Jingle Belles 48 - Candy Kisses

We're ending up the Jingle Belle challenges this week with a yummy one.  Our prompt is Candy Kisses - and our cards can have anything to do with holiday food.  Well, when I think of holiday food I do, indeed think of all the festive candies and cookies that pop up all over the place and tempt me to no end.  I was perplexed however, when HWNSNBP and I were in Shop Rite last Friday and I could not find a bag of regular milk chocolate candy kisses.  They had peppermint, dark chocolate, caramel, and a few others but no plain milk chocolate ones.  And I didn't even care if they had the red and green wrappers, I just wanted some milk chocolate candy kisses.  Oh well, I gues I can bank those calories for later in December when I will be tempted with all the other goodies. 

But before I side-track myself even more with thoughts of chocolate chip cookies and cinnamon marshmallows let me show you my card for the week.

I've had this $1 candy stamp for a long time and inked it up for the first time.  It was a little tedious coloring it and I'm sure that someone with Copic Markers or any of those other similar markers could have done a better job of coloring this image, but my SU markers didn't do too bad. 

The glittery background paper was a "Black Friday" purchase at Mikes with my 30% off before.... I forget what time of the day, but we were there around 9 a.m.  And the little glittery lollipop button also found it's way into my bag that day along with some lights and mucho ribbon and lots of other stuff. 

A trip to the Christmas Tree Shop on Saturday with my daughter yielded an addition to my border punches as they had these MS punches for a fraction of the original cost in the craft stores.  Who can resist a good deal on a punch?  I have to admit that it is kind of difficult to use this on thicker paper which is probably why they were so reduced and found in the CTS, but the Whisper White was okay, and if I just want those little gingerbread people I found I can punch them out on either side individually with the thicker paper.  Come to think of it, as I look at the card I think I will do that and add one on each side of the sentiment.

The ribbon treatment was an attempt to fill in that blank space created by not stamping that candy image twice, but I really thought that that would be too much busyness. 

So that is the last of the Jingle Belle challenges for this year.  I have to thank Lauren and Stef for coming up with this idea and for providing the venue to share all these cards since last January.  It really has put my mind at ease a little knowing that I will not have to do this in December.   I may even get to spend some time putting together some Christmas Thank You cards to have on hand and ready to send out right after the holiday instead of in January! 

I also would like to thank all the guest hostesses who came up with such great prompts for us and for all those fellow Jingle Belles who visited me here on my blog and commented on my cards.  I know that we are all limited in time, otherwise we wouldn't have been doing this, and I'm sorry that I didn't get to visit with the JB's as often as I would have liked to. 

I'm also glad that there were a couple of weeks when I made multiple cards because there were a couple of challenges I missed, like last week - I really wanted to make a Festivus card, but just couldn't fit it in!

And now I'll go take a peek at the gallery and look forward to seeing what the ladies will be coming up with for 2012!

Teapot Tuesday 174

For you Harry Potter afficionados out there this sure does resemble the Sorting Hat doesn't it?  So much so that this week our challenge does indeed revolve around the boy wizard and another boy celebrating his 12th birthday, who, like Harry has lost his mother.  The young man happens to be the older brother of the twins from a couple of weeks ago.  It is quite sad that they all are having their birthdays so soon after their mother's passing and so close to the holidays.  But the teapotters, and many other stampers, are doing everything that they can to make sure that they are remembered. 

Now, we were to use a sketch for this challenge, but it was a very "loose" requirement.  We were to have two framed circles on the card that were to depict Harry's glasses, and within them we were suppposed to put birthday images.  Well I, being the "too busy to read the details" person that I have sadly become, did get the framed circles, but neglected to put any birthday images within them.  However, if you see the size of these glasses, you will realize that there would not have been much room for balloons or cupcakes, but they did have room for Harry to peek in on the birthday boy and wish him a day full of magic. 

We happened to have replaced some of those button batteries in a light this past week and for some reason I held onto the plastic packaging that had two round wells where the batteries had been.  I trimmed around them and was lucky enough to find two circle punches - 7/8" and 1" to be exact, that made the frames surrounding the circles.  It was my intention to add some wiggly eyes to the circles but they would not fit, so I made the lenses the eyes also and just added the black pupils which do wiggle around if you shake the card.  The lightning bolt was sketched out and cut out of white cs that was highlighted in black.  I stamped Happy Birthday! using stamps from two different sets that actually appear to be the same font, just different sizes.

Having had to take down my photo tent off the dining room table for Thanksgiving I almost forgot to take a picture of this card before I put it in the mail on Monday which is why you see the picture of it on my keyboard at work. 

I hope that this young man will find some happiness in his birthday and know that there are a lot of people out there that are thinking of him. 

Okay, so what do you say we take a look at the rest of the Teapot Gallery this week!  Click here to join me. 

Surprise Party(ies)

We were recently invited to attend a Surprise 59.5 birthday party for our neighbor which also turned out to be a surpise 35th Anniversary party for he and his wife.  We were asked not to bring gifts but to bring items that could be sent to the soldiers stationed abroad.  HWNSNBP had no problem making the shopping trip to pick up granola bars, snacks, and the like while he encouraged me to make cards for the occasions. 

This first card is the Birthday card and has a simple birthday message inside.  I actually had made this as a Get Well card that I hadn't used and just switched out the sentiment on the card front.

