More "inspired by" cards

Edit- I am so excited, happy, and touched!  This card was selected as a Top Five on Hope Stamps Eternal.:)


I love when I have extra paper and supplies sitting out and inspiration hits! I made some cards yesterday and I almost never have a clean work area. Bits and pieces ended up sitting next to each other and they looked so pretty I came up with a "cherry" of an idea (I know, I know. I pushed it too much with the cherry thing huh. ;).

These are the cards I made with leftovers after making yesterday's cards. Hope Stamps Eternal had the cutest cupcakes for their cupcake challenge. The button candy on top of the cupcakes is so cute! Your Next Stamp has a spring themed challenge so I'm claiming spring colors since cherries are really a summer fruit. ;)
The paper is Bo Bunny Ella and some Bo Bunny Poppy Dot. The buttons and cherry stamp are from Papertrey. I stamped the cherry stems with Distress Ink peeled paint The tag is a 2" office label tag and the ribbon is leftover from some cookies I got in a beautiful bag (love that "free" ribbon!).

Where do you get your inspiration? Magazines, blogs, sketches, catalogs? I'd love to hear when, where, how inspiration struck and what you were able to create!

Life IS like a box of chocolates!

***Pictures of cards 'n other crafty stuff way below. Scroll down lots to get there. :) ***

More on our Savannah trip... We've taken to calling something "A Savannah" when we change our plans at the ultimate last minute. :) (Methinks we have been watching too much Leverage and Human Target). We drove back in 2 days and it took us about 17 hours. We were totally exhausted and a little sad that we were so tired. We used to be able to drive from Clemson, SC to Albany, NY without ever having to stop at a hotel. Ah, the idiocy of youth. :)
This is the church the feather comes floating down from in Forrest Gump. The sky was just too beautiful and the steeple looks so stunning! The bench he sat on and the feather scene were filmed in Savannah.
We did make it to Lady and Sons! Of course we had fried green tomatoes, pulled pork, crab cakes, cheese and herb rolls, cornbread pancakes, and then a very long walk because we were so full. :)
One of the "sons" was there and there was a huge line of folks getting their "picture made" with him. I skipped the line and climbed the stairs to get this shot. It seemed only fair that the huge fans get the picture with this fella. Oooh! I got some gossip from our waiter that Paula Deen is supposed to start her own talk show soon. She's filming it in NYC. I'm sure uber fans already know this, but thought I'd pass it along anyhoo. ;)
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I'm sure to post more pic's in the future, but for now- CRAFTY STUFF!

Belli Challenge, The Corrosive Challenge, and Taylored Expressions are all hosting challenges involving things with wings. Taylored Expressions is taking their challenge a step further and making their's a pay-it-forward as well. They gave a sketch and asked folks to make cards with a dragonfly. Their hope is to collect dragonfly themed cards to donate to a neonatal unit. The doctors and nurses give these cards to parents who have suffered the loss of a newborn. You can read more about it on their site. I hope you will consider taking a moment to send some love to others in need.

To make this card I used Memory Box card for the base, Bo Bunny Ella paper for the background layer, a Magenta dragonfly stamp, Dew Drops flame, some scraps of pink punched paper, and no name ribbon I got ages ago from a $1 bin.
I colored the dragonfly with copics and added a golden shine with interference paints. Not sure if you can get the whole effect in this photo, but they are pretty IRL. I made some other "stuff" with this same color scheme that I hope to post tomorrow. We'll see how exhausted I am after the first day back to school since vacation began on the 12th!

Better lucky than good...

