A harvest of memories

Time for the CHF challenge over on the Cornish Heritage Farms Blog.  This week the challenge is hosted by Maureen and is to create a card/project that includes a pumpkin.

I used CHF’s Pumpkin and Pie Digital Stamp for my card. Colored image with copics and cut it out completely. Distressed the Top Note die and added some ribbon. Images is attached with pop dots. Sentiment is from Paper Pretties.

If you would like to play along with us of course we would love to have you!

To play create a card using CHF images. You can use either CHF digi or rubber stamps to create a card or project.... anything you like as long as the stamps are Cornish Heritage Farms. (Yes, they can be older stamps.)
Once you have created your card/project head to the CHF blog and place a comment with a link to your card/project to the post so that we can see what you created. If you upload your card/project to SCS don't forget to include the keyword CHF64. We can't wait to see what you create!

Don’t forget to check out the rest of the Design Teams blogs today so see what they created for this challenge.

Amber Hillman

Ann Marie Saunders

Irit Shalom

Kelly Santi

Kristine Reynolds

Maureen Russell

Steph Ackerman


         Thanks for stopping by!

                      Amber

Card for a Cause

Today’s featured stamper is Miss Boo aka Jen. I got to met Jen way back in ‘07 at a stamping retreat so I had to do the challenge. I picked this card of Jen’s to case. I changed the image to another Thomas Kinkade image, changed colors and used a stamp for my sentiment.

This card will be going into the basket that mom and I are donating to the silent auction for Paula Lowry. A big thank you to those who have donated so far. To date we have over 70 cards for the basket with more coming in! Details are below if you would like to donate.

(on Sept 23 about 6pm just a few miles from our house, Paula had walked down her driveway to get her mail (on her side of the road)...a pickup pulling a flat trailer (narrow country roads)was coming up the road, the trailer somehow came off the truck, struck Paula head on and stopped in the neighbor’s yard about 100 ft away!!
Paula’s right leg, her tibia and fibula were broken and everything from her knee down was torn away. She also sustained fractures in her back which required screws to be inserted (c4-c7) and (t1-t5). She also had a brain injury at her brain stem.
She has been through quite a bit of surgeries since then and is now breathing on her own during the day. (To read more about her day to day progress, please see My Story) She has 2 young teens and runs the only florist shop in our town. The community is putting on a dinner and silent auction with the money all going to the family to help with doctor bills.)

If you have any cards/small altered items that you’d like to donate for the basket, we’d sure appreciate it! And of course the recipient will end up with the best ever basket!! (please include envelopes with your card) Email me at [email protected] with Cards for Paula in the subject line and I will email you my address as I don’t wish to post it on here. We would like to have all the items by Dec.1st.

supplies: TK-It Doesn’t Get Much Better (CHF) & sentiment from MFT Let’s Go for a Walk, black ink, copics/prismacolor markers, brown, green, white cardstock, ribbon, hodgepodge

Published! Cards for Paula and the Sketch!

This will be a long post so please bear with me as I have something to ask of you, my readers.

First I’m going to brag a little on myself. Two years ago I sent in one of my favorite Thomas Kinkade cards to RubberStampMadness in hopes of being published. Never heard a word until this summer! It is in their Nov/Dec/Jan issue.

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This past weekend I did a Stamp Camp for a friend of mine. She wanted a bundle of all occasion cards. I browsed through SCS and mixed cards left and right until I got 7 cards I was happy with to share with the ladies. The camp was actually 2 days as not everyone could make it the first day so I had double the cards for myself.

Now what am I going to do with all these cards you ask? Well back on Sept 23 about 6pm just a few miles from our house, Paula had walked down her driveway to get her mail (on her side of the road)...a pickup pulling a flat trailer (narrow country roads)was coming up the road, the trailer somehow came off the truck, struck Paula head on and stopped in the neighbor’s yard about 100 ft away!!

Paula’s right leg, her tibia and fibula were broken and everything from her knee down was torn away. She also sustained fractures in her back which required screws to be inserted (c4-c7) and (t1-t5). She also had a brain injury at her brain stem.

