Dilly Beans Shades of Black and Red

Wow, I can't believe it's been almost a week since I blogged. I'm really having a guilt thing going on here. So sorry, but hubby was pretty ecstatic about the whole thing, LOL. The holidays are winding down now though, so I hope things will be back to normal soon. I am pleased to have a fabulous new Dilly Beans Challenge for your viewing pleasure today. Those who visit frequently know that one of my favorite color combos is black and red so you can imagine how excited I was for this challenge. I chose the adorable #184 Flower Girl. Love her hair! (Thinkin' about cutting mine. Whaddaya think?) And don't her beautiful grey eyes just make you wanna melt? She looks like she could use a little sun (as do the leaves, for that matter), but I really took this challenge seriously and only allowed myself black, red and white (that's just me) and I love how it turned out.

I printed her 3 times so I could do some fussy cutting and popping and don'tcha just love the flower button I added to the flower in her hair? I couldn't believe how perfectly it matched the background paper I used which is from an old pack from Target. I used my Nesties Blossom and Circle behind Flower Girl and added some bold polka dot ribbon to the black stripe and called it done. No sentiment because I think it could be used for a variety of occasions. My DT sisters have all done a fabulous job with this challenge, so be sure to check out the Challenge Blog and take a peek. We can't wait to see what you come up with. I'm also entering this in The City Crafter Make the Cut Challenge, the Shopping Our Stash Tie it Up Challenge, The Colour Q Challenge (see pic below), and Simon Says Stamp anything Goes.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas Eve everyone! This is the "Big Day" in our family as we open our 'prises (short for surprises) this evening and have the neighbors over for a little "Christmas Cheer". We still open stockings tomorrow, however, but Christmas Day is much more relaxed and is just my hubby and I since our BFF's are away and we do our traditional Christmas dinner with them after New Years.

As you can see, Santa is at my house (under the grand piano) deciding who gets what so I hope you've all been good little boys and girls. He is the newest addition (last year) to my Santa collection and all of those fabulous vintage toys pack up in that beautiful trunk for storage. At the moment I'm a bit upset because he's one of a kind and for some reason I've misplaced his "credentials" which also lists the artist. Usually these pieces are also signed but I can't seem to find any signature anywhere either. HHHmm... Hopefully our guy at the Mole Hole in Carmel can remedy that for me. I seem to be a "collector" of all sorts of stuff and my Santas are some of my faves. Click HERE for pix of the others. What about you? Do you have a special Christmas collection that you lovingly put out every year? I'd love to say and chat, but I've still got lots (read more decorating) to do, not to mention wrapping gifts and such. Yeah, I know, I said I wanted this to be a "stress free" holiday and here I am rushing around as usual. The difference is, I'm going with the flow. If it gets done, it gets done, if not, well, nobody really knows (or cares) but me. I still better get moving though. LOL I apologize for not visiting you each individually, but know that I'm thinking of all my blogging friends. So here's wishing all of you a magical Christmas and a very healthy, happy New Year. xxD

Dilly Beans 3 Images Challenge

Happy Friday! Can you believe it's the day before Christmas Eve? Yikes! Hope you all are more ready than I am. I apologize for being less than prolific the last couple of months, but hopefully by mid January things will settle down and I'll be back in the groove. Here's wishing all of you a fabulous holiday just in case I don't make it back before. I can't tell you how much I appreciate all of your friendship and support. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart and a very Merry Christmas to you! xxx

We're still crafting up a storm at the Dilly Beans Designers and Challenge Blog and this week's challenge is to use 3 images on your card or project. I fell in love with #310 Happy Snowman the minute I saw him with his hands thrown up in the air in pure joy. To me he looks like he is thrilled with winter weather and should be juggling snow balls so I added some wired trim so he could do just that. I also thought Megan's "Joy" (hmm, can't seem to find it in the store but I'm not quite awake yet, LOL) would be the perfect sentiment for my little door hanger. My third stamp is from the Holly Tag and Holly Set. This is a mix of fussy cutting, paper piecing, and coloring with Copics. I particularly love the way his "fur trim" came out. My craft room is such a disaster that I couldn't find my puff pen and started poking around in other drawers. I found a SnowWriter (from perhaps 2 years ago, unopened, the opened one was all dried up) and tried that instead and dusted it with FunFlock so it has dimemson AND is fuzzy. WooHoo! His boots are coated with Glossy Accents and the heart buttons are Alpha Beads.

