Hopping with Anya

Hey there, peeps! It's time Hop into the Holidays with The Greeting Farm and I've got sweet little Elf Anya here to say hi. I think she's darling and so fun to colour!

Now, if you're just coming to my blog because you like me, thanks bunches! But if you want to see the hop, you'll want to go back to the beginning here. Full deets and a list of all participants, in case you get lost along the way, are also listed at the TGF blog.

I won't keep you, because there are a lot of people to visit, so here's my card for the "Santa, Baby" challenge. I hope you like it!
I used the sketch from StampTV (STVSKSP4) and this painting for the EtsyInspired Challenge #116 (the deer.)

Homework...

Today is a homework kind of day. I've been on the sofa with a heating pad and ibuprofen, just doing homework today. Little bit of dozing off, but it didn't seem quite as bad - maybe because I slept most of the weekend.

Tomorrow is the big "Hoppin' into the Holidays" Blog Hop with The Greeting Farm. I'll be participating. It all gets started on the TGF blog at 7pm CST. See you then!

ATU20 - Make a Tag

It's time for tags over at All Things Unity and I thought I'd play around with one of Tim Holtz's 12 Tags of Christmas - Unity Style! I took Tim's Day 7 tag from 2009 and, with almost all of the same basic supplies, turned it into a Unity tag. Instead of Tim's stamps, I used the snowman and sentiment from Jolly Good Fun, the snowflakes from Snowflakes Fall From Heaven, the swirl from Imagine It and Worn Music.

Check out the other DT member's blogs to see what fun tags they made. We hope you play along, too! You have until Saturday, December 11 at 11:59pm - just be sure to use your Unity or {ippity} stamps!

Cathy
Lynn
Sara (on break due to injury)
Savannah

Happy Dance

I've been waiting all day to find out if I made it to round 3 for the Design Team search for the Clean & Simple Cards Challenge DT over on Splitcoaststampers. The good news is that I did!! I've tried out before and made it to round 2, but never made it to round 3. Now, there is still one more round of competition with another card to make, and I'm up against a lot of talent, but considering everything, I'm extremely thrilled to have made it this far.

For round 2, we were to make a CAS card for a family member. The caveat? It had to have that member's title on the front of the card, so it needed to say Mom/Mother, Grandmother, Dad, or whichever member of the family you chose. Oy. It turns out I don't have much to choose from in that area.
Fortunately, GinaK came to the rescue with Friends are Forever and Not Forgotten. I actually think this card works for either Valentine's Day or Mother's Day. The technique is a variation on one I've done before, and GinaK has a lovely tutorial on StampTV.

I used two different inks on the stems, because I didn't have the green I wanted. I first inked them up with Unity's Viridian Green and then went back over the top with Distress Ink Shabby Shutters. The combination gave me exactly the look I was going for. Oh, and I started out with a yellow card base and a completely different patterned paper, but this is what happens sometimes when a card starts talking to me in the middle of things!

FWF Writes Home

Hey guys. As I mentioned a few days ago, my thyroid function is off and I keep falling asleep any time I sit still for more than a few minutes. This is Not A Good Thing™.

Anyway, quick post here for Friends With Flair. Full deets of all participants over on the Unity blog. Massive (and I do mean massive!) sale at Unity this weekend. Check it out. You'll be super glad you did. It includes some of the brand new Bella Blvd co-branded stamps. They are super cute!!My card for today is another Valentine's Day card for Operation Write Home. They're trying to collect 4000 Valentines by December 1. Archway Cookies will match cookies for cards to send to the troops. As of Thanksgiving Day, they were up to 3305 cards!

I used Be Owl Mine and some fun Basic Grey paper. I even decorated the inside.

Don't forget, you can vote here every day between now and Dec. 4 for OWH to win $50,000.

Missing Magnolia

Hey everyone. If you're coming here from Barb's blog, thank you. To start at the beginning, go to Magnolia-licious Christmas All Year Long.

Ever have one of those days? I made my card for this hop ages ago - like before the October Magnolia-licious Christmas hop. I put it in safe place. Can we see where this is going? I thought I'd take a picture the night before and write my post...easy peasy. Except I spent most of yesterday working on a *huge* homework assignment, all the while dozing off every 20 minutes or so. Today was much of the same, just with more sleeping. I will be very glad when my thyroid is working properly again, that's for sure. This whole falling asleep constantly thing is really getting old. It's been going on for weeks.

