You know you're from Colorado when...

 

...it's ok to post a snow themed card on the second day of Spring! :) I made this card Sunday night while the snow was lightly falling and I really love how it turned out! I pulled out my "daisyboardabella" stamp from Stamping Bella for the very first time! I know, crazy! She was another stamp that I had somehow managed to forget about and once I found her, she was calling my name! 

So to make this card I used Jen's Sketch For You To Try. It was another sketch that had jumped out at me so I am glad I got to use it! I colored Bella with my Copics and added some glitter to her board. The paper is from an older Cosmo Cricket Christmas pack but I thought it fit the theme of this card perfectly! I then used my Snowflakes embossing folder on my strip and cut out some snowflakes using my Snowflake sizzlits. 

 

That's it for today's post! Enjoy your Wednesday everyone! 

Welcome Spring!

Happy Spring! Is everyone else extremely glad to see Spring arrive? Even though I live in the mountains and see snow on the ground when I look outside my window, I'm still relieved to know that we are almost done with the cold weather! For some reason, this winter seemed to drag on forever. I was a little worried we would never make it to March 20th!

Anyway, I'm back to share this pretty card with you. I made it for a dear friend of mine who has been a huge blessing in my life lately. I had completely forgotten that I owned these stamp sets until digging through my supplies the other day and I am SO glad I found them! Both sets are from Rubbernecker and I had picked them up at a local craft a few years ago. The sentiment is from the set called Floral Silhouettes and the flower image is from the set called Wild Flower. Isn't it a gorgeous stamp?

To make my card I used this past week's Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge. I fell in love with this sketch the minute I saw it and so I was excited to get to play! I also stumbled across the Splitcoast challenge from yesterday which was to use only part of an image on your card. Since my stamp was so big, this challenge was perfect for my card! I colored my flowers with Copics and added glitter to the flower centers. The background was embossed using the Sizzix Damask #3 folder. The dp is some old Stampin' Up! paper I had in my stash and the buttons are old Stampin' Up! Baja Breeze corduroy buttons.

Here is a detailed shot of the flowers.

 

Thanks for stopping by today! I hope some of you are blessed with warmer weather than we are today. It is currently only 30 degrees here and it's almost 2:00! Yuck!

A Halloween Pumpkin

Woah! Two posts in two days! It's a miracle! :) Ok, so I have a card that I have been DYING to share with you! I must say that I am really pleased with how it turned out! I have been itching to play with some yummy Unity so I pulled out this old Kit of the Month from Sept. 2009 and found this adorable pumpkin that had yet to see ink! I stamped it on some SU! watercolor paper and then colored it with my markers and blender pen. I just love this coloring technique and hadn't used it in awhile.  Anyway, I paired it with some fun Cosmo Cricket Nutmeg paper and found the sentiment from the SU! set called All Holidays. The sketch is an old Splitcoast sketch challenge that I thought would be perfect for today's card. I guess I love that it's fairly simple yet detailed at the same time. Does that make any sense? Haha!

I made a video showing the process of creating this card as well. If you are interested, I would love for you to watch it! :) You can either find the video at the end of this post or click on this link to watch it directly on YouTube.

Here is a detailed look at the image.

And since it's been awhile since I've shared a picture of my sweet little Addison with you, here are a few pictures of us from our trip to the pumpkin patch this weekend! :)

Here is the video for today's card:

By LORi Designs Challenge: BLD5

It's time for another By Lori Designs Challenge and I'm running behind! My card has been done for quite some time but I completely forgot to post it to my blog! I guess you can say I've been a little distracted while I've been here in Iowa! I can't even believe how crazy busy Addie and I have been! It's nuts! We've been visiting family and friends non-stop! :)

Now on to today's card! This week's challenge is an AWESOME color combination! I absolutely LOVE it and the image I used is perfect for it! I must admit that this may just be one of my very favorite images from Lori Designs and the reason for that is because it is called "Baby Addy". Now I know the spelling is different but it still holds a dear place in my heart! I mean seriously, how cute is she??? I think she kind of even looks like my baby Addie! :) Anyway, the paper I used is some retired Stampin' Up! designer paper (I can't remember the name of it). The sketch is one of the Viva la Verve sketch challenges from this month and the image was colored with my copics. 

Well thanks so much for stopping by today! I hope you have time to play in today's challenge! There are some awesome opportunities in store for you! Each week the team will vote on a TOP Lollipop CARD and that designer will receive a digi from the BLD Shop and will have an opportunity to be our guest designer for the following challenge. How awesome is that??? Make sure you stop by the By LORi Designs challenge blog to see what the other lovely ladies have created! Have a fantastic Thursday!

