Winter carols

 This is the first card I made in several years and I am thrilled in how it turned out!  I used a gorgeous House mouse stamp and am entering this in the House Mouse and Friends Monday Challenge.

I stamped the image on Gina K pure luxury 80lb paper using Tim Holtz black soot distress ink. I then coloured with Copics.  I used craft ink on the edges and dotted with a white paint pen.  On the background I stamped snowflakes with white craft ink and sprayed with tattered angels glimmer mist.  

Golf thank you cards

With the cool winds of autumn approaching, I think it will be time to get back in to card making!

Here are two thank you cards I made tonight for the gals who organize the ladies golf league I joined this summer.  I've really enjoyed meeting new people and hanging out for a girls night once per week, it has been a highlight of each week, and I was happy to get to make these.

They were a bit of a challenge as they  needed to be big enough to accommodate many notes from many people inside, so I made them 5 1/2 by 8 1/2--> double the size of my normal cards, AND I added an insert inside each one so it is more like a book with multiple pages. 

This first one (above) is with a house mouse stamp, coloured using Copic Markers on Neenah Solar white.

The second one, below, was stamped with Black Soot Tim Holz Distress Ink and heat embossed with some sparkly glittery embossing powder.  It looks great, and worked out way quicker than colouring these very detailed stamps.  The stamps below are from a Stampin up set called "the back nine" which has been in my stash for VERY many years now.

For both these cards I pulled out my handy dandy "Bow-easy" tool.  Since it had been so long since I used it, I had to go watch a tutorial on you-tube to refresh my memory, LOL!

It felt good and satisfying to make these, so I think you'll see more things popping up here soon.  The past few months I haven't been doing too much crafty stuff--each time I dig out my stamps I miss my mom, with whom I spent many crafty hours.  But time is passing, and it seems perhaps its time to find the joy of playing with ink and paper again.

Pucker up

I do love House Mouse stamps, they always make me smile.  When I first got them I found them so hard to colour and it took a long time to do it, but now I know the colours I like for the mousies and how to accent them, and I find these are now some of my quickest and easiest ones to colour.

I didn't put a sentiment on this yet, I figure it could be used for a few different things, and it's always good to have cards that are "flexible" in the stash.

Challenges:

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge - Summer food and drink

Paper Crafting Journey - Punches and die cuts

Autumn challenge with HM

Happy Monday!

I hope you all had a lovely weekend with lots of crafty time, though I know for many of you crafty time is during the week and the weekend is for family time, but for me, the weekdays never seem to have enough time in them for crafts, so I am grateful for my weekends.

Today the card I am sharing with you was created for a challenge with House Mouse & Friends Monday Challenge.  This weeks challenge is to make a card with an autumn/harvest theme.

This card made me think again of all our local farmers, who put so much work in to the harvest.  We are lucky to have them!!  

I've used the A2 Card Creator dies by Spellbinder.  I haven't gotten tired of them yet, and am still enjoying experimenting with them.  So easy to make pretty, mailable cards with these dies.  The image is a House Mouse Happy Hoppers stamp called "an apple a day".

I hope you too will dig out one of your autumn/harvest themed HM stamps and play along with us in this challenge at House Mouse and Friends Monday Challenge, as usual there is a sweet treat prize available to a random winner.

House mouse and friends - guest designer

A couple of weeks back I was lucky enough to get picked (randomly, but nonetheless!) as a winner in the House Mouse and Friends Monday challenge.  Not only did they send me a sweet gift certificate to Simon Says, they also invited me to play along with them for the month of September as a Guest Designer.

The first challenge I am playing along with is on the theme "Friendship".  I went through all my mousy images and stumbled across this one, which I bought many years ago and just love.  It is coloured with copies, then the whole fish bowl is covered in glossy glaze.  It looks VERY cool IRL.  It is layered on an A2 Card Creator die by spellbinders and decorated with some ribbon from my stash.  

I hope this inspires you to play along with this challenge too, so you can also have a chance to win a sweet prize :-)

Summer berries

One last card to post for today, these sweet House Mousies were calling to me to colour them up.  We have been enjoying berry season, first the strawberries (long gone now), then the raspberries, then the blue berries, and now finally the blackberries.  Hubby went and picked me a whole box of blackberries today so I made tarts and froze the rest.  I didn't use a recipe, kind of just winged it, and they came out edible.

This image is so gorgeous, I just couldn't' bear covering any of it up with fancy corners or ribbon, so went for a pretty simple layout, so that the artwork can stand out on its own.

I'm entering this card in two challenges - one  for Simon Says - Animal Antics challenge, and also for the House Mouse - Double Troublechallenge.

House mouse - double trouble

Happy Sunday!  This has been a productive craft weekend, and I've cleaned my craft room and also made a few cards for challenges.  The first one I have to share with you is a cute birthday card featuring House Mousies :-)  The popcorn was hubby's idea, and they've been adhered using glue dots.  The sentiment is an SU one, and the colouring is with Copics.  I hope this gives you some inspiration.