I treated the images sort of like I do Cricut cuts for layering purposes. They were printed on kraft paper first and I fussy cut them with a border that would show. They were printed again on either DP (these were all from the DCWV Homemade Christmas stack) or white card stock and colored, fussy cut, glued or popped accordingly. Originally I planned on making a card, but this week's Whimsicle Wednesday Home for the Holidays challenge called for a home decor project so I used my Nesties Grand Lables Four to make the hanger instead.There's more fabulous inspiration on the Dilly Beans Challenge Blog so go take a look and if you have a moment to yourself this next week, come play along.

And WOW! Craving Dilly Beans?

Need a last minute Christmas gift (for yourself maybe) or perhaps something to do with the Christmas $$ you received? Check out the fabulous deals in THE STORE now through December 31st.

Wrap it Up Candle Challenge

This week our challenge at BBTB2 was chosen by our sweet sis Karen in honor of her Daddy's birthday. She chose the candle on the Wrap it Up Cartridge which is one I must say I hadn't touched yet. WooHoo! First I'd like to wish Karen's Dad a very happy birthday and then remind you that you can participate in our challenges using the candle from any cartridge and as long as you enter a new creation and link it to BBTB2, you're good to go. We know it's a busy time of year, and really appreciate your efforts to play along. I started out with 5 of the candles in a row (at 5 ") and welded a scalloped circle from Sweet Treats that I'd stretched into an oval in DS behind them all so I'd have a place to put a sentiment inside where it wouldn't show from the front. That, of course is welded to a rounded rectangle from George to make my card base. I cut it in black, but then had a hard time choosing papers for the inside mat because there really wasn't all that much of it showing from the front. I finally found a card suit print from Stampin'UP that was small enough and continued with that theme.

Here it is open, a shaped front, no surprise there. The smaller scallop, in red, is embossed with a folder from the Sizzix Hello Kitty Spring set (thank goodness I wrote that one on the folder, LOL). The candles were cut in black first, then in Saffron (from Stampin'Up) and gold foil for the flames. I used the larger Cuttlebug Polka Dots on the candles.

"Make a Wish" is also from Sweet Treats and I'm pretty sure I cut the layers at 2". The DP with the poker chips was also part of that Stampin'UP set (now retired, I think). The cute little acrylic cards were from my LSS. So now I've got a b-day card for our poker playing friend almost all set. (His birthday is in July, let's just hope I don't forget where I put it before then) Thanks for stopping by, and have a wonderful holiday season. I know we've all got lots to do and I truly appreciate you taking the time to visit. Looks like we have a bit of an abbreviated team this week but the participants we do have are definitely worth seeing so stop on by BBTB2 and leave some Christmas cheer. Now I'm off to get boofy at the hair salon. See ya later!

Dilly Beans Santa Baby

The days are just flying by, aren't they? You ready? I'm not even close. But the Dilly Beans Designers have been hard at work with our new Santa Baby Challenge. Megan has so many adorable Santas and helpers at the Dilly Beans Shop I had a hard time choosing but finally decided on #311 Santa and added #176 Mittens (printed twice, once flipped and fussy cut individually) so he could hold #293 Three Presents. Obviously, someone has been very very GOOD! (That would be ME, LOL I can dream, can't I?) I colored with Copics to match the DP from the Jingle Bells stack by Recollections. The whole thing looks a bit busy, but hey, it's a busy time of year. Santa's beard and moustache were glittered and embossed with Swiss Dots in my Cuttlebug not only for some bling and texture, but because I also planned on entering it in The Cuttlebug Spot Santa Baby challenge this week, as well.

Various part of the pressies are popped and I've added some glittered chipboard by K&Co to the bows and pom pom to Santa's hat. "Jolly Santa" are acrylic from Cloud9. Now go have a look at the fab inspiration from my teamies at the Dilly Beans Challenge Blog and don't forget, you can still grab the adorable freebie Snowman Family and join in that challenge through the 19th, as well. And don't forget the fab sale at the Dilly Beans Shop, now through Dec. 26th. Buy 3 single digis and get one free. WooHoo!

