A Sketch and a Dog

Greetings and Salutations! :) I can't seem to stop playing with Pat the Dog - he's cute and fun - and I love adding some texture to him!!!

Sometimes when I stamp, I can sit down and play with papers and come up with a layout. But I LOVE to have a sketch to work off of - I find it very inspiring. Occasionally it may lead to something else altogether. Today I decided to play along with the Splitcoast Sketch Challenge (SC236). I decided to use Pat the Dog (by Our Craft Lounge) as the main image. So what better to use for patterned papers than dog themed papers? I dug out my Die Cuts With a View pad and it was fun and easy from there.

For my main image, I cut it out using my Nestabilities. I colored Pat in with my Copic markers - and added some FLUFF with my Coffee Bean Brown Sparkly Fluff. I just love the sparkle that it has - and the fun fluffy texture it gives my project. I popped my main image up on dimensional foam tape.

Hope you have some time to stamp today!

Who's Your Doggie?

Happy Friday! It is weekend FUN time! :) LONG weekend fun time! Happy 4th weekend fun time! Are you going to see any fireworks displays? I have always loved fireworks. It is a great family event. We always pack up some snacks in the cooler (grapes, watermelon, drinks) and head out to enjoy the evening.

Today I've got a cute and sparkly card for you. The stamp set I used is Pat the Dog by Our Craft Lounge. Pat is super cute and fun to color! I cut him out using my Nestabilities - oh how cool they are!

So how did I make Pat even more special? I colored him in using my Copics - and then added some Coffee Bean Sparkly Fluff to Pat's dark brown patches. Then I added some Chunky Crystal Crafty Sparkles to the heart for some added bling - and I loved the result!!

For the pink background paper, I ran the Pretty In Pink cardstock through the Cuttlebug with the Heart Blocks embossing folder and then sprayed it with some Gold Glimmer Mist. Add some ribbon and a bunch of brads all in a row - and I was happy!

On the inside, I stamped the row of paw prints and the sentiment "Who's Your Doggie?" - so fun!

I hope you have a WONDERFUL day and Happy Fourth!!!

*Heather*

Bookworms for the Class

It's Sweet Sunday!! Here's hoping that you get to have a nice relaxing and fun day with family and/or friends. That's my plan today.

So school's out - and we have had a week off so far. Well hmm - I guess it's about time I post my end of school projects, huh? LOL

I have a bunch of pictures to share - so I'll keep this short and sweet. I had fun making gifts for the teachers, other school staff, and a bookmark for each kiddo in my son's class. The first picture is of the gifts I made for Tyler's teacher. I also included some chocolate- HAVE to give something tasty!

Then a close-up of the tin. The tin was approximately 3"x3". I put a bunch of 1.5"x2" post-it notes inside. Can't have enough of those. Isn't this apple and worm ADORABLE?!?! It is from the stamp set Bookworm by Our Craft Lounge. ACK - I was so excited to make this ensemble using this set!

I made some of Val's desktop notecard holders - OMW - they are SO CUTE and SO EASY to make - thanks to Val's brilliant mind and fantastic tutorial. THANK YOU VAL FROM CAL!

I love having bags around in the house in case I need to put a gift together. These bags were PERFECT! I just stamped up a couple of apples (Stampin' Up! image) and voila - the bags were adorable!

Here are the little tags I made for each bag. Using Nestabilities, I put a simple tag together (white version on the back so I could write the "to" and "from" information). Added a little bit of star bling and I was happy!

And last but certainly not least, the bookmarks. The stamp set Bookworm is PERFECT for any school gifts you might want to make. As soon as I saw the set, I knew that I would be making bookmarks for all of Tyler's classmates (and the teachers) at the end of the year. I loved making them - put each kid's name on the bottom of their bookmark, and laminated them.

Hope your day is AWESOME!

Some grad fun

Happy FRIDAY!!!!! I can't believe that it is the end of another week and almost the end of JUNE! Where is the time going? In Massachusetts, we have NOT had summer yet. The entire month of June was overcast and rainy - which is very unusual. The weather reporter said that we haven't had a single day of full sun. So here's hoping that July brings some sun our way!

Speaking of the ending of June - school ended! My son's last day of 1st grade was only on June 19th. And there were plenty of graduations. So today, I have 2 graduation cards that I had made to show you.

First was a simple and fun card - and I used it in a class I taught. I love using one color with black. The color just pops! So here I used Tempting Turquoise (by Stampin' Up!). I used the stamp set School's Out by Our Craft Lounge. To add some texture and interest, I used my Swiss Dots Cuttlebug embossing folder on the top portion of the turquoise layer. Do you have that folder? IF NOT - RUUUUN TO ECLECTIC PAPERIE AND GET IT - you'll NEVER regret that purchase! :) To add a little dimension to the diploma, I glued on a bauble. Using some liquid glue (instead of a glue dot) really popped the color through the bauble.

