KAITLYN'S BIRTHDAY

After a week off I'm back with this week's challenge at The Paper Players, and the lovely Claire has put together a Tic-Tac-Toe challenge for us. 

The Paper Players: PP664 - A Tic Tac Toe Challenge from Claire

I'm pretty sure that Claire's intent was that we would make a fall card, judging by the various elements in her grouping, but Friday was my youngest granddaughter's 9th birthday, and I thought I would take care of two things by using Claire's challenge to kick-start Kaitlyn's card. I chose the middle row across as my inspiration - patterned paper/die cut/sequins or enamel dots.

I started my card with a die-cut background from Papertrey Ink - "Birthday Bash", which I cut from white card stock. I stamped two adorable stuffed animals from AALL & Create (#249 "Dog Toys"), masking to overlap the images and colored them with Copic markers. I stamped a third one on a scrap of white and colored and fussy cut him. I mounted the stamped and colored die cut panel to a panel of patterned paper so that it would show through the circles and stars and attached all of this to a white 4-1/2"x 6" white card base. I added a fussy cut sentiment from Avery Elle's "Peekaboo Pets". I die-cut a PTI #9 twice - once from the same printed paper and a second time from a white card stock and glued them together so it would have a bit more thickness. I overlapped the fussy cut stuffed toy with the 9 and attached them to the face of the card with dimensional foam, lining up the 9 with the background stripes. The final step was to add several enamel dots in various colors and sizes, and a tiny, stamped heart on the little guy on the left. The coordinating envelope is made from lightweight paper.

PS: My granddaughter LOVED this card!

Anyway, have at it! Make any kind of card you wish - just make sure you've selected one of the horizontal, vertical, or diagonal rows for all of your elements - and share it with us. I always like the Tic-Tac-Toe challenges, and I'm sure you do as well! 

On a personal note: This "Birthday Bash" background die from PTI has been a favorite of mine for quite a few years and I've used it on many cards - most notably on this one I made 8 years ago for Kaitlyn's one-year birthday party:

  

I don't have a photo of the inside of this invitation, but I computer-generated the message "One year old is what you are!" plus the invitation information and a really cute photo of her. In the ensuing years between one and nine, this kid has become quite a force to be reckoned with!

 

ZOMBIES

I'm slipping in today with one last Halloween card. I thought I had enough for my mailing list, but alas, I was short by one card! To give myself an additional challenge I decided to play along with AAA Cards Challenge #251 "Anything Spooky Goes". This is a CAS challenge, which is great with me.

There's not much to be said about how this very simple card was created. I stamped a pair of bloody hands on a white cardstock stitched rectangle and over-stamped some Tim Holtz splatter in black. Then I attached a sentiment (also Tim Holtz) white heat-embossed on black cardstock and mounted all of this to a black card base. That's it!

AAA Cards: AAA Card Challenges : #251: Anything Spooky goes

 

TRICK OR TREAT

Midway through October, closing in on Halloween, and time to look in at Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge! We all have some additional inspirational cards for your consideration. Check out the awesome cards my fellow DT members have created!  

 

I fashioned this card after the trick-or-treaters in the lower left quadrant of our inspiration board - see below. I had a couple of sheets of very old 12x12 Halloween paper from Halloweens past and I completely lost track of whose papers these are. Starting with a black card base, I added some handmade Japanese rice paper to the front of the card and layered over a couple of panels of stitched waves in gray. Then I fussy cut a couple of houses out of the printed paper and slipped them and a die cut picket fence under. I stamped some tiny bats in the sky and attached a couple of coordinating costumed trick-or-treaters from a page of tags in the same collection of papers. I finished with another fussy cut house and die cut fence, stamped bats, and heat embossed sentiment inside. The custom envelope was made from the overall printed paper and lined with green lightweight paper.  

Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge: October 2023 Mid Month Reminder

SIGNS OF AUTUMN - CAS

It's Sunday again, and you know what that means - a new challenge at The Paper Players! The very talented Joanne is this week's host, and she has chosen "Signs of Autumn" as the CAS challenge.  

