Perfect Match Birthday Wishes

We've been having a great time with our family being here, so I'm not doing much posting for a little while. I did get to do a card for my sister-inlaw's birthday though. I really liked the cards Carolyn at P.M.S., etc. made last week-end and I loved the colors of the papers and ribbon. They're from PaperTrey Ink and they are part of the Perfect Match series and I chose Berry Sorbet and Lemon Tart because I liked the colors she used - they're so bright and cheery. I know my sister-inlaw will love the House-Mouse gang, so I had to do her a card using them and I'm quite sure all subsequent cards for her will be HM designs. Last week we were anticipating Fay, and now we're keeping a close eye on Gustav. I've already done my shopping and stocking up, but if it looks like it may head our way, I'm "getting out of Dodge" as they say. Hope you have a wonderful week-end. Hope to get a card done for the HM Monday Challenge this week. Hugs,
Karen

Two Cute!

I'm very excited that my grandkids are in the air on their way here as I post this. Amidst getting ready for their visit, I did manage to make my card for this week's HM Monday Challenge. Since the theme this week is "Lace it Up", I tried to incorporate as much lace as I could. I stamped Sahara Sand with SU's Victorian Lace in Craft White. I then colored my mice in the shoe and punched holes to put real laces in. I used a "cord", or ribbon, (not sure what it actually is) that I purchased some time ago that is 80% Acrylic and 20% Linen, and I died it on my Pretty in Pink ink pad. I used Crystal Effects around the shoe eyelets and the end of the "shoe lace". I used my scalloped Nestability to cut and emboss the circle in Blush Blossom and then ran it through the Cuttlebug again to get the Swiss Dots. I used 6 pink eyelets and laced ribbon through them. The sentiment is from SU's By Ones and By Twos. The edge piece was punched with Martha Stewart's lace punch, sponged lightly with Sahara sand and embellished with half pearls in Blush, as are the corners and the sentiment. I'm loving these pearls and I have purchased several colors from Flourishes. Hope you like how I "laced it up". I'm happy with how it turned out and I can't wait to see all the other entries. Happy Wednesday!

Amending "Sneak Peak"

I have to amend two things from last night's post. After posting my sneak peak image, it occured to me that they hadn't announced the theme for this week's HM Challenge. DUH! I turns out it's "lace it up." Well, doesn't look like I'll be "lacing this one up", so I'll post my card here and then it's back to the drawing board. Be sure to check out the cards the design team did - they're fabulous. The second thing to amend is that we actually did get the backside of the storm during the night. I woke up to pouring rain and what sounded like hurricane-force winds. I'm sure they weren't that bad, but nevertheless, we did see more of Fay. All's well this morning so far. We're supposed to get more rain, but I think the worst has moved on. Our sweet little grandson is two months old and has to go for shots this morning. :( Grandma is going along for moral support. Must go get ready. Have a good day!

Sneak Peak

Good Monday morning (or whenever this actually comes your way.) I'm posting a sneak peak to my card that I'll be posting to the 2nd House-Mouse Monday Challenge. You can follow the link to see the card and all of the rest of the awesome cards that get posted there. Beware - I'm thinking you'll get hooked on HM if you do. Of course, there's nothing wrong with that now, is there. This card is also going to be the first in my Sunday School series I'm designing around the Fruits of the Spirit and using our little House-Mouse friends for every lesson, at least for this first quarter. I'm very excited about this and it's one reason I've been buying them out over the last few weeks. I'll reveal more about the whole project as we begin our lessons. Just want to report that we were blessed in that we were spared the wrath of Fay. We actually got some rain, some wind, and nothing else. We kept waiting, but today not a drop of rain. I'm not complaining in the least. I'm very thankful we didn't have to go through the mess or the loss of power. Well, I just wanted to get a post up and I'm off to get coffee and play with my grandson. Be sure to check out the HM cards - they're too cute!!

