What a Wonderful Time of the Year

Hi All!  I wanted to share a coupon book that I made for my mom for Christmas...had to wait till all the gifts were opened before I could share :)  I took a small 7 Gypsies chipboard album and covered it with Little Yellow Bycicle Poinsettia laser cut border paper which is simple but pretty and attached a digital stamp from Tiddly Inks aptly named Check My List Twice, which I adore!

I colored her with Copics and added some Stickles on her dress and hat for a little bit of sparkle and dimension.  The cover still needed a little something so I pulled out some pearls from my stash and randomly attached them to the center of a couple of the poinsettia's...add some little red knots in ribbon to the binding and it was picture perfect!

Once the cover was done I took some Bo Bunny Christmas paper from last year in a few coordinating patterns and cut some squares that would fit nicely on each page for a background.  With my computer I printed out what the coupons would be and attached those to each page with Pop Dots for dimension.  Then on each page I went back through and added a little bit of bling, as was appropriate, and the project was complete.

My mom loves handmade gifts, and anything that gives her time with her daughters, but this year was extra special because, as some know, my mom suffered a house fire this summer and her house had to be rebuilt.  She had mentioned that they gave her back the gift I gave her last year but it did have water damage...so I was so glad that I could make her something new to hold on to.  And after a wonderful holiday spent in her newly redone house it was an extra special Christmas this year...it truly is a wonderful time of the year!

Let It Snow Tiddly Inks Challenge

Hi all!  I've been a fan of Tiddly Ink images for some time now...Cristy Croll knows how to strike the perfect balance of cute and quirky!  And they are all so much fun to color :)  One of the main reasons I started a blog was so that I could start entering challenges and participate in all the wonderful creative outlets that are provided care of the internet.  Since I already love coloring these images I figured it was the perfect maiden challenge!

The challenge is a 'Let It Snow' theme which is perfect because it's been warmer at home and all the beautiful snow that we had has mostly melted away- and I LOVE snow so this put me back in the spirit!

I used my Copics to color up Santa's Helper, you can find it here in the Tiddly Inks Shop, which I fell in love with when I first saw him!  Then, to coordinate with the red in his suit, I used some Echo Park double sided design paper for the contrasting background.  I love when paper is double sided- it takes out all the guess work!  Add some self adhesive ribbon from JoAnn's and some bling (cause you always gotta have a little bling) and the cards complete.

Please check out the Tiddly Inks Challenge blog to play along next time!

Just a quick one...

Hi All...just a quick post today as I'm still not feeling so well.  We are putting together a little gift for my supervisor at work so I offered to make the card.  I came across this adorable image of an angel on a star by Mo Manning and it reminds me of her grandbaby so I couldn't resist.  I just colored it with copics and added some stickles to the wings for a little punch of glitter.  Then I added a couple of design papers that complement each other, the yellow snowflake paper from Graphic 45 and the red snowflake paper with the postage stamp border from Making Memories and it didn't take long to pull together.  I love using the yellow/cream color palette for a change from the traditional christmas colors.  I placed a few yellow gems in the center of the snowflakes because I always like to use a little bling and the cards complete.  Not to challenging but I still think it turned out pretty...I hope she loves it!

Busy, Busy Weekend!

Well, this weekend didn't exactly go as planned...not been feeling so hot so missed ALL the fun stuff I had planned and ended up doing lots of work to make my deadlines!  I've done cards for these customers the last 3 years so I knew what to expect- they always get 20 gay themed cards which are both fun and challenging to do and 10 general cards.  The gay cards always incorporate the rainbow and I'm always trying to top what I did the year before...

For the first card I used both the Bo Bunny design paper and matching clear stamp for the tree.  Once colored with my Copics as a rainbow it just took a few same colored gems and a little star at the top and the card was done.  It actually looks much cuter in person!

Second card I used the berries on the holly to do my rainbow, and as always, a little bling is always a good idea :)  Some Making Memories Fa La La La design paper and the base of the card was done...not to difficult.

The last set of cards are just general Christmas cards.  I found this digital tree stamp from Gingerloft.blogspot.com and it's just so pretty!  I took some muted Copic greens and brown and colored it in lightly.  Then I used a little stickles in Frosted Lace for the snow on the boughs of the tree.  It makes such a gorgeous image.  A little red suede paper from JoAnn's to mat the image and some more of that Little Yellow Bicycle green snowflake paper and it was complete.

So, a successful weekend of work, here's hoping I start feeling better because my 9-5 job starts bright and early tomorrow morning!

Spring in December

Hi All!  So I have someone that I make birthday cards for each month (there are always a few!)...she tells me the kinds of things they like and I usually go from there.  This time was a little different because it was pretty much a 'do whatever you want' card.  I had a stamped image already colored, Madelyn from The Greeting Farm, which seemed like the perfect way to start.

To tell you the truth I didn't have much time so when I was digging through my dp and came across the Zinnia paper from My Little Yellow Bicycle it was perfect because it already looked like patchwork so I didn't have to think to hard about the layout.  Add the image with a couple of paper flowers I always have hanging and a bling flourish from Michael's and I was done!  Only when I looked at the whole thing put together I realized that I had unwittingly made a spring time card!  For a December birthday :)  Guess it's a good thing it turned out cute!