I'm entering this card in two challenges - one  for Simon Says - Animal Antics challenge, and also for the House Mouse - Double Trouble challenge.

Cute and Cuddly with Sentimental Sundays

Today's challenge at Sentimental Sundays is to make a Cute and Cuddly themed card, with (of course!) a sentiment.  As soon as I saw the challenge I knew I had to dig out one of my House Mouse stamps, and this one here is one  of my all time favorites!  I decided I could stretch the Lucky theme from St. Patty's a bit longer, and use this for a March birthday.

The sentiment is one from the Lucky Sentiments sets by Raindrop Echo Designs, available at Whimsy Store.

Here is the link where I found the free digi for the shamrock:  http://rubberstamping.about.com/od/digitalstamps/ss/Four-leaf-clover-Free-Digital-Stamp.htm

Autumn Mousies

Hi folks,
Well, I'm sitting here in my living room, huddled next to the fireplace with a blanket...sure is funny how quick the weather can change at this time of the year!

The leaves have started to fall here, and they are so beautiful!  When I'm driving I have to remind myself to focus on the other cars, not the pretty leaves :-)  I felt inspired to play with some leaf images, and this one jumped out at me: 

This House Mouse stamp is a great image to colour since you can geet pretty artistic with the leaves, and despite that there's not too much detail to bog you down with.  The background is airbrushed with some grey, blue, and sand colour.  The leaf is cut out using a Spellbinders die cut which was then coloured with the airbrush.  In the top right hand corner I added a piece of chipboard from my stash which is coloured with my airbrush and some recycled canvas thread tied through.

I also decorated the inside, since I wanted to use an autumn sentiment, and there was no room on the front.  It sure does dress a card up when you decorate the inside!

The background is made using the faux letterpress technique, there is a tutorial on StampTV  here: "Inking a Cuttlebug Folder".

The sentiment is one from Heartfelt Creations, from the set called All Seasons Tree.  Added a bit of lace, and it was done!

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:
Sentimental Sundays - Autumn
Tuesday Throwdown - Chipboard
Stampin for the weekend - Autumn inspiration
OCC - Colour combo "Beautiful fall colours"
Cute Card Thursday - Make your own (the leaf)

So on to more technical details, did you see I finally started using a watermark?!  The watermark was purchased from Doodle Pantry, Laurie there makes them so pretty and they are a great price, totally recommend if you want one you go there!  And my Photoshop Elements arrived yesterday, so I started playing with it--this is going to take a lot more learning than I expected!  Any words of wisdom, please share!

Back to School

Happy Sunday!

This week at Paper Sundaes our challenge is to create a back to school card.  Our sponsor this week is Simon Says and I decided to use one of the Gruffies images that they carry called Bedtime Story.  I have to tell you I've spent a lot of homework hours just like this LOL!



The image is stamped on velum with Staz on, and then I coloured the underside with copics.  This is a new technique I've been playing with and I think with this image it might not have been the best choice, but it still came out ok.

The country crinkle ribbon is from Sugar Creek Hollow, and the sanded paper in the background is Co-ordinations.  The buckle thing that the ribbon is tied around came from a local button store I recently discovered--did you know there are stores that sell nothing but buttons and buckles?!

I hope you'll play along with us this week at Paper Sundaes--one participant will have a chance to win a prize from Simon Says!

Paper Sundaes Colour Challenge - Kraft and Blue

We've got an easy challenge for you this week at Paper Sundaes - it's a colour challenge to use Kraft and Blue.

I decided to make a card using one of my favorite House Mouse stamps:

Our sponsor this week is Simon Says Stamps, and they do carry a large selection of House Mouse stamps, some incentive for you to pay along with us this week, since one lucky randomly selected participant in this weeks Paper Sundaes challenge will win a prize from Simon Says Stamps.

Recipe challenge

Today Paper Sundaes has a challenge for you to work with a recipe.  No, you don't have to get out your Kitchenaid or Bakers chocolate, in this case the challenge was to make a card using the following ingredients:
 - 3 Patterned paper
 - 2 Cardstock
 - 1 Flower

Here's my creation:

The image is a House Mouse image that I thought was perfect for Spring.  It's coloured with copics, and the rain drops are accented with glossy glaze so they look wet.

Play along with us and get a chance to win a prize from Simon Says Stamps.

Get Well Kitty

Here's a card I made a while back.  I had been putting together a gift pack of cards for my Niece who is in University, and this card was made to go with it.  Her favorite colour combo, as I recall, is yellow purple and green, so I wanted to use at least two of them.

The image is a House Mouse one, and so sweet!  When I was little I was always so jealous of the other kids because they got casts and everyone would sign them.  Now I'm happy I never had one, and got to keep my bones intact LOL!  Funny how our ideas change with age :-)

Here's a close up of the main image:

It's coloured using copics, and the DP is SU.  The pretty ribbon is some I got on clearance a while back, not sure of the brand.

I figure this image works if someone is sick or if their kitty cat is sick LOL!  Talk about versatile.  The perfect item to include in a gift pack of cards for a university student.

