Woot Woot - Boxing Week Score

I decided last night that, even though I don't really need any stamps, I would search out some company that had some awesome deals for Boxing Week.

And well I must say YAY for Verve. I score some awesomely awesome deals. I managed to get these stamp sets all for under $40

Worlds Best
All About You
Heart to Heart
Poinsettia Christmas
Love Monkey
Flirty Phrases
Happy Birthday
Hibiscus
Little Star

I think that's a pretty good haul

Sugar & Spice and Everything Nice

My younger sister is expecting a baby in early March, a little girl (YAY for little girls). Currently she is living in Europe with her husband, who is a professional hockey player and playing for a team there. She is coming home to have the baby though, and leaving her husband behind, which isn't the best thing that could happen. She'll be back in February, so my Mom and one of my Mom's friends are having a huge baby shower for her. They tasked me with making the invites for the shower. It was a bit of a daunting task, since I needed to do about 70 of them, and they needed to be done in four days, and well I was told this four days before christmas. So a little bit of a crazy time.

First thing I did was go to splitcoast and check out some ideas. There are a tonne of cardmakers that have made a onesie designed card. I thought it was super cute, and seemed quick and easy to make. So I went with it. Here's what I ended up with:

I could have embellished a lot more, but time was of the essence and well I've come to really appreciate simplicity. I have also come to hate tying tiny little pink bows :)

It was beginning to look like christmas a long time ago

I had a whole load of ambition this year when it came to making christmas cards. I found my inspiration card on splitcoaststampers.com (I can't find it anymore so I can't post a link to the original makers, for which I apologize) and was all set to go to work on my christmas cards in late October. I had most of it done by mid-november, slacked off a little and finally didn't get the finishing touches done (the stamped inside sentiment) until about a week ago. So I've had these puppies sitting around for a long time.

Pretty simple to make really. Cut out a few rectangles of white card stock. I chalked them with some cold sparkly chalk just to give the door a little depth. Cut out the wreaths with my cricut. I used self adhesive paper which was both a good and bad thing. The adhesive on it kind of sucks, so I'm not sure how well my cards will travel in the mail, but I hope they last. Without the self adhesive they would have been a pain in the butt to put onto the card. Add a few little sparkly jewels, a bow and there you have it. I think they are cute and turned out well.






Now after thinking I was way ahead of the game by having these all done, I had to add more people to the list. I had no more supplies for the other card to make more of the door ones, nor did I really have time if I wanted people to get cards before christmas. So I came up with these three.

I used a glue stamp pad for them, added a little glitter, slapped some ribbon on and had 15 cards made in no time. I think they turned out really well and now I'm actually kind of kicking myself thinking I should have just made these ones as my main card because they were so simple to make and I think they look pretty classy. Maybe next year.

Anyway, hoping anyone who is reading this has a safe and happy holidays and a wonderful 2011!

Another Day, Another Birthday

Its a miracle, I've now posted something a few days in the row. The world must be coming to an end ha ha.

It appears that birthday season at school has started. I hope to heck that my kid does not get invited to every other kids birthday party, that she knows from school. First I don't want to go to 15 birthday parties, and I certainly don't want to buy presents for them all. But making cards, sure I'll do that.

She has a birthday party this afternoon for a little boy in her class. Now being the Mom of girls it is actually really difficult for me to come up with cards for little boys. I have very few non feminine stamps in my craft drawers, and I'm used to all things pink.

So I went hunting, and I found my very seldom used SU Wagon Full of Fun stamp set and went from there. I decided to make a wagon full of cupcakes. Pretty straight forward. The cupcakes ended up looking kind of weird in the middle the way they are stacked up but I still think it looks pretty cool. My daughter helped me pick out the colours for the cupcakes, and gave me the brilliant idea of using buttons for the wheels (ahhhh what a good little crafter)

I know the kid will not really give a crap that he's getting a homemade card, that took a lot of thought and actually a lot of work (cutting out nine little cupcakes was a bit of a pain), but it gave me something to do to get my creative juices flowing.

