Essential Worker Chef

Hello friends! I hope that your week is finding you in a good place right now. Sometimes I feel a bit overwhelmed with things that are going on in the world, but I am so thankful that I have the crafty time to keep my mind creative and music to help alongside to keep on keeping on. This is one way that I know I can express myself in a postitive way and hopefully inspire someone too.

In my previous post, I had made several healthcare worker cards and I had made one for my son who is a mail carrier, but I was having a hard time finding an image for a food service worker. (check out that post HERE.) I asked if anyone knew of any images. Someone had reached out to me and shared a few images that were just too adorable and I couldn’t pass up on nabbing one for my other essential worker son:

Isn’t he just as cute as can be?! I’ve used the LOTV Pancake Day digi stamp for my card. It actually reminds me of my son making crepes for a restaurant that he used to work for. I was treated with a delicious pumpkin pecan cream crepe by him a few years back on my birthday! It was yummy!

As you can see, I’ve altered the image a bit to fit with the current covid-19 restrictions by giving him a make-shift face mask as well as coloring some plastic-style gloves on his hands. To make it even more personal, I decided to give him a couple of colored tattoos on his arms as my son has tattoos on his arms and dark brown hair.😁

For the card, I’ve used some Sidewalk cardstock from Brutus Monroe and used a Stampin’ Up! brick embossing folder over it and then sponged some distress ink around the edges. It was cut out with a stitched rectangle die. I added a strip of Prism paper and some silver metallic ribbon over it before attaching it to a top folding A2 sized black card base. I finished it off with some silver Glossy Dots from Pink and Main.

I colored the image with Copic markers and as mentioned above added the special coloring for the tattos and gloves for his hands. I’ve also covered the pan with a glitter brush pen.

To make the face mask, I took a Copic liner to draw in the lines for the cord around his ear and then I took a tiny piece of thin tissue style paper that was used between the packages of acetate sheets you buy. I wanted it because it was thin and I was able to create tiny folds and wrinkles in it…I just glued it over the area on his face and manipulated it before it completely dried.

I stamped the sentiment from a Lawn Fawn stamp set with black ink next to the image and then I used a stencil that was cut out by my mom, thanks mom, on her Cricut machine and inked it up with some red ink using a foam brush tool. I wasn’t very accurate with not covering the image, but thankfully the sand eraser helped out! I finished coloring up the “ground” area and sponged around the stitched square cut out of the image. I layered it onto another piece of black cardstock and popped it up over the card with craft foam.

I think this card turned out so cute and it’s on the way to him now! I think he’ll get a kick out of it and he’ll probably notice the extra personalized details I’ve added to it too!😂

I hope you have enjoyed my special essential worker card today and brought you a smile! Thank you so kindly for stopping in and I’ll see you again soon!✌

Challenges:

Pearly Sparkles – #52 For the Boys/Men
Love to Scrap – LTSCB134 For the Boys
QKR Stampede – #400 Anything Goes
Digi Choosday – Anything Goes + colored image
Arty Divas – #23 Anything Goes
The Paper Funday – #18 Anything Goes with twist: make it masculine
Simon Say Stamp Wednesday – Masculine
Unicorn – Masculine

Caffeinated Changito☕

Hello there friends! Really hope that you have enjoyed your long Memorial weekend! The weather finally turned warm and once it turned warm, it REALLY turned warm and humid over my way! So we were able to plant some flowers in our garden pots outside and enjoy some cookout time too!

I noticed that the “Spring/Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop” had started up this weekend and I thought it would be a great opportunity to pull out some old stamps and have some fun with it while making a masculine card for the up-coming Father’s Day holiday too:

Does anyone remember these cute little “Changito” stamps back in the day?! I have used the Changito Coffee stamp (only found this one online) and the sentiment to go with it too! I actually bought these wood mounted rubber stamps years ago at a convention I had went to and have kept them hoarded like my other old stamps. LOL!

I stamped the image on Copic blending card and then again on some blue gingham background paper for paper piecing his PJs in! For the sentiment, I heat embossed it over my background with some appropriately named “Coffee” EP which has a metallic copper with some brown speckling in it…very cool. the store is no longer active that it came from.

