Farmer Riley

This is the second of the two swap cards I made for Jeanette’s newest forest swap on SCS—the theme is “Food in the Forest”.  I really like this Riley set and I am not sure it has been inked up yet.  Perfect for a forest swap I think!

Image/Sentiment—Riley Stamps-Farmer Riley and Moose Sayings 1

Cardstock—Gina K Designs Fresh Asparagus, Dark Chocolate, Vanilla; Stampin’ Up Creamy Carmel; The Paper Loft Scattered Pine Mountain Scrub Oak Valley/Cedar Run Designer Paper

Ink—SU Old Olive; Palette Burnt Umber

Accessories—Copic Markers; Early Espresso Quilted Satin Ribbon; Green Brads

The Living is Easy

Welcome to October!

This is the one of the two swap cards I made for Jeanette’s newest forest swap on SCS—the theme is “Food in the Forest”.  I love her swaps—this is #11 and I have been in each and every one.  All of the people—friends—that are in the thread are so much fun and are very nice.

Image/Sentiment—My Favorite Things Summer Stamp Set

Cardstock—Stampin’ Up Lucky Limeade, So Saffron, Certainly Celery; PTI Rustic White;  Echo Park Paper Sweet Day Pretty Pinwheel/Pretty Polaroid Designer Paper

Ink—SU Certainly Celery

Accessories—Olive Taffeta Ribbon; Saffron Brads; Olive Button with Bakers Twine

Crafters of Faith Blog Hop

 

Today is the last day of the month and I am here to introduce you to a new blog bop.

To God who gives our daily bread
A thankful song we raise,
And pray that he who sends us food
May fill our hearts with praise.
Thomas Tallis (1505-1585)

Welcome to the first Crafters of Faith Blog Hop! We are so blessed to have you stop by and celebrate the beauty of AUTUMN with us! The Crafters of Faith blogging group is a joyous blending of Christian friends ~ joined together to fellowship, share our faith, build friendships and craft together! If you are just visiting and would like to hop with us, welcome! Please start at Carol's blog.   If you hopping along already, you should have arrived from Tami’s blog. 

This month, our hostess is Carol S! She gave us a wonderful Harvest challenge and here is what she asked us to create: "I love FALL, the colors and the smells! I would like to propose that we make a card with fall colors, it should include fruits and vegetables to remind us of the harvest. When my kids were small, I canned peaches and pears, made pickles and such. So much fun to open those jars in the dead of winter! I am looking so forward to the fall festival of Sukkoth (Feast of Tabernacles). To Biblical historians, this is the actual time of Christ's Birth and many people believe this will also be the season of HIS return. Blessings All!"

To celebrate in this glorious season upon us, here is the inside card I created for you!

From here, continuing hopping to April’s blog to see what Autumn splendor she has waiting for you! We also have a special little giveaway for one lucky hopper today and you can find that on Kelly's blog - the last stop on the hop!

Thank you for stopping by today! In this glorious season of Fall, and the wonders of the earth changing to gorgeous colors in a time of gratitude and thanksgiving, we wish many blessings for you!

Image/Sentiment—Whipper Snapper Horn of Plenty/Stampabilities Bountiful Blessings

Cardstock—Gina K Vanilla, Sweet Mango, Pumpkin Spice; Stampin’ Up Chocolate Chip; Imaginisce Apple Cider Cinnamon Sticks Designer Paper

Ink—SU Chocolate Chip and Memento Tuxedo Black

Accessories—Copic Markers; Brown Brads and Acorn Brad; Tan Raffia

Calendar Girls Cherish

It is the 28^th, so I am here to welcome you to another round with the Calendar Girls!

Who are the Calendar Girls? We are a group of bloggers who want to have a place where friendships blossom, creativity abounds, and encouragement prevails! In keeping with that dream, this blog group has been created so we will have a place to interact and enjoy being fellow bloggers. 

