Ladybug life

I had such a fun time making this card! I think it was a sketch challenge on MFT I think. I saw the sketch on SCS and I believe she mentioned MFT. Anyway story behind the card: I needed to make a card for a very good friend of mine Rita. Since we've been in Germany she's always done little things to make our transition over here better like always inviting us for dinner, bringing me home made lumpia which is the BEST i've ever had. They always want to take us to see new sights, and she has called or text me every single day since being here to make sure I'm ok or if I need anything. I thought the saying on the bottom of the card was perfect! Because even though they may seem like little things to others it's been a HUGE little things to me. I am so appreciative of her and her family. I think I will make her something chocolate cause she is a chocolate gal! Probably some home made Mocha Cupcakes from Batter-Splattered blog that I love! You can find the recipe here. I have made these and they only make 9 cupcakes so double your batter because let me tell you they will NOT last 1 day. They are the best chocolate cupcake I've ever tasted! For my card I used Purely Pomegranate as the base, matted a piece of printed cardstock from my wonderful Pocket Full of Posies stack by Die Cuts With a View. I then cut squares in Soft Sky, Summer Sun, Purely Pomegranate, and Whisper White. I layered them and on the Whisper White piece I stamped the heart from the A to Z Accents by Stampin' Up! in Purely Pomegranate on all four corners. I punched out a scallop in Summer Sun, used my circle punch for the Whisper White circle and stamped the big ladybug from Little Lady set by Papertrey Ink. I used 3 black brads from the vintage brads by Stampin' Up! on 3 of her spots to give her a little depth. I can't wait to give Rita this card on Friday!

Thank You BERRY Much!

A few other ladies and I are doing a mini card swap here in Germany and this is one of the cards I came up with. I got my Tart & Tangy set in the mail and just had to use it. I had fun making it and it was a lot of work sort of. You can't tell by the picture but the Green Galore piece has dimensionals on all four corners to make it pop up from the card base. I started off with a standard size card piece of Whisper White. I cut a piece of cardstock 5 1/4 X 4 and stamped the Print Pattern background in Green Galore onto the Green Galore cardstock. I then punched out 3 scallop circles and used my 1 3/8 inch circle punch to punch out the middle. I positioned the scallop cirles on top of the Green Galore cardstock and drew circles so I knew where to punch the wholes so I could stamp the strawberries directly onto the Whisper White card base. I used the Real Red & Green Galore marker to color the strawberry. The middle strawberry I embossed the top in Green Galore and put a dimensional underneath it to make it pop. My card needed some kind of embellishment and I didn't feel I had enough room for ribbon. So I opted to punch out 4- 1/4 inch cirlces and use Green Galore brads through them on all four corners of the card. I needed a sentiment and knew I wanted it to read Thank You Berry Much however the stamp from Much Appreicated reads "Thank you very much" I opted to use my Basic Black stampin write marker and ink up the Thank you portion stamp then hand wrote in the "Berry" in Real Red. I then masked off the first three words and inked up the much portion of the saying and stamped it. It looks so much better in person!

Black & White prima's

Lindsay's blog In My Stamp Room's catchy blog header caught my eye! I've just recently found it and visit it often. I did not realize she has sketch challenges which seem to be my "thing" right now. It's so much easier to be able to sit down and create when there is a sketch challenge rather than trying to come up with one on your own. Tonight I decided to give her Thursday Sketch challenge a shot. Let me tell you it was so painless and not messy! Usually when I do a sketch challenge you should see my desk area. It is full of probably all the supplies I own because I will start with something I see in my mind and it will end with something completely different than what I started with. But this challenge I kinda knew exactly which paper I wanted to use and wanted it to be a mainly black and white color scheme. To start off I used Whisper White as the base. I purchased the Doodlebug Black & White eyelet paper at A Walk Down Memory Lane because they actually had it in stock! Thank you A Walk Down Memory Lane I had been on the hunt for this collection for a while and the best thing it was on sale!!! Back to my card......I then cut a piece of Whisper White cardstock and matted Basic Black to it then another Whisper White and topped it off with Prima flowers purchased at Eclectic Paperie. I used Real Red brads in the middle of the black Prima flowers, and a Basic Black brad in the red & white polka dot Prima flower. I then doodled a little and decided to not put a sentiment on front because I'm not sure what occasion the card will be used for. I'm on a roll today got 2 cards under my belt because my family has let me enjoy my day in between spending time with them....

