brrrrr...

It's snowing in MN today and what is better than curling up in front of the window and keeping warm by putting rubber and ink to paper? lol

Being that it's a tich chilly, I reached for Fueled by Caffeine (Our Craft Lounge). A hot cup of coffee with a little French vanilla cream sounds sooo good about now, but first the card.

The coffee pot and cup are stamped in Burnt Umber (Palette) and colored with Copic markers to match the paper (Pebbles Inc). I needed a tray for them to set on, but didn't have a stamp that would work. So, I improvised. I used a small oval stamp, but just ran the brown ink around the edge. I masked the coffee pot, stamped the tray and colored it in.

The paper doesn't have any turquoise in it, but I wanted a third color, so I colored the little spaces in between the pattern with a marker. I also highlighted each cream "flower" with a darker shade of yellow. I love *enhancing* to match the colors I'm using!

I hope you're keeping warm today!
HB

Hey Ghoulfriend!

This was a stress-release creation! You see, coloring and cutting are two of my favorite things to do when life gets the better of me. So, I colored this cute little witch from Spook-tacular (Our Craft Lounge) and then sloooowly and carefully cut her out. Not all the stress was gone, but a big chunk was by the time I was done! LOL

She's attached with foam tape to white cardstock that I cut with a Labels One die and airbrushed with YG91 (Putty). Notice that little orange star all sparkly up in the corner? It started as a clear, orange button, but didn't *pop*, so I covered it in glue and sprinkled on the Real Juicy Orange Sparkly Fluff. I love that stuff!

Hope you're staying stress free, and if not... try coloring and/or cutting something up!
HB

A Fall Thank-You

A quick little post today, using Beate's 100th sketch challenge. It's such a fun and easy layout!


The center image, Pumpkin Birdhouse (Plum Purdy Designs), is one of my new favorites to color with Copic markers. The sentiment is Hero Arts and the papers are October Afternoon.

Thanks for visiting!
HB

WCMD - Trip to Mexico

My card yesterday took us to Japan for Nichole Heady's WCMD challenge. Today, we are heading to Mexico.

I love the look of Mexican tiles. They are so vibrate and colorful! I used one of the medallion's from Simple Little Things (Papertrey Ink anniversary set) and colored each with Copic markers to match the *tiles* of cardstock I had cut.

The center tile is the sentiment "estoy feliz que somos amigos" which translates to "I'm happy we are friends".

There's a funny story behind why I have a Spanish sentiment set. Our granddaughter, Grace, was in a Spanish immersion kindergarten class last year. SU! has Spanish sets and I thought it would be fun to send her a card using them once in a while. However, once I got the set I didn't know what any of the sentiments said. I had to ask her to ask her teacher if she would translate each stamp for me. LOL.

So, there you go... a little trip to Mexico on a Monday.
HB

WCMD!

What a FUN day yesterday was! I was able to sit at my table and play the day away!

The first challenge I did was the Nichole Heady's challenge. I was intrigued by her "trip around the world". Talk about a challenge!

This card is Japanese inspired. I used Out on a Limb for my blossom tree, stamping the blossoms with Fresh Snow ink (PTI) and then embossing with white EP. I used a pink (R30) Copic maker for the center.

When I googled Japanese art, I found a site that showed pictures Japanese birds. I stamped the little bird from Bird Watching in a light blue to represent a Blue Rock Thrush.

I finished it off with a sheer pink ribbon and a tag with a little blossom stamped in pink and Life stamped in red.

A simple layout, just using pink and red cardstock. (and look... not a piece of pattern paper in sight! lol).

I'm hoping to finish up the rest of my challenges tomorrow. Today was cooking day (a stockpot of soup and a yummy pork roast for meals this week)!

Thanks for stopping by!
HB

October? Already?

Where o' where did October come from? YIKES! I am soooo not ready!
Next think I know someone is gonna post how many days left until Christmas. I'm gonna plug my ears.

So, to combat this early arrival of October, I took today off and decided to see if I can get the creative side of my brain to start working again. lol And, since it is October, I broke open my new BOO TO YOU set from Papertrey.

Since this set was designed by Pine, I just had to use Kraft as my cardstock. :o)

This card is a simple little 4x4. I used a dark purple cardstock as a mat, and stamped the stars in Vintage Cream. The bat and sentiment are stamped using Black Soot (Distress Ink). A purple "moon" for the bat to fly in front of finished it off.

I used a page from the Eerie paper pad (Basic Grey) for the background on the next card. Don't you love those trees!?! The ghost is stamped on Kraft with Vintage Cream and then I trimmed part of the cardstock so the sentiment part wasn't so wide. I wanted more of the trees to show.
The ghost/sentiment strip is layered with purple cardstock that I punched with an EK Success border punch.

This last card is my fav of the bunch. After I trimmed the tree paper for the card above, I had a strip left that had one lone tree on it. I just couldn't throw that lone tree away! I trimmed the tree out and after stamping a couple of the pumpkins on Kraft, I glued on the tree. One more pumpkin is stamped, cut out and attached with chipboard to raise it up a tich. The strip of pattern paper from the same paper pad is attached to the base card before I put the tree panel on.

I stamped the pumpkin again in orange and cut it out for the moon. I covered it with Rock Candy Distress Crackle Paint and OMGosh, it is just the coolest effect! If you click on this pic you should be able to see a closer view, and see the *crackle* I love this stuff!

The bat is stamped in Black Soot, cut out and attached in the corner. I added a few stars in Antique Linen.

It's World Cardmaking Day this weekend and there are challenges galore out in the universe! I am hoping to take on a couple of them! How about you?

HB

Something new!

A couple weeks ago, my friend Bevie sent me the link to THIS site; a company called Plum Purdy. O...MY...GOSH! The memories came flooding back of the time I was a wood crafter! Yup, pre ink & rubber, me and my skillsaw were the best of friends. I used to buy patterns from this company and make wonderful wood creations as gifts for my family and friends.

So now they are taking some of their fabulous designs and making them into STAMPS! Yipppeee! I placed an order right away for the Pumpkin Birdhouse. I just bought one... needing to make sure it was all I was hoping it to be in terms of quality. I was not disappointed!

Here is my first creation. I used the SCS sketch challenge (SC246) from last week and fall papers from SEI.

I used Copic markers to color the image. I wanted the birdhouse to have a *weathered* look, so I used colors that you wouldn't typically blend together; B12, YG91, B34, B72 and E31 (Marianne from Copic would either cringe or cheer to read that combo! lol)

The leaves and stem are colored in YG91, YG93 and touch of R39 and an over-shadow of E31. I like the effect E31 gives as a final color. Kinda dulls everything out.

The pumpkin is shades of orange; YR04, YR15 and YR18.

The bird is stamped a 2nd time on scratch cardstock, cut out and attached with foam tape.

I finished the image by shading B0000 around the image and a little E31 on the *ground*. Here is a closer look.

I will SO be ordering more of these stamps and hope they come out with a full line of their adorable snowmen!

Don't you just LOVE discovering new things! Thanks Bevie!!

HB