Make It Stitched! @ Little Red Wagon

 This week at

it's Brenda's turn to choose the challenge and she's saying, "Make It Stitched!" which just means she would like to see stitching on your creation.

Lately, for some reason, I've been making card for younger kids.  Not sure why, I don't have any young kids to give cards too.  Well, that's not exactly true, I do have a number of under 10 great nieces & nephews.  Thing is, no one on that side of the family is really interested in cards.  But, that hasn't stopped me from making card for.....well.....to sit in my baskets of made cards.  I did see that my local scrapbook shop is gathering cards to donate to our armed forces, so I'm definitely going to get some of my cards together for that.  I might get all my cards to fit in one basket then!

Anyhoo, this is what I made.....

As you can see, I have two stitched square die cuts on there.  I absolutely love the stitched shape dies.  An easy way to add some oomph to a clean & layered card.  Digi is from Drawn By Krista (who I believe used to be Drawn With Character).  She's got a lot of amazing images.  This one caught my eye so I decided to buy it, even though, as I said before, I didn't actually need it.  After I added the sentiment to the image in Word, got it printed out, coloured it up, and was just about to put on the card, I realized that the critter looks more like a dragon than a dinosaur.  And then I might have said, "Well, f@#k."  But, when I went back and looked, I saw that the image is called Happy Birthday Dino, so I decided it was a dinosaur after all.

I'm impressed that the picture I took this evening, in artificial lighting, turned out as good as it did.  I was going to take a photo this morning but our new kitten was asleep on my lap when I thought to do it, and I wasn't gonna wake him up.  We adopted him from a local rescue, and he's just the sweetest.  Here's a picture of him....

Of course I'm totally biased, but isn't his half 'stache just the cutest thing?  He's estimated to be about four months old, so not a kitten kitten, but not a cat either.  My daughter and I take turn stealing him away from each other.  (:

Why not give our challenge a go this week and join us?  And, if you'd like more inspiration, be sure to check out what the Girlfriends have made.

Also for:

613 Avenue Create:  anything goes

Addicted to Stamps:  birthdays

Fab 'n' Funky:  birthdays

Simon Says:  anything goes

Through the Craftroom Door: anything goes

Use Your Stuff:  birthdays

Watercooler Wednesdays:  anything goes

Make It Masculine! @ Little Red Wagon

 This week at

it's yours truly's turn to choose the challenge and I'm saying, "Make It Masculine!" which is fairly self-explanatory, but.....I would like to take a minute to talk about exactly what I mean by masculine.  See, as we take those small steps and get more inclusive as a society (I'm saying small steps as we still have really far to go), the terms masculine and feminine shouldn't mean, "this is for a male and this is for a female".  I'm not one for labels.....and please don't think I'm being all "Look at me, I'm so enlightened!".  I just don't understand why some people feel the need to characterize people.  "She's a tomboy", "He's shy", even seemingly innocuous labels can make the person labelled feel they need to always fit into that role.  And no one is ever one thing all the time.  The "tomboy" might feel like she can't wear makeup, the "shy" guy might use that label as an excuse to not try new things/make new friends.  Anyhoo, before I get too philosophical and start into a discourse about how we should just get rid of gender pronouns completely and come up with new words to replace he/him/his/she/her/hers with one(s) that would mean all genders (huh....really, that's the discourse right there) let me continue to explain what "Make It Masculine!" means to me.

I think of masculine as a theme, rather than specifically for a man/boy.  To me, a masculine make means clean lines, bold or dark colours, not loads of embellishments.  A masculine card does not have to be for a man/boy, does not have to have a man/boy on it.  A masculine card can have flowers, like this card here.  A masculine card can be pretty like this card here.  A masculine card can have pink on it, like this card here.  So, for those crafters who struggle with making masculine projects, I bet if you look at masculine as a theme, you'd be cranking out creative craftiness with no difficulty whatsoever.

Okay, I think that's more than enough talking from me!  This is how I made it masculine....

 

Isn't that image awesome!  It's a digi from Bizzy Hands Creations.  I absolutely ADORE stamps in sketchy style, so when I saw it, I bought it immediately and made this card.

Now it's your turn to "Make It Masculine!".  Why not give our challenge a go this week and join us?  And, if you'd like more inspiration, be sure to check out what the Girlfriends have made.

Also for:

Crafty Calendar:  anything goes

Shopping Our Stash:  feature hands

Unicorn Challenge:  let's see red

Dream Valley:  2 or more patterned papers

613 Avenue Create:  anything goes

Corrosive:  anything goes

Watercooler Wednesday:  anything goes

Creative Fingers:  anything goes

Love/Valentine's Day! @ Cut It Up (GDT)

 I was lucky enough to be offered a GDT spot at

Yay!  So happy to be joining them for the next two weeks where the challenge is "Love/Valentine's Day".  So, you just need to make a card that's all about lurrrrrrrrrrve, and include a die cut/cutting machine cut file on your project.  

