Winter love birds

The current challenge at ABC Christmas is "U" for "unused stash."   The DT included photos of their stash, and it was so much fun to see their unused stash "magically" turn into cards.  I thought it would be neat to create a little magic of my own.  Here is my unused stash. (Can you believe that gorgeous Whiff of Joy stamp was un-inked? For shame.)

And here ****waves magic wand**** is my card. 

Doesn't this image make you want to cuddle?!

I used the fabulous sketch at Sketch Saturday to complete my card.  The papers are from a DCWV Christmas stack--a little more unused stash for you :) The stitching around the image looks black, but it's really dark green.  The camera also seems to have washed out the colors in the image--maybe the waxy finish of the colored pencils just doesn't photograph well?

And to make up for the fact that I left that poor little stamp un-inked for so long, I decided to make a second card.   ****waves wand again****

Tadaa! 
This time I used the sketch from Our Craft Lounge.  The papers are from the same DCWV Christmas stack  (it's not unused anymoooooorrrrreeee!). The ribbons and gems are from my stash. 

In addition to the challenges mentioned above, I'd like to enter these cards in the following challenges:
Winter Wonderland-- "Robin Redbreast"
Christmas Stampin' All Year Long--"Seeing Spots"

Thanks so much for looking! 

Cute Card Thursday #75: New Beginnings

The challenge at Cute Card Thursday is New Beginnings, a perfect theme for a baby card and perfect chance to use this super sweet stamp from Whiff of Joy's wedding and baby collection! I decided to use a less traditional color scheme and went with green and purple rather than pink or blue. I'm hoping this could be used for a boy or a girl, but it looks a little more like a baby girl card doesn't it? I could NOT get this card to photograph well (not that my photography EVER comes out well..LOL...I'm still learning). In real life the dress matches the paper much better. For a special touch, I added green fun flock to the baby's sleeper. When I was putting the card together, I kept rubbing it and smiling.

Thanks for looking!

Truly Scrumptious #14: Anything but a Card

Recently I picked up a couple of notebooks at Michael's for $0.66 (not too shabby, eh?). I thought that they would be good to alter for the challenge at Truly Scrumptious. For this challenge we can make anything...as long as it's not a card. LOL. Altered notebooks seemed like a fun alterantive, so away I went. I had never altered a notebook before, but I figured that even if it was a total disaster, I'd only be out $0.66 and an afternoon. I used really different color schemes for the two notebooks. On the first one, I went with soft pastels, and on the second one I used the colors of the notebook itself.


This image is from a stamp line at Sugar Nellie drawn by Elisabeth Bell. These are some of my favorite stamps. I think they're so sweet. If you want some for yourself, they're available over at Funky Kits. I wanted to keep the overall look soft, so I set aside my prismacolor markers and I used my prismacolor pencils. The papers are from from DCVW Nana's nursery stack. I've been hoarding this paper because I like it so much, but I finally talked myself into cutting them...*gasp.* I kept every little scrap. LOL :)


I decorated the inside using the same papers.


And the back, since I had to hide the original cover for the notebook.

For the second notebook, I used a deeper color palette of purple and green. Since I used the same colors that are on the notebook, I didn't have to be as careful about hiding the original cover. YAY! The images are from Whiff of Joy, another stamp company that carries a line of stamps designed by Elisabeth Bell. I just love her images. I tend to get hooked on certain artists--have you noticed?! LOL. I used my Prismacolor pencils for the coloring on this one too.

If you noticed the giant amphersand on the front of notebook, you probably guessed that I decorated the back of this notebook too. LOL. hee, hee. My sister is always complaining that illustrators give girls blond hair while their beaus are brunettes. As a brunette dating a blonde, she finds this particularly annoying. I reversed this trend on this notebook as a little shout-out to her. Hi Lola! ;)

Thanks for looking!