Happy Easter!

Happy Easter Everyone!

I really thought I was done with Easter cards but this frame was still laying on my messy desk just begging to be used and I realized I hadn't colored a single one of my quirky Easter and Spring images from The Octopode Factory. Well that would NEVER do! I know you love 'em. So here ya go, an Easter card that I hope makes you smile. I love it when you smile... The egg frame was cut on my Cricut from the Easter 2010 cartridge. The DP is from Heidi Grace. Sentiment is computer generated.

Here's the dimension shot...and speaking of...I sure hope you have a chance to play along with my challenge on Yvonne's blog, Do More With Less. Am I gonna have to hunt you guys down? Throw on a few pop dots and you'll be good to go. I'm feeling very sad and neglected. BooHoo! Don'tcha wanna make ME smile again?? Pretty please?

Hoppy Easter

Although I didn't use Celebrate with a Flourish for my BBTB2 project this week, I did check out alot of the beautiful cuts and couldn't resist doing an Easter card using the sweet bunny and Easter sentiment. I started with an egg shaped card welded in Design Studio using Easter 2010. Then I just cut the layers. Added a bit of texture to the grass layer with Swiss Dots and cut that layer an additional time so I could pop the flowers. I'm thinkin' the Swiss Dots and the striped Egg will qualify for Papertake Weekly's Challenge which is Spots and Stripes. I glittered the bunny but running him through my Xyron face down to match the glittered striped in the DP on the egg. I'm hoping that's enough sparkle to enter this into the ABC Challenge "S" is for Sparkle. You know, some people complain that the adhesive from the Xyron either leaves sort of excess adhesive over the small cut out or leaves gaps on the die cut which isn't that big a deal for just gluing, but if you're glittering or flocking it's a prob. This won't happen if you use a stylis to trace around all of the cut edges (especially the small openings in letters and such) and then really rub the clear side to make sure it comes in contact with the adhesive to help pull it cleanly away and also helps the adhesive adhere firmly to the die cut. It takes a few more minutes, but really makes a difference.

You know I love the layers, and even more if they're popped, so of course, that's what I did. I'm not sure this is what the gals at Cupcake Craft Challenges had in mind but they gave us a pretty wide berth so I'm entering this in their Lots of Layers challenge as well. And speaking of POPPED layers, I'd sure love it if you'd visit Do More With Less and check out my Guest Designer tut and come join my challenge. Yvonne's Blog is packed with super inspiration and I'm giving away a great prize.

The inside sentiment is also from Celebrate with a Flourish. I added a few adhesive pearls to enhance it. Some were colored with my Copics to match. Obviously this is an Easter card so I'm entering it in the Sparkles Forum Challenge which is Easter and also the Whimsical Wednesdays April Showers Bring May Flowers Challenge. See the flowers, Steph? I'll try to do better next time, but I didn't want to miss it. LOL

Tiddly Inks You're a Stitch Challenge

Happy Tuesday! Our challenge this week at Tiddly Inks is You're a Stitch. We want to see some kind of stitching on your card, be it real or faux, machine or hand, rub-ons or doodling...the possibilities are endless! I took some patchwork paper from the DCWV Flower Showers stack and used my sewing machine (sans thread, I'm such a chicken!) to (approximately) follow the lines and then connected them with my sparkle gel pen. I couldn't resist one more Easter card using Minnie's Egg. Isn't she the cutest EVER? (P.S. there are 2 MORE Minnies HERE and HERE) I colored her up wth Copics and fussy cut her out. Her prescription sun glasses are green RainDots. (I'm hopin' Easter is bright and sunny!)Added a big Nesties egg behind her, and MS punches for the grass and fence. The sentiment is done with Alpha Beads. Now hop on over to the Tiddly Inks Challenge Blog. The DT will keep you in stitches. HA! We can't wait to see your creations using TI images (Click HERE for cute freebies just in case you don't have any. (Shame, SHAME!) And for more chances to win some Tiddlies, check out Haunted Design House, where Christy is sponsoring this week, and you can see some of the fab Gothic Pin-Ups in action! WooHoo!

BBTB2 Egg Challenge

Yes, you're on the right blog. I know, I've NEVER made a regular rectangular card for BBTB2. Well, okay, once, but it was because we had sponsor product and I had no choice but this time I did so there ya go. Our sweet and talented Krista chose any egg from the Easter 2010 cartridge. I've used this cut alot and if you'd like to see one of my more typical shaped cards from last year using it, click HERE. There's even a .cut file. This particular card, however, has been in my mind for quite awhile and although the egg is not exactly front and center, it's still there so...