Paper: American Crafts; Backyard Drip

Ink: SU Chocolate Chip

Stamps: SU Bitty Basics, SU Wagon Full of Fun

Happy Happy Birthday

We have the best babysitters in the world. We were lucky when we moved into our house. We moved in to a house that was next door to a house that had three teenage girls living in it. All of them have babysat for us for the past four years. They have all been awesome and my kids love them to death. Unfortunately we are on the last one and she is almost ready to go off to University. I don't know what the heck we are going to do when that happens.

Anyway it was our sitters birthday two weekends ago. My kids and I made her this little card, just to say thanks for being such a great kid. I wanted to do something bright and fun because that is what our babysitter is.

The kids picked out the pink cardstock, the ribbon and picked out the ink and buttons that we used for the flowers. They helped me stamp the flowers and glue the buttons on. The rest was up to me :)

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. If I could have changed one thing I would have maybe added a couple of more flowers and made the sentiment a little bigger, but otherwise I think it did the job

Going to the Chapel.....

This weekend we are going to a wedding. I really don't know much about the couple that is getting married. I haven't seen either of them in about a year, I have no idea when the last time my husband saw the bride was (they are friends from MBA school).

So trying to personalize a card for their upcoming nuptials was a bit hard. The only thing I really had to go on was their wedding invitation. So I went with that. The invitation was Black and Green and had swirlies on it

I always try to make these beautiful wedding cards whenever we go to a wedding, and they never really turn out as well as I expect them to. So this time I decided to go with a bit of whimsy and kitch and I went with hearts. In June I made a card for my husband for father's day that looked like a suit (I can't remember if I blogged about it). So I decided I'd make one heart the groom and one the bride. I could have done a way better job ont he groom heart, I could have made the tux look better by making it with lapels, but I only had about 1/2 an hour to pull this baby together, so I went simple. I also had different paper to use for the bride heart, but it just didn't pop enough so I went with sparkly instead.




I think it turned out alright. Its not my favourite card I've ever made, but hey at least its something.


Paper: Bazill Basics Bank Roll
Ink: SU Certainly Celery
Stamps: Baroque Motif

Simplicity

I haven't made any cards in ages, but finally had to make one for my nieces birthday. I've been sitting on this for almost a month now, and have procrastinated and procrastinated, and I'm finally just sending it off with her birthday present today (well I was away on vacation in there for 8 days so that's my excuse)

My kids wanted to help, so we had to go simple, and that's what we did. We used just plain blue and white cardstock. One stamp from the SU Big Bold Birthday collection, and we glued on a few buttons. They were both really happy that they got to help and I think it turned out to be a cute card.

Finally something to post and its not a card

Finally got off my butt and bought myself a charger for my camera battery. So I took some pictures of my craftiness. I don't have any cards to post, but I do have a little sewing project to brag about. A friend of mine has a 3 year old son who loves to help her cook. That means he loves to get himself messy with whatever they are cooking. She asked me to make him an apron and I gladly obliged. I'm pretty proud of this. I managed to make it without a pattern. I think it turned out great and by all reports the new owner just loves helping Mom while wearing his shark apron

I've Got Nothing

Over the past month or so I've had so many occassions to make cards for. Why haven't I posted any? Couple reasons. First I'm lazy. I've turned into a big fat lazy blob. For the first time in many years I actually went out and purchased birthday cards for two of my daughter's friends. I'm completely ashamed to admit that ;P



Second reason. I've lost the battery charger for my camera. I have searched this house high and low and cannot locate it anywhere (along with several other chargers that were with it - maybe they've secretly stolen off somewhere to be free). I'm not willing to shell out the $80 for a new one either. So my kids are not having their summer documented at all, and my cardmaking (the few that I've made) haven't been documented either.



Eventually I'll relent. I'll either find the camera gear or I'll buy a new one. I'm not at that point yet though :)

Hartelijk gefeliciteerd!

My Brother In Law's birthday is tomorrow. He's one of the hardest people to buy for. If you ask him what he wants he says nothing or comes up with something stellar like Tim Hortons. So its tough to come up with something unique that he will actually like and get some use out of.