The second project I have to share is a graduation gift card holder. Again I decided to go with one color and the black. Oooh - I love using red and black together! I got this idea from my friend Pine - she posted her gift card holder here. You can also see more information and a link to a tutorial here.

Once again, I used the stamp set School's Out by Our Craft Lounge. I stamped the mortar board on the red cardstock in Versamark so that I would have a subtle background. For the main image on the front, I stamped the mortar board once on the white circle and a second time on a scrap piece of white and cut out the top part to pop it off. I poked some holes and used some black hemp for the tassel - and then added some Rockstar Red Crafty Sparkles by Our Craft Lounge - ooooh how I love adding some GLITTAH! Add the sentiment and some brads - and VOILA - a card and a gift card holder for that special grad in your life.

This stamp set is AWESOME for some quick and fun cards - but also PERFECT for scrapbooking! The stamps create crisp images - and quickly!

I hope you have a great day and a wonderful weekend!

Tide Pool Play

Happy Thursday! Today is the second to last day of school for my son Tyler. He really likes school - but is also looking forward to summer vacation. You know - playing with his friends, playing outside, staying up late, and going to the beach. Speaking of the beach . . .

Tyler's class and another class participated in a play this week. It was called the Tide Pool Play. As part of their science curriculum (1st grade), they learned all about tide pools and all the "creatures" you find in them. They performed the most DARLING play - each child had their own part, describing their sea animal and many songs were sung. I was laughing so hard at times that I was crying - IT WAS SO CUTE! Tyler doesn't really love being the center of attention - so I half expected him to be super nervous. He did FANTASTIC! He learned his lines very early on - he was articulate and confident. Boy, was I a proud Mom!

So here he is - Tyler, my little Moon Snail! :)

Now - when one goes to the theater and knows one of the performers, it is often customary to bring flowers. However, I knew Tyler wouldn't really be too excited about that, being a 6 year old boy and all. LOL So what is the next best thing? A "plant" full of CANDY!!! So I got a small paint can out of my stash, covered it in some paper that I had that was the image of water. I printed out a photo (the quality is poor, so I'll have to replace it at some point) of him when we had gone to the beach recently, and decorated it with some shells we had collected at the beach. I soaked the shells in bleach and then water - then let them dry so that they wouldn't smell. Attached the candy bars to some thin wood dowels and stuck them into the foam that I had put in the paint can - and VOILA! He was ECSTATIC!

And one last photo of the beach we went to. This beach is called Corporation Beach - located in East Dennis, MA - Cape Cod. It was GORGEOUS! We had an absolute blast - and will definitely be heading back there this summer.

Hope you have a beautiful day.

Flyin' Again

Happy Wednesday! It's hump day - the week is half over - and the weekend is coming up! :) This Friday is my son's last day of school - so summer vacation is around the corner. He's excited - and we are busy working on what our plans will be.

I wanted to participate in one of the challenges on SCS. I have always loved looking at them - but I tend to be a lurker. Participating was SO MUCH FUN!! And it made creating really easy! So this past Sunday, I did the Featured Stamper challenge. This week the Featured Stamper was Sumtoy - and boy does she have a fun gallery! She is also the Aunt of one of my fab friends, Cami!

This card is the one I chose to CASE. It is so much easier for me to stamp more feminine cards - but I have 2 boys - so sometimes I need to do the more masculine stuff. I knew JUST the stamps to use - Flyin' Birthday by Our Craft Lounge. It was a pretty easy card to make - just a little bit of cutting and VOILA - a card for a birthday boy!

I had tons of fun doing this challenge - and think that it will be something I do much more often in the future.

Hope you have a happy day!

Thanks Coach!

Hi there! As you probably know from a previous post, my son Tyler plays baseball. He recently played his last game for "The Angels" for the season. So I thought I would make a card for the Coach (hey - better late than never - LOL). His coach is a great guy - and deserves some acknowledgement - especially for dealing with a group of wild 6 and 7 year old boys - and volunteering to do it!!!

So I went to my stamp set Game On by Our Craft Lounge. It is perfect for both card making and scrapbooking. I just LOVE the star in the sentiment "You're A Super Star". So I decided to use that for my card. Now what? Hmmm - I need a layout. So off to Card Positioning Systems to see if something spoke to me. And BAM - there it was - CPS#20. It even had a STAR in the sketch!!! Perfection! (yes - little things make me very very happy)

For the main image using the sentiment, I used a star brad inside the star - an idea I got from my friend Kendra, who used a star brad in the middle of a star on one of her projects. And then I punched out my embellishment star with my SU! star punch. What card is complete without SPARKLE???? So I used my Lemon Drop Crafty Sparkles and blinged the star up! Oooh yeah - that's what I'm talkin' about!

Oh - and once again I made my own background - on the grey I stamped "Go Team Go" repeatedly. I love that - being able to create something to match with stamps!

Hope you have a great day!