My turn, my turn, my turn!!!

Can you see me waving my arms around, hollering that it's my turn?!? Yes, it's my turn to play hostess this time for Guylou's Inimitability. This time around, we're doing a "crazy cat lady" color challenge. Ok, it is true. I am verging on becoming the crazy cat lady. Or, so I am told by my 15 year old nephew. According to his teenage wisdom, if I get even one more cat, that will officially push me into crazy cat lady territory. For the record, I have three. They're all siamese and full of personality. The two of I've had the longest are sealpoints, and were the inspiration for this challenge. I want you to make a card inspired by the color of a sealpoint siamese, which is to say, blue for the eyes and brown and cream for the fur. Here's a picture of my girls to give you some idea:

Aren't they beautiful? I know that I'm biased, but I can't help but think that in this case, I'm also right!!!

G is also helping you out by giving away her image cat on a fence for free. You've only got 24 hours to snatch it up! Even if you miss out, just go buy it. One, it's precious. Two, G's prices are extremely reasonable. Three, everyone will love a card you make with one of her kitty images.

Speaking of cards, I guess I should show you mine. Mother's Day is just around the corner. My mother-in-law has two grey cats who love to sit in the window and watch the world go by. This image seemed perfect.

Now, I probably went a little too turqouise-y with my blue, so I tossed in some blue more reminiscent of siamese kitty eyes in the flowers and on the pot. I colored this adorable image with copics, added some glossy accents to the nose and some ivory flowersoft to the flower. The background paper reminded me of the paneling in my inlaws' house. Yes, they still have way too much paneling. I colored a doily with some brown ink and put it down below the flowers, which are a mixture of Wild Orchid Crafts and cheapo Dollar Store finds. The cool shutters are from Michael's Recollections collection. I love them.

You have until 10:00 EST on May 4th to enter the challenge. Come on, be a crazy cat lady with me! Pretty please!?!?

My heart beats like mushy mush mush

That is pretty much my heart right about now. It's all twitterpated over this adorable thing my friend's kid said today. Kim and I have been friends for 28 years, since the first day of 7th grade. Naturally, when she had her son five years ago, I was visiting him in the hospital and bonding with my new buddy. Well, he's five now. For his fifth birthday last month, I got him a Sonic the Hedgehog Racing Game. He's been taking it over to his Poppy's house to play on a regular basis. Today, as he was getting out of the truck in preparation for running into Poppy's house, his daddy heard him say, "God, please tell Gina thank you for getting me the sonic racing game." Seriously, how cute is that?!? What are some cute things you've heard a kid say lately? What made your heart dissolve into mush?

Spring is in the air!

Ok, so I know, the title is not that original. Sorry about that. Although I'm setting this post to come up on Monday, it's really Sunday night and I am beat. I have no brain power left to come up with a clever title. It's been a LONG weekend. A great one, but LONG and BUSY. Isn't it kind of cool how you can schedule posts on blogger, though? It's like time travel!

Anyhow, you probably don't want to hear me prattle on about soccer games, cleaning, shopping, creating, and all of the other things that composed a rather mundane weekend, so I'll just go ahead and show you my card for the Belles n' Whistles challenge. This time around, we're focusing on spring!

This little cutie is one Elisabeth's designs for Sweet Pea Stamps. I stamped her off on kraft paper from Gina K, then colored her up with copics. The DP is from Graphic 45. Flowers are Wild Orchid Crafts. The metal tab is Making Memories, the little bracket journaling block is Maya Road, and the cameo is from Webster's Pages. I snagged the ribbon off of a gift bag. Pearls are Kaiser Kraft. I think the felt butterfly is Heidi Swapp. I think that about covers it! Now head on over to the blog and check out what the DT has to show you. This ends my term on the BnW Guest DT. It was fun; I always love to create with Elisabeth Bell's adorable images, and to create alongside such a talented group was an honor!

Happy Spring!

My post is so late!!!

Holy cow! I finished my card long before it was due, but somehow, posting it slipped my mind. Here is my card for the latest challenge over at Guylou's Inimitability:

This time around, we're using a sketch created by our awesome leader, Guylou, and the creator of such fun designs as the one I used on this card. Head on over to the blog to get the details and see this fun sketch! Go ahead..move along....don't be late like me! Man, I still can't believe I forgot. So sorry, G!!!

Happy Birthday, Grandma!

I'm headed to my aunt and uncle's house tomorrow to celebrate my grandmother's birthday. She's always telling me that she doesn't need much, but on a fixed income, I know that she appreciates all that she gets to "help out." She gets her medications and some fun stuff from Walmart, so I stopped there to get her a gift card. I also made her a card, which I showed you a few posts ago. Tonight, I decided to make her a cute little notebook. I snagged the idea from another blogger but can't seem to find the post to give her credit. Sorry about that! I hate when I do that; it makes me irritated at myself because people should get credit for the ideas they give me. Anyway, the idea was to take one of the little notebooks with matching pen from Michael's dollar spot and fancy it up. So, that's what I did. Check it out:

The little notebook came with that pretty blue flower pattern. I added a new stamp that I also got at Michael's and colored up with copics. I added some bling to the image with my stardust pens, but it's hard to see. Then I cut it out with spellbinders nesties, and stamped a sentiment and cut it out with my spellbinders labels. I inked around the edges to make them pop a little more. I added some flowers and pearls from my stash, some white leaves from the Dollar Tree, and ta-da!