Our hostess for September is Paola and here is her beautiful challenge:

To honor a dear longtime friend of mine who passed away early today, I would like to request that you create a beautiful card using the following guidelines:

Your card must be a fancy fold, and have apples stamped on it -and colored-(OR, if you don't own any apples stamps, apples can be incorporated on your cards via designer papers, stickers, dies, etc.), plus have at least one 3-D butterfly on your card too.   The main colors used for this challenge are to be your own favorite colors (use at least two of them please, and tell us which ones they are once you blog it.)

Why the apples/butterflies combos you may ask?  My friend used to bring me tons and tons of beautiful apples from her garden at about this time of the year as the fall season just starts to appear, and today, at the hospice, she was covered in a gorgeous handmade blanket full of beautiful colorful butterflies as we said our final goodbye....A bigger 3-D all white sequined butterfly was placed on top of her heart too. Please keep your card ‘happy/festive’ - as a celebration of LIFE in general! Hug a friend today...life's way too short!

I looked through my stamps and do not have anything with an apple.   But, I was sure I had some DSP with an apple theme.  I recently made a pocket card for a swap on SCS and liked the look, so I thought I would try it again.  I think it goes well with the butterflies.

Here is the insert from the pocket card.  I really do not have any favorite colors—but I do like greens and blues—it matches the designer paper pretty well!

Image/Sentiment—Stampin’ Up Warm Words; Stamp Oasis Success is

Cardstock—Gina K White; Stampin’ Up Pear Pizzazz, Pool Party and Island Indigo; We R Memory Keepers Show & Tell-Teacher’s Pet Designer Paper

Ink—SU Island Indigo

Accessories--Apple Brad; SU Sizzlits Wonderful Wings Die and Oval Punches; Indigo Ribbon; Crystal Rhinestones

Please check out the blogs of all of the Calendar Girls—there are 10 of us, so it might take you a bit.   I am sure you will enjoy all of the beautiful creations for Paola’s friend. All of the blogs are listed on my left sidebar. Thanks for joining us!!!!!!!

Boys Will be Boys

A local stamp and scrapbook stores hosts an every other month swap with various themes.  It is fun to get cards from area ladies and see all of the different styles!  This month we are making cards for kids or babies—I think the primary colors make for a perfect boy’s card.

Image/Sentiment—Little  Paper Shop-Boys will be boys

Cardstock—Gina K White; Stampin’ Up Real Red, Ballet Blue, Yo Yo Yellow; Reminisce Let’s Ride Patterned Paper

Ink—SU Real Red and Ballet Blue

Accessories—SU Blue Corduroy Brad and Oval Punches; Yellow Bakers Twinc

PTI Wishing You Brighter Days

This is the third card I made for Tracie’s recent Papertrey Ink—PTI swap on SCS.  Love those swaps!

Image/Sentiment—PTI Think Big Favorites #10

Cardstock—Stampin’ Up Chocolate Chip, Really Rust, More Mustard and Designer Series Paper

Ink—SU Really Rust

Accessories—Brown Satin Ribbon and Bronze Brads

PTI Congrats Swap Card

This is the second of the three cards that I made for Tracie’s recent Papertrey Ink—PTI swap on SCS. I love these swaps as the ladies make some of the most wonderful cards. This is one of the two regular cards that I made.

Image/Sentiment—PTI Mat Stack 1 and Signature Greetings

Cardstock—Stampin’ Up Soft Suede, Very Vanilla, Cajun Craze and Comfort Café Designer Series Paper

Ink—SU Soft Suede

Accessories—SU Oval Punches, Soft Suede Brads, Ribbon and Button with Bakers Twine

Mystery Swap ~ You Cured Yet?

This card is for a Mystery Swap on SCS.  A group of us are doing a bi-monthly swap where we all use the same mystery image, sent to us by the hostess.  This swap was created by Forest Ranger—Jeanette.  These images were sent to us by Samantha, who will swap the cards and send us the next image, provided by Terry!  I can't wait to get the swap cards back to see how everyone else used the same image.  And then we get to do it all again!!!!