Trying to make a birthday card for him is almost as tough. He's a manly man type of guy. He's a hockey player so tough is a pretty good word to describe him. So making a card with all kinds of fancy paper, sparkles, and ribbon is sort of out of the question.

A few days ago I had a bit of an epiphany. He and my sister are moving to the Netherlands in September. He loves soccer. World cup is on right now. So best conclusion is buy the guy a Dutch World Cup Soccer Jersey. And with that it made my card making a little bit easier.

I found this cardhttp://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/photo/1735673?&si=simply repeated on Splitcoaststampers and used it as my inspiration. Not to frilly, simple colours, simple design. Here's what I came up with:

I decided to go with the whole Netherlands theme. I went with the Orange background, because as anyone who has watched any kind of international sports knows, the dutch are usually decked out in orange (its the colour of their royal house). I used embroidery thread using orange again and two of the colours from the flag of the Netherlands, the third colour white is of course the background. The ink I used for the stamps was blue and I coloured in the cupcake with orange and red, again going with the whole theme. Of course I had to throw in just a little bling. What's a birthday card without bling? So I used a little tiny silver embellishment to top off the cupcake.

I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. I would have been even more happy if I hadn't messed up the happy birthday stamp, but this was the third time I'd made this (thanks to four little busy hands attached to a 4 yr old and 2 yr old, who like to draw on things they aren't supposed to) so I just went with the screw up

Stamps: SU Big Bold Birthday, SU Bitty Basics

Ink: SU Night of Navy

Paper: Recollections cardstock.

With Sympathy - Mojo 144

I have been totally neglectful in posting pictures of my handywork. I've made a bunch of cards in the last little while, just haven't taken pictures of them, and haven't taken the time to post anything about them.

I needed to make a card and couldn't decide what to do, so I decided to turn to Mojo Monday for inspiration. This is this week's sketch:


\ Last night we got news that one of my husbands uncle's had passed away. We had no idea that he was gravely ill. We had known for a while that he was ill, just not anywhere close to knowing the full extent of his illness. So, not really a happy moment to make a card for, but nonetheless I wanted to make a handmade card to express our sympathies to his aunt.



I decided to use green as my main colour. I didn't want to go too bright so I chose to use a bit of a muted celery green in a criss cross pattern as the main background colour of the card. I mostly chose the green because I didn't want the card to be too gloomy, I wanted it to have a bit of brightness to it. I chose to tone down the green a bit by using a few brown accents.

This was the first time I had the occassion to use this Verve stamp set (thank goodness it was the first time, its not really great to have to use it), but I think that the sentiments that are with it, and the simplicity of the stamps really lends itself to the occassion for which the card was made.

I'm quite happy with the way that it turned out, even though its with a bit of a heavy heart that I made it.

Paper: Bazill Basics Petty Cash & Suede Dark Brown, Martha Stewart
Ink: SU Old Olive
Stamps: Verve Forever In Our Hearts

Bringing the Zoo to You

The first kid is turning 4 in a couple of weeks, so its that time again. Birthday Invitation time. I have so much stuff going on right now its absolutely crazy, so I didn't have a lot of time to sit and think about this one. I also didn't have time to do stamp anything, so this card is all about the cricut.


The kid is having an animal party. We've hired a company to come in that brings furry little animals, or snakes, lizards, crocodiles that sort of thing. I asked my daughter what she really wanted to come to the house and the number one answer was a turtle, so that is the animal that got front billing on the card.

I thought about making three or four turtles in a row. Each of them walking with a present on its back, but I thought that was a little presumptuous, and just went with the single turtle and his big bunch of balloons.

The turtle and the "you're invited" I cut out with my cricut using adhesive backed paper and the Beyond Birthday's and In my Garden cartridges. The balloons were made just using a circle punch and then the strings on the balloons are embroidery thread.

I think its a pretty simple card, and just alright. My daughter loves it though and thinks its the best thing since sliced bread, and really that's all that matters right?

Hippity Hop Hop - Mojo 133

There appears to be an explosion of little bunnies in my household :). I've made a couple of cards in the past few weeks using Bunnies because its really the only baby related stamp that I have and really like, and well my friends are going through a mini baby boom. The latest had a baby on Friday, so I got down to work earlier in the week. I decided to use another Mojo sketch to inspire my creation.



