Coffee Loving Cardmakers Coffee Date

So excited to be up on the Coffee Loving Cardmakers Blog today and having a Coffee Date with two of my crafty buddies!  We've used the adorable Paper Smooches Sunnyville Stamp Set along with a throwback sketch from the Paper Smooches Blog!  Hope you'll hop on over there and check out all of our makes!

This cup from the Sunnyville set is SO cute!  And I used the rays from the set to make the cup "shine"!  My morning sunshine comes from my coffee cup very often!  I cut the flowers from the Mini Flowers dies from white and colored them with my Copics.

I created the background using a couple Paper Smooches stencils... the grass and and mountains (or haystacks if you prefer... but I see mountains... cute little bumpy mountains) were made with the Patterns Stencil and then of course my background clouds using the Clouds Stencil.  I popped up some Curly Clouds over the background and used the Bannerific dies for my sentiment from Sunnyville.  And of course that adorable little birdy from the stamp set... sweet right??

I'm playing along with the Monday Challenge at Simon Says Stamp which is Bright and Cheerful this week!  I'm also playing along at Double Trouble which is Something, Anything and Everything... check out all of the details here!

Hope you'll check out our Buddy Post up on the Coffee Lovers Blog here!  And visit my buddies too!  There is a giveaway and the more visits and love you leave the better your chances for winning!

A Truck Full of Butterflies-Rubbernecker Stamps

Welcome back to some more Rubbernecker Rainbow Inspiration...lol!  I hope you're not sick of my Butterfly Kaleidoscopes yet because I'm not nearly done!

This truck!!!  I love this die... it's so easy to put together and for this one I just cut one out of each of the rainbow colors and I've got enough leftover to make many more rainbow trucks!  How many rainbow trucks does one need?  I'd say you could never have enough....

Fun, right??  I mean.  Your truck doesn't have to be rainbow colored, but then again, why wouldn't it be?  #Idbuythattruck

I kept my sentiment simple like I often do so I can send it to anyone for almost any reason!

I'm joining in the Monday Challenge over at Simon Says Stamp which is Bright and Cheerful!  You should check it out!

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  Come again soon!

Below are affiliate links to all of the Rubbernecker products I've used today.  If you choose to purchase through these links I will receive a small compensation at no additional cost to you.  Thanks so much for stopping!

Crafty Elves' Countdown to Christmas - July 2019 Edition!

Welcome to this month's Crafty Elves' Countdown to Christmas!  Debra Davison from Meticulosity and I are the Crafty Elves and we've made a pact to create a Christmas card a week so that when December comes, all of the hard work will be done and we can just mail them out!  We share our makes every 25th of the month and this one is special because we are also participating in an Instagram Hop with our Polka Dot Orchard Teamies to show off some awesome Christmas themed digital stamps!

Each month I draw a name from the visitors who commented the prior month and send out some Happy Mail!  Last month's winner will be announced at the end of this post.  And when you are done here be sure to head over to my Instagram Hop post that begins at 10am EST and follow the instructions there for a chance to win some more!

Here's how I was inspired:

This adorable Penguin from the Penguin Love digi set was just begging to have a Santa Hat on and this one from the Magic of Christmas set was perfect!  The awesome thing about digis is you can resize them so it was easy to make it in just the right size.  I pulled up the penguin and made him the size I wanted and then pulled in the hat and sized it so it would fit on his head.  I then separated them to print because I knew I'd be cutting them out.  I used the beautiful Really Rainbow Christmas papers from Lawn Fawn as well as the Mini Snowflakes.  The sentiment is from an adorable Reverse Confetti set, S'more Love and I layered my papers using some dies from Rubbernecker... these and these!

These images and sentiment are also in the Magic of Christmas set.  And since I printed the sentiment on my laser, I was able to foil it with my Minc.  I used the Lawn Fawn snowflakes and Rubbernecker background dies again.  I used this NEW Rubbernecker Stencil on the top layer and that adorable Santa Hat die from Taylored Expressions.