BBTB2 Winter Frolic Tag

Yea! We're back with a new fabulous challenge at BBTB2. Our dear DT sister Lori has chosen any of the tags from the Winter Frolic cartridge (or any tag if you haven't that one). I chose a pretty shape (the one with the heart cut out on page 70 which I promptly hid the contour of in DS) and cut the shadow and patterned topper at 6". I was going for a vintage feel using paper from y fave older K&Co. Christmas Cheer stack and thought some embossing might be in order. I chose a love scrolly folder from the Heritage Companion Embossing set. although the folder is 5x7", it still wasn't large enough to emboss the entire tag base so I had to do it half and half in my Grand Caliber. The gold layer is the top tag layer increased to 6 3/8". There are so many cute phrases on Winter Frolic that I had a hard time choosing.g.

"All Spruced Up" caught my eye thinkin' I could use the tag as sort of a clue to one of the Christmas gifts for my hubby. You know, reminding me that this box has some spiffy new clothes in it. We don't use tags very often at our house because the gifts under the tree are for each other. I'm usually wrapping those for others at the last minute and they're had delivered or sent so there's really no need. I like to wrap mine sort of according to what's in the box so I can remember what's what. DH just writes them all down in a notebook so he can dole the out appropriately. LOL Anyway, the branches are cut with a Tim Holtz Festive Greenery Die to which I added some vintage tinsel and the ornaments are K&Co stickers that went with the Christmas Cheer DP. I sorta felt like I was cheating, but hey, I'm really running behind on everything (as usual) so...

Although I had great intentions on doing a different project for the Whimsical Wednesday Layer It challenge, I'm afraid this one will have to do because I'm running out of time there. And I can't resist entering Cindy's Scraptastic Monday Challenge which calls for a card, tag or ornament that includes a Christmas ball on it and some bling! I'm hoping you haven't forgotten about us at BBTB2 and have a chance to play along with our challenge. Remember, you have 2 weeks in which to complete it and be sure to stop over to BBTB2 and check out the fab inspiration from my DT sisters.

Dilly Beans Twisted Christmas

It's time for another Dilly Beans Challenge and this week it's a fun one, Twisted Christmas. HeeHee! Now the theme is open to interpretation, but also being a Macabre Minion at HDH, missing my dark and twisted sisters while we're on break, I had to go a teeny bit creepy. Besides, this is pretty much how I'm feeling at this stage of the game. How about you? The image is called #275 Framed Disturbed Snowman (ya think?) but there are lots of creepy cute images in the SHOP. And actually, you can play along with any image, as long as it fits the theme, so why don'tcha? The DP is Making Memories. I don't know about you, but counting down the days 'til Christmas totally freaks me out. As if I don't already know how freakin' behind I am.

I printed him twice so I could fussy cut the bags under his eyes and pop them and I've popped alternating letters of the sentiment as well as the image panel. The black snowflake is Cuttlebug and the black icicles are courtesy of Martha Stewart. They're a good thing. The cool letters are Cuttlebug Embossing Plus Postage Alphabet. I really love these folders but I don't think they caught on. My DT sisters have some hilarious examples for they're take on the challenge so pop on over to the Dilly Beans Designers and Challenge Blog and have a look. Oh, and BTW, our special kick-off Snowman Family Challenge is still going on through Dec 19th so you might want to pop over, grab the FREEBIE (WOOHOO!) and play along for the fab prizes. Now, hopefully Cindy and the gang won't have a heart attack, but I'm also entering this is this week's Scraptastic Monday challenge #5 which calls for a snowman(check) or snowflake(check) with a winter wonderland theme (well, icicles?, you decide, LOL). Maybe I can do another, but I'm not counting on it considering how things are going.

Bah!Humbug!, Scraptastic Monday, and Whimsical Wednesday, WooHoo!

