Sharing My Daze

Simon Says Stamp & Show challenge

This week at the SSSS challenge they asked us to show our favorite Tim Holtz stamp.  Sounds so easy, but I love so many....what to choose?  In the end I chose the Eiffel Tower stamp...one of my faves, certainly not my only fave!

I like this stamp because it can be bold or (like here) it can merely be a subtle portion of the greater piece. For this tag I first distress inked then masked with a couple of Tim's masks. Then, I glimmer misted over that. Next, I thought a flower using Claudine Hellmuth's sticky back canvas and paints along with Tim's tattered floral die cuts seemed the thing to do. The flower also has a little script writing stamped on parts of it. A snap finishes off the center of the flower. If you're here in the states one needs to know the time in Paris. Tim's Ideology timepiece - perfect. The only other bit this tag needed was a cute little glassine envelope complete with a little note of wisdom tucked safe inside.

ATT calendar swap

I signed up for another swap over at All Things Tim.  It was a calendar swap for 2011.  Each of 13 people makes enough of one month for everyone else in the swap.  I chose April because I really wanted to use my Tim Holtz rabbit stamp.  April makes me think of rabbits and life springing back into motion.  Meanwhile, the die cut of T.H.'s tree by Sizzix arrived and I wanted to play around with that too.  This is a bit cute for typical Tim stuff, but it's April and that month is all sweet and pretty.

All 14 of the pages are in piles here.  For the background I used spun sugar, old paper and bundled sage DI's. Then I took a couple Wendy Vecchi stamps and some Versamark ink that I then dusted with blush perfect pearls.

In the close up it's easier to see those perfect pearls. You can click on the pic for a bigger view of it. The rabbit is stamped in frayed burlap. Next I took various brown papers (some were Co'ordinations with the different core) and embossed them with Tim's folder that looks like knotted wood. After that I sanded and ran thru the Big shot using that new tree die.  Isn't it the coolest old tree?  The calendar is printed on vellum. I wish I'd realized that it was this opaque. I'd wanted it to be more translucent.  Oh well. It still needed a little sumpin sumpin so I added the little dragonfly for the rabbit to chase after. 

Now, I can't wait to see what everyone else makes for their months!

CCC #19 and Simon Says Stamp and Show

This week's challenge at Studio L3 with Linda is extreme masking (see page 61 of Tim Holtz's Compendium of Curiosities) and the challenge at Simon Says Stamp and Show is show us something spookay.  Hmm, a mask and spookay go hand in hand or perhaps...hand to back. Don't you jump, just a little maybe, when something unexpected taps you on the back?

Now, as much as I wanted to do that step number 5 for the CCC, I couldn't get it to work with the masks that I have. Sometimes one has to know when it's time to say enough. I stopped with that step for now, but will definitely be trying that again down the road. I did what I could and turned my attention to the spookay part.

It's hard to see here, but the background is enhanced with some silvery perfect pearls mist that I used instead of what one of the challenge steps called for. With the skeltons, I painted them with some golden sparkling H2O's. They look eerily glowing up close.  I'm hoping they put a little glow on somebody's face when they get this little spookay masked card.

A few more LOAD layouts

Tonight, I think I'll start my CCC #19 challenge, but today I made a digi layout for LOAD.  It was a good way to take my mind off of worrying and waiting for Marc to give me a call from Florida.  Several "loads of bedding at the laundromat this morning and a LOAD of scrap layout were good therapy.  As for the laundromat...if you're wondering....yes, I do have the capability of doing laundry at home.  There, I can get all the bedding done at once, go next door and go grocery shopping while it dries and then voila...a lot of drudgery done in no time!

Today's prompt was - Today you....  It was so easy to run with since Devon had suggested we take some pics out in the yard yesterday afternoon.  

Lain Ehmann, our LOAD host had an interview with Ali Edwards this morning. That is how this prompt came to be.  Ali most often does layouts of everyday life. I did a digi and used a Jen Caputo template as the starting point. I like the way it came out in the end.  

That doesn't always happen.  In fact, yesterday's was a disaster.  That won't be rearing it's ugly head here....at least until I get a chance to redo it!

But here are a couple more that made the ok list.

This one I did the good old fashioned way, no digi at all. The pumpkins are cut from other paper and layered. The glittered BOO came that way...no work for me on that one.

This was another digi page. For the photo I used a mask that slices the photo into pieces. Then I merely resize, move it around, get it the way I like it. I did that so that some of the smaller signs on the theater become more noticeable.

Now, it's off to create a card, tag, or something else for the Challenges of the week.

OWH cards for Christmas and I received a prize!

The other day I made my card for CCC#18 which was for OWH to send to the troops. I made more of those and then I made a few of these.

I thought they might be perfect for kids.  My heart goes out to all the kids here who have a mom or dad serving in the military, a mom or dad who can't be home with them. It made me want to focus most of my cards that I'm making for Christmas for them.

Here's a little closer look. The sentiment is stamped in barn red distress ink and then embossed in red pepper. It's sitting atop a strip of pretty red velvet ribbon. The elf is stamped in Versafine onyx black, then colored with copic markers. The background is painted in twinkling H2O's - very fun! There are also some enamel accents used on the hat and clothes. I took a bit of tinsel ribbon (Webster's pages maybe?) and wrapped the edge. Maybe this close up will show the twinkling H2O's and enamel accents better.

Until Eclectic Paperie ran a little contest for OWH cards, I didn't know much about them. Contests though...well I like those :)  I rarely win anything, but they are fun.  Fun to get me thinking about what to make.  Fun to see what everyone else dreams up....mostly much better than the any talent I have.  I love seeing how creative so many people are! So, I made some cards and entered them on their Flickr site.  