It is all done with the Easter 2010 cart and actually is not welded and doesn't need DS, except, perhaps for placement of the egg cut out on the rectangle from Plantin Schoolbook but you could always cut the egg and then trim the surrounding paper to a 4 1/2 x 6 1/2" rectangle. I'll give you the dimension of the cuts at the end in case you're interested. The card itself measures 5x7. Oh wait, I also hid the contours of all of the interior filigree cuts on the regular cut of the cross and embossed it with a tiny textured Sizzix folder for Stampin' Up. The white mat is embossed with one of the Cuttlebug folders that I think came in a bundle.

The Easter Lilies were cut 3 times in regular, once in shadow. I colored the stem and leaves on one layer as well as the stamens. On the second one I cut off the individual blooms and added some shadows with copics. Then, on the third layer I turned the flowers upside down and drew where I thought the stamens should be (on the back so I wouldn't have to worry about pencil lines) and fussy cut them so I could color and glue them to the blooms. the sentiment is a peelie by Stampendous I got on clearance at my LSS a year or so ago and I just hand cut layers to frame it. I didn't go nuts on popping the layers but as you can see, there's a reasonable amount of dimension. This is for my MIL for Easter.

Card size 5x7

Purple mat 4 3/4 x 6 3/4

White mat 4 1/2 x 6 1/2 with shadow egg cut out at 5" (Egg cut out is slightly above center)

Cross 5", both shadow and regular

Easter Lily 4", shadow and regular

Please stop by BBTB2 to see the lovely eggs designs by my DT sisters and I hope you're inspired to play along. I'm also entering this into the Cricut Cardz Easter Challenge and My Partner in Crafting Crime Layer it Up Challenge. Less than 2 weeks to Easter.

Bunny Hopping with the Tiddly Inkers

In honor of our the "Bunny Hop" coming up on the Tiddly Inks Challenge Blog I made a whimsical little basket using Hoppy Easter (retiring soon and on sale HERE for only $1.00) but also part of the super deal Bunny Boo Adventures that includes 4 images plus sentiments AND some secret images not shown for the sale price of $3.50! WooHoo! OOOh, that was a mouthful! LOL Anyway I'd colored Bunny Boo with Copics, added a little punched butterfly, cut him out and backed him with Nesties, and then said "Now what?" I mucked around with papers and found some by Heidi Grace that matched my coloring and then remembered an adorable basket I'd made several years ago using that same paper. Perfect!

The Origami basket is from a UTube Video from JenLowe Designs. It requires one sheet of 12x12 double sided card stock that isn't ultra thick. My image is a bit big to get a really good pic of the basket but you get the idea. Isn't it fun?

Now for more fun you MUST check out the Refer a Friend 2 week challenge on the Tiddly Inks Challenge Blog HERE. Christy explains the whole deal WAY better than I ever could and there's lots of chances for you and your friends to win free images AND meet more friends. That's what all this is about after all, isn't it? I'm also entering this in the Simon Says Stamp Spring/Easter Challenge and the Simon Says Stamp and Show Challenge which is Anything but a Card.

The Cuttlebug Spot Oh So Soft Challenge

Were rounding up our month of embellie challenges at The Cuttlebug Spot. And I'm sad to say it's the last of our challenges for awhile. The Cuttlebug Spot will be taking a bit of a break but don't forget us, WE'LL BE BACK! Our final challenge is Oh so Soft featuring felt in our designs. I was particularly excited about this one because I'd been dying to try my MFT Die-namics dies with felt. I use the Rolled Flower and the Rolled Rose. They cut quite easily in the Cuttlebug, but in a few cases I did have to snip through a few reluctant stands of fiber. You use the same sandwich as with Nesties; A plate, C plate, die, felt, and B Plate. Then I rolled them up and glued them using Zip Dry glue to a small punched circle and added adhesive pearls to the centers. The leaves were from the Spellbinders Nested Leaves dies. Pretty pretty, huh? The background embossing is done with an old style Fiskars Basketweave Texture plate. I'd never had much luck with embossing with these, but while at the Scrap Expo I came across Lucy McGoo's Wonder Goo which, when sprayed on card stock is (among other things) supposed to enhance embossing. Still not as crisp as a folder, but a definite improvement. The eggs were cut with my Spellbinder's Nested Eggs dies, and embossed with my new Sizzix Country Foliage folder. The bottom scalloped border was not punched, but rather cut with the Scalloped Scallop Die-namics Die from MFT. "Happy Ester was computer generated on a little banner cut with my Stampin' Up Bigz Petal Cone Die (Thanks Lilllie!) I'll be using that whole die in the near future.

So, it's a simple Easter card, but ALL Cuttlebug. Here's a pic of all of the goodies I used. the Design Team has all sort of inspiration using felt, so be sure and check out The Cuttlebug Spot and please play along. Last chance for awhile. You might want to consider subscribing so as not to miss our return. Don't forget us!

