giu (x2), day three

Welcome to day three of my Growing in Unity week -- if this is your first visit, be sure to go back to Monday's and Tuesday's posts as well -- remember, commenting all week can help you win a little Unity goodness of your own. :)

Once again, I have two projects for you made with my Counterfeit Kit (read a bit about that in Monday's post). First up, a layout about my awesome dad: 

He hates it when I take pictures of him while he's working, but I just love capturing a bit of his concentration. I used this set for a bit of subtle background stamping, and this itty bitty from Simple Stories for the month up in the corner.

This KOM went to work to make my little label (stamped on a FabRip and almost-successfully punched out). That little man was actually trimmed from a "packed-by" card that came in a Studio Calico order - I thought he was cute!

My journalling fit perfectly on the journalling spot stamp in this KOM. 

Next up, I have a card...but there are a couple of very special things about this particular card. Take a look:

Sure, I used a cute stamp from this KOM for the bees and a retired KOM for the sentiment, but if you look more closely at the lower half you'll see one of the special things -- I just got my very own Silhouette Cameo! This is the first project I've posted here using it...and I think I'm in love :). The honeycomb cut beautifully. Yum. You'll be seeing more projects using it soon.

But the way more special thing about this card is who it is for -- my sweet friend Lindsey over at Bashful Blogging! Happy Birthday, Linds...and sorry your card is gonna be a little late ;). I hope your day is great!

I hope the rest of you enjoy your day as well, and I hope to see you back here tomorrow for a bit more Unity fun!

Wait....what? (and FWF)

Since this is a FWF post, most of you are probably just dropping by to see the Unity project...but for the rest of you: I'm back! After an almost-3-month blogging hiatus, I finally found the bug again. My creating bug didn't go anywhere (you should SEE all the layouts I've been cranking out), but the whole photo-editing-writing-uploading-commenting thing was wearing on me for some reason. I missed having an audience of crafty blog friends, though. Happy to be back. :)

Ok, enough of that. How about a card?

I made this one a month ago for our godson's 7th birthday (Can't believe he's SEVEN! That's insane). I actually started by stamping a whole 9x12" sheet of watercolor paper with the bike background from April's Kit of the Month in Staz-On. Then I broke out my old-skool Crayola watercolors (you know, the little oval pans in the plastic case?) and randomly added citrus-hued blotches over the bikes. It made me happy to get all painty! I trimmed out a panel for my card front and drew the frame around it.

I almost never do sticker sentiments on cards for some reason, but I needed something that would really stand out, so I turned to my trusty October Afternoon alphas. The little banner-y things underneath that are the ribbon part of the blue ribbon punch from Jenni Bowlin, made from a handful of scraps that were on my desk. Stickers and punch are both from Scrappy Chic. A couple black accents and I called it good.

Hope you all enjoy your weekend, and I really do think I'll be back soon with more.

FWF times three.

Hi there!
It's Friday, so it must be Friends with Flair over at Unity -- be sure to stop by and see what great deal they have in store today.

In the meantime, I have three whole cards to share! January is a busy birthday/anniversary month in our circle of family and friends, so I always try to get the whole month's worth of cards done right at the beginning so I don't panic later ;)

Three of this month's cards use fabulous Unity stamps. Here's #1:

A CAS anniversary card for some friends, using December's Kit of the Month, Filled with Love, paper-pieced simply with some love-y Sassafras papers. The oval shadow is from Amuse.

#2:

A birthday card for a college pal using the multi-butterfly stamp from Picture Perfect (which I finally picked up during one of the big Unity sales last month), as a background. The sentiment is an oldie from SU, ribbon from PTI, and a Martha butterfly punch.

#3:

Har. This one makes me chuckle. It's for my art-loving aunt, so I know she'll appreciate its quirkiness. I used the fabulous multi-frame stamp from Picture Perfect.  How handy that there are just enough frames to spell out "birthday"! The "happy" is from PTI, and the letters are from all over the place.

I've finally started to edit the photos of the Big Fun Christmas Project (aka my first December Daily). When I have enough stamina, I'll finish them up and post 'em soon.

A quick note for local folks: Don't forget that Scrappy Chic has its Grand Re-Opening party tomorrow (Saturday 1/7) from 2-4! Plans include a Smash-style photobooth (like the first photo here), so you know it'll be a good time! :)

Until then, have a great day! It's sunny and shockingly warm here -- I should be outside!