The second card is a variation on something I saw and a smidge of an idea of my own. 

You see my two swirly Christmas tree die pieces, along with two punched/embossed birds.



I've used the heart from Floral Fillers which I embossed in Elegant Eggplant and then colored with markers. 

So are you feeling the holiday crunch yet?  Got your shopping done?  How about those Christmas cards or are you planning not to send them this year?  Inquiring minds want to know!

I've got some little projects in the works that I'll be showing later this week.  Hope you're having a great one!

Swaps and Projects

I was checking to see if I had anything set to post that hadn't and you'll see from the inclusion of some Halloween items that this post should have gone up last month after our Downline Meeting.  Above is mine and below are the wonderful cards that my fellow Paperazzi's swapped.

And these are the projects that our upline Debbie shared with us.  This fancy fold Halloween card....

A nifty Thanksgiving/Fall Treat Box...........

These would be great at each place setting on Turkey-day or any festive occasion.  We filled our cello-sleeves with pistachio nuts, but you could use sunflower seeds or small candies like m&m's or those fruity things that look like m&m's.  (Bonus points if you help me remember the name!)

And this is a great way to present a gift card within this stocking.

Pretty good stuff!  And we had a wonderful time all the while we were stamping away together. 

Jingle Belles 46

This week's challenge is Sticky and Sweet.   We had to use a sticker on our card.  Last year before Christmas I picked up a few of these jeweled teapot stickers in the $ bin at Michael's and didn't use them.  That didn't stop me from grabbing a few more of them when they went into the clearance bin for 20 cents in January.  Thought this would be a good time to use at least one of them. 

I have to say that they are a little tricky to get off the clear plastic that they come on, but with a good pointy tweezer and a little perserverance I managed.  It was finding supplies that took the longest today.  (Yes, I know I shouldn't have waited until today.  Bad me!)  I have a bazillion of these paper doilies gifted to me by a retiring teacher a couple of years ago and I just could not seem to remember where the devil they were.  Luckily I had pulled a couple for another project that I came across. 

I really love this Cherry Cobbler cs and seam binding.  The color went well with the scrap of Basic Gray dsp that I had in the Christmas pile.  The champagne ribbon is from the Christmas selection at Michael's.  They were having a 60% off sale a couple of weeks ago, and who could resist ribbon at that price? 

I took some 1/8" red line tape and pieced it all around the center of the doily and then with the trusty tweezers I ruffled that ribbon.  A quick pass with the heat gun should help the ribbon stay adhered to the doily (I hope, I hope, I hope!). 

So I hope that this is still considered a sticker cause it is stuck on with no glue or adhesive added. 

Okay, it's raining and nasty tonight and perfect for going to visit the rest of the sticky and sweet concoctions.  You can check them out here.

Teapot Tuesday 172

Cars, buses, trucks - what little boy doesn't love em'?  Well, if you visit our Teapot challenge thread this week you'll learn of two little boys who do love cars, buses, and trucks and their mother who, unfortunately just passed away only weeks before they celebrate their 6th birthday.  So as teapotters do, we will try to make this birthday a little special for them and send them birthday cards - one for each!

You're not seeing things, these are the same two cards in both pictures, I just rearranged them so it would look like the cars were traveling from one card to another.  Hopefully the boys will have a little fun doing the same.

So join me know as I visit the gallery and see all the other wonderful little boy birthday cards. 

Lighthouse Challenge 2011 - Sunday (10/16)

Day two of the Lighthouse Challenge. 

The lens at the Barnegat Lighthouse Museum.

Barnegat Lighthouse - Old Barney

Sea Girt Lighthouse

Sandy Hook Lighthouse

North Tower of the Twin Lights

Center of the Twin Lights

South Tower of the Twin Lights in Atlantic Highlands

The view of Sandy Hook from the Twin Lights

The NYC skyline

From Branchburg, New Jersey we started Saturday morning on the Delaware with a view of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, traveled and visited all the sites ending the day in Barnegat.  On Sunday, we traveled to Long Beach Island to begin the remainder of the challenge at the Barnegat Lighthouse Museum.  The day ended overlooking the Atlantic with a view of New York City in the distance and with the return to Branchburg, logging approximately 500 miles.

Lighthouse Challenge 2011 - Saturday (10/15)

I thought I'd post these today before we get so removed from October and I totally forget about it.  The Lighthouse Challenge was held the weekend of October 15-16 and it was a lovely two days.  I won't go on about the history - just caption them. 

Tinicum - on the Delaware - first stop of the day.

The moon rolling down the lighthouse.

Finn's Point

The shack on the way to East Point.

The roiling "chocolate" water of the Delaware Bay.

East Point Lighthouse

Sunken anchor outside the Cape May Museum

The rainbow-like prisms of the lens at the museum.

The units of the lens were numbered for shipping for easy reconstruction.

Each section was stamped with the manufacturer's information.

Cape May Lighthouse

Hereford Inlet Lighthouse

Birds congregating on the beach behind the lighthouse.

Butterflies in the garden.

And a napping squirrel - soon to be disturbed!

The murals outside the lifesaving station in Ocean City.

The lifesaving wagon outside the second lifesaving station.

Absecon Lighthouse through the gate.

Tuckerton Seaport Lighthouse (construction is on the road behind).

Sunset over the wildlife refuge - a great end to a beautiful day.