Creative Blog Hop

Hiya all!  Got something a little different for you today- one of my very favorite crafty peeps, the one-and-only Odd Girl herself, Kristy Dalman tagged me to participate in the Creative Blog Hop and I'm happy to participate!  I was lucky enough to meet Kristy when she was crazy enough to offer me a spot on her design team for Some Odd Girl a couple years back and since then we've gotten to meet up twice in person to work CHA.  I feel so blessed to call her a friend :)

Right!  Now onto the very important questions part of the hop- away we go!

What am I working on now?

Currently I'm working on some design team stuff that I can't really show you just yet- but stay tuned cause it will be fun!  I'm also filling some card orders- one of which is a baby shower card- full post to come soon :)

How does my work differ from others in my genre?

Hmmm, I mainly make cards although I like to alter things now and then as well.  I love to color with my Copics and usually the images that I choose are the main focus of anything I'm doing.  I love patterned paper and a decent amount of bling- there's definitely no denying that I'm a girly kinda girl, lol.  I've been trying to push beyond my comfort zone more lately and try some different styles- I don't know that I'm always successful but I think it's good to push yourself.  I'd also like to try my hand at full on scrapbooking but I gotta find the time first!

Gardening Mae- Some Odd Girl

Autumn Mae- Some Odd Girl

Trixxie Treat- Kenny K Downloads

Why do I create what I do?

I kinda fell into card making accidentally after making a spur of the moment gift for someone.  My uncle had been diagnosed with terminal cancer and my aunt was taking care of him at home.  After a trip to visit, seeing the struggle she was going through, and feeling, to be honest, quite helpless I decided to make her a handmade quote book full of inspirational quotes.  After searching online and gathering quotes I printed them in different fonts on pieces of paper, decorated them, and then inserted them into a 5x7 photo album.  Now, knowing what I know of the craft world, it wasn't unlike a mini album or even a small project life type book but at the time I didn't really know what I was doing creatively I was just trying to make something special for her.  But once I delivered the gift and saw what an impact something handmade could make I kind of got hooked.  I felt completely overwhelmed by something like an entire scrapbook but a card was something made to be given away and a much easier task to wrap my brain around.  So I started making cards, then started selling them, found out that there was a whole blog community and joined up, bought some Copics, and the rest, as they say, is history :)

How does my creative process work?

To be honest- my creative process is not set in stone and I think that's partly 'it' works!  Sometimes I start coloring an image before I pick papers; sometimes I color to match specifically what I'm going to use.  Sometimes I'll have an idea already in my mind of exactly how I want a particular card to look- there's no real thinking behind it- it's just kind of there in my minds eye so to speak.  Other times I have absolutely no idea where I'm going so I just start pulling out paper, embellishments- anything I think I might want to use and set them on my desk and start messing around placing things here and there.  Because of this my workspace is usually a complete disaster- but I find if everything is put away then I hit a mental block and all my mojo goes away.  

I think my creative process is reflection of how I like to live my life- I'm not super big on planning and like to be spontanious.  I do my best work when I'm under the gun of a deadline and like to feel like I have one too many things waiting in the wings for me to get to- that way I'm never in danger of being bored.  It's kind of a crazy way to do things but I figure it balances out my work life where I have to be incredibly organized and detail oriented all the time.  My creative process allows me to be free- and really isn't that what creativity should do- free our minds?

Thank you so much for sticking with me through these questions- I love being able to share a little piece of me with all of you :)  The next part of the hop is to invite 3 crafty people that inspire me to take part in the hop next Monday Oct 3rd so make sure you stop by their blogs to see how they answered these questions!

