Happy Birthday Maile! - 1st Birthday card of 2016

Hello!!

Hope you all had a nice New Year's Day.  Every year on New Year's Day we go to my friend's house to celebrate and for the past 11 of those years it has been a double celebration with a birthday party and New Years celebration all rolled in to one.  I spent the morning working on this card for my friend's niece's birthday...

It's still got a little bit of the holiday flair going on, but with a touch of birthday fun.  I used the adorable image from TGF's Secret Santa set as the focal point.  I also broke open my Recollections Craft It Vintage Glam paper pads for this one.  Might as well use something new for this card.  I like this paper pad, lots of glam and glitter and it has lots of craft paper designs.  Also used here are some go to MFT dies, Blueprints 20 & Stitched mini scallops oval.  From Mama Elephant the two sentiments dies.  The gems and flower are both from Recollections.

I took this with me to the party for the birthday girl.  With friends, relatives and my parents, I spent another wonderful day celebrating not only the new year, but my friend's sweet niece's birthday.  Another wonderful surprise was to see one of my former basketball players there with her little family.  Her husband coaches my friend's niece in basketball!  Small world!  It was another blessing to see her there and to know she's doing so well.

Now that the Christmas season has passed, I'll be sharing the other cards & projects I made which include lots of birthday cards.  It should be fun trying to remember all the products I used, so if I can't remember please don't hold it against me.  hahaha!  Cheers to day 2 of 2016.  Thanks for stopping by!

A Fat Free Boba-licious Bday Card

Hello!

Wow it's been so long since I've visited blogland.  I hope you've all been doing well. Apologies for not being able to stop by.  Since coming back from the La-La Land Craft Retreat my days have been super busy with work stuff and my nights with craft projects so posting and visiting have been put on the back burner until today.  I do have a fun card to share with you today.

This is the birthday card I made for my friend/co-worker, Delaram.  A little background on the card...  Delaram LOVES boba milk tea.  There is a local donut shop by our office that sells the one she really likes and at one point she was going every day and sometimes twice in one day!  Now a days she's limiting herself to 2 a week, unless it's been a stressful day.  So in honor of her love of boba milk tea I created the card above using MFT dies, and the cutest boba milk tea image (TGF Frappi Anya with a few alterations of the cup & removal of the bow) plus a TGF cutting die.  I also was able to use the cool embossing folder on the green cardstock, which made the perfect background for the card.

To create the boba milk tea I used the Die-namices LLD Cool cup dies. First cutting them out of white cardstock, coloring them, then cutting the same out of transparency paper to make it look like the actual cups.  I added the handwritten tags to represent the days of the week and the dark brown circles on the bottom of the cup represent the boba.  On the inside of the card I handwrote, "Hope you have a fat-free BOBA-licious birthday!"  Needless to say she loved it after she figured out what was in the cups.  (Yay! hahaha!)

Well that's all for now, hoping to stop by to visit some of my favorite blogs soon, I know you've been creating up a storm and I can't wait to see what you've been up to.  Have a wonderful Saturday friends!!  Thank you for stopping by! 

Time to Celebrate

Good morning!

Woke up and it was raining!  Yay!!  I know some of you don't need the rain but we sure do.  Hopefully it will continue for a few more days.  Lucky for me I don't have anywhere I need to be today.  So staying indoors while the rain pours sounds like a nice plan.

Yesterday was apparently World Cardmaking Day and I did squeeze in some time to make a card, not for this occasion but it seemed to coincide with the same day.  Here's the card I made specifically for my niece, Scarlet, who turned 1 on October 2nd.

Another card featuring fun La-La Land Crafts Club kit stamps and dies from the April & May kits.  The stamps are from the May 2015 kit as well as most of the dies.  This is Celebrate You Marci.  There is one die that I used from the April 2015, but most are from the May kit.  Papers are from the May kit, Recollections and Neenah.  I went with a purplish theme here and added some cream in to the mix.  You can also see a hint of the same layout here, just substituted the balloons, streamers, cake & gifts for the branches and flowers.  I colored Celebrate Marci with Copics (yes including her dress) and fun-cut her out.  It took me quite some time to figure out what to write inside the banner, there are only 4 flags, but right at the end it came to me.  I think it worked out nicely.