This one might be my fave... but then you know why that is...lol!  The belt and sentiment are in the Magic of Christmas digital set.  The mug die is from Memory Box and I used a stencil from Paper Smooches for the steam along with some texture paste and glitter.

And my fourth card for this month is this one that I shared a few days ago.  I used digital stamps from The Cutting Cafe and you can find more details on this one here if you'd like them!

Now for the winner from last month's commentors:

Shell!  Contact me at bzscrapper66 at gmail dot com with your snail mail so I can send you some Happy Mail!

Now be sure to head on over to Instagram (after 10am EST) and hop for a chance to win a digital stamp set of your choice!  Head to my Instagram here and look for this graphic!:

Come back soon!

Caffeine Fueled Paper Play - Altenew

I'm up on the Coffee Loving Cardmakers Blog today and playing along over at Altenew's July Inspiration Challenge!  Here's a sneak peek and I hope you'll hop over to check out the details!

Petals for the Pittmans Fundraiser and Linky Party - Card 3

I've created another card today for the Petals for the Pittmans Linky Party!  If you'd like, you can check out my introductory post here and my second card here!  

Today's card is created with another one of the images available in a special and beautiful floral digital stamp set available in the shop over at Polka Dot Orchard.  There are actually two huge sets that are a collaboration of images by several different artists and companies and are part of a fundraiser for one of our fellow makers, Larissa Collins Pittman and her family, who are going through a very difficult time and have mounting medical bills.

You can read more about Larissa and her husband Gary here: Pittmans Go Fund Me.

Today I'm using an image donated by Crystal O. Minkler and a sentiment from Angie Blom.  Here's how I was inspired:

I love this sweet image by Crystal Minkler!!  And it was so much fun to give it a rainbow twist!  I decided to just have a simple white background, but gave it some interest using this die here!  

The hardest part is picking my colors that I think will go together and blend a bit without getting muddy... and do you think I'd keep track of what colors those were???  Well, of course not!..lol!  So next time I'll experiment again and it won't turn out the same, but maybe I'll find a happy surprise!  This combo made me happy...

And again, simple sentiment... this one from Angie Blom was perfect!  And this die here was just right to frame it!

You can play along with the linky party too!  Just create a new floral card and link it up at the Polka Dot Orchard Blog here and spread the word!  There are lots of prizes!  And if you would like to help, head on over to the Polka Dot Orchard shop to get one or both of these beautiful digital stamp sets!  Or just play along and spread the word! All proceeds from the sale of these images will go directly to the Pittmans to help with their medical bills.  Take a look at these awesome sets:

So we hope you'll join us and play along!  And come back soon!

Watercolored Backgrounds with CAS-ual Fridays!

Welcome to some CAS-ual Fridays watercolor inspiration!  I'm really loving my Paul Rubens glittery watercolors lately and creating lots of backgrounds with them.  I'm sharing with you today one of the ways I've been using them (or maybe two).

Nothing like a beautiful floral and this Pretty Posies set is SO lovely.  And with it's pretty and simple sentiments, the set is perfect for any occasion!

I cut my panel of watercolor paper and started by stamping the medium flower from the set in versamark and heat embossing with some Wow Bright White Embossing Powder.  When I'm random stamping I like to start with my largest image and stamp in a triangle pattern leaving room for my other images.  Then I go down to the next smallest image and do the same and fill in with the smallest.

Because the paper is white and it can be hard to see the images on the paper I heat emboss each set of images separately.  It also helps to keep me from smudging and ruining an image because my thumbs tend to get in the way.

Then I start to add my background color.  I don't worry so much about getting the background color over the images because a lot of the time it just mixes in with the other colors I add and creates some really cool colors.  Also because it's water, you also have the option to wet a space again and lift up the color with a paper towel.  I did that for my smallest flowers a bit because I was using orange and felt it would be a better color without mixing with the blue.  I'd let the background color dry and then see if I wanted to add any more color until I was happy.  Really the waiting is the hardest part as the song says...lol!

After I was happy with my background coverage, I started adding color back in with a smaller paintbrush.  Again, I would let my colors dry and then add some more where I wanted it.  I mixed in some purple with my pink and a couple different greens on the leaves... along with the blue I love the way they came out!