Lenny

A few things about Lenny in her own words..."I'm from Belgium and teach French in the 7th and 8th grade.  I love papercrafting as well as reading, traveling, baking, gardening and floral arranging."  I chose Lenny because I love her style and the way you can just tell how much she loves creating- it's one of my favorite things about reading her blog posts :)

Tabbatha

A few things about Tabbatha in her own words..."Hi, I'm Tabbatha.  I'm an American living in Sweden who has just become a full fledged Swedish citizen!  I love design.  I love knitting.  I love photography.  And I love food!"  I chose Tabbatha because I love her bright and graphic style and looking at her cards always make me think "Oh, I want to try that!" :)

Rachel
A few things about Rachel in her own words..."I started scrapbooking 15 years ago after my first daughter was born and started stamping and card making 3 years ago.  I am addicted!  I love sharing ideas and getting inspiration from other who are just as obsessed as I am!"  I chose Rachel because her cards are just the cutest and I love scrolling through her blog for inspiration :)

The Tassel is Worth It

Hi all!  I'm currently on vacation visiting family but wanted to share a card that I made for a friend- I gave her 3 custom cards as her Christmas gift and she asked for me to make one that was a cool graduation card.  The main thing she asked was if I could find an awesome image that had a more urban feel and some big, super cool hair- I instantly thought of this image Bling Baby by Kenny K.  I colored her up and paired her with a pretty background of a cityscape and sunset for a clean and simple card.  The sentiment is one I saw online and then just typed up in Word.  The best part was when I delivered the card my friend flipped over how similar the image looked to her friend- I love it when people see the card and say it's a perfect match to who they wanted it for :)  Thanks so much for stopping by to visit and for taking a look at this little blog of mine- ya'll rock!

 **Gasp** Sorry everyone- I can't believe it but I forgot to write down my colors!  Please, don't throw rotten tomato's, lol!

I'd like to enter this card in the following challenges-

One Stitch at a Time- Use a Digi

The Corrosive Challenge- My Sentiments Exactly

Totally Papercrafts- Diva Image

Supplies: Cardstock- Bazzil; Cling- Recollections; Copics; X-Press It Coloring Cardstock

Forty & Fabulous

Hi all!  Sorry for being silent this week- I got sick and it just backed things up for a bit.  Thankfully things are back on track and I've got something new to share :)  I was asked to make a 40th birthday card that was fun, flirty and girly- all the things I love best!  When I saw this stamp called Blonde Bombshell by Kenny K I knew it was perfect and I had such a blast coloring her up with my Copics.  I found some Tim Holtz ribbon at Tuesday Morning for a steal and have been eagerly awaiting the chance to use it and figured it was perfect for this card.  There's some signature bling on there as well- if we're talking girlie there's got to be some bling right?  In the end this is one of those cards that I would love to receive and I hope that it makes this 40th birthday a little bit more fabulous!  I hope you enjoy it as well- thanks so much for popping by to visit!

Copics:
Skin: E0000, E000, E00, E11, R30, R21, BV34
Hair: E50, E53, E55, E57, E59, E49
Dress: RV21, RV23, RV25, RV29, RV99, T5, T9

I'd like to enter this card in the following challenges:
Whoopsi Daisy Challenge- Make It Girly
Colour Me Creative Challenge- Girly Time

Supplies: Cardstock- Bazzill; DP- Pink Paislee, Bo Bunny; Punch- Martha Stewart; Flower Ribbon- Tim Holtz; Hearts- Pink Paislee Artisian Collection; Bling- Zva Crafts; Metal Letter- my stash

A Biker Girl's Christmas

Hi All!  I've got a non traditional Christmas card to share with you all tonight :)  One of the fun things about making custom cards for sale is that often I get to work with a theme that I might never have the need for in my personal life but that is a special request from someone for the people in their life.  This happens to be one of those cards...the request was for a cute motorcycle girl with short red hair on a Christmas card.  Now sometimes these special requests send me on a goose chase to find an appropriate stamp but luckily as soon as I heard the request I knew I had just the stamp from Kenny K- let me introduce you to Spy Chick- isn't she the coolest?!?  I colored her up with my Copics to match some fun patterned from Doodlebug Designs.  I know this may not be the traditional Christmas card but isn't it fun when you can make a holiday card that doesn't have a 'holiday' stamp on it?  I sure had fun- and from the sounds of it the biker girl that was the receiver of this card thought it was pretty cool so I would say mission accomplished!  Thank you so much for stopping by to visit and take a look and if I don't get the chance to say it later I want to wish everyone a wonderful holiday- I hope it brings joy and happiness to you all!