Kraftin' Kimmie Seeing Red!

 

Last week's Kraftin' Kimmie challenge was to create a card using lots of red. Well my card didn't turn out exactly as I had pictured in my head but I still think it looks alright. I pulled out Charlotte again for this challenge and paired her with some more Cosmo Cricket Garden Variety dp. I just think this designer paper is so much fun! I can't get enough of it lately! Anyway, I colored her in with my Copics and embellished with some ribbon and buttons! Slowly but surely I am becoming more acquainted with my Copic markers. It's taken me awhile to find my favorite method but I think I finally have it! :) As for the sketch of this card, I used today's Friday Sketchers layout! 

Well, that's it for today's card! I am heading to Iowa next week to see my family so I am not exactly sure how much I will be able to post. I definitely have a few cards lined up though so be sure to stay tuned for those! Thank you so much for stopping by. I appreciate all of my readers so much and am very thankful to those of you who have stuck around with all of my posting lags! :)

 

And in honor of the ornery Charlotte, I wanted to post this hilarious picture of my daughter! She was sound asleep in her bouncer with her finger completely jammed up her nose! Haha! I just had to get a picture of it! She must get that from her daddy! ;)

By Lori Designs Challenge #4 Plus An Announcement!

Edited to add: I played around a bit and tried to take a new picture of my card using better lighting. I was able to get a slightly better picture. Hopefully they only continue to improve!

 I have some VERY exciting news! I was asked to be on the By Lori Designs challenge design team! :) I absolutely LOVE By Lori Designs images so of course I was thrilled to be chosen! Lori creates the most adorable images and they are so much fun to color! I am joined by MANY talented women so be sure to stop by the BLD blog to check them out.

Without further ado, here is this week's color challenge!

This week's color challenge was a little bit of a struggle for me. I can't seem to make a card without using designer paper and I found that the Cosmo Cricket Garden Variety paper was almost a perfect match. It just had some yellow thrown into the mix so I went with it!

My image is from the Sugar Sticks line and it is called "Love You Friend". I love how versatile this image is! It can be used on either a masculine or feminine card and for almost any occasion! I colored the image with my Copics and used this month's Sketch For You To Try as my layout! I sponged the edges with some Antique Linen distress ink and embellished the card with some ribbon and buttons! Overall I absolutely love how my card turned out! The only thing I am disappointed in is the fact that my picture didn't turn out that great. I am still trying to figure out why my photos don't look as bright as they used to. Hopefully I can get it figured out soon!

Thanks so much for stopping by today! I hope you have time to play with this week's challenge!

Happy Birthday To My Amazing Husband!

 Yesterday was my husband's 28th birthday and I was able to find time to create a birthday card for him! Let me tell you, finding time to create a card hasn't been as difficult as finding time to actually to actually take a picture and upload it to my computer! Haha! I've had 4 cards sitting on my desk this week just waiting for their picture to be taken. Anyway, I decided enough was enough and that I needed to share these with you so I am! :) 

So back to my husband's birthday card, he absolutely loves moose (I think I've mentioned that a time or two before) and so of course I had to use this adorable Ed the Moose stamp from Kim Hughes and pair it with the fun little mountain image from the Bear Hugs set. The Mr. Campy dp from Cosmo Cricket was the perfect pair to these images as well! I used this week's Mojo Monday sketch challenge as the layout, colored the images with my Copics and sponged the edges with some Tim Holtz distress inks.

Let's just say Nick liked the card. After he opened it he said "This is your best card yet!" WOOHOO! :) That definitely made my day! 

Of course I can't end this post without sharing a picture of us with our own mountains! :D They look little in this picture but that they definitely are not! :)

 

Thanks for being patient with me these past few weeks! I promise things will get better, it's just taking me time to adjust! Stay tuned for tomorrow's card as well as a fun announcement!

Bee Mine

Taylored Expressions Blast From the Past Blog Hop!

 

Welcome to Taylored Expresions' Blast From the Past Blog Hop! This month's blog hop theme is LOVE so of course I had to pull out my very favorite TE set called "Love is Sweet"! This set has some of the cutest images in it and I am very partial to this kissing cuppie image! Isn't is SO cute? :) I stamped them and colored them with my Copics. I then cut them out and popped them up on some old book paper that I had lying around! The sketch I used is the Viva La Verve sketch challenge #2 and I paired it with some more BasicGrey Bittersweet dp! I used my swirls CB embossing folder to emboss the panel behind the main image and then tied some fancy ribbon on! As a final touch I sponged all of the edges with some Tim Holtz Antique Linen distress ink and then added some pretty pearls to the corner of the card!

