Happy Friday and a Few Challenges

Hi everyone!
I'm back today with another card and this time I managed to work in TWO challenges.   I've seen some people work a dozen challenges into one card, but I'm not quite up to that speed just yet.  :o)
This card is being submitted to the Penny Black Week 86 - Special Someone challenge.   I made it for one of my oldest and dearest friends for her birthday.   The other challenge is the Cute Card Thursday Challenge 98 - spots and dots.   My spots and dots are on the background.   I couldn't find any blue polka dotted paper in my stash (I know - I was shocked too) so I decided to make my own by punching circles (in this case spots and dots) out of scraps of blue background paper.   I glued them down on white card stock, sponged the edges with turquoise ink, and then ran that whole piece through the Cuttlebug with the circles embossing folder.   The stamp is Penny Black.   I embossed it twice, colored with my ZIG markers and then cut out the little mice and popped them up on foam tape.   I got the felt flowers from Kutz (you can find the link for her Etsy shop on my side bar) and I actually sewed on the buttons.   I hardly ever sew so it's kind of a big deal for me.  LOL.  

I hope you all have a great weekend & God bless!
Hugs!
Sue :o)

Happy New Year!

Hi everyone!
Well, Christmas break is drawing to a close and tomorrow morning we'll get back into the school routine. Sigh. I might be a little strange, but I honestly love it when my son is at home with me during the day. The house is too quiet when everyone is gone! Oh well - there's no getting around it, I suppose. I'm not qualified to teach him honors algebra, so he has to go to school. LOL!

Here's a card I did over vacation. The stamp is from Penny Black (my favorite). I used my new Cricut to make the layered frames for the little hedgie, and the flowers were made with good ol' punches.

I'm hoping to get back to card making tomorrow and to blogging on a regular basis again. I was blessed with a lot of new goodies over the holidays, so I should be ready to go! I also had a major organizing epiphany (LOL) over the last week so now my crafting area is better organized and easier to work in!

I hope you're all having a great day!

Sue :o)

A Quick and Simple Christmas Card

Hello everyone! I whipped up this card last night while playing around with a bunch of foil paper I found in my stash. It was super simple and I just love the results. The image was embossed and colored on watercolor paper and then cut out with my nesties. I taped the gold foil paper onto a piece of white card stock and then ran it through the Cuttlebug with the snowflakes embossing folder. The rest is just layering.

Now I have to ask - does anyone know of a good place to buy more foil paper (or foil card it's called sometimes)? I only have a limited stash of it and well ---- I want more! LOL.

I hope you're all having a happy Tuesday!

Hugs!

Sue :o)

Stamp Credit: Penny Black

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #1

Hello everyone! Here's my submission for The Play Date Cafe challenge #1. I have to say that the colors for this challenge are not ones I'd think to use but I'll darned if I don't love them! I guess that's the purpose of color challenges, right --- to get us to think outside the box! My card is on the cutsie side and pretty straightforward. The stamp is one of my favorites from Penny Black. I embossed it on watercolor paper, cut it out with my scalloped oval Nestabilities dies and then colored it with a combination of watercolor pencils and my ZIG markers. The papers are from K&Co. and I made the flowers with punches and some brushed nickel (looks like it anyway) brads. I'm including a picture of the inside of the card too. I always finish the insides of my cards because it's sort of a let down to look at the front of a pretty card and then open it up and see nothing inside. I think it's fun to make the inside of the card a surprise too!

I hope you're all having a beautiful day. It's rainy and gray here today but I have lots to keep me busy inside the house - so I don't mind! Thanks for stopping by and please visit again!

OH (one more thing)! If you'd like to play along with the color challenge at The Play Date Cafe click here to go to Julie's blog for all the information! There are prizes involved so don't miss it!

Hugs!