Wishes for a Sunny Day

I'm trying to get this posted before Fay arrives and threatens to leave us powerless. I've been enjoying the "adventures of Speedy the Cat" at Stampin' with Markie's Mom, and apparently Speedy couldn't find any umbrella stamps in the midst of the storm. That inspired me to use my umbrella stamp and I also decided to incorporate it with the Sketch Challenge. My "umbrella girl" likes to be stylin' even in the pouring rain. Her raincoat designer is Basic Grey's Scarlet's Letter. Her boots are by WaterPolo, and her umbrella is by British Mist. Her dog's garment was a bit too pricey to even mention. For those of you picking up the pieces from Fay, I hope the sun comes out and your day gets brighter. To all my blogging friends I wish you a bright, sunny day. Perhaps I can even post this to the sketch challenge while there's time. Then, I'd best get busy with preparations for the arrival of my Cali kids this week. Hugs and Happy Saturday, Karen

Hang in There

Tonight's card is dedicated to my daughter who is weary from sleepless nights with her precious new son, Joan at Paperlicious who needs some hugs and smiles, all of you in the path of Fay (that includes me), anyone who is about Olympic'd out even though we're proud of our athletes, and anyone else who needs a little encouragement right now. For those of you who couldn't be happier if you tried, I'll dedicate another card to you another night. I know Carolyn at p.m.s.etc is tickled to death to receive the distinguished "I Heart your Blog" award, and she deserves it - I love her blog! Her cards are awesome! Not much explanation for this little fella - I colored him with pencils and used my May Arts dotted ribbon. Just can't get enough of all these little critters.
Hugs and happy Friday! krb

Olympic Watching at it's Finest

Our two newest grandbabies got together for some Olympic-watching. It must have been gymnastics that were on because Julia seems interested and Ethan seems rather bored. The question is, was it the guys or girls performing??? Hmmm...
My card is one I made my DH for our anniversary, but the sentiment goes out to all my precious grandchildren, 4 of whom are coming for a visit next week. Can't wait! My card contains that adorable frog from SU's "Unfrogettable", and the DP is Basic Grey's LilyKate. My collection of HM stamps is growing, so I'm going to have to start featuring more of them, but hey, nothing wrong with that. Ya gotta love 'em! That's it for today, except to say that if you saw your name in the Blog List and now you don't, it's because I accidentally deleted the entire section this morning while trying to delete a duplicate entry. I had to reinstate everyone, so if I'm still not remembering who's missing, give me a little time to remember who's missing.
Hugs,
KrB

Tuesday Color Challenge

I'm going to try posting at night in the hopes that subscribers won't get this a day late. I'm going to post my card that I put on SCS for today's color challenge, which was Close to Cocoa, Ruby Red, and Blush Blossom. I love this image from Hanna Stamps, and the sentiment that comes with the set says "Stamping Develops Strong Muscles." I think that is so cute, although I'm not going to use it for the person I intend to send this card to. At any rate, I colored it with my Prismacolor pencils and that's about it. I really like the color combo, and I like the work-out girl....I need to get busy with my own weights. Have a great day!

Keeping it Simple

Today I want to feature two cards that my daughter created. She is a new mom and a very accomplished musician, but when it comes to artsy things, she likes to "keep it simple." We recently made up a bunch of card sets to auction off to raise money for our Mission Team at church, and she came up with both of these ideas. My family always laughs that I'm up late in my studio working on cards, but the card with the stars was her creation late at night - very late actually - and she surprised me with it in the morning. I was very tickled with her creations, and all of our card sets sold in the auction. It was then that I ordered a stamp that said "K&B Cards" since I put her on my "design team." The card with the stars used Barely Banana for the card base, which really doesn't show up here. The colors were actually great together. Happy Tuesday!

