Grateful Greetings

Afternoon, y'all!  Well, since I was last here, I got Ryan to school (he left his backpack at home so we had to come back and get it, but he got into school on time just by the skin of his teeth) and then I took a long nap to make up for last night's insomnia.  The only good part about insomnia is that I got to read for a couple of hours while the house was all quiet since everyone ELSE was asleep.

Anyway, I have another card to share today and here it is:

I have to say, when I first saw the Hand-Stamped Sentiments sketch, I had planned to skip it because I didn't really want to futz with all the layers, but when I actually got in my craft room my brain insisted on making it anyway : )  Here's the sketch:

The easy part was pairing it with the Color Dare Challenge:

Those colors together instantly made me think of the long, long, long-retired Fall Flowers DSP, and that chose my third color for me (and a neutral) because the paper has Really Rust, Old Olive, Soft Sky, and Crumb Cake.  Once I chose patterns for the background bits, this came together really quickly.  There is a Bigz die for the leaves, but since you can't see where you're cutting it (as the name implies, it's a big fat die, not one of the wafer-thin ones you can see through), I almost never use it and just fussy cut the leaves.  Wonderfall is another longtime favorite leaf set and Grateful Greetings popped into my head for a sentiment, and happily there was one that fit perfectly in the sketch.

Okay, Daphne is staring me down because I didn't take her for a walk this morning, so I had better fix that oversight before she takes matters into her own paws.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wonderfall. Grateful Greetings
Ink:  Really Rust, Soft Sky, Old Olive
Paper:  Really Rust, Thick Basic White, Fall Flowers DSP
Accessories:  Dimensionals, Enamel Dot Essentials

Dropping By

Mornin' y'all and happy Friday!  And guess what...today's card is NOT a pumpkin, haha!  But it's still fall-related.

I was inspired to ink up Acorny Thank You by the new Inspired By... challenge:

And I revisited this week's Freshly Made Sketch too:

This time I kept the sketch in its original orientation.  And I couldn't resist the pie-licious color challenge from Hand Stamped Sentiments!

I almost forgot about that one, that's what I get for having my challenge notes on my desk upstairs.  Anyway, I added some Early Espresso to the challenge colors because I thought they needed a darker neutral to anchor them together.

Anyway, it's about time to get Ryan ready for school and then I have a bunch of errands to run.  Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Acorny Thank You, Wonderfall
Ink:  Pecan Pie, Early Espresso, Pumpkin Pie, VersaMark
Paper:  Thick Basic White, Early Espresso, Peach Pie DSP
Accessories:  Acorn punch, white EP, Dimensionals, In Color Shimmer Gems

Challenge Redux

Okay, most of the time I don't go back and re-do challenges because there's so many out there and I want to play along in most of them, but I had such a good time making my Silver Fox card that I just had to have another go at those two challenges.  So here it is:

I pulled out some retired stamps for this one.  First up is the Inkspirational mood board:

And then the Cupcake Inspirations challenge:

The combination of orange and deep pink plus the idea of plaid made me think of the Plaid Tidings stack so I just had to do another card with it.  I loved that paper so much I bought an extra stack, I do love me a good plaid!  I stamped two large leaves from Wonderfall and cut them out, and then found a wee sentiment from the very, very old All Year Cheer I and there's another card done.

Okay, I'm off to wash Ryan's taekwondo uniform, he managed to get Taco Bell all over himself on Tuesday and you know what doesn't come out of WHITE pants?  Wish me luck.  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU! (some retired)
Stamps:  Wonderfall, All Year Cheer I
Ink:  Mango Melody, Melon Mambo, Rich Razzleberry
Paper:  Seaside Spray, Rich Razzleberry, Thick Basic White, Plaid Tidings DSP
Accessories:  Deckled Rectangles dies, Dimensionals, Milky Dots

Leaf Peeping, Part 2

Scrappy Monday!  Okay, wow, I've been absent from here for much longer than I intended or wanted to.  We had my parents here and Thanksgiving and the hubs caught a nasty cold and Ryan had a fever for two days and now I suspect I'm coming down with the cold too.  Urgh.

In the meantime, I have the second set of leafy layouts from our trip to New England in 2016 when I was expecting Ryan (see part 1 here).

Fall is my favorite season.  We had to get up early this morning to get Ryan to a dental appointment, and the doors on my car were all frozen shut.  Just like that, fall is over here--now we're starting in on winter weather!  I'll miss the beautiful fall colors, and the temps that are cool enough that it's nice to curl up under a blanket with some hot tea but not so cold that you feel miserable.

We really liked the lattice on that last bridge we looked at, it was so fun to photograph.  And last up is a selfie with my online friend the axe murderer (long story, she's not really a murderer) and our respective hubbies.

