Red White and Blue Through and Through

Hi guys! Not a lot going on the last few days, still working on more V Day cards and gifts with occasional breaks to change it up a bit. This helps so that I don't get burned out before I finish, and what better way to do that than practicing my CAS card technique? I have a confession...Sometimes I can be a bit of an over embellisher and there have been a few times where making a card has taken several hours just for one card because I simply could not decide on what papers to use. By the time I'm done, I'm mentally exhausted so I end up not making a card for several days or worse, forcing a card that ends up taking ANOTHER several hours and repeating the cycle lol! Well to prevent this from happening I started making simple but elegant cards that only take about 10 minutes to assemble, using only a few embellishments and an image I already had colored up ( I have TONS). They come out great and look like they've taken hours. Today I have one of my finished 'stress relief cards' using another awesome TGF image:

C.C. Dante



Over at Splendid Stamping, the Farm Fresh Friday Challenge was Red White and Blue and since I already had this little guy colored up in those colors he was perfect for a quickie card. I ran a piece of cardstock through a Tim Holtz brick wall embossing folder and since my Stampin Up Real Red ink pad will be permanently stuck to my craft table until after V Day, I inked the top corner red, left the center white and used a memento tear drop ink on the bottom corner to give me a nice and simple red white and blue background. A few buttons, some Bakers Twine, and a sentiment from TGF's Creepin Kit (retired sorry!) and this card was a done deal! I plan to enter this card in the above mentioned challenge, Red, White and Blue over at Splendid Stamping, if you have the time, pop over and see the gorgeous projects the DT has come up with. Until next time!

-Krys

A Couple of Cuties

Hi guys! As I mentioned before, I'm in LOVE with Valentines Day it is my all time favorite day of the year, it even trumps my birthday! Maybe it's because I'm a hopeless romantic and everybody seems to be twitterpated starting around the end of January. So in honor of  this most awesome day I decided to go all out for my daughter's class Valentines Day party doing not only 23 goodie bags with Tags as well as a handmade card for each of the 22 classmates, but cupcakes from our local Cupcake specialty shop in decorated Chinese takeout boxes and altered notebooks for her two teachers as well! Boy do I have my work cut out for me but I am so excited. Today I have for you the cards for the girls and boys using TGF OA Lovey Dovey

  

OA Lovey Dovey

Inside Card

I finished these over a 2 day period to give myself a little breather to keep from getting burned out on this project and also a few of my copic markers were drying out so I had to wait until the refills arrived. They started off as CAS but I've never been able to leave well enough alone ^.^ this is the closest to CAS you'll get with me! I raided the $1 bin at Michael's and got 4 awesome V day stamps (after having paid an absurd amount for one wood mounted "Happy Valentines Day" stamp at Hobby Lobby...lesson learned o.O ). I stamped them on kraft cardstock using stampin up Real Red and accented with a white opaque gel pen. A few rhinestones and some Candy Cane red Stickles added that last bit of sparkle and a bit of red ribbon finished the look. Hope you guys love them as much as I loved creating them thanks for stopping by!

-Krys 

Bag 'em and Tag 'em

OMG I'm so sorry you guys I've been absent for a while and I hope I didn't lose any of my awesome followers because of this! A few posts back I mentioned that my husband left for basic training and I've been trying to adjust to essentially becoming a single parent over night. I already had much respect for all the single mothers out there but I have a whole new understanding and level of respect for the women who do everything and still manage to find time for themselves. I'm blessed to at least have finances taken care of so I can focus all my attention on business matters and raising my two beautiful girls, but what about those women who maintain the household, raise children, tend to business matters AND are the sole source of income??? All that being said I just wanted to give praise to all those strong women who do this every day not just for a few months! Now on to the actual cause of my blog; cards and craft projects.


For the last week I've been working on one huge project (it was HUGE to me at least). As we all know, Valentine's Day is right around the corner, partly because you cant go anywhere without seeing hearts and candy, the other part because you can't turn on the tv without seeing an advertisement for Jared's, and guess what? I LOVE IT!!!! Lol call me crazy but I look forward to this day more than I do Christmas so I start counting down every year, poor poor hubby ^.^ Well TGF did it again, just in time for my favorite holiday they release a stamp, Sweetie Bean,  that was simply perfect for my project! For my oldest daughter's class I made gift bags with tags using sweetie bean and they turned out wonderfully!

Sweetie Bean

I ended up making 23 in all, 22 for my oldest daughter and her class plus one extra for my youngest so she wouldn't feel left out! Man are my markers up for refills after all that coloring! I plan on entering these sweet treats in TGF's Farm Fresh Friday Challenge Love is in the Air! 

I'm trying to keep the ball rolling with the V day theme until after V day has passed because as I said before, I FREAKIN LOVE IT!!!!! lol bear with me you guys it'll all be over soon...maybe ^.^

See you next time,

-Krys

Holiday Cheer

Have you guys ever been so sick you're totally convinced that this is the end and you are tempted to write your own will? Well for the last three or four days I've been a step past that. A friend lovingly commented that I could be an extra on that tv show 'The Walking Dead' and I politely shared my cooties with him. Well not really but he did say I sounded contagious enough to make him want to text me to open the door, yell "FIRE IN THE HOLE" and toss my medicine in like a grenade while simultaneously making a run for it. Gotta love those friends huh? LOL! Today I'm feeling much better, though still not 100% I decided to make a card. Monday over at Splendid Stamping  one of the DT members, the talented Ms Joni of the blog A Sticky Situation, created a post about how any of TGFs awesome stamps can be used as a holiday image, you just need to add a little Red and Green. I decided to give it a shot and waddaya know, sure enough I had instant holiday cheer!

Anya Styles

 

This was also my attempt at a CAS card (clean and simple) but obviously leaving well enough alone is NOT my area and could use some improvement, or in this case, self restraint ^.^ ah well it still came out super cute to me. Anya Styles was colored up with my trusty copic markers and to add some extra holiday cheer I added Candy Cane stickles to make the red areas sparkle! The sentiment was another rub on from the DCWV rub on sentiments stack. Thanks for stopping by, let me know what you guys think!

 

-Krys 

Plenty of Pockets!

Ha! told you I would eventually come up with a name that wasn't ridiculous...or is it??? Ah well I tried, I really did! Well today splendid stamping put a new challenge up for this week's FFF and I was so excited that I had to make my card right away! And of course in keeping with my theme for this week, its a pocket card, the last one of the week. I've never been that great at monochromatic coloring, largely due to the fact that my copic marker collection is still expanding so I am missing quite a few shades in every color family. I always feel that with my limited selection of markers I will not be able to capture all the shading and detail or make a big enough difference in tones between skin and hair but I gave it a try anyway and I'm very proud of how it turned out!

C.C. Tuesday Premier

 



 

I colored Tuesday Premier up with my copics (W0-W5) I really wish I had W-7 and W-9 for the darker areas of her hair but I believe this came together nicely with just the ones that I own and I love how the pop of red compliments the black and greys in the card. This card will be entered in the Farm Fresh Friday Challenge for this week, Splash of Color. Hope you guys like it as much as I do, although it puts me in the mind of vampires for some odd reason ^.^ Love you guys thanks for the support!

 

-Krys