Happy Monday

Good morning! Either there is a problem with my computer, or a problem with Blogger, because every time I log onto my blog a different picture is missing. Go Figure! Since I am very new to this, I am not familiar with any of the little quirks or how to fix them. If I thought my blog was actually being viewed, I would ask for help, but alas I think Molly and I, (well, maybe not Molly) are the only ones viewing it. Anywhoo, I said I'd be back yesterday with more cards from our class. I'm going to post one, because I'm not sure about this picture-disappearing act going on. This stamp is gorgeous and simple, but after I stamped mine I realized that I need to put the "grass" down lower on the CS. We inked the flowers in pink and then with a sponge dauber went over little areas with Regal Rose and then stamped it. The grass alone makes a beautiful image and there's much you could do with this. The CS we used is the new Pink Pirouette, and the stamp set is called "Inspired by Nature."
So, problem was with MY COMPUTER! I restarted it, and voila - the pictures are all there. Time to do some back-ups before I encounter any disasters.

Cards from Class

Last night, as I mentioned in yesterday's post, we did four cards at our stamping class. We always do 4, usually CASED and always great cards!, and it's always fun to try a new technique, new products, etc. I'll post 2 of them today, and 2 tomorrow. The first is bright and fun! We used two of the new In-Color papers, Pacific Point and Tangerine Tango. We also tried out SU's new Scallop punch, which I got the hang of after doing this card. The fun little stamp set , which includes the "flowers" as well as the "Thank You" is called "Wow Flowers" and it's only $12.95 in the new catalog. It is a set of 4 and I think there is a lot you could do with it. The cool technique used on this card was that Charlotte, our SU! demonstrator, used Ivory Ribbons and dyed them by putting them into a zip-loc bag with a tsp. of water and a tsp. of preferred-color re-inker. Love that idea! This color combo really pops and this was a fast little card to do, especially being able to punch the scalloped border so quickly. The second card was pretty simple and combines the "Fresh Cuts" and "Fresh Cut Notes", also from the new catalog. The flower in the center of the card is already die-cut, so you simply pop out the "lobster claws" and back it with any paper you wish. Be sure to do that after stamping the image to the front of the card, though. We used felt flowers and brads in the center of the flower. We added the complimentary floral image to the envelope to tie them together. Very simple and elegant! Hope you get some ideas from these. Tomorrow I'll be back with the other two cards we did. I think you'll like them!

Gotta Love Those Mice

Well, yesterday's post never happened, but that's okay.....life moves on. Yesterday my HM order came with 5 new little mice stamps to color. Just when I was trying to decide which one to start with, I started to have pain in my shoulder. So, I decided to give it a rest and watched the Olympics. My granddaughter started to color one, and for 4 years old, she did very well. Today, I colored the largest one and I just love how cute and happy these little guys are. I've also been loving the new stamp sets from Flourishes. Can't decide which to start with. And..., tonight is my SU! class and we'll come home with 4 new cards and lots of fun ideas and things to add to our wish list. I'll probably feature those in my next few posts as they always end up being very cool cards. I'd better get ready for that now, so hope you enjoy Muzzie, Mudpie and Amanda juggling raspberries.

Notecard Box

Today's Weekly Inkling at SCS was to make a 3 x 3 Notecard Box. Yesterday's color challenge, which I didn't get to play, was to use Taken with Teal, Elegant Eggplant, and Old Olive. So.......I decided to make the box tonight with those colors. It really was easy and the tutorial for the box is on the homepage at SCS. It's really late, so you can read about my slight oversight in my gallery if you want to. Since it is the bewitching hour and this post almost doesn't count, I'll try to get something up tomorrow,..... and earlier than this. Happy Thursday!