For the background of this card, I had some fun playing with my Oxide Distress Inks in Vintage Photo, Broken China, Scattered Straw and touches of Espresso. I sprayed and dried layers as I went. I even took the bottom of a jar I had laying on my table to ink up some Espresso ink to make the “ring” marks over the background. I also took some more of that “Coffee” EP and sprinkled some over the background for even more distressing.

I wrapped some twine around it and attached it to an A2 sized white card base that I sponged around the edges with some Vintage Photo ink.

Here you can see a better look at the image and how I’ve got him colored up with Copic markers. You can barely see the gingham pattern in his paper pieced PJs, but I thought it was cute! I also took a black Copic liner and drew lettering on the coffee cups. I added just a hint of sparkle over the coffee inside the cups with a Spectrum Noir glitter brush pen. I also took a black gel pen to dot his eyeballs, the buttons on his PJs as well as dot the bunny slipper eyes. I think that little detail really makes his pop more with a bit of character.

The image was cut out with a stitched circle die and then I also cut out an additional circle to mat behind him, which I took a VersaMark ink pad and then used the “Coffee” EP to heat set along the edges of it so it has the same look and texture as the background and sentiment. This was attached over the background with twine.

Lastly, I’ve taken some brown colored sequins from my stash and attached them to the background and filled the centers with some Nuvo Honey Gold Glitter Drops.

Hope you’ve enjoyed my masculine and quirky card for today! Thanks so much for dropping in and I’ll be seeing you again soon!!😉

Challenges:

Spring/Summer 2020 Coffee Lovers Blog Hop – Coffee/Tea/Cocoa Related Project

2. Addicted to Stamps and More – #391 Anything Goes

3. Cute Card Thursday – #635 Critters

4. Creative Knockouts – #351 Embossing Delight (wet or dry)

5. QKR Stampede – #399 Anything Goes

6. Simon Says Stamp Monday – “Going Around in Circles”

7. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – PIP2021 Anything Goes

8. Die Cut Divas – Make it a Beverage + die cut/embossing folder

Cards From My Heart

Hello friends! With this not cooler, but COLDER weather we’ve been having, it looks like it may be a hard winter ahead and I’m already feeling it in my body unfortunately. So with the heating pad and warm slippers, I’m still crafting!

Today I’d like to share some cards that I have made for my hubby using some of the adorable stamps from Lawn Fawn …which I love:

At the end of October hubby and I celebrated our 20-year anniversary, and I made this card for him to let him know how I feel about him after all these years. This would be something that we would certainly do where we live! We always enjoy looking at the night sky together.

I started with some watercolor paper and blended some distress inks for the background and spritzed it with water. I then made sure it was completely dry before white heat embossing the stars that I colored in the centers with a gel pen. I then took a white gel pen and added more “dots” in the sky.

I’ve used Upon a Star and the Winter Skies stamp sets for both the images and sentiment. I took the Little Town border die to add over top of the starry sky and layered it onto a navy card base that has some more die cut stars (from Upon a star coordinating dies) at the top sponged with white ink.

For the sentiment, I had to piece together a couple of words from different sets to get it to say what I wanted it to. I cut it out with a long banner die from My Favorite Things.

Here’s a closer view of the sky and the images. For the fox couple, I black heat embossed it and then used my Zig Clean Color Real Brush markers to color them with and then popped them up over the corner of the scene with foam dots.

I actually used a color palette and sketch from a challenge blog, but missed the deadline to post it, but I think it turned out great and hubby enjoyed it. He said, “Yes, this is something we would do!” He also likes the color blue.

Here’s another card I made for hubby as his birthday was this last Friday:

Although this one is a bit simple, it has a really fun interactive element to it! If you’ve known me for a while, then you may know that my husband is an electrician, so this card was very fitting for him!

I have used the Lawn Fawn Turn Me On stamp set and coordinating dies along with the Life is Good stamp set for the sentiment and the Push Here stamp set to make this card. I also have a large stash of Lawn Fawn papers that I’ve used for this which I don’t think are available any longer.

