You're the Bomb!

One of the things I love about CASology challenges is the freedom to use whatever products I have to interpret the cue in whatever direction my mind takes me:)  And it just so happens that this week's cue is the word "FREE":





Because of the time of year it is my thoughts naturally went to Independence Day.  But I took it a step further and thought about all the times in my life when I've felt the most free and I would have to say the summers of my youth rank right up there.  Summer then meant the freedom to spend my days doing or not doing anything! (And also not suffering those weird pangs of guilt when a whole day was spent on the porch reading a book or just daydreaming).  It also meant eating ice cream every day and not worrying about how many carbs I was ingesting:)

  

When I saw this set from North Coast Creations called "You're the Bomb!" I HAD to have it!  Hands down, my fave treat from the ice cream trucks that used to regularly troll my neighborhood growing up was the Bomb Pop!  I used some star dies from Papertrey ink to create a negative space panel from white cs and instead of popping up the panel I adhered it flat to the card base to keep the design more CAS.  I added some texture to the white star using a Stampin' Up woodgrain embossing folder.  The bomb pop image was embossed then colored with copics - difficult to see in the pic but I did add glossy accents to give it more of an "icy" appearance.  And yep, I finally hopped on the sequin trend train - so proud of myself for actually buying and using something:)  

Other Materials Used:  Papertrey ink white cs, Stampin' Up pp, Echo Park Dots & Stripes pp, Michael's sequins

I'm also going to link this up to the current Simon Says Stamp challenge - Anything Goes!

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!  Thanks for all your supportive comments!

PDCC#188: Raspberry, Pastel Pink, Lilac

Happy weekend everyone!  We've been having such unpredictable weather here in upstate NY  - sunny one minute, then skies as dark as night with torrential rain the next - that it's difficult to make plans to do anything outside:(  Today was one of those days so I decided to spend some long overdue time in my craft room playing with some new (and old!) stuff:)  The colors and inspiration collage for the current Play Date Cafe challenge inspired an idea I had for a congrats card:

 

I absolutely love that plate in the lower left hand corner of the photo collage - would love to own a stamp of that image!  I pulled out an old Hero Arts clear set called Asian Elements and randomly stamped one of the images several times in black.  I had to restamp it several times in pink on scrap cs then cut out each flower by hand.  All I can say is thank goodness for the current trend of producing dies to match stamp sets!!  I recently acquired the cute Memory Box bike die - it comes with a bike basket and horn!  I wanted to keep my scene simple so I scored a couple of lines to ground the bike.  Sentiment is from Penny Black.

Other Materials Used:  Papertrey ink white cs, Stampin' Up raspberry ripple cs and brads, pretty in pink cs and ink, orchid opulence ink, Hero Arts clear gems, Michael's black cs

I'm sure glad some of my blogging buddies are on top of the demise of Google Reader effective 7/1!  I'm so non-techy but I think I successfully transferred the blogs I follow over to Bloglovin'!  Hope the sun's shining wherever you are:)

Cards for Maddy!

I just saw this Simon Says Stamp post via Lin's blog regarding the current card drive for Maddy:

It's really heartbreaking when you read about what this courageous young girl and her family have been through.  And I hope that by reading about their story many others will want to create and send cards to Maddy. 

I wanted to create a card that might bring a smile to Maddy's face:

I know this little vase full of smiley faced flowers from the Lawn Fawn set "On the Mend" always makes me smile!  After embossing a piece of white cs with a swiss dots embossing folder (and using a Darice easy folder frame to leave an unembossed oval) I embossed the flowers and sentiment from the same set and colored with copics.  Difficult to see in the pic but I also added some Ranger glossy accents to the centers of the flowers.

Other Supplies Used:  Papertrey ink white cs, Teresa Collins Tell Your Story pp, W R Memory Keepers corner rounder

Also, have you checked out the current Lawnscaping Challenge???  This time around it's all about coloring:

I am sooooooo glad I saw Lin's post about this card drive (Thanks Lin!).  Some recent comments from a few acquaintances about how I choose to spend my free time caused me to question the value of my cardmaking.  Creating this card for Maddy was a gentle reminder of why I started making cards in the first place.  Making and sending a card to someone to let he/she know you care is a powerful thing!

Happy week everyone and thanks for listening:)