Congratulations to Rae Barthel!

Rae is this year's Gallery Idol winner. Congratulations, Rae! Your cards were amazing every week.

My Bags Are Packed...

I'm ready to go. I better stop before I start singing. Nobody wants that.

Tomorrow morning I'll be saying adios to the buckeye state for two craft-packed days at CHA. Gus is pacing nervously and glaring at my suitcase. Buddy is gleefully oblivious. Sean has fresh milk, strawberry Pop-Tarts, and pressed work clothes. I think I have everyone covered.

I'm super excited to get down to Florida and meet all of the amazing ladies I interact with on this here internet. My roomie is the amazingly funny Joan so I am sure to have a good time! I booked a hotel with internet access, so I'll make sure to check in over the next couple of days. I even charged my camera battery again just to make sure it has enough juice to get me through day one. Oh, jeepers I can't wait!

Get Well Umbrella

Good afternoon Blogland! It's a little gray and rainy here in Ohio at the moment. The plants are happy and the air is nice and cool, so I'm not complaining. The rain started me thinking about umbrellas and I knew exactly what I wanted to share today.


This little "get well" number was created by stamping an umbrella from Scattered Showers in Seascape and Charcoal inks. Then, I added the edging and red dots with the tip of a marker for a little burst of color. I stamped my sentiment onto Spring Rain cardstock before adhering the umbrella image. I wrapped the image panel with a strip of Pure Poppy ribbon and a piece of pearl cotton thread and secured them with a brad.

I set that aside while I stamped the background using Background Basics: Retro onto Smoky Shadow cardstock. I adhered the patterned layer to a white card base and mounted the focal image with foam tape. The final touch was adding Glossy Accents to the red dots for just a little dimension.

Thanks for stopping by this afternoon. I hope you're having a great day! See you soon...

Recipe:
Cardstock: Spring Rain, Smoky Shadow - Papertrey Ink; Ultimate White - Strathmore
Stamps: Scattered Showers, Faux Ribbon - Papertrey Ink
Ink: Seascape, Charcoal - Palette; Frost White - Colorbox
Fibers: Pure Poppy Saddle Stitched Ribbon - Papertrey Ink; Pale Blue Pearl Cotton - DMC
Other: Foam Tape - Scotch; Pewter Brad - Making Memories; Glossy Accents - Ranger; Red Marker - Zig

Gallery Idol Round 4: Humor

So here we are. Round 4; the finals. I'm going to avoid melodrama, but I do want to say thank you. Thank you to everyone that stuck in there and voted every week. Thank you to Paper Crafts for giving me this opportunity. Thank you to Sean for listening to my harried brainstorming (especially after this weekend of bad jokes) and for offering your opinion and for not getting crabby when I'd ask you repeatedly if you were sure the cards were good enough. Thanks again, everyone. It means so much. I'm not a big hugger, but I'd hug everyone of you if I could (or at the very least give a fist bump).

This week's theme was difficult for me. Hopefully it translates over the interweb, but if it doesn't...well, blaze of glory and all that. I took a line we say around here from time to time (that I just found out was part of a rap song?!) and added a punchline. I had a creative writing teacher once tell my class to "write what you know." Well, I should just let the card speak for itself...



















First, I want to say I am well aquatinted with chubbyness and therefore feel comfortable making such a joke. Secondly, there is nothing wrong with angel food cake. It just sets itself up as a good punchline. It's like the chess team captain of cake while chocolate is the bad boy musician. Chocolate is sinful. Chocolate is good.


So to make this card I printed my joke onto Aqua Mist cardstock and scored the punchline to the inside. Then, I printed the set up on white cardstock and stamped that with Spring Moss and a background from Background Basics: Retro. I trimmed that down and used the Apron Lace border punch along the bottom edge. I adhered that to the base and wrapped the top with a bit of twill to make it look a bit more finished. A scalloped circle of Spring Moss was adhered atop the twill to highlight the focal image.


The focal image was created by stamping piece of cake onto Kraft cardstock and embellishing it with Liquid Applique. The applique was heat set when wet to get the fluffy appearance. I trimmed around the cake and foam mounted it to a matted piece of white cardstock stamped with a circular burst pattern. That whole piece was adhered to the Spring Moss circle with foam tape. The cake looked a little naked, so I added a candle with a rhinestone flame.

My last step on the front was to add the button bow. Nichole Heady has a fabulous tutorial on these bows on her blog. I used Aqua Mist saddle stitched ribbon and a little hemp twine to create my bow. I'd never done one of these before, but I love how it turned out and I'm sure I'll be doing more of them in the future.

I was all ready to be done until I looked inside and my punchline looked a little lonely. I decided to spruce up the interior with a strip of decorative edge paper I had left over from doing the front of the card. I think it added a little something. I'm happy.

By now, most of you are old pros when it comes to voting. You can go HERE to see everyone's entries and vote for your favorite. Remember: You can only vote once! This is the last round so you are essentially voting for the winner. The voting runs from noon MST today through noon MST on Thursday. The winner will be announced on Friday morning.

Most of my week is dedicated to getting ready for CHA this weekend, but I'll try to stop in and post a few new cards before I head out Friday. Take care and I'll see you soon!

Recipe:
Cardstock: Aqua Mist, Spring Moss, Dark Chocolate, Kraft - Papertrey Ink; Ultimate White - Strathmore
Stamps: Piece Of Cake, Background Basics: Retro - Papertrey Ink; Circles & Dots - Inkadinkado
Stamping Ink: Spring Moss, Aqua Mist - Papertrey Ink; Burnt Umber - Palette
Printer Ink: Pantone 4625 U 80% intensity
Tools: Apron Lace Border Punch - Fiskars; Mega Scalloped Circle Punch (pink)- Marvy, Adobe Illustrator
Font: Chasm Normal (I increased the kearning a little)
Fibers: Aqua Mist Saddle Stitched Ribbon, Dark Chocolate Twill Ribbon - Papertrey Ink; Hemp Twine - Darice
Other: Foam Tape - Scotch; Liquid Applique - Marvy; Rhinestone - Darice; Button - unknown

Can Someone Please Teach Me To Be Funny Before Monday

The Top 5 in the Gallery Idol contest were announced today and I am thrilled to be on that list! The only difficulty is the challenge. Our theme this week is humor. Humor?! Those of you that know me know that my personal brand of humor is more of a dry, chuckle inducing (but not gut busting), roll your eyes sort of humor. I'm not sure how that translates into the world of greeting card design, but I'm going to give it the old college try. This could be a disaster...