MFT Witchy Spell

Monday. Ugh. I did get to glue down this card that I started yesterday, but that's about it. I had to pick Laila up a bit after 9 so that's pretty much been my day. She wasn't even there long enough to be considered present for the day. I think I give up. :/ I hope to get my Halloween cards addressed and mailed out tomorrow if I can work on them after she goes to bed tonight. I promised myself I'd actually mail them this year.  lol This uses the MFT Card Challenges sketch and their Witch Way is the Candy set.

Off to find something else for us to do. It's been a longggggg day. Fingers crossed for a better week to come. 

Halloween Hello

Happy Sunday. I didn't think I was going to get a card made and posted today, but I am REALLY trying to do it daily this month and didn't want to fail so far in. So, I grabbed my Halloween box of goodies and started working. I made a simple card using the sketch at MFT Card Challenges. I'd also like to enter Colour Crazy Challenge as well.

Have a most wonderful week! If not, have lots of coffee and wine. lol 

Witch Way is the Candy?

Happy October!!  I guess it's time for Halloween stamps and decorations, huh? I was excited to grab this set from MFT as it's one of my favorite images to color. It's just so fun!!  I used it along with the current sketch at MFT Card Challenges. I'd also like to enter A Gem of  Challenge's last challenge (sad) and Dragonfly Journeys, both with a Halloween theme.

My goal for October is to get more creative time in and to get more cards in the mail. I'll also try to actually blog the cards I make, but for some reason that seems to be a HUGE challenge lately. I have mailed out several that I totally forgot to even photograph. Bummer, right?? 

I haven't posted a lot about our butterfly garden, but it's still going. It's been raining so much that I don't get to go out that often. I'm going to have a lot of weeding to do once we do dry up a little. Yikes. 

Have a great week. I'm off to grab a second coffee and check out some challenges for today. (and do laundry of course). 

Witch Way is the Candy

Happy Saturday!  I hope everyone is having a great weekend. I've been having a bit of a low key one. Laila seems to be getting sick again, so I don't want to take her out too much. I worked a bit on more of the Falliday Fest challenges from Splitcoast Stampers. This one was a new to me technique called dendritic printing. It was an interesting one for sure. If you haven't tried it, it's a great way to use up some acrylic paint! Here's the link to the YouTube video.

Sorry for the witch again! I had an extra one colored and wanted to use it! I need to put away the Halloween stamps soon and work on some Thanksgiving cards. I also need to mail the tons of Halloween cards I keep making. That's on my to-do list for Monday.

We did do a couple of fun things today. Laila and Jason made the Halloween House.  I struggle in doing those because I'm too much of a perfectionist and would take 6 days to complete it. I am not the mom who enjoys crafts with their kid. I try, but I'm biting my tongue the whole time.  It was nice to let him handle that one. lol  Then we went to a cool program at the library where kids can come and read to some of the therapy dogs in our area. Not much reading happened, but we enjoyed the dogs so much. Most of them are so sweet and calm.

Laila's still struggling at school. Thursday we ended up picking her up around noon. She had decided to be totally defiant and non-compliant. The staff seem to spend a lot of time sitting in the hallway with her. It makes me sad and I wish we knew how to make things easier for her and the teacher. We had the initial 504 meeting yesterday and they agreed to do a functional behavior assessment and work on a behavior intervention plan. It looks like most of her first year will be trying to figure out what works. It's really getting me down to continue to hear so much negative. She has a great principal, teacher, and counselor, so there's at least that. She's just so different than any kid most people have worked with that it's hard for people to know what to do with her. It makes me feel better to know it's not just her clueless parents who struggle. Keep sending good thoughts and let's hope we can keep improving each week.

Now I'm off to finish up Mindhunter on Netflix. I think I have 1.5 episodes left. :) It's been my binge show the past few days. Have a great Sunday!

FMS 308: Witch Way is the Candy

Hey! Checking in with a new challenge at Freshly Made Sketches today! I got to design the sketch for this week's challenge and I think it's a fun one. :)  I love making cards with the focus on a Polaroid-like piece. I bought a die last year that cut one, but it got mixed up in a friend's things and spent the past year hanging out in Minnesota. She recently visited again and now it's back in Texas. So... I thought I'd base my sketch around it.

I think I am now obsessed with this witch stamp set. I can't stop coloring her! Sandy Allnock has an awesome tutorial on the MFT blog, so I spent time this weekend coloring along with the video. This was my first attempt at following her.  The shadows are much better than I do, so it's been fun to learn about how to color more realistically. Not that green skin and purple hair are realistic, but you know what I mean... ;)

I hope you'll come play along with us this week! 