A Week of Challenges, day two

Back again with another challenge card -- this time for the Play Date Cafe. Here's the inspiration image:

While this set of colors would indeed make for a cool Halloween card, I went birthday instead:

This tag is for my mom, who has a birthday coming up later this week. She always gets tags, because she like to hang them all up in one of their kitchen windows. Cute!  Another special fact about this card: it uses all stamps that she and my dad (who are we kidding -- she does the shopping in their house!) got me for my birthday a few weeks ago. She picked well!! The stamps are from a couple of the Studio Calico by Hero Arts sets that I've been drooling over at Scrappy Chic. My eyeballs see the challenge colors as lime (A.Muse studio ink), Purely Pomegranate (old SU), and Dusty Concord (Distress), paired with black and some Honeydew twine (the Twinery)

Ooh, how about a bonus tag! This one is also for my mom, who is a huge Detroit Red Wings fan (Huge, people. It's scary):

I stuck it in her mailbox as a surprise last week, when the official hockey season kicked off. The stickers are from my stash, the octopus is from Paperworks and gets pulled out once a year just for this purpose ;). The back of the tag reads "Go Wings!" Yep, she liked it.

I have a bit of bad news, too -- my dad, who might not do the shopping but instead is self-employed as an awesome all-around fixer/painter/renovator/Bill-of-all-trades, just got his work truck stolen. With all his tools and equipment inside. From the street in front of their house. And insurance won't cover the loss. Boo!! That really stinks. I'd like to help him out somehow, but I think he won't take assistance from his own child, y'know? Any tips for sneaking Home Depot gift cards into his pocket or paintbrushes into his mailbox are welcome!

Anywho, if you'd like to play along with these colors, the challenge closes at the end of the day today. Happy creating, and have a lovely day!

Baby got BAK.

Well, if that Justin Bieber song didn't get stuck in your head after my last post, I sure bet you've got a song in your head now!!

I've always wondered why we crafty folk refer to the cards and other goodies we get in the mail as "RAKs" (Random Acts of Kindness) even when they aren't random at all! Recently I got some lovely cards for my birthday, which I shall hereafter refer to as "BAKs," or "Birthday Acts of Kindness." Sound good? Ok, on we go!

First, from Lindsey over at Bashful Blogging, comes this cheery Bird-day card:

Linds is a whiz with color, and I really love the pops of yellow all over the place. Plus, Linds knows I love a pun!! I haven't spied this one on her blog yet, but keep an eye out for it! (She also knows I love a good surprise!).

Next, a card from my birthday-sharing buddy Emily that makes me look way nicer than I actually am ;) :

Gorgeous! It uses my favorite shades of orange, pink, and green, along with those glorious wings, which I bet Em knows I'd never in a million years have the patience to fussy-cut at all, much less as perfectly as she did here. You can read more about it in her blog post here.

And finally, from my uber-creative-with-her-Silhouette pal, Meg, comes a card she knows I LOVE:

Ack! If you recognize this one, it's because it's kinda famous -- it was part of her amazing final round submission for Gallery Idol a couple months ago. You can see the whole rad suite here. And yep, the tape pops out:

Since my bday often falls on the first day of fall (as it did this year), this adds an air of poignance...or something ;)

Thanks for the BAKs, crafty pals! You made my birthday brighter. And a little more full of loot, too -- there were some fun stampy gifties that came along with each card! I'll be sure to let y'all know when I use them. Woohoo!

Have a lovely day!

Happy Birthday, times 2!

Well, happy Friday to all of you, and Happy Birthday to my crafty pal, Emily Leiphart!  Em, I hope you get to party down today!

Often, when I make a card that's going to be mailed right away, I jump the gun and get it all sealed up in an envelope before realizing I haven't taken any photos. Doh!  This isn't one of those times, luckily. 

other supplies: Unity and PTI stamps, SU inks, My Mind's Eye pp.

Can you tell I tried to channel my inner Emily on this one? Twinery twine, a mix of patterns, and I even {gasp!} colored that little party birdie! Ok, so I watercolored him, whereas Em is a Copic genius, but still.

[Speaking of that little bird, he's from a company new to me -- pictureshow stamps -- and he's actually their logo. Ain't he cute? I picked him up at a local stamp show, where they were selling tons and tons of images in mounted and unmounted versions. Their etsy shop only seems to sell mounted stamps, and a smaller variety, so if you are lucky enough to see their booth at a show, be sure to stop and browse.]

