B&W + Color (Last)

During last night's Clean Sweep, I took a few minutes to finish these cards, mostly so they did not end up on the Scrap Heap, ne'er to be seen again. I originally had a green card base, but once I cut the green down to just a layer and put it on a white base - voila!

I have two different vertical Happy Birthday stamps (embarrassing, yes), and I stamped one of them here (mostly straight), then drew some green highlights on the letters with the Gable Green marker. I thought it looked nekkid otherwise.

I made four of those, then I went in search of the vertical Thank You stamp I just knew I had so I could make four Thank You cards. Unfortunately, the sneaky bugger has gone underground and cannot be found, or else I never really owned one in the first place. Highly unlikely, but you just never know. It was getting late, so I grabbed my Just A Note stamp and made four of this version instead. Yeah, it's stamped crooked. Surprise, surprise.

The ribbon is retired SU Apple Green, and I think it goes just fine with the Gable Green layer! Wow, at this rate, I'll finish the whole Apple Green spool by, oh, I don't know, maybe 2014? I swear I barely made a dent with eight cards. This was definitely a SABLE (Supplies Available Beyond Life Expectancy) moment.

So all the B&W is behind me now, at last! Today's workshops went very well, and all the projects were well-received. We even had two saves, which are always exciting and force us to stretch our collectivie creativity. My customers think I am real smart when we have these Save Opportunities, but I told them that I mess up so much all by myself, I've "been there, done that" so many times that I know all sorts of ways to make things look like "I meant to do that". We have a good time, and that's really what it is all about.

Well, time to finish the laundry so I can go to the Day Job in the morning. Thanks for stopping by!

The Curse Of The Creative Mind

My name is Leslie, and I am a hoarder. If I see something I like, I must own it. There is no reasoning behind this, as I certainly do not need anything, but still, it happens. And I know I am not the only one, because every time I shop for stamps and I mutter something out loud like, "I do not need another bird stamp.", the complete stranger (but fellow hoarder) next to me laughs and says, "What's your point?", then we both laugh, shake our heads, and put more stuff into our baskets.

Why does this happen?!?!? Today, I went to Target to buy some plastic wrap and some laundry soap. THAT'S ALL! I did glance at the Dollar Spot, but it was largely empty, so I was safe. But I still had to look, because you never know if there might be something lurking that I needed. Yep, sure enough, I needed these:

Isn't St. Patrick's day just around the corner? Well isn't it? Have I ever, in my entire stamping life made a St. Patrick's Day card? (What's your point?)

Moving on, I happened by the scrapbook section. Like I need stuff from that area, riiiiiight .... But wait, if it is on sale, it's not so bad. Um-hm. So I got some stuff that I just might use some day, including these:

Sigh. I guess I'll add them to my collection of Alphabet stickers.


Then I went in search of a silicone baking thing of small hearts. I saw this very cool post somewhere about how you take your crayon pieces, put them in the heart-shaped cups, and bake them. They all melt together and make really cool embelishments. Naturally, I must own this. Unfortunately, my Target did not have them, so I was saved.

But then I passed the towels on the way to get my plastic wrap. I do not need towels. However, they had some that spoke to me, so I reasoned that my towels are 15 years old, and while they still technically work, I could use a new one. And they were so soft! AND, they inspired me to make a card (after the Clean Sweep).

Can't you just see it? A leafy stamp on, hm, let's say Celery, or maybe Mellow Moss, embossed with Winter White? Hmm? Am I right?!?!?!?! I thought so.


I do believe that is the secret to this hoarding thing: inspiration. I see stuff, I can see what I will make with it, then I buy it. It does not matter if I never get around to making the card that caused me to buy the darn thing, but I suspect this is where 'stash' comes from (from whence 'stash' comes).

So I am glad I did what I did this morning before I headed over to Target. I cleaned. NO KIDDING! I cleaned out a large storage box in The Other Room, then I cleaned out three boxes of stuff! Most of it ended in the cleaned-out storage box, some of it resulted in, "Oh, that's where that is!", and some of it got trashed. Only 198 square feet to go and I'll be done. Sigh. What was in the boxes? Mostly dollar stuff I needed, but have never used. Why do you ask? WHAT'S YOUR POINT?!

