Shock! Another post. I'm on a roll!

Anyways, here are two more cards using justjohanna's stamps.

"Best Fishes" uses loads of blue, which is my favorite color! Wednesday Stamper's challenge this week is "blue". So yay! This qualifies!!

I love this little fish. Michelle's just sooo darned cute! The minute I saw her, I knew that eventually I'd be making this card. Michelle is colored with Prismacolor markers. I do love that they usually produce translucent, streak-free results. I chalked around the fish and then punched 'em out as circles. Looking at the scan, I seem to have forgotten the fishes' air bubbles. The patterned paper is by Flair Designs -- one of my favorite companies. The little crabs are punchies.

If you've been here before, you know how much I love and use the Intertwined Kitties stamp. Like my cats, this pair is very naughty and likes to catnap together, dreaming of their next meal. Poor Sylvie. I masked the cat image and the negative space of a scalloped oval punch, then inked the background (sky & grass) with Brilliance ink. The images were unmasked and colored with chalk (kitties) and Prismacolor marker (Sylvie). I added the the "thought dots" and "thought bubble" outline. Then I trotted out some exceedingly old typewriter epoxy stickers, plus some not-quite-as-old K&Company word stickers. And there you have it. Oh. Did you notice? No patterned paper! Wow!

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Lime Tart Sketch v2.0 or I'm really a magpie.

Here's another card using the Lime Tart sketch.

It looks much better irl with the blue in the circle not quite as screamingly blue. I don't think my scanner likes shiny. I guess that it's not a magpie like me.

Anyways, I used these cool German lacy metallic diecut borders that I found at Artchix Studios. I love their stuff because it's shiny and fun and appeals to my inner magpie.

When I was at CHA, I found that I gravitated towards anything sparkly. My friends kept losing me because of this, but being smart ladies, quickly realized that if there was "bling" anywhere around, I'd be there, gazing longingly at the sparkly bits.

I don't wear much jewelry, but I do tend to either like very funky or the expensive stuff with gemstones galore. This predilection extends itself to my crafting. I'm so happy that bling is trendy, though in truth, I've been using geegaws for quite some time. Twinklin H20s are also used frequently. Metallic paints? Yep. Them too.

But I digress. The card could be used for either a Rosh Hashanah (Jewish New Year), a holiday card, or a get well card. I chose to make this card an all purpose card and will add whatever greeting to the inside.

The stamp is justjohanna. The sketch is from LimeTart. The cool gold glittery scallops and star strip are from Artchix. I used Tsukineko's Galaxy Gold ink and colored the rest of the circle with a Prismacolor marker. Pretend the blue matches the "Chicken Little" patterned paper by Cosmo Cricket. Because it really does.

Haa. I'm verbose today.

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Lime Tart Sketch Challenge!

I made a card for the Limetart Sketch Challenge which you can find here

The stamps are from justjohanna. The scalloped borders are Doodlebug Frills, which I just love since I'm not a whiz with the scissors. The paper was white, but it didn't contrast enough with the border which made the cute little skull/crossbones get lost in all the black & white. So I crumpled up the paper, inked it with blue & red Distress Inks, sprayed it with water, and let the ink spread. Then I ironed it til it was dry and relatively flat. Adding the color to the white paper made a huge difference! The card was a bit bulky, which made it scan a bit dark.

This card is for one of my friends who is turning 50 soon. Birthday greetings and more obnoxious age-related comments will be added to the inside of the card!

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Yay. Finally some cards to share!

Whereas I've been a stamping maniac the last few weeks, I finally got around to scanning 'em and now have some new stuff that I can share! Yay!

I was putting some stuff away and came across a pile of 8.5 x 11 old Club Scrap papers and decided that it was time to use them.

All stamps are by justjohanna. Since I stamped directly onto the patterned paper, I tried different colorants and decided that the Prismacolor markers gave me look that I wanted. I do love these markers since they color with virtually no streaking and give a nice translucent color. I'm still learning how to use them and I definitely need more colors. I'm contemplating trying out some Copic markers as an alternative. If anyone wants to offer an opinion and/or pointers, please feel free to share with me!

