Looking Back

Michelle was the hostess for last Thursday's Way To Use It challenge and she has named it Looking Back.  Michelle's challenge is about looking back through the last year of Ways To Use It challenges and incorporating at least two of those challenges.  Michelle even provided links to those challenges.  A big thanks to her because that is time consuming!  I used six past challenges on my card.  I chose Stuck on Me, Friend of Faux?, Love Your Kraft, Something Old, Something New, No White Cardstock, and i HEART you.  It took me a while to get around to posting this, but here it is! 

Happy Tuesday to you, folks!

Details - Stamps: Short & Sweet; Paper: Very Vanilla, Early Espresso, Kraft; Ink: Whisper White craft, Early Espresso; Accessories: Musical Flourish ef, brayer, M's glitter foam stickers, stampin' dimensionals.

Monday's Sentiment

It's Monday and the Friends of Speedy TV are only using sentiments today for our challenge.  No images for this week, just words.  When I began to work on my card for this challenge, I knew I would go with pretty patterned paper and then keep the rest simple.  I could gaze for hours and hours at some paper without cutting into it.  This sentiment is one that is a good reminder for me at the moment. My husband is away and I am single parenting.  I know that some parents do this on a regular basis, so they must have this one down pat.  I am not very practiced at this, so I need the reminder.  I went ahead and posted this on Facebook today as I thought some people I know might like a pretty little reminder too!

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you have a wonderful week.

Details - Stamps: Floral Tea (Mark's Finest Papers); Paper: Very Vanilla, Soft Suede, Everyday Enchantment dsp; Ink: Soft Suede, Peach Parfait; Accessories: Nestabilities, corner chomper, wide Vanilla organdy, 1/8" Calypso Coral organdy, sponge dauber, Sakura clear star gel pen, stampin' dimensionals, glue dot.

Speedy TV and Birthdays

It's another Monday challenge with the Friends of Speedy TV.  Today's challenge is all about birthdays.  Who doesn't need a birthday card?  I am always running out of these, especially the masculine variety.  With all of the fun and fancy embellishments that are available these days, it's hard to keep it simplified.  I think it did it here though!  I repeated that tree a bunch of times to get that forest on there.  I only reinked it a few times so that I would get some variation in the color of my trees as well.  I did one thing here that I rarely do, as it feels criminal most of the time.  I cut apart my stamp so that I could lengthen my sentiment to fit my flag.  Have you ever cut apart a stamp?  How does it make you feel?  If you get some time today, it would be great if you could play along! 

After a full week off from work, I head back to school today.  Let's hope I can remember my job! Thanks for stopping by and Happy Monday.

Details - Stamps: A Walk in the Woods (MFP), Buffalo Spring (MFP); Paper: Certainly Celery, Very Vanilla, Early Espresso; Ink: Old Olive, Early Espresso; Accessories: Earth Elements button, paper snips, stampin' dimensionals.

Featuring One of Speedy's Friends

Today's Featured Stamper on Splitcoast is Kim, Luv Flowers.  Kim is a design team member for Mark's Finest Papers.  She is on the Speedy Fox Blog Team.  So, you know I had to play...and I had to break out some of my MFP too!  I reached way back into Kim's gallery to 2008, for a very simple design that would work for me.  I chose this card to case.  I hope she doesn't mind that I dug so deep.  The Saturday challenge for Speedy Fox and Friends (Kim's design team) is to make a birthday card. Hey, I can do that!  My card is fairly self-explanatory.  I stamped my crocus and colored it with Copic markers.  I'm still learning about these markers, so forgive me.  I cut out my image and popped it up over some designer paper and an embossed card base.  I finished it off with a little organdy ribbon, an embossed sentiment and some rounded corners.

I'm going to keep this short and sweet as the wind is blowing in my neck of the woods and I am wondering if we are going to get to keep our power.  I hope so, but if not, I am prepared.  I'm going to start my laundry so that I can have some clean clothes for work tomorrow, too!

Thanks for stopping by!

Details - Stamps: Winter Crocus (MFP), Background Fun (MFP); Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, Night & Day Specialty dsp; Ink: Tuxedo Black, Versamark; Accessories: White ep, heat tool, stripes ef, Nestabilities, copics, white organdy ribbon, corner chomper, stampin' dimensionals.

Sew Beautiful

"Sew Beautiful" is the name of today's Ways To Use It challenge hostessed by the fabulous Hannah!  She has challenged us to use stitching on our cards.  With preparation for my hubby's big trip, I have been busy and now am tired.  As much as I wanted to hand stitch these cute little papers together, I went faux!  I normally do white stitching, but went with black today.  I really like the look of the black mats and accents.  I'm not sure why I don't think to do it more, but I think I will be trying from here on out.  It really seems to pop.  Speaking of popping, the head of the flower is popped up off my page.  I realize it's hard to tell, but that isn't shading around the blossom, it is shadow.  I also glitzed up my flower center with some yellow Stickles today too.