The image the Samantha sent is very cute and I had  fun trying to decide on what color combos I wanted to use.  I recently bought the Gina K cardstock and patterned paper set called Sundance and I knew the colors would be perfect for this image.

I think this card turned out very cute—and I hope Samantha as well as the others in the swap like it also. 

Image/Sentiment—Stampin’ Up Farm Fever

Cardstock— Gina K Pumpkin Spice, Sweet Corn, Sweet Mango and Sundance designer paper; SU Whisper White

Ink—SU Basic Black

Accessories—SU Markers; Orange shiny Ribbon, Orange button with Twine and Orange Brads

This card is also in the following challenges:
Divas by Design ~ Lovely Layers
Stamp-n-Doodle ~ Anything Goes
Sweet Stamps ~ Shades of Autumn
Twisted Tuesday ~ Things that Fly  (I have heard that pigs fly.........................!)

PTI Thank You Swap Card

This is one of the three cards that I made for Tracie’s recent Papertrey Ink—PTI swap on SCS. I love these swaps as the ladies make some of the most wonderful cards.  This is a pocket card I made for that category.

Image/Sentiment—PTI Mat Stack 1

Cardstock—Stampin’ Up Soft Suede, Very Vanilla, Summer Starfruit and Comfort Café Designer Series Paper

Ink—SU Soft Suede

Accessories—PTI Mat Stack 1 Die; SU Soft Suede Taffeta Ribbon, Corner Rounder and Round Tab Punches, Antique Hodgepodge Hardware; Sticky Tape

 

Dueling Darlings "Must Go" Card

It is the 15^th of the month and that means another Dueling Darlings challenge.  Our hostess this month for the entire group is Debbie.  What?   Everyone has the same kit to use this month?  Well—that is kind of correct.  Debbie challenged us with Debbie’s Delight—a kind of “Must Go” type kit.  I was on a recent bike/camping trip in Michigan and we had a couple of “must go” meals—things in the cooler and food bin must go!  So—here is the recipe for Debbie’s Delight:

The dish: Know how we do our kits each month and we have LEFT OVERS? Each and every one of us probably didn't use every single thing in the kit, every single time!

The recipe: KEEP your extra items! That's right! From this month on, when you complete the Dueling Darlings cards, anything you DON'T use, keep it in a SAFE PLACE 6 months from now, after all the duels from all the divas and dazzlers have passed us by and September rolls around, that is what you will use! From the papers, to the ribbons, to the buttons to the all of left over, that will be your kit!

The Sit Down: The final result will be a collection all things not used, recycling at its best! When you get ready to sit down and play with your paper and beyond, it will be from all the kits - or some of the kits - that you've gotten and will reuse for the September challenge

I admit that this could have been a strange card—filled with hearts from Valentine’s Day or shamrocks from St. Patrick’s Day or game pieces from last month—but I loved the kit that we used for June and Father’s Day.  I used the opposite color theme as I did then and came up with another masculine card.

 Here is the inside of my card.

Image/Sentiment—Stampin’ Up Open Sea/My Sentiments Exactly

Ink—SU Crumb Cake

Paper—SU Crumb Cake, Bazzil Brown; Bo Bunny patterned papers

Accessories—SU Ticket Punch; Brown Brads; Brown and Ivory Buttons with Bakers Twine; Ivory Ribbon with Brown grosgrain on top; Star brad on inside.

Please be sure to stop in to see what all of the Divas as well the Dazzlers have created this month. All of the blogs are on the left sidebar of my blog. I am sure you will enjoy all of the creations for our Game! Thanks for joining us!!!!!!

Matilda Louise

Here is the second of the two swap cards that I made for Fran’s Off Their Rockers Swap on SCS.   Fran challenged us to ink up some of our comical “Seniors” or Golden Oldies” stamps.    I have a few favorites that I use when making an “oldie” card and this is one of them!

