The Pink Elephant Challenge #47

It's time for another challenge over at TPE! We have another sketch challenge this week which is sponsored by Totally Stampalicious. Here is the sketch

And here is my card using the Old Brawd set

Be sure to stop by TPE to see what the rest of the team came up with this week.

TPE Challenge #46

This week we have a sketch to use for our challenge. In Style stamps is sponsoring us this week and we got to play with some of their stamps. I used the Swinging Cynthia stamp for my card this week.

Here's the sketch we used

And here's my card

Now head on over to TPE to see what the rest of the design team did with the
In Style Stamps this week.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas with family and friends

Friday Favorites-Birthday Card Organization

I have been slacking on my Friday Favorites, guess I've been too busy trying to get things done for Christmas.

For the past two years I have been making my Christmas cards throughout the year so I have them all done by November, this has really worked out for me so I've been thinking I need to implement a similar idea for birthday cards (I don't send out anniversary cards but maybe if I get organized I just might). So I've been searching for ways to get organized with my birthday cards. Im even going to do a monthly challenge for the gals on Wisconsin Scrappers, maybe I'll even bring it over to my blog if I get things figured out and organized by the 1st :)

So, as I've been looking around I've found some ideas out there. Nicole Heady has a post on her blog about this with a free downloadable calendar. Here's the post with some ideas. And here's a pic of her calendar. I actually have a notebook with a calendar in it but I just don't seem to use it. So that's my 1st goal, to get something that I will utilize I also like her tip about putting a reminder in your phone to send your cards out. Usually I can get the card made (basically the day before lol) but I never seem to get it filled out and dropped in the mail.

Do you have any tips or anything to share with how you keep organized with your Birthday cards? I'd love to hear/see what you do.

TPE Challenge #45

This week's challenge is a Christmas/Winter theme challenge. I put together 2 cards and a tag for this week.


For some last minute Christmas card inspiration be sure to head on over to The Pink Elephant to see what the rest of the design team made.

TPE Challenge #44

Are you getting all your holiday crafting done? It seems like my list just keeps growing and my time is running out. I'll try to share what Ive been creating as I get things done, thing is my family reads my blog so I can't share too much :)

This week's challenge at TPE is to use your favorite Christmas color combo. I love the retro looking colors so I made my card with some lime green, pink and blue. Our challenge this week is sponsored by Your Next Stamp and we got to play with some of their images.

Be sure to stop on over to TPE to see what the rest of the team did this week.

TPE Theme Challenge #43

This week's challenge at TPE is to use your favorite coloring medium. Our sponsor this week is CC Designs. Since I started purchasing the Copic markers, they have been my favorite coloring medium, Im still a newbie with them but I love how they color. I've also added a bit of glimmer to the images with my glitter gel pens. My first card features the Swiss Pixies Heidi with Ornament stamp, I colored her with the Copics and the ornament was colored with a glitter pen, you can't tell in the photo but I added glitter glue to her wings.

And for this card I used one of the Cookie Crumbs Reason for the Season stamps which I also used my Copics on with a little bit of glitter pen on the star and heart.

Be sure to head on over to TPE to see what the rest of the design team made.

Inspirational Friday Favorites

While browsing around the web a few weeks back I found a way to make reusable tote bags out of old t-shirts, it's super easy and who doesn't have a ton of old t-shirts laying around. Now I don't know about you but those cheap .99 bags you can buy at the stores with their logo on them just doesn't thrill me so I had to give this t-shirt thing a try, it was so easy and I'll definitely be digging out some more shirts to make lots more. The one I made you can really cram that baby full with groceries and it's so durable, no worries about the bag tearing or anything.

HERE'S a tutorial on the bags.

After seeing the t-shirt totes I recently came across these super cute tank top totes. Now I've gotta give those a try. You can see how she did these HERE

So next time you start stacking up those old clothes to give away or toss, think about repurposing them into something you could use.

TPE Challenge #42

This week's challenge at The Pink Elephant is a recipe challenge we are to use plaid, any # of brads and no ribbon. Our challenge this week is sponsored by Wildflower Kids and we got to play with the 'Tis the Season digi set. My card features the Lily elf stamp. I also used the candy cane stamp. One thing I love about digi stamps is you can change the size and flip the image and that's just what I did on the strip of paper to create a border. And for the inside of the card I used the "Merry Christmas" sentiment. I have recently gotten a number of new cuttlebug folders so I naturally had to incorporate some of those into my card too. The green paper is the plaid emboss and the red is the candy cane stripe.

Be sure to head over to The Pink Elephant to see what the rest of the team made this week and also be sure to check out the Wildflower Kids Blog to see more samples using these great stamps. To purchase them you can find them HERE

Inspirational Friday Favorites

This past week I've been perusing the internet for a number of different ideas for lots of Christmas stuff my focus for today's inspiration is brown & blue Christmas decor. After doing the local shop hop the beginning of this month with my mother and seeing these colors in one of the shops its been stuck in my head to switch out my Christams decor. I have a deep orange for my walls in our living room and I have been using red and silver for a number of years, not really a color that really pops it kind of blends in. My mom commented that the chocolate browns and blues would look really nice with the orange and I would agree. So I've been searching around for some inspiration and found a few inspirational photos, it's not a popular combination in Christmas decor so there wasn't a lot out there.