She has been through quite a bit of surgeries since then and is now breathing on her own during the day. (To read more about her day to day progress, please see My Story) She has 2 young teens and runs the only florist shop in our town. But those bills will be piling up so as a community, we are putting together a dinner and a silent auction to help the family with the cost.

Mom and I have decided to donate a basket of stamped cards and altered (small) items to be auctioned off. So all those double cards I just made this past weekend are going into the basket. And this is where you come in. If you have any cards/small altered items that you’d like to donate for this basket, we’d sure appreciate it! And of course the recipient will end up with the best ever basket!! (please include envelopes with your card) Email me at [email protected] with Cards for Paula in the subject line and I will email you my address as I don’t wish to post it on here. We would like to have all the items by Dec.1st.

Here are the cards from the stamp camp that I am putting in the basket (just realized one is missing!)

inside of card (the stamps used on this card are from Our Craft Lounge – Autumn Garden)



For today’s sketch252 I used two sets from Our Craft Lounge; Giving Thanks and Nuts About You. I used the leaf border from Giving Thanks to make a frame that I colored with prismacolor markers and then cut out completely. It is attached with Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots. The squirrel is from Nuts about You and is also attached with Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots. The nut border is from Nuts About You and once again I cut it out completely. On the green strip I combined the images from Giving Thanks and Nuts About You and stamped them in Versamark.

Thanks for looking and please consider donating some cards to Paula’s basket. Life can change in the blink of an eye.

A Baja Breeze Christmas

I decided to take a small break today and do the sketch challenge 207 combined with the color challenge 197 (baja breeze, kiwi kiss, basic gray with opitonal not quite navy) (Infact I loved this sketch so much I actually did two cards, second card will be in a seperate post as it is special.)

Thomas Kinkade's Stonehearth Hutch was perfect for the sketch. Wanting something quick but stunning, I stamped the image in Baja Breeze on very vanilla. Colored in the windows with barely banana marker and added a little crystal stickles to the lights. Layered, distressed, add Ski Slope design paper for the background. When I attached the image to the card, I used Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots. I took a couple pictures this time to show you exactly what they look like.

Here is how I applied the Liquid dots to the back of the image.

Here are the Liquid Dots after 5 mins of sitting. After 24 hrs they will be completely set and you can try to squish down the image and it won't budge!

Here is what the complete card looks like:

stamp: Thomas Kinkade Stonehearth Hutch; paper: kiwi kiss, basic gray, very vanilla, not quite navy, ski slope dsp; ink: baja breeze; accs: barely banana marker, crystal stickles, distressing tool, Helmar liquid scrap dots

Speaking of Helmar, the Helmar blog is having a count down to Christmas with the design team members taking turns posting some kind of project using Helmar adhesives each day. Some very cool projects being shared there. And you never know when it will be my day so go check it out!

Christmas card order

The week before I got sick, I got an order for three special Christmas cards. Needless to say I didn't get them done until this week! Here was the order: masculine tropical Christmas, special card for her mom & special card for her Aunt. No problem... except that masculine tropical one!

Only 'tropical' I have is flamingo stamps! So I went with them, drew on some Santa hats and added some 'masculine' christmasie colors. Happen to have Impression Obsession's Fall/Winter wreath set that had a little candy cane, ornament and poinsetta. Stamped those with versamark on the real red. Added some twine to the top. Sentiment is from Treehouse Stamps.

stamp: misc flamingo, impression obsession fall/winter wreath, treehouse sentiment; paper: real red, wild wasbi, white, dsp; ink: black stazon, versamark; accs: twine, prismacolor pencils, odorless mineral spirits, white gel pen, red marker

The next two 'special' cards I used Cornish Heritage Farms' Thomas Kinkade stamps. I made each one different so she can decide which one goes to her mom and aunt. For the Christmas Village, I stamped it right onto the Top Note die, colored it a little, added gold leafing Krylon around the edge. Then I covered it in Irredescent Ice embossing powder. To get the next Top Note layers, I used SU's retired Layer Ease. Used the notched corner punch on the sentiment and added gold cording to finish off the card.

