Attitude is Everything

Today's project was a special request by a co-worker. One of her dear friends turns 90 today, and she wanted to give her something special to celebrate.The birthday girl in question is one sassy & feisty lady, so I was asked to make a card to suit her personality. Fun, huh?

For my image, Tito-Mosquito on deviantART kindly agreed to allow me to use his drawing, Mari the Flapper. Isn't she fabulous? What could be more perfect for someone who grew up in the roaring 20's than a feisty old flapper who is still flaunting her stuff?

Mari was colored with copic markers, and has clear spica pen over her outfit for a bit of sparkle. I added white Fun Flock to her boa for some textural interest (close-up below). I wanted to use a real feather for her headpiece, but since I couldn't find one in my stash, I substituted a bit of wired white fringe that I airbrushed to match her belt & garter.

Think she'll like it?

Autumn Falls

I don't know about your neck of the woods, but here in upstate NY we've been having unseasonably cool weather for the past 2 weeks or more. We were doing yard work this past weekend, and I noticed that the leaves on the neighbor's maple tree are already starting to change colors. Oh, my! The colors stuck in my head, so when I got in the crafty mood, it was a no brainer to play with Sweet Pea Stamps Autumn Falls. Isn't she gorgeous?

Autumn Falls was colored with Copic markers, and highlighted with a white gel pen. I colored over her tail with a clear Spica pen, and added star dust Stickles to her outfit and the leaves for a bit of extra sparkle. The pretty dp is from the DCWV Pocket full of Posies matstack, and the rest of the paper is all SU. I picked up the leaf gems at the dollar store ages ago, and touched them up a bit with my copic markers to make the colors match my image.

Challenges I participated in with this card:

Stamping for the Weekend - anything goes
Stamp with fun - card for a girl (this is already on it's way to one of my girlfriends)
Paper Cutz - anything goes

Quick and Easy Christmas

I'm trying to get a  head start on my holiday cards this year, so I've decided to try to play along with the ABC Christmas Challenge to help get me motivated. I don't know about you, but I find it awfully hard to get to work on Christmas cards when the heat makes me want to spend some quality time in the pool! LOL.

This weeks challenge is Q for Quick and Easy, so I decided to pull out one of my favorite holiday sets, SU's Snowflakes. I must admit, I've gotten a bit out of practice with quick cards, since most of the images I've been using lately require quite a bit of coloring, so this was a nice change for me.

I wanted a bit of depth to my snowflake, so I started out by inking the whole flake with Bashful Blue ink, then rocked on some Brocade Blue ink, and finished off the edges by rocking on some Night of Navy ink. I added a bit of sparkle with Star Dust Stickles (I finally got a bottle, yeah!!!) and added a pearl to the center for my final touch. You can't really tell from the photo, but I also outlined the swirls on the paper with a clear spica pen, so this card sparkles like crazy in real life.

Thanks for stopping by!

Artwork for Anna...

I thought I'd share the artwork I made for my niece, Anna, for her 2nd birthday a while back. Little Anna is really into ballet (pronounced "bah-way" LOL) right now, so her mommy and I decided on some of the cute digital images by Mo's Digital Pencil.

First, we have Anna's name frame for over her bed:

Anna loves giving kisses, so the adorable "Kissy" was perfect for her name frame.

The image was colored with copic markers, and then carefully cut out to layer onto the background. I added a bit of star dust Stickles to her tutu and a gold Spica pen to her crown for a bit of sparkle. The background itself was made by cutting pieces of Nitwit's Buds n Blossoms digi paper into little squares and layering them quilt-like onto my base paper. I printed "Anna"onto PTI Sweet Blush paper, carefully cut out each letter and ran them through my Cuttlebug for some added texture.

My apologies on the horrid photos of the other 3 pieces in this set. I forgot to take photos of them before giving them to Anna, and so was stuck taking the photos in her not-so-well lit room after they were hung on the wall.

Thanks for stopping by!

male birthday cards...

See - I told you I had itchy fingers and would be posting projects more often! August is a busy card month for me, with 4 birthdays and 2 anniversaries to make cards for, so I thought I'd better get cracking!

I decided to start with my guy cards since they are always the hardest to come up with. I saved this great card by Michelle Short months ago with the intention of CASEing it at some point, and thought the simple but fun layout would be perfect for a guy card. In fact, I liked the first one so much that I made a second one (slightly different) out of my scraps.

For my first one, I used the cake from SU's Fun & Fast Notes set, with coordinating sentiment. The image was colored with copic markers, and has diamond Stickles added to the frosting and flames for a bit of sparkle.

For the second card, I dug out one of my favorite SU sets, Send a Celebration. This was one of the very first SU sets I ever purchased (Yes, purchased. My introduction to SU came right after SAB that year, and I had to find this baby on e-bay. The horror! LOL!) and it still remains a favorite.

Thanks for stopping by!