I used vellum for the light bulb that was heat embossed over it and then I colored it yellow on the backside of the vellum to place behind the die cut opening from the blue panel. That was die cut with the coordinating dies. I stamped and colored the light switch as well and also die cut it out over the blue panel. I then white heat embossed the sentiment and cut it out with a sentiment banner die from MFT. It was sponged with white ink and glued over the blue panel.

The best part of this design is that when you push on the light switch, the light bulb turns on! I’ve used the Chibitronics to create this feature.

You can see here what it looks like when you push on the light switch!

You can also check out this quick few second video to see it in action below: (CLICK HERE if you want to see it on You Tube.)

Although this looks like a pretty simple card, mechanically it had its difficulties with the light up interior portion of it and it was met with some challenges and patience as I had to keep testing it to make sure it worked right! At one point I had to tear it apart because the battery accidentally flipped over! I also had to use like 4 layers of foam tape so that the light wouldn’t continuously be on all the time! LOL!

It was all worth it though as it was for the love of my life, and he really did appreciate the efforts that went into making it as he even took it to work with him so that he could show it to his fellow co-workers! LOL! They seemed to be pretty impressed with it and even offered some advice on how much to charge for something like this! LOL

The card was thick due to the amount of foam on it, so it didn’t fit into a regular envelope. Since it went to hubby, I just hand delivered it to him! 🙂

Hope you’ve enjoyed my share of creations today that I made for hubby! I will be seeing you again soon! Thanks for dropping in friends…I will be visiting soon!

Challenges:

Lawn Fawnatics – Cards for Guys
Creatalicious – Anything Goes with optional: For a Man
Crafty Friends – Anything Goes
Cardz 4 Guyz – All Wrapped Up (top card with scarves)
Get Creative – Anything Goes
Through the Craft Room Door – Anything Goes
Retro Rubber – Anything Goes + stamps older than 1 year (ALL listed are at least 1 year or older!)

Spots and Dots for Cute Card Thursday

Hello friends! Hope you’re having a great week so far. The month of October is flying right through and I know once Halloween gets here, it will be the end of the year before we know it!

Today starts a new challenge over at Cute Card Thursday this week! We are looking for “Spots and Dots” on your creations this time! We look forward to seeing your take on this one!

For my card, I decided to keep it rather simple:

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This card is using items from the Simon Says Stamp Sweet Birthday Limited Edition card kit which has since been sold out, but I know that you can still purchase a few of the items that were included in the kit.

I started out by taking the SSS Celebrate stencil from the kit and spread on some Deco Foil Transfer Gel over a white piece of cardstock from the kit and let it completely dry before moving on. After it was dry, I took the Rainbow Shattered Glass transfer foil sheet and put it through my laminator. It looks so pretty and shinny with a wow factor to it! I cut this piece down and layered it over a black scallop square die cut panel. I then layered these pieces over the green colored Tim Holtz Metallic paper from the kit.

For the square card, I used a black top folding 4.25″ black card base and then layered another piece of that green metallic paper over it. I took a ‘dotted’ piece of paper from the Honey Bee Over the Rainbow papers (included in the kit) and layered it over top of the metallic green. Then I added my foiled balloons panel over this.

Lastly, I took the sentiment from the Simon Says Stamp Sweet Birthday stamp set and white heat embossed it over a piece of black cardstock that I trimmed down to a banner and popped up over the card with some foam tape.

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I really didn’t want to add too much more to it as it was for a male and I think with all of that foil and shine, it really didn’t need much else! I think it’s fun, simple and really cheery looking especially with that foiling done.

I know that I’m getting this fun kit out again very soon as I am in need of another birthday card to send to someone that needs a good birthday cheer!

Challenges:

Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – PIP1941 Anything Goes
Crafty Cardmakers – Sparkle
Through the Craft Room Door – Anything Goes
A Bit More Time to Craft – Anything Goes
Watercooler Wednesday – WWC243 Masculine Anything Goes

Thanks so much for stopping in and sharing a bit of myself with you! Wishing you a beautiful day friends!

Russell is Rustling in the Leaves!

Hello friends! Can you believe that Fall is right around the corner already?! I so look forward to this every single year! What’s your favorite Season? Fall is my favorite season and I just love everything Fall related! I’m excited to share this really cute and fun Autumn style card with you today using some Whimsy Stamps products!