So here's the image I'd coloured and scanned in to ask if it was usable, because I was worried about smearing around her cheeks. So there she is, poor Tilda is missing her card. If anyone knows where it is, please tell me! I sure as heck don't know what I did with it.

From here, hop on over to Cheryl's fantastic blog. I hope everyone has a very Happy Thanksgiving.

On Feeling Old

I had a audiology exam last week. I hadn't had one in a while, and with the spousal unit retiring in a few months, we've been trying to make sure we have everything poked, prodded, tested and taken care of before the big change from active duty Tricare to the unknown of retiree medicine. One of the things that needed taking care of was new hearing aids for me.

Yes, I am a 41yo who wears hearing aids. I've worn them since I was 25. I can get by without them, but I sometimes misunderstand what people say, or I ask "what?" more than is socially acceptable. Most people don't know I have a hearing problem unless I tell them because I cover pretty well, but my hearing loss, which is officially in the "mild to moderate" range, is at its worst smack dab at normal speaking tone frequencies. If there is any sort of background noise going on, or if the person to whom I am speaking doesn't enunciate, I'm completely sunk.

I have an appointment at 10:30 to be fitted for the new aids. I'm looking forward to seeing what advances have been made since my last pair, which were made in 1998. I'm seriously overdue!

I had to have more blood work done on Monday. My doctor called back within hours. That's never a good sign. It turns out my thyroid function is off again, even though I take medication for it - and have for 10 years. I take a prescription Vitamin D supplement, too. I got another call this afternoon letting me know that my supplement isn't enough and I need to go back on the super-mega-doses. Well, okay. I can do that.

There are definitely days when I feel old. I have fibromyalgia and 2 degenerating discs. On bad days, I walk with a cane. Heck, there are some days when I can barely walk at all. But you know what? It could be worse. It could be a lot worse.

I just watched Jennifer Grey win Dancing With the Stars. She danced with a torn ligament in her knee and, during her last 2 dances, a ruptured disc. What? Mind-boggling. She inspired me to make this card, using stamps from the Unity/Melody Ross kit Brave Girl Boots.Oh, and for those of you who have seen this post over on the Spellbinders blog? Can we say "bouncing off the walls"? I'll be posting some blog candy here soon. I don't know exactly what will be in it, there will be some Unity and probably {ippity}. I'm pretty sure there will be a couple other stamp companies represented too. I can definitely guarantee that it's going be the biggest blog candy I've ever offered. Oh, and yeah, I'm gonna make you work for it.

It's an EtsyInspired DT Call!

Oooh!! My favourite challenge is having a DT Call!! The EtsyInspired Challenge is having a DT call. The call is open until December 10th and the term runs from January 1 through June 30. You can bet I'll be trying out! Will you?

H{ippity} Hop Scraplings

Good morning! I am up way too late playing with stamps. Ever have one of those days where you started making one thing and ended up taking a left turn somewhere around Jupiter? I'm not really sure what happened to my original card, but it is nowhere to be found. Instead, I ended up with 3 scraplings. There would have been more, but I had to make myself stop so I could go to bed!

One thing I really like about {ippity}/Unity stamps is how well the different kits coordinate with each other. I used the star from Authentic Man from the last release, 3 different sentiments and the flower from how YOU doin' ( how many people hear Joey Lawrence when you hear the name of that one, because I know I do!), and the cute little hat from Party Hat Wishes. I have all three kits in stock. If you're interested, just drop me a line. I'm EtsyInspired today. I went with a flower motif for the third scrapling because of the yummy looking Daisy cookies.

Be sure to stop by the {ippity} blog to see who's got eye candy to share. Don't forget to leave comments. A random winner will be chosen from one of the participating blogs' comments, including those of the design team. The lucky winner, and the prize, will be announced on Thursday during Hip Hop.

