The best way to start my card week off is with a Bellariffic sketch. It gets me in that creative flow and away I go!

I started and finished my card for this Friday’s challenge, and tomorrow it’s out the door on its way to a lucky recipient!
This week’s sketch was created by one talented Bellariffic babe, Shannon Teubner.

I had just the stamp in mind for this sketch. In order to use it, I had to rotate the sketch 90 degrees to make it fit.
And here it is:

I used the new Ketto clothesline with fancy dresses. I stamped directly on the patterned paper for both dresses because I thought it was a neat pattern to use. The paper is from the same set as the rest of the patterned paper used on the card. I looked all around the spare room for some cream coloured lace to add around the borders, but alas came up with nothing. One last dig through my ribbon drawer and I found some ribbon with a frill along the edges that matched perfectly in colour! I put some double sided tape from scor-pal and ran the ribbon along the oval shape. I can’t believe it didn’t bunch of turn in. Worked out just right. The clothesline is so big it couldn’t even fit on the biggest oval nestablitities shape, so I took my time in cutting everything out and piecing it together. I think it made it easier in the long run to line things up anyway.
To keep with the theme of clothing I used buttons as my embellishments. I could’ve coloured them with my copics, but I thought the cream colour that they are was good enough. If I was feeling more ambitious I could’ve threaded something pretty through the button holes, but nahhh… didn’t want to dig around the sewing room anymore.

Now on to finishing up Dylan’s birthday card for his 1st birthday. Hope to have that posted tomorrow.

Nighto!

Feels good to get back into it. I haven’t participated in 2 or 3 weeks because of vacation. But, that’s why it’s called vacation. No obligations, no schedule and lots of sleep. Though I probably got the same amount of sleep, but at opposite times of the day. And now it’s the weekend! And Robbie and I will be going house hunting tomorrow!! I’m so excited. I’ve been buying design magazines, and watching design shows… ahhh, I love it. I was at Des Serres today and they had these cute wall decals too. I think I may do my craft room in a more vibrant green in my new home and have wall decals on it. Can’t wait to make a home my own! I’ve been collecting things for years and when I get to put them all on display I will be ever so happy.

Well here is this weeks challenge sketch by Paulabella:

And seeing as it is my sister Katie’s 21st birthday next Monday, I made this card for her:

This is a new stamp from last weeks release at Stamping Bella. They are the Lulu collection. So very adorable. I am sure to make my next few cards with the others I bought.
I used my new clear glaze pen on each dot on the bottom of the dresses as well as the dots in the dress design on the right. I used my Martha Stewart Hydrangea punch for the flowers above and little diamonds (totally real) for the flower centers. It felt a little empty and unbalanced on the upper right hand side so I cut a corner from my patterened paper and pasted up there to even it all out.

And tah dah! That’s it! Hope she likes it. Also hope she doesn’t check my blog before Monday. But if she does I’m sure she won’t tell me.

Off to my HUSBAND’S now! Have a great weekend everybody!

Tomorrow I’m having a little birthday party/bbq for my friend Michelle. She’s a dog lover and has mentioned before how she likes Stamping Bella’s doggy stamps. I bought Dogwalkabella about a year ago but haven’t even used it yet. I guess because it’s something I would want on a card for myself but hadn’t found the appropriate person to give it to yet. So I started working on it last night and it just transformed into something I never even pictured in the beginning.

I had watched a video tutorial a while back from Lauren Meader where she drew in a sidewalk to add to her stamp. I thought this would be the perfect time to try that seeing as they’re in action here. I didn’t have as many copic markers to do the shading, but I think it turned out pretty good. I added in some grass above it and blended that into the sidewalk as well so it all came together nicely. I used my lyra pencils to colour the 2 dogs, shading and the grass. Then I had this big empty background and thought I’d chalk in a sky to fill it up. It still looked quite empty so Robbie gave me the idea of using my circle nestabilities to make a three layered sun with different shades. That led to me using my blossom nestability for clouds and painted on some “angel wings” shimmerz for some sparkle, and it all came together and made a loverly scene! It’s something I haven’t tried before and I really like the way it turned out. Plus it filled up most of the card so I really didn’t have to do much for layout design but frame it.

I’d like to try more scenery cards with my fairies soon. I have some really cute stamps from Eat Cake Graphics that could really fill up a page. Maybe make something that can be framed and hung up.

Seeing as it’s an outdoor scene I photographed it outside to use the natural lighting. However, there was only shade in my backyard since it’s 8pm and the sun is in the front yard right now… but a little added lighting in photoshop and “boom goes the dynomite”.

So leave a comment and let me know whatcha think! Thanks for dropping by!

Today’s my sister and brother-in-law’s anniversary. I was a just a young curly, afro-haired bridesmaid at their wedding. I think I had 100 bobby-pins in my hair that day. But that’s what you get for having an Italian hair dresser. Shauna was a beautiful bride and is still such a beautiful woman today.

I only have a few anniversary/love stamps to choose from at the moment, but this one is my favourite. I bought it originally to use for my fiancé Robbie’s birthday because he’s a computer guy and robots just go hand-in-hand with that. But it fits perfectly well for an anniversary card too.

The sentiment was embossed with a vibrant blue embossing powder and then coloured inside with copics. It’s easier to stay in the lines that way. At first I had stamped it in black an coloured, but the red copic smudged and it was just garbage so I re-did it with the embossing and I like it so much better. Mistakes happen for a reason! Something good always comes out of it.

Well I’m going to get back to working on Michelle’s birthday card. I’m having a BBQ party for her on Saturday. The only day out of the week that’s going to rain and THUNDER. But we’ll just thunder away in the basement with Rock Band.

13 more days until Vegassssss!!!!! And you should see the cute dress I bought yesterday… my oh my. Hope to have some pics up when we get back. But I don’t want to think about that day yet. Nighto everyone!