Tilda's Christmas Wish

Yay! I finally got to color one of my new Tilda's. I decided she looked like she's deep in thought, as in perhaps wishing for something. So, the scene next to her looked like she might be wishing to be home for Christmas, or that someone would come home for Christmas, or that it would snow where she is, or maybe not snow,......so many maybies. I know she looks huge in comparison to the scene, but I did want the scene to represent her Christmas wish. The scene is from SU's Home for Christmas, as are the DP's. I colored Tilda with some Copics, some Prismacolor Pencils. I have 3 more I can't wait to color. I thought about offering some blog candy for the best guess at her Christmas wish, but I'd never be able to pick a winner, and I don't know how to use the Random chooser. I'll save that thought and when I figure out how to do it, I'll start occasionally offering some goodies. Thanks for stopping by. Don't faint that I have so many posts all of a sudden. I just got a little extra time to stamp. :) Hugs for the holidays.....

Award Thanks

I want to say a big thank you to Carolyn for nominating me for this lovely award. Carolyn, you are so thoughtful and encouraging. Thank you so much for this honor. I have loved getting to know so many through visiting their blogs and getting acquainted not only with their artistic talents but their gracious hearts as well. I am supposed to post the following with this award:

This blog invests and believes the PROXIMITY- nearness in space, time, and relationships! These blogs are exceedingly charming; and these kind bloggers, aim to find friends and to be friends. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please, give more attention to these writers!

Deliver this award to eight bloggers, who must choose eight more, and include this cleverly written text into the body of their award.

Please forgive me, but my nominations are going to be half the amount recommended. I checked the blogs of some that I would have nominated and alas they had already been awarded.
This time I will nominate 4 ladies who are talented stampers and spirited bloggers. Thank you ladies for the encouragement you have given to me both with your creations and your comments. Hugs and smiles,
Rachel
Shary
Nancy
Emma

Quilt Card Challenge

I was so anxious to participate in this challenge, and I finally finished this last night. Mary issued the challenge and you can read about it here. I used the downloaded "trial size" Christmas paper from PTI for my quilt pieces. I love the festive colors. I also stamped the sentiment on the quilt edges from PTI's "Made of Snow." The paper the sentiment was stamped on was PTI's Spring Moss, which I thought went well with their colors. It was tough matching these greens, but I used Old Olive behind the Spring Moss, and I used a Bazzill paper behind that, all mounted on Real Red. The photo corners have Kaiser Chocolate half-pearls on them. I loved doing this. It certainly went quicker than a real quilt and I love the festive look to it. Thanks for the challenge. Now I have to figure out if I can still post to the challenge and just how to do that. If I missed it, I still loved making the card. Thanks so much for stopping by. Hopefully I'll be back with a few more posts before the holiday.

Blog award

I am long overdue in acknowledging an award from my friend Mary. Mary nominated me for the "You Inspire Me" award. Thank you so much. I'm thrilled to think my cards could be an inspiration to someone. Mary has done amazing cards and recently hosted her own "quilt" challenge with PTI. I'm happy to say I finished my card, FINALLY, and will post it, hopefully, shortly. I loved that challenge, and if you haven't seen her quilt cards, be sure to check them out. They are amazing! Thank you so much, Mary. I would like to pass this on to a friend who inspired me to start my blog where I've been able to meet all my wonderful blogging friends and view their many talents. Jan Marie is a very talented lady herself and co-owner of Flourishes, and she has shared much with me to help me on my journey. She stays busy and doesn't get to post her own creations as often as she would like to, but she's an inspiration to me and I thank her for that. Thank you, Jan Marie!

....and all through the house.....

Well, today was sad because I had to say farewell to my dear friend who has been here for almost a week visiting......as visit long overdue. Needless to say, we had a wonderful time together and my daughter and I tried in our most persuasive way to keep her here. But alas, work was calling her, so as they say, "a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do." I did get to finish my card for this week's HM challenge that I started late the other night. This week's challenge was "All about Christmas." I am loving SU's Holiday Treasures Christmas paper, so that is what I used for the background panels. The main CS is Riding Hood Red, also from SU. Alas, the ribbon is also SU. The tag is from PTI's 2008 Holiday Tag Collection stamped on Flourishes Carmel CS with Palette ink and the snowflakes are done with a MS punch. I colored my little furry creatures with my Prisma colored pencils. I'm aching to color my first Tilda's from Magnolia stamps, and I'm also designing my quilt card for Mary's quilt challenge. I must also mail Thanksgiving cards and my grandson's birthday present, so I guess I'd better quit yacking and get to it. Be sure to check out all the cute little mousies in a Christmas theme at the HM Monday Challenge. Thanks for looking and a special thank you to those of you who leave encouraging comments. It always makes my day when someone likes my cards.
For now, hugs and smiles....