Sunday Post

I was asked whether or not I was continuing to use the hanging system for my Unity wood slides. I had shown a photo of those on Hip Hop this past Thursday, so hadn't posted them here, but for those who missed it, here they are - except for the overflow, since I ran out of room on my Rubber Racks. The top 3 racks were made by Unity, but do not appear to have been added to the new website. The bottom-most hanger came from Ikea, and I took half the slides off, because it was sagging too much.
I mentioned briefly that I had gotten something special in the mail. I have a very dear friend who lives in San Antonio. Her name is Bobbi and on Friday I got a very sweet card in the mail along with a hand-knit fall leaf. I immediately hung the leaf up where I can look at every time I sit at my desk and think of her.
I met Bobbi when my kids were very tiny. Bobbi used to be the owner of The Yarn Barn of San Antonio, which is where a lot of my money and time was spent. I was exceedingly fortunate in that Bobbi became a friend, and I consider her a mentor as well. I don't get to see her nearly as often as I would like, but she does come up here for MD Sheep & Wool festival - in part because one of her daughters lives in the DC area, which is quite lucky for me! She is a truly a dear and gracious lady.

I've got one card to share today before I sign off. There's a DT Search going on over at the Splitcoaststampers CAS Challenge and I made a card for the first round tryouts. The parametres were to use ribbon and some sort of bling to make a card with a decorative theme. I went with Christmas, since I need more cards to send out.
I made it to round two! I'll post that card at the end of the week, when the round is over. See you in the morning for the H{ippity} Hop!

Dis-organizational Saturday

I'm taking a page out of Patter's life and making an attempt at organizing my stamping area. Right now, it's kind of a mess. I know that once it's fully organized, I'll be a lot more productive.

Believe it or not, this is much better than it started out today. I tend to pull everything down and basically destroy a room before I put it back together, so if you look at it right now, it's in the "destroy it all" phase. I've also been making quite a few cards lately, so you can see the results on my desk, from where I've pulled things out and not put them all back yet. It'll get better. It has to, right? I'd say it can't get much worse, but it was quite a bit worse earlier this morning.

So for those who have been wondering about what my creative space looks like, here you go. Be prepared. It's not pretty.

First we have a wide view of my desk. This is where I sit to chat, watch tv, create...whatever. This was my desk at Deloache Chocolate. When we closed, I hadn't had a paycheck in 6 months. My desk, and several of the other things you'll see in my room, like the chair and the storage bins underneath the desk, were part of what I got in lieu of back pay. The desk is huge, but I like it. The bottom two bins on the left currently house wood mounted stamps from all companies other than Stampin' Up and all of my non-Unity cling stamps that don't have a home in binders. Those on the right are varied - but the middle one has things like embossing powder and what were my newest Unity stamps before we moved.
My cuttlebug actually sits on a small bookshelf that matches the desk. It butts up against one side, and I can reach it when my back doesn't hurt. Otherwise I get up and walk around. The shelves house stamps from Taylored Expressions, GinaK, Paper Makeup Stamps, Our Craft Lounge and Paper Pretties. It will also be housing a few others as soon as I get some more storage panels. The binders to the left (still in the plastic) are empty.On the bookshelves, which are some of the Skandia shelves we bought at the Container Store years and years ago, are my original Unity storage. These boxes also have my first stamps from PMS and the Greeting Farm. Next are the Scraponizers, where the Unity Kits of the Month are stored, along with GinaK StampTV kits and Taylored Expressions Key Ingredients kits. I've got some of the larger Unity kits, such as the scrapbook kits and the Stampin' Store kits stored in Scraponizers as well. I will probably move the cardstock from both GinaK and Taylored Expressions out of these containers and into the next photo, which I am just beginning to get organized... ...courtesy of Kimme, where I got the idea to do this with all of my cardstock, and it is making things so much easier! Thanks, Kimme!!So, that's the beginnings of my organization. I'm getting there. Someday, I will be truly organized - and then I'll really get all kinds of things accomplished. Of course, my mom may have heart failure, because she's been waiting for me to get it done for years.

Edit: I was asked about the hanging system. You can't see it in any of these photos, but it's above the desk holding the Unity wood slides, as well as some other things. And I need a new pic of it, since I got something special in the mail...new photo to come.

FWF - Short Post

Short post from me today. Migraine hit with a vengeance. I'm not sure if it's new medication, stress or if it's weather related, but my head has been all kinds of cranky lately.

Anyway, usual stuff for a Friday - all the deets are here on the Unity blog.
Sketch is Unity Sketch Challenge #34, stamps are one of the new co-branded Jillibean Soup sets, Jolly Good Fun.

