Caron Vinson Blog Hop

Today is a great day for a blog hop! We are having one today with Sweet Pea stamps featuring artist Caron Vinson. I am using a wonderful stamp called "Blusing Rose Fairy" (Plate #89). Right now all this artist's stamps are on sale on the Sweet Pea website, so as you go through the hop, be sure to leave comments and then stop by the store and check out the stamps on sale by this artist!
My card is using three layers of Spellbinders nestabilities. The top layer is heavenly white paper with my Caron Vinson image colored in Copic Marker, the second layer is clear transparency stamped with white ink using another Sweet Pea Stamp (Plate #104), and the final layer is a textured bazzill paper in navy. I added a wonderful Sweet Pea saying "You rock my world" (Plate #15); I highlighted the card with some beautiful lace from Turkey.

Be sure to go to the next blog in the blog hop, Outside my Window by Jennifer (CLICK HERE) Leave a comment on every blog in the hop and be eligible for a prize from Sweet Pea Stamps! Winner will be announced on the Sweet Pea Stamps Blog!

Cheers, Holley

Happy Birthday Sylvia!!

Huge Birthday wishes to my cousin Sylvia!! I can't believe she is 21!! When she was just a kid, she would often come and stay with me and my husband. We even took her on trips including a huge vacation to Disney World one year. I hope you had a wonderful birthday! HUGE hugs from Holley and John!!Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Lili of the Valley); Ink (Memento); Ribbon (Michaels); Bling (Michaels); Sticker (Heidi Grace); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All, Ribbon Glue, Glue dots); Color (Copic Markers); Die Cuts (Spellbinders Nestabilties);

Squigglefly Challenge

Happy Monday everyone! The Squigglefly digi-stamp contest this week is to include some school theme items in your project or school theme digi-stamps. To do that, my card is litterally including an actual school theme item, by taking a pencil and adding it on to a card. I though this would be a wonderful thing for a child to take and give to a teacher on her first day. However, you could just make a card using pencil or chalk....OR how about a stamp image of a pencil or chalk?
Check out the wonderful samples on the Squigglefly challenge blog and see the other designers ideas and then make your own card. CLICK HERE to go to the challenge blog and see the examples.

Project Materials: Paper(Bazzil Swiss, Archivers, Neenah); Digi-Stamp (Squigglefly-Daisy Chain Bunny); RubberStamp (For You-Queen Kat); Ink (Memento, Colorbox Chalk); Button (Grandma's Button Bag); Adhesives (Glue Dots, Glue All); Color (Copic Markers);

For John

I got this great stamp from Queen Kat stamps. I just had to make a card for my dear hubby. He's a wonderful man who has been with me through it all. I know many of you have followed the blog a long time watching my art and listening to my life, about the brain surgery and seeing my amazing recovery, John has been by side all along as a wonderful companion, a constant cheerleader, a soft shoulder to cry on, and a stong arm to pick me up. He's the best!!This stamp is called Desperate for you by artist Robin McQuay (click here). I got the U-n-Me stamp as a clear stamp, but I don't know which set it comes from (it is also from Queen Kat).

Project Materials: Cardstock (AC, Bazzill, Neenah); Ink (Memento, Colorbox Chalk); Rubber Stamps (Queen Kat); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All); Color (Copic Markers);

Cute as a Button

Here's another wonderful Digi-stamp from Tiddly Inks. I just love this artist. Isn't this stamp touching? I know you all loved the heart-breaker stamp earlier this week, so I am posting this card today. I added some wonderful lace that I got while in Turkiye, a fun saying "Cute as a button" and the tiniest buttons ever!! I love those little bitty buttons. YUM!Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Bling, Neenah); DigiStamp (Tiddly Inks); Rubber Stamp (Saying-Hero Arts); Ink (Memento); Border (Doodlebug); Lace (Istanbul, Turkey); Buttons (Grandma's Button Bag); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue all, Glue Dot, Ribbon Glue); Color (Copic Markers); Die Cut (Spellibinders Nestabilities);

Tad Batty

Here's a totally awesome stamp from Sweet Pea artist Terra Bidlespacher called Tad Batty! She's just super cute. After the Halloween card that I made last week and all the new Halloween theme stamps I have been seeing (and ordered of course!!) I am already in the Halloween stamping mood! SUPER in the Halloween card mood. I pulled out this wonderful stamp and had to make a card. This stamp comes on Plate #155 with other Halloween theme items and even includes the wonderful saying I used on this card!