Speaking of useful cards, my poll on the sidebar is still ongoing, and I'm looking for feedback and comments (you can leave a comment on any of my posts) telling me what type of cards you use (give, not hoard) and how many in a year.  If you donate to retirement homes or to our soldiers abroad, or give gift packs like this to friends and relatives, those all count.  I'm interested in seeing what the trends are and what you are doing in your home with your cards, so please share some ideas with us.

Lucky birthday

Today's card is one I made on the weekend for my nephews birthday.  He's a young man in his twenties and his b'day is on St. Patricks, so I wanted something masculine, and with some lucky clover.  I used the Week #95 sketch from Sketch Saturday.

The lighting/photo doesn't do it justice, the colours are all a bit off in the photo.  It looks great in real life, and I don't think it's too girly, which is a good thing!

Santa's cookies

This was the first card I made with this die cut.  It is very large and I was worried about wasting so much paper, and then I figured out it was a perfect size for cutting out of the underneath mat (which always bothers me as a waste of paper.  See this is how the back side looked before I adhered it to the white card base:

I'm always happy when I can find a trick to save some cardstock and this just turned out to be so efficient!

This was also my first time using this HM image, and I'm still not really keen on how it came out, it is actually a hard image to colour to figure out just the right colours to use for the cookies and the Santa note.  I will be experimenting more with it!  Despite that, it is such a sweet image, and I do like the finished effect.

And, my question to you today, is, do you leave notes out for Santa?  Do your kids still believe?

Cozy evenings

At this time of year there's nothing better than to snuggle with a cup of cocoa by the fire.  My hubby picked this image out on one of my last House Mouse orders, obviously unaware of how much work it would be to colour!  Despite the size and detail, it was a lot easier than I expected because it's largely the same colours used over and over again. In case you are wondering, yes, I did use Copics and they did a great job.

The layout is really simple, with such wonderful artwork in the base image there's not much needed!  A bit of ribbon and cord as an accent and some layers of carstock to matte it and that's it!

Speaking of that artwork, take a look at the picture - are the little micey's running around frantic?  Obviously they don't live in my house lately LOL!  I hope that you all manage to take some breaks from baking and  shopping and Christmas prep in order to rest and reflect and enjoy some quiet cozy evenings with friends and family!

CPS Sketch 143

Here is a fun card I made with this weeks CPS sketch 143.  I used one of my fav House Mouse stamps, Swing Chime as the focus image.

There are tiny rhinestones in the centre of each snowflake and Crystal Effects on the surface of the bell, and the red ribbon is coloured with a red glittery Spica pen--in person this card glitters and catches the eye magnificently.  I found in my cupboard an old SU stamp of pine branches that coordinated nicely to go in the background, and used an ornament from my online friend Alica.

Today will be a happy day

Isn't this House Mousie cute!?  and his fortune reads "today will be a happy day".  What a great sentiment for a card.  And so useful.  I figure this could be a good luck card, or a take care card, or even a birthday card--love the versatility!

We love fortune cookies, my hubby and I.  After consuming way too  much greasy food at the Chinese Restaurant, we sit, sipping our hot tea, and read our fortunes and try to decipher if they make sense.  I usually tuck mine in my purse to look at again in a couple of weeks to see if it turned out accurate :-)

I used this weeks sketch from Card Positioning Systems, CPS142, as inspiration for the layout.

New Mousies

Ooh, I got a new shipment of mousies on Thursday from House Mouse. I was so glad they got here in time for the long weekend--usually it seems I always receive orders on a Monday, and then have to wait for DAYS for the weekend to come so I can use my new things.

Above you can see one of my first cards with the new stamps. This image is called Choir Practice.

Next here is a card made with one of the Mousies which was already in my cupboard, and this one is called Winter wind. I used the tattered angels glimmer mist on the background sheet and put little rhinestones in the centre of each of the snowflakes on the main image.


And my third little work of art, using the image called Yummy Cherries. Now I love this image, but let me ask you, do cherries in your part of the world still hang on the tree when the snow starts? I have a cherry tree in my yard, and the cherries were all done by end of July. Snow here won't likely come until December...I'm wondering where it is that they have cherry's and snow at the same time.



I used the same snowflake stamp from my snowflake drawer that I used in the last two cards (yes, I have a whole drawer in my stamp organizer dedicated to various snow flakes! What about you, how may snowflake or snow falling stamps do you have?). I stamped the image on blueish gray cardstock and used my white craft ink and a sponge to put some cloudy texture in the background. It was very hard to get the mousies face and skin a decent colour due to the blue background, I couldn't get there with my copics, so dug out some craft ink in a yellowish colour and applied that. The snow on the branches was coloured using an aqua painter and the ink from my white craft ink pad, and accented with a white gel pen.


I can't wait to get my white flowersoft, hopefully next week some time, since I have great ideas on how to use it with my new stamps. There are another 4 new stamps I need to show off, so keep your eyes open the next few days :-)