Thankful Blast From the Past

Morning everyone! It's another Taylored Expressions Blast From the Past Blog Hop and I've got a very CAS card today. I'm using some nice fall colours and stamps from two sets, Discover Your Wings and CreativiTEA. I've also used the scalloped eyelet border die on some paper from the Blackbird collection from Memory Box. The sketch is an older one from Clean & Simple Stamping, FTL105.
That's all from me today. Have a great one!!

OWH Blog Candy Winner

Rhonda Miller said...

What a cute card. That doggie just looks so happy. I love Stampin Up.

Rhonda Miller
come on down!!
You are the winner of my Operation Write Home
blog candy!!

Penguins are the Cat's Pajamas

I think penguins are just the cutest things ever - and penguin stamps are among my favs, so when I saw these cute little guys at The Cat's Pajamas, I went nuts. I had a really hard time choosing just one set. Okay, so I did buy two sets, but the other one I bought was a sheep, and that's entirely different!

I'd been waiting for the perfect opportunity to ink them up and VSN was it. I was hosting my own challenge, which was to make a Christmas card without using any red or green at all - a concept that some people had a hard time with. It's sort of like asking Lee to make a card without using pink. It can be done, but it takes some doing.

In addition to my own challenge, I took on the sketch from TCP Tuesday 134, because you guys know how much I love sketch challenges!
TCP stamps are clear acrylic - and something pretty cool about that is that you can often bend or smoosh them if you need to. My sentiment was already curved, but not quite curved enough to fit into my die cut. With a rubber stamp, it never would have fit, but with the acrylic, I was able to maneouver the arc so that it was shaped perfectly.

Enjoy the H{ippity} Ride

Hey everyone! How was the OWH hop this weekend? That was pretty inspirational, don't you think? Lots of blog candy to be won, too. You still have time to enter mine, as well.

Today, though, it's time for another h{ippity} hop, and we're closing in on release day! Only three more days and the sneaks have started on the {ippity} blog. There are some really cute new stamps coming and I've got some on order. I'll have some specials if you want to order through me, including a bundle package if you want the entire release!

My card for today uses Authentic Man. I'm finally getting it inky. Head over to the {ippity} blog for a full list of today's hop participants and to find out the deets on the release challenges.

Challenges for this card:
EtsyInspired 114: Happy Day Designs - this bracelet
CAS93: sketch
Nancy's VSN: blue & white

ATU Leaves Me in Stitches

For the OWH Valentine's blog hop, please scroll down.

This is my second challenge as guest DT for All Things Unity and this time around, it's a colour challenge. Red, brown and orange are required, with yellow being optional. Basically, it's a nice fall colour palette, perfect for this time of the year.

I've been one of the hostesses for this round of VSN, so I've been trying to participate in some of the other challenges. One that jumped out at me was Jimmi's. She challenged us to make a card about another activity that puts us on Cloud 9. I've been sewing ever since I finally talked my grandmother into teaching me how. I even wore out my first sewing machine!!
The Unity/Cosmo Cricket co-branded stamp set Material Girl was perfect for this. I overstamped the orange die-cut layer in Burnt Umber with the {ippity} stamp A Bit of Burlap to tone it down just a hair. The layout is Mojo Monday 164.

I hope you can all play along with us at All Things Unity! You have until Midnight EST on November 27, 2010.

Hopping For Operation Write Home

Hey there!! If you are coming from PaperAddict Catherine, then you are in the right place today!! We are hopping in support of Operation Write Home, which is a fantastic organization that not only sends cards of gratitude to encourage our nation's armed forces, but also sends blank greeting cards so that they may send cards home to their loved ones.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, and would like to start the blog at the top, head here to OWH Stars & Stamps to get started.

Now, if you'd like to become involved, that would be fantastic! But - the Christmas deadline has already passed, so they're asking for Valentine's Day cards. Yes, already. It takes a while for the wheels to turn and for cards to get to OWH and then out to our troops. It's not like heading to Hallmark or even just down to Michaels to pick up supplies and then sending your card to Aunt Bertha in Toledo. It takes a lot of time and effort on the part of everyone behind OWH - and in fact, if you can find it in your hearts to do so, please go vote daily at JoAnn Fabrics Craft For A Cause. It would really help.

