Sitting Pretty

Hi everyone and Happy Wednesday! :) We are halfway through the work week, yay :) I think I'm in some sort of post-holiday slump, I can't seem to stay awake when I get home from work :) I'm so sleepy, I took two cat naps last night when I got home from work :) Maybe it's because it's so cold outside, I just want to stay in and hibernate :) It was in the low 20s here yesterday, Brrrrr!

Anyway, onto my card for the day. I only have one card for you today and again, this is a picture that I took before our new camera so it's not as clear as I'd like it to be, but I think it came out okay. I love, love, love this Tilda image, I think she's just adorable :) This one is called "Dinner Tilda." It looks like Diana at Magnolialicious is out of this particular design at the moment, but you can find it at 7 Kids Here. I stamped my image in Memento Tuxedo Black ink (which is the ink I always use when I color with copics). I then colored the image with my copics (I'm so sorry, I don't remember the numbers I used) and cut her out. All cardstock is by Stampin Up (Brocade Blue and Chocolate Chip). The design paper is by My Mind's Eye (have I mentioned lately how much I LOVE MME paper? LOL! :) ). On the brown design paper panel I used my Martha Stewart doily edge punch (love that one). I then used my SU ticket corner punch in the corners and placed these beautiful light blue pearls that I got at Michale's (Recollection brand) in the corners. I then used my swirl punch (you can find it Here). I love this punch and I find that I reach for it often. I added darker blue pearls to the swirls and then cut the ovals out using my oval nesties. I added small blue pearls for Tilda's necklace and bracelet, then adhered her to the card with dimensionals. The bow is SU's Chocolate Chip. Finally, I added some roses to the corner. I purposefully left off a sentiment. I figured this card could be used for many occasions, from Birthday to Thinking of You to Thank You, etc.

What do you think? Thank you so much for stopping by today. I hope you all have a wonderful day and I'll see you back here tomorrow :)

Hugs, Christine

Hot Cocoa

Hi everyone and Happy Tuesday! :) Hope your new year is off to a great start. I'm working hard at work, I'll be out of town next week at prosecutor boot camp (yikes!) so I have to get some things ready to go. The boot camp is for new assistant prosecutors. I've been at the job for about 4 months now and my boss sends all new prosecutors to this course. I'm actually kind of excited about it, but I have lots to get done before I leave :)

Anyway, onto crafting. I'm currently working on Valentine's Day cards, but I still have some winter cards and a couple Christmas cards to show you.



For my first card, I used Cocoa Puff (how cute is that name :) ) from Susana's Custom Art and Card Design. This is another image illustrated by the super talented Victoria Case. I colored the image with copics (R81, 83, 85, and 89 for the pink, B34 and B37 for the blue). I added some stickles to the snow at the bottom of the card and I added Glossy Accents to her eyes. All design paper is by My Mind's Eye (love this company!). Cardstock is from SU (Ballet Blue and Rose Red). All flowers are from Wild Orchid Crafts.

***I apologize, my pictures aren't as good as they should be. I took these pictures before the craft show back in November and we got a new camera since then so these aren't as great as I'd like.



My second card today uses another Victoria Case image from SCACD. This one is called BFF's. I think this image is absolutely adorable. I colored the image with copics (R81, R83, R85, R89, G24, G28), added some gold Spica glitter to the bells on the stocking, added Glossy Accents to her eyes, and some Diamond Stickles. All design paper is from K&Co. The cardstock I used is from SU. I also used my SU Ticket Corner Punch on the corners and added pink pearls (from Michael's). I think the sentiment is from Whiff of Joy. A very simple layout on this one, but I didn't want to overshadow the cute image (love that kitty cat) :)

Well, that's it from me today. Thank you so much for stopping by. Hope you all have a wonderful day and I'll see you back here tomorrow :)

Big Hugs, Christine

A Winter Wonderland Pop Up

Hi everyone and happy Monday :) It’s back to work for me today. I really enjoyed the Christmas holiday, but alas, all good things must come to an end :) Thanks to all of you for all your lovely comments yesterday, it feels so good to be back and sharing my crafts with you. Today, I have a very special card to share. This card was a labor of love, it took several hours to create, but I was really pleased with the end result. This was a combination Christmas card and Anniversary card for hubby (we have been married four years as of December 30th). I have lots of pictures to share today so bear with me :) I was inspired to create this pop up card by Suzanne Dean (Scrap Bitz, link to her blog on my sidebar). She created a gorgeous pop up card about a month ago and I decided to give it a go myself :)





Here is a picture and a close up of the front of the card. I wanted to keep the front simple since there is a lot going on inside. I used Kissing Tilda and Kissing Edwin for the front of the card. I couldn’t find these on 7 Kids or Magnolialicous, but they came in last year’s winter kit and I believe they were in last year’s New Year’s Collection. I colored the images with copics and cut them out. The bow was tied with my Bow Easy (I got mine Here. I added some Martha Stewart tinsel glitter to Tilda’s socks (I have some fuzzy socks like that that sort of look like tinsel and glitter so that’s where I got that idea). The design paper on the front of the card is K&Co. The cardstock is Stampin Up (Regal Rose, Rose Red, and Not Quite Navy).