Today's color palette is the same as last time:  Cajun Craze, Lucky Limeade, More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Early Espresso, and Very Vanilla.

I *may* have just bought myself some new stamps for Cyber Monday (spoiler alert:  I totally did) and I still have a big pile of stamps already in my craft room that I haven't played with yet, so I'm going to dust off the table in my craft room as soon as I finish my pumpkin pie lunch.  What.  I made a TON of pies for Thanksgiving and most of them are still in my fridge...

Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Calendar Alphabet, Wonderfall
Ink:  Cajun Craze, Lucky Limeade, More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Early Espresso
Paper:  Cajun Craze, Lucky Limeade, More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  None

Leaf Peeping, Part 1

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  We had a nice weekend here with some really beautiful weather yesterday, so we went out for a family bike ride which unfortunately ended with a crash for Ryan.  No major injuries but it did make us go back home and feed Ryan popsicles because he hit his mouth pretty good.  Glad he was wearing a helmet!

Anyway, today I have a couple of layouts to share that I just LOVE.  We've got the pretty fall colors happening here in Germany right now and they're also happening all over this layout.

This was from our trip up to New England in 2016, when I was pregnant with Ryan.  These pics are from a state park in Massachusetts and we took so many pictures that I loved that I had to do several layouts.

I love the long-retired Orchard Harvest DSP which is good because I bought several packs of it when it went on the clearance rack.  I stuck to the color palette from the DSP for all my layouts (this is just part 1, more coming next Monday) and just changed around which of the patterns I used.  I used Wonderfall for the leaf accents, which is a fabulous leaf stamp set.  There's a coordinating die for it, but this was back in the day before there were the wafer-thin dies for everything that you can see exactly where it's cutting; the die is a big solid block which means it's impossible to cut out stamped images accurately, and it's a PAIN to stamp on already-cut images so I fussy-cut all the leaves on my pages.  Worth it!

There's the Orchard Harvest palette:  Cajun Craze, Lucky Limeade, More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Early Espresso, and Very Vanilla.  I miss Island Indigo.

Cheers, y'all!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Calendar Alphabet, Wonderfall
Ink:  Cajun Craze, Lucky Limeade, More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Early Espresso
Paper:  Cajun Craze, Lucky Limeade, More Mustard, Raspberry Ripple, Island Indigo, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  None

Baby Luke: November

Hey hey!  Here we are in the second half of May and it's still cool enough outside that we're all in long pants and jackets.  I'm ready for it to warm up just a little bit.  Of course, after it gets hot this summer I'll be dreaming of cooler temperatures!

Anyway, a new baby book layout for today.

When I did the Acorny Thank You Friday Flashback post, I'd forgotten that I had used it on this layout too.  I love making the acorns with different colors and patterns.  Wonderfall is a favorite leaf set, too--it has a matching die, but this was before wafer dies were really a thing so it's a Bigz die which means you can't see exactly where it's cutting.  So you have to cut the paper first, then stamp on the die cut shapes...to be honest usually I just fussy cut the things, it's easier to me.  I love these leaves so I'm willing to put up with it :)

I got up before the hubs and the kid this morning so I spent a bit of extra time in my craft room and made ELEVEN cards for future Friday Flashback posts.  I won't get to do any paper crafting this week so I had to snatch the time while I could!

Have a great weekend, y'all.

Supplies:
Stamps:  Wonderfall, Acorny Thank You
Ink:  Raspberry Ripple, More Mustard, Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade
Paper:  Soft Suede, Raspberry Ripple, More Mustard, Very Vanilla, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  Sizzix letters, Acorn punch, Nestabilities circle die

Ryan: November

Trucking right along with the baby book layouts, and here we are up to November!

I scrapped all of 2017 chronologically (unusual for me, the perennial skip-arounder) and I did a few Thanksgiving layouts for our regular scrapbook albums using Wonderfall for the stamped accents as well, though completely different colors.  One benefit of skipping around is I can use the same stamp sets multiple times and not have several layouts in a row that all look alike ;) Anyway, I've got some cute pics of Ryan on here and one very silly one of the hubs which I am just so glad I managed to include on here.  People around me should know, if you make a silly face and I catch a picture of it, it's going either on my blog or in my scrapbooks.

Today's color palette includes Baja Breeze (perhaps my all-time favorite SU! color), Not Quite Navy, Garden Green, and More Mustard.  And a bit of Soft Suede which I didn't put in the palette picture.  Baja Breeze might be an unusual choice for a fall color palette, but I liked it.

Peace out, peeps!