By the Numbers Halloween Style

Happy World Card Making Day!  I hope you found some time to get inky today.  I managed three cards and am debating another before bed.  MFT has some fun challenges, so I've been working on those.  This one is for the By the Numbers challenge. I hope you can see my numbers. I didn't really have number stamps or dies, so I used my Cameo to cut out numbers.  Kinda fun to play around with different ideas. :)

It's been a very low-key day here.  We needed one! I hope you are having a great weekend.  Enjoy your Sunday! Here's Little Lady having a stressful Saturday. 

MFT Card Challenges 353

Greetings! Can you believe it's October? Like really???  I have all these fun Halloween and fall stamps, but how many will I have time to use???  I fell in love with this cute Witch Way is the Candy set from My Favorite Things and had to get her this time around. It was so awesome of them to bring her back because so many people wanted one!  I used it for this week's sketch challenge at MFT Card Challenges.



It's been an interesting week since I last posted. Laila had early release on Wednesday, so I picked her up at noon. Yesterday was just a stressful day of messages and calls from school. Jason handled much of that thank goodness. I can't do the whole week of negative feedback. But, today seemed some better and we are now on track to get her some accommodations to try and make her days better. I don't know how many times the counselor told us she was a VERY strong-willed child. Like yeah, we know that. Oh boy do we know that!  I think she sat in the hallway for over two hours yesterday because she wouldn't apologize her to teacher for something. (and yeah, that's an issue we'll bring up in her 504 meeting as it's too long of a time out of class). I am connecting our behavior specialist that we worked with this year with the counselor in hopes that she can pass along some things that she found to help. So, keep us in your thoughts please. It's going to be an interesting  year. I'm already struggling myself because the constant negative feedback just destroys me.

We went to Target after early release on Wednesday and looked at Halloween stuff. She's already got her costume, but she loves all the skeletons and pumpkins. :)

She's going to be a Monarch butterfly. :) We have to find tights and she should be ready to go! I love that she picked that one. 

Hip for Summer Halloween

Halloween again. :)  I believe this is the last week of Sizzix's Hip for Summer promotion, so I wanted to get another entry in.  I thought the ostrich would be fun as a witch and I think she is.  I had fun using some different supplies and techniques to create it.  Also a lot of cutting. lol

Little Lady is doing great.  Well, if by great I mean keeping me awake at night I guess.  lol She gets a super playful spell right as it's time for bed.  Then at 3am she comes and lays with me.  That would be awesome, but it's right on my face!  We work through it and then I get snuggles until 6 or 7 when she's up and ready for another round of crazy.  Good thing she's cute.  :)

MFT Card Challenges 342

Laila is already talking about Halloween, so I thought I'd get ahead of the game and make her a card.  I hope to sneak it in her backpack or lunchbox. :) I used the new sketch at MFT Card Challenges and a cute MFT Pure Innocence girl.  I got brave and used my neglected Cameo for the web and bats.  The background is Distress Oxide inks in Wild Honey, Spiced Marmalade, and Wilted Violet.

For the past two weeks, Laila has been with a new counselor at her social skills group.  She has been awesome and so helpful with suggestions to try at home.  It seems to be working pretty good, so I'm happy for that.  It's still far from perfect, but we'll take any improvement.  They do a lot of practice like transitions, standing in line, sitting and going work at a table, sharing...all good things that will help her transition to school.  I can't believe it is only five weeks until she'll be a kindergartner. 

Falliday Leaves and Halloween

Back with more cards for the Falliday challenges!  I'm like seven behind, so I don't know if I'll catch up before it ends or not.  I'm working on them, but it takes me a long time to make one.  This challenge was to use fall colors for your card.  I love this sheet of patterned paper from Stampin' Up! so I based my card around that.   The stamps/dies are from Concord & 9th.

The next challenge I worked on was for a joy fold card.  I am not that great at anything outside of a traditional fold, but this one is pretty easy to make.  Thank goodness for great tutorials.  lol  I went with a Halloween theme as I seem to have a lot of paper and stamps for that now.  Here's the inside:

That's all for now.  I have to clean my desk and my room up to be able to make anything else.  It is a wreck.  Laila has been in here with me this week and she's "helped" a lot in hiding the carpet.  lol   I'll be back when I can see my desk and floor again.  Have a great weekend!