Copics:
Skin- E000, E00, E11, R30, R21, BV34
Hair- E95, E99, YR18, E59
Clothes- T0, T1, T3, T5, T7, T9, R02, R29, R89
Motorcycle- T0, T1, T3, T5, T7, T9, 100, R02, R27, R29, R89

I'd like to enter this card into the following challenges:
Diva's by Design- Anything Goes
Celebrate the Occasion- Christmas Anything Goes
Ladybug Crafts Ink TLT Challenge- Anything Goes

Supplies: Cardstock- Bazzill; DP- Doodlebug Designs North Pole; Bling- Recollections; Flowers- Prima; Twine- Jillibean Soup; Charm- Tim Holtz

A Girly Graduation

Hi All!  I feel like I always say this but I've got a fun one for you today :)  I love doing girly cards so when I got asked to do a special girly graduation card I immediately got excited.  It just so happens that in a round about way I actually kinda know the girl it's for- a long time ago I worked in daycare and drove her to school each morning.  It kinda makes me feel old to think about that!  But it's fun to think about where her life might take her now.  I instantly thought about a Kenny K image because  they are so appropriate for girls that age and I figured Download Diva was the perfect mix of sassy and sweet.  I colored her up with my Copics to match some My Minds Eye design paper and, per the request of the person ordering the card, I gave her brown hair and brown eyes so she even kind of looks like the person receiving the card....that is the beauty of a custom card!  This is one of those cards that I kinda wish I could keep for myself because it's the kind of card I would love to get :)

Copic List
Face: E000, E00, E11, R20, R32
Hair: E25, E47, E49, E79
Clothes: R20, R32, RV34, B91, B93, B95, B97, T1, T3, T5, T7

I'd like to enter this card in the following challenges:
Diva's By Design- One for the Girls
Do It With Digi's- Sassy & Sparkly
Kenny K- Die Cuts & Punches: Large Rectangle Nestabilities
PaperPlay Challenge- Sparkle Galore
Simon Says Stamp Challenge- Sparkle & Shine

Supplies: Card Base- Yours Truly Archivers; DP- My Minds Eye; Jewels/Pearls- Recollections; Flowers- Prima, Recollections; Rub On Sentiment- my stash

Spice It Up

Hi All!  I swear I must have some sort of jinx with electronics lately!  First it was my internet and then my email from my phone.  But I think I've finally got everything in working order- Knock on wood!  I'm not good at operating without all my toys :)
On to the fun stuff now!  I saw the Kenny K Krafty Girlz Challenge was 'Spice it Up' this week.  If I wanted to get completely literal here I could say I used some orange- courtesy of Paprika, some red- maybe a little Cayenne Pepper and some yellow- lets go with Curry for that one.  I don't think literal thinking was mandatory but it's definitely a way of thinking outside the box :)  I colored up Club Kid, one of my new favorites (grab it here), in my spicy colors and then used some more of the My Minds Eye Stella and Rose paper since it complemented my colors so well.  It's a pretty simple layout because I wanted my image to be center stage but I had to add a little bling in there of course!  She certainly looks like one cool- or maybe I should say hot and spicy, chick!

Here's a close up and a list of Copics used:
Skin: E000, E00, E11, R32
Hair: YR00, YR02, YR07, E99 (this is a new favorite combo of mine!)
Jacket: R14, R24, R27, R29
Tie: Y23, Y26
Jeans: B32, B34, B37
Shoes: C1, C7, C9
Ground/Background: W0, W1, W3

I'll be entering this in the following challenges:
~The ABC Challenge: S is for Sugar and Spice
~Digital Tuesday Challenge: Little Women
~Kenny K's Krafty Girlz Challenge- Spice It Up

Supplies: All DP- My Minds Eye Stella and Rose, Flowers & Bling- my stash, Card base- Truly Yours Archivers, Ink- Distress Ink Spiced Marmalade

Time To Celebrate!