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I think he’s just having too much fun in the crisp cool Autumn air, don’t you?! This is Russell from the Whimsy Stamps August digital release just in time to start your Autumn makes! I can picture him colored up in all sorts of fun Autumn colors, right?! I’ve colored him up with Copics over some X-Press It Blending Card. (See photo below for Copic list details.)

After coloring him, I’ve cut him out using the Whimsy Stamps Notched Square dies and then cut another piece of brown cardstock to layer behind him. I took some fun plaid papers for the background that was cut out with a rectangle stitched die. Then I took another piece of the brown cardstock and white heat embossed a sentiment from my stash that was cut out with the Whimsy Stamps Quick Strips die set.

I took the plaid background and the brown layer behind Russell and attached them together. Then I took a strip of score tape and wrapped it around both of these layers. I sprinkled some pretty Autumn colored glitter over the tape and burnished it in. Then I glued the leaves down and then popped up the image as well as the sentiment banner with foam tape. To finish it off, I took some dimensional glue to create small “dots” randomly on the design and then I sprinkled some more of the same glitter I used for the strip over them and let it dry. A little glitter never hurts!

Here’s a closer look at Russell and how I’ve got him colored up. Here’s the Copic markers I’ve used to color him with below:

Leaves – R22, R24, V95, V01, YR14, YR12, Y23, E33, E31, E30, YG63, YG61
Grass – G24, G21, G20
Squirrel – E15, E13, E11, E53, E51
Russell’s outfit – YR18, YR15, YR12, E44, E42, E43, E41
Skin – E000, E00, E02, E11, E21, R20
Hair – Y21, Y32, E43
Shadows – BG10, BG000

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This was a really fun card to put together and color up! Now I’m excited for all things Fall coming soon! I hope you liked my card today and inspired you in some way!

Thanks so much for stopping in! I’ll see you soon!

I’d like to enter this card for the following challenges:

Creative with Stamps – Dad/masculine
Crafting With an Attitude – Anything Goes
Love to Craft – LTCCB37 Aug Anything Goes
Brown Sugar – Anything Goes
Simply Create Too – Anything Goes
Send a Smile 4 Kids – Thank you for Kids or Anything Goes

I’m back! It’s Been a Rough Patch!

Hello friends! 🙂 Are you still with me out there? (This is a bit of a long post to catch you up with what’s happened.)

Wow! It sure has been a while since I’ve been able to even TRY to get back into things. This was a really abrupt and rude unplanned disappearance from me and I was getting worried for a while about how I would even begin to start up again! I actually feel pretty “rusty” and unpracticed from my absence and I have a few things to share with you too!

Firstly, I want to thank you ALL from the very bottom of my heart for your wonderful comments, personal e-mail, cards and social media contact that I’ve heard from many of you. There were days that I just went to tears hearing from my fellow crafty friends as it came on a few days that I REALLY needed it the most! I thank you SO MUCH for that and it really helped to get me though some difficult pain days.

So what happened was a worsening of something that I believed to be a minor back issue that I thought would resolve on it’s own, but the issue grew worse and more painful to the point that I couldn’t sit, stand, walk or even getting out of bed was painful enough that I had a procedure to try and control the nerve pain. With this done, along with physical therapy and adjustments to my life style, I am feeling better now. It’s not COMPLETELY pain free, but it’s tolerable enough to do normal tasks for a period of time until I need to move around again. It’s just a life style adjustment that I can live with and hopefully fit in with what I love to do which is crafting! It really bothered me to just “walk away”, but sometimes when your health is in trouble, you just have to do what you have to do and heal. I have just learned that SEVERAL small breaks a day are better than none at all and I will pay for it later if I don’t! 🙂 Thanks for sticking it out with me!

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And so with that, I would like to share a couple of things that actually took way longer to complete than what I would normally take the time to complete and it was actually the very last little bit that I had accomplished before I had to completely step out of my room for a while. My husband wouldn’t let me go back in there until he was sure that I could tolerate my pain ok. Still working through the exercises until my follow up Dr. appointment, but I think I’ll be fine from here…I sure hope so as I’m ready to ROCK N ROLL!!! LOL

I had made a couple of masculine cards:

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Although I don’t have a black light, if you hold up the card to a black light, the watercolor background that I made will glow! It’s a pretty cool affect!