Here's a closer look at this cute stamp:

Adorable, right? I should note that I adhered everything with KI Gloo, because that stuff is like cement. Once it dries, it holds EVERYTHING. I don't think anything is going to pop off of her little notebook, even if she shoves it down inside the very bottom of her purse.

That's all I've got tonight. I should hit the hay soon. 8:00 comes early, and that's what time I need to get up to make the two hour drive and be there in time for the festivities. Have a wonderful, blessed Easter weekend. Feel free to send me some of your extra chocolate.

Who knew that lemon and pepper could be so sweet?

Well, the Lemon Pepper image from Elisabeth Bell for Whimsy Stamps is sweet. She's downright precious. I am having so much fun coloring my new Cottage Cuties! The latest card is for my Grandma, for her birthday next month. I'm going to visit her in two weeks, and wanted to have the card ready to go. I didn't want to wait til the last minute and then stress, or run the risk that Mr. Mojo would be his usual persnickety self and take off, you know? While he was still visiting, I colored up sweet little Lemon Pepper and decided to show her off on a card. Here she is:

I chose her for more reasons than her utter cuteness. One, her balloon makes me think of celebrations like birthdays. Two, I like the combination of purple with creams and yellows (and since lemons are yellow...well, you get it). Three, she seems to be saying hi to a little bird. My gram loves birds, but especially hummingbirds. So, I used my spica pens to color the feathers like a hummingbird, and used my multiliner to increase the length of the beak a tiny bit. The story of my gram's love for hummingbirds comes from a rather bittersweet place. My dad died in 2002. After his death, this one little hummingbird would come to my gram's window each morning. I can't remember how she could identify him as "hers", but he had some distinctive marking of some sort. Then my gram moved to another house. You guessed it; the same hummingbird found her there (or one with the same markings, but she prefers to believe it's the same little guy). She swears this hummingbird was sent by my dad to let her know that he's okay. Sweet, huh?

So, anyhow, Gram's favorite color is purple, so I figured Basic Grey's Kioshi line would be perfect for her card. The flowers are prima, tickets are Tim Holtz, lace is from my stash, and I used a Whimsy pennant die to cut the banners. I went around all of the papers with my piercing bug. I colored the image with copics. Here's the list, in case you're interested:

Hair: E31, E25, E50
Skin: E00, E0000, R20 (blush)
Grass: YG63, YG67
Balloon: YG06, YG05, YG03
Outfit: E53, E51, E50, V25, V22, V20, BV0000, Y15, Y13, purple spica pen

I'm entering her in the following challenges:
Whimsy Inspiration Blog: Anything Goes
Simon Says Stamp: Bingo - flowers, lace, and twine

Beary Big Koala Hugs!

I have to admit, I am having a hard time picking which stamps to use. I was blessed enough to get quite a few new stamps for my birthday. I stamped them all off on to Gina K or Cryogen paper and now I find myself sitting there for ages trying to pick which one to color. I wish I could color them all at once! I know, I know....I shouldn't complain, since many people would like to have my "dilemma". So, I'll shut up now before one of you reaches through my computer screen and smacks me.

In the back of my head, I had a list going of the cards I need to make. Then I started to browse blogs for some color inspiration. I lucked out at Bente's blog. I loved how she colored the Koala Hugs Tilda with primarily greys. I have wanted this image since it came out, and a wonderful friend got it for me for my birthday. Lucky me! My father-in-law loves koalas, so I decided to use it for his Father's Day card.

Here's what I came up with:

This is a pocket card. The tag lifts out to read: "You are not LIKE a father to me, You ARE a father to me." I made the tag narrow so that I can fit a gift card in the pocket, too.

So, let's see: I used black rain dots, grey mesh, My Mind's Eye Miss Caroline Fiddlesticks paper, black and white twisted twine, and black bazzill. The MME papers are actually grey, but my camera wanted to reinterpret them today.

Copics are as follows:
Skin: E000, E00, E11, R20
Hair: E50, E31, E25
Shoes: R21, R20, R00, C3, C1
Dress: C5, C3, C1
Koala: N5, N3, N1, R00
Ground/Grass: YG67, YG63, E31, E25

I had to make her shoes pink, since it's my favorite color and he associates it with me.

I'm entering this card in the Charisma Cardz Challenge to make a pocket card.