On the inside of the card (not pictured) I stamped Celebrate You Marci off the page with Concord Grape (Distress Ink) and will stamp a Happy Birthday sentiment with the same color.  I am really enjoying digging in to the club kits and just yesterday I got the September one along with some older stamps & dies from last years kits.  Can't wait to dig in to those.  If you're interested in the kits stop by the LLLC site, there are a few different plans you can sign up for, but if you want to spend the money and get the project kit I think it's worth it.  You'll still receive the dies & stamps but you'll also get the amazing projects Irina has dreamt up to create with the kit.

Thank you so much for stopping by and I hope you have a wonderful Sunday! 

Happy Birthday Erica!

Hello!!

Happy last day of September!  :(  Kinda sad that's it's already over, but looking forward to October.  Before welcoming in October I wanted to share this birthday card I made for my co-worker who is celebrating her bday today!  Here's the card I made for her...

I can't believe I made this card!!  I have to say it's something I would never have come up with if I hadn't just finished making a similar card with a similar layout over the weekend.  I'll share that card tomorrow.  This is one of those cards you just look at and smile.  I smiled a lot when I was done.  

The papers are from Prima Marketing and the solid colored papers are from Neenah & Recollections.  I used dies from La-La Land Crafts & MFT.  Love the dies from these two companies!  The flowers are from Petaloo and were pretty with the colors on the card.  The image is So Hip Anya and she is one  of the SSSC from TGF.  I gave her a little bit of an alteration, but just a tiny one because my friend has short hair not long, so the ponytail has disappeared. 

 I don't normally add an inside but this time I did.  

Pretty and simple.  Well I hope you're all doing well and getting in some crafty time.  I'm so behind on a couple swaps that I'll be burning the midnight oil for a few days.  The hard part is trying to come up with something for my swap partners!!  Wish me luck!  Take care and thanks for stopping by!!

Have a sweet day Kathy!

Hello!

Hope you're all having a great Sunday.  It's another hot day in LA so I think I'll stay in and play with some stamps and paper.  Hope you're doing something fun as well.

Here's a card I made for Kathy who celebrated her birthday last week.  (Yay to September babies!)

The main image I used is Dollie with Cupcake and the cupcake from The Greeting Farm which is part of the Dollie with Cupcake set.  I had thought to just do a simple plain white background, but as I started to stamp the cupcakes I just kept going.  I used small hearts & some blueprint dies from MFT, ribbon/twine from my stash and that sweet sentiment from AmyR.  The colors are some of Kathy's favorites, mine too, so I was really please with how it turned out.

In this shot you can see that I sprayed on some shimmer mist, makes the image and paper shimmer in light.  I also used my Wink of Stella pen on a few of the cupcakes for even more glittery fun which you can see better IRL.

I stamped something on the inside, it's always fun to add something fun to the inside too.

Dollie with Cupcake

Can't say too much more about this card so I'll sign off for now.  Enjoy the rest of your Sunday and thank you so much for stopping by!  

A Time for Tea Birthday card

Hello!

I made today's card for my boss' birthday.

Most of the papers used are scraps from my stash.  The layout is simple and functional.  I chose the pretty Always time for tea die set from MFT.  I always love the way dark brown makes everything pop, especially floral designs so I made sure to incorporate it in subtle ways here.  It really gives a nice accent to the card.  I should try to make more cards like this and add to my stash.  I have plenty of scraps that I could definitely accomplish it, and it's always fun to put something together where coloring is not involved.  Just sayin' hahaha!

Thanks for stopping by!

Spotlight @ Kitty Bee Designs

Hello!

Happy Labor Day everyone!

It's the 1st Monday of September which means it's time for a spotlight post from me.  I'm sharing this card over at the Kitty Bee Designs blog.