I borrowed today's sketch from the ladies at the My Favorite Things Wednesday Stamp Club.   I took a little artistic license and moved my blossom in a bit to work with my image. 

It's chilly today so this little flower gives me hope for a nice warm spring.  Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Details - Stamps: Time To Blossom (Verve); Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, BG Perhaps, BG Eskimo Kisses; Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black; Accessories: Copic markers, yellow stickles, M's rhinestones, black grosgrain, stampin' dimensionals, paper snips.

Can You Digi It

Have you heard?  No really, have you heard?  There's a new game in town, or a new store on the net and it's name is Can You Digi It!  My Ways To Use leader and VSN buddy, Michelle, is running the show, so you know that it is good.  Today is the Grand Opening Blog Hop for the store and I chose to showcase this cool digi set by LilyPink Designs called Shoes & Shopping!  This shoes in this set are super cute with fun sentiments to keep them company.  I colored this shoe, embossed it for a little shine and then popped it up on my card.  Let me tell you, it was fun!  Ready for some more fun???  I'm in the middle of the hop.  Head back to the Can You Digi It Blog to get your full dose of Wednesday eye candy. In case you get lost, here is the  hop order: 

C.Y.D.I? Blog

Michelle Single

Lelia Pierce

April O'Connor

Toni Storie (you are here)

Dana Alley (go here next)

Jan Hunnicutt

Patty Chalas

Nancy Williams

Hannah Clark

Once you're done hopping, you'll want to stop by the store for the fabulous SALE we have going on right now.  Don't forget to use CYDIGOC15 to get 15% off all non-digital goodies in addition to the products our artists have put on sale.

The sale/coupon ends Friday, January 27th when Michelle gets on the plane for CHA.  Make sure you are a C.Y.D.I? Twitter follower to get all the updates from CHA!

Details - Stamps: Shoes & Shopping (LilyPinkDesigns); Paper: Whisper White, Chatterbox Inc. dp; Ink: Versamark; Accessories: Seeing Spots ef, colored pencils, clear ep, heat tool, stampin' dimensionals.

A Colored Bird

Today, the Friends of Speedy TV are only using their colored pencils.  It felt like a sort of back to basics kind of day, so that is how I made my card.  I did use a Splitcoaststampers sketch to kick off my card.  I liked this sketch because it worked well for my image that I had in mind and seemed to match my interpretation of the challenge.  Then I stamped this pretty little bird on a pussy willow branch from a Mark's Finest Papers set called Pussy Willows for my main panel.  I colored the image with some colored pencils and shaded just a little bit.  I added a sentiment from the same set and a couple of buttons that I threaded with a vanilla paper strip. 

I have the day off today and will be spending it with family.  We are preparing for my husband to leave on a vacation.  I hope you enjoy your day today...you are in my thoughts.

Details - Stamps: Pussy Willows (MFP); Paper: Very Vanilla, Basic Gray, Le Jardin dsp; Ink: London Fog, Basic Gray; Accessories: Random buttons, stampin' dimensionals, colored pencils.

Using Stickers

Hi there!  Thursday was my turn to hostess another Ways To Use It challenge at Splitcoaststampers.  I chose stickers as my theme for this week's challenge.  I figure that just about everyone has some kind of sticker in their stash.  My sticker here is a clear sentiment sticker from Cloud 9 Designs.  It has been in my drawer for at least two years.  Every else about my card is rather simple.  I die cut a couple of hearts.  I embossed and sanded one for a little more interest.  I distressed the edges and really worked my corners for some more shabbiness. 

I used a sketch from My Favorite Things.  Sometimes I find their sketches a bit challenging.  That probably means that I need to keep at those for a while.  I also worked in a Stamp 2 Spend challenge offered up by Kelly to make a card and send it to someone.  This will be my anniversary card for my husband.  I'll have to tuck it in his luggage, as he will be traveling on our anniversary.

Thanks for stopping by!

Details - Paper: Very Vanilla, Chatterbox Inc. dp; Accessories: Cloud 9 Designs sticker, Musical Flourish ef, edge distresser, sanding block, Heart Framelits, square punch, stampin' dimensionals.