Olympics vs. Cards

Well, it's already evening and I couldn't decide if I should just wait until tomorrow to put in an entry, but I decided not to break the daily posting so I'm posting a card I did for the Flourishes Featured Stamper challenge this week. I mentioned in my description that I colored my image whilst watching the Olympics last night. Since the card took precedence over the Olympics at times, I missed some of the gymnastics moves. Oh well, "a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do." I finished it this morning and like how it turned out. Most of the "ingredients" can be found at Flourishes. The stamp is from Poppy Patch, and the DP is Basic Grey's "Boxer". The reversible ribbon and the half-pearls can be found there as well. I sound like I'm doing a commercial, but just letting you know where you can find these elements if you're interested. I do love their stamps, pearls, H2O's, and I guess I'll save the rest for another post. Getting ready to see Michael Phelps swim, so I really must "pool" my energies to cheer for him. LOL Go USA!!

"Mice little cards"

Since House-Mouse stamps are still on sale, (buy 4, get one Free), and I've been trying to pick out some favorites, I thought I'd post a few that I did a year ago. The one was done with my Cuttlebug using the "Baby" embossing folder and colored with chalks. The other uses the "So Very" sentiments from SU! Their new images are just so cute, as are so many of their regulars. If you like to color, you can have fun with these. Check out their site, found under "Links."

To our Athletes

The Olympics are underway and there's no doubt that these athletes from all over the world have worked very hard to be there. The abilities they have are phenomenal. It's time to post our Bible verse cards, and I wanted to do one that tied into the Olympics. It has made me think of the movie "Chariots of Fire" when the incredible missionary/runner from Scotland, Eric Liddell, participated and won in the Olympics so long ago. According to the story, he was handed a note by the American runner that contained the Bible verse that said, "he who honors me, I will honor." Eric had a conviction about running on the Sabbath, which allowed him to honor God and "let his light shine." So, here is my card, which I will also post to the challenge on Splitcoast.
May our athletes compete in such a way that they would bring glory to God. Go Team USA!

Something "old"

Happy Saturday! I love Saturdays! I have a card to post that I did a few weeks ago for a dear friend who left our church to go live with her daughter. She was such a "pillar" of the church and will be sorely missed. The set I used is an "old" set from SU! that I came across and grabbed because I loved it. Sharon Johnson (NoTimetoStamp) issued her Friday challenge to be something old....old stamp set, papers, etc. that you haven't used for a long time. Since I've only been stamping for a year, that's hard for me to do. But since this is a retired set, I figured it would count. You can post to this challenge using keyword SSnotime47 at Splitcoast, or on your blog. I colored my image with PrismaColor Pencils and I used my Scalloped Square Nestability to cut and emboss the main-image paper. I enhanced the corners with the flat pearls that I have loved using from Flourishes, as well as the Mayarts reversible ribbon, also from Flourishes. I like how it turned out. My background paper behind the main image is one I picked up last summer but I don't remember if it was Michael's or JoAnn's. (Sorry 'bout that.)
A whole group of us watched the opening ceremonies for the Olympics last night, and if you saw them I'm sure you would agree that they were incredible. I have a card in mind to make to honor our country and post to the Bible Challenge at Splitcoast, so if I can get to it today, this will be my next card. Have a wonderful day!

Blazing Trails

Wow, I'm launching into unknown territory. I decided I would like to have my own spot where I can share my creations for those who care to see them. My desire is to be an encourager with my cards and my posts. I have been stamping for just a year, and I have loved every minute of it. I am wowed by the incredible works of art that are out there as I've logged onto so many blogs and websites in the stamping world. What a long way it has come from when I dabbled with it so many years ago! I would love to find that I can blog every day, but I am not going to commit to that. We'll see how this all goes. If I can't figure out blogging, this may be my only post. LOL
I want to post two cards that I just did for my sister who is having a birthday next week. One is her birthday card. I wanted to keep it basic, so I did and just used the red, brown and ivory colors. The stamp is from My Favorite Things.
The other is to celebrate her move since she finally sold her house after waiting a lonnnnng time for it to sell. YEA! The stamp is Crafty Secret's "Bugs Life." I'm wanting very much to learn how to "color" and I have a ways to go to know where to shade and highlight, but I colored this with my colored pencils because I have to start somewhere. Thanks for checking out my blog. Have a wonderful week-end.