Love when challenges can motivate me to create my holiday cards and try out my new stamps. In this case, I’m in Halloween mode and wanted to use my Newton’s Nook Batty Newton stamp set which seemed perfect (to me) to use in The Paper Players Clean and Simple Challenge and to include pets. My ink blended circle was supposed to me a “spooky” moon however I think it turned more into a far mysterious planet for Batty Kitty to be flying around. After erasing a inky smudge off my focal panel, I found one more and decided to cover that one up with a bat stamps. Then I adhered the same panel to the card base the wrong direction!! Thankfully it pulled off without creasing or tearing. Besides this card being entered into the challenge it’s also in memory of my PennyLane. Boy we still do miss him and our morning wake up call with his paws in my face.

Thanks for looking!

Next week Fall begins and the weather today in Pennsylvania again today was glorious. It was a little chilly for our grandson’s 9 am baseball game. I love beginning my Halloween cards with my favorite monster Frankenstein!! My stamps are all from Prickley Pear and the cloudy skies background are using a Simon Says Stamp stencil and some Distress Ink. I will find my favorite Bonnie cloud stencil but was anxious to begin my card. LOL…yes my desk is a mess again 🙂

This card will be entered into the Double D Challenges: Don’t Fence Me In in which we were required to include a fence. One Prickley Pear fence stamped behind Frankie. The cardstock is GKD’s Wild Lilac but the auto adjust deepened the color.

Thanks for looking and have a great weekend!

Hello! Stamp Buddy Johanna shared a video of a Radio Flyer car recently and it made me think of my latest find from Spellbinders Sunday Drive die set. There are add ons to this original set which I have yet to find but it was fun to build my own car. This card will be entered into the Dies R Us Challenge #153 – One For the Boys. With a little bit of background ink sponging, patterned paper and a little splatter of Nuvo Shimmer Powder, the hardest part was assembling the car. The trunk “birthday” section lifts up and that’s where I placed a package. Happy with the turnout of this card.

I thought was finished sending out my Back To School cards when the Dies R Us Challenge # 152 was posted with that theme and to include a metal die. This card is for a girlfriend who has taken on the almost impossible task of learn at home schooling for 3 grandchildren in grades 1 and 2. Of course if that isn’t enough to handle she also babysits for her other grandchildren….an infant and 1 year old. Whew!!

I decided to do rainbow stripes and die cut the letters from Concord & 9th’s Double-Cut Alphabet Dies. The apple (for the teacher) and die is a love Nicole stamp set. Finished the card off with some wink of stella to put a lot of sparkle on this card for Ms. Grammy.

One more back to school card designed with the IT’s the Thought That Counts (Sentiment as the Focal Point) challenge at The Sisterhood of Crafters challenge. Keeping this one simple, I stamped some crayons from the Teachers Clear stamp set from TPC Studio in colored ink and then highlighted each crayon in the same color surrounding the Concord & 9th’s Double Cut Alphabet dies using only the base letter.

Good luck to all our students and teachers. Definitely not starting out as a normal year for any of them.

ModSquad Challenge Garden Harvest

I’d love to turn my bushel of apples into an apple pie but instead I’ll just turn them into a card for two different challenges. The Sunday Stamps Weekly Challenge is a Sketch by Claire:

and the ModSquad Challenge hosted by Nancy is to create a card featuring a garden harvest in a bucket, basket or container.

My GKD Autumn Splendor STVKit bushel of apples is stamped in VersaFine Black Onyx ink and heat set with clear embossing powder and colored in with a variety of markers. My garden harvest of apples had to come from an apple tree so I pulled out Darice tree embossing folder, then added a checked layer for the sketch requirements. What goes better with the apple tree and apples but a red checked tablecloth. Finally, cut a tag from GKD’s Decorative Tag die set.

I may have to wait a little longer for the apples as we are still in peach, nectarine and plum season in Pennsylvania.

It’s getting closer to that time of year and Back to School…well kind of sort of with a hybrid option for our grandchildren’s school district. We will have a 4th and 3rd grader this school year and their mascot is an owl so I pulled out my GKD Friends Til The End stamp set as well as a TPC Studio teacher stamps set for the book and inside stamps. This was a very intriguing sketch challenge from The Paper Players and my mind took me to a gatefold card.

The letters are Concord & 9th’s alphabet dies. Not sure how much longer I’ll be able to make “cute” cards for our grandson the big 4th grader but maybe I’ll slip spending money in the card for him.

The challenge at Double D Challenges is Sunflowers. I can definitely pick out a real live majestic sunflower growing in someone’s garden however in my stamp collection it was a little more difficult. So just in case these are not actual sunflowers, I created a very “sunny” background using three different stamps and distress inks. Using my Waffle Flowers A2 layering dies I cut out my background piece and then cut the thin border from GKD Lucky Clover cardstock. The stamps used to create the background are Gina K Designs’ Eclectic Summer, Love and Prayers, Heartfelt for the sentiment and the fussy cut sunflowers are StampinUp! Touch of Nature.

I initially cut the sentiment circle on vellum and stamped with my go to VersaFine Black Onyx…..MISTAKE. I had smears all over then I tried gluing the vellum in sections to the green layering circle and covering with sequins until I realized it was a hot mess! Perfect for these hot days of summer!! Deconstructed the sentiment section very carefully and used white cardstock for the sentiment circle. Whew!! Saved my project and didn’t even think twice about tossing. I really liked the background and was undecided if I wanted to cover it but what’s one more sun-ny flower.

Thanks for looking. Stay cool. Stay Safe.

ModSquad Challenge Patterned Paper Trio

I just realized that I have a lot of birthdays coming up through September so I better get working on my cards especially if our mail service is going to slow down!

My card was created using GKD’s Birthday Blessing stamp set and matching butterfly die which is the theme of the Double D Challenge. My trio of patterned papers for the ModSquad Challenge are from GKD’s Fight Like A Girl patterned paper set and undetermined first layer of patterned paper. The sentiment was stamped in VersaFine Onyx Black ink and sponge lightly in GKD’s Key Lime ink while still in the Spellbinder’s large classic ovals die.