The Cutting Cafe Meets Peggy Loves Vintage

I really enjoyed the BBTB challenge using the adorable images from Peggy Loves Vintage and had a hard tome choosing which one to use for that challenge. All of them were sooo cute so I had to make another card this time using the circus image. The round shape made me immediately think of the Happy Birthday downloadable stamp set from The Cutting Cafe because I thought the circle frame would be perfect. I cut the card on my Cricut using the Doily card in blackout from Wildcard. I printed the circle frame on cardstock, cut the outside by hand and discovered that I had a Nestie circle that would cut out the inside perfectly. WooHoo!

I printed the Peggy Loves Vintage image 3 times because I wanted to use the decoupage technique to add dimension and added tiny pompoms to the clown's shoe and hat. I just love the funky pinata paper from the cupcake collection by Basic Grey and thought it was so festive and looked great with the image.

Regina's downloadable stamps are so easy to work with and I'm particularly fond of this set because it has cute sentiments as well. I think this one is my favorite. I cut it out with my Nesties label 4 and backed it with 2 presents cut and embossed with my Cuttlebug combo and a Nesties scalloped octagon. It's so much fun using these downloadables for a card because you can finish a card in a jiffy with truly amazing results. Peggy Loves Vintage had CD's of darling designs for all occasions. And while you're at the Cutting Cafe be sure to check out the fabulous All About Mom set that's available too! There's still time for Mother's Day, but this set would be great all year long.

The Cuttlebug Spot "Time for Tea" challenge

This week on The Cuttlebug Spot we were challenged to use the technique of tea bag folding. Little squares of paper are folded and combined to make lovely shapes and add a new excitement to cards and layout pages. Our Design Team Sister Steph as a fabulous tutorial on her blog for this fun and exciting technique so click HERE to view it. There is also a site that offers tea bag tiles to print and cut out if you'd like to use coordinating patterns. That is what I did for this challenge. Click HERE to go to that site. I am back to using my Nesties for a frame for my tea bag folded star. The background is cuttled with Swiss Dots (honestly what would I do without it?)

The pattern I chose reminded my of the Blue Onion china pattern so I used my QuicKutz tea set die exclusive to The Scrapping Cottage. (No I don't work for them, I just can't resist their stuff! LOL) I cut the handle, spout, base and top twice to give it a bit of a shadow and used Swiss Dots (again) on the main part of the pot. "Hello Friend" is from the Cuttlebug Friends Forever combo underlined with the zigzag border. Please be sure to stop by The Cuttlebug Spot to view the fabulous designs from my teammates and Please come and play along. This was so much FUN!

BBTB Doodle Charms border feature challenge-"Popsicle Toes"

What a fun challenge this week at Bitten by the Bug! Regina chose the border feature from Doodlecharms and it was our choice! Of course I couldn't resist the popsicles so I made my own little "Popsicle Toes" card by welding mutiples of the border popsicles to the feet from New Arrival and a rectangle from George.

The sentiment says "are always froze" which are words from the song my Michael Franks. (My fave version has got to be Diana Krall's) "Froze" is welded in Design Studio using Mickey Font and "are always" are from Opposites Attract. I added the Brrr... from Graphically Speaking to balance the design.

I used the little wooden stirrers from Starbuck's for the sticks and added Glossy Accents to the popsicles to make them look like they were melting. I also did that on the Froze and Brrr... but added some glitter on top so they still looked "froze". (Hmmm... why didn't I just use stickles?)

Of course I used a wad of dimensionals and some fun adhesive gems. I also tried to chalk my toes a bit blue which is the way mine ALWAYS look no matter how warm it is. LOL

Be sure to stop by Bitten By the Bug to see all of my Design Team Sisters' fabulous creations. We are even having a blog hop with some candy being offered. Sorry I was caught a bit off guard because of my Birthday today so I sorta dropped the ball on this but there's lots to be had so go check it out and please play along.