Junk Challenge

This week's HM challenge was "junk." I'm getting this in right under the wire because I've had a very busy week. My junk drawer could have furnished an entire banner, so I decided on using a straw and my "Mice Cappucino" stamp of Monica, Maxwell and Mudpie. I colored it some with Copics and mostly with Prisma color pencils due to my small inventory of Copics and my lack of confidence in coloring with them thus far. The DT created some great cards, as always, so be sure to check out their creations, as well as everyone's that were submitted for the challenge. Thanks so much for stopping by. I hate getting this in late, but I love the HM challenges and would rather be last minute than not participate. Tomorrow we get to see what this week's challenge is. Have a great evening.

Blogger Award

Oh my goodness, Nancy from Windstar Creations and Rachel from

My Cardstock Creations both nominated me for this award. I feel so honored. Thank you so much, Nancy and Rachel. That certainly brightened my day!! I finally figured out how to display the logo on my blog, so here it is. (Yay!) Now I get to pass this on, so here are the steps to follow:

1.The winner may put the logo on their blog.

2. Put a link to the person who sent you the award.
3. Nominate 5 blogs.
4. Put links to their blogs. (Click on name below for link)
5. Leave a message for your nominees.
I'm going to nominate some blogs that I've not nominated before, so here are my nominees:
Mary

Becca
Suzy
Coni
Latisha
I hope you'll check out these blogs and maybe you'll find a new favorite to follow.

Anniversary Wishes

I finally got to use my "Summer on the Patio" set from Flourishes to make my daughter and her husband an anniversary card for their 2nd anniversary. They're thrilled to be celebrating it with their 4-month-old baby boy. They did get to go out to dinner to a quaint Italian restaurant here in town, so the card ended up being appropriate. I used Crystal Effects on the wine in the wine glasses, and it looked very real, even though you can't see it in the picture. They loved the card and I think I'll enter it in this week's Featured Stamper challenge with Flourishes. Thanks for taking a look. I was also honored today with an award which I need to acknowledge and pass on. I'll try to get to that soon and proudly display my award on my site. I will leave a link when I do that to Nancy who passed on the award to me and you can check out her very cool blog. I wish you a wonderful Veteran's Day tomorrow. Hugs.......

These cute little bugs from Alota Rubber Stamps are ready for their Harvest celebration. I colored them with Copics, cut them out, and mounted them on a piece of DP from Basic Grey's "Mellow" (yes, .....again.) I mounted all of that on a piece of Riding Hood Red, added a strip of brown-checked ribbon and I added a couple of MS punched leaves.Finally I stamped a "Happy Thanksgiving" sentiment on Bazzill dotted swiss paper and they're good to go. I think they look happy and thankful for what they have. Thanks for taking a look.

HM Recipe Challenge

Here is my HM Recipe. One Candy Cane Dreams HM stamp, colored as desired. One stocking of felt, stuffed with a sleepy little mouse who already ate part of his candy cane. Mount mouse on dimensionals. Add two button brads to the stocking and two scallops cut with SU's scallop punch to the bottom edge of the card. Stamp one Merry Christmas sentiment from Flourishes "Rejoice" and mount over strip of Dashing DP from SU, and add one piece of ribbon, attached with a brass brad. Sprinkle with snowflakes in Brilliance "Cosmic Copper" using complimentary snowflake stamp from Alota Rubber Stamps. Mount all ingredients on green CS (Wild Wasabi in this case.) Photograph for HM Challenge and then enjoy! (Hmmm, I'm craving peppermint.....and a nap.) :) Thanks for looking at my entry. Be sure to head over the the HM Challenge blog and check out the other entries. They're wonderful and full of talent.

Make a Joyful Noise

Well, I finally got a card done that I could post. I have so many cards I want to make and post and so little time right now. This is my newest stamp from Sweet and Sassy. It's a Sarah Kay design called Angels Rejoice. My main cardstock is a Bazzill dotted swiss and my DP is Dashing from SU. The sentiment is from Flourishes Christmas set called Rejoice. I used my MS branch punch for some "holly" and attached some "berries" by cutting out red with my smallest circle punch and then attaching black half-pearls. My image was stamped with Versa Mark, heat embossed with black embossing powder, and then colored in parts with Copic markers. I used my large oval Nestie to cut and emboss the whole image and sponged it with Versa Magic in Wheat. I like how it turned out. I have a few more new stamps I'm anxious to stamp and post, so I'll try not to be so long in posting. Be sure to check out Paper Craft Planet. I need to find my way around it, but it's booming with papercrafters. Thanks so much for stopping by.

