Heart & Home @ Little Red Wagon

This week at

it's Sandy's turn to choose the challenge and she's saying, "Heart & Home" which means that she wants to see a project with both a home/house and a heart(s). Lots of fun!

This is what I did....

As you can I made a shaker card.  It's a pretty darn staticy piece of acetate, despite me running an Embossing Buddy over it, but I kinda like how the glitter sticks to it, adds to it I think.  I shoulda added more shaker guts though.....that always seems to be the way when I made shaker cards....I either add to much or too little!

Why not give our challenge a go this week and head on over to Little Red Wagon and link up?  And, while you're there, be sure to check out the wonderful projects the other Girlfriends have created.

Also for:

Christmas Card Challenge:  anything Christmas
Simon Says:  anything goes
Merry Christmas Challenge:  anything goes + Christmas
Watercooler Wednesdays:  all about Christmas
Sunny Day:  M is for male
ABC Christmas:  T is for trio
Sweet Stampin' Christmas:  anything Christmas
Cardz For Guyz:  architecture

Making the Patterned Paper Do All the Work - Fab Friday @ Tiddly Inks

It's Fab Friday time!  Hey, did you know that there's only two months until Christmas?  I'm nowhere near panicking now, not because I've got everything well in hand, aside from making a few holiday cards I've done nothing, but it's not close enough to Christmas yet for me to care - ha!  Still, I do know I won't have enough time in the run up to the holidays so I do try to combine Christmas card making with DT duties.  And, well, whaddya know, I have a Christmas card right here.....(Nice segue, JanR.  Why thank you, JanR.)

As my title suggests, I did just let a sheet of pattened paper do the heavy lifting for making this scene.  I do love when it works out like that.  I used Sweet Dream Molly, isn't she adorable?  I gave her the extra girly treatment going with a lot of pink.  I'm betting she'd look smashing in red & green, or blue & silver, or purple & white...heck, I don't think she could look anything but smashing no matter what colours she was dressed up in.

Do make sure you go check out the other fabulous Fabby Friday makes the rest of the DT has come up with. You can see 'em all right here.

Also for:

Aud Sentiments:  use a two word sentiment
Incy Wincy:  unconventional Christmas - I've got the slightly non-traditional pink/green/blue colour scheme going on...plus, look at the size of that candy cane.  Not too many conventional candy canes out there that are the size of a kid!  Not to mention she's outside in her pjs and nightcap.
The Card Concept:  inspirational image - I was inspired by the colours and the patterned wallpaper for my Clean & Graphic card.
Christmas At Sweet Stampin':  anything Christmas
The Merry Christmas Challenge:  anything goes + Christmas
Jingle Belles:  3 in a row - snow, cardstock, blue

"Leaf" It To Me @ Little Red Wagon

This week at

it's Kate's turn to choose the challenge and she's (a Girlfriend after my own heart by using a pun like that and) saying, "Leaf It To Me" which just means that she wants to see leaves on your projects. Perfect for fall!

We've been having some gorgeous autumn weather 'round these parts. Like 25ºC, very little wind, sunshine for about two weeks straight....like I said, gorgeous. Made it easy to make a fall-type card......

As you can see I used a leaf embossing folder. Made a grungy masculine birthday card. Something different for a change.

Why not give our challenge a go this week and head on over to Little Red Wagon and link up? And, while you're there, be sure to check out the wonderful projects the other Girlfriends have created.

I Want To Be A 2017 Card Design Superstar! @ MFT

Did you guys hear about this contest?  To be honest, I want to be a really bad bloggy-friend and not even tell you about it.  Coz I know you all rock the making of the cards and why would I want to give myself more competition?  I mean...there are five GRAND PRIZES OF A $250 SHOPPING SPREE in each of the three categories.  That's a serious shopping spree, right there.  Makes a person want to be a little cut-throaty, kwim?

But, I can't be that mean to you, Dear Readers, coz you're all too awesome.  So, you can check out the contest here.