When I had everything colored in, I let it dry and splattered some more colors on with my tiny paint brush.  It's so much fun to play with watercolors this way!  

I stamped and embossed a few more of each of the images onto some watercolor paper to be cut out and popped up on my card.  I added this simple sentiment from the set and finished my sentiment ...

With this Hello from the Sweet Friend Fri-Dies... 

And there you have it!  I did fussy cut my images out because in my usual fashion I FORGOT I had the dies!!  Oh I wish I hadn't forgotten that...lol!  Although I don't mind cutting.. it sure would have been SO much easier had I just die cut them out.  Don't ask me how I forget these things... I just do...lol!

I'm playing along over at Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday Challenge which is to Create Your Own Background and with Die Cutting Divas Embossing Challenge!  You should too!

I had some extra flowers left over so I decided to create one more quick one:

Rather than creating a new identical background... I just used my watercolors with the Modern Petals Stencil for an even quicker and simpler background.. I'm gonna make a few more of these as well and I'll share those with you next time!

To make things easier for myself I kept the same design basically and this one came together quickly!

Have I mentioned how much I love the font on these Sweet Friend Fri-Dies??

So that's me for today!  I hope you enjoyed your stop here today and you'll pull out your watercolors and play a little.  I know I'm going to be doing just that very soon!

If you've seen something here today that you must have, I have this for you:

And come back soon for more inspiration!  You can find us at these places:

Another Kaleidoscope of Butterflies with Rubbernecker Stamps

Happy Monday!  Or hopefully after stopping here maybe it will be a little happier anyway!  I've got another Kaleidoscope of butterflies for you today!  I mentioned that after cutting the Small Butterflies die from all of my rainbow papers, I had lots of leftovers and had made a few more cards.  Here is one of those!  I just can't think of anything that I wouldn't want a swarm of butterflies flying out of!

And the Tall Bucket die is perfect!!  I'd love a bucket of butterflies!  Love the details on these bucket dies... it was fun to cut it from silver, but it's also great to cut it and make it look old and distressed... I'm imaging it being full of all kinds of good things!

I love the pretty font of this sentiment and it's good for so many occasions... I could put whatever I want on the inside of this card... oh... and I used that awesome Wood Grain background stamp again for a little texture... this time on the front panel and in white... just a whisper of something there... I love it!

I'm playing along with the Embossing Challenge over at Die Cuttin' Divas!  You should check it out!

And that's it!  So simple and so pretty... with all of those layers the background is interesting but clean and really let's the bucket of butterflies pop... idk... it's made my Monday better anyway.

Thanks so much for stopping and allowing me to indulge my Rainbow Butterfly sensibilities again!  Come again soon!

Below are affiliate links to all of the Rubbernecker products I've used today.  If you choose to purchase and click through these links I will receive a small compensation at no additional cost to you.

The Cutting Cafe Inspiration-Christmas in July 2019!

Welcome to some Cutting Cafe Inspiration!  It's Christmas In July over at the Cutting Cafe!  I've been making Christmas cards all year long along with my friend Debra Davison and I'm a couple days early with this one but that's ok... I'll still be back on the 25th with more!  For today I decided I wanted to color up some of the poinsettias from the Sleigh Treat Box set.

I printed them in different sizes, colored them with my Copics and some colored pencils and then cut them out and layered them together with thin popup tape between the layers.

I also used the Merry Christmas background from the Christmas MIni Colored Printable Set... but I printed it in black and white.  I splattered everything with some gold, red and black glitter water colors... a little ribbon, a button, wooden snowflake and some stamens... and well, of course some sequins.

I had a lot of fun with this one... I haven't used ribbon in quite a while and this beautiful ribbon from DL Art was perfect!  It's a bumpy one though so extra postage for sure... although who am I kidding... I don't send many flat cards...lol!

SO!  Be sure to head on over to the Cutting Cafe Blog and see what everyone has created for you!  Comment there for your chance to win three files of your choice!

Thanks for stopping and come back again soon!