WOYWW #163

I was up last night and did some crafting then suddenly got too tired to take pics or post! It was past 2am so... :)
Short post this time, promise! And if you're wondering, why pics of a messy desk? Then go see Julia at Stamping Ground! Here's my desk shot:

 Usual detritus, and new stamps! From Prima and My Minds Eye, as detailed in the previous post...

 Can you tell at all how awesome that balloon is? And this shoe...

I did take close ups but it was still hard to get the details, they're miniscule but so perfect...little script writing on the toe of the highheel, and gears all the way up to the heel and then *hot* chevronish style for the spike! And check out these steampunk birds! I cannot wait to use these new stamps but my excitement is sorta blocking my creativity! I'm in mojo overwhelm? Anyone else ever had that happen? What did you do to get going again? I'm wondering if a mojo overwhelm is like a regular mojo loss and I can just do a little atc to get me out of it...wish the shot wasn't so blurryish...

This last one is part of an almost completed card:

Used one of my new stamps on it too. Made the background for the stamped image with TH distress inks and water...this card looks better in person. Hmmm. Oh, well.
Thanks for stopping by and have a great week! :)

Monday...and one new card. Plus a Gnome!

Yah, just one new card today...my weekends are actually busier than my weekdays, as my two summer classes both have papers due, one on Saturday night and one on Sunday. Of course, I could do those papers during the week so I don't have to do them in a rush 3 hours before they are due, but what would be the fun in that? So, true to my procrastinating style, I have saved the bulk of the studying for my GRE, scheduled for 1:30 pm tomorrow, for today and tonight. And still I am procrastinating! :)
Here is the front of the card...I printed the template off from Tempting Templates (Stampington) and enlarged it on my scanner then just traced it onto my double-sided cardstock.

Inked the edges with TH, added a little necklace of pearls and a sash of glitter, embroidered the sleeves...this was my first time to embroider paper. I like the effect so I'll probably do it again...

Glittered the center of the pink flowers, and some brown dots, embroidered the bottom, messed up in the middle section by sticking my needle through in the wrong place so I "fixed" it by adding the little pink and pearl flower in the middle, which then needed the companionship of the two on the edges of the hem. :)

 Inside far shot...

 Inside near shot...it says A girl should be two things...Classy and Fabulous~Coco Chanel

This card was a lot of fun to make and I encourage you to go check out all the free templates available at the link I left you above. They have some super adorable ones there! :) Did I mention they're free?!

Here is the gnome...colored him in more sedate colors this time and made him older, with the whitish gray beard and all...used TH distress markers. His hat is the barndoor red and I'm honestly disappointed its not a brighter red. Anyone else have this experience or feeling? I'm planning to get the ink pad with the hopes that its brighter...but if you have it and its not would you mind leaving a comment and saying so? I would really appreciate it! :)

I also printed the gnome off a little home and colored it in the same colors I used on the little mushroom at the gnome's feet. I'm not sure its done yet but I thought I would include it today.

Eventually I will probably make a card with the gnome and his home. Someday. :) Right now, other than putting of studying I am eagerly awaiting a delivery of some new Prima stamps, ordered from Scrapbook.com. I have found them to have excellent prices on a huge variety of stamps(I'm not sponsored by them) and if you go to this link you can see some of the sets I ordered, La Femme, Steam punk(so excited about this set!!!), Almanac collection mix 1 and mix 2, Meadow Lark collection mix 1 and mix 2. I already have the Fairy Belle and Printery collections and I really love working with them. I almost ordered the Londonerry(since I have the paper anyways) and Musicale stamps but had to show great, *great*, restraint and not order them. It was hard! lol
I also ordered two My Minds Eye stamp sets, see at this link, the Be Happy and the Be Amazing sets. I have 2 of the Lost and Found 2 Collection sets, Breeze~Dream and Rosy~Everything and love them, too. I am really excited about my new stamp sets and I just checked on their whereabouts(thank you shipping tracker!) I found out they are getting delivered today! Another excuse to put off studying! :)
Well, I've delayed until its lunchtime so now I can go eat instead of studying! woohoo
Have a lovely day all you dear people!
Wow, all those exclamation points make it seem like I'm really excited today...well, I am! :)
I'm really glad test day is almost here so I can get it over with already!
(And that my stamps will be here this afternoon. teeheehee)

WOYWW #162 (or 163) and latest completed "projects"...

So, while my camera is in upload mode-that is your warning there are *lots* of pictures here, I thought I would write a quick note to tell you why I am sharing pics of my craft room...that would be because dear Julia at Stamping Ground has graciously granted us this forum to be as snoopy as we can! If you would like to take a peek at other crafty spaces from around the world head over to the Stamping Ground and go crazy. :)
First are a few pictures from around my craft room since I used more than just my paper space this week. Rare, but it happens! :) This is to the left of my paper crafting space, you can see the edge of my big shot in the far right corner of the picture, see? Its covered with "sassy embellishments" and completed cards at the moment, they will soon be taken to shops. Also my cherished ATC's from around the world are hanging out here...its the safest place for them at the moment! :) Must get one of those display thingies...

 Here is the oft pictured paper craft desk...yah, its a wreck! No excuses for it either...

 Here is the bow and jewelry station/side...and its where I've been creating the most for the last few days.

 Made this one a long time ago but I still haven't taken it to the shop.

 New black and white funky fabulous...

 Sock monkey!

 Another sock monkey!

 Boutique styled funky and considered "over the top"!

 So frou-frou-licious!

 Not the best picture but its a close one...future centerpiece for a new necklace. Steampunk style!

