Babies and Patterns!

Do you ever design a card and then think, I need to make 19 more just like it? Well that's exactly what happened to me with these adorable baby cards. 

I decided to take on the challenge from Sketch Saturday. Their linkup party has ended now because I procrastinated, but credit where credit is due! 

Little did I realize it had ONE BILLION layers to it. (ok, ok, I'm being dramatic, it's only 13... haha - ONLY 13). 

But it did give me the chance to flex my pattern mixing muscles. 

I'm linking the boy card up to the Alphabet Challenge B is for Boy Cards. 

Coincidentally, I have about 13 pregnant friends right now (ok, ok, I'm being dramatic but I do have at least 5 that I can think of off the top of my head). And the sad part about it is, most of my friends who are preggers are sharing about how they can't have their partners attend ultrasounds, or host the baby showers they were planning. It would be really tough and scary to be pregnant right now.

But the minute I laid eyes on the finished design, I squeeed with delight and then had to make up more. They're so happy and every time I stamped a little onesie (STAMPlorations Bee's Knees BabyBump set) it felt like "buying clothes". 

I liked it so much I made a girl one: 

And I made a gender-neutral one: 

This color scheme was inspired by the TGIF challenge:

I've been hoarding all these 6x6 coordinating paper packs, and these proved to be the easiest way to pair patterns. All in all, I made 12 different designs because I had so much fun! 

I'm also going to link this up to the STAMPlorations never-ending anything goes challenge. 

Thanks for popping by! 

Card Concept - Pastel Baby Card

Baby cards. I don't know why, but I never have ANY onhand when I need them. In terms of the difficulty of thinking through creative designs, baby cards are only second to masculine cards. Every time I try to envision one in my head, my brain stares blankly back at me and says "does not compute". 

But thanks to The Card Concept this week, I now have a set of cute baby cards. When I saw the inspiration image of their latest challenge, I couldn't help BUT to make a baby card. 

I was immediately drawn to that colorblocked dresser, and decided to try to duplicate it for my card's background. 

I cut a bunch of pastel cardstocks into different sizes and then started patchworking them together. 

I used the cute elephant from the STAMPlorations Tweet Love set and added in some ombre lettering by repeating the stamp without re-inking. 

Taaadaaa! Now I have baby cards. You could, too, if you head on over and play along with The Card Concept!

Little Girl Baby Stamped Card

Do you ever make a card that makes your ovaries well up with happiness?

 No? Just me? 

Today I'm showcasing a card I created for the new STAMPlorations Theme & Sketch challenge. 

It's frilly & polka dotty and full of shabby chic goodness. I stamped the little stroller from the Heaven Sent stamp set and colored it up with some Spectrum Noir markers. 

I chose to play along with the theme at STAMPlorations - which is Celebration. 

To play along, just use the theme OR the sketch OR both - so many possibilities. You can use any brand of stamp you want - and there are prizes!!

After I colored up my focal image, I added a swath of pink and girly flowers, some buttons and a crinkle ribbon from Verve that I died a little with Spun Sugar and Vintage Photo Distress Inks. 

See what I mean about those ovaries? :) 

I'm also linking this up to:
Aud Sentiments - ATG + a sentiment
Cardz 4 Galz - Vintage or Shabby Chic

Deepti's Popped Hop!

Many of you might know the lovely and oh-so-kind Deepti Malik of Dee's Art Utopia. Well good news! She's had a precious little boy - her very first child! The girls at STAMPlorations decided to have a surprise card "shower" for her. 

Since Dee is a watercolor wizard, I decided to go with that! 

I actually got this stamp set when I was 14 years old. It was my very first stamp I ever owned. I walked into a scrapbooking store with my grandma, and for some reason I fell in love with this big ol' sentiment. My grandma, who lived on a fixed income, saw how much I loved it and bought it for me. I was soooo happy when she gave it to me. Such good memories and I'm glad they are being put into a card for Deepti. 

Very clean and simple, but I think impactful and pretty! 

