SAS4K DT Card: For the Boys - Super Kid & Summer Monkey

Hey, everyone! This is going to be a shorter post than my usual... wait, who just yelled "woohoo!"???  Shush!  As I was saying... short post. I'll fill you in later on my buzy week, but I have about 30 minutes to get this done, so to the point I go...

It's time for a new challenge at Send A Smile 4 Kids! This challenge is all about cards FOR THE BOYS. Snips, snails, puppy dog tails...  or in my case a cape and the ol' undies-over-tights outfit and a monkey splish-splashing his way into summer. LOL Our sponsors this week are Karen's Doodles - offering 3 digis, Bugaboo Stamps - 7 digis, and the Stamp Shoppe - a $15 gift certificate.

My first card is a Karen's Doodle image.

I colored first and then fussed forever to find patterned papers. I finally came up with creating the black and white rays in Word. This is third attempt at coloring black and I really like how his outfit came out, at least the real life version (the pic is a little lighter than it looks IRL). Not perfect, but better than I expected, which is always a nice surprise. LOL Elements on this one are Star Nestabilities, EK Success Sticko glitter star and dot stickers, Christmas Red Stickles and a sentiment done on the computer. And my ever-present foam dots.

My second card was not what I started with for this challenge. A last-minute disaster as I was taking photographs on Wednesday involving a cup of tea and a rather large furry doofus I might have mentioned recently who has taken to popping her head out from under the craft table at random moments during my crafting. So... I had to color up a new Bugaboo image and create a whole new card at the last minute! Here's my second card...

I know, I just did a Christmas/winter card with a snowflake, crying over missing the best bits of winter. Ah, well, blame that on my Gemini horoscope as well. haha  If I had to do it over again, I might make the image bigger, but it still is cute! Elements for this one are a Bugaboo image (love this monkey!), an EK Success beachy border punch, I think the wave border punch is also EK Success, more of those EK Success Sticko dots, a blue foot paperclip from the Walmart office supply aisle, papers from DCWV, foam dots (for the image and under the sentiment (which was done in Word) and the painted wooden umbrella from my stash.

I will say I've been experimenting with my coloring a bit more and had a lot of fun with both these images this week. If your mojo isn't chomping at the bit to get started yet, click on over to the SAS4K blog and see what my teamies were up to and get your creative juices flowin'!

Th-Th-Th-Th-That's all, folks!  See you soon and 'til then...

Happy crafting!

Christy

Doctors Day Card & My Furry Doofus

For my SAS4K DT cards, scroll down to the next post! =)

Hi! Hope everyone had a delightful Easter! I had a lovely lunch with my parents and my youngest brother. I love those warm family moments where nothing is particular notable about the conversation or the meal and it's not necessarily a big event like a birthday or Christmas, but you still get a comfortable warm, fuzzy feeling that stays with you long afterwards. =)

Just popping in to share a card that I mass produced last month. March 30th was Doctors Day and I had 30 of these to create that were signed and given to them by our admin/transcription/secretarial group!

Since I was mass producing, I kept it pretty simple. I noticed when I was done that my proportions ended up a little different on some of the cards. On this one the black ribbon is about in the middle, but the original intent was that the ribbon and border strip were lower so there was a two-thirds to one-third ratio going. Ah, well. Cramming thirty of these things into about a week's "free" time didn't leave a lot of room for ultra-perfection. Not that you ever get that from me anyway. LOL

I used Hero Art's Flower Dot Pattern that is one of their BasicGrey coordinating stamps. I saw Jennifer McGuire using it all the time and finally had to get it for myself. I love using all the images, but I do like cards like she does where the focal point is not a cute little girl or bunny or bear. Maybe it's my Gemini nature - I have a hard time settling for one style of anything. LOL The star border is a Martha Stewart punch, the big star is a Nestie, the black ribbon is from Berwick-Offray and the gem is Recollections. Pearlescent silver cardstock is Colorbok and the black is Recollections. WHite cardstock is Georgia Pacific and it's The star is popped up on foam dots. Even going simple I couldn't stray from that bit of dimension. =)

I know for sure that I will not be mass-producing any cards for a while if I can help it. With do-overs for the stamp images and the occasional crooked border punch and accidental ink-swipes, I am really sick of that stamp image at the moment. LOL