Turns out I was one of the winners.  How cool is that!  I thought I'd get a little package with a couple little goodies in there.  Oh no, Look at this box.

This is much, much more than I ever could have imagined or expected to receive!  Check out all this wonderful goodness - all perfect.  Perfect for making some more cards to send to OWH as I find the time.

Isn't this unreal, the amount of stuff that Daisy sent me???  I kept saying oh my gosh, oh my gosh as I went through the box. Thank you Daisy and Eclectic Paperie for such a generous prize.  I think I will also need to come up with a pay it forward. I'll be thinking about that.

CCC #18 - Dabber Resisit

This is my entry for the Compendium Challenge this week over at Studio L3 with Linda. It's my prototype for some of the Christmas cards I plan to make for OWH to include in their packages for some of the troops to be able to write home. Only thing is...I forgot about no glitter and added a little rock candy distress stickles because it seemed to be what the snowflakes needed.  Then again, that's why this prototype is so darn handy.  I can make the real ones exactly what they need to be...which is glitterless!

Inside the card has one little sentiment only.  That way the person who chooses this card will have some space to write a nice note home. Here's the inside...

Isn't it perfect for maybe a teen or tween recipient?  I bought Prancer and his sentiment over at Ellen Hutson's. I've had the snowflakes for a while. Can't remember where I got those.  The tree I picked up at A.C. Moore. For my colors I used frayed burlap and pine needles distress inks. Prancer is stamped in Walnut Stain and then distress embossed with you got it...Walnut Stain.

I know this is a bit on the plain side, but I want to make quite a few to send off and they have to reach OWH by the 31st. 

More LOAD layouts

I thought I'd put a few more of the layouts that I've been doing in LOAD - Layout A Day with Lain Ehmann. It's been fun getting the prompts each day and trying to come up with an idea to complement the prompt.

This prompt was do you begin with a story, photos, supplies? I tend to go back and forth between photos or story first. Supplies are always after those.

This was use your oldest embellishments - how's 1996 for those pumpkins?

This prompt was what do you like to use on a page.  I like stamping and embellishments that aren't always for scrapping.

I just had to do a 10/10/10 layout!

I can't recall the prompt this day, but I did this about collections.

CCC #17, Simon Says Stamp & Show and Warrior Women

That was a mouthful and I haven't even started! This week the Compendium Challenge over at Linda's was fragment charms. These are so cool to play with.  Also this week Linda is participating in the Warrior Women's Blog Hop to bring awareness to breast cancer. Over at The Simon Says Stamp & Show blog it's all about metal. I usually try to combine the CCC and SSS&S into one project because I like to push myself to be doubly creative. That made me think why not triple my creative endeavor and have a little something to honor those women who have battled or are currently battling breast cancer. I call this Break these Chains.

Break these Chains is in the hope that a cure can be found soon, unshackling women from this dreadful disease. The stamp is out of the awesome box of stamps that I was able to buy from Suze Weinberg. The metal flower was a gift from Allie and the chain is Tim Holtz.  Of course, the fragments are Tim's also. The fab flourish, why that is from Tim as well!

A whole loot of rubber stamps

No, it's not a misspelling! I got a whole LOOT of rubber stamps.  If you have never checked out Suze Weinberg's blog then you are missing a treat. Not only is she a talented artist, she has a talent at taking the most colorful photos. Her blog is pure visual eye candy! Plus, she visits the coolest, most amazing places.

While slogging thru some of my fave blogs I of course checked out Suze's. She mentioned she had some boxes of stamps for sale. I raced my fingers right on over to "email me" and asked if she had any left. Ooh, she had one box left! I immediately bought it :)

It has already arrived and I can't begin to say how lucky I am to get this box of stamps. I could never have afforded to buy this many stamps at one time had it not been for Suze's generous offer. I was like a kid at Christmas ripping through that box and checking out each stamp. There were some other goodies too! 

Look at all this loot.  Can you believe there was this much in the box?  I sure can't.  I was expecting one of those little postal prepaid mailing boxes.  Oh no. That's not what UPS brought. This was a large, heavy box! There are such cool stamps in here. There are faces.  I've always wanted some face stamps. There are shapes, and nature, and words, and asian themed, and more. My fave though is Hathor.  Can you see her there in the lower left corner?  Click on the photo for a bigger view.  She's the goddess of women, joy, motherhood and love. I am so into Egyptian stuff, this made my heart soar :)

Thank you Suze for offering to sell some of the stamps you had tired of.  I feel very lucky to have visited your blog at just the right time to get these. I'm ecstatic with my new loot, it's a whole loot of rubber stamps!

I'm LOADed this October

In May I participated in LOAD.  What in creation is that you may ask. LOAD is Lain Ehmann's creation of doing a LayOut A Day for scrapping your photos. It's a fun way to connect with others who scrap, get great inspiration, and think more creatively about how, why, and what you scrap. It can get a little crazy trying to keep up with that and life, but a little challenge in life is needed now and then. 

This is what I've pulled together since the 1st.

Day 1's prompt was Once Upon A Time.  This is what immediately came to mind.

 

Day 2's prompt was a perspective of my life. These were some of my daily life events, not all, but hey, I had pictures for these!

Day 3 was to use a picture to tell the story, title only. I love this photo at the lake. For me it captures the essence of what an evening at the lake is all about.

Today's (Oct 4th) prompt was showing portions of an event, getting the small details to help tell/show what is going on. I hadn't scrapped anything from London in 2009. I knew in a heartbeat that this is what I needed to work with today.

 

Can't wait to see what tomorrow will bring.  Be sure to check back periodically through the month of October for more glimpses because I'm LOADed!