Supplies, all SU!!
Stamps:  Letters for You, Wonderfall
Ink:  Not Quite Navy, More Mustard, Garden Green, Soft Suede
Paper:  Baja Breeze, Garden Green, Thick Whisper White, Autumn Vines DSP
Accessories:  none

Happy Thanksgiving 2017

Scrappy Monday, y'all!  How was your weekend?  I've made more progress on my future nephew's baby book, so that makes me happy.  I haven't heard Ryan make any noise yet this morning, so maybe I can sneak in my craft room for a few minutes and work on the next layout!

But for now, how about a couple of Thanksgiving layouts?

These pictures are from Thanksgiving in 2017, Ryan's first.  We were living in Virginia at the time; Bennet and Missy lived about 1 1/2 miles away, and Scott and Tiana drove down from New York to spend the holiday with us.  I think this was the first year we instituted the pajamas rule for Thanksgiving.  I don't know if we get to do that this time since we're going elsewhere for Turkey Day, but anytime Thanksgiving is at my house, pajama pants are the dress code.

That apple pie was hands down the PRETTIEST pie I've ever made.  I used a little cookie cutter thing (actually I think it was specifically made for pie crust but works the same as a cookie cutter) to cut out leaf shapes and then piled them on top of the pie.  It was a cranberry apple almond pie and sooooo delicious.

So here is today's color palette:  Peekaboo Peach, Cherry Cobbler, Granny Apple Green, Bermuda Bay, Gray Granite, Basic Black, and Whisper White.

Dangit, Ryan is awake now so no stamping time until he goes down for a nap this afternoon.  Oh well, time to get with it!  Cheers!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Taffy Alphabet, Well Said, Wonderfall, My Paper Pumpkin (the pie sentiment, love it!)
Ink:  Bermuda Bay, Granny Apple Green, Cherry Cobbler, Peach Parfait, Memento Tuxedo Black, Basic Black marker
Paper:  Peach Parfait, Cherry Cobbler, Bermuda Bay, Granny Apple Green, Basic Black, Thick Whisper White, Festive Farmhouse DSP
Accessories:  Layering Circles Framelits

Thinking of You...Twice

All the Christmas decorations might be up in the malls, and Christmas music playing on the radio, but I'm still in fall mode, dangit, so I'm going to keep on with my leafy creations at least until Thanksgiving.  : p  So today I have not one, but two leaf cards.

For this one, I used the sketch from Create with Connie and Mary:

I started with the maple leaf but it didn't fit, so then I switched to the oak leaf and the lower left corner seemed too bare so I added the acorn and now it feels a little too heavy in that corner so I just can't win.  I think I just need that acorn stamp to be like 30% smaller.

Anyway, since I already had a perfectly good maple leaf stamped and die cut, I made a second card:

This one uses the latest challenge from CAS(E) This Sketch:

And it took me about two minutes to put this card together.  If you don't recognize the sentiment, it's from the Everyday Occasions card kit, which I bought because I looooove the stamps and I haven't put together any of the kit cards yet (to be fair, I've had it less than a week and I continue to be scrapbook-obsessed).

Anyway, the color combo for both cards is courtesy of the color challenge at Pals Paper Arts:

Thanks for stopping by today!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wonderfall, Occasions
Ink:  Crushed Curry, Rich Razzleberry, Chocolate Chip
Paper:  Crumb Cake, Chocolate Chip, Whisper White, Sycamore Street DSP (retired), Eastern Elegance DSP
Accessories:  Autumn Accents Bigz Die which I still wish was Framelits but what can you do, corner rounder punch, Dimensionals

Wonderfall Thanks

I've been doing mostly scrapbook pages of late, but I do have quite a few cards I haven't posted yet and I figured I'd better hurry up and get to some of the autumn ones before Thanksgiving gets here.

Once again, this was a combo SCS sketch and color challenge card.  Thanks for stopping by, have a great day!

Supplies, all SU!
Stamps:  Wonderfall, Seasonal Sayings
Ink:  Cajun Craze
Paper:  Cajun Craze, Soft Sky, Night of Navy, Very Vanilla, Sweater Weather DSP
Accessories:  Autumn Accents Bigz Die, retired Regals buttons, linen thread, Woodgrain EF, Dimensionals

Friday Flashback: Falling Leaves

Happy Friday, ready to Flashback?  This week's stamp set is Falling Leaves, which I love :)  So let's get to it!

You'll see that I love to line up the leaves in this stamp set.  This was for my brother's birthday a few years ago (he was born in November).  I also used French Filigree and the sentiment is from All Holidays.

Here's a card that matches one of the kokeshi dolls in my collection :)  Sentiment is from the eponymous Grateful Greetings.

Here's a baby book layout which also features Wonderfall.

