It's AmberINK's INKredible 21-Day Challenge!

Yes, It's Challenge #5 -- Organize!

Did you know that once upon a time, people lived without sticky notes? (Note careful avoidance of trademarked names... :P) Thank goodness someone recognized this void in our lives! Sticky notes are a powerful organizing tool. Think of the dark days when fluttering, torn scraps of paper were all you could use to, say, mark articles in a magazine to read later! Or flag your favourite recipes to try in a new cookbook! Or denote paragraphs to cite in that important term paper you're writing! Not to mention all the to-do reminders that you can safely and securely stick anywhere you might need them.

Sticky notes don't have to be just plain, however. It takes only a few minutes to turn them into an elegant desk accessory.

Then, whenever need or inspiration strikes, your sticky notes are close at hand:

I made this sticky-note holder using the clear and easy directions at Splitcoast Stampers. On a base of SU Ruby Red cardstock, I layered white cardstock with three different AmberINK iPapers, SpinPin -- Holiday: Black Tie regular & tiny; and Schoolgirl Plaid -- Fire and Ash: Tiny. I could have used a regular golf pencil, but why when I could use a shiny, cow-splatted one! I didn't add ribbon to my holder; when you're brilliant but not patient *wink* you can't take the time to undo a ribbon to get at those sticky notes!
Check out AmberINK's INKredible 21-Day Challenge and join in on the fun... and get organized! ☺

Supplies: white & SU ruby red cardstock, AmberINK iPapers: Spin Pin -- Holiday: Black Tie regular & tiny and Schoolgirl Plaid -- Fire and Ash: tiny, sticky notes, pencil

My First Unity Friends with Flair!

Happy Christmas Eve, or Happy Friday, or happy "I have time to sit at the computer and blog hop"! I thought I'd try playing along with Unity Stamp Company's Friends with Flair blog hop for the first time!

This is a Christmas card I made with Unity's October 2010 Kit of the Month "Take Time to Laugh" and the cute little freebie that came with the November/December issue of Paper Crafts magazine. Although I think of it more as buying the stamp and getting a free bonus magazine. :D I really like these little mittens, and I'm currently addicted to paper-piecing them. They fit nicely on a small scrap of leftover patterned paper, too! ;)
Check out Unity's great deals right now:

You can check out all the blog hop creations by starting at Unity's blog. If you're already hopping, your next stop is Andrea. And remember to watch for the blinkie! ;)

Supplies: SU kraft, green & white cardstock, DCWV Christmas collection dp, Unity October KOM, Brilliance graphite black and Colorbox evergreen inks, clear ep, Studio G gold glitter glue

Tag Days

Although a few distress inks have a happy home with me, Tim Holtz I am NOT. ☺Especially when it comes to tags. Tags go on gifts. People care about the gifts. The tags, not so much. My idea of a tag is cutting a circle or oval from a cute part of one of last year's cards we received, gluing it to a scrap of cardstock, and calling it good. :P But occasionally, I'll take a few more minutes and a bit more thought. As on these:

These are all made using the music background stamp from Local King Rubber Stamp. and are inspired by the November/December issue of Paper Crafts magazine. Yep, I buy a magazine full of card-making ideas, and get inspired by a TAG. Sigh.
Then I made eleven of these:

These are for table presents on the Christmas dinner table. This is my family's alternative tradition to Christmas crackers. Don't you love the happy accident careful planning of the gilding of the branch around the embossed ornament? (That was after I let the green ink dry over dinner AND ran my heat gun over it. It was meant to be.)

Supplies: (music tags) white & red cardstock, Local King Rubber Stamp music background, SU to/from, Memories passion red & Colorbox evergreen inks, patterned papers from DCWV & Karen Foster, hemp twine, Divine twine; (ornament tag) white cardstock, Hero Arts clear stamps, Versamark and Colorbox evergreen inks, gold ep

Done!