So now that you've seen my card, make sure you check out everyone else who is participating in today's fun blog hop! Also, if you haven't already, please stop by the Taylored Expressions blog to see all of the details!

Thanks so much for hopping by my blog today! I should be coming home from the hospital at some point today (I HOPE) so make sure you check out my blog candy a couple posts below in celebration of my daughter's arrival! :)

The Frog Prince???

I'm still in the hospital after having my c-section so this is being posted in advance! Don't forget to enter my blog candy drawing down below while I'm away!

For today's card I decided to pull out another adorable Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps image called "Lillith"! I fell in love with her the minute I saw her! She just looks so ornery, doesn't she! :) Anyway, as I was sitting at my desk trying to think of a sentiment to go with her I realized that she reminded me very much of The Frog Prince! Why else would she have a frog sitting on her head??? Haha! I then found the sentiment "Kiss Me" from Kim Hughes' set called the Birds and the Bees and decided to use it! I colored her with Copics and decided to color and cut out the cute little froggie stamp that comes with her so that it would look like the frog was saying it! What a perfect Valentine from a guy to his gal! I think it's so cute! As for the rest of this card, the sketch is from last weeks Viva La Verve sketch challenge #3 and of course I had to enter it into the Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps challenge which was to include flowers on the card! The paper is from Cosmo Cricket and that is where I pulled my colors from.

Well I really hope you enjoyed today's card! I REALLY enjoyed making it. I am finding that I am getting much more advanced with my Copics and I owe it all to the fabulous stampers in blog land! Thanks ladies! :)

I'm Nuts About You Valentine!

Isn't he CUTE??? I just love this stamp set called "You're So Punny" by There She Goes!  I wanted to create a fun Valentine's Day card for my husband and knew this little squirrel would be perfect! However, Nick saw the card and said "Did you make this for me??" Haha! Of course he was excited about it but obviously he knows me way too well! Anyway, I colored the squirrel with my copics and did quite a bit of sponging on this card. I used Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch from last week and combined it with more of my BasicGrey Bittersweet dp. 

This is going to be a short post for today because I am getting ready to head out for our hotel so that we can be at my c-section bright and early tomorrow morning! Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we enter into these next few days! I'm not going to lie and say I'm not a little nervous about it! :) 

Also, stay tuned for some BLOG CANDY!

Cutie Patootie!

Well I was originally planning on sharing another Valentine's Day card with you but then I decided to get crafty today and came up with this card instead! :) I have had this stamp from Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps for over a year and it has never seen ink! GASP! I know, I know, I'm a bad stamper. Anyway, I bought it just after Kimmie had her very first release and then I ended up taking a stamping hiatus. I knew when I saw her I had to get her though. I find her absolutely adorable but for some reason she creeps my husband out a little! Haha! It's a good thing he doesn't get a say! ;) Her name is Charlotte and I must say that she was so much fun to color! I paired her with some of my older Paper Studio dp from the Serendipity line. She was then colored with my Copics (which I'm still attempting to learn how to use). Since I was using her I decided to go ahead and participate in this past week's Kraftin' Kimmie Stamps challenge which called for no ribbon or fibers! YIKES! I hope my flowers don't count as fibers but I thought they looked so cute with the image! Since I find her to be so cute, I am also entering this card into today's Paper Play challenge which is called "Cutie Patootie". The sketch started out as this week's SCS sketch challenge but I quickly discovered that my image didn't fit so I had to flip it instead. I really like the layout still though! As a final touch, I embossed some buttons across the bottom and distressed the edges with some Tim Holtz Antique Linen distress ink. 

Well, I think that is about it! Stop by tomorrow for the Flourishes Timeless Tuesday blog hop! I'm SO excited to share my card with you! :)

P.S. For those of you who are wondering, my blog candy will be posted on a VERY SPECIAL DAY. That is my hint for you, if you've been following my blog lately, you will know exactly what day I'm talking about! :)

Beautiful Baby

Good evening everyone! Sorry I'm a little late with my posting today but I wanted to finish reorganizing my craft room and I think I can officially say it's finished! :) I have a few projects I want to work on but they are nothing big. I'll be sure to show you pictures of it later on!