So here's what I came up with.

My friend had chosen to not find out the gender of her newest little one, so I needed to use a neutral palette for the colours. I decided to go with the classic green and yellow. I love using greens in cards especially if its springtime. It just makes everything seem super fresh and bright. Because the majority of the card was green I went with making the bunny yellow to match the accent solid that I used. To make the bunny look soft I chose to use blending chalks instead of markers, and I also chose to give it a little bit more depth by using an orange to blend in with the yellow. And of course I needed to just give it a bit more pop, so I raised the bunny off the card itself and then chose to do the same with the bow.

I'm pretty pleased with my little bunny card. I gave up doing the Mojo sketches for a long time because I was completely intimidated by the talent of some of the cardmakers participating in it, but I've decided rather than be intimidated to look at the cards that come from the sketch and use them as inspiration. I learn a lot from them and from the other cardmakers, so even though I don't think my card is even close to being on the level of some of the others, meh I think its still cute.

Paper: Martha Stewart (I think its from a series called picnic), Recollections Yellow Cardstock

Stamps: SU A New Little Someone

Chalks: Inkadinkado Blending Chalks

Other: Dahses Dots & Checks ribbon, Mark Richards Crystals

Better Late.....

Last week I thought I was incredibly organized, and I was out of ideas in terms of card making, so I decided to take a look at Mojo Monday and see what kind of sketch they had come up with for the week. I found this, and thought it was a decent sketch and I could do something with it.




The problem. I wasn't as organized as I thought. I didn't get around to actually taking pictures of the card I did for last week's sketch until this morning, so I didn't get a chance to upload it, but oh well, its better late then never right?

I didn't do a round card, because well I'm not that good and I have no idea how to actually make a round card. I didn't make the card square either because I don't have square envelopes and the last time I attempted to make one it was an abysmal failure. So I went with my standard card.

I needed to make another baby card, so once again I had to turn to the only set of baby stamps that I own, my trusted little SU A New Little Someone. Gosh if this set didn't exist I'm not sure what I would do. I made this for a friend who is due to have her 2nd in a matter of weeks, and she knows she is having a girl. I figured why not go with complete pink overload. I don't often like to mix patterns of papers but I thought using 3 different patterns and a solid with this card would work out well because the patterns were all fairly subtle.

I have massive issues with bows. I have a horrible time tying decent ones, so I cheated a bit on this one and just made a simple loopy ribbon and used a brad to hold it in place.

All in all I'm pretty pleased with my little pink bunny. Now all I have to do is get my butt in gear and get organized enough to actually sew the gift I'm making for my friend. We are supposed to be going out for dinner next Wednesday so it gives me a bit of time, but I'm the queen of procrastination.

Stamps: SU A New Little Someone

Ink: Colourbox Black, Inkadinkado blending chalks: Bold Brights

Paper: Embossed Daisy, TPC Tinted Dawn

Brad: SU Filigree

Ribbon: Straight n Arrow Offrey

Two for One

The birthday card parade continues. One of the stamp sets that I had left to use for the cards I was making was Polka Dots and Petals. I saw a design on Split Coast that I really liked and decided to go with it as my inspriation card

I decided to once again use really springy type colours. So I chose to go with Yellow and Pink. I needed to use the black to anchor the colours as the white just wasn't doing it. Once it was all said and done though I wasn't really happy with the outcome


So I decided to try again. Using the same design I modified the colours that I used. I ditched the crazy yellow and went with all pinks, and chose to go with something a little less harsh than the black to anchor the whole card, so I went with a chocolate brown. I think the second card turned out much better. The only thing that I'm still not happy with is the way the stamping turned out on the darker strip of pink paper. I had initially tried both a dark pink and a white ink to stamp the pattern in, but neither of those looked right. So I tried a shimmery pink. Still not really happy with it, but it was the best of the three choices that I went with.

I asked my almost 4 year old daughter which card she preferred, and what a surprise the crazy kid chose the most colourful of the two.