BBTB2 Easter Chick Challenge

Morning peeps! This week our challenge at BBTB2 was chosen by our dear sister Penny and she's chosen the adorable chick from the Easter 2010 cartridge. My chickie is decked out in an Easter bonnet from Heritage with a sentiment from Songbird, all welded together in Design Studio with an egg and grass from Easter 2010 as well. I flocked her by running her through my Xyron right side down and sprinkling on the Doodlebug flock to get her all fuzzy. If you're careful, you can sort of rub off the sticky from her beak so she doesn't get feathers in her mouth and color it with Copics. She actually has an additional layer behind her in orange for her feet and she's off set from the cream layer slightly (as is the grass) which is what I do when an image lacks a shadow on the cartridge and I'm unable to successfully create one in DS.

The whole kit and kaboodle was welded to a rounded rectangle from George (big surprise, LOL) to make a shaped front card. I seriously hope you all don't get tired of these because they're my absolute favorites to make. Although I didn't plan on it, it ended up being an A2 size card which almost never happens. Of course it doesn't fit in a regular A2 envie, though, because it's FAT! But it will go in the smaller size padded one for a change so WooHoo!

I happened upon a little tip while constructing the card which I'm gonna pass along because it was an "aha!" moment (and because I like to hear myself talk :) After I'd glued the egg to the card base I noticed I'd forgotten to ink it. It looked so FLAT to me! It bugged me...REALLY bugged me. I tried to peel it off but it was a no go. Laying on my table was the piece of DP I'd cut the egg out of (the negative). Obviously it fit perfectly around the attached egg and I was able to ink the cut without messing up my card. Brilliant! (Or so I thought, but I'm easily impressed.) The difference was really subtle, but it made ALL the difference to me. I don't feel compelled to ink everything, but inking and doodling are those extra touches that I think make a card more finished and professional looking.

Here are the dimensional shots. I said it was FAT! The majority of DP's are from the DCWV Nana's Nursery (Baby Girl) stack and the bonnet is from the Flower Shower Spring stack from last year. For the egg I used the Baby Girl mat stack because the scale of the print was smaller and more proportional. Originally I had planned to use the cut out floral layer of the egg cut, but even that seemed out of scale with the chick.

Now that I could see the end in sight I actually even finished the inside! (Gosh, this one might actually get sent! LOL) One thing to keep in mind when designing a shaped front card is planning to have enough solidity to the front to hide the inside sentiment. You can size your sentiment in DS by trying it on the card front page first and copy and pasting it to another to cut. "Happy Easter" is also from the Easter 2010 cartridge. Now go be inspired at BBTB2 by the rest of the team's fabulous takes on this challenge and remember, you have 2 weeks to complete our challenges for a chance to win our coveted blinkie. As always, if you don't own the featured cartridge, any chick or duck will do.

Happy Easter Everyone!

Jezebel was beside herself this morning because she didn't have an Easter card for Daddy. Mommy and Hello Kitty Greetings to the rescue using the card feature at 7 1/2 which I hardly EVER use. I got the whole thing done and showed it to her and she said "No, Mommy, the Easter Bunny is FUZZY and I want to be SPARKLY!" Not wanting to disappoint (although I wished she'd mentioned it earlier) I cut more layers, ran them throught the Xyron and added the flocking and glitter. "Much better", she said.

Sort of had to wing it on the inside because I need to go beautify for Easter brunch, but she was happy and that's all that matters. Sure wish the weather were nicer since we're off to Auberge du Soleil in Napa and it's threatening rain. BooHoo! Here's wishing you all a very Happy Easter no matter what the weather in your neck of the woods. (Another BooHoo, MSU lost yesterday to Butler. Just 3 of their missed free throws would have done it but it was not to be. I'll be drowning my sorrows in chocolate today.)

The Cuttlebug Spot Color Challenge (with a stamp)

This week on The Cuttlebug Spot we were asked to used ONLY the TCS colors of pink, green, black and white AND we were to include a stamp which could be an image or sentiment. Since those colors make me think of Easter (and it's less than a week away) I decided to use this adorable bunny I got from my friend Marlene during a Digi Shack Blog Hop.

Isn't he the cutest? Thanks so much Marlene! The eggs are cut with my Nesties and cuttled with the Argyle folder. I used an EK Success punch for the wavy landscape and embossed with Swiss Dots and the flower folder that comes with the Cuttlebug With Thanks card making combo. The bunnies and grass at the bottom are a MS border punch. The most exciting thing for me on this card is that I actually hand stamped the "hippity hoppity" sentiment on the card without screwing it up. WooHoo! a FIRST! Gotta love those $1 stamps from M's, eh?

The layers are popped as usual, including that bunny which was a bit of a challenge to fussy cut. My DT sisters did a fabulous job with this challenge so don't miss their fabulous takes HERE and our wonderful Sponsor, Simon Says Stamp, is offering a $50.00 gift certificate for the lucky randomly chosen participant this week.