September is shaping up to be one of those months where tons of birthdays are happening.  There seemed to be a lull for me, but now and until the end of December, I'll be busy making some birthday cards in between Christmas and some calendars.  Lucky for me I stocked up on a few Kitty Bee Designs images to help me with the birthday card process, including this oldie but goodie, Pleasantly Surprised Bear.  This card also features some older DCWV papers, an AmyR sentiment and the layout was created using several dies from MFTs Blueprint #24.  I love this set a lot and how fun that I can create my own sequins using two sets of dies from the same set.

I sent this off last week to my crafty friend, Angie who celebrated her birthday on the 2nd.  1 down lots more to go.  With that I'll sign off with a have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

Happy Birthday David!

Hello!!

This will be a quick post, I'll be back in a few hours with my Spotlight post for Kitty Bee Designs.  I wanted to share this card I made for my brother who is celebrating his birthday today.  It's another shoe birthday card, yes he loves shoes!

I decided to keep it simple, and finally break open this awesome stamp and die set from MFT.  This die set is called Dienamics LLD All-Star high tops and it is so darn cool!  It makes the coolest All-Star sneaker!!  I had to watch the video to put this together, but it was worth it.  Sorry about the photo, I had to take the picture in another room where the light source is not so great.  The colors are way off too.  What looks like black is actually dark midnight blue.  The colors are for his love of  the University of Michigan.  The sentiment is from the companion stamp set LLD Be Original the set also includes the circular stamp inside the circle.  The rays are a Tim Holtz stencil and I used some Distress inks to ink it up.  Here is the inside of the card...

Again this is supposed to be midnight blue not black with golden yellow and white.  The sentiment is part handwritten and Island Scrapbooking laser cut sentiment.  We celebrated yesterday with Thai Bar B Q, it's what the birthday boy wanted to eat, a red velvet cake and scoops of Neapolitan ice cream.  Good times with good food and wonderful people, just missing my sister & her family.

Well time to sign off, gotta get up in a few hours to get to work.  Sigh.. hahaha!  Thanks for stopping by and if you come by later I'll have my spotlight post from Kitty Bee Designs up.  Night!

KBD July Spotlight

Hi everyone!!

Today I'm spotlighting this card on the Kitty Bee Designs blog!!

This card was created with the adorable Cupcake Surprise Pup!  I have used this pup for a few of my cards, he's just so darn cute and perfect for any birthday card.  This time around I colored him up with some spots, including a heart spot right above his eyebrow.  I also colored the cupcake really bright, not as bright as the dp, but bright enough.  :D  This is the third card that was sent to my SSS for May.  Those cool words were cut out with some new Mama Elephant word dies and I love how I can overlap the image but not take anything away from it.

Don't forget about our current challenge, click HERE for more details.  You can use any image but why not stop by the KBD Etsy store to choose one of ours instead?  You won't be disappointed.

HB2U - Celebrate You Marci

Hello!

Today I'm happy to share this second to the last card from my Sunday stamp camp group get-together.  It was designed by Linda and is so super sweet and girly.  Another adorable birthday card to add to my stash.  Woo hoo!

Designed by Linda Tan

This sweet little girl is Celebrate You Marci from the May Club Kit from La-La Land Crafts.  I recently encouraged Linda to sign up for the club because she loves the beautiful dies and stamps.  Plus she gets the sets a year in advance.  She decided to give it a try and this was her first club kit.  (Hmm, maybe I should ask Irina if she gives incentives on referrals? hahaha!)  Linda decided to dig right in and used one of the dies, the celebrate sentiment, and of course the sweet, Celebrate You Marci.  I loved the colors of her card so much that I colored Marci using the same colors, yes including her hair.  This is a very pretty combo.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed the little showcase over the last week and a half.  I've got one more card to share so I'll be back!  Take care and thanks again for stopping by! 

Happy Birthday - Sitting Lovely Anya

Hello!!