Now on to today's card! I decided to make a baby card in honor of my dear sweet baby girl and my original plan was to post it on Monday since that is when she will be here but I realized that the challenges I used for this card will be expiring before then! Haha! I again combined a bunch of different challenges and I am really pleased with the way it turned out! First of all, this sweet little image is called "Ella the Elephant" and it is from By Lori Designs. If you have never checked out their store, you definitely need to! They have the most adorable digital images! The By Lori Designs challenge this week was to use the colors dark pink, light pink, blue, and green. Go to their blog to see the color swatch that is posted. I decided to pull out my fun My Mind's Eye "Just Dreamy" paper pack and pull the colors from there! It was just perfect for this color challenge! The sketch is from the Stamptacular Sunday Challenge. Since this is a baby card it also qualifies for the Cupcake Inspirations Challenge AND the  Scrap, Stamp & Doodle Saturday challenge which was called "New Beginnings". As if that wasn't difficult enough, I also decided to play in the Paper Works Recipe Tuesday challenge which requires you to use 3 patterned papers (one of my patterned paper pieces is actually the sentiment), 3 embellishments, and an animal. Finally, the last challenge I took part in was the Paper Sundaes challenge which required you to include circles somewhere on the card. :) 

Well I think that's it for today's card! Stay tuned for tomorrow's card and don't forget that I have some fun blog candy coming up! Thanks so much for stopping in! Enjoy the rest of your Wednesday!

 

And here is a little updated picture of our nursery and my belly! I still can't get over how big I've gotten! 5 more days! :)

Hi Tweetie!

 

Are you ready for another Valentine's Day card? I'm telling you, it's an addiction! :) I honestly wish I had more Valentine's designer paper but I don't so you will just have to bear with me! 

So for this card I decided to pile on the challenges! I was able to combine so many of them! First of all, the images are from Clear Dollar Stamps in the set called "Love Tweet Love". This is a really fun digital image set with 3 images and 4 sentiments! The best part, it only cost me $3! What a deal! :) Anyway, I decided to use it for the Clearly iStamp challenge called "Love is Sweet". I also pulled the colors from the inspiration challenge over on Crazy 4 Challenges and since I was using these cute birds I decided to enter it in the Our Creative Corner inspiration challenge as well! The sketch is from The Sweet Stop challenge and I also decided to enter this card into the BasicGrey challenge which was to use dots or spots. Finally, I saw that this past week's JUGS challenge was to decorate and line a matching envelope so I went ahead and did that as well! :) PHEW! Talk about a challenge! It wasn't easy trying to include every challenge but I managed to do it! 

The designer paper is from BasicGrey's Bittersweet line and the buttons are some I just happened to have in my stash! I have been in a "distressed mood" lately (hehe) so I sponged and roughed up the edges and added a little bit of sewing as my final touch!

Well, I hope you enjoy today's card! I have been working on organizing and purging my craft room this week. I have a couple of projects that I created to help my organization so I will be sharing those with you throughout the next couple of weeks! Also, stay tuned for some blog candy! Purging means sharing! :)

Birthday Penguins!

Welcome to another Monday! In exactly a week, I will be holding my baby girl in my arms! That is so crazy to think about! :) Anyway, I wanted to share this fun card that I made this past week. Isn't this image from The Cat's Pajamas great??? I just love this set called "Smells Like Cake". I wanted to participate in the TCP Tuesday inspiration challenge as well as Jen del Muro's Sketch For You To Try so I pulled this little cutie out! I decided to keep it gender neutral since I seem to always be short on masculine cards. I think I did an ok job on it!

As for the card details, the image was colored with my copics and the sentiment was stamped in versamark and then heat embossed with white embossing powder. I added some stickles to the cupcake and party hats for a little added dimension. I then used some retired SU! paper and added a corduroy button with a little ribbon embellishment to finish up the look!

I hope you all have a fantastic Monday! I have absolutely LOVED being able to post a card daily this weekend and I hope to keep them coming! I am going to try and get a bunch made so that I can have some ready to post when I'm recovering from my c-section! I don't want to fall out of the habit of posting again!

Sweet Love Birds!

So I must warn you. Since Christmas is over, I've been on a HUGE Valentine's kick. I just can't stop making Valentine's Day cards! They are so much fun to make. Maybe it's the colors, I'm not sure but either way, I have lots of them to show you!

For today's card, I used this past week's Mojo Monday sketch challenge. The sketch was a lot of fun to work with and I knew these cute birds from the Birds and the Bees set by Kim Hughes would be perfect! By the way, this just happens to be my favorite Valentine's set so you may see quite a few cards using it! :) Anyway, I also decided to use the color challenge from Flourishes on it and I ended up throwing in a little brown as well. Hope that's ok! The papers used for this card are retired papers from SU! I sponged the edges with Tim Holtz distress ink and then sewed around the outside and on the little pink strip. The images were colored with my Prismacolor pencils and I added a little twine so that I could qualify for the SCS Ways to Use it Challenge.