I haven't really posted pics of my fur-kids before, but I had to share this one....  the backstory? My Lab, Zoe, is a sneaky trash collector. She usually eats--or at least rips, chews and spits out bits--of paper plates, napkins, TV dinner boxes. Drives me insane some days! The dogs and I had been slowly eating our way through this container of white cheddar cheese puffs that were on special for Easter ("Cottontails" har dee har har). We finished it up and I tossed the container last Sunday.  Monday night there was a ruckus under the craft table and I looked and saw this:

She would freak out for a moment sort of hopping about frantically, then suddenly stop and lick the cheesy bits, then remember she was stuck and freak out a bit more, then stop and lick.  It was hysterical. "Aaaaack, I'm stuck, I'm stu-ooooh, tasty! lick lick.... Oh, aaaaack, I'm stuck, I'm... oooooh, tasty! lick lick...."  LOL   My friend Lisa says maybe I should have named her Homer Simpson. =D  I did stop giggling long enough - and after a few photos - to pry it off her ears. She's definitely my big furry doofus. My other dog 'Liss was rolling her eyes, well, at least the doggie version. They play together well most of the time, but everyone once in a while I can tell 'Liss is saying, "You are such an idiot, Zoe" in doggie body language. LOL Poor Zoe.

Speaking of mutts, they're doing the 'Hey, Mom, let's go out" dance so I'm off...

Have a crafty week, everyone!
Christy

Happy Newt Year!

Hello, hello! =) Every January my work gives us the chance to sell off some of our vacation time. I usually cash in so I can pay off Christmas bills and the like. This year I decided to invest in some anti-stress medication:

Prettiest meds I've ever seen  =)

I had a chance in July and then in September due to an out-of-stock raincheck to pick up some Copics at low prices (well, as low as Copic could get). I like ProMarkers, but I'm finding it easier to learn to color with the Copics, especially when it comes to choosing good colors to blend. Once I get more experienced, I know I'll be able to pick ProMarker colors better, too. And pencil colors, for that matter. But for now... I'll practice with Copics. The company ran another sale in December and now these beauties join my collection and are all organized and tucked away in a nice little rainbow on my desk. =) Don't hate. LOL  I spent the weekend coloring, blending, recoloring... and binning. LOL Most of my work ended in the bin, but that was ok. Mistakes = learning, right?

So... I saw this terrific New Year Newt over at Hambo stamps. I got done too late last night to enter the challenge with him, but I had fun anyway in this colorful, kind of masculine Newt Year card:

He's a digi, so I printed him and colored eveerything but his shirt in Copics. I really like how his head came out.with the dots. Kind of froggy-like. =) I planned to paper piece his shirt, but the tie-dye glitter cardstock was too thick, so I ended up doing something I don't want to do again for a very long time... I cut out the white space inside the lines to glue it over the cardstock. I had to use my black Copics to darken up all the lines on his shirt and I put buttons back on with some black enamel.

I have a stash from many years ago of holographic film samples. My inner crafty child's shiny quotient needed addressing. ;) I love how holographic materials give off that rainbow as they flash in the light. Hopefully I captured some of that for you in my pics. Turn it one way and get blues and pinks, turn it another and get greens and reds... It keeps me occupied for hours. hahahahaha 

I also couldn't wait to use another playtoy... the Star Circle Nestabilities!

I used a precious metals Recollections cardstock I picked up at Michaels, but it was too much white over the dark blue textured Wausau paper, so I used a circle Nestie to made it a ring of stars. I used the little star punchouts with some gems and a bit of silver metallic pen, a star Nestie cut out of some of the tie-dye paper and a sentiment done in Word in a matching orange-yellow hue. Ta-da! Very suitaable for a boy, I think.

Since I missed the Hambo challenge this week, I'm entering him in these...

Dutch Dare Challenge - New Beginnings (New Year!)

Inky Impressions - Anything Goes

Paper Play - Week 1 Happy New Year (New Year, new stash!)

Crafty Catz - #114  A New Beginning (New Year)

Fairy Tales - #32 Something New  (New digi, new Nestie, new Copics, New Year!)

Paper Cutz - #120 Brand New Year

Crazy4Challenges - C4C118 Do Something New (New digi, new dotty skin coloring, new Nesties!)

7 Kids College Fund - #38 Try Something New (New papers, new digi, new technique (dotty green skin), new Nesties)

That's it for now... I might be back tonight with a Bugaboo creation if I can get it done before bedtime, otherwise, I will see you tomorrow! Til then, happy crafting!
Christy