The deadline for OWH to receive Valentine's Day cards is January 7, 2011 - so it'll be here sooner than you think.
I used the sketch for Our Craft Lounge DT Sketch Challenge #39 and the colours from Color Throwdown #118, and Toni's VSN challenge to use a line art image and silver for Optimism. I don't know much that is more optimistic than Valentine's Day - except maybe a new baby!

I've got a little blog candy to offer. Please leave a comment and tell me your favourite stamp company. If you'd like to become a follower, I won't complain.
Next on your trip is Giselle at Cross My Heart Papercrafts. Have a great day!!

Throwing Down for FWF

Hey everyone!! That was a pretty awesome Hip Hop, wasn't it? And did you see the new Echo Park stamps?? If you've got little boys, they are a must! I'm still considering them, even though my boys are grown, because I've still got a lot of scrapping to do from their earlier years and I think those stamps would be perfect.

Anyway, it's Friday and that means Friends With Flair! To see who's participating this week, check out the Unity Blog. Somebody has a blinkie that could win you 25 random Unity stamps just for leaving a comment.

My card this morning uses Hip Hop Sketch Challenge #33, posted by Jimmi yesterday and the colours from Color Throwdown #118. I substituted some Prismatics cardstock in the closest red I could find, since I don't own any cherry cobbler. I think it works. Then I pulled out a set I won off Hip Hop several weeks ago...Brave Girl Boots, which I just adore! I think the sentiment just says pretty much everything that Melody Ross tries to get across in all that she does.
Other challenges this card is for:
Anything Goes: Emboss it - I used a Tim Holtz embossing folder
Paper Pretties: embossing - the stamp is also heat embossed
Cute Card Thursday: anything goes
EtsyInspired: Putu Princess Escapes - the colours in this shirt

Have an awesome day - and I hope to see you all this evening on the VSN forum at Splitcoaststampers starting at 6pm. We start off with my challenge...wonder what it could be...

Christmas Inchies

I have a few things that I have on my list of things to do. Getting a few inchies sent out is one of them that has been on that list for a long time. As you can see, only one of these is white. The box of white inchies is still missing, but I came across the box of black inchies today, so thought I'd see what would happen if I stamped with metallic ink.

With the snowflakes, I embossed them with holographic embossing powder. I like the added sparkle. As for the trees, they were pretty blah until I painted them with Creative Inspirations paints. The ornament inchie was done quite some time ago. It was well before we moved in June.

Other Deets:
Stamps: Snowflakes - a Muse
trees and ornaments - Karen Lockhart
Ink: ColorBox Silver & Pheasant Gold,
Memento Tuxedo Black & Distress Ink Shabby Shutters
etc: Copic markers, Spica glitter pens, stickles

I'll be back tomorrow for Friends With Flair!

Day 10 of NaBloPoMo

So far, so good, although this one is cutting it super close to the edge. I'll add the photo of my card in a few minutes, as if I wait too long, I won't make it by midnight and I'll mess up the whole month.

I had to finish a pretty hefty homework assignment first, since, well, priorities and all that. I'd hoped that the Play Date Cafe challenge would be up, but it isn't, so I'm sticking with Clean & Simple Stamping's FTL115.
The stamps came from Taylored Expressions Summer Afternoon and Discover Your Wings. Ink is various ColorBox, mostly pigment and one chalk, stamped onto GinaK Pure Luxury white layering weight. The base is Prismatics.

Growing in Unity Winner

Random.org first selected day 4 for me to choose from. So I went to day 4, where there were 18 comments. Random.org selected lucky number 12!

Elisabeth, from Everyday Matters, that's YOU!!

E-mail Eryn (at Unity dot com) and she'll get you all set up for your prize.

Thank you to everyone for the fabulous comments all week long.

H{ippity} Hop Goes CAS

Good morning everyone! Thank you so much for the good wishes on my stupid back problem. I really don't like it when it flips out on me. It's a little better so far this morning. Still cranky, but I can move, so I'll take it.

It's Monday, so that means it's time for a h{ippity} hop. I'm taking it Clean and Simple this morning, with a sketch from CAS89 on SCS. I thought the colours from the Play Date Cafe would work beautifully, so here they are again.
This is the first time I've ever done any piercing on a card, so it's definitely not perfect. I'm going to have to work on this a bit. A template would be good. This was free-hand. I used {ippity}'s YOU Deserve.