stamp: Thomas Kinkade's Village Christmas; paper: purely pomegranate, always artichoke, black; ink: black st azon; accs: gold cording, irredsecent ice powder, yellow marker, top note die, notched corner punch, layer ease

For the Try New Technique, we were to brayer ink on glossy cardstock. Taking care not to muddle colors. Spray with Simple Green, let dry and end up with a 'speckled' background. I only used one color on my glossy, old olive in place of kiwi kiss. I had colored the image with Prismacolor pencils and blended with odorless mineral spirits. The lake was painted with Sky Blue Shimmerz. Stickles were added to the tree for the lights. Yellow stickles was added to the windows, star and light. My layout is cased from flowergal36's card Grandma's Teacup as flowergal36 was the Featured Stamper this week. I changed colors, images and added dots to my scallop. You can see how I decorated the inside of the card with the same dsp that I used on the outside.

stamp: Thomas Kinkade's Skater Pond; paper: kiwi kiss, chocolate chip, glossy, black, ski slope dsp; ink: black stazon, old olive; accs: scallop edge punch, prismacolor pencils, odorless mineral spirits, stickles, simple green, brayer, shimmerz

Catching up again.

I just realized that there are some cards I made while I was sick that I didn't have the energy to post here! Enjoy.

Try new Technique 182: Acetate boxes. I made a Teacher Survival Kit for son's Kindergarten teacher. I used the Kim's Korner for Teacher Talk for the ideas inside the box.
stamp: It's Academic; paper: acetate, scrapbook kit papers; ink: black; accs: marker, stickers, ribbon

MFTSC44 of the week.

Stamps: Meet Me at the Cafe, It's Elemental - MFT ; Paper: pale plum, mellow moss, perfect plum, black, vanilla, dp ; Ink: black, pale plum, perfect plum, mellow moss, bashful blue, ruby red, creamy caramel, blush blossom ; accs: Flower patch suede flowers, glitter gel pen, nestibilities, cuttlebug

WT179: Copics or Faux copic (SU markers with aquapainter). I did the Faux copic. Sketch is from Julee's Anni-VERVE-sary sketches, this is sketch #12.
stamp: Happy Fall Ya'll - Treehouse Stamps, SU's Flannel Plaid; ink: black; paper: red, watercolor, wild wasabi; accs: brads, circle punch, aquapainter, markers

Another WT179 but on this one I used Prisma color Markers which was also allowed. Another Anni-VERVE-sary sketch, this is sketch #3.
stamp: Jolliest Time of the Year; paper: black, white, red; ink: black; accs: prismacolor markers, ribbon, hodgepodge, white gel pen, scallop square punch, corner round punch

Sketch Challenge 189. Thomas Kinkade stamp from Cornish Heritage Farms (CHF). Combined the color challenge 179 of old olive, elegant eggplant, taken with teal. Watercolored image and then embossed with Iridescent Ice to give a sparkle.
Stamps: TK- Village Christmas, We Wish you.... - CHF ; Paper: Elegant Eggplant, Old Olive, Vanilla, Black; Ink: Versamark, Elegant Eggplant, Old Olive, Taken With Teal, Barely Banana, Black ; accs: Iridescent Ice embossing powder, aquapainter, eggplant marker,artist pen

Inspiration challenge 140. I went with the colors for my inspiration. This is sketch #9 from Julee's Anni-VERVE-sary sketches. Totally Witchin' from MFT dressed up for Christmas. Liquid Applique turns the witch hat into a 'santa' hat. Dresses and boots are paper pieced.
stamps: Totally Witchin' - MFT ; Paper: Black, white, DCWV The Christmas Stack ; Ink: black; Accs: christmas tree eyelets, markers, liquid applique

Still alive!

I'm still alive even though it may not seem like it as I haven't posted at all last week. For some reason I was busy every single day last week and had no time to update my blog. I am hoping this week will be a little slower and I'll be able to post more!

Here are a few projects I made during the week. The first two use Stampin' Up! set One of a Kind, Berry Bliss design paper and purely pomegranate ink!

This was for the Try New Technique challenge, opens to reveal a gift card. Directions can be found here at Pinefeather's blog. Watercolored the flower with inks.