... the Christmas baking and shopping, that is. I think. Wrapping and other food prep for the big day, not so much. I did a last baking blowout in the kitchen yesterday, and here's what resulted:

These little morsels of goodness are chocolate orange cookies, from the Moosewood Restaurant Book of Desserts. Orange zest in the crisp cookie, bittersweet chocolate glaze.

Chocolate babka bread, from Canadian Living magazine. And look at the cute loaf pan! Silicone-lined paper gift pans from President's Choice, they even come with red ribbon to tie around in a big bow. Which I'll do after I wrap it in plastic first. This is for a friend who's not quite into cooking the way I am. ☺

Christmas Fun with AmberINK

Did you see me catch that flaming torch from Angela without even singeing my eyebrows? ☺ I thought it would be fitting to CASE one of her cards for my first official torchbearer project:

I really liked the look of this holly image paired with the red snowflake lace iPaper. I decided to pretend the greenery was mistletoe, so I left the berries white. :P A little green cardstock, a couple of dimensionals for the holly panel, a little peapod baker's twine from the Twinery, and done.
Then I decided I wanted to play with my recent AmberINK blog hop winnings! I had fun making a gift bag for AmberINK's recent challenge, so I decided to make another one:

The images are from Fish Wishes, which is a great set to use beyond Christmas, too. The images are coloured with Prismacolor pencils with a little baby oil for blending, and then backed with some light blue cardstock from my stash. (I'll try for a better pic if we see some sun later...)
Thus ends my first official Torchbearing post! Stay tuned... a new INKredible 21-Day challenge starts next week!
Supplies: (card) white & green cs, Tis the Season to be Pretty Holly Bunch, Red Snowflake Lace iPaper, watercolour pencils, Twinery peapod baker's twine, dimensionals; (gift bag) bag, white & blue cs, Best Fishes Lure the Tree, Holiday Fishes & Puffy Santa, Prismacolor pencils, baby oil,  eyelet, raffia

Exciting News!

I'm still having trouble believing it, but I've been asked to be a December AmberINK torchbearer! The talented Angela has entrusted me with the Orange torch. Check out her great work here.

For the next month, I'll be posting projects using AmberINK's digital stamps and iPapers alongside four other torchbearers:

Alyssa Scrithfiel

Laurel Seabrook

Jane Millard

Cheryl Ann First
Check out AmberINK's blog for more info on all of us! And check out all of AmberINK's fabulous digital stamps, clear sets and iPapers. I'll be back tomorrow (Tuesday) with my first Torchbearer project... please come back and share in my excitement!

I won a prize on the AmberINK blog hop!

The awesome Julie at The Last Minute Crafter was nice enough to let me know I should check her blog... and when I did, I found out that I won a prize from the talented ladies at AmberINK!!! It was a fun blog hop... the participants were asked to create a seven course meal (seven procedures, techniques, etc.) for two (colours, that is). Lots of tasty (paper) dishes were created!
I did go shopping today... but it will be a few days, I think, before any finished products appear. Let me just give you a little sneak peek of cuteness...

Party Time!




Play Date Café Challenge #59

Another last-minute card for a challenge... this time for The Play Date Café colour challenge of light blue, darker blue and purple. Colour challenges are, well, CHALLENGING for me! I finally came up with an idea last night instead of sleeping. Here's how it turned out:

This is a variation on a card I did for one of Splitcoast Stampers Hope You Can Cling To challenges. This time I remembered to give my two little squirrels a moon to skate under, masking with a crescent of a post-it note and a torn edge of scrap cardstock. I also used an oval mask to sponge the edge of the skating pond. The squirrels dressed in their new purple sweaters so they would qualify for the challenge. ☺ Next time, I think I'll go back to red squirrels, but I thought gray squirrels were more likely to wear purple. Or something.

Supplies: white & blue cardstock, Squirrel Capades stamp by A Muse, ColorIt gilding pad, Brilliance graphite black & pearlescent sky blue inks, Prismacolor pencils, dimensionals

An INKredible Challenge

AmberINK's current challenge is to wrap it "your way" using their stamps or iPapers. I chose to use two images from their pretty set "Tis the Season" to make a Christmas gift bag.