I can't believe it's the very last Bah! Humbug! challenge of the year. I want to thank Ann, Max and the monthly Guest Designers for the fabulous inspiration they've given me these long months. The final challenge is Cute Christmas Critters and I don't think you can get any cuter than this sweet little Christmas Penguin from Cindy's Scraptastic Designs. Better yet, I was able to enter it in the Scraptastic Monday Challenge #4 which calls for no red, green, or gold. In case you're unfamiliar with the Scraptastic Monday challenges, there's a new challenge once a week but you have 2 weeks to complete the challenge. You may use anything you like (your Cricut, rubber stamps, or digi's) as long as you follow the theme, but of course I wanted to use one of Cindy's own. For this challenge, you even get an adorable free digi for entering (showcased by Cindy's talented daughter Tiffany among the DT examples) so I know you all want to check it out and enter.

Seriously, who could resist that face? I printed him twice and colored him with Copics, then fussy cut him out along with his beak, wings (or are they called flippers?) and light strand from the second image and popped him into a Nesties Beaded Circle. The glitter snowflakes are a McGill punch and I've also added some glitter icicles punched with a MS border punch. Oh oh, I see a bit of chartreuse has snuck onto the ribbon. EEK! Quickly avert your eyes, or if I must, I'll gladly rip it off to qualify for that fabulous digi.

Here's the dimension shot. Notice the pretty bling on the light strand and snowflake centers? That's for the current Whimsical Wednesday Winter Fun Challenge that just started today and asks that you use something sparkly. I think I've got it covered with the that and the glitter snowflakes and icicles, don't you? I'm also entering this in the ABC Christmas Challenge (Y is for Yippee! Anything Goes).

Wicked Wednesday Black and White Challenge

Have you played along with Wicked Wednesday yet? ATC's are so much fun and go really fast so I was able to sneak this in this morning between my workout and shower. We're on the way to the city (SF) to see My Week with Marilyn and do a little Christmas shopping. WooHoo! The challenge this week is Black and White. Ah well, okay, how about black and off white? Can you work with me Jenn? I have to admit I found this little birdie already cut and raring to go and he just begged to be used and he was off white, so... He's cut from the Home Decor Cricut cart. I popped him on a branch I punched with my new MS deep edge, added some corners, beads, and some musical note brads and there ya go.

So where is BBTB2? Well, the team has another little break this week. Sorry about that. I'll try to do something more with my Cricut this week for your viewing pleasure (but don't hold me to that, it is the holidays, after all and I made that deal with hubby...) In the meantime, if you didn't see my Altered Alice post from yesterday, scroll down to see a bit more Cricut goodness. Catch ya later. I'm off to get boofy.

A Lewis Christmas Carroll to All

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from The Altered Alice! This month we bring you our holiday wishes, and we invite you to send your holiday greetings to The Altered Alice. You have until Friday, Dec. 23 to enter. The winner post will either be a little early or late, as the last Sunday of the month falls on Christmas day!


To celebrate the season, we bring you The Lewis Carroll Memorial Window at Daniell Chapel in England. Notice the left panel where Lewis Carroll and Alice kneel to pay homage to the newly born Christ in this wonderful Nativity scene! Our quote this month is actually contained within the window. The window was designed by the stained glass artist Geoffrey Webb, a must-see for anyone that loves Wonderland. A wonderful Christmas poem by Lewis Carroll is shown in the center three bottom panels, which include characters from Wonderland - the White Rabbit, Dodo, the Caterpillar, Mad Hatter, and more!

Our own Sue Roddis visited this window and is sharing the closeups on The Altered Alice so be sure to visit to view all of the glorious details and read the lovely verse.


My project is a teapot snowglobe easel card featuring the Alice characters taking their Christmas tea in a Wonderland of snow. The stamp is from our past sponsor Indigo Blu from the Alice II set. I've cut the teapot on my Cricut using the Ashlyn's alphabet cartridge with a circular cut out to fit my "globe" from George. The image is popped and I've added snowflakes from Jolee's as well as mica flake glitter to create a Winter Wonderland.

The globe itself is leftover packaging material from Terrifically Tacky Tape. I encourage you this holiday season to look at your trimmings and wrap and repurpose, recycle and reuse whenever possible.

The sentiment is computer generated and the banner is mounted, layered and popped on Nesties Labels Eleven which serves as a "stop" for my Easel. I've also used my Cuttlebug to cut and emboss a silver snowflake to which I've added a beaded one from JoLee's.