Fall Festival Fun

This card is for a sweet lady who does so much to make fellowship at our church a wonderful time. She is working feverishly to put together our annual Fall Festival. The children have so much fun dressing up and our activities include a Cake Walk, Hayride, Jumping Cage, and usually a Dunking Tank, although it's supposed to be too cold to do that this year. ( Can you imagine that, in Florida!) We also have lots of other little games, face painting, etc. Young and old love to come to this. My friend also put together a church reception this past Sunday night and an all-church shower for one of our brides-to-be last night.
I made this card for her in the hopes that it will put a smile on her face and help her remember this year's Fall Festival....unless she would rather forget it. LOL The point is to let her know how much she is appreciated. The background paper and scalloped paper at the bottom are from Basic Grey's "Mellow" which I'm still using with gusto. The "sentiment" was done with my Just-Rite stamper. I love the way I can personalize with that. My wreath is from a post from Paperlicious, and my "punch-pumpkin" is from a post from Snapnextras. Both of the ideas really grabbed me, and it all added to the theme of Fall Festival for this card. Thank you, ladies, for sharing these techniques. Don't you love Muzzie (you can tell him by the notch on his ear) dressed up as Swiss cheese?! This image is just too cute. I'm going to post this to the HM Challenge for this week since they are calling for something "natural". My bow on my wreath will hopefully qualify this card for that theme. Check out their cute cards for this week's challenge if you get a chance. Thank you for stopping by. I hope to get more posts up, but this week is tied up with many things, so I'll do what I can.

Beate's WSC63

I had a little time today and decided to try to jump in on Beate's week-end sketch challenge. I used a new stamp that I love by Inkadinkadoo. I'm still loving the papers in Basic Grey's "Mellow", so I used that for the main background paper. The sentiment is from Sweet and Sassy. The main CS is Riding Hood Red and the green is Kiwi Kiss, both from SU's new In-Colors for 2008. I embossed the Kiwi Kiss with my Divine Swirl Embossing Folder for my CB. I stamped the birds in Riding Hood Red and I sponged the birds in Certain Celery while it was still nested in my Nestie. The Zig zag borders are punched with my Martha Steward border punch. From a distance, it looks kind of Christmas-y. Thanks for looking. I do enjoy sketch challenges so this was fun for me.

Fun Fall Riley

I had two cards to make/send to two special people. One is my niece Lynda who won, for the second year in a row, "Teacher of the Year" at her school in Florida. I am so happy for her and she is most deserving of the honor. The other is my grandson who has "stuck by the stuff" and mowed enough lawns this summer to open a savings account. I'm very proud of him and wanted to send him a little something to add to it. So, my Riley card is going to go to one of them for sure. I am still loving Basic Grey's "Mellow" that I picked up at Michael's. I even went back and bought a second one. Riley is so cute sitting with the pumpkins, and I slid him into my new Sizzix die-cut envelope from SU that works fine in my CB. I can see me using this a lot. The DP has a touch of blue in it, so I incorporated Bashful Blue with PTI's Dark Chocolate. My pumpkin is Tangerine Tango, and I sponged it a bit to cut down on the bright tangerine color. The leaves are my Martha Stewart punch. My ribbon is Pumpkin Pie from SU. Hope you like it. It was fun to make. Will be back with another project soon.

Surprise Award

This morning I learned that my sweet friend Carolyn from P.M.S. Etc.
left me an award.  I am so honored to be recognized by such an outstanding
and talented artist.  Her cards and projects have all been so awesome and it
just makes my day (week, month.....) that she has honored me.  She is such
an encourager and I feel as though she's one of my dearest friends, even
though we've never met.  As I'm getting acquainted with many of you, I feel
like I'm developing friendships and I look forward to seeing each of your
creations and letting you know how much I love what you've said and done.
I love Fall, so this is a gorgeous picture to attach to my blog.  Thank you
so much, Carolyn. 
Now I confess that it is difficult for me to pass this on to just 6 bloggers.  So,
I'm going to cheat a bit and single out one blog that has been my pleasure to
visit, not only for the talent she shares but for the whitty things she posts
that cater to my love of humor.  So Paperlicious, I'll  pass this on to you.