Hop on over to the {ippity} blog to see a full list of participating peeps.

Kid Pics

Hey guys. I have a ton to do this week. More doctors and dentist appointments, plus both boys have appointments with Disability Support Services at the college. Oh, and a test in Principles of Accounting 2. So...since my back is still misbehaving a bit, instead of a card for today, I thought I'd put up some pics from Hannah's homecoming and a pic of Holly from Halloween. These are kind of for my mom and for friends who say I never send them pictures. Well, here they are. Plus, I'm proud of my kids, and most of the time they don't like their pictures taken anymore.

Here's Holly, all dressed up as a kitty cat. She was very generous with her candy loot this year. She shared some of it with each of us, since she was the only one to go Trick-or-treating.

This is Hannah and her friend getting ready to leave the house before the Homecoming dance.

The next photo is of Hannah and her friend Madison. Madison used to live around the block from us when we first moved to MD. Hannah lost track of her but they've become Facebook friends, and Hannah is thrilled. Madison attends a different high school, but came to the Homecoming dance as a guest (ahem) so they got to hang out a little. She's grown into a very lovely young lady.

Here you can see the necklace that Hannah got from "Crystal" - one of Aunt Liz's horses. Hannah wears it whenever she has a special occasion.

And here is the whole gang, post dance.. I think it's a great shot.

I hope you've enjoyed this quick little peek. I do love my kids. See you all tomorrow morning for the H{ippity} Hop!

A Topsy-Turvy Day

Well. Today is certainly turning out a lot different than it started. I woke up this morning with my back screaming. Anybody with degenerative disc disease will know exactly what I'm talking about. It's like sciatica on steroids, with pain shooting all the way down to my toes. Usually it's my left side, but the past week, it's been my right, and this morning it all went nuclear. So, instead of the IB flea market, I've been holed up with pain pills and a heating pad.

I finally came online late this afternoon after talking one of the kids into bringing me the laptop, and all of a sudden the clouds disappeared, the sun came out, and the birds started singing. Why, you may ask? Not only did I win one of my favourite challenges, (EtsyInspired - woohoo!!), but, holy Toledo Batman! I won the big 500 followers blog candy at Feline Playful!!

Thank you so very, very much to Karen at Feline Playful and to all the girls at EtsyInspired.

BTW, if you haven't checked out Feline Playful and you like challenges, go there now! Karen keeps a fantastic list of all the latest challenges, by day - and she even gives you a little bit about what the challenge is. I've been using her lists to hunt for sketch challenges and to remind myself about which challenges I want to play along with.

Also, I think everyone should be EtsyInspired every week.

GIU Has Friends With Flair

It's day 5 of Growing in Unity, and that means it's your last day to leave a comment in order to win some Unity goodness. I'll be drawing a name this weekend. It's also time for Friends With Flair, so there will be someone else hiding a blinkie out there for another chance to win! The Unity Blog has a list of every participating. Look hard to find that blinkie and check out all the eye candy while you're at it!

Today's card uses the sketch from HYCCT30, posted by flowergirl36 (aka Dawn B). It's also EtsyInspired, just by this week's shop overall, which is very whimsical and cartoony. BeiLeXian has the most adorable prints! The whole shop makes me smile.
I just love Unity's co-branded stamps! Ashley is using Material Girl today, also. The sentiment I used came from "Get Scrappy With" Material Girl, and of course the dp is Cosmo Cricket's Material Girl.

If you want to know which set the two of us are challenging each other to use tomorrow, you'll just have to come back and see. Have a great day.

And a little sidenote - RIP D2 Williams. WRNK
You will be missed.

Simply GIU

Hey there, party peeps! It's Day 4 of Growing in Unity!! I've had a few requests for ornament instructions. I will endeavour to get those up by Monday at the latest. I've got a flea market table to man that will benefit the high school's IB program on Saturday, so I'm not sure how my weekend is going to stack up just yet, but rest assured, I will not forget!

The Play Date Cafe has another set of lovely colours to work with, so I used them in my card for today, which is for another of the HYCCT challenge cards. This one (HYCCT29) is by Cathleen (aka Ctorina) and it is to use a sentiment as your only stamped item. No problemo! Both Unity and {ippity} have quite a few sentiments that are perfect as main images.