Blueprint Poison

What?  Halloween???  I know!  I treated myself to a stamp set I found on sale last week and it is Halloween/Fall Tim Holtz blueprints.  I wanted to try some liquid masking using a technique I learned in the Mask-erade Online Card Classes class. I put a ton of time and effort into this card.  So many techniques and drying time!  It is still drying now because there's Crystal Effects on the bottle.  lol  It might be ready to mail by Halloween. ...maybe!

Stamps:  Stampers Anonymous Tim Holtz Halloween Blueprint 2, Stampin' Up! And Many More
Ink:  Ranger Archival Jet Black, Distress inks: Dusty Concord, Spiced Marmalade, Hickory Smoke, Black Soot, Tea Dye, Brushed Corduroy
Paper:  Canson 140lb watercolor paper, My Favorite Things Black Licorace, Recollections Midnight Magic Halloween
Dies:  Lil' Inker Stitched Rectangles

That's all from me.  We are getting ready to go on a little family drive.  Jason has to pick up something about an hour away and there's a Whole Foods near where he's going.  I love going there to look around, so Laila and I might be finding some new fruits/veggies to try later!  :)

Have a great weekend!
Rita

Monster Mash

It's Wednesday and I'm here with a card for Kim's great sketch at Freshly Made Sketches.   I just love this layout and will be using it again for sure!   A sketch that makes you do a bit of math is always good for the brain!  :o)   I decided to play along with The Paper Players again this week and their challenge was a Halloween theme.   I love these little Lawn Fawn monsters so I thought they'd be fun.  I started off wanting to make a monochromatic card but I couldn't resist a bit of green to break up all the black and gray.  

Stamps:  Lawn Fawn Monster Mash

Ink:  Memento Black, Copics

Paper:  Stampin' Up! Green Galore, MFT Black Licorice, misc. Stampin' Up! retired Halloween DSP 

Scary Owls for TPD

Happy July 4th!    The fireworks are starting here, so I wanted to get up post up in case my girl woke back up.   She was up super early today, so I'm hoping she will sleep through them.  Fingers and toes crossed!    I decided to do a little Halloween card with the new Hooters stamp from Two Paper Divas.   I got a bit out of control on this one.   I did my watercolor/distress ink background, colored the owls with my Copics, added Glossy Accents to the owls' eyes and the BOO!, and then added a bunch of stitched rectangle die cut mats.   It's probably too much, but it was fun!  :) And it's PURPLE!

 Jason and I aren't fans of watermelon, so we don't really buy it.   Laila has a book from the library about a watermelon-eating alligator (or crocodile) and she asked for some this week.  We got her one and she ate all of this piece.  She hasn't seemed to want it since, so I'm thinking it's not her favorite either. :)

Happy Independence Day to my American peeps!

Creepy Crawly Halloween 2

Last week I showed you this Creepy Crawly Halloween stamp as a gift tag and today and I wanted to share a matching card. As before, I used some stamps from Wicked Wear Accessories to add a little more fright to it.  :)   I really love the fonts on this stamp, so I know it will be used a lot.   If you haven't checked out all the new releases at Two Paper Divas, be sure to go do that.  There's so much to see and love!  

I'm enjoying making watercolor backgrounds with distress inks and stencils and I did another one here.  The stencil is subtle, but I think you can see some of the circles here and there.  For fun, I added a little paper fringe I cut to my tag.   It took me a while to make this as there were lots of parts that had to dry before I could move on to the next step, but I think it was worth it.

Laila had to go to the doctor this week and afterwards we went to Target.  She asked to go look at clothes and then picked out this cute dress.  I loved it too, so I had to get it for her. It should be super cool and comfy for summer.   I hope you are having a great weekend!  Enjoy your Sunday!  I'm about to go into party planning mode for Laila's birthday.  I can't believe it's two weeks away!   Crazy.

Halloween for Two Paper Divas

Dude!  How did it get to be 9pm already?!    Today has been one of those days. So busy and so much to do.   I've been in my stamp room working all evening getting ready for my class tomorrow.  I also made this cute project to show off the new release at Two Paper Divas.   It's weird to be using Halloween stamps in the hot, humid weather we are having now.   Any excuse to eat gummy worms works for me though!  Ha!     I made a little tag with Creepy Crawly Halloween stamp and added a few spiders from Wicked Wear Accessories.  Cute, huh?   I wish I'd had some different bags to put my treats in or an actual topper die, but I tried.  Just focus on the tag.  ;)

Now I'm off to relax.  I worked until I got a headache and I'm calling today DONE! Have a great rest of the weekend.