Paper Blooms Challenge 4

In honor of Earth Day the Paper Blooms challenge this week was to alter or use something you'd normally throw away. I've been saving these octagonal jars that yummy olive spread comes in because I love the size and shape. Happily in the mail today I received my latest Paper Blooms order with Leah's new daisy shaped hand crocheted flowers so I just HAD to use one. Isn't it gorgeous!?!

I found a tiny spool of adorable blue and yellow ribbon and the color scheme was born. The lid cover I did with my Nesties, used my Threading water border punch for a band and some blue and white gingham ribbon and tiny yellow buttons around the jar. I finished it off by layering another of Leah's blooms and tiny blue button in the centerof my new daisy. I think I'll keep it to store either buttons or Paper Blooms. I'm loving this new challenge blog and you don't have to use Paper Blooms to play along but since I've been ordering up a storm I can't help myself.

Caardvark's "Tree's a Crowd" Challenge

Happy Earth Day! I decided this was the perfect day to work on the current challenge over at Caardvarks. I had a new Cottage Cutz tree die from The Scrapping Cottage and was dying to use it. I originally planned to do something all Springy and floral when I came upon my rather neglected Green Stack from DCWV. PERFECT! How more Earth friendly could I get? I'm afraid I'm rather stuck on these popped frames lately but I couldn't help using my Labels 1 Nesties set. The colors turned out to be fairly masculine so I restrained myself on the embellies and chose not to use a sentiment to keep it versatile but all in all I don't think it turned out half bad.

Paper Blooms Challenge 3 and 2S4U

WooHoo! another multiple post day. That can only mean I'm running late for a challenge. LOL I find it really tough to recover from a vacation and get back into everyday mode. Still I didn't want to miss this week's challenge at Paper Blooms. Leah challenged us to use the 5 "B's"; blooms, bling, butterflies, brown, and a sentiment that began with "B". I had perfect paper to go with Leah's gorgeous hand crocheted blooms but I was at a bit of a loss for a design. One of my New Year's resolutions was to get comfortable with sketches so I hopped over to 2 Sketches 4 U and lo and behold Laura's sketch 24 did the trick. I'm hardly what you'd call creative with sketches, but I think it turned out alright. I may even get the nerve to post it on the site. LOL

I used my threading water punch and wrapped the strip in plaid and thin gingham ribbon, used my Cuttlebug emboss/die combo for the butterfly, my Nesties and a Melissa Frances rub-on for the sentiment and pink rhinestones for the bling. Voila! Just under the wire for Paper Blooms, and EARLY for 2S4U.

The Cuttlebug Spot Takes the Cake

This week at The Cuttlebug Spot we were challenged to use a cake or cupcake on our card. I chose the cupcake from the Doodlecharms Cricut cartridge because I thought it fit nicely in the octagon frame I did with my new Nesties. The background was cuttled with the Happy Birthday folder and the plaid foreground with Swiss Dots. The cupcake frosting used D'Vine Swirls highlighted with stickles and I ran the holder through the crimper. I used the cuttlebug Birthday Greetings combo to cut the sentiment twice, and an EK Success border punch along the bottom. Be sure to take a look at the all of the yummy cards my design team sisters created for this challenge and there's a fun prize if you want to play along with The Cuttlebug Spot.

You Made Me Smile! Thank you Margie!

My sweet friend Margie gave me this adorable award and I couldn't be happier. With so much going on we haven't been able to connect nearly as often as we like. I treasure her friendship and sincerely hope she finds something to smile about each and every day! I agree with her that all of the blogs I visit make me smile but since I can only choose five I will pass this along to Lillie, Caryn, Leah, Susan, and Heidi. Be sure to click on these talented ladies names to go straight to their blogs and you'll be smiling too!

And a Great Time Was Had By ALL!

I'm BAAAAACK! Had to throw in a few pics of the gorgeous place we stayed on our girly getaway before getting back to the crafty business. Tell me this house isn't to die for! It's the Mendo House at Irish Beach on the Northern CA cost about 30 minutes from Mendocino. Those ocean views are from the deck and let me tell you that sunset in the hot tub with a glass of wine is breathtaking! (No pix though, afraid of dropping my camera in the drink and neither Lisa nor I wanted any incriminating bathing suit shots. LOL) We had SUCH a marvelous time!