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, ); Rubber Stamps (Sweet Pea Stamps); Lace (Turkiye); Ink (Memento); Brads (); Flowers (Prima); Bling (Michaels); Adhesives (Popdots, Glue All, Ribbon Glue);

Goblins Witches and Scares

Here's a great design from Phantom Rose of Queen Kat stamps called Golin, Witches,and Scares. I am sure many of you know that I just LOVE Halloween theme. Now many companies are starting the new halloween stamp lines and I am finding it hard to resist picking up a few of the new ones. You will be seeing lots of Halloween fun. This stamp was right up my alley. Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Crafter's Companion, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Queen Kat Stamps); Ink (Memento, Stazon); Bling (Making Memories Button Brads); Die Cuts (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All, Glue dots); Color (Copic Markers); Flowers (Prima);

You broke my heart....

Here's a beautiful digi stamp from Tiddly Inks. I just love this artist and her works for both Tiddly Inks as well as the rubber stamps from Stamping Bella. This image is no different. Touches me a lot as a certain someone has been a heart breaker lately. So hard. Please say prayers. God knows exactly who they are for, he hears my prayers too.Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah); Digi Stamp (Tiddly Inks); Ink (Colorbox Chalk); Color (Copic Markers); Flowers (Prima, Archivers); Ribbon (Michaels); Bling (Studio G); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue all, Ribbon Glue);

Happy Birthday!

Posting a great birthday card for my sister today! Happy Birthday Hallie! Here's the cute card that I gave her this weekend for her birthday. It's using a great stamp from Sugar Nellie. I hope she has a wonderful day today with her family. Some great news recently for those of you who know my family is that Hallie and her husband Paul recently finalized the adoption of their two children! WOO HOO. They have had custody of the kids for over a year and now the kids are offically adopted. Love you Regina and Christopher!!

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Basic Grey, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Fairy Tale-Sugar Nellie); Ink (Memento); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilties); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All); Color (Copic Markers);

Beauty

Here's a great image from Starving Aristamps. The saying is from them too, "Beauty without grace is the hook without the bait." While I love that saying as well, I guess I kind of have to shake my head a little and think it really depends on the fish. I know plenty of people who love beauty and don't look for grace. I also know people who miss grace and fail to see a person's real beauty.

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Bazzill Swiss, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Starving Artistamps); Ink (Memento); Color (Copic Markers); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All);

Addicted to Stamps

Here's a new design team that I am a part of, the company is called Addicted to Stamps. You will see some great stuff from many artists that I have loved and many new artists. They sent me some fun stuff to get started with including this wonderful image to use. They also make these great fabric patches for all kinds of art work, so I used one of them to make this simple card.Doesn't it look great? I can't wait until I get some stamps!! The website is http://www.addicted-to-stamps.com/ go check them out and see the artists and you will know why I had to do some cards for this company!! This cool image is from artist Heather Valentin.

Are you checking to see who the blog candy winner was for tuesday's contest--scroll down, the winner's name has been posted!! If you are the winner, drop me an email-htondre@aol.com

Cheers, Holley

Crafter's Companion Fairyopolis

Today's project using a wonderful kit from Crafter's Companion. This kit is the Fairyopolis Complete Cardmaking kit (CLICK HERE). It comes with 24 beautifully printed cards (2 different sizes) and matching envelopes, wonderful die cuts, amazing rubons, tons of stickers, bling, flowers, pop dots, you name it! Be sure to check the site to see all the items you get. Here's just one sample that I made myself. You also get a book that shows you ideas and samples.I will say that I just love to open up all the goodies and come up with my own ideas, so this card above does not use any of their patterns. The materials all match nicely, so it's no problem if you don't want to follow the pattern book. But, if you like, the book is full of beautiful quick and easy ideas. One of my favorite items they have in the kit is the decoupage sheets, which I used here for the fairy. It's a layered set of die cuts that you put together for dimension. The one used above has four levels of dimension. I added pop dots where I wanted to include as much dimension as I wanted. You can also use decoupage glue on it instead of just pop dots. The butterflies, Just For You and rectangle behind it the saying are all rub-ons that are included in the set. This card is one of the 6x6" cards in the kit.

This set will also go very well with any of the Fairyopolis stamp sets or the paper pads and other matching fairy products. I just love fairies!!

Hope this card makes you smile today!

Cheers, Holley

Sweet Pea Blog Hop!!