Well I hope you enjoyed today's card! Not much to update you on as far as this baby is concerned. I've had quite a few contractions but they haven't led anywhere yet. As for other news, we are getting snow today! I am absolutely LOVING it! When I sit at my stamping desk I am directly facing the windows and it has been just gorgeous today!

Thanks so much for stopping by! Be sure to take a peek at tomorrow's card (which surprisingly isn't for Valentine's Day). Until then, have a great Sunday evening!

Peaches Anyone?

Doesn't a peach just sound amazing right now? Ok, so maybe that is my pregnant belly talking but seriously, I could go for some yummy peaches right now! Peaches in January are a little hard to come by so I decided to share this pretty card with you instead! It reminds me so much of summer and even though I'm not ready for summer yet, I'm sure some of you are! Here in Colorado we have had hardly any snow at all. Surprising, huh? However, back in Iowa where I grew up, they are SICK of it!

So about this card. I used one of my absolute favorite Flourishes set called Peaches and Cherries. I paired it with some super old dp that I had stashed away. In fact, I think this dp was the very first set that I had ever purchased when I started stamping! Crazy! :) I also used some fun plaid ribbon and pretty pink pearls to embellish this card. The peaches were colored with my Copics and I added the sentiment as a tag!

Well I hope you are enjoying your Saturday! I was able to spend some time with my good friend Leanne this morning and it was some much needed girl time! Other than that, it's been a very relaxing day and I must say I needed that relaxation! :)

Give Thanks!

Can you believe October is almost over? Time seems to be flying lately and it's starting to freak me out a little! My baby girl is going to be here in about 14 weeks! Woah! It's super exciting yet kind of scary at the same time!

So one thing I AM loving about time flying is the fact that this hot weather seems to have run out! I am quickly learning how NOT fun it is to be pregnant in warm weather! These fall temperatures have me feeling SO wonderful! I have always loved fall but I seem to love it even more now! I have really enjoyed watching the leaves change colors and snow has already started to cover the mountain tops! Beautiful!

I am also really looking forward to Thanksgiving because that will be the last trip Nick and I will be able to take to Iowa for quite a while! I have really missed my family and it's going to be so neat to see their reactions to my growing belly! Thanksgiving is such a joyous time for our family and to top it off, I will be having baby showers while I'm visiting! Woohoo!

Ok, enough rambling, on to today's card! In the spirit of fall, I decided to post a Thanksgiving card that I made for the GinaK sketch challenge last week! I used Theresa Momber's fall set! I just love her designs because of how realistic they look! I used the wheelbarrow and instead of leaving it empty, I cut out some pumpkins and stuck them in there! I also stamped the little vine in the corner and stamped some leaves and the sentiment for my circle piece. As a finishing touch I added a little bit of twine that reminded me of fall in Iowa (hay bales)!

Well, I hope you are all enjoying your Friday! I am SO excited for Saturday because that means spending time with my sweet husband!

Patterned Pines Joy!

So does anyone else agree that my sporadic posting needs to come to an end? This pregnancy has just stolen all of my mojo from me! I'm 26 weeks pregnant and finally feel as if my creativity is coming back! I made 5 cards this week! Woohoo! I went downstairs and showed them to my husband and he said "Look! You've still got it!" Haha! That definitely made my day!

Anyway, this is a card that I made for Tuesday's SCS color challenge and Julee's Mojo Monday sketch challenge! The color challenge was to use Pink Pirouette, Real Red, and Pear Pizazz. Well I don't have Pear Pizazz so I went with Old Olive instead and I really like the finished look! I used the Patterned Pines set (for the first time) that I got out of last year's SU! Holiday Mini catalog! I couldn't believe it had never seen ink and then I remembered that my stamping kind of died off right after I had received it. :( I plan on using it A LOT more this winter though!

My friend Christine sent me the newest SU! catalog a couple of weeks ago (Thanks so much Christine!) and I have LOVED looking at all of the new stuff they have out! Sadly, we are VERY short on cash this winter since I lost my job and my husband doesn't have much work lined up until spring so I will have to be patient with my wish list. I suppose I have plenty to use here anyway!

Well, I think that's all I have for you today! Thanks so much for stopping by and to all of you subscribers that have stuck with me so far, YOU ROCK! I appreciate you all SO much!