I took one of the foilable image panels from the kit and took several of the Neon Aqua Pigments and smooshed them over the background until I was happy. I tried to foil over it, but it didn’t completely get all of it. I added the strip of holographic paper at the bottom and the stamped elements along with the stars over it. For the sentiment, I heat embossed it with the EP that came in the kit and popped it up with foam tape. My bro seemed to like it and I think those neon watercolors turned out pretty cool! 🙂

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This is probably one of my all time faves from Newton’s Nook called Winston’s BBQ. I think they have had this set for a while, but It’s a great one for masculine themed designs!

I’ve used a kraft cardstock background and stamped several of the images from the set all over the background with the same color of ink. For the main panel, I stamped Winston, the grill and sentiment together and colored with my Copic markers. I also sponged some blue ink around the edges of it for a “sky” looking appearance.

I’ve taken a strip of silver foil cardstock and ran an embossing folder through it to place across the center of the card. I used some foam tape to pop up the image panel over top. All of these layers were placed over an A2 sized white top folding card base.

Of course, last but not least, I wanted to share a card I had completed for a guest design card meant for June and that was completed at the end of May, but I was unable to share it before I had to leave for a while. This is the card I gave to my husband for Father’s Day and he really does feel like my super hero! 🙂

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Isn’t this just the cutest?! I made this card using the adorable Paper Nest Dolls Superboy Owen and his sweet companion Superpuppy too! I had so much fun blending the background in the different colors! I added some blue stars stamped in the background. the city scape behind him was made with a city scape die cut layered a couple of times. I used some yellow cardstock behind the building for a lighted building affect. The wall was made using some gray colored cardstock and then a brick stencil with some red ink colored embossing paste to over it with. Then I just added the sentiment by white heat embossing it over a black strip that I die cut out.

Here’s a closer view of the coloring I’ve done on the images. I’ve used a silver gel pen to color in the buckle on his outfit. I fussy cut the images out after coloring.

Here you can also see the splattering that I’ve done with some white shimmer paint in the background with the blue stars.

Other news

I actually got a bit of really cool news while I was down and thanks to a lovely craft friend, she tagged me and let me know about this, but my set of Whimsy Stamps “Bee cards” were shown in the Making Cards & Papercraft Magazine for August 2019! Chosen as a “top spot” editor’s pick right inside the front cover! I was very surprised and to see what was said about it along with my blog address was pretty cool! So go get your copy of this magazine! It’s my first time having a peek at it and they’ve got some pretty neat inspiration in there!

Although I have been in a great deal of pain and mainly dealing with what came with it, of course my husband was great at trying to “distract” me from it and trying to get me to smile as much as possible. He knew first hand how I was feeling each day and like I mentioned above, he’s my super hero! So there were a few fun or smiling moments here and there while I was being patient with myself as much as I could anyway.

Vicki-backyard fireworks

I wasn’t able to do much to celebrate 4th of July, but going out in my backyard, my neighborhood seemed to have a pretty cool display! You can see the half moon at the bottom underneath the left side of the firework. Needed bug spray, but it was a nice night!

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Back in April, hubby and I had gotten some Styx concert tickets and I was worried about going due to the problems I was having. Of course hubby said not to worry about it as our seats were great with no one behind us so I could sit, stand or whatever I needed to do! It was loud enough with the music and it took my mind off things plus I could always clap and sing the songs! 🙂 We took a good break in the middle of it so I could move around away from the seat too. It was a great concert!

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In my backyard, I have different flowers and I really enjoy going out in nature to see the flowers, birds, bees, etc. The flowers this Summer really helped me relax, smile and just enjoy the beauty that is around.

Some days were absolutely horrible, but there are also these days too…

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Vicki-red Iris

Vicki-orange Iris

Vicki-Yellow Iris

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I’m soooo happy to finally be able to write up a post and now that I’m able to start getting back into my stamp room, I’m very excited to be able to come back to my design teams (who were ALL so absolutely wonderful with letting me have the time to heal and recover! It meant so much!) and I will be along again soon to share new creations now! Yay! Hope everyone is doing well and I’ve missed you!

