Happy Monday to all! =)

Hello everyone!  Well, this is my last week of freedom before I go back to school!  I've got lots of crafty plans for this weekend, and also plan to work on cleaning up the house and whatnot.  It's been a super busy but AWESOME summer! 

This past weekend was a TON of fun!  It was my hubby's birthday, so we went out to BRGR (the best burger place ever) for dinner and had a great meal!  Then we went to the State College Microbrew Expo on Saturday with some friends.  It was AWESOME!  So many amazing microbrews!  It was really neat to get to try so many delicious beers and talk to the breweries about how they got started, how they decided to make certain types of beer, etc...  Finally, Sunday the hubs went golfing and I got to see my Dad perform in the local Senior Follies music and talent show!  It's a huge fundraiser for his Aging Agency, and it's always a great time!  We all met up for dinner after too, for a perfect ending to the weekend!  =) 

Ok, so onto the card!  I made this last Friday, but didn't get to post it until today!  This card uses several stamps and stamp companies, and I LOVE how it turned out: 

Can you spy all of the stamp companies on this card?  There's FOUR: Hot off the Press (scroll and border), Studio G (butterfly), Papertrey Ink (Circle), AND Lawn Fawn (sentiment).  I also love that I once again got to use several of my favorite techniques -- distressing and embossing!  The middle strip is embossed with clear powder and then covered with Mustard Seed Distress Ink -- I LOVE this particular stamp/color combination here!  So vivid and pretty!  I also heat embossed the sentiment and used watermark ink for the borders.   I also added some teeny tiny pearls and embroidery floss to finish off the card.  =) 

So, this card was also inspired by a couple of my favorite challenge blogs: 
CR84FN #36 - Yellow, Kraft and Neutral Colors

CAS-ual Fridays #16 - Embossing

Also, don't forget to check out my BLOGOVERSARY GIVEAWAY!  There's only four more days to comment for a fabulous $25 giftcard to your favorite store!  =) 

Casual Fridays #16 and Off the Wall Craftiness #58

Good evening readers!!!  I've really been packing in the crafty time these days since school is about to start!  I can't believe summer is almost over!  Also, did you check out the updated header and design???  I hope you like it! 

At any rate, today I wanted to have some fun with fun colors and embossing, so I played along with two of my favorite challenge blogs -- CAS-ual Fridays and Off the Wall Craftiness! 

OTWC's colors right now are Navy and Coral.  Coral!  I LOVE coral, but I was certain that I didn't have an ink that I would call "Coral."  Thus, I had to do some ink blending/mixing, and I ended up creating a pretty cool looking coral on this card: 

What do you think?  I'm really happy with the result!  I dry embossed the background piece and then used a foam ink blender and blended Tim Holtz's Worn Lipstick and Memento's Tangelo over it, which creates a very corally color!!!  I also used both inkpads to stamp the sentiment from one of my fabulous Wilson Designs sets!  I added ribbon, pearls, and homemade coral resin roses to finish off the whole card!  I'm really pleased at how this turned out -- and at how simple I was able to keep it! 

I was playing along with two challenges today:
CAS-ual Fridays #16 - Embossing

Off the Wall Craftiness #58 - Navy and Coral

So there you have it!!!  OK now I need to get some sleep... I have a long weekend of fun ahead of me!  Have an amazing weekend everyone (and don't forget to check out my BLOGOVERSARY post!) 

Keep the Sun in your Heart

You know, I just love that sentiment and I've not yet used it since I got Lawn Fawn's Partly Cloudy set forever ago!  This card was a bit difficult for me, mainly because it had to be ONE LAYER, because I wanted to play along with the latest challenge over at Lawnscapings!  I didn't know if I'd be able to make that happen, but then I saw this week's CAS-ual Friday's challenge, and I had an idea that matched the sketch and involved LOTS of Distress Ink (which I've been SUPER into lately!)  Here's the final result:

This card really turned out better than I expected!  I masked off that white strip and went to town with my Broken China distress ink!  Then, I masked off the blue and stamped the white area with elements from Lawn Fawn's Partly Cloudy and Blissful Botanicals.  I drew in my own flower stems and added some embroidery floss and pearls as added embellishments!  I really like the way that the embroidery floss looks twisted around the front of the card, too!  It's a super fun technique! 

So, as I said I made this card with both Lawnscapings and CAS-ual Fridays on the brain:
Lawnscapings #16 - One Layer Cards

CAS-ual Fridays #15 - Sketch Challenge

Ok friends!  This is a SUPER exciting time for me, stay tuned!  There's something exciting coming up VERY soon on my blog, and it might just involve a giveaway!  =D  Happy Wednesday to all! 

Have a WHALE of a Time!!!

Honestly, I think that should DEFINITELY be the idea on your birthday - to have a whale of a time!  =)  Anyhow, that was the inspiration for this Lawn-Fawny creation today!  Here's my card:

This is one of my absolute favorite cards I've made in awhile!  I love the colors, and I love getting to use Critters in the Sea - which I haven't really put to good use for a long time and it's one of my favorite Lawn Fawn stamp sets!  =) 

I started by punching the edge and cutting out the seahorses and whale.  Then I used Tumbled Glass distress ink on the paper just to add a little extra coloring. Then I stamped the spouted water and sentiment onto the green cardstock, adhered down the embroidery floss and then the whale.  Then, I adhered the punched blue piece and the seahorses.  I then added the bubble stamps around the seahorses!  I finished the whole thing off with a few pearls (which you should know by now are one of my favorite embellishments) and some glossy accents to the bubbles (doesn't that make them look fun?!?!) and there you have it!  =) 

This card was inspired by three different challenges:
1. Lawnscapings #12 - a fabulous sketch (shown below) 

2. CAS-ual Fridays #8: Getting Edgy - I used my favorite border punch and the seahorses to create a CAS but funky edge to this card! 

3. CR84FN #32 - Use Aqua, Yellow, and Green as your main card colors

Wow I posted twice in the same day!  =)  It's been a long time since I've done that, but I'm feeling really great about all of the fun, crafty creations I've had time for lately!  =)  I'll be back with some more fabulous fun tomorrow! 

Casual Fridays #2

Well hi there blogland!  WOW it's been a really long time since my last post!  This month of May has so SO much going on that I really haven't had much time for crafting!  Luckily, I've finally found a little time and I'm SO excited to play along with my first challenge over at CAS-ual Fridays!  This week's challenge was Buttons and Twine:

Both buttons and twine are two things that I really enjoy putting on my cards, so here's what I came up with:

How cute is that background stamp?  It's a Studio G cling stamp and I couldn't wait to ink it up!  Then I colored the flowers with copics, and created the center focal point!  I thought it would be fun to make little "balloon buttons" using some Divine Twine and buttons from my stash!  I then made the button and twine border to finish off the card!

=)  In other news, my Father-in-Law got remarried over the weekend!  Basically, they've been together since I've known my hubby, and we've all always considered ourselves one big happy family!  It was nice to just finally make it official!  They got married at a lighthouse in Annapolis (it was an amazing ceremony filled with both families' cultures - Irish and Persian) and we all got to have a part.  It was super special and the entire weekend was filled with a lot of love and blessings. 

As part of their wedding gift, I made their wedding announcements!  Here's what they looked like:

 

I really had a great time doing this for them, and they absolutely loved them!  They displayed them at the reception and used a picture of it for their u-stream of the wedding!  Needless to say, making 70 of these has consumed my every crafty minute for a good while, but it was ABSOLUTELY worth it!  =)

Ok, that's it from here!  Have a splendiforous day!