Card #1

Stamps: SU Polka Dots & Petals

Ink: SU Pixie Pink, Dew Drop Brilliance Orchid, Chocolate Chip

Paper: Recollections Cardstock

Other: Dashes Dots & Checks Ribbon

Card #2

Stamps: SU Polka Dots & Petals

Ink: SU Pretty In Pink, Chocolate Chip & Dew Drop Brilliance Orchid

Paper: Bazzil Basics Mudpie, Paper Company Tinted Dawn

Other: Dashes Dots & Checks Ribbon

Spring Fling

Spring has almost sprung here in Southern Ontario. The weather has been decently nice (although I hear its going to get colder again this weekend), the temps are staying above freezing at night. Its liking like spring is on its way.

As I mentioned in my previous post I needed to make a few birthday cards, and I wanted them all to have a "spring" theme to them because the birthdays all happen right around the first day of spring.

For this one I decided to use on of my rarely used stamp sets again, Just Like You. I haven't used this set in so long that I had forgotten what exactly was in it. I tried a few other designs but just couldn't get anything to come out as bright and vibrant as I wanted. So I decided to just use stamps and ink. No fancy cutting out of papers, and gluing thousands of tiny parts together. Just simple stamps ink, and two scraps of green paper


I think it turned out really nicely. Its nice and bright and cheery and looks like a bunch of spring flowers just blooming. I really like the ink colours I chose. I think they compliment each other nicely and I think the background of the green paper really shows off the vibrancy of the ink.

Stamps: SU Just Like You & Sincere Salutations
Ink: SU Pink Passion, Tempting Turquoise, Green Galore, Only Orange

A Star is Born

Birthdays are everywhere at the end of March. I have at least four cards to make for friends/family who are born between March 22 and March 27. So I thought I'd better get started sooner rather than later.

I have a few stamp sets that I rarely use from SU. In Full Bloon, Just Like You, In the Stars and Polka Dots and Petals. I decided that those were the stamps I was going to use to make my cards. I also decided since the birthdays all fall just around the date that spring starts that I was going to use all "spring" colours. Colours that all seem fresh and bright.

So here it is, the first card

I originally started out this design thinking I would use the Polka Dots and Petals stamp set, because I wanted to do circles. I cut off about 1/2 inch of the top portion of the card to make room for the various sized circles that I had cut out so that the card would have fairly even edges. I just used scraps of paper that I had left over. I decided that using the stamps from the Polka Dots and Petals would be too much in terms of cirlces. It would be circle overload, so I went with the In the Stars instead.

The ribbon I've used I have had for over two years and haven't used it once. It had the perfect colour combo on it, and went great with the colours I had already used. I tried just using a strip of the ribbon at first but it looked weird so I went with a bow.

So this card will be for my Little Star who was born on March 22, 2008. I can't believe she's almost two. Time flies

Stamps: SU In The Stars

Ink: SU Green Galore

Paper: Recollections Cardstock

Other: Dashes Dots & Checks

In my last post I mentioned that I needed some inspiration for my #2 daughter's second birthday. The kid is completely obsessed with Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. She loves the song, walks around singing, reads books that are all about the song, talks about it constantly. When I say obsessed I mean obsessed.

Her little obsession of course gave me the perfect out for having to think up a birthday party theme for her. She's just having a family birthday but its still fun to do up invitations so that she will have memories when she's older of what she did on her birthdays. So we went with a Star theme:

Originally I was thinking of doing something a little bit more "twinkly" but I saw this american crafts paper and though it was perfect. Lots of girly colours, but not too crazy girly, and light and fun. I decided not to go the stamp route. I have a few star stamps but I'm not overly fond of any of them. So I went with the cricut. I cut the star, #2 and the You're Invited with my handy dandy little machine that rarely gets used.

The inside of course was my downfall. I could not find anyway to come up with a cute little rhyme that incorporated Twinkle, Star and Two. So she gets a boring little poem inside inviting people to her birthday.