Our prize this month is a $40.00 gift certificate to Custom Crops, the premier online retailer for crafters of all kinds. From Accuquilt to Zva Creative, adhesives to vinyl and everything in between, Custom Crops offers a huge selection of the products you've been looking for at competive prices with fast, friendly customer service.

We look forward to seeing your holiday greetings at The Altered Alice, so send us a Christmas Card! If it features Wonderland, you will have two chances at the randomly awarded prize instead of one. Multiple entries are fine, but each must be on a separate post. Please visit each week to see fabulous inspiration from all of our team and click HERE to view the lovely creations by my sisters Tracy and Retta this week.

I'm also entering this in the Cuttlebug Spot "Leftovers" Challenge this week. Besides the leftover packaging, the DP is scraps from the SEI Winter Song Stack.

Dilly Beans Stripes Challenge

It's our first official Dilly Beans Friday Challenge and it's an easy one. Use STRIPES, any way you want to. I decided to take a little break from Christmas and use the first Dilly Beans image I ever saw (or bought) on my teamie Jenn's blog. I immediately fell in love with #197 Framed Bumblebee Girlie , isn't she just bee-u-tiful?) and was blown away with the cute and quirky Dilly Beans designs. She's colored with Copics with a bit of gel pen detail and I used skittles at the end of her antennae. The bottom portion of her wings is layered and curled and attached only near her body so they would have a bit of dimension. The color scheme is simple using the sort of retro flowers DP from an old pack from Target and a fun yellow stripe by Heidi Grace. The little hive is a metal "quicklet" from the Eyelet Outlet I've attached over a Prima flower with a Queen&Co bee brad. Now go "bee" inspired by the rest of the DT and we'd love it if you'd play along. BTW, there's still time to grab the freebie HERE for our 3 week kick-off challenge too so we hope to see you there too. (Lots of prizes!) I'm also entering this in the Simon Says Stamp Anything Goes Challenge.

Tiddly Inks New Release and SALE!

I've been missing my Tiddly Inks and Inkers so much since retiring from the team the end of October and was thrilled to see the fabulous new release Christy cooked up (or should I say sketched up) after spending time with her adorable niece the past weekend. I had such a hard time choosing which of these darling "Little Somethings" to use first, but this "Little So and So" really stole my heart. I had a fun time paper piecing him and shading him with Copics and I finally got to use some of my DCWV Safari Kids Stack. You can view the rest of the group and fabby samples on Christy's Blog HERE. And WOOHOO! Check out the Cyber Thursday code (SOMETHING) for a whopping 30%off any order at the Tiddly Inks Shop.

I was excited to use Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch #145 for my card for this is the first time playing along with this challenge. And I'm also entering it in the Shopping Our Stash Digi Images and/or Sentiments Challenge. (BTW, that cute little digi saying is TI too) Happy shopping!

Bah!Humbug! Fabric Challenge

This week the lovely ladies of Bah! Humbug! have challenged us to use fabric. Normally this would be daunting for me, but I came across some Loralie fabric I'd purchased in 2009 that I had bought from J&O Fabrics. They don't have much of a selection any more, but Loralie Designs in the meantime not only has it's own website, but makes all sorts of stamps and stuff, embroidery designs, you name it, with not only some kitties, but her signature sassy ladies, so if you're interested, check them out HERE. OOps! Off the track a bit here. I'd bought this fabric because of the adorable cards Enfys was making with them but I never got around to trying any myself. 'Bout time, eh? Basically all you do is glue the fabric to card stock using a glue stick, wait for it to dry and fussy cut it out. Make sure you've glued your design completely and it really resists fraying and cuts easily with sharp scissors. The background DP is from an 8x8 pad by Making Memories I got on clearance last year and the little Bingo card is Jennie Bowlin. WooHoo! Couldn't be simpler.

As you can see, I've lots more fabric and Jezzie was eyeing the kitties in the foreground thinkin' they would make fab cards for her to send. I think this would be a great idea for those who sew as well. Make something cute using fabric and save a bit for a matching card. The possibilities are endless. For once I've not waited until the very last minute to complete this challenge, so I suggest you pop by Bah!Humbug! and be inspired by the lovely examples by the DT and join the challenge too. It's almost December. YIKES!

