Good Morning All!
Here it is Thursday and I haven't posted anything since last Friday, can we say "slack"?
FCD posts a new challenge each Sunday for the Design Team, we can participate if we want but it is not mandatory; this weeks challenge was basically just a background. The background is so "not me" that I figured it would be a good personal challenge to try to do something like it. So I decided to play along and made a card with the challenge background as my inspiration. First here is the challenge piece:

(sorry for the size)

Using my October stamp set Tumbling Scarecrow I decided to use one of the verses included which talks about the smells and sights of fall. Using fall colors as my palette this is the card I came up with.

As you can see this is way outside my usual style, but you know, I kind of like the way it turned out! :)  I used a piece of printed card stock from Club Scrap as the background mat, then I covered that with a piece of burlap looking, straw feeling material. I used various ink colors to swipe color directly on the material, this gave me license to put as many fall colors as I wanted into the paper pieces attached on top. These pieces came from various papers I had on hand, I did ink the edges to sort of bring them all into the color palette. Then I took a piece of the original mat paper and used a Fiscars border punch and attached it just under the edge of the straw material. Taking the verse from FCD stamp set I inked with versamark, black ink and clear embossed,  then cut out each part of the verse so I could fit it on the small piece of mat paper. The frame is from Spellbinders which when cut out gives you the small mat piece used for the verse. Clear as mud??

Ok, the frame was used as a stencil as well as a die cut so I could color in the open areas and then smooshed it into versamark and Utee'd. I did this twice to get the gloss I was looking for. The little apple embellies are from the Tumbling Scarecrow set as well and of course I had to Utee them to make sure they showed up. There you go, a card which uses the Challenge, makes me think outside my normal style and an acceptable card at that!  Challenges can be such a "good thing"!!

Thanks for stopping by, leave me your thoughts and comments. Hope your day is as bright as the colors of fall!!

FCD Blog Hop: Autumn Creations using Mesh!

The official start time of this Hop is Friday, at 8:00 AM (EST). If you arrived early, please be patient as all the links may not be live yet. Welcome to the second Blog Hop for the newly named Design Team. I am so excited about being here and hope you will enjoy hopping around and visiting all the sites, make sure you leave a comment at each of your hops because there will be a Prize awarded to one lucky hopper! For this Blog Hop our inspiration was to make something with the theme  Autumn Creation using MESH.  Since my set for this month is Tumbling Scarecrow you would think this would soooo easy. The autumn part yes…….the mesh part…not so easy for me! I will freely admit, I am mesh challenged! What do you do when you are challenged to make something but you are challenged at or with the materials?? I go to Splitcoast Stampers for ideas!!! I didn’t find an idea that had mesh incorporated into the design but I found a project that a mesh challenged person could use mesh with. So here is my take on the Pillow Box Bucket! You will notice  you are supposed to use  Sizzix pillow box die cut for the sections which I didn’t have but I did have Spellbinders Curved Rectangles which I substituted.  After following all the other instructions carefully I think it worked just fine….

 
From the top you can see the candy inside and I used mesh!

Did I cheat? No, I used mesh it just isn’t attached! Besides I think the mesh adds a lot to the overall effect of the bucket! My little horsey buddy will love getting this for Halloween!
However, I just couldn’t leave well enough alone, no I had this notion running around in my head about making a “journal”. You know one of those where we take a regular composition book and then decorate it, I guess technically it would be called an altered composition book….whatever! This stamp set is just so adorable I started working on an “altered” composition book and you know what? I love the way this turned out, it even has mesh incorporated into the design!! Do you see it? It’s the spider web, use your imagination!! LOL Take a look!

These are pumpkins in a Pear Tree …grin….  Here are a couple more views of the book!

back cover

  inside front with custom bookplate

Inside the back cover….I used stickers to spell out “the end”. Fun, huh??