I'm pretty happy with the way the card turned out. Oh and apparently I have found a pretty good spot to take pictures in my house. I know its taken for freaking ever, but I found it. My dining room between 1 and 2 pm has awesome sunlight. I think the picture turned out pretty good (better then all my other ones anyway)

Paper: American Crafts Hi Y'all; Bazill Basics Pinkini

Other: Alphalicious Cricut Cartridge

Moving on Up

I had run out of things to make cards for. I have no upcoming birthdays to make a card for, there are no other events happening with my family or friends that requires a card for the occassion, so I was going to make a few blank cards and just keep them in case of emergency.

However, just my luck I got a great excuse to make a card. A friend of mine just got an awesomely awesome promotion at work. She moving up in the world and I'm so happy for her because I know how hard she works and how much it really means to her especially after a bit of at trying year. So a Congratulations card was in order

I have seen all kinds of cards people have made using flowers out of paper. I think it was from a PTI challenge but I'm not entirely sure on that. I decided to try my hand at making them. I had a bunch of scrap paper that had a bit of a shimmer to it so I thought that would be perfect for the flower. Once I had chosen that it basically led to the card having a purple theme.

I think it turned out really nicely. I like the layout and the colour scheme and the flower didn't turn out too badly either.

Paper: Recollections cardstock

Stamps & Ink: Inkadinkado Congratulations; SU Elegant Eggplant

Other: Dashes Dots and Checks purple velveteen ribbon; Recollections Bright Mini Cirlces Brad; SU Scallop Border and Circle Punch

It's that time of year....Birthday invites

I'm busy brainstorming about birthday invites for kid #2. Her 2nd birthday is coming up in about a month. I need to get on the invite bus and start working on these things. I have a pretty good idea what is going to be going on in terms of stamps, paper choices etc, my problem as always is what kind of silly poem to put on the invite to tell everyone that its her party and she's turning two.

The theme is going to be Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. The kid loves this song. When I say Loves, I really mean LOOOOOOOOOVES this song. She sings it probably 700 times a day. The hard part, try to rhyme star with two. It just doesn't work.

If anyone has any suggestions, help a girl out :)

Deja Vu

About a week ago I sat down to make a birthday card for my BIL. I knew I was going to have to use cupcakes because its really the only birthday like stamps that I have. So I just needed to come up with a design. I had remembered seeing an awesome birthday card last fall sometime that had four small cupcakes on squares. So that's what I decided to do.

I love the American Crafts Paper. So that's what I set out to use. Once I picked the paper I found the contrasting colours to layer. Of course I ended up going with Orange and Red again, as they are my go to masculine birthday card colours (I really need to break out of that rut). I also decided I wanted to use a little ribbon accent across the bottom. I have had this AC ribbon FOREVER and have never really been able to use it, but I think it goes perfectly with this card.


So I look at the finished product. I keep looking at it and thinking I've seen this card before having massive Deja Vu. And well I went on a search to find it. I knew I had seen it and I found it. I basically stole this design from my awesome friend Emily over at Art From the Heart. She makes the best cards, so Emily if you read this sorry for stealing your design but take it as a compliment :) I have no creative ability at all and you clearly do. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery

Paper: American Crafts Giddy; Canson Red; PC Primary Orange
Stamps: Inkadinkado Birthday Cupcakes
Other: Martha Stewart Markers, American Crafts Ribbon

One Track Mind (a late valentine post)

Sorry this is a few days late. I can't lie, I didn't have a busy weekend, the exact opposite actually. I had my entire weekend free. The kiddies went off on a mini vacay with their dad to visit Grandpa and Grandma and I was left alone in sheer quiet bliss. I got so lazy I couldn't even drag my butt downstairs to get on the computer to post my Valentine cards.

So here they are. I made them days apart (actually two were made two weeks apart). So I didn't even realize until I had them all lined up to take pictures that I clearly have a one track mind. This time it was all about ribbon and bows running along the botton 1/3 of the card. Everyone got a bow on their card this year.

I didn't take note of the papers or anything when I made these and well now I can't be bothered to go back and figure it out. What I do know is Card #1 used Verve's Hundred Hearts set, Card #2 was some random heart stamp I had that probably came from the bargain bin at Michael's, and Card #3 used Pink Cat Studios Sweet Treats. The first card was for the husband, the last two were for the kiddies.

