apple Green inks, then added a few of the greenery pieces around the edge.  The postage stamp piece was also stenciled with a rectangular stencil I created with a die and a piece of acetate, and the background was stenciled with the retired Basic Pattern Decorative Masks:

On the inside, I added a sentiment from Year of Flowers along with another little leafy diecut.  I did add a couple of white sequins on the front too!

Thanks for popping in today!  Enjoy it and be blessed! And have a great weekend, too!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Year of Flowers, Layers of Beauty
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Coastal Cabana, Soft Sea Foam, Acetate Sheet
Ink	Smoky Slate, Coastal Cabana, Lost Lagoon, Soft Sea Foam, Granny Apple Green
Accessories	Sequins from my stash, Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Layers of Beauty Dies and Masks, Perennial Postage Dies, Textured Notes Dies, Blending Brushes, Basic Pattern Decorative Masks (ret)

AHSC623 Welcome Spring

Happy Monday, fellow stampers! Time for a fun new sketch from Atlantic Hearts:

My friend Sheilah lent me (again....but my own is on its way!) her Layers of Beauty Bundle and it seemed perfect for this sketch:

I created a gate-fold card with some Petal Pink cardstock, adding Soft Sea Foam layers to the front panels as well as some Cane Weave-embossed Basic White layerss.  I stamped and stenciled the florals in Petal Pink, Pretty in Pink, Flirty Flamingo, Soft Sea Foam and Granny Apple Green inks.  This bundle just creates the most beautiful flowers! I fussy-cut the image apart and laid the pieces in the corners of the card, overlapping them on top of an oval panel, stamped with a sentiment from Close to My Heart:

Here's a view of it, slightly open:

And a view of the inside:

It's so fun to make a card with a different fold--I tend to get in a rut!  I hope you'll play along with our pretty sketch this week--it doesn't even have to be a gate-fold card! Can't wait to see what you create, and please share it with us at the Atlantic Hearts blog!  Thanks for visiting today!  Enjoy it and be blessed! 

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Just Chicken In (Close to My Heart)
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Soft Sea Foam, Petal Pink
Ink	Memento Black, Petal Pink, Pretty in Pink, Flirty Flamingo, Soft Sea Foam, Granny Apple Green
Accessories	Dimensionals, Matte Dots (ret)
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Layers of Beauty Dies, Layers of Beauty Masks, Blending Brushes, Cane Weave Embossing Folders, Stitched Shapes Dies (ret), Layering Ovals Dies (ret)

Copper Stenciled Roses

Happy Tuesday, everyone!  Still playing with the Layers of Beauty bundle and since the JUGS challenge this week is stenciling, I thought I'd throw my hat in the ring!

Inkspirational is also looking for stencils:

And I am also playing along with my old friends as Tic-Tac-Toe; I chose to use the elements from the left column:

I haven't done any heat embossing for a long time, so I pulled out my copper embossing powder, my Versamark ink pad and went to work:

It's fun to experiment with different colors on these roses; to go with the copper embossing, I chose Peach Pie, Copper Clay, Cajun Craze, Soft Sea Foam and Old Olive.  Even though we're in the midst of summer, I still enjoy these fall hues!  

I also heat-embossed a couple of sentiments from Unbounded Love and diecut them with the matching die, then everything got mounted on a panel of Basic White that was embossed with the Distressed Tile embossing folder and diecut with the Perennial Postage dies.  Around the edges of my Basic Beige card, since I already had my Versamark pad out, I stamped the smaller floral image from the same set; it gives a lovely tone-on-tone effect that doesn't detract from the main design.  I also added a Neutral sequin in copper as well!  You just cannot go wrong with this stamp, stencil and die bundle!    

Cassidy had a friend over last weekend and although our weather has been HOT, that particular evening it was quite chilly.  Wayne had set up a TV to watch on the patio, and the girls wanted to watch a spooky movie:

Sweatshirts, blankets, two bowls of popcorn and two DOGS to keep them warm!  Looks like fun! Thanks for popping in today--enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers Of Beauty, Unbounded Love
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Thick Basic White, Basic Beige
Ink	Versamark, Peach Pie, Copper Clay, Cajun Craze, Soft Sea Foam, Old Olive
Accessories	Dimensionals, Neutral Sequins, Copper Embossing Powder
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Layers of Beauty Dies & Masks, Unbounded Love Dies,, Heat Tool, Blending Brushes, Distress Tile Embossing Folder, Perennial Postage Dies

PP695 Sketch from Ann

Happy Sunday, everyone!  We are still in a sweltering heat wave, hopefully next week we will get some relief! Personally, I plan to spend some time in Dana & Wayne's pool, LOL!  Ann is our hostess today at the Paper Players with an awesome sketch challenge...sketches may just be my favorites!  Here we go:

As I said before, my friend lent me her Layers of Beauty bundle, so I thought I would try to recreate the vintage look of the papers from Country Woods...they are so pretty and lend themselves to the frame that Ann has in her sketch!  Here's my take on it:

 

I didn't want to lose any of those pretty florals, so this card is a little larger than a standard card size.  I attempted to make a frame with mitered corners (I now have a new-found appreciation for carpenters who can make the corners match perfectly!!) but I was failing miserably, so I just used one piece of DSP and used markers to create the corners...in other words, I cheated, LOL!  I stamped the flowers in Pecan Pie and used Crumb Cake and Pecan Pie inks to do the stenciling.  I left the smaller daisies unstenciled, and added some Pool Party and Bashful Blue inks to them with a Blender Pen:

My horizontal piece is Basic Beige, embossed with the Eyelet embossing folder, and I sponged on a wee bit of Crumb Cake ink to give it a vintage look.  The sentiment and dies are from Unbounded Love, and I did add a couple of Neutral sequins for embellishment.  Another Unbounded Love sentiment went on the inside:

I was pretty happy with the results of this attempt at vintage!  I hope you'll play along with the Players this week too!  Check out what the other designers did at the PP blog....you'll definitely get some inspiration!  Thanks for popping in today!

Cassidy's final day of basketball camp was Friday, and Dana & I had some free time before her last game, so we walked around the college town of West Chester, PA.  The main street had been blocked off for a couple of blocks as they were having a music event later in the dday, so we got some cold drinks and sat out on the street in the shade of an umbrella!

I am not a "city" girl, but without all the college kids, and early in the morning, it wasn't a bad place to be!  It was nice to get some mommy/daughter time too!  Thanks for visiting today!  Enjoy it and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Unbounded Love
Card stock & Papers	Very Vanilla, Early Espresso, Country Woods DSP
Ink	Pecan Pie, Crumb Cake, Pool Party, Bashful Blue
Accessories	Neutral Sequins, Dimensionals
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Eyelet Embossing Folder, Layers of Beauty Dies, Layers of Beauty Masks, Unbounded Love Dies, Blending Brushes, Blender Pens, Crumb Cake Blend, Early Espresso Marker

FMS641 Christmas Joy & Peace

Happy Thursday, peeps! This hot week is winding down!  My sweet friend Sheilah very kindly lent me her Layers of Beauty bundle while she is on vacation, so you'll be seeing a few creations made with it in the future!  Today, I created a Christmas card with it using the sketch from FMS as well as the inspiration photo from Peace on Earth Christmas blog:

I chose the image from the lower right-hand corner, using green and silver as my main colors:

I stamped the outline of the florals in Old Olive and used Soft Seafoam, Lemon Lime Twist, Old Olive and Granny Apple Green for the stenciling, which I admit, I did better on the first couple of cards I made!!  I diecut and fussy-cut the images out, then placed them on a panel that was embossed with the Simon Says Stamp Pepperberry embossing folder. 

I also stamped a SSS sentiment in Old Olive on Soft Seafoam cardstock, diecut it out, then layered it on another Seafoam panel on top of some silver glimmer paper:

It seemed appropriate to add some pretty silver sequins too!  And since I messed up the inside sentiment, I stamped it again on a piece of white cardstock and diecut it out to cover up my booboo:

I know none of my stamping friends ever do that, right?!  LOL!  I can add this to my Christmas card stash!

We have been watching the antics of at least two (maybe three) chipmunks that live under our shed.  So far they've not caused any damage but they sure are fun to watch.  They have several hiding spots, one of which is our downspout.  As I was sitting on my porch yesterday, I heard a noise and got my camera ready; they're not too clear, but he's a quick one!  First, you can just see his nose as he scopes out the landscape.  Honestly, he spent two minutes stock still like this:

The coast looked clear, so he began to venture out:

Not sure if he saw me up on the porch or not:

But he thought he should probably run and hide somewhere else:

And off he went!

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

The Lord's unfailing love and mercy still continue, fresh as the morning, as sure as the sunrise.  The Lord is all I have, and so in him I put my hope.  Lamentations 3:22-24

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Layers of Beauty, Christmas Blessings (Simon Says Stamp)
Card stock & Papers	Basic White, Soft Seafoam, Silver Glimmer
Ink	Old Olive, Soft Seafoam, Granny Apple Green, Lemon Lime Twist
Accessories	Dimensionals, Sequins (ret)
Tools	Cut & Emboss Machine, Layers of Beauty Dies, Layers of Beauty Masks, Blending Bruses, Pepperberry Embossing Folder (Simon Says Stamp), Stylish Shapes Dies