Breast Cancer Awareness Blog Hop(e)

Michelle in Boise had the fabulous idea to organize a blog hop for Breast Cancer Awareness. Like most people, I have been personally touched by this horrible disease - my Gramma is a SURVIVOR. She fought it like a girl!! So when I heard about the hop, I had to jump right in and play along! It also gave me the perfect excuse to get my wonderful new Fight Like A Girl set from Flourishes inky!! I absolutely adore this set, have you seen it? Flourishes was generous enough to donate a few copies of it to our SCS Shoebox Swap here in Austin, as well as some of their delicious Classic cardstock for everyone to sample. Me and my Copics are loving this paper!! So I am sending out a great big thank you to Jan Marie and the Flourishes team - another fabulous, generous company that I love! Let's see, what else? I decided to play along with the latest Mojo Monday sketch for my card. It was also a perfect excuse to use my sweet little pink ribbon beads I found at the craft store recently - love them!!

Alrighty, so now you want to continue along the blop hop and check out what Martha created! I bet it's beautimous!! And if you just happened upon my post, make sure and head back to the beginning at Michelle's blog. Thanks for stopping by today!

• Stamps: Fight Like A Girl from Flourishes
• Paper: Pretty in Pink, Regal Rose, Pink Pirouette, Flourishes white, The Paper Studio DP
• Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, SU Pretty in Pink, Copic markers
• Accessories: letter & ribbon beads, embroidery floss, Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder, Marvy punches

Mmm cupcakes!!

I'm posting cards two days in a row, can ya believe it?! Well this one came together quite quickly, so it's not THAT shocking, really. :-) Today I'm breaking from my goal of featuring the stamp companies I adore, but only briefly - next post I'll be back with another one!! This fun and yummy card was inspired by a beautiful butterfly card created by sweet Lisa of papergrace cards & crafts. She's one of my Twitter buddies and shared the photo on there - as soon as I saw it I felt an overpowering urge to CASE it! :-) But even though I own a Martha Stewart butterfly punch, I couldn't help but reach for the cupcakes instead! My color combo came from this week's Color Throwdown - Elegant Eggplant, Bordering Blue & Rich Razzleberry. I hope they don't consider it cheating that I added all that Kraft! LOL! So with a beautiful card as inspiration and the color combo figured it, it's no wonder this one came together quickly! I ran the tops of my cupcakes through my Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder. The sentiment is one of my favorites, I use it all the time, especially when there are cupcakes involved! It's from a set by Flourishes. I don't know about you, but I'm totally craving a cupcake now!! I'm off to find one - thanks for stopping by today!

• Stamps: Sentiment from Flourishes
• Paper: Kraft, Bordering Blue, Elegant Eggplant, Rich Razzleberry
• Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
• Accessories: Martha Stewart cupcake punch, SU ribbon, Cuttlebug Swiss Dots folder, Making Memories straight pin, embroidery floss

Ahhh Monet. Well not really, but it reminds me...

Today I'm continuing my quest to feature every company who generously donated prizes to the Austin SCS Shoebox Swap. And today I'm also realizing that at the rate I'm stamping these days, this little endeavour may take me well into next year to complete! But I will trudge on, slowly but surely... :-) Today's card features stamps from smARTworks. I love this image, it reminds me of a Monet! I used the watercolory direct to stamp method, where you color right on the stamp with a marker and then mist it with a little water before stamping. After it dried I painted over the entire image with Crackle Accents, to get a cracked glass look. I love Crackle Accents, but I have to tell ya - it can totally change the colors of your image! I was inspired by last week's Color Throwdown - Taken with Teal, Certainly Celery & Purely Pomegranate. I didn't have a Pomegranate marker, so I used it's close cousin Rose Red. Well when I painted it with Crackle Accents, it turned more of a hot pink! Eek! But, it's not terrible. The whole thing didn't photograph very well, but it's mighty pretty in person, I promise! :-)

So have you ever visited smARTworks? I highly recommend you do! They have WONDERFUL images, owner Susan is a super nice lady, and I know I've raved about them before - they have THE BEST acrylic mounting blocks on the planet!! I promise you - if you treat yourself to some, you will LOVE THEM. I have two bins of blocks on my desk - my wonderful The Clear Thing blocks that I ALWAYS use, and my bin of other random blocks that just sit there collecting dust. I know, I sound like a commercial. But nobody is paying me to say this - I MEAN IT!!! My hands appreciate me treating them this well. :-D (but if I HAVE convinced you, make sure and mention me when you place your order bc Susan also offers an incentive program!!) :-D

Ok my sweets, duty calls (ie naps are close to ending!) so I must wrap this up. Thanks for stopping by today!