And now . . . ta da, here’s the inside of the card:



I wanted to show you the inside from various angles so you could sort of see how I put this together. If anyone is interested in a tutorial on this, please let me know. I might not get to it in the next week, but I’d be happy to do one.

Here are some close ups and various angles:









I used skating Tilda and Edwin for the inside of the card. I added Diamond Stickles to Tilda’s dress and lots of Glossy Accents to their skates. All design paper is by My Mind’s Eye (MME). The Christmas trees were cut out from MME design paper and popped with dimensionals. The snow men were also cut out of MME paper and were popped as part of the pop up card. The “ice” was cut out using an oval nestability. The paper is some silver paper I found at AC Moore.
To create the pop up part is quite easy. I just measured out how far I wanted the images to stick out from the back of the card, then cut a piece of cardstock (make sure you cut it thin enough so it can’t be seen when looking at the card at eye level), put three scores into the cardstock strip, then I attached it to the image, the bottom of the card, and the back panel of the card. It truly is much easier than it looks.

Here’s a bird’s eye view:



All flowers are from Wild Orchid Crafts. The sentiment is from Whiff of Joy. I cut the sentiment out with my oval nesties. The pearls are from Michael’s (Recollection brand). From this bird’s eye view, you can really see what I was talking about earlier about the strips of paper being attached to the pop up image and to the back panel of the card.

Whew, sorry for such a long post and thanks for reading this far :) Again, if anyone wants a tutorial, leave me a comment and let me know and I'd be happy to put one together. Thanks so much for stopping by. See you back here tomorrow :)

I'm Back :)

Hi everyone!!! I know I’ve been gone forever. I want to thank all of you who have sent me such sweet e-mails and messages during my long break. While I was gone from blog land for several months, I have been crafting like crazy. I actually even did a craft show back in November which turned out to be pretty successful. I have so many cards to share with you and I am so incredibly excited to be back. I’ve had another great change in my life during this break. I got a new job! I left the corporate world and am now a Prosecuting Attorney. I love my job and I feel like I’m doing something that makes a difference which is very rewarding. So, in short, hubby and I (and the furbabies) are doing great. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and I wish you all a very happy new year. Now, onto my cards I have for you today :)





***Please click on the pictures to make them bigger, for some reason, I can't get the pictures bigger on the homepage. Thanks :) ***

I have been loving the easel card look and I can’t seem to stop making them :) My first card today is an easel card I did using Snow Fun, a Victoria Case image from Susana’s Custom Art and Card Design (SCACD). I love, love, love these images by Victoria case, they are so fun to color. I colored the image with copic markers (R89, R85, R83, and R81 for the pinks, B34 and B37 for the blues and W6 and W8 for the black hat on the snow man). The R81 series is my favorite line of pinks. I added Glossy Accents to the eyes and some Diamond Stickles. I then created my easel card (see instructions for how to create an easel card HERE. I made my card 5 ½ by 5 ½ (this is my favorite card size to make). I then created the top part of the card using design paper from K& Co. (last year’s Christmas paper stack). All cardstock is by Stampin Up (Ballet Blue and Rose Red). Next I added the snowflakes to the card. These are so cool, I got them at Michael’s and they are made by Me and My Big Ideas (I bought several packs because I thought they were so cool . . . hmmmm, may have to do some blog candy :)). Next, I added these beautiful roses to the center of the snowflakes. I got the roses from Wild Orchid Crafts. This is a company based in the UK and they make the most beautiful paper flowers I’ve ever seen. They are very reasonably priced. They have tons of colors and shipping was pretty quick, I definitely recommend them. Finally, I decorated the bottom portion of the easel card. I used the Fleur de Lis punch from Fiskars and then placed my sentiment (from a clear stamp set from Wal-Mart last Christmas) at the bottom. I then used dew drops along the top to hold the front panel up. I attached the front panel to the card using Scor Tape (this tape is so awesome, it’s very strong and is perfect for projects like this or for boxes, bags, etc.).