Ways to use it challenge: scissors. I cut the flower out and cut the ribbons. Added some white gel pen accent to the flower. There are post-it notes in the middle of the 'booklet'. This was what I gave to my hostess at a recent workshop.

The color challenge was pretty in pink, certainly celery and chocolate chip. I used a new set from Treehouse called "Hoppy for You". Cuttlebugged the background and watercolored the frog with inks. Added some google eyes and the saying "Hang In There" from the frog set. Sent this to my friend, Angie, who is still in the hospital.

This card was for the challenges that were held all last week at Cornish Heritage Farms using backgrounds. The only background of CHF that I own is Pretty Pattern. I embossed it in white on the blue (prisma cardstock) and also embossed it in black on the chipboard bird that I had colored with distress inks. The saying is from the set Elegant Sentiments by Treehouse.

Start every day...

with a smile and get it over with."

Here is my card for the Featured Stamper this week on SCS. Once again I went with High Hopes. What can I say? Thier images are too adorable.

With Featured Stamper, we are suppose change 2 or more things but try to keep the layout the same. I kept the layout the same (well except she tore the bottom of her card and I completely forgot to do that!) but I changed the colors and the images. To see the card I cased, go here. I used watercolor crayons to color my image with. Distressed all the edges of all layers of cardstock. Used a CHF background in the same color of ink as cardstock.

stamp: High Hopes, Edgy Eloquence, CHF; ink: black stazon, bordering blue; paper: bordering blue, brocade blue, black; accs: aqua painter, watercolor crayons, ribbon, distresser tool

I promise I will have a card up sometime today using Stampin' UP! images even though I have only made it half way through the High Hopes that I have borrowed from my mom!!

My Ugly card

I was asked to join a group of ladies, known as the Sassy Six, to participate in a weekly challenge that they come up with. Well now they'll have to change it to the Sassy Seven! The challenge is due on Wend. and this week it was an all green card with neutrals allowed.

I used the Sketch challenge as my focal point. I had a really hard time with both challenges as I had to change my idea around a few times. I finally settled on only using CHF's Pretty Pattern background stamped in Mellow Moss on Vanilla and also stamped on Always artichoke in always artichoke. I found a piece of chip board that I sponged Mellow Moss onto and embossed saying in white. I titled it ugly card because it took me so long and wasn't what i had planned in the first place!!

stamp: pretty pattern - CHF, It's your Birthday; ink: mellow moss, always artichoke, versamark; paper: mellow moss, always artichoke, vanilla; accs: white embossing powder, chipboard, sponge

Last post of the year!

Figured I had better get one last post in before the year is up. I didn't do much stamping this weekend as it has been family time. Took the kids out shopping to spend their Christmas money. Hit the clearence racks.. my favorite places to shop! lol

Emily posted the color challenge way early today so I was able to do some stamping before the year was up. I combined my card with the color challenge, the MFT sketch and a challenge a group of us came up with just to give us a push to stamp this holiday weekend/week.

I pulled out Dino-Mite (as I haven't used it at all and that was one of the 'challenges') from My Favorite Things to use. Stamped him in stazon and watercolored him in with SU inks, Certainly Celery, Real Red and Taken with Teal. I used the retired SU cloud stencil to make taken with teal clouds. I made the clouds cover the entire background cause you know, dinosaurs are pretty tall.. you wouldn't be able to see the ground in the image!

The cupcake, the balloons and the little saying all come from the Dino-Mite set. But I liked the stars from the Icing on the cake (My Favorite Things) and wanted to use them somehow... they are soo perfect for a background with this set. I did add a little bit of yellow stickles to the candle.

stamp set: Dino-Mite, Icing on the Cake from My Favorite Things; Ink: Black stazon, real red, certainly celery, taken with teal; Paper: real red, certainly celery, taken with teal, white; Accs: diminsion, stickles, cloud stencil

I am going to close the 2007 year with a few Christmas cards that I haven't uploaded to SCS yet but am totally in love with.

