Friends Having Fun and Some Little Cards

Have you heard the news about Friends Having Fun yet? It’s a brand-new challenge blog that is just about to debut!  And this one will be a little different – fun is the first priority for this site!  Challenges will be weekly, and will rotated among four teams – see below for the challenge themes and the team leaders:

Alison – Color Challenge (week 1)

Dani – Sketch Challenge (week 2)

Sarabeth – Recipe Challenge (week 3)

Erica – Pop Culture Challenge (week 4)

In addition, each team is looking for 3-4 friends (design team members) who would like to have fun!  All the details can be found here and the deadline for submission is this Friday, March 12th.  Details are still being worked out for the debut of the challenges, which is now tentatively scheduled for late March.  I will be sure to update here! 

Now, feel like seeing some little cards?  There are times when I seriously love making smaller-scale cards like the three pictured below.  They come together quickly and the size forces me to really keep them simple.  

This first one is my fave of the bunch – I absolutely loved using that sentiment stamp (by Verve Stamps) and that designer paper (by Pink Paislee).  Putting them together just made me happy!   I think I need to use that stamp again really soon – as a matter of fact, an idea is coming to me as I type this….hmmm….

The Twilighty card below went to the winners of blog candy prizes from the recent Twilight Tuesday Farewell Blog Hop.  It was a bit bittersweet making this final Twilight-themed project, but I HAD to use that sentiment from Beth’s StampInsanity Stamps set (called Otherworldly Loves).  Although I may very well make more Twilight-themed projects in the future, this definitely felt a bit poignant since I was officially done with my Twilight Tuesday duties when I mailed out the blog candy prizes and these cards.  I hope that the prize winners liked them!

And this last card also resulted from that Twilight-card-making session – exactly the same as the card above with a different sentiment and die cut shapes in the center. 

Thanks so much for visiting – see you again soon!

What I Used:

Anything is Possible Card:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink white cardstock, Stampin’ Up! Ruby Red cardstock, Pink Paislee designer paper

Stamps:  Verve Stamps

Ink:  Stampin’ Up! Ruby Red

Accessories:  Stampin’ Up! ticket corner punch, Kaiser red pearls, dimensionals

Twilighter and Thank You Cards:

Paper: Papertrey Ink vintage cream and black cardstock, Stampin’ Up! Riding Hood Red cardstock; K & Co. designer paper

Stamps:  StampInsanity Stamps Otherworldly Loves set (“Twilighter”); Verve Stamps (“thank you”)

Ink:  Stampin’ Up! Riding Hood Red

Accessories:  Spellbinders Nestabilities labels dies, dimensionals, K&Co adhesive jewels

Bird Song

Hey everyone!  I’m back with a card to share today.  How’ve you all been? 

This card I made for my dear friend, the lovely Beth of StampInsanity.  I needed to thank Beth in a big way for a gift she had given me – the gift of THE BROTHERS.  She lent me her entire set of the Black Dagger Brotherhood books, and I adore them so much it’s not even funny.   If you haven’t read the books yet, READ THEM!  They’re amazing! 

If you’ve read the books, you might get my (admittedly vague) reference to the 5th book in the series, Lover Unbound, that I included in this card.  (Once I explain the reference, that is!  It’s not obvious – lol.)  I was really touched by the events in that book with Vishous and the birds – I will say no more for those who might want to read the book – and this card was inspired by that.   But hopefully it’s nice to look at if you have not read the books, too, so see below!

I absolutely love this stamp (the sentiment) by Verve and I was really excited about using it for this card, along with a bird stamp by Inkadinkado. 

I added a bird charm attached with a bit of chain and glittered up the bird image a bit – you can see that below.

I will be back again soon to share more stuff – I have been working on SO MANY projects lately that I’m honestly losing track of all of them!  They’re all in various states of completion, which is why I have not been posting much lately.  Bringing them to completion – that is what I need to do right now!  I can’t stop myself from starting new things before I’m done with other projects.  It’s just too exciting – I HAVE to!  In any event, I hope to share more here soon. 

Thanks so much for visiting!

What I Used:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink Rustic Cream cardstock; Stampin’ Up! Brocade Blue and So Saffron cardstock; Bo Bunny Summer Cottage designer paper

Stamps:  Verve Stamps (sentiment); Inkadinkado (bird)

Ink:  Stampin’ Up! Brocade Blue

Accessories:  Cuttlebug:  Victorian embossing folder, Spellbinders Nestabilities petite circle dies; brad; dimensionals; Sakura Jelly Roll pen in clear; chain and bird charm; Stampin’ Up! ticket corner punch

Life is Better When It Sparkles: A Tribute to my Twilight Friends

Right before Christmas, I realized that my plan to make something special for my Twilight friends was just not going to happen, but I decided that a Happy New Year card would work.  And what better way to usher in the New Year than with the help of Rob Pattinson himself?  This card was so fun to make that I literally could not stop myself from adding things to it, even though I had to make a bunch of them, I just kept on embellishing.

The idea for the card came from a Verve Stamps set that I had seen a few months ago.  I  literally bought the set the moment I saw it — I just knew that I had to make a Twilight card, in particular, an Edward card with the sentiment, "life is better when it sparkles."  Does that sound like the Cullens or what?!  I included a lot of metallic, sparkly, shiny elements on this card to keep with the sparkle theme:  blue metallic cardstock, sparkly white cardstock, silver ribbon, silver brads, silver rhinestones, silver ink, silver Stickles — I think you get the idea.  I really went overboard on this one!  It was very fun to make this card for people who would really enjoy receiving a Rob card — that just kept me motivated!

One thing that was tricky with this — on the prototype card that I made, I used a couple  of embellishments that were seasonal/Christmas items from Michaels, and those items promptly disappeared from the shelves along with the Christmas clearance sales.  [Note to self -- when you see ribbon and other Christmas things that I would like to use year-round, buy a TON of them!]  I don’t know what they are thinking — those silver rhinestones should definitely be a year-round item!  Don’t they know that there are people out there who need Cullen-style bling for their cards?! 

So, half of the recipients got the cards with silver ribbon and silver rhinestones, and the other half received the white and silver ribbon and clear rhinestone embellishments. Both cards are pictured here.  It all worked out in the end.

And I have to get just a little bit sentimental here — I love my Twilight friends.  It amazes me that we have met online over a series of books (and one movie adaptation) — I have met the nicest people ever through this and I am grateful to know all of them.  This one’s for you, guys. 

Card components:

Paper:  Papertrey Ink white cardstock; The Paper Company blue steel metallic cardstock; Bazzill Bling in Diamond (white)

Stamps: Verve Stamps Starlight Starbright set; Inkadinkado Bohemian Flourishes (inside of card); Anna Griffin for All Night Media (sentiment on inside of card)

Ink: SU! Brocade Blue; Encore silver metallic ink

Accessories: Cuttlebug: textile texture embossing folder, Spellbinders Nestabilities small labels and tag dies; Making Memories silver brad; From Michaels: silver rhinestone embellishments and silver and blue ribbon.  On some cards: white ribbon with silver trim – Joann Fabrics; clear rhinestone embellishments from Michaels.