Ok then, back to business: Emily, I hope you have a fabulously crafty birthday!! I'm happy to be your stampy pal, and it's extra-special because we happen to be birthday buddies! That's right, it's my birthday too, and I'm already overwhelmed by all the birthday kindness that's come my way. I'll be sure to post some of my craftiest gifts from my craftiest pals soon.

Before I go, how about a cute cat photo for the first day of fall? It just so happens that our cats are perfectly coordinated for the season!

...dinner time is the only time they get this close to one another without any pouncing or growling, by the way ;). Don't they look like they're holding hands? Ha. Simon and Dex wish you a happy autumn, and so do I. Have a lovely day!!

Friends with (cake) Flair Friday

Two posts in the same week? I must be getting my act together!

Today is Friends with Flair day over on the Unity blog -- be sure to head over there to see the great deal they have in store for you. I made the card below a couple weeks ago for the same gnome-loving friend from this post. I used a couple of KOMs (shouldn't that be KsOM?), along with the sketch for the September Kit of the Month Sketch Challenge, and came up with this:

(sorry about the slightly blurry photo -- getting used to nighttime project photography is taking some time!)

My gnome-loving friend is also a talented cake-baker-and-decorator, so I also whipped up some recipe cards to send along as well. The recipe card stamps and the arrow on the card are from August's kit, while the cake is from May.

I'm a lazy-butt colorer, so I went with some simple outlining and accenting, and added some rhinestones to the spots on the cake. Maybe my pal will be inspired for her next cake design! The fun, fun papers are from Echo Park's Happy Days 6x6 pad (from Scrappy Chic, of course). Love the retro-cheery feel and the gender/age versatility of this collection!

Thanks for stopping by! I'll be back with some layouts and my newest scrappy venture: mini-books. Oh goody!

Have a lovely day.

Birthday Time!

Yes indeed, it was Mr. Cupboard's birthday this week! Now, normally I'd bake a cake for him (I do love to bake), but I happened to have a Groupon to a tasty local bakery...and this cake was tasty indeed! Cute, too -- cake decorating is a bit beyond me, mostly because my handwriting is so terrible! Anyway, birthdays mean cards, right? Here:

Yeah, that's a talking mixtape. Don't your mixtapes talk to you? ;)  Aside from the speech bubble, this is a one-layer card -- all those lovely straight lines made for some simple masking. The fabulous tape is a new addition to my collection -- I bought it locally here, but you can also order it directly from Yellow Owl Workshop (there's other cute stuff there!). The background stamps and sentiment are all PTI, and the bubble and the grosgrain embossing on it are fun My Favorite Things goodies. I also broke out a very old $1 Studio G alpha set for the names. Knew I was hanging on to it for something!

If you were wondering about the odd angle of the card in the first photo, well, let's just say Dex really wanted to be in the picture, so I let her hold the card open for me here ;)  I used some older We R Memory Keepers stamps on the inside, with another alpha and a heartfelt sentiment.

As for the birthday celebration, we spent some time with family, some time eating, some time shopping for music, and some time with a beer. Nice day!

Ah, well...school starts later this week, so that probably means I'll be a little cranky soon. I do love my job, but who doesn't love summers more, after all? Thank goodness for craftiness -- an excellent antidote to the back-to-school blues!

Enjoy your weekend! I have a roller derby bout to officiate tonight -- should be fun!

RAKs in, RAKs out!

Happy Monday! Hope your weekend was great. Mine was spent submerged in tasty (mostly homemade) food and drink -- yum!

My mailbox has been busy, too -- in both directions! First up, a giant HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my pal Lindsey -- be sure to stop over and wish her well on her big day.  Here's what should be in her mailbox...whenever the Canada Post snafu gets worked out, anyway:

The girl can grow some awesome flowers, so this seems suitable, no? I've used PTI dies and stamps with some of that fabulous dots and stripes paper from Echo Park (from Scrappy Chic, of course!) -- the blue stripes are from a 6x6 pad, while the green is 12x12 -- love the variation in scale. Have a great day, Linds, and I sure hope your card gets to you eventually!

Next up, a local RAK:

We have some new next-door neighbors, and they seem really nice. What better way to keep it friendly than with a little gift? The card uses mostly scraps from my desk -- papers from Crate and Amuse Studio, a house die-cut from a coaster with a stickles-filled heart at the center, and a fitting sentiment (PTI). Peeking around from the back is a jar of homemade strawberry-rhubarb jam for a little housewarming gift (oh, is it ever yummy, too -- we've almost polished off a whole jar ourselves, and I just made it a few days ago!).  The recipe I used is in this book, which has all kinds of totally doable canning recipes. Highly recommended!