My second card uses another stamp from SCACD by Victoria Case. This one is called Winter and I just love her. This is a pretty simple card, but for some reason, I just love it :) I sold this card at the craft show and honestly, I was a little disappointed that it sold, I kind of wanted to keep it :) Anywho, I first colored my image with copics. I then mounted the image onto Real Red cardstock from Stampin Up. I then created my card base (which is 5 ½ by 5 ½). It’s a little hard to see in the picture, but the white paper is actually glitter paper from DCWV glitter stack. I layered that on top of my Real Red card base and then I added my design paper which is from My Mind’s Eye (my new favorite paper company). I then placed a panel of the white glitter paper across the card, first punching the bottom with Fiskar’s Threading Water edge punch. I then placed my image on top with dimensional. I added my sentiment (from Whiff of Joy) to the image with dimensionals. I added Glossy Accents to the girl’s eyes and the puppy’s nose and eyes (this is such a cool effect). I also added Diamond Stickles to her coat. Finally, I added the silver snowflakes (I got these at Michael’s, I can’t remember who makes them) and I added red roses from Wild Orchid Crafts to the center of the snowflakes. Easy peasy card to put together, but I love it :)

Well, I hope you enjoyed my projects today. I’d love to hear from you so please feel free to leave a comment if you have the time. I’ll be back tomorrow with some more projects.

Hugs, Christine

A Little Break

Hi everyone and Happy Friday :) Hope you all have some fun plans for the weekend :) I just wanted to thank all of you that stop by my blog and leave me such wonderful comments. It means so much to me, I really appreciate all the support you have given me. I'm going to be taking a little break from my blog. Hopefully not too long of a break, but I need to take some time to regain my confidence in my work and find my mojo :) I promise I'll be back soon. In the meantime, I'll still be visiting all of your blogs as often as I can.

Big Hugs to you all,

Christine :)

Try It Out Tuesday #21 -- A Summer Tea Party

Hello everyone and Happy Tuesday! :) Today is Tuesday so that means it's another Try It Out Tuesday Challenge over at Susana's Store Blog, Follow Your Heart. Our challenge this week was to create a summer invitation using any of the stamps Susana sells. I decided to create an invitation to a summer tea party. I used this adorable image, designed by Victoria Case exclusively for Susana's Store. This particular image is called Tea for Two. Isn't it just adorable? :) It was so much fun to color too. I inked the image with Memento Black Ink, stamped it onto PTI cardstock and colored it with copics. It's hard to see in the picture, but I added Shimmerz to the butterfly's wings and I also added Pearls to her dress and to her bracelet, as well as around the image.

Next, I created my card base (which measures 5 1/2 by 5 1/2) out of SU's Sage Shadow. I layered Pretty in Pink on top of that followed by my design paper. I added a pink ribbon and then used my Nesties Label 4 to cut out the "You're Invited" tag (the sentiment is computer generated). I then adhered my image to my SU cardstock and to the card base using dimensionals. Finally, I used my SU Word Window punch to cut out the "Tea for Two" sentiment (also computer generated) and added pearls. What do you think?

Well, that's it from me today. Make sure to stop by Susana's Store Blog to see the rest of the DT's amazing creations. Thanks so much for stopping by. Have a wonderful day :)

Big Hugs, Christine :)

Fairytale

Hi everyone and Happy Monday :) I hope your week is off to a great start. I haven't done a fairytale themed card in quite some time so I decided to put one together. The castle is actually a digital image from In Style Stamps. I printed it out several times so I could cut and layer the castle. The princess and unicorn are from High Hopes Rubber stamps. I inked them both with Memento Tuxedo Black Ink, stamped them onto PTI cardstock, colored them with copics, and cut them out. I added Diamond Stickles to the unicorn's horn and Gold and Pink Stickles to the princess's crown. I then created my card base (5 1/2 by 5 1/2) out of SU's Barely Banana. I layered Pretty in Pink on top of that followed by my design paper from K & Co. I then adhered my castle image to my cardstock and to the card base with dimensionals. I adhered my princess to the unicorn with dimensionals and then adhered the unicorn to the card base with dimensionals. For some finishing touches, I added Shimmerz to the flags on the castle and Primas. What do you think?

Note: I have gotten a few questions about how to "follow" my blog. To make it easier, I have added a "followers" option on my sidebar. I'd love it if you'd like to follow my blog. I'd love to know who is stopping by and I'd love to visit your blogs as well :)

Well, that's it from me today. I hope you all have a wonderful day. I'll be back tomorrow with another project.

Big Hugs, Christine :)