Ashley and I are both working with {ippity}'s Delightful Little Things today.
I'm also entering the card in the following challenges:
Gingerloft Challenge 5 - buttons
Clean & Simple Stamping 114 - sketch
2 Sisters Challenge 11 - no designer paper

I'll be back tomorrow for Friends With Flair - and Day 5 of Growing in Unity. See you then!!

GIU is Never Square

Whew! It has been busy so far, and it looks to be a fully busy week. Taking the boys to class, then 2 kids to the orthodontist on Tuesday, plus 2 homework assignments due, then a trip for the boys to the dentist today and another assignment due...and NaBloPoMo is just getting started!

I'm having fun with Growing in Unity and my little side challenge with Ashley. Her card from yesterday was gorgeous, wasn't it?? Today's set is Jolly Little Winter. I think these penguins are adorable!! I made a Christmas tree card for AJ's Don't Be a Square HYCCT challenge, using my Spellbinders Nested Pine Tree dies.
Speaking of dies, jmahugger asked about the die I used for the flower on my card from Monday. It's the MFT Die-namics Rolled Rose die.

I also made a little ornament for this week's Unity Addicts Challenge. I tried making it with the same snowflake stamp from Jolly Little Winter, but all I got was a big, smeary mess, so, after trying a couple other stamp/ink combinations, I ended up going with a little tiny snowflake stamp that seems to be retired. Thanks for the lovely comments you guys have left so far this week! They make my days so much brighter. Leave one each day of Growing in Unity (Mon-Fri) and you'll be in the running for some Unity goodness!

ETA: Because I didn't think it really worked, so I didn't, and then was told it did after all, ...EIC112 for the whimsy of the penguin card.

GIU - A Playdate with Some Mojo

Welcome to Day 2 of Growing in Unity! Thanks for the lovely comments yesterday. They do help keep me going, always.

Today I have another card that started out for Hope You Can Cling To, Challenge 10, this time, which was to be inspired by things you see as you walk outside. I don't walk nearly as often as I should, but whenever I do, I always notice the flowers and plants, so I chose the Donna Downey/Unity kit Insightful Meadows.

Those who follow my blog know I love challenges, so I chose to follow two others in order to finish off my card. I slightly tweaked Mojo Monday 163, and the colours for this week's Play Date Cafe just felt perfect.

Don't forget to leave a comment every day this week. At the end of the week, I'll get to choose a winner for some Unity goodness.

Back again tomorrow with something wintry to share. Have a great day!

Growing with an {ippity} Hop

Happy November!! It's the start of NaBloPoMo - and my week for Growing In Unity!! Not only that, but OMG!!! I'm the Guest DT over at All Things Unity for the next 2 months!!! So I am super-duper excited today!! Oh, and of course it's H{ippity} Hop day! It's just all kinds of fun around here!!

The first official challenge that I get to participate in as guest DT is ATU18 - and it's to make a monochromatic project. I've been working on the challenges for Hope You Can Cling To (and yes, you'll be seeing more of those this week), so I went pink for this one. Sara doesn't know yet that this card was for her HYCCT challenge - something old and something new. The pink speckled dp and the dp I used to paper piece the leaves is some mystery paper I've had in my stash forever and a day. I couldn't tell you what it is or where it came from! My "new" item is my brand new rolled-rose die! It just arrived in the mail a few days ago.The sketch is Mercy's Tuesday Sketch Challenge #97. The floral dp is Basic Grey Olivia. The lovely {ippity} set is Where You Should Be, which is wonderful for just about any occasion. I hope this card cheers up whomever receives it at the UT MD Anderson Cancer Center.

Check out the {ippity} blog to find out who is playing along today...including the oh-so-talented {ippity} design team.

Now, for All Things Unity, you have until November 13 to create and upload a monochromatic project. That's plenty of time and we'd all love to see what you come up with. In the meantime, there's more eye candy to see:

Sara
Lynn
Savannah
Cathy

Lastly, one quick little note. My friend, Ashley (she of EtsyInspired fame), and I have challenged each other to see what we can do using the same stamp sets for the next 7 days. Should be interesting...I can hardly wait to see what she comes up with. Heck, I can hardly wait to see what I come up with!