How's it going?  Yep I'm back today to share another stamp camp card.  This sweet birthday card was designed by Belia.  Another card to add to my birthday stash.  (yay)

Card designed by Belia Sardinha

Featuring Anya from the Sitting Lovely stamp set this card design was a lot of fun to put together.  I colored her with dark hair instead of the lighter color that Belia used, only because I have a lot of friends with dark hair so I try to stay in that color scheme.  This little girl reminds me of Wonder Woman because of her blue/black locks.  hahaha!  I love the white space with the touches of pink and blues.  Super girly indeed!!

Thanks again for stopping by!  I'm excited to be back again for another share soon.  Take care!!

Aloha Friday Challenge #50 - Birthday

Hey!!

Today starts a new challenge over at the Aloha Friday Challenge blog.  I hope you'll play because this one is super super easy peasy!!

CHALLENGE #50

BIRTHDAY

Create a project with a birthday theme

Sponsor: A Random Fan

For the full details on the challenge and prize from A Random Fan, head on over to the blog.   While you're there don't forget to hop to the rest of my teammates blogs to see their fun birthday themed creations.  Speaking of creations here's mine...

I used Noah the Cowboy for my card and several stitched dies.  Keeping it CAS was my goal here. Little boys don't really like fuss and boy it was really hard not to add more!  hahaha!  But I think I added enough and I love how clean it looks.  Another card to add to the stash, and you can never have enough boy cards.

This challenge will last for two weeks, that's plenty of time to get your crafty hands and ideas together and link up your project(s) on the blog.  Thanks so much for stopping by!  Have a terrific crafty weekend!!

LFF #89 - May SSS

Hi!!  Happy Aloha Friday!

Hope you're all doing well.  I appreciate the love gals, you know who you are, and all the happy thoughts.  I think my missing mojo if finally coming back!  Woo Hoo!  I'm just going to take it one project at a time. =D

Today's Lilo's Fun Friday #89 I'd like to share two non-colored birthday cards that were part of a set of 3 CAS cards I sent to my SSS swap partner for May.

The theme was "birthday" and of course I was stuck on what to make.  Lucky for me I finally received part of my order from 7CK from March and included in this shipment were those Mama Elephant word dies (happy birthday click on each word for the links).  Bingo!!  I decided they were perfect for a CAS card.  The corrugated kraft paper with the chevrons is from my stash as well as the flower and lacy ribbon.  I have to say with those word dies anything is possible, they are big enough to be the focal point of the card and that font... love it!  Here's the second of the three cards:

I also recently received my May club kit from La-La Land Crafts and the theme in this one was birthday.  Bingo, Bingo!!  hahaha!  Inside were those balloons.  They made the perfect accent for this happy card.  The patterned paper is from an older AC paper pad and the balloons were cut out with random scraps of paper.

Here's the amazing swap I received from my swap partner Gail...

SO many pretty projects all in one bag!  She is an avid tea drinker and I was so happy that she sent me some of her favorite teas to try.  I love tea so these will go a long way.  So cute how she made the different projects with Stampin' Up products and I love the pretty papers and colors.  Thank you Gail!!  If you'd like to be a part of the SSS swaps leave me a message and I'll ask Kathy to add you to the list.  It's a great way to connect with others as well as receive some awesome crafts.  The next one just started but you'll be in for July.

Well this is a good place to sign off.  I hope you all have a wonderful Aloha Friday and that you get to do something fun or relaxing this weekend!  I'm going to be around to visit too.  Should be a slow relaxing, craft filled weekend for me.  Bye for now!

Lilo 

LFF #89: READY? 1,2,3...

Hello!

A reminder that you have a week left to link up your project to our current "Sew Cute" (faux or real stitching on your project) challenge over at the Aloha Friday Challenge blog, HERE.  Today the second half of the Bees team are sharing their mid-inspirations HERE.  If you're stuck on the theme then make sure to stop by and be inspired.

Today for Lilo's Fun Friday #89 I have a fun birthday card to share with you.  My mojo was flowing with this card, yay!!  hehehe.