Image—River City Rubber Works-Matilda Louise; Sentiment-Crackerbox Palace-O Lord

Cardstock—Gina K White, Black and Red Hot; Paper Inspirations Polka Dots Designer Series Paper

Ink—Memento Tuxedo Black

Accessories—Copic Marker; Black Stitched Ribbon; Punches

Vintage Cycling

Here is one of the two swap cards that I made for Fran’s Off Their Rockers Swap on SCS.   Fran challenged us to ink up some of our comical “Seniors” or Golden Oldies” stamps.    I have a few favorites that I use and created some “vintage” cards!

Image/Sentiment—Hero Arts Vintage Cycling

Cardstock—Gina K White and Black; 7 Gypsies Paddington Designer Series Paper

Ink—Memento Tuxedo Black

Accessories—Black Moonstruck Ribbon; Black and White Brads

Sympathy Swap Card

Here is the second of the two swap cards that I made for Emily’s Sympathy Swap on SCS.   I so love this style of sentiment—I have about 8 of them and use all of them often!

Image/Sentiment—Paper Inspirations Sympathy Calligraphy

Cardstock—Gina K Ivory; Stampin’ Up Really Rust, More Mustard, Chocolate Chip and Designer Series Paper

Ink—SU More Mustard

Accessories—SU Chocolate Chip Ribbon, Button with More Mustard Ribbon

Craft Gals ~ "Sweet" Punch Art Challenge

It is the 5^th of the month, so I am back with another challenge of the Crafty Gals!  We are a group of bloggers who have monthly challenges, caring comments & fun chit chat on SCS—our favorite stamping site to visit.

This month, the challenge was posted by Jeanette.  Here are the details of her challenge:

“Get Punchy”

I absolutely love creative punch art! (Have you seen my Pinterest Punch Art Board?) I know not everyone loves punch art, but I do. I also know that a lot of us don’t have many punches. Therefore I’m not going to make this challenge too difficult.

The Simple Plan: Make a card using a punch somewhere on it. Easy Peasy!

The Advanced Plan: Make a card where you use punches to make something they were not originally intended for. For example: Use oval punches to make a frog, use circle punches to make a snowman, use the stocking punch to make a stick horse, use a heart punch to make a Christmas tree, use a variety of punches to make a chef or witch or elephant, etc.

I like punch art, but I am a bit challenged to come up with my own.  So, I went off to search for some ideas.  I found a couple and I thought this one was sweet—pun intended!   I looked pretty easy, but was a bit challenging to get all of the circles even—and I hope I did.  I used a button to help hold the circles in place—but I have also seen a glitter brad in the middle.  The circles are all one inch and the stick is a piece of regular paper rolled up a couple of times—if you roll it on your desk a couple of times, it breaks down the paper fibers and works better. 

This card reminds me of the huge lollipops that eyed in the stores when I was little—especially in Wisconsin Dells, which was near my home. I am sure they were thousands of calories as they are pretty much all sugar—and I am not sure that I would be able to finish it—but I sure wanted one!  I hope you like my “Sweet Card” and I hope I met the Punch Art Challenge posed by Jeanette--I even think I made the advanced plan!

Image/Sentiment—Stampin’ Up Itty Bitty Banners

Cardstock—Stampin’ Up Crumb Cake, Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie and various colors of 1” circles

Ink—SU Chocolate Chip

Accessories—SU Bitty Banners Framelits, Modern Label and 1 inch Round Punches, White Button; Tiny Bronze Brads, Paper Piercing Pack

Please check out the blogs of all of the Crafty Gals.   All of the blogs are listed on my left sidebar and I hope you will enjoy all of our Animal Birthday creations. Thanks for joining us!

Souls in the World

Here is the one of the two swap cards that I made for Emily’s Sympathy Swap on SCS.    I think this is such a wonderful sentiment and it needs to be featured on the front of a card instead of the inside.

Image/Sentiment—Verses Souls in this World

Cardstock—Gina K White; Stampin’ Up Baja Breeze, Chocolate Chip, Crumb Cake and Designer Series Paper

Ink—SU Baja Breeze

Accessories—SU Kraft Brads, Baja Button with Chocolate Chip Bakers Twine; Sizzix Cirque Embossing Folder