Taylored Expressions Color Challenge 11

All weekend I've been wanting to do this color challenge Taylor posted on her blog. While at the Black Forest yesterday I was trying to come up with a layout and what I wanted to use. I'm pretty happy with what I chose. This time I made a card 5X5 which I've never done before. I like how much room there is to play with! The card base is Tempting Turquoise, then I used my slit punch to make a scalloped edge on Pumpkin Pie after that I cuttlebug'd that piece with the swirls embossing folder. I layered a piece of Soft Sky on top of the Gable Green. On the Gable Green piece I daubed Gable Green. On top of that I wanted the Soft Sky to pop a little because it looked a little dull so I layered a piece of Whisper White on top. I used my scallop punches and stamped the Hey There Cupcake set on my card. I added some brads on the lower left corner and I punched out some corners using my Stampin' Up! Photo Corners punch. I also daubed Pumpkin Pie onto the corners too. Lastly I cut some Gable Green polka dot ribbon from a ribbon share Taylor held a long time ago.

Life May Not be the Party

I had fun with this card tonight. Once again this is a sketch challenge over at Poetic Artistry. I went through two different designer papers and finally decided on this one. I'm glad I did cause I like the whole pink, green, black combo. The card is BasicBblack for the base, Gable Green was matted on top and embossed using the Swiss dots cuttlebug folder. Swiss dots is my favorite cuttlebug folder. A piece of Basic Black matted the Pink & Lime Argyle designer paper by The Paper Studio purchased at Hobby Lobby. I then matted a piece of sponged Pixie Pink onto Basic Black cardstock and used 3 black brads on the left. For the prima flower I used some bling for the center. I hope you enjoy! Thanks for looking.

Heartfelt Thanks

I have found that being a military wife and living overseas in Germany there are some very special women who are always willing to help eachother out. I posted on the germany military wives yahoo group two weeks ago about needing a king size bed frame. When we ordered our new kind bed but forget about the frame we knew we'd need one. The wait to get one on base was like 4 weeks long and I kinda wanted one for my new bed now. Many ladies made many suggestions but Julia someone I've never even met emailed me personally and said hey we're going to Mannheim to get one I can pick one up for you. She genersously paid it and picked it up. This morning my husband is going over to pick it up and pay her for it. I am so grateful to her for helping me out. It's people like this that make living in Germany really great. Thank you Julia!

Mojo Monday

I really like the card challenges over on the Poetic Artistry blog. This is challenge number 31. She always has such nice sketches and card samples! I decided to use some paper I bought a while back from Eclectic Paperie. I unfortunately don't know who it's by. I used Rose Red as the card base and matted the designer paper to it. I used the Swiss Dots folder Old Olive & Rose Red pieces of cardstock. I stamped the flower from Bud Basics in Rose Red then I cut it out to give it some dimension. A vintage brad was inserted in middle of a brown prima flower and finally through the cut out flower. It was matted on a scallop circle.

Birthday flowers

I love this color combination! I wish I had Basic Grey by Stampin' Up! but I didn't so I used Basic Black instead. Although last night I did place a order for the basic grey ink pad, and paper! Can't wait to get it. This was a color challenge over at SCS. I used the Paisley cuttlebug folder on basic black. I used the stamp set Women of Life by Papertrey ink using black Stazon ink. I really don't like the way the picture makes the ink look like I didn't stamp it clearly because it did. Not sure why it looks kinda blotchy. I then stamped the middle of the flower in bashful blue and used stickles for the middle of 4 flower buds. I wanted to put ribbon but didn't know where to put it so I tied little bows in the bigger two flower buds with the black gingham ribbon. I matted that image on bashful blue cardstock. To give it one last element I put a bashful blue square rhinestone in the bottom right hand corner.