And another baby book layout.  I do believe that Autumn Traditions DSP is the *only* DSP that Stampin' Up! has ever had with Elegant Eggplant in it (aside from the monochromatic stuff that comes in every color).  It's a shame too because I love Elegant Eggplant.  I think I (and lots of other people too probably) would use it more often if it was in more DSP.

Here's a little CAS card; sentiment is from the Bright Blessings wheel that I cut up into a bunch of little stamps.

So that's it for the past projects, here's the new card:

Yep, I lined up those leaves again!  Though this time I think they're a little crooked, I was kinda in a hurry.  This is based on some old SCS sketch and color challenges; the sketch turned out much better than I thought it would (though it's still a bit overcomplicated for my taste) and I love the colors together.  Again, I used the Autumn Traditions DSP though even in that there's not a print that features Elegant Eggplant as the dominant color.  That Riding Hood Red print and the acorn print are two sides of a single sheet of paper.

That's it for today, hope you enjoyed this Friday Flashback!

Supplies, last card only:
Stamps:  Falling Leaves, Express Yourself
Ink:  Riding Hood Red, Elegant Eggplant, Soft Suede
Paper:  Soft Suede, Elegant Eggplant, Very Vanilla, Autumn Traditions DSP (retired)
Accessories:  Corner rounder punch, Elegant Eggplant brad (I'm using up some old brads instead of using the new Candy Dots)
Stamps:  Falling Leaves

Olivia's Baby Book

Not too long after I started stamping, I got the idea to make baby books for a couple of friends of mine for their baby showers.  Since then, I've done ten, and I've got one more that's 80% finished (I just need to find out if the baby's a boy or a girl).  I do one layout for each month of the year, plus layouts for the baby's birth and first birthday.  Add in the first and last pages, and each book is 30 pages.  They take me at least a couple of months to do, so I don't do them for very many people.  And I won't sell them either, because honestly, no one would pay what I would want to charge for them given how much time they take, never mind the cost of supplies.

So here's the one I just finished up for my SIL and her new daughter, Olivia.  If you want a complete supply list, check out my SCS gallery here.  Jill is doing the nursery in what my mom calls Strawberry Shortcake colors--pink, hot pink, and lime green, so that's what I started with.  The die cut alphabet I used is by Sizzix and I've had it since I graduated from college and it's long retired :)  Click on any of the pictures to see it bigger.

 Stamps:  Mixed Bunch, Papillon Potpourri

Stamps:  Baby Prints

Stamps:  Make a Mitten (retired), Snow Swirled

Stamps:  Artistic Etchings, Carte Postale (retired), En Francais

Stamps:  Celtic Knots (retired), Tag Time (retired)

Stamps:  Announcements (retired)...I did this one several months ago, had I known Rain or Shine was coming out I woulda waited so I could have used that!

Stamps:  Tea Shoppe...I thought a mother-daughter tea party theme would be cute?

Stamps:  By the Seashore

Stamps:  Land That I Love (retired)

 Stamps:  Bronc Buster (retired), Wanted (retired)...Olivia was born in Texas, she needed a cowgirl layout :)

Stamps:  Fruit & Flowers, One Smart Cookie

Stamps:  Googly Ghouls (retired)

Stamps:  Wonderfall, Falling Leaves (retired)

Stamps:  Reindeer Print

Stamps:  Crazy for Cupcakes (retired), coordinating cupcake wheel (retired)

So excited this one is done!  I've even made a card to go with it, so now I just need to get it in the mail.  Thanks for stopping by!

Wonderfall Thanksgiving

I am somewhat amazed that I got a card made today at all, it's been a rough evening.  If I were a wine drinker, tonight would definitely be the night for it.  But I did get this card made today.

The sentiment is a little bit crooked, even though I used a SAMJ.  I'm just that special.  But this card will be going to a guy, and 99.999% of the guys I know wouldn't notice a crooked sentiment.  The only ribbon I have in any of these colors is some retired More Mustard grosgrain, and that stuff is hard to tie so no wonder it's retired.  Well, I have some Midnight Muse ribbon, but this needed some Mustard on that side of the card.  I'm wondering if maybe I should have make the Crumb Cake the left-most layer and done the Midnight Muse in the middle, hmm.

This is for two challenges, Fab Friday #6...

I had a tough time working the Crumb Cake in there, I think I like three colors for cards.  I slightly adapted Retro Sketch #37...

I made it a regular size card instead of square and did torn edges instead of scallops as depicted in the sketch, but still pretty darned faithful to it.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Supplies (all SU):
Stamps:  Wonderfall, Teeny Tiny Wishes
Ink:  Cajun Craze, Midnight Muse
Paper:  Cajun Craze, Midnight Muse, Crumb Cake, Very Vanilla, Orchard Harvest DSP
Accessories:  Autumn Accents Bigz die, corner rounder punch, More Mustard grosgrain (retired)