Rainy Day Fun!

  Today is a perfect day to stay inside and spend my day crafting.  It's pouring rain outside, but is much needed for the gardens and lawns and I think most people are actually happy to have a rainy day.  It's been quite a while that we've had a day like this, but I'm totally enjoying spending it in my craft room.

   I have three new cards to share and I'm working on a few more for a variety of new challenges.  My first card today was created for the new Copic Coloring Challenge over at the Color Me Creative Classroom.   This challenge is open to all and Suzanne always offers wonderful prizes.  If your would like to play along, please hop on over to the challenge blog HERE for all the details.

   Our newest challenge is to create a Friendship Card and to also use our Copics (or ProMarkers) to color our embellishments.   I used my to color my cute digi images (from By Lori Designs) and also colored white pearls to match the lavender and brown in my card. 

  My next card was inspired by a new challenge over at The Outlawz Challenge Group and this is their Paper a la Mode Challenge, which is hosted every Saturday.  The challenge this week all about Sparkles and Bling and this is the card that I created which features Max by Baby Bud Designs.  

   This cutie has always been one of my favorites and I added lots of wonderful sparkle and shine to this card with Glitter, Glitter cardstock, gems, pearls and also Pearl Pens.  It was a really fun card to create and will be added to my Christmas Card collection, which is slowly building up!!
 
   And my next card was also created for today's new CAS Challenge, also hosted at The Outlawz Group.  The challenges this week to created a CAS card using BOLD and BRIGHT colors and that's exactly what I did with this fun little flower card.  

   I'm off now to continue on two more challenges and the first is going to be the new Sketch Challenge over at the Stars and Stamp Challenge Blog.  If you create cards for Operation Write Home and/or would like to play along - I have copied over this week's sketch to share --  This is Sketch #81 and I hope it will inspire you to play along --

   I think it's a fun sketch and I'm looking forward to seeing what I can come up with!!   See you all tomorrow and wishing everyone a wonderful Sunday!!

Cards, Cards and More Cards!!

   Even though I have not been posting on my blog daily, I have made quite a few new cards in the past couple of days and wanted to quickly share them with you now.   Most of these were made for Operation Write Home and the idea of making a set of Five new OWH cards, was inspired by a new challenge over at Crafting by Designs.

   Most of these cards were very easy, but also a lot of fun to make and as you'll see they are all a bit different, but most have a general theme of Sending a Hug, Hello or Thinking of You and that's what I tend to make most often, since they can be used year round.   If you are new to OWH and think you might want to create cards for this wonderful group - please visit the site HERE for all the details on how you can help out.  

   All four of the cards above were created with these really fun and cut 'pre-colored' digi images that I bought from TigerFrogg Doodles.   They make such cute cards and they are really FUN - the make me smile and I think that's why I loved them the very first time I saw them.   I also have the black and white set, so that I can color them in anyway I choose, but it's nice to have the pre-colored images when you want to make a lot of cards quickly.

   And here is another OWH Card that was one I colored with my Copics for two different challenges.  The first was the current Coloring Skin-Tones,  Challenge # 41  over at the iCopic Challenge Blog and there is also a Skin-tone coloring challenge today at Crafting by Designs.  This is the card I created to submit to both challenges.

  For this card I colored his skin very light skin tones using E00, E0)0 and E0)00, with a soft touch of R01 for his little cheek area.  My image is an adorable stamp that I bought from Whipper Snapper, when I first started making cards for OWH.  I think it's so sweet and I also own the little girl version.  So Cute!

  My next card was created this week's Copic Coloring Challenge over at The Outlawz Group.  Our challenge this week was to use your Country's Flag Colors as the main colors for your project.  Of course, that would be Red, White and Blue here in the US and I colored up a fun Christmas Card featuring one of my new Bugaboo Images.  I am also submitting this cutie to today's new challenge at the Catch the Bug Challenge Blog  and this week it's 'Anything Goes'!!  WOOHOO!!

  And last, but not least I have two more very simple cards that will be sent off to OWH.  Both cards were created in a very simple Clean & Simple style and were actually fun to make.