The Paper Players: PP662 - A Clean-and-Simple Challenge from Joanne

I used one of my favorite sentiments from a fall Impression Obsession stamp set of several years ago. I stamped it onto an ivory cardstock that I had pre-cut with a stitched rectangular die. I used PTI's "Dark Chocolate" ink and then overprinted a PTI flourish in pale orange to suggest steam coming from the die cut pumpkin cup (Trinity Stamps #TMD-088 "Boo Brew"). I layered everything over a matching ivory card base and lined a coordinating envelope with some printed paper from my fall stash.

You'll have fun with Joanne's theme this week, but remember to keep it CAS! If you need a refresher on what we mean by CAS:

• Minimal layers and embellishments
• Plenty of open space, aka "white" space
• Simple and uncluttered

On a personal note: On Friday morning we delivered two more young feral cats to SNYP and found out it was one male and one female. That gets us down to just three more juveniles for an appointment in December - hoping we don't get blessed with any more! While waiting in line Friday I met a woman who is feeding 56 feral cats and has names for all of them! 

LEANNE'S COLORS

Well, the beginning of a new week and a new challenge at The Paper Players! This week our host is the Lovely LeAnne (alliterative!)  and she has selected a great collection of colors for fall - great for Halloween or fall images. I was feeling a bit 'Halloweened' out this week, so went with fall images. I hope to see lots of designers playing along with us!

 The Paper Players: PP661 - A Color Challenge from LeAnne

I stayed on the CAS side this week with some new images that I treated myself to during my birthday week - "Hello, Pumpkin" from Graphic 45. I started by stamping the larger pumpkin on a white die cut stitched rectangle with Memento's "Black Tuxedo" ink, overlapping it with a smaller pumpkin, and coloring the stems with an olive Copic marker. Then I stamped again on scraps of orange, purple, and olive polka dot papers, fussy cut the images, and pieced them, slipping the purple one under the orange. I finished with a PTI sentiment in black. It looked a bit bare, so I added a couple of punches on each side of the sentiment, pulled through and tied orange and purple twine in a bow, and mounted everything onto a white card base with some dimensional foam. Done.

Our design team has some beautiful examples for your inspiration. Visit their blogs and be sure to let them know how much you appreciate their challenge examples! 

On a personal note: The mention of Memento's "Tuxedo Black" reminded me to tell of my activities of the last couple of days. We keep getting "blessed" with kittens that feral mothers have been bringing in for us to feed and we have been trapping/spaying/neutering about every 6 months, hoping to catch up one of these days so we can control the neighborhood cat population. Last night we trapped 2 little juvenile tuxedos and delivered them this morning to the local chapter of SNYP (Spay & Neuter Your Pets). I think I mentioned that when we went through the last round of spaying and neutering, we had a lactating female, and she brought her 4 babies to us in June. The two little guys we took in this morning are part of her litter and we're hoping to get the other 2 in next Friday morning (I think 2 females). In the meantime, 2 more little calicos have shown up - it's feeling like a never-ending revolving cat door! I love cats, so I can't not feed them. Fortunately, some of the neighbors are helping out because we're all so disgusted with a woman down the block that lets her 13 cats run wild and breed constantly, leaving all of us to pick up the slack. The city has many laws on the books meant to control dogs, but nothing related to cats.   

ALL ABOUT THE CANDY

WOW! Here we are already in October, and if you've been following along you could have anywhere from 12 to 24 Halloween cards ready to mail out. I just counted mine today and I have 23. And we have a brand-new mood board to play with at Two Old Bats Anything Halloween October Challenge.

Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge: October Anything Halloween

I chose the top left quadrant, and I had this silly idea about a spider preferring Halloween candy corn to the protein-based treats she had already trapped in her web! 

I started with a square black card base and attached a slightly smaller yellow square to the face, followed by a printed orange/yellow paper that I had stamped an Impression Obsession cobweb image on. I also stamped some bugs on the cobwebs and fussy cut several candy corn pieces from another printed card stock. After computer generating the sentiment, I glued it to the face of the card and added a fussy cut spider. Much simpler than last month's card!