A Freebie for Snowman Lovers!

We're all so excited about the new Dilly Beans Challenge Blog that we just couldn't wait until Friday so Megan has provided you with this adorable Snow Family Freebie with which to create a project and a chance to win some fabulous prizes. WooHoo! I had so much fun coloring and glittering them up and even used some puff paint for their hats. (Note to self, do NOT lay your heat gun on the carpet until it's cooled off or you'll melt it, OOPS!) The group is cut with Nesties Labels 10 and mounted on glittered snowflake borders from the Tim Holtz Snow Flurries On The Edge Die. The cute snowman DP is from (well gosh, I've got so much crap laying on my floor, I don't know who it's by, sorry).

I printed my image 3 times so I could get the dimension I crave and it came together in no time since it was so easy to color with my Copics. For a little extra pizazz I threw in some epoxy stickers from Recollections and some cool tinselly stuff from my LSS. Hurry over to grab your Freebie HERE and while you're there, take a gander at the inspiration by the DT to get your mojo flowing. You have 3 weeks to complete the challenge ('til Dec 19th) and there will be 4 (yes, COUNT 'EM 4!!!!) winners. What are you waiting for????? I'm also entering this in the Paper Sundaes Winter Wonderland Challenge, the Cardmadfairies (also Winter Wonderland) Challenge , the 4 Crafty Chicks Snowflake Challenge and the Crafty Catz Snowman Challenge.

Whimsicle Wednesday Texture Challenge and Some Big News!

Yes, I'm sorry, I've been taking time off. One of the things I sort of promised was that I would attempt to make the holidays stress free. (Notice, I said attempt, LOL) We had a lovely Thanksgiving with stuff done at a reasonable time and a quiet day yesterday. However, I've been itchin' to craft and finally managed a cute little card for the current Whimsical Wednesday Add Texture challenge. I used the Heartfelt Creations Decorative Layered Basket die and made a shaped card by folding the card stock and placing the handle of the base die just above the crease. It's tiny, but oh so cute. I ran it through the Cuttlebug Plaid folder to give it more of a woven appearance, and hey, that is the challenge after all.

The adorable little Snowman tag is from Dilly Beans. I was able to print it small enough for the little basket and then colored it with Copics, backed it with card stock and embossed it with Swiss Dots (inspired by my dear friend Carole, the embossing queen!) I love the added interest the texture adds to the stamped image. This brings me to my exciting news!

I'm honored to be a part of the new Dilly Beans Design Team! The first challenge will be Friday December 2nd, but there just may be a little something before that that everyone will be able to participate in, so stay tuned. In the meantime, Megan has been drawing up a storm so you just might want to check out the Dilly Beans Shop to see all of her new designs (and check out the super sale only through midnight tomorrow!) and visit the Challenge Blog to take a peek at my fabulous DT sisters.

Here's one more pic of my little basket card. Maybe you can see the texture a little better here. I've added a few punched snowflakes and pearls and there ya go. Stephanie has some exciting news as well. The sneak peeks for her fabulous new stamps will be next Thursday and Friday Dec 1 & 2) with the release on Friday, December 2nd at 7:00pm EST. I'm sure you all are as excited as I am for Stephanie and can't wait to see what she has in store. There will even be a blog hop with her fabulous DT where you have a chance to win ALL 4 SETS! I KNOW I'll be seeing you there! I'm also entering this in the Simon Says Stamp Tag You're It Challenge. Have a wonderful rest of your weekend!