• Stamps: BFL-01 Floating & HSD-Hummer from smARTworks
• Paper: Taken with Teal, Certainly Celery, Whisper White
• Ink: Taken with Teal, Stampin' Up markers
• Accessories: Spellbinders Labels 8 die, Swiss Dots Cuttlebug embossing folder, Crackle Accents, American Crafts velvet scallop ribbon, staples, silver brads

Hogs & Sketches Challenge #2

Hi all! I did something unbelievable last night. I STAMPED!!! This is seriously only the second card I've made in the past MONTH. I'm going through massive stamping withdrawal! My mojo has been hiding out someplace far, far away. BUT - I wanted to be sure and play the second Hogs & Sketches Challenge from Hambo Stamps! I WON the challenge last month with this card, YAY! Well actually, the card didn't win because it was particularly good or anything, it was a random drawing. hee hee But BOY did I get a WONDERFUL prize!!! Monica sent me a stack of stamps like you wouldn't believe! Of course I already had several of them, because I love Hambo so, but sweet Monica suggested I use what I didn't want to keep for myself as door prizes for our SCS Shoebox Swap. So I did! She sent a second doorprize for that as well (a CD of ALL of their ADORABLE digi images - such a great prize!!). So, I want to sincerely thank Monica & Tim for their wonderful generosity. They are the best!! And I want to encourage YOU to get on over to the Hogs & Sketches blog and PLAY! There's only a couple entries so far, and you have until the 29th! The odds of winning are GOOD! And this month they are giving away TWO prizes - one to their favorite card, and one to a random winner. Good stuff!! For this challenge card I played with some of my fun, NEW Hambo rubber!! I just love this little Cat Witch!! And funny, I realized as I brought up my blog, the last card I made was with a witchy kitty too! I guess I can't own too many witchy kitty stamps! :-) I love the colors in this card more IRL - my photo is a bit muted compared to the real thing. And I coated the little square behind the kitty with Crystal Stickles so it's all sparkly and fun, something I can never seem to capture with a camera. This card makes me happy. :-) Thanks for stopping by today!
ETA: The photo was bugging me so I took a new one, propping the card up outside on the hood of my car! It's a little better... :-)

• Stamps: Cat Witch and Spooky Day from Hambo Stamps
• Paper: Perfect Plum, Basic Black and DP from Stampin' Up (Nouveau Chic & Cast-A-Spell)
• Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
• Accessories: Doodlebug Designs bat buttons, Making Memories bat brads, SU oval punch, Diamond Stickles, Michael's ribbon, Janome Sew Mini & black thread

FCD Blog HOP: Autumn Creations using Mesh!

Remember my last post, I mentioned the AWESOME companies that donated to our Austin Shoebox Swap? Well one such company was one you all know I love - FireCracker Designs by Pamela! Oh how I love sweet Pamela!! You know, I don't know if I ever fully told you what I'm up to with FCD these days - I think I only linked to the announcement on Pam's blog. I am no longer on her design team, it was only a one year gig. But she invited me to stay on as part of her "Creative Council" - I'm officially in charge of her guest designer schedule (have you checked out the fabulous Karen this month??), I share FCD card ideas on Facebook & Twitter that I find on SCS or various blogs (look for FCDStamps on Twitter!!), and I occasionally spew ideas at her for new stamp sets (which she sometimes listens to and sometimes ignores, LOL!). There are no stamping "obligations" on this gig, because as you've noticed my stamping time is limited these days. But I'm welcome to join her blog hops if I choose to - and of course I choose to!! So without further ado... LET ME GET TO WHAT YOU CAME HERE FOR!!!