We've had a great response to our challenges the past couple of months, so let's keep up the good work! Join us and have some fun with the latest images. Go to the blogs for our Design Team and let us know how much you appreciate our inspirational examples!

MOON & PURPLE & BITS & PIECES

I'm trying to fill out a need for just a couple more Halloween cards and went deep into my scraps for this one. Because of my tenure at Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge, I have a bin filled with stamped and/or die cut bits and pieces that started as ideas but then were relegated to the bin for possible future use.  

I had a square black card base with an attached slightly smaller square of stamped cobwebs on white (Impression Obsession #CC141 "Spider Web") and I started with that. The purple circle with die cut black graveyard and moon was another scrap that I had started a card from a couple of years ago and never decided what to do with it. I mounted a printed cobweb pattern from last year's Park Lane "Haunted Hollow" 12x12 card stock pad over the white stamped square and attached the die cut circle. Using a scrap of purple polka dot card stock, I white heat embossed the sentiment and cut a Stampin' Up "Chalk Talk" tag, slipped it under the circle, punched a hole through all of the layers, and tied on a couple of lengths of purple and black twine. The final layer was a white card stock ghost (Tim Holtz) left over from a couple of years ago and I slipped a scrap of black behind his mouth and eye.

 

I photographed this card on a gray-toned statuary marble slab I use for rolling out pie dough. I was surprised to see that the photos came out with the marble looking like it's a lavender tone - not complaining, just saying. I'm going to share this card over at Toc, Tac Toe Challenge #228 before it closes. I selected the top row - Free/Moon/Purple.

TTTC228 - Featured Designer Felicita - Tic Tac Toe Challenge

COLOR HUES - CORAL & BLUE

Hello, all! I'm pleased to be Guest Designing at Color Hues for the next two weeks! Challenge #73 is "Coral and Blue" - two favorites of mine.

I chose a bright coral tone and navy blue for my colors. I started by stamping a script on white card stock in PTI "Enchanted Evening" ink. I separated the two lines of sentiment from Hampton Arts + Gina K and heat embossed the second line directly on the white card stock in dark blue. The first line was heat embossed in white on a strip of dark blue iridescent stock and layered over the script, then die cut into a deckled rectangle. I added a dark blue iridescent strip to the face of a white card base and tied it with some slightly lighter blue twine. I die cut three more layers of deckled rectangles to give dimension and attached all of them to the face of card base and added die cut flowers and leaves from Alexandra Renke, along with three coral-toned sequins. My cellphone is presenting this coral tone as a bit pinker than it actually is.

I'm hoping you'll follow me over to Color Hues and play along with the coral & blue challenge!

Color Hues: Color Hues #73- Coral and Blue (colorhuesthecolorchallenge.blogspot.com)

LOST IN SPACE

How much fun is this new theme challenge at the Paper Players? Our very talented Ann is this week's host, and she's chosen "Lost in Space" as theme #660.  

The Paper Players: PP660 - A Theme Challenge from Ann

I have only one set of stamps that fit this bill, so that was a done deal when I saw the theme. It's Hero Arts #357 and I stamped it twice - once on this starry night printed paper and a second time on metallic silver vellum - and heat embossed it with dark blue embossing powder. I fussy cut the moon on the silver piece and glued it over the top of the starry night sky paper that I had die cut with a stitched rectangular die. Then I stamped and heat embossed the sentiment with silver and tied a shooting star tag to the bottom of the moon with fine silver thread. Finally, the die cut rectangle was matted with a second silver rectangle and attached to the face of a dark teal card base. I created a matching envelope from the starry sky printed paper.

It's really not obvious by my photos that the paper used for the moon, tag, and mat are all silver. 

It's now your turn to have some fun with Ann's wonderful theme! Check on the inspiring cards from the rest of our designers and let them know how much you enjoy their renditions.