Hi All!  I've got a 'funky' little card to show you!  The challenge over at Stamp Something is to do something Funky and that truly was the jumping off point for this card :)  First off I've used a Kenny K image named Bling Baby from the new Glam Gang set 2 (grab them here)- it just screamed Funky to me- and I have to admit I own a scary amount of Kenny K digi's but I just can't resist them...I love their urban feel!  To keep the urban feel I had some DP paper from Basic Grey in mind, the Wander line, with it's kind of cityscape design and used those more subdues colors throughout- including some of the new lines from My Minds Eye that matched perfectly.  For the Kenny K challenge they want there to be something that starts with the letter R on the card so I used my Rectangle Nestabilities to cut my image out and then threw in a couple of Rhinestones as well for good measure.  My style is usually a little more bright but I have to say I really do love this card!

Here's a close up of the image that I colored with my Copics- I was a little worried about the hair but it turned out just like I pictured in my head so I'm happy with it!

I'd like to enter this card in the following challenges:

Stamp Something- Funky

Kenny K- It's All About R's

Card Makin' Mama's- Happy Birthday

Totally PaperCrafts- Do It With Digi's

Do You Stack Up- Dots (the green and yellow DP paper)

Paper Sundaes- Use Masculine Colors

Supplies: Digital Stamp- Kenny K Downloads Bling Baby; Sentiment- My Favorite Things Ala' Mode Time to Celebrate; Color Medium- Copics, Sakura Glitter Pen, Tim Holtz Distress Ink Vintage Photo; Tools- Spellbinders Nestabilities Rectangle Large, Sizzex Big Shot, Imaginisce Distresser; Solid Cardstock- Bazzil Lakeshore; DP- Basic Grey Wander, My Minds Eye- Gertie 'You and Me', Hattie 'Buddies'; Paper Flowers- Bazzil; Rhinestones- Little Yellow Bicycle Autumn Bliss Sharon Ann

My Sister's B Day!

Hi All!  I feel like I've been slacking in the blogging department...but with the holiday's I'm sure I'm not the only one :)  My sister was home for almost two whole weeks and I'm sad to see her leave tomorrow.  But I'm glad that we were able to celebrate her birthday while she was home.  She's usually pretty easy to get gifts for; I know a gift card will go a long way- she's an Americorp volunteer so she can always use something that allows her to play since she doesn't make much money.  Plus, there was the bonus that I got to pull out some new product I purchased from Denami Design, a gift and favor template, to make the gift card holder.  I purchased a digital stamp from Kenny K a while ago named Kitty Katastrophe and colored her with my Copics and I loved her so much I just hadn't found the perfect thing to place her on...so when I was looking through my stash of colored images I just knew she'd be perfect!  A girl can always use a little sass on her birthday :)  Since the gift card holder was pretty small there wasn't much need to do anything else once I had the image adhered with pop dots but it was missing just a little something to balance it out so I sifted through my ribbon stash and found a simple little scrap of ribbon that added that final touch.

I'm happy to say that my sister loved the holder as much as the gift cards themselves which is exactly why I love making cards...I always say that when a card is handmade it ceases to be 'just the card' and magically becomes a part of the gift...and who doesn't love that?

Well, Here Goes Nothin'...

Hi to anyone who may have stumbled across my little blog.  This is my maiden post so I'm learning as I go!  I've been doing cards for a few years now and, after doing some blog hopping recently, realized that there's a whole universe of like minded papercrafters here in blog land.  After seeing a few postings for openings on design teams and reading the fine print I figured out that the first step, should I want to ever pursue the design team thing (or really any kind of challenge), would be to set up my own blog.  And lucky for me after a few false starts it wasn't really all that hard :)  

So now what to do for my first post...Since I want to be able to share my cards with whoever is interested in seeing them what better start than to post a recent favorite of mine?  It features a digital stamp from Kenny K Downloads named Troublemaker (if you've never seen Kenny K's stuff please check them out at www.kennykdownloads.com -they are awesome!) and the Lush line of paper from My Minds Eye in red.  Add a couple of paperflowers and pearls I always have floating around and the card is complete.  I love the way it turned out- it really allowed my stamped image, which I colored with my trusty Copic's, to take center stage.

Well, I think that concludes my first post ever!  I hope if you've stumbled across this little baby blog of mine you enjoy!  Till Later....K