A Two-fer for the Outlawz

As you all know by now, I love playing on the Outlawz Forum and enter the 7 different weekly challenges as often as possible.  Festive Fridays offers 4 theme options per week and I managed to just sneak in with a "Card with a Cardinal" last night using the adorable Cardinal Sprite from Aurora Wings available HERE on AW.com and HERE on Etsy.

Coloring Cardinal Sprite with my Copics brought back some fond memories of winters past.  There are no cardinals where we live in California and I miss the bright pop of color I used to see in our snow covered backyard in the Midwest.  I kinda even miss the snow, but certainly not brushing off the car or driving in it.  It's hard to believe it's been 38 years.  Yikes!

My original plan was to pop him in a snowy scene, but while perusing my papers I came across a mat stack with holly corners and thought it would work for the current Outlawz Wednesday Sketch, as well.  I actually had to cut and piece the mat to make it square and carefully fussy cut around the lower left holly leaf and slide the top portion in underneath, then added the checked opposite corner pieces I managed to cut from scraps on my table.  I cute Cardinal Sprite with a stitched circle and added a scalloped circle behind and I was done.  No real need for embellies since the paper did all the work.  WooHoo!

I'm also adding this to the DL.Art January Linky Challenge, Lil Patch of Crafty Friends #73 AG, Simon Says Monday Birds of a Feather, Crafty Animals Jan.  #10 AG, ...