     I'm off now to pick up my room and then relax for the rest of the day.   I've found that spending more time creating and less time being at the computer, has really been a plus.  My neck pain has been better and I'm also finding that I can make more cards and that my Mojo has returned!   Yippee!!!

Short and sweet....

  I have a short little post to share my latest card!  This is the only one I have at the moment that's all done and ready to share.

   It was created for three different challenges and was first inspired by the Midweek Throwdown Challenge over at Operation Write Home.   I feel in love with the adorable K-9 cards that gals had created and was off on a little shopping spree to find a really cute digi image for my card.

 After browsing a few of my favorite stores, I decided I wanted to use this adorable little Spotty Dog, digi that I bought today from Digi Stamp Boutique, and I even was lucky enough to take advantage of the 20% off SALE!   And you know me, I love a SALE - so I also picked up a few more images while at the store.   It's one of the very first digi stores I ever shopped at and one I love to visit.  If you love cute, fun digis as much as I do, then you'll want to head on over and do a little shopping -- especially now that ALL images are on SALE!    Have FUN!!

 

   I also used this fun new sketch from this week's Sketch Challenge over at The Outlawz and you can find the challenge HERE, if you would like to play along.

    This is my card and as you will see, I flipped the sketch to make it work out better or my layout!!

    I am submitting this cutie to each of these challenges and I invite you ALL to play along!   This card will also be heading off to OWH in my next batch!

• Midweek Throwdown - Stars & Stamps for OWH - K-9 Themed Challenge
• The Outlawz Challenge Group - Wednesday Sketch Challenge - August 3rd
• DigiStamp Boutique - DSB Blog - August Customer Competition

    And that is it for today!   I'm still going slowly catching back up on life and crafting, but it's been fun!!   My next goal is to work on a new card for another challenge at The Outlawz.  The inspiration for this will be to create my own background papers and with all the wonderful new Hero Arts images and techniques I've learned that will be FUN for me!!

Happy crafting and have a wonderful day!!

I'm so lucky...

...and I want to THANK everyone who took the time to leave me such sweet comments these past few weeks.    I'm truly touched by how many people took the time to say hello and wish me well.   I really hate not feeling like myself and I am pushing hard to feel better.

     I think maybe I'm a bit burnt out and having a few days of totally FREE time, was a bonus for me.  I did miss making cards and did some from time to time, but I did not miss my blog so much.   I love the interaction with people and how it keeps us all connected, but I wish it was easier and not so uncomfy for me to be at the computer!!  I think I was starting to find it really a lot more uncomfortable than it had been in a long while, so from now on, I will try harder to type less and simply add more pictures!!

     These are the cards that I've made in the past few days and they were all inspired by a variety of challenges.   This first card was created for the current challenge at Catch the Bug - and it's a theme challenge where the them is SPLASH!

   My next card was also created for a different Bugaboo Challenge and this one is for their Wacky Wednesday challenge, which is hosted every Wednesday at PCP and CDAC.   This week we had this sketch as our inspiration --

 

   And next I have two cards created for challenges that you can find this week over at 'The Outlawz' Challenge Group.  The first card is for the Monday Greeting Card Challenge, where the theme this week is Balloons --

   And my second card was created for this week's Color Combo Challenge, where we had these fun bright colors as our weekly inspiration -

  And my last new card was created for Challenge 7 - at the 'Through the Craftroom Door' publication and those challenges are now being posted at main site and also over on the new Challenge Blog! 

  I was excited to find out that my friend Melanie, is not only the new DT Leader at TTRCD, but is also now a Junior Partner working with both Suzanne and Marti  to produce a fabulous digital magazine!    Woohoo!!!  Congratulations Melanie!

   And now I'm off to rest up at bit and do some organizing in my craft room.  It felt nice to be making cards again and I'm glad I did.  Thanks again for all the kind notes and thanks for lifting my spirits and helping inspire me to create!  

I'll be MIA......

   Decided I need a longer break!!! - I will be MIA for awhile....!!     I am simply not feeling right....not sure it it's Fibro, meds or life...but I know it's not a good feeling and I need to figure it all out....

   Now I seem to have lost my motivation to craft and that is not a good thing....!  I feel really LOST and don't like it???     I sure HOPE this feeling passes soon.....it sucks!!