Crafty hugs

Anything Goes at Cute Card Thursday With Curly

Hello friends! I hope you’re all having a wonderful week so far!! It’s really starting to feel like Summer now with the warmer temps!

Today is a new challenge this week over at Cute Card Thursday! This week we have our “Anything Goes” challenge with our sponsor Whimsy Stamps! So of course, I am using a cute image from Whimsy Stamps for my card today:

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Tee hee! This little guy holding the tiny “sea creature” makes me smile and giggle! I’m not really sure what reaction he has about it! His name is just as cute too! This is Curly from Whimsy Stamps. I thought he needed a scene, so I made one for him.

I started with some Bristol Smooth watercolor paper and masked off the line between the sky and the sand. I used my Distress Inks to blend in the colors. After doing the sky, I thought that it was a bit too dark, so what I did was take a baby wipe and swiped it across which lightened up the colors the way I wanted them for the sky. The bottom “sand” portion was also masked, and I blended the bottom blue color into the sandy colors which created a nice shoreline. I then took a water bottle and spritzed some water droplets over it to create “texture” for the sand. I also took some Copic markers to create more texture with the pointillism technique, plus added some white ones with a gel pen. the water at the bottom was covered with a glitter pen. (You can see better details in the photos/description below.)

So, I’ve got him all colored up in the following Copic markers:

Flippers/water gear – B32, B34, B37, Y11
Swim Trunks – R32, R35, R37, Y11, Y15
Sea Creature – BV23, BV29
Hair – E41, E43, E44, E47
Skin – E000, E00, E02, E11, E21, R20
I used gel pens to color lines on trunks and cheeks, I’ve used a glitter pen over the “sea creature” and his flippers along with the bottom water area.

I fussy cut this image and used some liquid glue to attach over my scene.

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For the scene, I stamped the birds in the sky and a star fish image from an older Whimsy Stamps clear stamp set. I then took the sentiment from the WS Everyday Mini Sentiments and white heat embossed it over a black strip of cardstock and then used my scissors to cut out a banner to attach over the scene. I layered this over another piece of black cardstock that was attached to an A2 sized top folding white card base.

Lastly, I’ve taken some WS It’s a Party enamel dots and added them to the card.

Hope you’ve enjoyed my card today! Thanks for stopping in! I’ll be seeing you tomorrow for some fun news!

Challenges for this card:

A Bit More Time to Craft – Anything Goes
Crafty Friends – Men/Boys
Sweet Stampin’ – World Ocean’s Day/Anything Goes
Use Your Stuff – Summer Fun
Always Fun – Summer Fun
Unicorn – For the Men/Boys

It’s Masculine at Cute Card Thursday!

Hello friends! Hope you are all having a wonderful week so far! I’m ready for this rain to end over my way and would love to send it along to those that need it! June is a hop-jump and a skip away, so I’m hoping that Summer will dry things up.

Speaking of June, Father’s Day will be coming up shortly for us here in the U.S. so the new challenge at Cute Card Thursday is a very timely one to have! We’d like to see your “Masculine” creations this week! Here’s what I’ve come up with:

LOL!! Our sponsor this week is Bugaboo Stamps! I have used this hilarious image called Gus Tidbits Unconsciousness. He’s a really good one to use for not only masculine, but humorous creations too!

For the card, I’ve printed out both the image and sentiment together and then cut out the panel with a stitched rectangle die and then layered a piece of Stampin’ Up! Soft Suede behind it. Before attaching these pieces together, I’ve sponged some ink around the edges of it.

The checkered paper that I’ve used on my design came from a My Favorite Things paper pad collection. I die cut a piece to layer over a top folding A2 sized white card base with another stitched rectangle die and then placed the image panel over top it on the card.

I also cut out a banner with the same papers and added it to the upper right image panel and then added on a chipboard clock button from my stash with some twine ribbon tied around it and placed it over the banner with some foam tape. I’ve added a wooden button in the center of the bow.

Here’s a better look at the coloring on Gus. You can see on his eye glasses where I’ve added some glossy accents. It was a really fun and simple card to create!

I hope you’ve enjoyed my masculine creation today!

*P.S. Here is another update on the bird nest…we have a baby!!