Why I Will Never Lose Weight (aka: A Stamper's Lament)

1. I want to get an elliptical machine.
2. I have no room in my Living Room or Dining Room for an exercise machine.
3. To make room in my LR or DR for an exercise machine, I'd have to get rid of the Scrap Heap.
4. To get rid of the Scrap Heap, I'd need somewhere for it to go.
5. Logically, one would think all those scraps belong in The Other Room.
6. I'd need to clear a space on the table in The Other Room to house the scraps.
7. To clear a space on the table in The Other Room, I'd first need to clear a path to the table.
8. Every time I start to work on clearing even a few square inches of a path, I find cool stuff, I get distracted, and I go off to create.
9. I sit at my Dining Room table and make cool cards to post for our collective enjoyment.
10. Sitting so much makes me gain weight.
11. I really need to lose weight, so........
12. Go to 1.

I am doomed.

Yet Another CASE, and Another Bird, Too

Another Lydia CASE; this time it was the card at the beginning of this post. I took her original magnificently simple idea and decided I could not live with so much white space, so I made this instead:

I really like this SU Trendy Trees set! My only challenge is lining up the tree with the trunk. If you want a row of trees, I'd advise you to stamp the trunks first, especially if you think they are going to come out in a straight line, or even close. We all know *I* am genetically incapable of doing that, so do not do as I do, do as I say. I suppose you could use a SAMJ to get the tree tops aligned on the trunks, but I like to live dangerously, so I just eye-balled these. I got pretty close on a couple, too.

For the variegated look on the leafy trees, I colored the stamp with Certainly Celery, Old Olive and Always Artichoke markers.

And that halo over the center tree? If I told you I meant to do that, would you believe me? Nah, didn't think so. I stamped the dotted tree top first, realized I'd missed the tree trunk, so I came back with another more solid top and stamped over it. Eh, it's a mock-up. :-)

Next I have a card that evolved out of another failed project. I started out with my B&W + Color project from earlier this week. I have paired the B&W piece with Gable Green, and let me tell you - it is real purty! I went in search in The Other Room for a piece of paper with Celery and Black in the pattern to add it to the still-boring card, and I found a wonderful piece of paper, but it was Celery and Brown, plus it had birds on it, so I changed my plans and made this:

Isn't that paper cool?!?! It has all those brown bird cages on it, so I paired it with a Choc Chip layer and PTI's Spring Moss for the base. I pulled out my newly-delivered SU bird chipboard and put together that little bird, covering him in a piece of Ski Slope DS paper. I edged the chipboard with Choc Chip marker, and because I am incapable of not slipping (so I always get marker on the front of the DS paper when I try), I went over the top edge of the bird with the marker, too, to ... make it look like I meant to do that.

The do-dads in the top corners are some Thickers I finally opened; the ribbon is from my retired SU Box Of Ribbons; the bird's eye is filled with black Stickles; and finally - the sentiment...that's a rub-on from the SU Chit Chat pack.

And the original B&W + Green card? Still on the table, feeling neglected. I may get to it before the Clean Sweep, and I may not. We'll see. ;-)

Thanks for stopping by!

More Awards!!!!

Sweet Kristie gave me two (TWO) awards today! Woo-hoo!

This first one is the Marie Antoinette award.

This one came with rules - I am supposed to link to the blogger who awarded it to me (see above), post the award (done) and nominate 7 people who deserve it. Seven people !?!?!? Sigh ... When you all travel in the same circle, this is a tough one. I tell ya, one of these days I am gonna make up my own award so I get to go FIRST!

For this next award I'm supposed to nominate 5 bloggers... um, if I do not have 7 for the first award, I certainly do not have 5 for this one. I cannot even give it to the same ones as above, cuz, well, I am one of the Little People.

But I will follow the other rule for this award, and that is to tell you 5 things I am addicted to. Or more correctly, since this is my blog, I am supposed to tell you five things to which I am addicted. There, that's better. ;-)

Okay, here we go:

1. Paper, ribbon, irreverent sentiment stamps - all things related to card-making (I mean, c'mon, it is all I do!)
2. Books. I love to read. Mostly historical novels, but the occasional trashy love story finds its way into the mix now and then.
3. Weird history. Okay, not really addicted, but if I have the TV enabled, it is usually on the History Channel, and it is undoubted something along the lines of 'things you didn't know about {pick a famous person}'.
4. (Running low here ...) Um, er ...
5. ? Can I get extra credit for loading up #1?

