Two Michelle Perkett Mermaids for Color Me Creative Classroom Challenge

Happy Monday, everybody!  I promised you that I would be posting my final two entries for the CDAC Progressive Freebie challenge and so I will.  But first I wanted to show you a couple of cards I created for the Color Me Creative Classroom Challenge.  Because one of my Halloween cards was selected by the design team as one of their top choices, I was invited to be a guest designer for the current challenge, an honor I share with Angela Wood of Angelwood's Crafting Corner.

So without further ado, here are two cards I made especially cor this challenge, the theme of which is "Colors of the Sea and Sparkle".  Michelle Perkett Studio is the sponsor of the challenge and I was able to choose one of her wonderful digis to use in my design.  This lovely ocean dweller is called Tutti Frutti and with a name like that I had no choice but to make her colorful.  Well, I had so much fun with her, I colored her twice, first as a blonde and then as a redhead, and made two cards instead of one. Then I couldn't decide which one I liked better so I sent photos of both of them and they used BOTH!  How awesome is that?!?  I feel so special!

All of the materials I used were scraps and embellishments from my stash so I can't tell you where they came from.  The grass and vine die cuts were included in some swap items I received from one of my JustWrodz teammates.    The sentiment stamps is from the Joy's Life "You're So Punny" stamp set.  The tiny hook is made from a metal staple, believe it or not!  I just used some jewelry pliers to bend it into the shape I wanted.  It is suspended on a single strand of silver metallic embroidery floss.  I don't know how well you can tell in the photographs but Tutti Fruitti's tail is glittered with Stickles and then covered in Judikins Diamond Glaze.  I also used the Diamond Glaze to create the sparkly pearls in Tutti's hair, the little air bubbles floating up from the fishes' mouths as well as their eyes and pectoral fins.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog today.  I hope you enjoyed seeing these two projects.  I really enjoyed making them and want to thank Susanne, Charlene and the Design Team of CMC Classroom Challenge Group for giving me this wonderful opportunity to show off a little of my work.  Until next time...

Happy crafting!
Anniebee

Project #3 for the CDAC Progressive Freebies Challenge - Round 6 (cdacpc6)

(Please note that this is my third post for today.  Please scroll down to see the other two posts.)

Hello again!  I'm back with my third (and the last one for today) project for round 6 of CDAC's Progressive Freebies Challenge.  This card features an image created by Ginger Loft.  This scene reminded me very much of rural Louisiana where my ex-husband's family lives so I colored it to look like one of the thousands of country homesteads that litter the highways and byways of that state.  It rarely snows there around Christmas so I didn't put snow on the ground, which is very sandy.  The area where they lived, close to Lake Charles, is known for its lumber industry and there are huge pine trees everywhere.  In fact, that area of East Texas and western Louisiana is known as the Piney Woods.  The shack, or shed as they are called in Louisiana, is also a familiar sight so how could I had to call this one "A Louisiana Christmas".  My mother-in-law loved to quilt and the dp I used looks very much like some of the old traditional quilt patterns.  I also made my greeting resemble quilt blocks with patterned paper that reminds me of quilt fabric and faux stitching around the edges of the "blocks" and letters, which spell NOEL.

Well, here... have a look for yourselves.

So there you have it!  I hope you have enjoyed this eclectic collection of Christmas projects.  As I said earlier, I'll be back tomorrow with a couple more.  This is the last round of this particular progressive challenge at CDAC but I think they have plans of starting another round as soon as this one is finished.  So if you like free digi stamps and enjoy coloring with Copics, I encourage you to give it a try.

Aside from the CDAC Progressive Freebie Challenge, I am entering this card in the following challenges:

TBD

So until next time, my friends...

Happy crafting!
Anniebee

Project #2 for the CDAC Progressive Freebies Challenge - Round 6 (cdacpc6)

I'm baaaaack... with my second project for round 6 of the CDAC Progressive Freebies Challenge.  This is a cute card, which measures 4" by 9" and will fit in a standard business size envelope.  Normally, I make my own envelopes to match my cards but I'm not sure I'll have time to make all of them this year so I am trying to make most of my cards in standard sizes so I can use store bought envelopes if I need to.  However, I have made a couple of cards that are either oversized or the embellishments are very chunky, requiring a box style envelope to keep from crushing the dimensional elements.  This isn't one of those cards though.

This cute image from Ellephantastic, is a bear flying what reminds me of a WWII fighter plane!  Compared to the war planes we have today, these prop planes were slow and not very agile but they got the job done in their time.  Anyway, I couldn't resist the temptation to have him pulling a flying banner.  It just seemed the natural thing for him to do.

