Sweet Celebration

Last week was the finals for MFT Idol and I wanted to play along. There was no assigned theme - just a free week to do whatever you wished. I had spotted this container of ice cream toppings at the grocery store a while ago and snapped it up, figuring it would be great for the summer. I decided to create an ice cream sundae set - as a surprise for my son's last day of school. I figure we'll celebrate by making gourmet ice cream sundaes!

I used some old Doodlebug patterned paper, cardstocks, and sugar coated cardstocks from my stash. I created a topper for the container lid and made a matching card, paper piecing one of those adorable Hooga Boogas.

I covered the sundae cup with Crystal Effects and the cherry with Stickles. You can really see how that sugar coated cardstock sparkles!

Here's the whole set. I even stamped on these ice cream cups that I found for cheap at our local party supply store.

I used the Bling Bet and stazon ink for the cups. I think my kids will get a really kick out of them!

Well I hope you're having a great weekend! Later taters!

Birthday Notecards

A friend of mine celebrated a birthday last week and I wanted to make her something that she could use. I decided on a set of notecards a la Michelle Wooderson. These are simply a quarter of an 8.5x11 page and are meant for sending notes to teachers, etc... I used some Cosmo Cricket Girl Friday paper along with Kiwi Kiss and Purely Pomegranate cardstock. The LA on the cards are my friends initials and are stamped with MFT`s Bling Bet in Kiwi Kiss and Purely Pom. ink.
The box is a template designed by Lauren Meader and sold by Papertrey Ink under the name My Timeless Templates. This particular one is the Desk Top Organizer and was super simple to put together.
Happy Hump Day!! Hope you`re having a great week!

MFT Finals!

Well it`s down to the finals!! The final two contestants for MFT Idol have uploaded their projects and voting has started! My friend Kathy is in the final two and I am so proud of her and overjoyed for her! I know some of you were following my entries and I thought I`d pass this along in case you haven`t seen it!

Voting is a little different for the finals, but if you qualify, would you consider voting for her amazing project. You can see the projects here.

Here are the rules:

Your vote will count IF:
*There is only one vote per Splitcoast User Name. If there is more than 1 vote, only the first vote will count.
*The Splitcoast User Name casting the vote was created BEFORE March 15th, 2009.

All votes will be private messaged (PM'd) to the Splitcoast user name MFT Votes starting on May 26th at 10 PM Eastern and ending on May 27th at 10:00 PM Eastern

There's a lot up for grabs, and we want to make sure that the voting process is fair for everyone. Since the original intent was that the IDOL be selected by our MFT/SCS Family, we are implementing safeguards to make sure the IDOL is selected by fellow stampers!

Quilted Comfort

This is a card I made for VSN last weekend on Splitcoast. The challenge was to use a grid technique as well as sponging on your card. I decided to use my Quilter's Sampler set from PTI and simply stamped various quilt blocks on SU's Parisian Breeze paper and punched them out with a square punch. I arranged them randomly and adhered them to a piece of cardstock. I sponged around the entire block as well as around the entire card. I love that this card looks labour intensive, but took less than 45 mins. to make.
Happy Memorial Day weekend to my American friends - hope you're having a wonderful holiday! We've had a busy weekend of yard work, bike riding, a bit of shopping, and lots of family time. Talk to you later taters!!

Win a Blog Revamp!

Since the beginning of my blog, I've used one of Gisele Jaquenod's free blog templates. I LOVE them and have used quite a few different ones over the years. Gisele's offering up a chance to win a free blog revamp - details are on her blog here.

Sketchy Ladybug!

I made this card last weekend during VSN over at Splitcoast. The challenge was to make a red and black card (and it was o.k. to use white as well!). Red and black always make me think of ladybugs, so I grabbed my Little Lady set from Papertrey. I pulled some old Basic Grey paper (Aged and Confused) and the red pattern paper is Scenic Route. I stamped the ladybug in Riding Hood red ink on shimmery white paper. I also pierced the trail, although you can't quite tell from the picture. I used Taylor's sketch challenge 68 for the layout although I think the panel was supposed to tuck under the scalloped edge - oh well!! I loved making these quick cards for VSN - 45 mins. was the limit to make your card. Having the sketch and colours chosen made it super fast!
It's beautiful here today! 29 degrees Celsius (about 85 degrees Fahrenheit). It finally feels like summer is around the corner! Enjoy your day my friends!!

Polka Dots Gone Wild!!

So MFT has changed up their new releases a little and their ambassador challenges now occur before the release. My friend (and fellow canuck) Julie is hosting these challenges over in the MFT forum on Splitcoast. This month's challenge was to use lots of polka dots and there are definitely lots of polka dots on this card! One of my good friends just got given a laptop and is over the moon excited. It's been a while since I've sent her a card, so I wanted to go with this image because it's exactly what she'll look like with her new laptop!!
I paper pieced the entire image. And when I say paper pieced - I did it the "Joanne" way - making sure all the layers sit on top of each other in the right order. Sometimes I'm lazy and would put the layers on top of the image and not worry that the legs were on a layer lower than the couch. But I heard Joanne in the back of my mind and even paper pieced the arms and legs! I thought about giving the girl chicken pox - but that was taking the polka dots just a touch too far (even to me!).