I guess I have an addictive personality only when it comes to stamping. Hey, I am a good catch! And a cheap date! Just buy me stamps!!!!!

Okay, that's enough of that. Thanks, Kristie! I feel the love all the way across the big pond(s)!

I'm off to stamp now. Thanks for stopping by!

Smile!

Instead of drying my hair this morning, I took a few minutes to check my Google Reader, and along the way I stumbled upon this video. It is a commercial for T-Mobile, but it is still very cool. Enjoy!



You can find this and more cool stuff at this site. Lauren will especially like the first video, since it contains monstas! :-)

Gotta run to the Day Job now. Thanks for stopping by!

Weather, and Another CASE

Today I woke up to this:

In these parts, this is SNOW. It is WEATHER, as in, "We had some weather today." This has undoubtedly marooned the Post Office Cell Phone Lady from the other day. I am sure she simply cannot leave her house. In most North East or Midwest or Plains states, this is not even worth mentioning. But yes, it snarled traffic, thanks for asking.

And yes, those are dead mums. It's all the rage, didn't you know? Oh, yeah! If you do not have dead flowers in front of your door, man, you are simply not with the program!

Yesterday and today I received my new catalog goodies from Stampin' Up!, so tonight I set in to steal be inspired by this very cool card from Lydia. Here is my version:

I used a circle instead of a heart, largely because I do not own the SU Heart punch, yet. But also because my other three cards for this weekend's workshops/classes are all about love and mushy stuff, and I did not want a sweetness overload or anything like that.

I tried about 12 different ways to make that full moon. I tried punching out a mask, then brayering Pacific Point ink all over the white card stock, but my brayering skills are lacking, so I bagged that idea. Then I tried punching out a circle from a piece of paper, placing it over the 1/4 sheet of Pacific Point (thus masking everything but the circle), filling it in with my Versamark pad and embossing it, but the tree did not stamp very nicely, plus it was work. My customers looooove embossing, but I also want them to be happy with their stamping, so I decided to save the heat gun for another day. Lastly (um, yeah, that's only 3 different things I tried, not 12. Does it count if I tried several versions of each method?) I tried just punching out a white circle and sticking it onto the card front. Duuuh. Too easy.

I used white brads instead of the bling Lydia used ... please hold .... rats! I just noticed we do not offer white brads. Carp! Oh, well, I'll think of something between now and the weekend. Sigh....

I'm closing in on The Clean Sweep, so I'll have to make some cards tomorrow before I clean up. Thursday I have my massaaaaaage, then Friday I am volunteering at the City's Recreation Center for their annual Valentine Family Night. I'll tell you all about that one later. So tomorrow is IT for stamping until next week. I am sure I'll have p-l-e-n-t-y to blog about (about which to blog) though. G'nite, and thanks for stopping by!

Let's Talk Turkey

Isn't this little guy stinkin' cute? I got him, well, I do not remember when I got him, but he had never seen ink, so I used him this weekend! He is Cartoon Turkey from the Kim Hughes Collection at Cornish Heritage Farms. I also bought a lot of her other stuff at the same time, also still virgin. I am weak.

I colored him with my Copics and decided to just layer him on Really Rust to pick up the rust color in the image. (Did you know that red thing between the beak and the eye is called a snood? No, really, look it up!) The ribbon is from my stash of Every Color Red Ribbon But The One I Need Box of Red Ribbons, but in this case it pretty much matches. Fancy that! I even pulled out my Cuttlebug embossing folders and selected a non-feminine one. I think this one looks like hardware washers, and you cannot get much more manly than that!

As for the sentiment, well, you'd think with all the sentiments I have In There, I could have come up with something a little spicier, but then I thought this one would work for Belated Birthday and also maybe as a Sorry card, like if you totally forgot you were supposed to meet someone somewhere (also known to the other person as being stood up, but that phrase ends with a preposition, so I cannot say it. Oh, wait ... drat!)

So anyway, he's cute, and I made three. Done! I am still playing with my B&W card parts, so hopefully I'll have something to post tomorrow. Thanks for stopping by!

Under-Appreciated Holiday Challenge #4

Another February Under-Appreciated Holiday is International Polar Bear Day, which is celebrated on the 27th. Yeah, I know, I am jumping ahead, but if I stay two weeks ahead of the game, I might actually see this challenge thing through the end of the year! So far, it has been working...