BBTB2 Mouse from Meow

Eiyiyi! You have no idea how close I came to not having anything for you this morning but TADA! Guilt triumphs over exhaustion and here ya go. LOL Sweet Melissa chose the mouse from the Meow Lite cartridge for our BBTB2 Challenge this week. Generally this would be right up my alley, especially considering Goliath and Jezzie's habit of bringing them in to play (Jezzie) or for a snack (Goliath). Guess the prob this time was I had too many ideas, some being way more elaborate than my mojo would allow, so I settled on a sort of "Meet me under the mouseltoe" idea. Mice, from Meow, (obviously) welded togther with the "Kiss Kiss" sentiment from Tie the Knot and mistletoe from Christmas Solutions cartridge. I'm sorry I rarely (if ever) have my sizes. Often I experiment with a bunch of them or just stretch or compress things to fit, and I'm usually scrambling to complete, photograph, upload and post whatever I'm making so going back and figuring it out takes more time than I'm willing to spend (especially these days). I am pretty sure that the heart from George is 5 1/2" but the scalloped behind was the shadow of that heart with a bunch of little (less than 1") circles welded to it to make it scalloped because I'd already cut the plain heart out of the pretty striped DP (and didn't have any more of it) and decided the plain shadow was too plain. I know there are other scalloped hearts around, but none seemed to be the right shape. I embossed it with the 5x7" Polka Dots Cuttlebug folder (in sections) with my Grand Caliber which was the only machine that was large enough to accomodate the larger folder with the cut partially hanging out of it. (PITA! I was obviously not thinking things through in advance with this project.)

To be honest, I'm not quite sure what this thing is, a tag, a door hanger? It's not a card (yet, anyway) because I really needed to quit (near midnight). Normally, I don't craft in the evening unless hubby is not home and our bedtime is embarrassingly early (although we're often up at 4:00am) so it is what it is at the moment. A bit of dimension and thank God I found the adorable K&Co chipboard stocking in my stash or I'd probably STILL be up scratching my head about how to jazz it up. I still think the little mice need some attention, but that will be another day since I'm off to get beautified at the salon for Thanksgiving. My fabulous DT sisters have knocked this one out of the park, so be sure to stop by for inspiration and we hope to see your new creations featuring mice from any Cricut cartridge. Remember, you have two weeks and your creations must be linked in your blog post to BBTB2. Thanks so much for playing along. We really love seeing what you come up with each week. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

An ATC for Wicked Wednesday

Okay, so instead of working on my DT project for this week I've been messing around with an ATC. Have you seen the new(ish) Wicked Wednesday ATC Blog? Jenn has some fun challenges for ATC's only and this week it's being sponsored by Dilly Beans. Since ATC's are only 2.5" x 3.5" I figured I could slip one in today quickly but got pretty involved trying to come up with something a bit different. The challenge is Flowerful and I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to use another of my adorable Dilly Beans stamps. This one is #186 Framed Flower girl. After coloring her with Copics, I used my craft knife to cut out the frame and background. I tried a number of Dp's behind it, but in my stash was an old laser cut sheet. Cool! Then I came across some really heavy acetate from the now defunct Short Cuts and wondered if anyone ever makes transparent ATC's. Well, they do now! LOL Not the greatest background here, but I wanted you to see that you could see through it.

Whenever I print a digi stamp. I always print it at least twice (more likely 3 times) just in case I screw up the coloring or decide to layer the image. Big surprise, the flower is layered and I've used a tiny button for the flower center. Often ATC's are traded and the back is used to write the artist's name, blog, and whatever other pertinent info you want to include, a bit of a prob for a transparent one. LOL However, on the back I added a Scalloped Nestie Oval behind her head ( and not visible from the front) for a place to write if need be. This was a really fun challenge for me since my mojo has really needed a shot in the arm. I know I'll be playing again soon. If you want to try something new, why not pop over to the Wicked Wednesday Challenge Blog and be inspired. There's still a couple of days left for this challenge and there's an adorable Dilly Beans Stamp up for grabs. I'm also entering this in the ATC Challenge Blog #15 Anything Goes or Lace Challenge, the Squiggles Saturday Anything But a Card Challenge, and the Speedy's Friends Black, White and One Other Color Challenge (I'm assuming eye and skin color doesn't count here). Now I better get my butt in gear, or there'll be no BBTB2 for tomorrow. YIKES!

CDAC Progressive Challenge

Clearly, I'm having a problem crafting. Seems like I can only concentrate fully on one thing at a time, and lately it's been eating healthy and exercising my butt off (I wish!) which takes a major chunk out of my day and my mojo has suffered (BIG TIME!) When I finally actually have time to craft, I'm scurrying from blog to blog and challenge to challenge and although there are a million I WANT to participate in, it seems I can't make up my mind WHICH to do first (so I end up doing nothing). I've been talking about balance in my life, but I certainly haven't found it yet and I'm feeling terribly guilty now about my lack of posting.