And now for a couple of incoming RAKs, both from the fabulous Meg!

This is part of a trio she already blogged here, and I just love it! I'm also fairly certain I'd never have the patience to deal with all the tiny pieces she popped up so perfectly. Fabulous!!

Also, to celebrate Simon the kitten's arrival:

How cute is this? I swear, that woman is a genius with her Silhouette! Plus, it's punny in addition to being so well-designed. I absolutely love it!! I think Simon might approve:

...or he will, once he wakes up ;)

Here they are together:

I just love my stampy friends and neighbors! I hope you all have a delightful day!

Cards and cards...

and cards. Three for you today, to be exact! Let's get on with the show:

First:

I don't do much for St. Patty's Day, craft-wise (I'll never turn down a beer, though, green or otherwise!) -- I only have one tiny St. Pat's stamp set (from Papertrey), but it gets some use here on an anniversary card for some dear friends of ours who snuck off and got married on St. Patrick's Day a few years ago :)

I used Meg's fabulous clover idea, though in a larger size, curled up my "leaves" a bit, stamped part of the sentiment stamp, and added a rainbow center and stem -- here's a closeup of that bit:

The center is punched from a stamped and colored rainbow from another set (more on that in a minute), topped with a dome sticker, and the stem is braided twine from the Twinery. Quick, simple, colorful. Suits them to a T!

Next, I have two cards for the same person -- whom I've never met...but she must be pretty special! Any guesses why?:

Yep, she's turning the big century! My pal at work calls her an adopted grandmother...and apparently, it's a little hard to find hundredth-birthday cards at good old Hallmark ;) So, card-making friend to the rescue!  Turns out Ms. Century is a former mountain-climber who still enjoys the view, hence my hand-cut mountains rather than my usual hills. I used Up, Up and Away and the matching balloon and cloud dies for my little scene (the rainbow center of the above clover is in the same set).

Flower gardening is her other hobby:

Used that pretty flower set from Stampin' Up for this one -- I even used a bit of Copic work on them! The dies and sentiment are from Papertrey as well. The pink rose has a bit of dimension:

...um, hope you can see it :) the center was stamped a second time and popped up over the original.

Besides the fact that I made all three of these cards last night, they have something else in common -- they all use the same 8x8 pack of Making Memories paper (an Archiver's giveaway, I think) that's been sitting in a drawer forever. Nice to give my older stash some love!

Before I go, I thought I'd answer the questions I got on my giveaway post last week.

Meg wanted to know my favorite movie. My all-time absolute forever favorite is Willy Wonka (the original, please)...but my modern-day grown-up favorites are a three-way tie between Lost in Translation, Amelie, and Ghost World. OH, and I love everything Audrey Hepburn's ever been in. And all the Wes Anderson movies. And a few others.... :)

Cathy C. wanted to know if I ever do scrap weekends. I can't say that I have -- I've scrapped/crafted all day at Scrappy Chic a bunch, but never an overnight. I'm pretty sure that would be fun, as long as my fellow crafters were a fun bunch!

Liz wants to know what else I like to shop for besides scrap goodies (wait, there are other things to shop for?!?) Seriously, though, I love shoe/clothing/accessory shopping, especially when I score great deals :) And like you, Liz, I love a good HomeGoods run! Vacation spot: I'd love to return to London, and while I'm there I'd visit...um, the rest of Europe! I love cities and history. Favorite blogs: too many to count!

Well, that was a heck of a post! Hope you enjoyed it. If any other questions pop up, just throw them my way. Until then, have a delightful day!

Birthday x2

Hi folks!

Feels like it's been forever since I've posted a card -- and today I have two!

We celebrated two family birthdays last weekend. First up: my aunt. Here's her card:

I managed to make this whole card with stuff that was already sitting on my desk, which doesn't say nearly as much about my design abilities as it does the amount of crapola that was on my desk! I had plenty of stuff to choose from, that's for sure :). What made the cut: a bit of kraft cs I'd used to test out an impression plate from Papertrey Ink...several months ago. A bunch of scraps and bits and bobs...and a little stamping, too.

Birthday #2 was for my cousin. Here's her card:

Anyone wanna guess how old she is? ;)
Another card from scraps, although this time the scraps are a little newer -- floral paper from Echo Park, spotty paper from Crate Paper, another die-cut that was just laying there, and one of my new My Mind's Eye stamps for the bg. Quick and cheerful.