BBTB Meets Peggy Loves Vintage

Just had to borrow that post title from my DT sisters Sharon and DeeDee because it's perfect! This week at Bitten by the Bug Regina had us combine the lunchbag cut from TBBM with an adorable image from Peggy Loves Vintage. These are the coolest images and are soooo very nostalgic to me being a child of the fifties. (OOps, don't tell!) Anyway I had a hard time choosing which design to use but this new baby one reminded me of some of the cards I had in my baby book. And yes, it also inspired me to dig around a bit in my attic and pull out a "vintage" toy and dress for staging purposes. (I was an only child so my parents kept EVERYTHING! LOL)

Because the it is printable I decided to make several copies and cut out parts for dimension like a decoupage image. I used a chipboard glitter star and tried to dirty it up a bit and organdy ribbon to wrap the baby in. The pleated organdy trim that backs the entire image and made the handles was in the $ bin at M's. (Loved it so much I bought in about 7 colors!)

I thought the designer paper from Tracy Porter had a bit of a vintage feeling as well. The bag is cut at 7 1/4" which is the largest you can do on a 12 x 12 mat. I REALLY enjoyed working with these fabulous images from Peggy Loves Vintage and will be sure to order some more. She even has her CD's at $2.00 off the regular price at the moment with free shipping and is offering downloadable versions as well. Click HERE to check out all of her fabulous collections. Also be sure to hop on over to Bitten By The Bug to see what my fabulous Design Team sisters have done with them and come and play along. There's also an exciting new contest that is sponsored by Peggy Loves Vintage and she generously has offered two of these fun images to use for free! The new contest ends May 6 so you've got two weeks to play. WooHoo!

Sweet Baby Boy Card

This sweet little card went pretty fast and was sooo much fun to make! I guess I have bears on the brain (actually I have a fabulous collection of artist made teddies all over my house) so I just couldn't resist using this adorable die from The Scrapping Cottage. It's a Cottage Cutz die made exclusively for them by Go Kreate. I cut him twice, once out of white cardstock and once out of blue and white gingham and glued them together slightly offset and popped two of his legs and his head inside an oval cut with my Nesties. I used my threading water border punch on the blue mat and cuttled the top mat with Swiss Dots. The scalloped blue oval frame is also done with my Nesties and "It's a Boy" is spelled out in alpha beads.

I'm sorry that this will be my last post until Monday because I'm leaving for an all girls weekend with my BFF Lisa, her daughter Hayley and her BFF. We've rented a gorgeous house on Irish Beach up near Mendocino. No crafts, no internet. Our hubbies are backpacking and we're thrilled to be able to relax in the hot tub, shop, eat, drink, and do girly things. WooHoo!

The Cuttlebug Spot "Shape It" Challenge and Caardvaark's "Good Knight" challenge

This week at The Cuttlebug Spot we were asked to do a card with any shape other than square or rectangle. I have been dying to use the adorable Knight outfit for my Boo for You bear die so I designed a castle shaped card using Cricut Design Studio and the Doodlecharms cartridge.

I used Tim Holtz's grunge paper for the castle which is thinner than grunge board but still really flexible and cuts and embosses like a dream. I embossed the castle walls with the Tiny Mosaic Cuttlebug folder and the turret roofs with Diamonds in the Rough. They were inked and sponged with distress and chalk inks and metallic acrylic paint daubers and popped for dimension. Boo is and his outfit are dies from GoKreate, a UK company available in the U.S. at The Scrapping Cottage. "Celebrate"is an adhesive metallic sentiment I found in the $ bin at M's. It was so great creating a card for a male that wasn't a chore. LOL

Inside I used the Cuttlebug die from the Birthday Wishes combo with the knight's sword for the exclamation point. It just so happens that the Caardvark's challenge is "Good Knight" a fantasy theme. I think this fills the bill. Be sure to stop by The Cuttlebug Spot to see the other wonderful shaped cards my Design Team sisters have created and please come and play along.