So anyway, I got an email from CDAC talking about their Progressive Freebie Challenge Series 2, which is just starting now and decided to give it a try. Not a member of CDAC? No problem, just ASK to join. Then join the Progressive challenge Group and WooHoo! You're provided with a bunch of free images from a number of fab digi artists and all you have to do is use one to make a project and you have 2 weeks to do it. As long as you participate during each round, you continue to get the images for free (and if for some reason you just don't make it one round, you can buy in the round you missed for just $1.00). The payoff? Complete all 6 rounds and you will be entered in the fabulous grand prize drawing. Fun, huh? Since crab season started yesterday in CA, I just HAD to use the cute crab from Tiffany Doodles along with the birthday sentiment from Sending Treasures (that I modified a bit to go with the crab theme). HeeHee! These qualify me to enter the My Partner in Crafting Crime Freebie Challenge.

That crab just begged to be paper pieced so I'm entering it in the 4 Crafty Chicks Challenge this week and I added some lidded google eyes as well. The sentiment was cut with my Nesties labels One and the DP's are from an ancient DCWV stack. The shell border is a Martha Stewart punch.

I've popped parts of the crab as well as the mats and done a number on some of them with my Distrezz-it-All to make it more masculine. The twine holding the shell charms are looped through eyelets done with my Cropadile. These 3 different embellishments, along with the 2 patterned papers ( the large nauticul mat and the barely visible diagonal striped mat behind the small blue one) and one image qualifies for the Crazy Challenge Recipe this week. So yea! I'm set for round one, (although I just might make some more cards using the other adorable stamps I received in this round) and although this took me far longer than I ever anticipated, at least I finished something. If you've never played at CDAC, you must check it out. Lots of good stuff going on there all the time and it's a very supportive community.

BBTB2 Winter Woodland Joy Challenge

Morning! This week at BBTB2, our lovely Mona chose the "Joy" cut from Winter Woodland. This is just the kind of cut I love to design with because there's plenty of room to be creative. I've sort of been skating with some really simple cards this past week so I decided to make a nice fat juicy one. These are the kind I really feel a sense of accomplishment after assembling and although they're a royal PITA to make an envie for and to send, I think the recipient appreciates all the work that was involved. I've added snowflakes from Winter Lace and a swirl from Ashlyn's Alphabet and welded it all to my fave rounded rectangle from George (stretched to fit) in DS.

It is a shaped front card with just a few contours hidden (like the center of the "O" in Joy) so there would be room for at least a small sentiment without it showing through to the front. The inside mat is embossed with a Cuttlebug folder on each side. It's especially important to add texture to cards with such a simple color scheme. I've also embossed the Joy and swirl with Swiss Dots and glittered the snowflakes and "O" for more pizazz.

That "O" is not a separate cut on the cartridge, but I thought Joy looked a bit flat so I made one more cut of the Joy (and the shadow) and hand trimmed it out so I could pop one more layer. Adhesive beads are a bit difficult to stick to glitter so I tried a Viva Pearl Pen in red for the first time. I was happy with the way it worked, except for the fact that there was a tiny bit of bleeding (not really noticeable except to me and if you're really, REALLY looking for it). Upon closer observation, I think it's because as the liquid was settling, it wanted to absorb somewhat into the paper but the glitter sort of dispersed it. Had it not been as much of a contrast as bright as red, I don't think it would be noticeable at all, but it did prevent me from trying it on the flocking on my previous project because I think that may have done the same thing, only worse.

Here you can really see just how FAT the card really is. You'll also notice that I stickled the swirls on the embossed portions of the inside mat (because it looked so pretty on DY Sister Jeri's card last week). Thanks, Jeri! So, after making it through all of this, I'll bet you're more than ready to pop over to BBTB2 and see the fabulous inspiration from the rest of our team. Don't forget, you have 2 weeks to play, new creations only, you may substitute a similar Cricut cart if you don't have the one chosen, and please link back to BBTB2 so others can join in the fun. There's also still time to enter our "Boy Crazy" contest so be sure and check it out.