All three cards use the same image, Thomas Kinkade Village Chirstmas from Cornish Heritage Farms and cardstock is Stampin' Up!. Enjoy the cards.

ink: black stazon; Irredescent Ice embossing powder

ink: black stazon; Irredescent Ice embossing powder

Ink: distress Vintage photo, stickles

Happy New Year and thanks for visiting my blog. Hope to see you all and many more in the following year.

Dazzling diamonds, 2 hr delay, sick kid!

Well maybe not in that order. Oldest decided she wanted a day off school (don't know why as Christmas break starts next week) so she got sick yesterday. And with all the snow and ice we got, the school was on a 2 hr delay this morning (I think they should have canceled, can't see the roads)

Okay, so maybe it's not a lot of snow, a few inches, but it is enough to inspire me for today's challenge on Splitcoast. Today we had to try Dazzling Diamond Dust.

So I pulled out my favorite winter scene, Thomas Kinkade Village Christmas by Cornish Heritage Farms. I don't like to add a lot of color when I use this stamp so I went with a black and white card.

Using black stazon, I stamped the image and highlighted the windows with summer sun marker. Using versamark, I inked up the entire image and poured on some Iredescent Ice embossing powder. So hard to capture the sparkly in the picture but it is there!

stamps: Thomas Kinkade Village Christmas - Cornish Heritage Farm; paper: black, white; ink: black stazon, Acces: summer sun marker, Iredescent Ice embossing powder, photo corner punch, brad

A dog's Christmas?

Boy what a day! My camera is still on the fritz when it comes to downloading. The only way right now I can download is to take the little card out and stick it in my hubby's computer. Download on to his thumb drive and then take that drive back to my computer and download everything. Talk about the long way around just so I can upload my creations! (and it really stinks if I don't have anything done before he leaves for work because then I have to wait until he gets home and of course today he pulled a long day!!)

Today's challenge was Monochromatic cards. I have never done any (that I'm aware of!) but have always wanted to try. I also wanted to play with the dogs from Rubbernecker. I used my dog as my color guide and since I wanted him brown, I went with shades of brown!

I used old paper distress embossing powder on the tree (yes, it is different than regular embossing powder. After you emboss and it cools, you gently rub off to release crystals to 'distress') And instead of using a versamark pad for the embossing powder, I used the Distress embossing ink. OMG! That pad smelled wonderful.. like cinnamon! I've never had a pad smell that good before. (maybe that's why i did so much embossing on this card!!)

Snowflakes and snow is all white embossing powder, with the snow cover white craft ink that had been stippled on. (I finally got my first ever stipple brush from Rubbernecker ! I've been using kid's paintbrushes for stipple brushes! lol)

To make the icicles, i traced the doghouse with crystal effects (on wax paper) and then sprinkled crystal effects on it. After it dried, i peeled it off and stuck it on the dog house.

Dog house, dog and stocking are stamped in distress ink and then watercolored with distress ink. The dog house is on dimensions and the dog is attached to the main frame to give the entire Shadowbox card more of a 3-D'sh look. I even added a touch of crystal effects to the dog's nose to give it that wet look!

Stamps: dog, dog house, stocking, tree -Rubbernecker; ink: distress ink; acces: distress embossing powder, white embossing powder, brad, crystal effects

I've been wanting to try Debbie Olsen's sketch that she came up with for Lisa's birthday bash at CHF. I wasn't able to do it then but yesterday was the right time. I wish Lisa's birthday had been tons earlier in the month as i love this card as my Christmas card! Oh, wait.. I'm not done making Christmas cards so I guess i can still use this idea!!

I went with Cranberry Crisp as my color. I stamped the image in that wonderful smelling distress embossing ink (k, so I just wanted to take a whif again!!) and then into Cranberry Crisp. I sprinkled clear embossing powder over it and heated. The rest is pretty simple, cutting it out, layering, making the notched edge with the circle punch, adding ribbon. After I was all done, I went back with yellow stickles for the windows and any other lights. Also added crystal stickles to the ground for the snow.

Stamps: Thomas Kinkade Village Christmas by Cornish Heritage Farms; ink: Cranberry crisp, distress embossing ink; paper: Cranberry crisp, white; Acces: stickles, clear embossing powder, ribbon, circle punch

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