I'm going to link it up to:

AAA Cards - Love me like you do (I know this isn't the typical valentine that they will get, but I think it fits the theme just perfectly)

If you want to join in the celebration, you can link up your baby card for Dee over on the STAMPlorations blog! 

Back in Action, Baby!

Oh my goodness golly, does it ever feel good to be typing on this blank blog! I am sorry for going MIA - I did try to make it around and comment when I could, but I have been a busy Christmas auntie. My whole family came over from Minnesota (about 6 hours away) and I scurried and scampered and didn't have time to stamp! 

Can you blame me? Look at my Christmas cuties!

She wanted to try on Auntie B's glittery shoes:

Mr. B and his faithful puppy:

After my family left, I had just enough time to breathe before spending my first Christmas at my boyfriend's folks' house. We've been dating for 2 1/2 years now, but this is the first year I dedicated Christmas day to his family. And it was AWESOME! I even made his family's stocking wall this year:

As you can tell, I was thrilled! It's the little things...

Anywho, I spent yesterday unpacking and organizing all my new crafty goodies including a NEW CRICUT EXPLORE!!!! and a CUTTLEBUG!!! Woooooo! I played around with them a little bit today, although the card I made tonight doesn't showcase any elements from them. I have to practice first, ya know. 

I inked up this adorable elephant, because there were three pregnancy announcements from family/friends over the holiday season and thought I better get to work! That cute little flower button is from Doodlebug Designs "Baby Girl Boutique Buttons". 

 I was inspired by an amazing image over at the Just Us Girls challenge:

and this sketch from Retro Sketches:

And a first entry to Hiding in My Craft Room - Freestyle

Last, but not least, this is going to Simon Says Stamp's Wednesday Challenge: Anything Goes

Click on any of the images for more information on any of the challenges.

Thanks for stopping by. I promise I'm going to be a veritable bloggy fiend this week. Leave me a comment or follow my blog and I'll be sure to return the favor!

Waterdrop Technique

It's a boy! My cousin gave birth to a beautiful baby boy tonight and right after work I set about making her a congratulatory card to celebrate the little peanut.

Do you ever have emotional relationships to stamps, or am I the only weird one? When I was 14, I saw this beautiful stamp in a crafting store and my grandma saw me staring longingly at it. She, being the amazingly generous person that she is, surprised me with it. I have TRIED over and over and over again to use this stinkin' stamp but I always wind up hating the end result because the stamp is so big. Which makes it the perfect entry for Simon Says Stamp's Boldly go into STAMPtember challenge!

I finally conquered the stamp! I saw this technique where people emboss resisted the background images, and I thought - hey! Why not try it with a sentiment? I embossed the saying using white embossing powder and brushed over it with a heavy coat of shades of blue Distress Inks. Next, I dropped large droplets of water on to the paper, and let it sit. 

It creates this gorgeous result that, I think, compliments the saying perfectly. 

After the droplets formed, I dabbed it with a paper towel and used my heat tool to dry it. In addition to the big stamp, I think this card is bold because I took on two somewhat dated crafting materials: vellum and mulberry paper. I remember using these things back in the day, but haven't seen them used very recently - especially not the mulberry paper. 

I positioned mulberry paper behind the stamped image and distressed the edges using Faded Jeans Distress Ink. To tackle the vellum, I busted out my Cricket Basic Shapes cutter and made some flowers. I used blue vellum, dabbed it in Faded Jeans and painted over it with Perfect Pearls Blue Patina before drying it with a heat tool. Boy were my hands messy!!

The flowers turned out with this grungy, textured, shimmery feel and I finished them with some blue embellishments. Finally, I used some tiny sequins sent to me by my friend, LaVon Hall. 

The finished card looks like the perfect thing to send to my cousin in honor of her little bundle of joy!

MATERIALS:

• Distress Inks: Stormy Sky, Weathered Wood, Faded Jeans
• Perfect Pearls: Blue Patina
• River City Rubber Works, "Oh, but I Won't Know" stamp by Kay Foly
• Cricut Basic Shapes cartridge
• Blue embellishments
• Dark blue and white cardstock\
• Tiny sequins
• Light blue vellum
• White mulberry paper