Here is my entry for International Polar Bear Day:

I am quite proud of how much stash I used here. The patterned paper is half of an A Muse card, and I had to open the pack to use it. The igloo, oval and sentiment are also A Muse, and the polar bear and sun are from Rosie's Road Show. I used Baja Breeze ink and card stock, along with Very Vanilla. I outlined the igloo and polar bear with my C-1 Copic marker to help them 'pop' off the page. The polar bear was actually stamped on a scrap and cut out because I had no idea where to place him, and this way he was movable until I decided. :-)

Oh, wait, the sentiment is crooked. Sigh ... surprise ....

Did you Know? It is believed that all polar bears are left handed.

Here is a funny I just found from the Feb. 27, 2007 post on Charlie Cray's site: "Did you know (I'm looking at my Greenpeace calendar right now) that today is National Polar Bear Day? Makes me wonder -- 30 years from now, when the Arctic ice sheets disappear during summer, and someone decides that it's a good idea to move some Polar Bears to Antarctica to help them survive (w/o asking the Penguins), will they adapt very well or not? Maybe, like some humans who have been driven into exile, they will become bi-polar."

You can read more about Polar Bears, and see some really cute pics, here.

B&W + Color + Stash = Success!

Many moons ago, I saw this post on June's blog. I do not remember if I already had the exact same cards from Mike's, or if I went out and got them. Either way, they have been in my stash ever since, and I have not spent nearly enough time trying to use them.

For some weird reason, I cleaned a few square inches in The Other Room today and in the process I re-discovered the bag o'cards, and I decided NOW was the time. So sit back, because I have been a busy stamper today!

This first card uses the flocked set of note cards. I cut off the card fronts and layered them on black. I had some cool red ribbon from one of my last sprees at Recollections, and I thought since it was so soft it would be perfect with the flocked design. I also added a skinny black ribbon over it, just, well, because I could, I guess.

I did not want to add sentiments to these, so in my pea brain, boxing them as a set seemed logical. I am not sure why I keep making gift sets of cards, since they do not sell, but who knows, maybe this will be the year I sell a lot of boxes of gift sets. I'll report back on how that effort is going later this summer.

This is the next set of cards I tackled. The cards have a B&W top flap that covers about 2/3 of the width, and there is a dark grey pattern on the exposed inside edge. On each card, I decided to cut off the B&W front piece, cut it in half, and also cut off the dark grey strip from the inside of the card, leaving me with three strips. And this is what I did with them:

I layered the three strips onto an Old Olive panel, leaving the green showing through around all of the pieces. I was afraid it would look too Christmas-y with the Real Red base, but it turned out okay!

I used a piece of shiny green olive-y ribbon from my Box Of Green Ribbons, used some of my never-ending last-year's SAB rub-ons, layered the ovals onto black wide ovals, and added some black bling bling (or 'bing bing', if you are Lauren Cooper) from the same stash where I had found the cards. Not too bad!

I made three of the Love cards (above), and one each of these sentiments.

I decided I'd put enough labor and materials into these that they will be sold as individual cards.













But wait, there's more! The next set of notes also had a 2/3 front plus an inside strip, but this time I decided to work with just the dark grey strip and treat it like SU's Basic Gray. This is what came out:

I paired it with SU's Baja Breeze DS paper, punched a scalloped edge on one side of a Basic Gray strip with my Threading Water punch, put some Stickles in the holes (you know, because I could), dug up some cool, thin, just-the-right-color blue velvet ribbon from my Box of Blue Ribbons.... Then BR #2 called me. I told her what I was working on, and we decided punching hearts out of the patterned pieces would be a cool addition, and she begged me, nay, pleaded with me to please get them straight. Straight, as in line up the pattern so the punched image comes out, you know, even. I tried, okay?

The sentiment is from my trusty PTI set of messages, stamped in Baja Breeze on Vanilla. I doodled around the edge of the circle with my Basic Gray marker.

See those nice, almost-even hearts? I put them on dimensionals, then added Crystal Effects to make them look like epoxy stickers. Why? Because I could!

That's all I have for this evening. I still have the 2/3 parts of these cards left to deal with, plus I have one more set of unopened note cards. Tomorrow is another day! Well, evening, after the Day Job.

Thanks for stopping by!