Hello All and welcome to today's Sweet Pea Blog hop featuring artist Katerina Koukiotis of Sweet Pea stamps. This stamp is called "Pumpkin Pixie" and is sold individually or on Plate #150. What a wonderful stamp for Halloween! Be sure to stop by all the locations on the hop and leave a comment on each person's blog because Sweet Pea is going to giveaway a gift certificate of $20 to their store for the winner!Also, all you Sweet Pea stamp lovers--my earlier Sweet Pea stamp card this week has a prize attached to it, so scroll down to the Tuesday blog post and check it out, if you leave a comment, I will be picking a winner and announcing them sunday!! Winner gets a wonderful stamp from Sweet Pea Stamps!! Be sure to scroll down and sign up! Then continue on this blog hop for a chance to win a prize from the Sweet Pea stamp website. WOO HOO!!

Now off to the next stop on the blog hop is Outside my Window by Jennifer Willis (CLICK HERE).

Have a stamp happy day! All the featured artists stamps are on sale at the store and they are having a HUGE clearance sale too. Be sure to check that out at the end of the blog hop!
Holley

The Flower

Here's a wonderfully cute stamp from artist Heidi Drake of Queen Kat stamps called the Flower. Doesn't it just make you smile? I thought this stamp was just too Huggable!! I used some warm colors for it. Be sure to check out all of this artist's stamps on the Queen Kat site.
If you haven't signed up for the latest blog candy, be sure to scroll down to the Tuesday posting and leave a comment. One winner will get a wonderful stamp!

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah); Ink (Memento); Rubber Stamps (Queen Kat); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Buttons (Grandma's Button Bag); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue dots, Glue all); Color (Copic Markers);

Friends Forever

Here's a wonderful stamp that I got from my last shipment from Sugar Nellie. This was back before my vacation so this stunning lace I am using here was some that I bought while in Turkiye. Love it!! This is such a great stamp. I added the saying "Friends Forever" for my dear friends!
If you missed yesterday's posting, be sure to scroll down! There's blog candy attached to it. I will pick one person who leaves a comment on yesterday's posting for a wonderful stamp from Sweet Pea stamps!

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill Bling, Bazzill, Neenah, Hobby Lobby); Rubber Stamps (Sugar Nellie; Saying-Cats Pajamas); Lace (Istanbul, Turkiye); Ink (Memento, Colorbox Chalk); Die Cuts (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All, Ribbon Glue); Color (Copic Markers);

Pearl Drop

Here's a stunning image from Sweet Pea artist Renee Biertempfel called Pearl Drop (Plate #159). I just fell in love with this stamp at first site! The works of this artist are gorgeous. This stamp was one that I absolutely had to get. It really fits this great nestabilities die cut that I have too. As you can see from this card, I first carefully trimmed the wings to ensure that the Spellbinders die would not cut them when I did the die cut.
I added a wonderful saying "Have a Magical Day" which I think goes perfectly with this card. I put some elegant lace that I just got while I was in Turkey. The markets there are just amazing. There's more ribbons, laces, and beads than you could ever imagine. Think of a bead show times ten. Walking street by street with nothing but shop after shop of crafts (mostly ribbons and laces, I was skipping the fabric district). Some of the more English speaking salesman were telling me there were factories you could see too....but would have to of course have an escourt for that. It's amazing. As soon as I got home I was full of great ideas.


I can't wait to share all of them with you. So have a magical day everyone! NEWS: I just realized that TODAY is my 1 year 6 month anniversary following double brain surgery!! WOOHOO, to celebrate, leave a comment on today's posting and I am gonna pick one lucky commenter and send them a Sweet Pea stamp!! (Winner chosen sunday morning! and will be announced RIGHT HERE)...start leaving your comments now!

WINNER: A_J_Brown@yahoo.com drop me an email or I will send you one and give you a link to the stamp choices and you can pick your prize!! Congrats!

Project Materials: Cardstock(Bazzill, DCWV, Neenah); RubberStamps (Sweet Pea Stamps); Ink (Memento); Die Cuts (Spellbinders Nestabilties); Lace (Istanbul, Turkiye); Adhesives (Glue All, Ribbon Glue, Pop Dots); Color (Copic Markers);

Squigglefly Challenge

Here's a fun new stamp from Squigglefly called Teddys New Home. How cute? I loved this image. The challenge this week is to create a card using wonderful touch. For my sample I used some wonderful handmade paper with luscious felting and beautiful lace that I bought in Turkey (or spelled properly there-Turkiye);I also added three different colored and textured buttons. Be sure to go the the Squigglefly challenge blog and play along on the contest this week. There's a prize for the winner of the contest!