Well, that's about all from me for now. Saturday is the last official meet-up for scrap league at Scrappy Chic, so I'm busy packing up goodies for that. It's about time for new DT kits there, too -- and whoa, man, they're gonna be something else! I've lost count of all the new stuff that's shown up in the store this past month.

Also, I just kinda realized that my blog birthday (never did really like the non-word "blogiversary." Not that "blog" is much realer, but whatever)...where was I? Oh, yeah -- the 9th. I'll have been blogging for a whole stinkin' year. I'm thinking a giveaway of some kind. Are you up for that? Maybe all you stalkers out there (and I know who you are, Fawn and Kim!) might actually drop me a line if there might be some goodies on the other end of it!

So, stay tuned for that. For now, I'm out!

Enjoy yourselves, wherever you may be.

A Quick Rawr!

Yo -
It's a holy-cats-it's-freezing kind of day around here. Andrew got a snow day; I did not. Oh well - can't win 'em all!

I have a super-quick post for you...so...here it is --

It was a super-quick card, too, aside from the cutting-out-the-yeti part. A couple hand-cut hills, a word bubble, some little letters (plus hand-drawn apostrophe, of course) and a birthday stamp...and that's about it. Since I just got this stamp at the Detroit Urban Craft Fair (you can find others by the artist here), I thought it fitting to use for a bday card for our old pal Austin, who was selling his cool wares as well. He'd appreciate a yeti, anyway. Next time, I think I'll add some flock. Fun.

Time to work on a couple other projects. In the meantime, don't forget that today is the last day for the AmberINK INKredible 21-day challenge. Go check it out.

Have a great day, and stay warm!

My First Friends with Flair

Hey there -- happy Friday! (I know I'm happy -- whew, what a week!)

It's time for Unity's Friends with Flair hop. Be sure to visit everyone and look for the magic blinkie to win some great stamps! You can start at the Unity blog if you want to catch everyone.

So, on with the show:

I managed to use three different sets on this little card -- whoa! I stamped the banner from a little happy, then stamped it again on a scrap that I'd covered with some 7gypsies masking tape...so I guess it's still paper-piecing, but I'll call it tape-piecing :) The cute happy parachute is from the same set, and the "birthday" is a partial sentiment from Happily Ever After . I thought the "H" needed a landing spot, so I added a border from one of a kind.

Here's the thing: this card is for a friend's birthday, and I ACTUALLY GOT IT IN THE MAIL ON TIME! That doesn't happen too often :) Maybe the week hasn't been so bad after all...

Anywho, Unity has some great deals going on -- read all about them below, then hop on to the next stop!

Feel free to leave a little comment, then....

Hop along now...your next stop is Anne!

cha-cha-cha...

...as in, "happy birthday to me -- cha-cha-cha..."

Yep, it's my birthday. So far, so good. Or: so far, so extra-good! I got some great birthday happy mail from two of my craftiest blog buds, Emily and Meg! Our story is one of the rare few where people who met online end up neither married nor scamming each other for cash ;) At least, not yet!

First up is Em's, which came a couple days ago -- this means that Emily is super-on-the-ball, because she's shipping from Canada to the US, which might as well be the slow boat from Timbuktu! Fun fact: it's Emily's birthday too! Feel free to drop by her blog and see the cute card her husband and son made for her. Here's what she sent me:

First: that card is so stinkin' cute! I love her amazing coloring skills. (I envy them, too!). You can get the details on that card here. And then, that cute little arrow set! So versatile -- I can already see a couple card designs, plus they'll work great for layouts! Thanks, Em!

Next is Meg -- her little packet of joy came today, right on time (she thought it would be late!)

Not only does this card totally sell me on the Sunshine impression plate from PTI, it also features the cutest little paper-pieced, party-hat-wearing pup! And the button collection (with the cute and thoughtful tag) is almost entirely full of colors I don't have -- get out of my head, Meg! How did you know? You can see the details on this card, as well as the one she made for Em, right here.  She does a fine job of telling our behind-the-scenes story, too. Thanks, Meg(let)!! I will indeed have a glass of wine for you!

Speaking of which, tomorrow is the real birthday celebration for me -- my awesome husband is having a little party at a local wine bar. I'm sure some great layouts will ensue!

Well, I'm off to do...well, whatever I feel like! Ha! You go do the same, birthday or not!