If you remember, there were 3 blue eggs in the nest. We can’t tell for sure, but it looks like just one baby bird in there. As you can see, there is one egg in there. We see what looks like a crack on it, but it hasn’t hatched and we’re not sure it will. We have no idea where the other egg/bird went to! There is nothing on the ground. With all of these severe thunderstorms and rain, I can imagine they’re having a hard time out there. It shouldn’t be too much longer that this little guy will be taking flight! So we’ll see if we can keep track of what’s going on from here! 🙂

Challenges I’d like to enter my card for:

TGIF – #TGIFC213 All About That Gingham
Papercraft – For Men & Boys
Watercooler Wednesday – WWC223 Anything Goes
Simons Says Stamp Wednesday – Anything Goes

Under the Sea Shaker for Cute Card Thursday

Hello friends! Welcome to another Thursday and a new challenge over at Cute Card Thursday this week! The challenge for this week is Brads, Sequins/Gems. So pull out your embellishments and have some fun creating! Looking forward to seeing your creations using these items!

I decided that I was going to use all three items for my card today:

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I’ve used an “oldie but a goodie” Stampin’ Up! stamp set for my masculine shaker card here. I’ve pulled out the “By the Tide” and “Hardwood” rubber stamp sets that I’ve had for a couple of years now. (Not sure if they’re still available or not in the catalog as it’s been such a long time since I’ve bought any SU! products.)

I started by stamping the background “Hardwood” stamp with Basic Gray ink over a piece of Marina Mist cardstock and then blended some gray and black distress inks along the edges of it. I mounted it with some Basic Gray cardstock. I’ve taken some twine pieces and used it to fashion a “netting” accent from the side of the card onto the bottom front and then added some blue glitter around it for some fun texture and sparkle.

For the shaker element of my card, I’ve used some circle dies to create the frames and that’s where I’ve attached the silver brads all around the edge. I’ve used some more distress inks and stamp some more images from the stamp set for the inside of the shaker design. I’ve added some sequins for the inside of the shaker window and placed it over the front of the card over the netting accent. I stamped the images with Gray and Cajun ink pads and then colored them in and randomly placed them over the card design.

Vicki-CCT579-SU-flat

Lastly, I’ve taken some rhinestones and colored them with a Copic marker so that I could get the blue color for my design.

Thanks for dropping in!

challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Monday – Going Around in Circles
Use Your Stuff – Yarn/String/Twine
Through the Craft Room Door – Anything Goes
Retro Rubber – Anything Goes #rrcb109
Crafty Creations – Anything Goes

Whimsy Stamps Partner’s with Make a Wish Canada

Hello friends! It’s my pleasure today to post information about this special image that Whimsy Stamps has just released today in honor of our beloved illustrator Crissy Armstrong’s brother, Ray Gauvreau, who is currently battling cancer.

I have made a special card just for him that is being sent out his way:

Vicki-WS-Penguin Ray

I started out by coloring up this image with my Copic markers in the following:

Penguin body, IV wheels/post – C8, C5, C3, C1
penguin feet/beak, tongue, cheeks – YR24, YR21, Y23, R20, R11, R00, R000
Bandage, IV bag – E33, E31, Y11, R00
ground/shadow – C1, E0000

For the background of my card, I took some xyron printed paper and foiled the background which I think looks great for a masculine theme design and that is what I was trying to go for with this card. After foiling it, I took and sponged some yellow distress ink to blend around the edges of it for a bit of color, along with the image panel.

I had an old stamp set from my stash and thought it would be a great fit for this card, so I stamped the vertical “fight” sentiment next to the IV bag and then I took the other sentiment and heat embossed it with white EP and cut it in a strip to attach over the image. Lastly, I’ve added some white enamel dots to each corner of the design.

Here’s a close look at the image and how I’ve colored it in. It’s hard to tell in the photo of course, but I’ve also covered the IV bag with a clear glitter brush pen. I think this image is a really great one to add to a crafter’s collection for “get well” cards and encouragement too like this one. After cutting out the colored image panel and sponging the color around the edges, I’ve also layered this along with the foil panel with some black cardstock before attaching it onto a white top folding A2 sized card base.

Vicki-WS-Penguin Ray-flat