So, I Went To A Crop

A friend held a fundraiser all-day crop yesterday, and a bunch of us attended. Even as I packed the car I still wasn't even sure what I'd be working on all day, but I had a skeleton plan. I brought my Brothers labeler, some card stock variety packs, a box of tiny stamps that needed to be re-packaged and filed, ink and swatches to maybe stamp ... stuff that needed to be organized.

I also had my trusty collection of mini Distress inks, some water color paper, and the contents of my craft desk top, including trimmer, tools, etc. Oh, and black inks and acrylic blocks. And my MISTI, of course.

So, 10 hours to play, and not a lot of planning. Funny, but a lot of us did the same thing ... some people brought their Copics to update their color charts. But crafters being crafters, we also all brought enough "other things" that between the 10 of us, we managed to have enough stuff to actually make things, which is always nice when you have 10 hours to fill. I kinda love that about us.

After I'd labeled all my card stock and tiny stamp sets, I stared at my Tim Holtz Bird Crazy birds set that I'd brought for someone else to play with, and then realized I'd only brought water color paper, no plain white card stock. #FAIL  Hahahaha, but it all worked out, because I used my MISTI with the water color paper to stamp the birds, water color them, then stamp them again after coloring. I love how that crisps up the image.

Here's one of the bird cards I made:

These guys are so fun to play with, but they do seem to need just the right sentiment to go with those expressions. I had to dig through my mini sets and borrowed sets for sentiments at the crop. Next time I might bring a box of irreverent sentiments. They may need to be a traveling staple.

Here are two more bird cards I made:

Fortunately, while I forgot white card stock, other people forgot enough other things that the barter system was well in place, and I received white card stock in exchange for inks and other supplies.

The fun thing about borrowing from others is you tend to use things you wouldn't normally use, like flowers. Yes, I made a flower card. Soooo not me, but I played with Copics and coloring and I like how it turned out.

and some detail with Wink of Stella and Glossy Accents in the flower centers (because I could):

Naturally, we had other things to focus on during the crop. It was to benefit a local High School band, and there were a ton of very generous sponsors. Lots of gift baskets for raffle, mostly of the crafty type. We bought up raffle tickets for the cause, then stuffed our favorite bags with our winning tickets. We kept close watch on each other, and re-stuffed the bags when someone else was spied stealing our personal thunder.

And food. It's all about the food, right? Our lovely hostess provided a home-made lasagna dinner, compliments of her mom, for a small donation to the band. It was soooooo good.

Then, the raffles. We hooted, we hollered, and some of us even won! Oh, and those baskets with 46567645 tickets in them? One of our friends won THREE of those baskets, and she only had one ticket in each basket. We cried FOUL!  And she wasn't even there, which made it even more stunning for us. We contemplated booby-trapping her winnings, but in the end we just issued a plea for sharing of duplicates if she has any. We're nice like that.

In the end, it was a very good day. I love spending time with my fellow crafty peeps. We get each other. It's very reassuring, and always good for the soul.

Thanks for stopping by!

Stuff I used: various colored card stock from my stash, various sentiments, and the following:

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