My goal for doing this though is to do it for a minimal fee and try to use what I have by changing its color, we'll see how well that goes. I'll try to keep a tally of my expenses. We don't have a traditional Christmas tree so that'll help keep the cost down and a lot of my decorating is with my Christmas Village plus we have a small house.

Enough babbling :) Here are some pictures of inspiration

These first set of pics I found at The Christmas Faerie

BHG has a slide show of some brown and blue decor it's mostly blue but it's still inspirational. HERE'S the link.

When I was at Walmart the other day they had decorations grouped into colors and there was a nice assortment of brow and blue so I'll be scoring some items from there too.

Challenge #41 Sketch

This week's challenge at The Pink Elephant is a sketch challenge. Here is the sketch we used.


I made a couple gift tags using the sketch this week. My first one is a snowflake I cut from my sizzix snowflake die and the pink one is from my cuttlebug snowflake die which I embossed with a pink shimmery embossing powder. Then I stamped a snowflake which was embossed with the same powder & then used my circle punch to punch it out.


My next set of tags are also a sizzix die. I cut out some red and green ornaments out of a shimmery paper then did some embossing with my new cuttlebug border embossing folders. I punched out a circle and attached it to the bag and put To & From on it to use as a gift tag. These could also be used as ornaments.


I also have a card to share today for the Wisconsin Scrappers challenge this week. We also had a sketch this week from Mojo Mondays to use. I used the Nora image from C.C. Designs for my card which I colored with my Copic markers then added little snowflakes with my white gel pen. Isn't this Nora image just adorable?! You'll be seeing some more of her and her friends in the coming weeks.

Be sure to head on over to The Pink Elephant and Wisconsin Scrappers to see what the rest of the design teams have done this week.

Friday Favorites

Im going to start something new on my blog at least for the holidays partly for me to have these ideas on my blog and easy to find and maybe it'll inspire some of you. Ok I know today is not friday but I just decided to do this and I don't want to wait til friday to start :) So for this week I'd like to share a cute way to package up and give a hot cocoa gift. Im sure you could change this up for a tea or coffee lover too. I found this on Lacie's blog This little project is going to go onto my list of things to try and it just might be featured at my Christmas Make and Take Open House.

TPE Challenge #40 Thankful

This week's theme challenge at The Pink Elephant is "thankful". I decided to make garland/a banner to hang from our fireplace mantle. I used a paper pack I got from SU last year to cover my chipboard letters. I also used the Wildflower Kids Tom the Turkey which I colored with my Copics. I love my Copics but I so need more practice with them. I just attached the letters to twine with small clothesline clips which will make storage minimal.

I had a hard time photographing this because the lighting in our house isn't good so I tried a shot outside too.
Be sure you check out what the rest of the Design Team made this week.



I also have a card to share today that I made for the Wisconsin Scrappers challenge this week. Our challenge was to use primary colors. I also used a Wildflower Kids digital stamp for my card too, I used some delphinium blue flower soft for his hat and scarf.

TPE Challenge #39

This week's challenge at The Pink Elephant is a color challenge; brown, yellow, neutral and a color of your choice (I chose orange). I stamped my image with the Hero Arts Three Winter Trees and colored them with my Copics then embellished them with the autumn flower soft.

Be sure to head on over to The Pink Elephant to see what the other designers did this week.

CCAYL: One Layer Card Challenge

Last month I had the opportunity to be on a guest designer on the Christmas Cards All Year Long blog. Well Deanne was in need for a designer for the rest of the year and asked me if I would like to join the team!

Our challenge for Novemeber is to make a one layer card. At first I really had a hard time with this and really didn't know what I was going to create. Well after browsing around the internet my creative juices started flowing and I had a great time with these. They're simple but elegant, sometimes I get so carried away with adding more and more to the card I forget about simplicity. I have 5 cards to share with you today. This first one I used the Hero Arts Bare Winter Trees stamp and heat embossed them. Unfortunately the picture doesn't show off the shimmer of the embossing or the paper.

For this card I took a piece of chipboard and ran it through my cuttlebug to get the embossed framed image. I stamped the little Hero Arts Holly Bird image and colored him with my Copics.

I think this one is my favorite probably because it has snowflakes on it. I used the Cuttlebug and Sizzix snowflake embossing folders for this one and added a little jewel to the center of each snowflake.


I used the Hero Arts Holly Bird on this card too and just scored a frame around him with my scor-pal.

And lastly, this card was made with a sizzix embossing folder with some polar white flower soft and embellished with some Hero Arts and punched snowflakes.

Be sure to head on over to the Christmas Cards All Year Round blog to see what the rest of the design team made.

This week's challenge at The Pink Elephant is a recipe challenge. Our recipe to use this week is black, hardware and distressing. I found an image online of an old gas station and printed it off. My dad is into the old gas stations and corvettes so I thought this card would be great to give him. I embossed some mirror card paper with the diamond plate cuttlebug embossing folder for the background which I distressed the edges on. My hardware that I used is the Making Memories screws and Hero Arts nail heads.

Be sure to head on over to see what the rest of the team did this week.