As you can see in the photo of the inside of this card, I have not put a sentiment in it yet, which is the case with all of these cards.  I very often select the sentiment as I decide who will be receiving the card.  Okay, that's all for Project 2.  Now on to # 3!  Be right back with that one...

Aside from the CDAC Progressive Freebie Challenge, I am entering this card in the following challenges:

TBD

Anniebee

New Projects for Round 6 of the CDAC Progressive Freebies Challenge (cdacpc6)

Good Sunday morning to you all!  In two days we'll be at the mid-point of November and Thanksgiving is right around the corner. Right on its heels comes Christmas and New Years so we are already at the beginning of the busiest time of year. With that in mind, some of the awesome digital artists have given CDAC images for the participants in their Progressive Freebies Challenge to use in making Christmas cards and other projects this round. If you recall, in the last round we had some Thanksgiving and some Christmas images and they were all really cute! But I like the set of images even more than the last ones. I enjoy making my own Christmas cards so this challenge suited me to a tee! As I have done before, I will post 3 projects today and two tomorrow.  My posts will be short (after this one!) and I won't list the materials and supplies I used on each card so save you from having to scroll through it each time.  As always, if you have any questions regarding a card, just leave me a comment with your question included and I will get back to you with the information you need.

To start things off, I am going to show you  a cute little gift bag I made with the image by Designed 2 Delight.  It's an adorable polar bear sliding down a snow hill on his/her rump!  So cute!  I colored the image with Copics and used it to decorate a gift bag.  I thought it turned out really cute.

I am going to get some tissue paper that matches the pretty pale turquoise of the ribbon but I haven't had a chance to shop for it yet. The front of the bag as well as the snowflake charm are covered completely in silver glitter and the circles on the bow are white iridescent glitter so this little bag, which measures approximately 10" by 7", really sparkles in the light.

Okay, Project 1 complete!  Please stand by for Project 2... I'll be back in a flash!

Aside from the CDAC Progressive Freebie Challenge, I am entering this card in the following challenges:

TBD

Anniebee

Thursday and a new Scrapbook layout

Good evening, everyone! It's Thursday and I have for you today a new scrapbook layout that I made for Quick Quotes' Friday Challenge #7. Lately, I have really started enjoying creating pretty layouts and I have Quick Quotes to thank for that. Before I discovered their challenges, I made a page once in every great while but now I am wanting to make them all the time. I have so many ideas and not enough time to make them all.

As many of you know, I have been laid off for almost 15 months now but that has ended, at least temporarily, as of today.  I started working contract and today was my first day.  Working as a contractor, the position pays less than half what I was making prior to being laid off... that and having less time to craft are the down side!  The upside is that I have my foot in the door and the company I am working for is eventually going to hire two people to do what another contract employee and I are doing now so if I perform up to their expectations and keep my nose clean, I have a chance of getting hired into this position permanently and that would mean about another $5.00 an hour.  Still not close to what I was making but it's far better than unemployment and there are benefits!  Yay! And to make it even more attractive, it's not that far from where I live and the dress code is "comfortable"!!  How awesome is THAT??? LOL  And get this!  The other person working with me has a masters degree and she has been unable to find a decent job too!  So it's not just me as I was beginning to think.

Okay, now on to today's project.  This little scrapbook page is a rather loose interpretation of the sketch provided by Quick Quotes Blog for their challenge.  As I said, I had lots of pretty cool ideas for this sketch but I decided to make a layout featuring two of my nephews; brothers who are the sons of my younger sister who passed away in May of 2010 from breast cancer.  I have had these adorable pictures since they were little boys.  The older boy is now an electrical engineer and was married last May and the younger one is about 3 years out of high school, is engaged and is working full time.  It just astounds me that all my siblings' children are grown now.  It sure makes me feel old!  Anyway, I'll show you the sketch first and then my layout.

Here's the sketch.  Pretty cool, right?

Okay, now here's my layout.  Like I said, it's a loose interpretation but I hope it works well enough.

Actually, other than the location of the journaling, it's pretty accurate.

Weren't they adorable little guys?  They're still pretty cute and they're definitely sweet but nothing close to what they were then.  Anyway, that's it.  I hope you enjoyed seeing it as much as I enjoyed making it.  I'll be posting several new cards starting tomorrow night.  One will be for my guest design team feature on Color Me Creative Classroom Challenge and 4 plus a gift bag for CDAC's Progressive Freebie Challenge.

I am entering this layout in the following challenges:

Quick Quotes Friday Challenge #7 - sketch

Before I go, I'd like to mention that Joy's Life's new design team posted their first projects on Wednesday so stop by the brand new Joy's Life Design Team Blog to see their beautiful creations and enter to win some awesome prizes.  As I mentioned before, we are divided into 2 groups and next week will be my team's turn to post.  I got a quick look at their projects today and let me tell you that Team 1 did an awesome job!  Check 'em out and visit their personal blogs if you have a few minutes.

