Playing with Sprays

Happy Friday everyone! I've been playing along with the Unity Stamp Co. Itty Bitty a Day Challenge on Facebook this week and decided to finish it all off by playing with my new Heidi Swapp template I snagged with a birthday certificate (thanks again, Kristen!!).

I wanted CAS, shimmery, and FAST. My first attempt is still drying (bit too much spray, perhaps too thin cardstock) but this one came out, I think, pretty cute.

Shimmer and shine in the early morning light

Little hexagons dancing across the front...hehe, with the edge of the template visible as well. I rolled with it, and made the mental note to cover areas I don't want glitzed better next time. The 'thanks' is an unpackaged Itty Bitty I have which is, well, awesomely versatile.

Pardon my iffy lighting, but the sun wasn't quite up yet when I was snapping these before work. Oops.

Top view to see the overall effect

The dots in the hexes are from my rolling a paper towel roll over the sprayed area to pick up the extras. It came out so neat!

Thank you everyone for your comments via the blog post & Facebook about my 'Not Quite Perfect...' card. I love the change-up ideas, and the ones that basically told me to lighten up. Sometimes we crafters just need to hear that!

I'm also linking up to Friends with Flair today! Happy Crafting!

Not Quite 'Perfect'...

Ever have one of those ideas/designs that look fantastic in your head, but when you put it to paper...well...not quite so fantastic? That's what happened to me last night.

I'm trying to get caught up on thank you cards and had the idea of using a kitchen-y Itty Bitty Unity stamp with some matching paper I had. Instead of stamping the image in black (like always), I decided to change it up and use gray. I colored, I layered, I threw more embellishments at it to make it better. After all, when in doubt, add more embellishments!

The result:

Perfect? Maybe not...

  My reaction to the result: meh. I've done better, I've done worse. It's perfectly usable, I'm just underwhelmed by the result.

Even Liquid Pearls didn't really help

I tried the border punch to give it some pizazz as it looked quite sad just sitting on the paper. But then the holes were lost, so I filled them in with Liquid Pearls for some pop. It needed some texture, so I chose the crocheted ribbon to hide the edges.

Side view - I'm thinking my towel looks like a scarf. :/

So I ask you, my loyal readers - how would YOU redo this card? Help a fellow crafter out!

Sweet & Simple DeNami Blog Hop!

Good morning everyone! Thanks for joining me in hopping along this month with DeNami Stamps. The theme this month is Sweet & Simple. You should have hopped over from Lisa's blog. Remember, if you get lost along the way, you can always start back at the DeNami blog.

When: The blog hop starts on August 11th at 6 AM, PST. However, you have until August 12th, 2013, 11:59 pm PST, to leave comments on all the blogs (to be eligible for a prize).

Why: To be inspired by fun DeNami Design creations and also the chance to win mini shopping sprees on the DeNami Design website!

Prizes: We are giving away THREE $20 gift certificates to our website! We'll be giving away one gift certificate to a random participant (DT members not eligible) and then we'll also be giving away TWO gift certificates to TWO people who comment along the hop!

All right, now that the fine print is out of the way, onto my card! I came across this cute stamp in a clearance bin of all places, so of course I had to give it a good home.
 

Deck the halls with holiday chickies, fa la la la la!

I kept it nice and simple by simply layering three different sizes of my Spellbinders cutout with some lovely holiday paper. Some watercolor coloring, a bit of Stickles (because it's not done until there are Stickles on it!) and a whole bunch of foam tape and this cute little holiday card was all done!

Look at those luscious layers!

Here's a great tip; for my patterned paper, I used both sides of a double-sided page. Hey, they're meant to match, so take advantage of the opposite side!

Ok, now you're off to Linda's blog to keep on hoppin'.

Happy Crafting!

Friends and Rainbows

Happy Friday everyone! I'm hopping along again this week with the Unity Stamp Co. Friends With Flair party. While I was busy organizing all of my Itty Bitty stamps, I came across this little cutie again. Seeing as it's POURING rain here (hence the iffy photos; no sunshine!) it seemed totally appropriate for today. :)

friendship is the rainbow between two hearts

I love how it came out. A bit of pretty storm gray twine, some Stickles, watercolor pencils and a bunch of foam tape. Done! :D

Closeup of the rainbow and sentiment

Yes, the Stickles took forever and a day to dry but they were soooo worth it.

Now, don't forget that Sunday we'll be hopping along with this month's DeNami Blog Hop; Sweet & Simple and starting Monday I'll be trying to play along with the Itty Bitty a Day challenge for Unity!

Also, you still have time to enter our giveaway over at Joie Joelle's blog! It's a lovely treat package of bottlecap magnets, tea and cocoa pouches, and more.

Happy Crafting!

Happy Birthday 10 Minute Craft Dash!

 One year ago, a very creative lady said "I know, let's make a challenge where you have 10 minutes to complete a card!" One year later the challenge is still going strong, so of course there's a party to celebrate.

Yes, I said 10 minutes. From start to finish. You can get your supplies ready ahead of time and may use anything premade in your stash, but that's it. Easy, right?

I'll let you finish laughing.

It IS, however, fun to stretch your crafty boundaries to see if it's possible. So this time, I played along. I got my workspace all set up and set my timer to 10 minutes.

Doesn't it look all neat and organized? Just ignore the box o'ribbons

I took a deep breath and started the timer. Thanks to some technical difficulties including a mis-stamp of my image and my sentiment not coming out dark enough, it took me EXACTLY 10 minutes. Seriously. Like I tossed down my Sharpie when the timer went off in true "pencils down" fashion. PHEW!

Here's the aftermath:

It hurts not tidying up as I go, it really does. I had to find all the stamps again!

So, what was the end result? Oh, you know, just a cute little birthday package...

Who wouldn't' want to open a box and find a cute kitty??

I started with, *gasp*, a pre-cut card base. I know, it's sinful, but it turns out I have three boxes of DCWV ones so I figured I would start using them up. The adorable chevron paper is from one of the 6x6 MME paper pads in my pile that was cut with a cute Sizzix die. The kitty and sentiment are from Simon Says Stamp and are one of my new favorites. I mean, come on; it's a kitty. In a box. CUTE! I colored him in with watercolor pencils and then blended with my water brush. Then the kitty and the patterned paper for the present were fussy-cut (yeah, I was starting to freak by this point) and everything was attached with foam tape.

Meow!

 The 'happy birthday' gave me problems; I could not, for the life of me, get the 'a' in 'happy' to stamp. At the last minute (erm, literally) I grabbed a Sharpie and traced over the whole thing. A tiny bit of bling and this card was done!

Side shot of the layers

I'm linking up to the 10 Minute Craft Dash (of course!) and the Moxie Fab World Birthday Creations challenge.

One last look!

I hope to be back tomorrow with another Friends with Flair Friday with Unity!

Don't forget, the DeNami August blog hop starts Sunday!

Happy Crafting!