I paper-pieced the green of the tree with green card stock, then coloured in the trunk and the presents with Sharpies. (The frugal crafter's Copics. ☺) The bows are coloured with a silver gel pen. The tree garland is silver glass glitter, and of course the tree needed a star on top! I shadowed the snow a bit with Brilliance Pearlescent Sky Blue ink.

Supplies: white gift bag, white & green cs, SU siver glass glitter, Copics, silver gel pen, Sandylion star sticker, Brilliance Pearlescent Sky Blue ink, Twinery peapod baker's twine

OLW31 and... Cookies!

Susan Raihala's current one layer card challenge is to create a card that highlights the technique or product that first got you hooked on stamping. You can read all about it here. Well for me, that's heat embossing. Many people seem to outgrow their need to emboss everything. Me, not so much. So here's my one-layer, golden take on the challenge:

I don't buy a lot of Stampin' Up stamps, but Christmas Postcard called out to me. Happens once in awhile.
And in other news... the Christmas baking has begun.

Pecan shortbread... as long as these get made first, I'm pretty much free to make whatever I want after that. ☺

Supplies: cream cs, SU Christmas Postcard stamp, Versamark ink, gold ep, red watercolour marker

Mittens

I recently received the Unity October 2010 Kit of the Month, which I picked up during one of their recent sales. (Thank you, Unity!) These mittens are so far one of my favourites from the set:

I paper-pieced the mittens using a scrap of patterned paper, added a few Stickles to the heart at the top of the image, and kept everything else pretty simple. Which is generally how I like to keep my cards. ☺

Supples: white & blue cs, DCWV Chriestmas Stack dp, Unity October KOTM, Brilliance graphite black & Colorbox royal inks, clear ep, tiara Stickles

December Birthdays

While I really love making Christmas cards, it was rather nice to take a break and make a birthday card yesterday for a friend with a birthday next week. This is NOT the card I made:

Well, I did make this card, but back in September at a card store in Vancouver when we were out there. It's okay, but not really me. On my own, I wouldn't choose green and brown for my flower colours. (Aren't brown flowers dead?) I got to colour the two background flowers, but not the popped-up one, and I like to think I might have shaded it a little better than it is. But maybe that's just me. ☺ It was fun to try Copics for the first time, but there's only so much shading you can do with 2 browns and 2 greens, especially when they forget to give you the lighter green until after you've finished colouring.
Anyway... I liked the general design and wanted to try it again with my own slant. Here's what resulted:

In my head, it was done in mauves with a different flower, but it ended up in pink and black with the lily image instead. Funny how that happens. Instead of Copics, which I don't have, I watercoloured the main lily with the distress ink. 

Supplies: white & black cs, Recollections dp, SU Fifth Avenue Floral lily, Unity October 2010 KOTM sentiment, Worn Lipstick Distress ink, clear ep, dimensionals

My Favourite?

I was looking at this year's stack of Christmas cards, trying to see if I have a favourite of the ones I've made so far this year. It might just be this one:

Why? Well, it has music (one of these days I might try to play it, before I cut into all of it) that Joy sentiment is kinda cool, and the card as a whole has some interest to it without getting fussy. At least, I think so.

Supplies: SU Very Vanilla and black cs, SU Newsprint dsp, Brilliance graphite black and Colorbox cranberry inks, clear ep, corner-rounding punch, red ribbon scrap, dimensionals, rhinestone

First Post

So here it is, a blog, something I really never thought I'd do. But thanks to the urgings of blogging friends (thanks Emily, Angela and Meg!), I'm giving it a go. Who knows, maybe it will become an obsession! The plan is to have my own little place to post my papercrafting creations, to talk about cooking (another hobby of mine) and who knows, maybe have a forum for the occasional rant! If you've somehow stumbled onto this little corner of the web... welcome! Come back anytime. ☺