Front of the card

This is the front of the card featuring the adorable Turtle set from Sister Stamps, a fun vintage Aloha print paper, laser cut flowers from Island Scrapbooking and some fun stitched speech bubbles relaying a message...  Next up is the inside of the card which relays the rest of the message... and look how excited this turtle is to shout out "Happy Birthday!!"  hehehe, so kawaii!!  >.<  The HB sentiment is also a laser cut word from Island Scrapbooking.  Boy do these come in handy!  I wish the store was a lot closer to me or visa versa.  hahaha!  Luckily they now have an online Etsy store so if I need any more laser cut designs I don't have to fly all the way there to buy some, although that does sound like a nice reason to go.  hahaha!

Inside the card

I loved this card so much that I really wanted to keep it!  Instead I handed it over to my friend/co-worker so that she could give it to her son to give to his teacher for her birthday today.  This is the same teacher I made the teacher's day project for here.  Because she's from Hawai'i I felt it was ok to use the turtles for her birthday card.  Did you notice that I inked up the turtles in blue and not black or brown ink?  Yep, I thought it would be fun to experiment for an underwater affect especially if it made them blend with that pretty vintage paper.  Mission accomplished!  I had fun coloring and fun-cutting them all out.

These are some happy happy turtles and they make for a fun birthday card.  Thank you mojo for showing up in the nick of time.  hahaha!   Mahalo for stopping by, have a great Aloha Friday!!

What's Up? Dog day afternoon...

Hello!

Wow, it's been a few days since I last posted!  Life has gotten a bit more busy and I've been less active in the creative realm.  I don't know if it's the weather or the long hours at work, but there seems to be no interest in creating when I get home, it's as if my mojo has gone on vacation.  Sigh!

I realized that I never posted about this project I made for one of my friends.  It's actually a watercolor/die cut scene/portrait...

Obviously some of my mojo was working here.  hahaha!  I started out with the blue backdrop using gelatos and water on some Canson water color paper.  I believe the cute dog flying over the city is Silver from Tiddly Inks Flying High clear stamp set.  My friend has a dog, who resembles Silver a bit so I tried to color him the same.  I used multiple dies from LLLC and MFT to create this scene.  I also used a word backgroud stamp from MFT for the buildings and the tree.  Love the effect, it kinda looks like I used a newspaper.

I need to put this in some kind of frame so for now it's with me until I finish it.  I did show it to my friend and she loved it.  Yay!!  Here's a look at the annual birthday card I made, another adorable image of Silver and I actually decorated the envelope!

The sentiments on the card are from Paper Smooches.  Oh and in the background some wispy clouds made with Distress Inks.  Maybe this will jump start my mojo?!  We shall see!  I might need to go-around to everyone's blogs too, so I'll be sure to hop on the ole' computer when I get home to do some hopping!  Well breaks over, I better get back to "work".  Take care and thanks for stopping by!

May Spotlight at Kitty Bee Designs

Hi everyone!

Happy Monday and happy 1st Monday of the month.  Today I'm sharing this birthday card, over at the Kitty Bee Designs blog.

May begins a month of birthdays for me, so trying to come up with something simple yet cute was my goal here.  I think I nailed it.  This cutie is Cupcake Surprise Pup and boy was I happily surprised to find him in the Etsy store.  He's available for purchase and while you're there why not pick up a few more cute images to go along with him?   Just sayin'... hahaha!

Make sure you stop on by to see and join our current challenge.  Have a great Monday & thanks so much for stopping by to see what project I have to share!!  Bye for now!

Have a delicious day!

Hello!

May is a busy birthday month for yours truly, I know at least 3 loved ones who celebrated theirs on the 1st alone, including my mama.  Here's another birthday card to add to my "done, but need to mail" list, featuring Bake me some Love Wryn from Tiddly Inks.