Meanwhile, last Friday I got a delightful surprise in the mail! A copy of Vamp Stamp News, which had my Post It note book on the back cover! Yahoo! Better yet, the fabulously talented Julie Prichard had a card in the same issue. Even "betterer" (yep. I said it!), we both won the random drawing for back issues. So, double Yahoo. :-D

I will be posting more stuff later in the week.

Thanks for visiting today!

10 Days without a blog entry.

It's time to update, though I have precious little to share at the moment craft wise, so I'll share some older stuff.

So what have I been doing with my fine self?

I've driven to Massachusetts and back. I stopped at a nice LSS on the way home and got some Basic Grey papers, some Technique Tuesdays huge honkin' chipboard, and a huge bottle of my favorite stamp cleaner. I was most excited about the stamp cleaner. Go know. DD liked the college we visited, though it will be a major reach for her. We talked the entire trip, which was roughly 8 hours in the car.

I've also driven to and from Philadelphia for another college visit. I liked this one better. It's got a "small school within a big school" feeling and is in a city with lots going on all the time. Oddly enough that drive took almost the same amount of time because we got caught in dreadful weather, construction, bumper cars on the turnpike kinda traffic. Big fun.

I've had some stuff picked up by two magazines which makes me happy. I just hope that the projects make the final cut. I'm also thrilled that I've been asked to contribute to an article. I'll be doing step out photos of some cards as well as writing instructions and pointers. This means that I'll have to actually clean my work surface, so it doesn't look like a mini tornado has been through it.

I have been stamping a lot and will share those cards in the not-too-distant future. 'Til then, here are some old cards and such to fill the void in my blog. :D

Well Blogger finally let me add these. The first is a layout (gasp!) that I did last summer. The layout features a photo of four generations of mothers & daughters in my family. And best of all, I'm in it! That'll probably be the only photo of me that will ever be here, so enjoy it!

The butterfly card has an alcohol ink background.

The get well card has a stamp of one of Kliban's cats. American Art Stamp used to produce these and fortunately, I've got several since those cats just crack me up. I hope that he makes you grin just a teeny bit.

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Here are some recent cards!

I'm working on some cards that can't be shared at the moment, so I'll share some other ones.

All the cards feature justjohanna stamps. philippe the fish, al graduating, and the sentiments on those cards are from the new release. The new release is great! Check it out!

I used my usual variety of colorants -- chalk, Twinklin' H2Os, watercolor pencils, and Perfect Pearls.

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Sketch challenge!

There's a sketch challenge on justjohanna's newsletter! Check it out here! Click on "email updates" to sign up!

Here are my two cards for the sketch challenge! All stamps are by justjohanna.

The peacock card features lumiere and FiberMark Quills paper.

The "happy bird day" card features the chicklets and Basic Grey Lily Kate paper. justjohanna's birds perched so well on the bamboo paper that I used every last scrap of it for a variety of projects.

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Yahoo! I finally used my Bind-It-All!

Yippee! Yay! I finally used my Bind-It-All!!!

I purchased it way back in February at CHA and it arrived at my house shortly thereafter. However, life intervened and the machine sat unloved and unused in my closet.

I finally got it together and made this little notebook that features 4" chipboard coasters, Basic Grey's Lily Kate, justjohanna stamps, Chalk ink, and BossKut's Apricot diecuts. The pages are cut-down index cards.

I seem to be fixated on perching birds on the music staff but what can you do? Bird song wakes me in the morning and is the background music in my craft room.

This project was a breeze to put together and I'm moderately pleased with the result. I know what I'll be making as holiday gifts!

Thanks for stopping by today!

More little scene cards!

The first time I saw the Intertwined kitties stamp online, these scenes immediately popped into my mind. Since I didn't have the stamp yet, I sketched them and filed the sketches "someplace safe", aka the black hole. Fortunately I remembered my ideas and was able to re-create the sketches.

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