My craft space is still in an uproar from the minor renovations we made to our office/rec room.  I've got access to some of my stuff, but a lot of it is still packed away in our basement.  I'm having quite a time figuring out storage for over my desk.  The cubbies I bought are much to deep and encroach way too far over my workspace.  I bought a very long floating shelf but have been cautioned against using it by my youngest and her boyfriend who bought the same shelf, only smaller, and they don't like it at all.  They said the hanging materials are shoddy, and I should return mine.  Now, I miiiiight consider giving it a go anyway, but I know full well I'd be pilling that shelf FULL, and if its attachment to the wall is shaky....well, I figure I'd walk in to the room sometime and find the shelf had smashed onto the desk, breaking a lot of my crafty supplies, and tearing out a good portion of the wall.  And then I'd definitely just cry.  Add to that the fact that the other piece of storage furniture isn't available until March.....well, it's made me have to get a little more creative than usual.  But, if I didn't have to make sure I was only using crafty supplies I could access, then I might not have made this......

Admittedly, I did have to go spelunking to find that hearts embossing folder, but other than that, I was able to use things that were actually with my craft space.  Bear die is a nonamer from either Ebay or Amazon....have to admit, it was a lot smaller than I expected.  I didn't go back and look at the listing though because I prefer to think that it wasn't my fault for not knowing it was pretty tiny.  (:  Letter dies are Taylored Expressions and the heart die.....I believe is a very old MFT die.  Well, it's in a package with other MFT dies anyway.  

Why not join us over at Cut It Up?  It would be great if you shared in the luuuuuuurve.  (:

Cardz 4 Guyz:  love cards

Cupcake Inspirations:  Valentine's hearts

Use You Stuff:  hearts/love

613 Avenue Create:  my whimsical Valentine

International Art & Soul:  love/hearts

Crafty Catz:  anything goes

Creative Fingers:  anything goes

Aud Sentiments:  love sentiment

Craft Rocket:  sparkle/bling

Moving Along With the Times:  love/anniversary/wedding

Crafty Gals Corner:  add a heart

Double D:  hearts

Simon Says:  emboss it

Ellibelle's Crafty Wednesday:  hearts or flowers

Tic Tac Toe: red, heart, sentiment 

Be My Love! @ Little Red Wagon

 This week at

it's Chrissy's turn to choose the challenge and she's saying, "Be My Love!" which means she wants to see, you guessed it, Valentine's Day makes.

Ah, Valentine's Day.  Used to be it wasn't a favourite occasion of mine.  But, in recent years, I've mellowed a bit.  I don't find it as retch-worthy as I used to.  I'm not sure what it is.  Is it because I feel like the world could use more love?  Is it because I'm just not as jaded as I used to be?  Is it because as my kids get older, I get to see relationships at their beginnings, and remember how beautiful companionship can be?

Ha, naw.  I'm just fooling with you.  I like Valentine's Day more now because a few years ago, I decided that I could forever be the sweetheart of Zesty Cheese Doritos, and we've spent every Valentine's together since.   

So, know what?  I'm gonna dedicate this card to Zesty Cheese Doritos.  Coz they certainly do.....

Digi is from Tiddly Inks.  It's been too long since I've coloured up Wryn.  I love her, she's so adorable.  (And, there's a whole line of Wryn stamps, I'm betting there's one for the exact occasion you need to make a card for.)

Why not give our challenge a go this week and join us?  And, if you'd like more inspiration, be sure to check out what the Girlfriends have made.

Also for:

Crafty Calendar:  anything goes

Moving Along With the Times:  love/anniversary/wedding

Crafty Gals:  add a heart

Ellibelle's Crafty Wednesday:  hearts or flowers

613 Avenue Create:  my whimsical Valentine

Dragonfly Dreams:  love

International Art & Soul:  all about love/hearts

Corrosive:  anything goes

Crafty Catz:  anything but square

Through the Craftroom Door:  anything goes

Unicorn Challenge:  let's see red

Dream Valley:  2 or more patterned papers

Use Your Stuff:  heart/love

Double D:  hearts

{PIN}spirational:  inspirational photo

Cupcake Inspiration:  Valentine's hearts

Slimline Cards! @ Little Red Wagon

  This week at

it's Imke's turn to choose the challenge and she's saying, "Slimline Cards!" because she wants to see....well, it think it pretty much tells you right in the title.  (:

I have to admit, while I do like slimline cards, I'm not very good at making them.  I'm not much of a scene builder, and if you're not doing that, you've got a lot of card to fill up with just one image.  When I was taking a gander through my digis, I came across a freebie from Artherapie that had four forest critters in grayscale.  So, I came up with this.....

I added the green and red to make it a little more colourful.  And, my scene just consists of a piece of patterned paper and some die cut cardstock, so even I could manage that.

Why not give our challenge a go this week and join us?  And, if you'd like more inspiration, be sure to check out what the Girlfriends have made.

Also for:

My Time to Craft Christmas:  things beginning with S - snow, scarves, stitching, sparkler, sentiment

ABC Christmas:  A is for anything goes

Addicted to Stamps:  Christmas

Crafty Gals Corner:  snow much fun

Critter Crazy:  anything with a critter

The Holly & Ivy:  anything Christmas goes

Through the Craftroom Door:  anything goes