Cooking up some Cupcakes

I always find it really difficult to make masculine cards. I'm not sure if its just because I'm a girl, my kids are girls and I'm surrounded by pink all day long, or what. I have a hard time picking out colours, sentiments, you name it. Its always a big conundrum for me.

I need to make two birthday cards this month, that both have to be masculine. So I decided to do sketch #53 in my Joy of Cardmaking book. Its a fairly simple sketch that I thought could easily be done with solid colours. Solids are the easiest for me to go with when I have to make a non-girly card.

So I decided to go with bright happy colours. I chose yellow as the base of the card and layered it with orange. I decided that I couldn't do the entire thing out of solids because it just didn't look right so I threw in a striped paper as well.

The only non-girly birthday stamps that I have that don't involve flowers, fairies or princesses paraphernalia are cupcakes, so that's what I had to go with. I decided just to stamp out three simple little cupcakes and colour them in colours that complimented the striped paper.

I think it turned out alright. I'm not particularly happy with the white backgrounds of the squares (there is a hint of yellow behind them) but I tried a few other colours and they just didn't look right either, so white was the one that looked the best of the worst.

I was also going to have my first go at sewing on a card for this one, but got lazy and didn't feel like dragging my butt up to the sewing machine, or fooling around with the tension. So it stayed simple as simple could be.

Excuse the picture as always. Taken in the basement on the floor. Its the best I could do today :)

Paper: Starfish & Dreams Spiked Punch, Paper Co Festive Orange & Sunny Yellow

Stamps: Inkadinkadoo Birthday Cupcakes; SU Big Bold Birthday

Other: Martha Stewart Markers Tropical Sun; Daffodil; Lovebird; Cornflower meadow

A Trusted Old Friend

I have a friend who is about to pop any second. Her due date was last Thursday and she still has no signs of going into labour. She's scheduled for an induction on Friday, but you just never know if baby will show up sooner. I'm such a horrible procrastinator that I left making a congratulations/welcome new baby card until after her due date, but I thought I have to get it done before her induction date.

I decided to go back to an old stamp set that I haven't used in ages. SU's A New Little Someone. I love this set, but I haven't had the chance to use to for almost two years now. None of my friends have had a baby in that time. I figured it was time to pull out the bunny and put it to work.

As per a post I made a long time ago, I followed a sketch in my Paper Crafts Joy of Cardmaking book. Its Recipe 42 on page 102 of the book.

I know that the baby is going to be a girl so I wanted to go with something that was pink, but also wanted to add in a few other colours. So I chose a striped paper that had some other muted pastels in it. I used the colours from the striped paper to choose the colours for the bunny as well as the other accent papers. Of course I have no idea what any of the papers are because I always forget to write them down or the paper doesn't have the info on the paper itself as it was some part of a block of paper, so your guess is as good as mine.

I also decided to give the bunny a little 3D effect. I think it kind of sucks, but what can you do. I'm not sure I chose the right parts to make 3D, but I've learned for next time.

I also think my colouring technique still really sucks. I'm not sure its all me though, I'm sure part if it is the markers I'm using, since I kind of cheaped out on them, but I can't justify spending more money on markers nor do I have the time to learn how to perfect the colouring technique required to use ones like copics. So this is what you get.

I think it turned out alright.

Back in the swing of things

Since christmas I haven't had much time, or I just haven't been around to do any cardmaking. Of course Christmas and new years is always crazy and hectic with family stuff, and then we were away in Hawaii for a few weeks. But I'm back and I've been doing a little cardmaking. I just need to take some pictures. February appears to be a fairly busy month for my little hobby. I have a couple of birthdays, of course Valentine's day, a friend who is due to have her baby any second (not only do I need to make a card but I need to get the old sewing machine out and get on my little sewing project for her), and then I have to come up with and design a birthday invite for Kid #2's second birthday.

Things have been dead on my blog for a long time, but hopefully I won't get super lazy and I will actually have some things to post.