Sue :o)

Enjoy The Season

Boy it's been a crazy week in my house! It seemed I had somewhere to be every day of the week. It was all good though. One of my gal pals (and volunteerism motivators) asked if I'd come and help out the book fair at her daughter's school and of course I just had to do it. This is the same school my son went to when he was in elementary school (I was PTO Prez there for 2 years too) so it was nice to go back and visit with the teachers and staff again. I love the school book fairs anyway so it didn't take much motivating by my friend to get me to do it. I worked half a day yesterday, went shopping with one of my best friends this morning, and now tonight we have my nephew spending the night!

This is a card I did earlier in the week. I used some more Christmas chipboard pieces like I did on my last post. The holly stamp is by Penny Black (scored at the estate sale a few weeks back) and I added some buttons and silver star brad. The papers are all DCWV.

I'm really hoping to get busy on some more Christmas cards this week, but already my week is looking like its going to be a busy one. We have a potluck after church tomorrow and then we're going to dinner with family in the evening (better wear eating pants), and then I've got nothing but errands on Monday and 2 school convocations to attend during the rest of the week. Sigh. I don't know why, but it always seems that Fall is such a busy time in our lives! I'm sure I'll find time to stamp though. I always do!

I hope you're all having a great weekend!

God bless!

Sue :o)

A Holly Jolly Christmas

I finally got around to making some Christmas cards! Isn't this little snowman the cutest? He's from Penny Black (got him at 7 Kids College Fund) and I embossed and colored him on watercolor paper. I used an old speckle stamp and turquoise ink to add some "snow", and then beneath him I added crystal Stickles for some sparkle. That reminds me - I need to buy a new bottle of crystal Stickles. When I went to use it this time the tip was clogged. I tried routing it out with a stick pin and when that didn't work I got the bright idea to cut "just a little bit" of the tip off the bottle. Well, I cut a little too much of the tip off and when I went to use it I ended up with a sparkly desk and fingers. LOL. Oh well. These things happen. The big snowflake is chipboard, the medium ones are from Martha Stewart, and the little ones came from a punch I bought a long time ago. The blue background paper is Basic Grey and the rest is just card stock. I think he turned out pretty cute!

Well I'm off and back to my craft room to work on some orders! I hope you're all having a great day! Blessings!

Sue :o)

New Cards in the Shop!

Hello everyone!

I just finished up posting some new cards in my Etsy shop! There's one new everyday birthday card and the rest are all Autumn/Halloween related. The card I'm posting today is one of them. I had planned on stampin a lot of Halloween cards for the shop this year and I even ordered some cute stamps for that purpose. I seem to have hit a snag though. I ordered the stamps from someone on Etsy. She never sent the stamps and didn't return any of my messages, and now I find her shop has been closed. Sigh. Never one to be deterred by misfortune, I began sifting through my stamps to see what I had that could be modified for the occasion. LOL. This is what I came up with and I think it turned out pretty cute. The stamp is from Penny Black and I just stamped and colored it and then added the punched leaves to make it look like kitty is in a pile of leaves. It's not the cute like trick-or-treaters I wanted, but hey - sometimes we have to adapt, right?

Thanks for stopping by!

Sue :o)

A New Card

Boy it's been a busy day but I managed to get one card finished in addition to working on orders and the project for this week's giveaway. Have I mentioned I love Penny Black? :o) I swear I could sit and color these little critters all day long. Here's the recipe:

Stamps: Penny Black
Paper: DCWV
Ink: Colorbox black, ZIG markers
Accessories: paper flowers, mini buttons, MS leaf punch, SU big flower punch

Well, it's off to start dinner now and then off to the youth group lock-in at church. Our youth minister said he only needed me until around 8 or 9, so maybe I will get to stamp some more. Either that or I'll have a huge headache (teenagers can do that to you) and I'll go straight to bed. :o) I hope you all have a great night!

