Here I Go Again!

Well, I'm batting 1000 - late again for posting what should have been done Friday night. I just don't know where the time goes anymore!

Our challenge for Saturday's Paper a la Mode Challenge over at The Outlawz this week is to use stitching on our projects. It can be either machine or hand stitching, but it has to have some sort of thread on the project.

Confession time: I recently bought a new sewing machine - about a month ago - and it's still in the box. I have been holding out on setting it up because I wanted to get my craft room purged and rearranged, but at the rate I'm going, that will be next year this time. So ... I had to use hand stitching. But I thought it turned out pretty - sort of an embroidery effect. I like a lot of texture to my cards and layouts, so on what would have been a rather CAS design, the stitching adds a lot of "oomph"!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to be a bit more proactive this week in getting my blog post done! Hugs to you!

Time is flying! And I'm slow with my posting!

Hi everyone! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend! I am a few days slow with posting for Saturday's challenge. I took my son, who is a high school senior, for a college scholarship interview at Virginia Tech this weekend. It was a great trip, and so beautiful with all the leaves changing colors. Virginia Tech is located in Blacksburg, Virginia, which is down in the southwest corner of the state, and the terrain is a bit mountainous, so the views and scenery are incredible. Virginia Tech is so beautiful, with almost all of its buildings being made of stone, so it has a very regal and distinguished air about it. Chris did well with his interview, so help me keep my fingers crossed that he gets offered this scholarship.

For our weekly Paper a la Mode challenge at The Outlawz, I made a fall-themed banner - it covers both Halloween and Thanksgiving, so I can leave it up hanging from my mantle for a couple of months. I used some cute tree and house-shaped chipboards as the base, and alternated 7 of them for the banner. I made each one unique, because really, who wants to be boring and make the same thing over and over. Here are a few photos of the individual pieces and the overall banner.

So, which one is your favorite? I like each of them for different reasons. I put the whole thing together with some beautiful orange satin ribbon, but it's a bit difficult to see in the photo of the entire banner - it's the same ribbon that you see on several of the individual banner pieces. I got that ribbon, and most of my ribbons and lace, from Martha Pined's Etsy Shop, Creating Is Fun. She has gorgeous stuff, and you can't beat her prices and customer service. And she has lots of sales!

Thanks for stopping by, and big hugs to everyone!

And Even More ...

Got a couple more cards done yesterday with a couple more of my new A Day for Daisies digis.

This first one is for one of my little nephews - I thought he would enjoy the spiders. There wasn't much coloring involved - just the bodies of the spiders with some gray-scale Copics. Then I used one of my distress ink pads to blend some orange color around the edges, since it is for Halloween. The papers are a hodgepodge of scraps that I had from previous projects.

This next one is for my sister. She loves cats - we call her "The Crazy Cat Lady" - and so I always make cards for her that have cats on them. She always love them, and keeps every single one. I colored the cats with a mix of Copics and Prismacolors and put on a sentiment sticker and some pretty buttons from my extensive button collection, otherwise known as the "Stash"!

Thanks for stopping by! Big hugs!

Saturday is A Day for Daisies! (and pretty birds)

Soooo ... I got my new October digi kit from A Day for Daisies yesterday, and there are so many beautiful images. I love this little bird, and I decided to modify it a bit by adding some words to it. Not sure where this quote came from, by I thought it was appropriate. I made this card for a sweet friend of mine who has been going through some tough times this year, so I'll put it in the mail on Monday and hopefully it will cheer her up a bit.

I used some My Mind's Eye papers, my favorite Stampin' Up Top Notes die, and some ribbon and buttons from my stash, along with a little Tim Holtz ticket that I've been hoarding for several years! And of course a little black cardstock, because it just makes everything look prettier!

I think I'm going to make another one of these and put it on kraft cardstock, because it also makes everything look prettier!

Thanks for stopping by, and love and big hugs to you!

3-Dimensional Designs - The Outlawz 1000 Member Party

Hi everybody! Thanks so much for stopping by to see what I made. It's always nice to have visitors.

Over at The Outlawz, we are having our 1000 Member Party all this week, starting today, October 3rd. We have a blog hop going on, which is perhaps how you wound up here. We also have lots of challenges and games going on this week, so if you aren't already playing along, I recommend you get on over to the party and have some fun with us. We have over $800 in sponsored prizes being given away for the party - you can check out the sponsor list and prizes by going to The Outlawz home page.

Now on to my 3-dimensional creations. Our challenge for the Paper a la Mode group is to use Autumn colors for a non-Autumn themed design, and do something in 3D. So this first design uses a 3-D heart for a "love"-ly little card.

This next design is a decoration I made for my fireplace mantel. I love fall - it's my favorite time of the year. I don't do a lot of holiday-type decorating throughout the year, but I always have some things around the house to celebrate this wonderful season. The air cooled off here in Virginia this weekend, so it definitely feels like fall now, at least for the next few days. We will have a couple more hot spells I'm sure, but there's nothing like that first nip of cold air!

And then I made a couple of pumpkins to go along with the half pumpkin on the framed design. These are pretty good size - about 3" across on the scalloped one and about 3 1/2" on the larger one. They use up a couple of sheets of paper each, but they are just so darn cute and very easy to make. I'm going to make several smaller ones and create a tablescape for Thanksgiving with these and some larger real pumpkins and candles. Can't wait!

Thanks again for stopping by, and I hope you'll take a moment to become a follower of my blog and leave me some love! I recently realized I've gone over 100 followers, so it's time for some blog candy soon!

I hope you are having beautiful weather wherever you are, and don't forget to stop by The Outlawz and play some games, join some challenges, and win some prizes! Big hugs!