CUP O' CATS

It's mid-September, with Halloween bearing down on us! But, not to worry, you still have a couple of weeks to get your "Anything Halloween" project entered at Two Old Bats September Halloween Challenge.

I started this card with an unused black 5-1/2" square custom envelope, an unused die cut pumpkin cup from my stash (Trinity Stamps #TMD-088 "Boo Brew"), and the idea of cats and pumpkins as shown on our inspiration board. Add to that a challenge at Just Us Girls with the word prompt "Container", and voila, a cup O' spooky cats!

The first thing I did was to stamp my three Tim Holtz felines with black ink on a die cut stitched rectangular panel and colored a bit of green in their eyes. Then I created a 5"x5" folded white card base and stamped a spider web in black. I cut a printed paper square, glued it to a larger black mat, layered that over the white card base, and stamped the cobweb again. I attached the white cat panel and over-stamped the web a final time, masking the eyes of the middle cat. Finally, I glued the cup in place with dimensional foam and tied a sentiment tag to the cup handle with some baker's twine.  

Here's our September inspiration board for a kick-start if you haven't started working on your Halloween project yet - also, go and check out the great cards the other ladies have made for your inspiration:

Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge: September 2025 Mid Month Reminder

And remember that we don't have to get to 25 entries (although, this close to Halloween we probably will), for a chance to win these great supplies:

And here's the link to the additional inspirational challenge:

"Just Us Girls" Challenge: Just Us Girls #792 - Word Week - Container

A BIT OF BARNYARD H-EWE-MOR

Starting the day with a bit of humor is always therapeutic! Yesterday the Snarky Sisterhood announced their September theme - "F is for Finally Fall". That definitely has my vote! September is my favorite month, but that's most likely because practically everyone in my family has a September (or June) birthday. It starts on the 9th with my twin grands' birthdays, followed by my husband's, followed by mine, followed by our son and his wife's anniversary. My father also had a September birthday.

I recently purchased this very silly stamp set from Whimsey Stamps ("So Weird" #CWSD473) filled with barnyard animals and humorous sentiments. I really had no plans for how I would use it. Be prepared to see these great weird animals again off and on. But when I started on this card I used a couple of old stamp sets to complete my idea. The sentiment is from an old fall Impression Obsession set (#WP683 "Leaf Set").

I started with an ancient flurry of leaves (probably Inkadinkado) that I stamped in yellow, orange, and rust inks for a background. Then I cut the "EWE" off of one of the Whimsey Stamps sentiments and stamped it in black over the leaves. (I have a bad habit of cutting out individual words, and then sometimes they get lost.) Then I masked out the single word and over-stamped the old IO sentiment. It was a lucky stroke that they happened to match pretty much in font size. The ewe was stamped upside down over the leaves and the card stock was trimmed out with a stitched rectangular die. I matted the die-cut panel with a bit of brown card stock and attached the layers to the front on my white card base. Finally, I stamped my ewe a second time, fussy cut her body, and attached it to the face of the card with dimensional foam.

Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers: SoSS #266 F is for Finally Fall

LOOKING FORWARD TO FALL

After a hot summer, the temps are dropping a bit and making it easier to be outside. I'm now definitely ready for fall and we have some challenges that are leaning in that direction! I went to Freshly Made Sketches #702 this morning and was inspired by Cecile's layout. However, I took some liberties with her sketch by rotating it about 90 degrees.  

I had a black A2 card base sitting on my desk and decided to use it for my background. I die cut a wreath base from Tim Holtz out of a metallic gold cardstock. I cut it twice - once for the wreath and the second time for the center fill. The center fill is a scrap of gold printed Japanese rice paper that I've had for years. This pattern reminded me of ginkgo leaves, so I pulled out a Spellbinders "Autumn Wonder" die and die cut the ginkgo leaf twice with two different metallic cardstocks. I layered everything onto the black card base after gold heat embossing the sentiment and slipped in a fussy cut gold-printed rice paper flower. The final step was to add 3 small black enamel dots. 

Freshly Made Sketches: Freshly Made Sketches #702 - A Sketch by Cécile

 

SEPTEMBER TWO OLD BATS HALLOWEEN CHALLENGE

It's the beginning of September and we're starting the countdown toward Halloween - just 60 more shopping days left! If you've been following along with us all year, you have nearly all of your Halloween cards or projects completed.  

Two Old Bats Halloween Challenge: September 2025 Anything Goes Halloween

Our favorite ghoul friends Darlene and Diane have a great mood board for us this month - I'll bet you can't figure out which quadrant I chose for inspiration for the next two weeks!

I started with some orange card stock and black ink and stamped an old Impression Obsession background cover (#CC141 C-A-C "Spider Web"). I trimmed the image down to a rectangle using one of my deckle-edged dies from Tim Holtz. I like how the spiderweb above is highlighted with white, so I used my white gel pen to add a bit of interest to one area of the image. I mounted a black rectangle (cut from black spiderweb embossed cardstock) onto the face of an orange card base, edged the deckle panel with some black Copic marker, and mounted it to the front of the card. I added the die-cut "EEK!" (new-to-me Whimsy Stamps #WSD567 "EEK! Word and Shadow Die Set" and a fussy-cut spider from some printed Halloween card stock. I had some fun with the spider by fussy-cutting a tiny skull from a scrap of printed paper and adding it to her butt and a couple of tiny orange gems as eyes. 

AND LOOK! We have new items for the drawing - and this time there will be no minimum entries! Get your project in and win a chance at these great prizes!

ON OR IN THE WATER

That's the theme this week over at the Shopping Our Stash Weekly Challenge. I was digging through my stash and came across this heat embossed and blended panel left over from a previous experiment long ago. 

For this card, I just overprinted a couple of dolphins from a Hero Arts (#CM317) stamp set. Of course, the heat embossing repelled the ink, making the dolphins look like they're "in the water". I stamped a third one, fussy cut him, and attached him over the waves with tiny pieces of dimensional foam after stamping a tiny sentiment and adding the panel and matting to a white card base. A bit of touch up with a Copic marker and white gel pen was in order. So easy, and one more scrap cleaned out of the stash! 

Also in my stash was a sheet of white wood-grained paper for a custom envelope - I think wood-grain often looks water-like - and scraps of a blue nautical-themed  paper for lining.

Shopping Our Stash Weekly Challenge Blog: SOS555 - On or In The Water