God bless!
Sue :o)

Week 1 - Drawing for Free Cards

To celebrate my 1 year anniversary on Etsy, this week I am offering up for grabs these two adorable cards! Penny Black is one of my favorite stamp companies, so I thought it would be appropriate to use their stamps for this week's drawing. Both cards measure 4.25 x 5.5 and they come with a plain white envelope. You can enter by doing one of the three following things:

1. The easiest - leave a comment here on my blog.
2. Place an order from my Etsy shop.
3. Convo me on Etsy and let me know you'd like to be entered into the drawing.

If you do two of the three - you'll get entered twice! :o) I will do a random drawing for the winner of these cards next Tuesday, August 11th and post the winner here on my blog.

I have had such fun selling my creations on Etsy for the last year and I've met a lot of wonderful people. This is just my way of saying thanks to everyone! Oh! I forgot to mention that select items are marked down in my shop right now - go have a look!

God bless!
Sue :o)

Getting Organized

I whipped up this little project yesterday and although it's nothing that spectacular as far as stamping goes, I thought I'd share it with you all anyway. I love to be organized and I love making lists. It just makes life simpler, I think, when you know what you're doing, what you need to do it and when you need to have it done.

One of my least favorite housewife/mom duties is grocery shopping. Ugh. I love to plan meals and I love to cook, but if I could get away with going to the store once a month I'd be tickled pink. For that reason, I try to be very thorough when making my shopping list. I sit down at the beginning of the week and make a menu, and as I make the menu I go through the kitchen to make sure I have everything I need. If I don't have it - I put it on the list. I find that it really cuts down on $$$ spent buying things I already have or don't really need, plus if I get it all in one shot I don't have to go back to the store.

So this is what I made to keep all my grocery shopping/meal planning stuff organized. I just took a regular old school folder and decorated it up with background papers and a cute stamped image and now I've got all my things in one place. I even took half an hour and typed up another list (see what I mean!) of meals I know my family likes, for those times when I'm having trouble deciding what to make on a particular night.

I hope you find this idea helpful! I think I'm going to make another one for Christmas - to keep my shopping list, card list and receipts organized over the holidays.

Hugs!
Sue :o)

Penny Black Challenge - Week 56 - Red White and Blue!

I had time to squeeze in another challenge this weekend - this time the Penny Black Saturday Challenge which was to use red white and blue. If you'd like to play along here is the link: http://pennybfriendssaturdaychallenge.blogspot.com/2009/07/week-56-colour-challenge.html

This card is 5x5 and really it was pretty simple to make. The image was embossed and colored on watercolor paper, and the background paper is DCWV. I used my scalloped oval Nestabilities dies for the image and the blue paper behind it, and then I added punched flowers as accents. The brads (I think) are from K&Co.

I hope everyone had a great Monday!

God bless!

Sue :o)

New Goodies In the Shop

Boy I've been neglecting my little blog here, haven't I? I guess that's what happens when children are out of school and hubbies are on vaction! It's been a great summer so far. We've done some camping and hanging out in the pool and we've got a fishing trip planned later this weekend. I gotta remember to take a good book with me as I'm not as avid a fisher-person as my hubby and son are.

I wanted to post some pictures of new stuff I have in the shop. A valued customer of mine (you know who you are V) got me addicted to mini cards and tags so I'm expanding my line of goodies! In the coming weeks I'll have more of these in the shop! All mini cards come with mini white envelopes too. You can get to my shop by clicking on the link to the right.

I really like the Quick Notes Sets too. They're perfect for sending a quick thank you note to someone AND they only require one postage stamp to mail. Plus, they're cheaper than cards - you get 6 for only $3.50 (plus postage).

Well, I'm off to do lunch with my boys. I hope to be back later with some new challenge cards for SCS. I hope everyone is having a great week! God bless!

Sue :o)

Sneak Peek!

Here are a few new cards I'm working on for the shop. I was inspired by today's sketch challenge over at Split Coast Stampers. I used Penny Black stamps on the mouse card, and the cute little horse is made by Clear Dollar Stamps. I embossed the image on watercolor paper and then colored with my ZIG markers. Once I get the insides and envelopes done I'll have them up in the shop!

God bless!

Sue :o)