Truebie or not Truebie?

Well, are you?  A fan of HBO'S True Blood, I mean.  That's our challenge theme at Haunted Design House this week, so your mission is to create a dark, Gothic or Halloween based piece inspired by the series (that would be VAMPS peeps, in case you live under a rock.  LOL).  When Googling True Blood, one of the images that caught my eye was the advertisement for Tru Blood, the synthetic blood nourishment beverage for vampires.  Catchy slogan, eh?  It immediately brought to mind one of my fave stamps from Bombshell, Man's Ruin.  She's colored with Copics and fussy cut and then I stamped again on red vellum and paper pieced for the cocktail.  YUMBO!  She's popped atop a blood drip background from this Tiddly Inks freebie (funny how I use this A LOT!)  and I've added a wine charm with fabby vamp teeth from Scattered Tenacity.  Please visit HDH for more inspiration, and again on Wretched Wednesday for additional fun from Creepy Glo and whomever else was slow on the go this week and remember, please drink responsibly.  Oh, and be sure to come back later today for the Skull Appreciation Day Blog Hop, sponsored by Smeared Ink.  Loads of skullie goodness and prizes.  You know you wanna!

I'm also entering this in the Simon Says Stamp Anything Goes Challenge.

Macabre Monday Menacing Mermaids

This week at Haunted Design House our challenge is Menacing Mermaids. OOOHHH, did we have fun with this one! Forget Ariel! Mermaids have always had the reputation of causing shipwrecks and luring sailors to their deaths (conveniently forgetting that humans can't breathe under water, yeah right!) with their irresistible songs. They are often portrayed as beautiful creatures, but in the dark gloomy depths of the sea they revert to the the horrific creature they REALLY are. BWAHAHAHA!



So there ya go. It's been awhile since I've gotten my full creep on and I was afraid the Minions might just drum me out of the corps. Never fear! I was REALLY inspired by this challenge! It started with the digi skull head I received for FREE by participating in the Skull Appreciation Day Blog Hop with Smeared Ink. The rest of the skelly was cut and pasted from the Muertos Doll digi from Bombshell Stamps. They were shaded a bit with Copics, then fussy cut and glittered. Her tail was cut from the Dreams Come True (yikes, with dreams like this, who needs nightmares?) Cricut cartridge, again shaded with Copics and embossed with the Cuttlebug.

Her hair is a ripped up used dryer sheet, inked with Distress Inks, dabbed with silver acrylic paint and glittered. the background was done with Distress Inks in the smear, spritz and swipe manner on a craft sheet, dried, ironed and distressed with my Distrezz-it-All, and overstamped with Perfect Medium and brushed with Perfect Pearls. It turned out too big for a card once the mermaid was popped on there so I used my Grand Caliber and the 3 largest Spellbinders Grand Labels Four to cut and emboss a base. This was also stamped with Perfect Medium and brushed with Perfect Pearls. The stamp is the Large Elegant Words background stamp from Heartfelt Creations.

"Siren Song" was computer generated and printed on a Fanciful Label from the Cuttlebug Embossing Plus folder. It was inked and glittered as well. For additional texture I added a woven piece that was cut from a pouch that came with some silverware. It was inked with Distress, dabbed with acrylics and glittered too. This was the closest I've ever gotten to mixed media and I have the blue fingers to prove it. LOL

All that was need was a hanger and some fibers and ribbon to trail from the bottom and a Recollections brad to dress it up a bit. Now, if you dare, check out the rest of the Minions fabulous creations at HDH. I'm sure you'll be inspired to play along. I'm also entering this in my DT Sis Susan's Guest DT Monochromatic Challenge over on the Smeared and Smudged Forum. I'm thinkin' it's close enough, eh Susan? And I'm also entering it in the Cardmadfairy's Under the Sea Challenge and the Shopping Our Stash SOS Challenge using Spellbinders, Smeared Ink, Ocean theme, skull, sparkle, stamping, Siren's Song.

And WooHoo! Look at this!

and this! I love it when people appreciate my "dark side". LOL

Bombshell Stamps V-Day Contest. Cardvaark's Heart Challenge (Are you Shocked? HeeHee)

Quite different for me, don't you think? LOL First of all I must say I'm not much of a stamper but when I saw these stamps I was bound and determined. This sassy image is from Bombshell Stamps. They have the cheekiest collection of stamps I've ever seen. I LOVE THEM! Not only the images, but for some reason I had much better luck with them than with many I've tried. (Maybe I was just motivated, but I really think the quality is great.) Also, when I showed the images to DH he told me to buy some (OMG! Are you kidding? How often does that happen when shopping for craft supplies?) Anyway, they're having a Valentine contest so I thought I'd give it a go. Also since I first became aware of Bombshell Stamps when Debbie won the Jan 1 Cardvaarks' Sketch Challenge using an adorable cowgirl image (scroll down to the bottom of this Cardvaarks' post to see it. It's on my wish list) I thought I'd use hearts and enter it there as well.

This image is perfect for DH since he gave me the nastiest (in a good way, LOL) pair of red spikes for Christmas. I wasn't pleased with the color of the shoe when I used the MCPT technique (and unfortunately I don't have Copics) so I decided to stamp again on red foil cardstock (using StazOn) and cut it out. Then I ended up cutting out the Bombshell as well as her leg, arm, and selected other parts again and popped them for dimension (of course, see, it IS still me here). Used Nesties for the hearts (also popped), foam glitter hearts, adhesive rubies and a diamond (on her finger). "What a girl really wants" is part of the stamp set, and the "is U" are stickers. Inside is X-Rated. LOL OOps! Just went to enter my card and realized it didn't have a ribbon so I added one to the heel.