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah, Hobby Lobby); DigiStamp (Squigglefly); Ink (Colorbox Chalk); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Lace (Turkiye); Buttons (Grandma's Button Bag); Adhesives (Pop Dots, Glue All, Ribbon Glue); Color (Copic Markers);

Bumblebee Boy

Here's some delicious papers from Paper Temptress...I just love this black column paper, it stands out and looks great with some wonderful frosted edges using a dash of ink or spritz on it. I then used a layer of beautiful yellow ruche paper to match the coloring I did on the image. The top layer is some wonderful Heavenly white paper.
I added some links here, so you can see the papers in their original state, here's the name of the paper and a link that will show you the paper at the store I got it from
Papers used: Epic Black Columns (CLICK HERE)
Yellow Crepe (CLICK HERE)
Heavenly White (CLICK HERE)

Project Materials: Cardstock (Paper Temptress); Rubber Stamp (CC Designs); Ink (Memeto, Stazon); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilties); Buttons (Grandma's Button Bag); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue Dots, Glue All); Color (Copic Markers);

Time for Ice Cream...

Here's an adorable Teddy from Whipper Snapper stamps and he wants to share his ice cream cone with you! Don't you wanna bite? I am not a huge chocolate ice cream fan, but I must admit that it looks pretty good!Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Whipper Snapper; Saying-Queen Kat); Ink (Memento, Colorbox Chalk); Buttons (); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue Dots, Glue all); Color (Copic Markers);

Hello everyone!

Here's a sweet Gorjuss Girl. I took this image along with me to Istanbul, so she has been on quite a journey. She was colored with watercolor pencils as I didn't have enough room to carry all my copic markers. When I got home, I turned her into this cute little card and added a sweet hello message.Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Crafter's Companion, Neenah); Stamp (Gorjuss Girl-Sugar Nellie); Hello (Sticker); Flowers (Prima); Brads (Making Memories); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All); Die Cuts (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Color (Watercolor Pencils-Derwent);

Goblins, Witches and Scares

Here's a great design from Phantom Rose of Queen Kat stamps called Golin, Witches,and Scares. I just LOVE Halloween theme. I am sure you all know this. This stamp was right up my alley. I added a fun saying from Queen Kat stamps too that says "Being Bad isn't easy"
Project Materials: Cardstock (AC, Metallic, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Queen Kat Stamps); Ink (Memento, Stazon); Bling (Hero Arts); Die Cuts (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue All, Glue dots); Color (Copic Markers);

Purrfect!

This card features an adorable cat and mouse couple from Whipper Snapper. I love the sweet stamps from this company. This cutie is just purrrfect! I had to add some wonderful punched border and a little bling.

Project Materials: Cardstock (Hobby Lobby, Bazzill, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Whipper Snapper, Cats Pajamas); Ink (Memento, Stazon); Bling (Michaels); Punch (EK Sucess); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue all); Color (Copic Markers);

Beauty is art

Here's a wonderful girl stamp from I Brake for Stamps. I just love this image. I added a wonderful saying from Sweet Pea stamps "Love of beauty is taste, The creation of beauty is art. Ralph Waldo Emerson" I am amazed how quickly summer is flying by. All the kids here are getting ready for school and most will be starting in just a couple weeks now.

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah, AC); Rubber Stamps (IBFS, Saying-Sweet Pea Stamps); Ink (Memento); Punch (Martha Stewart); Bling (Michaels); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue all); Color (Copic Markers);

Look Who's Here

Look who's here today...it's a Gorjuss Girl. I am sure anyone who see's the blog on a regular basis knows that I love the Gorjuss Girl designs. They are super! This artist's work just touches me. Some new stamps came out several months ago so here is one of my most recent stamps.I love how it has an owl too! I also incorporated some great blue paper from Crafter's Companion. Today is the nnouncement of the winner of the Aug 1st blog candy! The winner from my blog is Shellie Sauve!! Congrats Shellie. I will be contacting you soon so you will know how your prize from Crafter's Companion will arrive.

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah, Crafter's Companion); Ink (Memento, Colorbox Chalk); Rubber Stamps (Gorjuss Girl); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Adhesives (Popdots, Glue All); Color (Copic Markers);

Friends Always....

Here's a wonderful image from Queen Kat artist Kathy Cyr, Francis Mary & Cornelius. She has some delightful images and I just had to get a couple of them. I adore this cute girl and her cat. I added a great saying to it "Friends Always" because I know that's what a lot of us think of our cats.
Last chance for Blog candy!! Be sure to scroll down to the August 1st posting and sign up!!

Project Materials: Cardstock (Bazzill, Neenah); Rubber Stamps (Queen Kat Stamps); Ink (Memento, Colorbox Chalk); Flowers (Michaels); Brads (Target, Basic Grey); Die Cut (Spellbinders Nestabilities); Color (Copic Markers); Adhesives (Pop dots, Glue dots, Glue All);