When I saw this contest was going on, I ran straight to my craft desk.  (Okay, ran might be a little strong...my computer is three steps from my craft desk so running would have put me into my desk before I could get stopped.)  I don't have much time to devote to crafting anymore, as you can tell by the fact that my blog posts are strictly for my Little Red Wagon and Tiddly Inks duties.  (Which I love doing and would not give up even if I had to start swapping sleeping & eating......hahahahahahahahahahaha.....got a little carried away there.  I would never trade anything for eating.  I'm pretty sure I could get my craft on with one hand while shoveling Doritos in my mouth with the other.)  But I was sure going to make some time for this.

I got busy pulling out all my MFT products.  Dies, stamps, paper pads....just spread 'em all out on my desk (which then left me with a 1' square area for creating) and just scanned them over, pretty much inhaling inspiration from them.  A plan started forming.....I decided I was going to do something for the Clean & Simple category.....and got busy.

So, this is what I did......

I genuinely had intended to showcase more MFT products, but, and this almost always happens when I do cas cards, I went super-duper cas.  Still, I did use a sentiment from the Deepest Sympathy stamp set as well as the Die-Namics Roses in Bloom, so s'all good.

Welp, there's my entry.  I guess I'm done here.  (Though, I am seriously considering going back through my post and inserting "please pick me" subliminally throughout, but that would be exceedingly juvenile, even for me.)  So, I'll just wish everyone a Happy Sunday.  Laterz, all.  :-)

Distress It! @ Little Red Wagon

This week at

it's my turn to host and the challenge is "Distress It" which is pretty self-explanatory, I'm thinking.

My card ended up being not only distressed, but distressing. Got the photo of my card all shined up and ready for posting....at 11:40pm last night.....was just clicking save, when I got this kinda look on my face....

Coz sumthin' didn't look quite right.  Took me a moment to realize and when I did I just was all....

Well, f@#k.

As you've probably noticed, two pearls on the left side have escaped to freedom.  Now, I'll affix two more before I give this card to the recipient, but you'll have to forgive for not having the time (or the patience) to go through the whole photographing and edited process all over again.

As you can see, I used Distress ink and distressed the edges.  Also coloured in a way to give it a more grungy feel.  (At least that was the idea anyway.)

Why not give our challenge a go this week and head on over to Little Red Wagon and link up? And, while you're there, be sure to check out the wonderful projects the other Girlfriends have created.

Give Us Your Background @ Little Red Wagon

This week at

it's Brenda's turn to choose the challenge and she got a fun one for us. She's saying, "Give Us Your Background" which just means that she wants us to make our own background paper. So fun!

Now, I'll admit, I had a bit of trouble with this one. I was totally overthinking it too, of course. As much as I love inked backgrounds I'm completely horrible at trying to produce them myself. I cannot blend ink smoothly, I end up making a big mess, and a lot of paper ends up in the garbage (and more than a few swears fly outta my mouth too).

In the end I followed this tutorial from Mel Stampz and made this...

So, while I did use patterned paper, at least I dressed it up, right?  What you do is use an embossing folder on the patterned paper, use clear embossing powder on the raised sections, then ink the rest of it.  Of course the embossing powder resists the ink, so it comes through as is.  It looks stunning if you use a dark ink that completely covers everything but the raised parts (click on the link above to see a sample of that).  Silly me, I thought that what would happen here, but obviously, pink isn't dark enough to black out the pattern.  Still, looks pretty cool if I do say so myself.

I did do some ink smooshing too, which I can sorta, kinda do. Sprinkled salt on it but I really don't see that effect on it at all....maybe because I blotted off the excess ink before I did?  I dunno....yet another example of why me and inks aren't best of friends.

Digi is from DigiStamp Boutique.

Why not give our challenge a go this week and head on over to Little Red Wagon and link up? And, while you're there, be sure to check out the wonderful projects the other Girlfriends have created.

Also for:

The Holly & the Ivy:  anything Christmas goes
Addicted To Stamps:  Christmas
The Merry Christmas Challenge:  anything Christmas goes
Addicted To Stamps & More:  holiday