Ok, so off you go to visit  Melisa  to see the wonders she has designed for Autumn Creations with Mesh!! Then you will follow Melisa’s link to the next stop and so on until you wind up at Pamela’s!! Don’t forget to leave comments and your email address at each hop stop to be eligible for the Blog Candy!!!

Pamela has provided a coupon for 15% off during this blog hop, the coupon ends at the same time the hop ends....Monday 8:00 EST.  Code for the coupon is hopidays (magazines are not included)



check out Firecracker Designs by Pamela for a sneek peek of some Christmas goodies, oh man are they adorable!!!


Good Luck, have a great time and enjoy all the eye candy!!
I am so glad you stopped by!!

Attention: Blog Hop is Eminent.....starts Friday at 8:00 am

Count Your Blessings

Here is my take on the FREE digital stamp available at Firecracker Designs by Pamela. I also entered it in the LSC241 (Limited Supplies Challenge) for today's challenge on Split Coast Stampers.
What makes the digital stamp so great to work with is you can size it to fit whatever size card you are making. This card is a 7X5, but you could make any size you want because your image is totally sizeable. Paper is all from Club Scrap except for the image which was printed on SU! vanilla. I find this paper to be practically perfect for using watercolors and markers on ~ which just happens to be the technique used here. The little frilly fronds are from another Club Scap kit, they were just cut out and used as a decorative corner. The outline of the mat has a thin line of gold Krylon to make it stand out. Whatcha think? Pretty easy card but has some "umph" to it.
If you haven't already downloaded your Feebie, click here and get yourself this awesome stamp!

FREE Digital Stamp from FCD?!!

Yep, that's right, there is a FREE Digital Stamp from Firecracker Designs by Pamela! Keeping with the wonderful and classy designs of Pamela's stamps, this digital stamp is very classy and just in time to make Thanksgiving Day or Autumn cards.
I am working on mine today and will have it posted soon but you can see a couple of finished cards for ideas here and here.
TaDa.....here it is! Isn't is perfect for this time of year. When you go to Pamela's site she has instructions on how to copy it, scroll to the bottom area of the page and look for the download. I hope you enjoy this "freebie" as much as FCD's has enjoyed providing it for you. Be sure to tell us what you think!!

Select Christmas Stamps Sets on Special!!

Select stamp sets on Special!

October is Breat Cancer Awareness Month

In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month I did this card. Using "pink" which is the choice of color from NBCA Organization, I used paper from Club Scrap's Kit for a Cause" and SU! vanilla. The saying is also from CS's kit. I tried to make a card that would be encouraging and delightful to receive. The pearls are just to make it bit more feminine. Thanks for dropping in!

Al Foil (with Metallic paper)

    This card was made to celebrate World Cardmaking Day! You will find a link on the right side of my blog so you can go to this special sight and visit all the different links; feasting your eyes on all the beauty! I am on my way over just as soon as I describe my card! :)
   I love the colors in this card!! The base cardstock is from Club Scrap, the designer paper is DCWV's Once Upon a Time, stamping of the verse and leaf was done on SU! vanilla. Al foil (a Technique Junkie technique) was done on some metallic paper I had on hand rather than using aluminum foil. I used a Cuttlebug embossing folder to get the design but I cannot even begin to tell you the alcohol ink colors used because I kept adding ink until I came close to a color in the designer paper. 
    When stamping the verse (from FDC by Pamela's Tumbling Scarecrow set) I used Memories black and versamark, clear embossed and cut it with a Spellbinder and matted on two more Spellbinder sizes using different parts of the designer paper. The corner in the top left was cut from yet another area of DCWV's paper as well as the bottom right corner. I'm not sure you can tell from the picture but there is a fancy A popped on the decorative square which stands for "Autumn". The leaf is from FCD by Pamela, it was stamped in gold and versamark then clear embossed; I added some other colors to the leaf then utee'd twice before mounting.All in all I am very please with the final result. I hope you like it as well. Thanks for stopping by, don't forget to check out the link to the World Cardmaking Blog and enjoy!!