FOSTV Thanks You

It's Monday again and time for another Friends of Speedy TV challenge.  Today we are making thank you cards.  It's just the right time of year for that sort of thing.  Well, anytime of year is good for thank you cards, really!  I went with kind of a masculine feel today and a clean and simple design.  I'm a clean and simple kind of girl and I really love silhouettes!  This one was fun and all I had to do was just mask and sponge in a little ground!  

I used a sketch from the clean and simple stamping blog to get me going.  Those are always great.  This one is particularly versatile and I can totally see myself using it time and again. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Details - Stamps: Buffalo Spring(Mark's Finest Papers), A Walk in the Woods (Mark's Finest Papers); Paper: Very Vanilla, Crumb Cake, Early Espresso, Welcome Neighbor dsp; Ink: Early Espresso, Crumb Cake; Accessories: Nestabilities, 1 3/8" circle punch, 1 1/4" circle punch, 1/8" Early Espresso taffeta ribbon, stampin' dimensionals.

Flashin' Back Clean and Simple

We are flashing back to our first clean and simple card.  You can check out the Flashback Friday challenge here.  For me, that means going back to the very beginning of my Splitcoaststampers gallery.  Back then, almost four years ago, I wouldn't have been able to define my style.  As I continued on in my hobby, I found my style and it really leans more toward clean and simple than anything else.  You'll have to pardon my photography skills back then.  I have learned a thing or two in four years about making my cards appear more like they really are.  But then, who hasn't? 

I originally made this card for a Kristina Werner color inspiration challenge.  The colors in the challenge are So Saffron, Sahara Sand, Pumpkin Pie and Wild Wasabi.  It's fun to look back, isn't it.  I don't think I have ever put these colors together since!

Thanks for stopping by!

Details - Stamps: Artfully Asian, Embrace Life; Paper:  So Saffron, Sahara Sand, Pumpkin Pie, Wild Wasabi; Ink: Stazon Black, So Saffron, Wild Wasabi, Pumpkin Pie, Really Rust; Accessories: Self-adhesive twill tape, Stampin' Dimensionals, Blender Pen.

Happy Birthday Michelle

We are using it again, this time with a birthday theme.  In honor of her birthday, Michelle, our fearless leader, hostesses today's Way To Use It challenge. Today's challenge is a choice challenge.  You can either make a birthday card, which I did, or you can make a card with your favorite things.  Michelle is an enabler of the best kind and is happy to be enabled as well.  Let's help her find a way to spend that birthday cash!

I went super simple today.  I have had this designer paper for a while and finally decided to cut into it.  That is after I found the perfect sketch to work with.  The sketch is this week's CPS sketch.  I strayed just a teeny bit by rounding some corners.

Thanks for stopping by!

Details - Stamps: Best Dad Ever; Paper: Whisper White, Brilliant Blue, Pumpkin Pie, Jillibean Soup dp; Ink: Brilliant Blue; Accessories: Corner Chomper, stampin' dimensionals.

A Tropical Feeling

Yep, I've got a tropical feeling.  I watched an episode of No Reservations last night in which Anthony Bourdain visited Cambodia.  It reminded me very much of my visit several years ago to Thailand.  It makes me long to go back to SouthEast Asia.  I'm very jealous right now as my husband prepares to travel with his brother to Thailand in just two weeks.  I resurrected this card from early 2011.  I'm fairly certain that it never made my blog. 

I originally made the card for a mini VSN challenge back in April during the Pirate Party VSN.  Lori McAree hostessed the challenge and made it lots of fun! 

Thanks for stopping by!

Details - Stamps: Balmy Breeze, Windows To The World (Flourishes); Paper: Crumb Cake, Whisper White; Ink: River Rock, Baja Breeze, Poppy Parade, Tangerine Tango, Daffodil Delight, Early Espresso; Accessories: Stampin' Sponge, sponge dauber, post-its.

A Gatefold Challenge

The Friends of Speedy TV are offering up a challenge today to make a gatefold card.  If I am right, I suggested this little challenge.  I wanted my Black Eyed Susan to be the star of the show, so I left the design fairly simple.  I did sponge ink on my focal and sentiment panels and the edges of the patterened paper.  When you open up this little gem, the sentiment opens to the left and the image opens to the right. 

I want to wish you all a belated Happy New Year and wish you all wonderful adventures for 2012!

Sorry for the short post today :)  My daughter and I are off to have fun on our very last day of winter break.  It's back to school for both of us tomorrow.

Details-  Stamps:  Black Eyed Susans mini (MFP), Peaceful Nuthatch (MFP); Paper: Chocolate Chip, Old Olive, Whisper White, Sweet Pea dsp; Ink: Rich Cocoa; Accessories: Copics, Nestabilities, word window punch, modern label punch, sponge dauber, stampin' dimensionals.