It's been so very long since I inked up a Wrynn, and seeing a sale at the TI store was too hard to resist.  hahaha!  I might have printed her out a bit too large for what I had in mind, but I think it worked out well.  I used some new dies: MFT dienamics blueprints 24 & MFT background grid stamp and rounding out the rest of the card are an embossed background, a doily, and the fun speech bubble with sentiment.  The colors are bright and fun and I think the person I have in mind for this card will enjoy it.  Alrighty, a few done but so more to go, better get to it!

Hope you're all having a nice Sunday!  Take care and thanks so much for stopping by today!

Challenge(s):
Tiddly Inks Challenge: So Sweet - woo hoo! Top 3 results

Happy Birthday Mom!

Good morning!

This is the birthday card I made for my mom who celebrated her "22nd" birthday yesterday!  hahaha!  I used the exclusive newsletter, Gift Mermaid Anya, from The Greeting Farm and some beautiful new dies I just received in my April La-La Land Crafts club kit!!   Also included are one of my favorite Sizzix embossed backgrounds and a laser cut sentiment from Island Scrapbooking.  I have to admit I had no idea what this would look like in the end, but I'm so happy with the outcome.  Lucky for me I already had the mermaid colored up and using a few Copic markers the flowers were done in no time.  Used Tumbled Glass DI for the backdrop.  Here are a few more pictures from last night...

Dinner at Ai's a Japanese restaurant my parents like to go to

The birthday cake with only 1 candle

yum tasty!

Tulips and a Mermaid

We also got her a mini iPad so now she can face-time with her sisters and friends.  All-in-all a wonderful day to celebrate a wonderful lady.  Okie dokes, sorry to cut this short but I have a lot to do today so I'll stop right here.  Thanks for stopping by, have a fabulous Saturday!!

Challenges:
TGF FFF: Flowers
Loves Rubberstamps: Use 2 dies

Yay it's your birthday!

Hello!

Hope everyone is doing well.  Today I thought I'd share a birthday card.  FYI, I made this card last year and somehow it missed getting posted.  Well better late than never right?!  :)

Victoria's Night out

Please bear with me as I try to remember what I used here.  It features Victoria from Stamping Bella's Victoria & Juliette's night out stamp.  If you remember I used Juliette on a previous card, click here for more details.  If you remember, or not, this stamp actually has both girls with their arms intertwined, like drinking buddies.  Well as with the other stamped image I inked up all of Victoria and wiped away as much as I could of Juliette.  Once stamped I used Copics to color her in.  Going for a night out theme I used silver colors with white, black and pink accents.  I also chose more glitter papers to use.  They add a little extra something to the card, without having to add too much more detail.  Since it was a night out theme I used the MFT Skyline border dies for a fun border.

Here is a close up of the bottom of the card.  As you can see I used a lot of the glitter paper.  I bought several stacks when they were on sale at Joann's.  What I love about this paper is that it's smooth to the touch.  See the sentiment from AmyR?  I stamped it on acetate.  I was looking for vellum, but couldn't find any in my stash so I decided to try acetate/transparency paper.  Instead of using Memento ink I used Staz-on.  It was perfect!!  I used a spray on adhesive to tack it down and love how clean it looks, no glue marks in sight and I didn't have to add any embellishments to hide those "marks"!  YAY!  I will definitely be experimenting more with Staz-on and acetate/transparency paper.

Well that's all for today.  Thanks a lot for stopping by!

Happy Birthday with Birthday Anya II

Hello!

Popping in to share a quick birthday card.

It's a pretty simple card.  I used Birthday Anya II for the image and the rest is from my stash.  The pretty ribbon roses are from a swap and they add a nice bit of color to the card.  Kept the rest of it simple and clean.  The embossed background was perfect for the sentiment which I highlighted with a nice peach color.

I've joined #thedailymarker30day challenge (see link up at the top left) which is to take 5 minutes or more out of your busy or not so busy day to just color.  This colored image was day #2.  I colored her for a good 15-20 minutes (just her hair!) and the rest took about 5 minutes.  (lol)

I'm going to sneak this one in to the current FFF challenge at The Greeting Farm.  Wishing you all a lovely day!!

Other challenges:
Loves Rubber Stamps #141 Anything Goes