Thanks for stopping by and wish me luck on this job thing.  I sure could use a break!  Until next time...

Happy crafting!
Anniebee

A New Paper a la Mode Challenge at The Outlawz

I'm so sorry to be posting this so much later than usual. It was my turn to post the Paper a la Mode challenge at The Outlawz and by the time I was finished with that at 1:30 this morning, I was really tired and not feeling great so I decided to turn in. I must have been REALLY tired because I didn't wake up until 10:35! Normally I would have typed this up ahead of time and had it scheduled to post at 3 AM. Anyway, enough of that drivel. I'm here now and I'll have this up in a few minutes.

This week our theme was Thanksgiving or Fall Harvest, but with a twist. We were to use a technique and tell what that technique was. I used this awesome image from Phee McFaddell and colored it with Copics.  It's not a traditional cornucopia in that it's all veggies instead of fruit and it's a basket instead of a horn of plenty.  If you'll look closely, you'll discover 4 tiny fairies too. My cornucopias never attracted fairies so I guess they prefer vegetables to fruits! If you click on the individual pictures, they will enlarge to show more of the detail.

The technique I used was to apply Diamond Glaze to some of the veggies to give them a sheen and also to add dimension and texture. The close up above shows the glaze on the Indian corn. This piece was the most difficult and took considerable time to achieve the appearance of individual kernels. First, I put a think coating of the glaze over the entire ear of corn. After that dried, I applied tiny droplets to the individual kernels but I could not apply it to adjacent kernels or the glaze just ran together to form more of a blob.  I had to let it dry thoroughly between each application until I had all the corn kernels applied. Then I went through the process again to build up the layers of glaze to make it more pronounced. I also used the glaze on the peas (but not the pods), the eggplant, bell pepper, tomato and yellow squash. All of these vegetables have a natural sheen to their outer skin so the glaze makes them look more realistic as well as dimensional. I also used a little bit of Stickles on the tiny fairy wings to draw attention to them.

I'm not going to list all of the products I used in creating this card but if you have any questions, please feel free to include them in a comment and I will be more than happy to respond. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. I have 6 cards and two layouts to make this weekend so I'll be plenty busy with the crafting.  Look for these new projects to be posted here during the coming week. Until then...

Happy crafting!
Anniebee

Never Kick a Sleeping Dragon!

Hello, all!  It's the middle of the week again and I have given my blog another spiffy little facelift.  Well, I changed the wallpaper and furniture out again, at least.  I started to go ahead and decorate for the upcoming holidays but I thought that my readers might get a little sick of it by the time Christmas arrives so I decided to go with a fall theme for now.  I realize that snow has already fallen in several regions of the country so it may seem like winter has already arrived to some of you.  However, it has been beautiful here lately!  I never thought I would be able to say that again during the dreadful summer we had but fall finally did arrive on velvet wings.  It has been cool at night and sunny and warm during the day.  No sweaters needed most of the time but we have had a cool snap already and another one is due to arrive sometime today or tonight.  I guess it's time to drag out the cool weather wardrobe such as it is.

Soooo... today I have a cute little card that I made a while back but never got around to posting.  This is one of those multi-purpose cards that I love so much because it can be used for a number of occasions or no occasion at all.  Sometimes I like to give cards just to let someone know that I value their love or friendship and this could serve that purpose too.  This cute dragon was is another Phee McFaddell design and I just thought he was so adorable sleeping with his pillow and blankie!  I have a couple of other images Phee drew that have dragons in them and they are for Christmas!  Wait until you see them!  I have not yet colored them so it will still be a while before I'll have them ready to post here but I thought I would give any of you dragon lovers a heads up.  Haha!

Isn't he a cutie?  He was, of course, colored with Copics.  The DP is adhesive-backed cardstock from K & Company and the sentiment is made up of alphabet stickers by Sticko that I adhered to white cardstock sqares and edged with chalk ink and then layered onto blue cardstock squares and popped up on foam tape.

I am entering this card in the following challenges: TBD

Thanks for stopping by today.  I don't know if I'll have time to post another project before the weekend when it will be time for a new Paper a la Mode challenge at The Outlawz.  Then next week will be the launch of the new Joy's Life design team.  Joy decided to divide her team into 2 groups and I will be in Group 2 so we aren't scheduled to post our first project until the 16th but group 1 will post theirs next week on the 9th.  We are all very anxious to show you all the wonderful things we'll be creating with Joy's fabulous stamps.

So, until next time...

Happy crafting!
Anniebee