This month our theme is "Autumn Creations using Mesh!" - it was probably meant to be leafy autumny creations, but to me, autumn means HALLOWEEN! So I pulled out my sweet Witchy Kitty (which is actually called Pawsitively Frightful) and went to work. I used my purple mesh as just a background - and added some googlie eyes, like they are peeking out from behind the mesh! What do you think? Do you like it? I really think this card is missing SOMETHING, or something isn't quite right. It's the first thing I've created in ~3 weeks, so it was a struggle. I'd really love to hear what you think I should add or change. Leave me a comment, and I will actually give out MY OWN BLOG CANDY to the person with my favorite suggestion. I have a set of Pamela's sweet photopolymer Shore Birds for the winner!

But I'm not the only one with blog candy - there is also a "mystery hostess" somewhere along our hop, so be sure to travel around to the blogs and leave some love, and maybe you will win Pamela's fabulous goodies!! As always, it's a circular hop, so you'll end up right back here, if this is where you started. AND - Pamela is offering a DISCOUNT CODE during this hop - enter hopidays at checkout for 15% off your order! This discount ends when the hop ends - Monday at 8pm EST.

And as if all of that wasn't exciting enough - Pam also has her NEW HOLIDAY RELEASE up on the website. OMG is it ADORABLE!!! You've got to go and look at these new stamps!!

Ok, enough jibber jabber, please go to PAMELA'S blog and continue hopping!! Thanks for stopping by today!!

Austin Area 2009 SCS Shoebox Swap!

Wow it's been ages since I've posted on here!! For the most part I have been on a MAJOR stamping break - totally lacking in the mojo department. I was close to giving up hope that I'd ever stamp again, but luckily some sweet stamping friends hosted a big SCS Shoebox Swap and I was able to kick it back into high gear!! Ok, that's a lie - I still have very little mojo, but at least I was able to make cards OTHERS designed, and hang out with some wonderful stampy chicks! I'll share some photos in a bit, but first I wanted to say a GREAT BIG THANK YOU to some WONDERFUL companies - they donated doorprizes and discount codes for our swap, providing enough STUFF that everyone got to go home with a goodie bag as well as a doorprize!! They ROCK and they are now officially my favorite companies on the planet. (Ok, most of them already were anyway!!) But here's who I officially LOVE!
American Art Stamp * Deadbeat Designs * DeNami Design * FireCracker Designs by Pamela * Flourishes * Gina K Designs * Hambo Stamps * MFT * Our Craft Lounge * Rubbernecker Stamp Company * smARTworks * Stampendous * Stamping Bella * Taylored Expressions * Texana Designs * The Greeting Farm * Unity Stamp Company
My next posts will feature each of these fine companies, starting tomorrow morning with an FCD blog hop!! So tune in for that! :-) And now onto the photos. First, here's me with two of our wonderful hostesses for the event, Karen (gamblemom) and Brenda (sassybee)!This is the entire gang - 40 stampers. The event was at the Lone Star Retreat Center in Georgetown, and owner Karmen could not be any sweeter! She joined us for the stamping!Stamping our little hearts out...Here I am with Christy (cpine) - one of the sweetest stampers I know!You know I love Deborah's (deborahmegan) blog! And of course she is such a fun chica too!And last but not least - here I am with two AMAZING stampers, who I was hoping like mad would rub a little of their talent off on me as we posed for this photo! Bev (texasgrammy) and Joan (joanervin). EEEK!Thanks for stopping by today! I'll be back soon with the blog hop!!

One and Done!

Isn't this image adorable!? Would you want to be the ONLY PERSON IN ALL OF STAMPLAND playing with it???? Well you better HURRY on over to the Hambo Stamps blog, Talk to the Ham! Tim & Monica had the fun idea of doing "silent auctions" on their blog for one of a kind digital images! Check the blog for all the details. TODAY they are auctioning off this cutie! Bidding ends at 10pm EST - so hurry on over there! Last I checked I was winning, we'll see if I can hang on! I can already tell it's going to absolutely KILL ME each week knowing there's a cute Hambo image that I may not EVER be able to own! EEEK!