 Took the plainish paper on the right and turned it into the fabulous paper on the left for a special card...

My sisters 1st year wedding anniversary card that was to be for my mom to give her. Its a gatefold and has touches of silver in the clock, sentiment & frame, and the pocket watch, which all 3 pop-out. I used some TH to color the paper a little then I embossed it and colored with TH some more. It looks amazing against the black background! I'm not just braggin'! I really liked how it turned out. :) The card base was blackish cardstock that I inked up with archival black to make it a deeper black.

Next was my card for her and hubs, from me. The sentiment "Happily ever after" probably seems more like a wedding card but what I wrote inside was along the lines that everyone wants happily ever after but isn't always willing to work for it...I think they are and so they will get their happily ever after. Insert tears. lol Sorry it didn't photo that well, all that glitter ya know...

And lastly, because I couldn't wait any longer, though I hope she puts them up too, if she wants to I mean, are pictures of the ATC's I sent to dear Lilian...I was really pleased with these!

The edges are distressed, which I haven't done much but loved how it revealed just a bit of the ATC base, which was black. Used metalic pewter embossing powder over deep red ink on the "the beauty of nature" sentiment and just black archival ink on the "spread your wings and fly" sentiment. And the part I really loved is the charm that looks like a bird cage but has pearls in it. Fun and gives me the nice odd number of 3 cages on the ATC! :) Used black adhesive gems to make the "rope" holding the cage.

This is the other one I sent her. Its a prima stamp, I think, called talk of the town. Stamped then colored it.

Added the sentiment on the bottom, which pops out and is inked up, then a pink rose cabochon and finally a frame for the middle ladies face.

They were both so fun to do that I almost didn't send them away! :) Make sure you go by dear Lilians blog to see her fabulous art work! Now her stuff is what I really consider art. Beautiful. But thanks for stopping by to see my fun and shall we say creative? stuff! :)

WOYWW #161, New Cards and Happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th of July, for those of you stateside! Happy Wednesday to everyone else! :)
So thanks to Julia over at Stamping Ground here is a shot of my desk this week and its pretty tidy considering all I managed to get created and completed this week...probably because I forgot it was Wednesday last night and tidied up my desk! Oops! I know how much fun the messy pictures are so to make up I included plenty of shots of all my newly finished cards. :)

Honestly that seems fairly tidy to me. :) And some embellishments I've been working on, plus my new Mimi stamps! I think they will be really fun to practice my watercoloring techniques on.

 Here is my grandparents 50th wedding anniversary card. The main paper is a gold shimmery...see through type stuff, that I've just totally forgotten the name of! I couldn't get a picture of its shimmer though. :(

 Made this one for fun...I think the sock monkeys are so adorable!

 I think this one could be a thank you card or a thinking of you thing. And I just realized it didn't photo very well at all! Oh well...

 Finally got this card to where I am happy with it. I had to color in the stamped image, ink the edges of the card and the embossed swiss dots, then used a die cut and some Tim ink (Victorian Velvet-awesome pink!) to color it and just brown ink for the stamped sentiment.

 Finally happy with this card too.

Butterfly is distressed with Tim ink and stamped over with script words then I used a bronze butterfly brad to secure it so the wings could still flutter freely. Sentiment strip was prepared similarly but I just used foam double sided sticky strips to apply it so it would stand out a little.

Here is an ATC I made at the start of all the other projects and it got me motivated and inspired...I love making ATC's now! I also made two that finally(!) got mailed out to Lilian and hopefully she will get them this weekend and then I can post the pictures of them...because I am really excited about them!

Anyways, this guy was fun...he got embossed and then I used 2 types of Tim inks, in the same color, and they came out slightly different colors, which was nice. Stamped it in archival black then created a clocky looking embellishment and attached 3 metalic steampunky accent pieces.

So I couldn't show you either of the anniversary cards for my sister, yet(they get them this weekend), and the other 2 ATC's but, I mean really, didn't I get a lot done this week? And I'm posting for WOYWW before 10:00 pm! Because I'll be out watching fireworks then. :) lol
Hope you all have a lovely day!

ATC's!

Lookee what I got in the mail! The ATC's from Mark winged their way, from across the big pond, to here and look how awesome they are...(and again I wish I could take better pictures!)

He is incredibly talented, huh? I wish you could see all the details in these...he overlaid them with clear plastic and stamped images on that too! Really cool! The hot air balloon(below) is stamped on the clear piece but then he found and cut something brown to go behind it, just adding another dimension. So cool! The background is also embossed and colored perfectly so it looks like riveted sheet metal! Wow! I love all the details and think Mark just did an amazing job! Brilliant, in fact! ;)

 This next one is from Lilian and look how lovely it is! Lovely, lovely, lovely!

The back quote makes me feel this lady is a mermaid(since its from The Little Mermaid-one of the *best* movies!) and I love mermaids! Especially redheaded ones! :) There is a lot of detail in this one and I believe she hand drew and painted the mermaid which just stuns me because its so beautiful! The face and eyes and the whole thing is just wow, really wow! And there is glitter in her hair! Just like I imagine a mermaid would have! :)
Now I really have to figure out some way to display all my new lovelies from the dear crafters who traded with  me during this swap...don't they make like a thing for that? lol
Anyways, I just wanted to say another big thank you to everyone who traded with me...you are all incredibly talented and I feel really blessed to have received an ATC from each of you who sent me one. Its like eye candy I can keep and not feel like I need to give it away! (Like sometimes I really like a card I make but feel like it needs given away since it wasn't "made" for me, if that makes any sense?)
I hope you are all having a wonderful week! :)