Thanks for looking and have a great weekend! I was wondering why my stomach was growling. I got lost in coloring and creating, and had no idea how much time had passed. I know I'm not the only one who does that, right?!?

What did I do to be so rewarded?

I don't know what in the heck I did to deserve the reward of Mr. Mojo's ongoing visit, but if I can figure it out, I'm going to do it again! Tonight, that Mojo dude didn't feel like coloring. He wanted to play with paper. I'm all about paper, so I yanked out an image that I colored a while ago and prepared to slap her down on a card. I had a lot of fun distressing, inking, rooting through my embellishments for just the perfect thing, and so on. Here's what I came up with:

Ain't she cute? She's from the Greeting Farm. As usual, I colored her with my handy-dandy copics. It was a while ago, so don't ask for colors, k? I gave her little scarf a striped pattern with different shades of pink, rouged up her little cheeks, added some highlights with a signo pen, and added some shine to her buttons with glossy accents. I think she goes really well with this Doodlebug paper called Sweet Cakes, don't you? After all, she's so cute and sweet!

I'm entering her in the challenge at:
Cute Card Thursday - anything goes!

The weekend is almost here. Does anybody have any fun plans? I've got my belly dancing class tomorrow night, then my brother and I plan to go see "The Hunger Games" afterwards. I've got to yank down my warm weather clothes from the attic, put away the winter ones, clean my house, and maybe craft a bit. My nephew's got a soccer game on Sunday, so I'll go cheer him on, too! I can't cheer too loud, though. He's 15. Apparently, cheering aunts are embarrassing. Who knew?

Chloe is definitely a cutie!

I first saw this Elisabeth Bell image on her blog a while ago. I asked her if she was going to sell her as a stamp, and she told me that a company would have to "pick her up". Not too much later, Whimsy Stamps did just that! Chloe and the other Cottage Cuties came out just in time for my birthday. Imagine my excitement when my mom gave me a gift card to Whimsy that allowed me to get the first four cuties. Yes, I admit it. I was dancing all around and clapping my hands like the overgrown child that I am. And yes, I treated myself to the other two today, so now I will have them all. Anyway, despite the total and utter cuteness that is every single one of the Cottage Cuties (they're so aptly named), Chloe remains my favorite. Needless to say, I had to color her up first.

I tried some rolled roses with paper this time. Well, let's just say that they are SO MUCH easier with felt. The paper was just heavy and stiff. Perhaps I should get it slightly damp next time? But then wouldn't it stick together? Yeah, I think I'll just go back to felt. I colored sweet little Chloe with my copics (of course. Let's face it. I'm addicted). Here's a closer look at her adorable self:

Dontcha wanna go grab some apples with her? She reminds me so much of my niece Gabby, who also has flyaway hair, adorable freckles, and big eyes that grab you.

Papers are My Mind's Eye Howdy Doody (Miss Caroline). Love them! Everything else is pretty much from my stash. I'm entering this card in the following challenges:
Sketch Saturday: sketch (3/24)
Simon Says Stamp: bingo - lace, ribbon, flowers (3/28)
Stamptacular Sunday: use buttons. I used three (as flower centers) (3/24)
Elphine House: rain or shine. I chose sunshine! If you look closely, you can even see the little bit of yellow in the upper left corner of the image (sun rays peeking through the clouds; I used chalks to make the sky and rays).
Whimsy Stamps: Anything Goes (3/26)
Outlawz Monday Greeting Card: recipe challenge to use flowers, patterned paper, and ribbon (3/26)

As always, thanks for looking!

We're getting monochromatic over at Guylou's!

Yes, I said that bad word, "monochromatic." I admit, I have a really hard time with sticking to one main color and its various shades. I love the look of a monochromatic card. I just think they look so cool. However, I have the hardest time with them. Trina decided that's why it's called a "challenge" and that we need to be challenged to do monochromatic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good thing I love Trina. She's a great teamie and so much fun. Otherwise, I might have been throwing things and cursing while trying to make this card. LOL. Trina, girl, you know I kid. Maybe.

So, anyway. Here's my card:

My card has lots and lots and lots of blue. I had to add a pop of red and yellow to the image. I just couldn't take all of the blue! This little guy is Chuck. He usually has a flag in his left hand, but I removed it this time around to make the image fit the space better. He has lots of blinginess, although it's hard to tell in the pic. The sentiment and doodling are done in a navy blue stardust pen. The sparkler has silver stardust on it. The star stickers have glitter embedded in them. All of the stars are very happy, wouldn't you say? I sure hope so, because I sent this card to a young boy who is in the hospital and awaiting a heart transplant.

Challenge details: Make a monochromatic project and post it to Guylou's Inimitability by March 29th. That's it! Easy peasy, right? If you use one of G's images, your entry counts twice.

To top it off, I'm giving away an additional $10 gift certificate to G's store to one lucky winner! I'll draw a winner at the end of the challenge. What are you waiting for? Pick a color and GO!