Hope you're having a great week so far! Later taters!

Sketch Lily!

Friday and Saturday were Virtual Stamp Nights (VSN) over at Splitcoast and I joined in for the first time. These weekends happen every couple of months and basically a new challenge is posted every hour. The rules are that you follow the challenge rules and that you limit yourself to 45 mins. to complete the challenge. You also don't have to complete each challenge when it's posted - you can go back and complete them any time over the weekend as long as they are uploaded by Sun. night. It was super fun! I've completed 5/11 challenges so far, and I'd like to try a couple more today.
This was for the very first challenge on Friday night - to double down (the VSN was Vegas themed!). Basically to create two identical cards. I used the Weekend Sketch Challenge for the layout and pulled out my new Beach Lily stamps. The paper is from Doodlebug and the pink cardstock is from their sugar coated line - it's covered in glitter! So pretty!
Anyway, hope you're having a great weekend! We still get one more day as Monday is a holiday here. Later taters!!

Fairy Sweet!!

I have been dying to get these Enchanted Lily stamps inky - and I finally had time to do it this week. Love this image and the sentiments in the set are super sweet too! I paired Lily with some Cosmo Cricket Girl Friday paper. Pretty simple card - I used this week's sketch challenge from Splitcoast for the layout.
Well this is a long weekend here in Canada - Monday is Victoria Day. We don't have any big plans - just getting some things done in the yard and the house. It's virtual stamp night over at Splitcoast so I hope to complete some of the challenges, seeing as it's supposed to rain all day tomorrow. So hopefully I'll have lots to show you soon! Have a great weekend!

Beaver Leader Thank Yous

It's that time of year again when Beavers is finishing up. Beavers is the first level (age group) of scouting here in Canada. We were lucky enough to have six leaders this year who were simply amazing! Unfortunately, it's hard to come up with six gifts - so I decided to go simple. I made up a couple batches of Peanut Butter cups - they are basically a thick peanut butter cookie batter baked in a mini muffin tin, and then when they're hot out of the oven, you stick a mini Reese's peanut butter cup in the middle. I was able to fit 8 of them in each takeout box and made little cards to go with them. The stamp is one of the Billy sets from Pink Cat Studio and the paper is some old My Mind's Eye stuff from a stack paired with some Bashful Blue cardstock. We wrote thank you messages on the back. They had to be easy to create since we needed six of them!
Anyway, hope you're all doing well! Happy hump day! I'm hoping to have some stamping time today, things have been a little crazy with my contract work. Catch you later!!

MFT Mother's Day

I had time this week to play along in the MFT Idol judges challenge. We were to use pink and brown and the theme of inspirational women. Well there's no one more inspiring to me than my mother, so I decided to make her a card and a cup cozy. We love going to Starbucks when we get together and she always orders an extra hot latte, so this is practical as well!

The card was made using Papertrey's Berry sorbet paper and ink, which happened to match the fabric I had chosen. I used the same fabric to "paper piece" the dress so that the card matches the cozy. The sentiment reads "Wherever I go" and the inside reads "You're always with me, Happy Mother's Day".
I made the cup cozy using felt and assorted fabrics. I stamped my mom's name on muslin and used some instructions I found online to sew it all together.

Hope you have a wonderful weekend and Mother's Day!! Thanks for stopping by!

MFT One Click Contest

So My Favorite Things is changing up their former Guest Designer contest. It's now called the One Click Contest and the winner gets the months new releases. The sneak peeks for the sets being released tonight have been awesome - I would love to win this months sets so here's my entry.

Some of the regulars in the MFT forum have decided to start an online book club (here's the link to the thread if you want to join us!). Our first books is Water for Elephants. We have a schedule for discussing certain chapters and time lines. I wanted to create a notebook to jot these down, as well as to record questions, thoughts, impressions, etc... I covered a notebook with Cosmo Cricket Girl Friday paper and used Reading Flopsey.

I also used the Bling Bet to create the title. I stamped the letters on Purely Pomegranate cardstock with versamark and then embossed with clear embossing powder. I cut each letter out.
I used these instructions from Maureen to apply flocking to Flopsey and make him fuzzy. I usually use a Quickie Glue pen to apply flock, but this method was so easy and gave such good coverage that I'll definitely be doing it again. I used Close to Cocoa cardstock and Latte fun flock in this case.
I also decided to make a matching bookmark. Pretty self explanatory - I used this tutorial which was very helpful!

Well - happy hump day!! Hope you're having a great week!

A Deep Blue Breath

I made this card for a friend of mine who needed a couple of cards. I used MFT`s Serenity Now set and paired it with some Basic Grey Marakkech paper. I also used SU`s Pacific Point and Riding Hood Red along with some So Saffron - pretty combo!! I paper pieced the yoga top and used a Carole trick to extend the frame with a copic multiliner. I adhered my ribbon over the original bottom line and stamped the sentiment underneath. The layout is Jen del Muro`s sketch for you to try from a the week before last.

Hope you had a great weekend friends!