Stampin' Up! Good Greetings

I'm having a few friends over on Saturday, so I've been designing a few cards for us to make.   As I was looking around Pinterest, I realized that I pin a lot, but never really look back at them.  I decided to do a "spin on pins" class this time and this is the first card.  It was inspired by a lovely card by the amazing Mary Fish.   I think this layout is a great way to use up packs of coordinating papers and some of the scraps I'm sure we all have.   I am going to work up a few other versions for Christmas and birthday I think!

When toddlers pick out their own clothes and accessories...  lol  

FMS107: Stampin' Up! Halloween

I went simple this week for my Freshly Made Sketches card.  I had a busy day yesterday and limited craft...that means a simple card must do.  :)   I had a totally different idea in mind when I sat down to stamp, but a last minute idea led to this.   Maybe it was seeing the signs that the pumpkin patch is almost ready to open?!  Our fun sketch this week was created by one of our amazing leaders, Jen T.  

Stamps:  Toxic Treats (retired)

Ink:  Basic Black

Paper:  Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie, Chocolate Chip, Old Olive

Tools:  Big Shot, Spider Web EF (retired), XL Oval punch, Little Leaves sizzlit

Sometimes owls need CPR.  :)  

Stampin' Up! Halloween Happiness

No scrap card today.  :-/  Between football and stamp club coming up next week, I had to be focused on doing those projects.   I wanted to do a cute little Halloween card using the Halloween Happiness stamp from the Holiday Catalog.  I kept it pretty simple, but I think it's adorable.  

Stamps:  Halloween Happiness

Ink: Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip markers

Paper:  Basic Black, Old Olive, Pumpkin Pie, Brights DSP stack, Polka Dot Parade DSP

Tools:  Big Shot, Chevron TIEF, Paper Snips

A certain little girl is obsessed with owls this week.  She learned to say it as we were reading a new Halloween book we found at Michael's and now she wakes up saying it....and says it all day.  My sweet stamping friend Anne Marie had sent Laila this owl way over a year ago, so I knew now was the perfect time to pull it out.  She LOVES it.  lol  She's back to normal now and feeling like herself again; throwing fits, fighting naps...all that fun toddler stuff.  lol  

Scrap Card Sunday!

Is is not THE most non-spooky Halloween card ever?   I used some old Halloween DSP scraps and thought I'd include a Halloween sentiment.  Looking at it now it looks silly!  Oh well, I made a card with my scraps, right?  I can always change the sentiment if I want to; it's one little circle.  If you have some coordinating scraps, give the herringbone technique a try!  Everything except for the card base came from my scrap bags, even the ribbon! :)

Laila has been very interested in letters lately, so I bought some cheap flashcards to work with her on them.   She is picking up on some of them already.  It's amazing what little sponges they are.   She is walking everywhere now and keeping us on our toes.  She has a fever today and is just wanting to snuggle though.  I hope she's not getting sick again.  :(   It's been  a long month here already! 

FMS57: LeAnne's Sketch

Today at Freshly Made Sketches one of our fabulous guest designers for the month, LeAnne, created the sketch.   Isn't it fabulous?  So versatile and good for any type of occasion.  Since we are so close to Halloween, I decided to focus on that for my card, plus I needed a card for another Hope You Can Cling To challenge.  This challenge was from Judy and here's her description:  My challenge to you is a reminder! Get 'em mashed, squooshed, photographed, x-rayed, and checked! And to that end, we will be sharing creations inspired by "The Monster Mash"!

I don't have the super fun Ghoulish Googlies, but I was able to bum it from my sweet downline Shannon to make this card.   I thought lil' Frankie was perfect for the Monster Mash theme.   I did switch the image side for my card, but that's the fun of sketch challenges, right?!  

Stamps:  Ghoulish Googlies, Tiny Tags

Ink:  Staz On Black, Pear Pizzazz marker

Paper:  Pear Pizzazz, Basic Black, Whisper White, Wicked Fun DSP (retired)

Tools/Accessories:  Big Shot, Perfect Pennants die, Chevron embossing folder, 2 1/2 circle punch, Jewelry Tag punch, Basic Black 1/4 grosgrain ribbon (retired)

Here's our little family at the local pumpkin patch yesterday.   I'll have more of Laila to share in the next week or so.  I'm not sure she knew what was going on poor dear.  It was pretty warm here, so I'm hoping it will cool off a bit so that we can go again.