Copic Coloring / Get Well Kitties

Hooray...It's hump day! Which has nothing to do with this post other than Gieco has been running old commercials, I love the camel commercial, it's Wednesday and I'm grateful to be a little bit closer to the weekend. I don't own a camel stamp so kitties will have to do for this hump day.

Carrying over from my self imposed color challenge with the thank you cards, I bring to you get well kitties.

In addition to birthday and thank-you cards, I always need get well greetings, especially this time of year. Lots of cat lovers and owners in my circle of friends so MFT I Knead You set gets lots of use. I paired it with some stamps from MFT Merry Chistmoose.

On this card, I paired it with some washi tape..actually a double band. The teal design was too stark and red tone wasn't quite right so I layered the two using a bit of glue to secure the two layers together. Depending on the brand I find washi tape doesn't always want to stick over time. A little bit of glue prevents having to fuss with the card when I'm ready to send it.

Thank You

Happy Monday. 

Kicking off a new week and finally kickstarting the new year. It's a rough start. My niece is home sick so all my big goals for the day need to be modified to account for spending most of my day with her. Usually, I'm better organized and prepped. Full of energy and eagerness to set goals, clean out and very productive. Last week, not so much. Procrastion was my first, middle and last name. We did manage to get all the Christmas decorations put away. And I did get to spend some time in the craft room building a stash of Thank-You cards for the coming year. I'll require many more but it's a good beginning and I'm counting it as a win in an otherwise pretty lazy, laid-back start to the year. 

This was really more of a color challenge for me. I've had the turquoise cardstock from Paper Source for a number of years. I believe it is called Pool. Decided it was time to put it to better use than sitting on a shelf. Why I don't use this color combination more often is a mystery to me...I really like to cool greens and blues complimented by the warm brown. And it's not like this combo hasn't been everywhere during the past couple of years. Figures I'm picking it up just as it's going out. 

Stamps and dies are from Altenew, Concord & 9th, Mama Elephant, MFT and I might even have one from Simon Says in there. 

This first one uses the C&9 double cut alphabet dies. This is still one of my all-time favorite alphabet dies. And, yes, I'm still hoping they'll release some phrases because lining up the individual dies, even with a temple, is still a major pain. The fact that I do it is just an indication of how much I love the results. I've paired it with Altenew's Leaf Canopy stamp set. Another new favorite. 

This card uses a free little stamp set Altenew sent to their customers. It was such a wonderful year-end surprise in the mail. Though I'm pretty sure this meant I spent way too much money with them last year.  No matter, my loyaty is easily bought with kindness and great customer service. 

The sentiment is from Mama Elephant. The set contains the word thanks in several languages. Love that!

The final card is using the remaining die cuts and MFT Distressed Patterns stamp. Of all the stamps I purchased last year this one is definitely in the top 10 favorites. I predict it will get a healthy workout in the coming year. 

Happy 2019

Happy New Year! We're not quite ready to give up on the holiday season, meaning the Christmas decor is still up and it's not coming down until the weekend. But the urge to clean and purge did arrive promptly with the new year. My desk is clean and everything that had contributed to the craft room looking as if a cyclone has hit, back in the proper place. Just in time because I'm out of birthday, get well and thank-you cards. I can work in messy but not in a disaster zone. Feels good to be in the land of organized again.

The card I'm sharing today is using the Simon Says Thanks border die and MFT You Gnome Me stamp set. I'd been eyeing this stamp set for a long while and finally purchased it this Fall. The images are adorable. We have a running joke in the family about garden gnomes...so I have no idea why it took so long to become part of my stamp collection.

Just a real simple thank you card. Now I need to make about 40 more to get me through the first half of the year.

Deck the Halls

Happy Monday! I'm coming off a very busy weekend with family and prepping for the holidays. No decking of halls buts lots of gift wrapping. With a large family, there is definitely more of that in my future.

Today sharing a card made with Concord & 9th's Deck the Halls turnabout stamp set and PTI Holiday Double Cut dies. Lots of gold embossing and sparkle on this more traditional color schemed card.

CN9 Cozy Christmas

Been holiday crafting and baking since mid-November. Every year I make a promise to myself to start earlier, plan it all out and then something or another disrupts my best intentions. I try not to stress about it too much after all this is supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year...and honestly if some of the items don't get completed the only person usually disappointed is me.

The good news is my church's holiday cookie walk and bake sale is done! We had a great turnout and some wonderful cookies, candies and desserts. I feel like I gained inches just walking by the displays of goodies. I'll post some images at some point, mainly of the decorated cookies I create for the sale. I like to do a comparison on my decorating progress and capacity. Five years ago when I began learning to use royal icing it took me an entire week to decorate a couple dozen cookies, this year I managed to complete 247 cookies in the same amount of time. Progress!

Along with baking, I have been busy creating some holiday cards. I always read about the super organized starting their holiday card production in mid-summer. Yeah, so NOT me. Envious? Yes! But I can never seem to break out the Christmas stamps earlier than November.

Today I'm sharing a card I created with Concord & 9th's Cozy Christmas stamp set. I'm a sucker for knit patterned stamps. The minute I saw the release this baby made its way into the cart. Washi tape from Michaels and those cute little mittens are from Simple Stories.

I'll be posting more this week as I finally got around to photographing all my cards and crafty things for the holidays.

PTI Twig Wreath

Another autumn inspired card for Thanksgiving. This one is using PTI's Twig Wreath along with the new dies from CZ. I stacked several die cuts for some slight dimension. I stamped the envelope with a set from Concord & 9th, pulling the colors from the wreath.

PTI Autumn Hills

Hello. Just a quick post today. I'm in the midst of renovating again so my time and energy are being spent on caulking, scrubbing and nailing. It's a good thing I had prepped some cards last month for the Thanksgiving season. I have a lot to be thankful for this year and high on my list are friends and family always on the ready to lend a helping hand when my schedule gets a bit too crazy. I'm spending a little each morning expressing my gratitude and keeping the postman busy.

The card I'm sharing today was made with an old PTI set Autumn Hills. This is definitely one of my favorites and makes a beautiful card reflecting all the splendor of autumn.