I'm Breathing - and a little VSN

I'd like to thank everyone who left comments or who emailed or messaged me privately regarding my post from Wednesday. Today I'm breathing. I'll really just be glad when it's over. Knitting is helping.

VSN (Virtual Stamp Night) has also helped. Today was the Mini for December's Winter Wonderland. There are six challenges. You can find the Master Challenge Thread here, which will give you the details for all six challenges, including mine. You have until 10pm, Monday, November 14, to upload VSN creations to the Splitcoaststampers gallery.

Because of everything going on around here, I didn't get a chance to make and photograph for my white-card challenge a card that I was happy with, so I used as a sample a card I made a while back that has always been one of my very favourites.
The spousal unit is in Tennessee tonight. He'll be back tomorrow with his mom. She'll be coming up here to live with us and all our insanity. I am hoping they have a safe and uneventful trip back.

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.

Getting Buggy for VSN

VSN is over and the winners have been (mostly) chosen. As usual, that was the hardest part for me. Some of my top choices had already been picked for honours by other hostesses, so they were knocked out of the running automatically. In a way, that makes things a little easier, because I have fewer great cards to choose from, but on the other hand, sometimes my absolute favourite cards become unavailable for me to choose.

There were a good half dozen cards I wanted for first place and another several I wanted as runner ups, though. Alas, I was limited to one each. They'll be posted on the main VSN page as soon as all the hostesses have chosen their winners.

The following is my challenge, as it was written on SCS:

Written originally as a poem by Katharine Lee Bates in 1895, and set to music composed in 1892 by Samual Ward for a 1600's hymn, America the Beautiful was was first published in the combined form we know today in 1910. The first stanza is the most widely known, not counting the chorus, and it is what my challenge is based upon.

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!

My challenge for you is to make a card using the colours AMBER and PURPLE. You may use small amounts of white and one other neutral (such as black ink for line image stamping), but please make amber and purple your main colours.

If you'd really like to go for it, the last verse contains the line "Thine alabaster cities gleam" - which calls to mind the translucency of vellum, but this is not completely necessary. That's just for those who feel like an additional challenge.

I'm pretty happy with how mine came out, although I've been thinking about going back and adding vellum to the bees' wings. I've had this Buggy Sayings set from Paper Makeup Stamps for a while now. I got it from Ashley (thank you!!) maybe a year ago? I've used the butterfly from it, but not the bees or this sentiment.The patterned paper is SU's Razzleberry Lemonade, which I really like a lot. Solids are Rich Razzleberry and Crushed Curry. The bees are painted with twinkling H2Os, which do shimmer, but I don't think they're quite as shimmery as Creative Inspirations paints. I think the CI paints are thicker and smoother, too.

This was also my card for Jen del Muro's July 31 SFYTT, which I'm relinking to here instead of my SCS gallery.

H{ippity} Hop-a-doodle Do!

Yes, I'm in a silly mood. Sometimes I just can't help it, especially when I'm happy. VSN was so much fun this weekend! I am exhausted, but it was worth it! As of the time this post goes live, there will be 14 hours remaining for people to get their cards up and still be eligible for prizes. A master challenge thread is posted here, so if you didn't get a chance to catch it live, you still have time to play along with one or two challenges!

I overdid it again - which happens pretty much every time there's a VSN, and my back is very cranky today. I'll probably be moving a little slow all week. Thank goodness for ibuprofen is all I have to say.

So for today's {ippity} hop, I pulled out another stamp set I hadn't yet inked up. Yes, I know. I have too many of those, which is a situation I'm working hard to rectify. This one is Fishy Philosophy. I went with sleepyinseattle's salted background technique challenge from Saturday evening. This is a really fun technique! I used my Distress Ink pads and reinkers to get the ocean-y colours I was looking for.So, in addition to the VSN challenge and CPS sketch 182, this is also for EIC103. I used the fish on this cute little bracelet, which I'm tempted to order for one of my girls to set aside for Christmas. No, I'm not saying which daughter, since they sometimes read my blog.

And InStyle Stamps has their colour challenge for this month, based on this photo. Those drinks sure look cool and refreshing - just what we need, since the weather turned super hot again.
The {ippity} blog has a list of everyone participation today. Head on over for a full list. Check it out. There are some fantabulous peeps sharing their talent.

It's a Pink Friday

Hey everyone! It's Friends with Flair Friday and I'm feeling very pink today. As usual, check out the Unity blog for a full list of participants. Someone is hiding a blinkie that could net you 25 random Unity stamps.

Now, before we get to my card, I have a quick announcement. This weekend, starting tonight at 6pm, is VSN over at Splitcoaststampers! That is Virtual Stamp Night - a big gathering of people with challenges, chat and fun. There are prizes to be won for each challenge. You don't have to be present to win, but you do have to post your project no later than 10pm EST on Monday, Aug. 30 in order to be eligible. I will be there during most of the event, but my challenge time slot is 2pm on Saturday, so I will be at the keyboard, chatting away and answering any questions you may have during that hour. I hope to see you there!!

My card today uses another stamp set I hadn't gotten inky yet. It was one that had gotten packed away before our move. The box was unearthed last week (and the knights rejoiced!), much to my pleasure. I've rotated Jen del Muro's Sketch For You To Try and cracked open my Basic Grey Olivia paper. I just love this Donna Downey quote.I'm also entering this in the current All Things Unity challenge, to show your style. The only problem, really, is that my style changes as often as my mood. Isn't that a woman's prerogative??