There's a LONG tale of adventure here. If you just want to see pickies of the card, scroll down a ways. :)

My husband jokes that it's sometimes better to be lucky than good when things go really well for us. Take this past week for instance. We finished celebrating Curious Cupid at school and I got my Reveal Present! Yummy sweets from one of the first grade teachers. I, of course, gave my gal a little basket of cards. :)Then it was time to pack. Tom proposed to me in a little town outside Asheville 10 years ago. To celebrate the anniversary we were supposed to stay at a beautiful cabin near Asheville. Have you heard about all the snow in the South?!?!? We joked about it and drove down to see friends in DC on our way to NC. (To say that DC's neighborhood roads are a disaster is like saying that a broken leg is just a scratch. It is awful to drive on anything but main roads and I love to drive in all weather, on all roads.) Just before we were supposed to leave DC for Asheville I got an email saying we might not be able to get into the cabin because of snow. Well, we figured we'd start the drive anyway and see what we could do when we got there. In the process of leaving we got stuck in our friends driveway, then as the guys were trying to rock push the car, I got a phone call. The owner of the cabin needed to refund my money because there was no way we could get to the cabin with all the snow. (The poor folks in NC, they never get this kinda weather!) What to do?!? Drive to Savannah of course!
We were already driving a long ways and Savannah would only add an 1 1/2 hours to the trip (the Asheville part was going to be a LOT of backroads). We scrambled and found a fantastic place I had been looking at on HomeAway was available. It usually works that you send emails to the owners, but I bit the bullet and called. Jackpot! The owner said the place was available, but worried about how quickly I needed to get in. No worries, I told him, we were a good 10 hours from Savannah. :) We traded a couple of emails for contract/agreements/rules/check-in/directions and then we were off!
The place is gorgeous, but the cold has come to GA. Highs have been in the mid-40's with a heck of a breeze. Glad I had packed for a cabin and not Savannah or I would be cold right now. It's right on River Walk, so the view is amazing!
This is from the little balcony looking to the right so I could get the cobblestones and ship in the picture. It's too cold to sit outside, so I'm sitting on the sofa right now sipping coffee and looking out at the Savannah River (I think that's the name). Yesterday we got the chance to see two huge (I mean HUGE) cargo ships come down the river. It's amazing to see how big those ships are and how quickly they move! Anyway, this loft is in a great walking location to shops and restaurants. We're hoping to be very touristy and go to Lady and Sons for lunch today. :) I'll post pictures if we make it! So basically we got lucky. We had planned for a totally different vacation and ended up with a fantastic last minute Plan B vacation. Life is good right now and we both know it and completely appreciate it.

Now for the inspiration piece!!!
This is a ridiculously easy card. The image is a Penny Black sticker that I Stickled and then stamped some black swirls around. You should see how it sparkles in the light! Folks love these cards and since there are so many PB stickers the possibilities are endless.

What kind of big or small adventure have you had? What great and easy cards have you made? Tell me, tell me, tell me! I love to hear a good tale. :)

Patterned Thoughts

Thanks to folks for sharing some of their Valentine traditions! It's so interesting to hear, and be inspired by, the traditions of folks everywhere. Day One of Curious Cupid is over and I need to hurry up and get the gift for Day Two ready! In the meantime I thought I would post a fun card that I taught a little bit ago and finally got around to snapping shots.
I just came across a lovely blog called Lucy's Cards and she is hosting a polka dots challenge, gosh then I saw Pollycraft was doing a challenge with a things with wings theme and finally Kaboodle Doodle is doing a spots and stripes challenge. Well, I was so excited to see these challenges because this card was a stretch for me. I tend to stamp only on white paper, color the image and then mount it on pattern paper. I've seen other fabulous creations that are stamped on patterned paper and so I stepped outside of my box and created this (I think) fun card.I used StazOn timber brown to stamp this birds and tree image. I'm pretty sure it is Memory Box, but I just finished cleaning my little studio and this stamp is buried in my "Fauna" bin of stamps. (If I'm wrong, please let me know!) The paper is from the orange scrap bag.
The sentiment is from Hero Arts and is also stamped with StazOn timber brown on paper from the green scrap bag (cause it happens to have mostly green on it :) ). I added red Stickles to the flowers and a couple of dots that were stamped along with the sentiment.

I'm kinda proud of myself for stepping outside of my comfort zone. My friend Isabelle and I used to joke that I used so much brown, white, and other earth tones that to me exciting cards were ones that I would "punch up with a little beige". I think I've come a long way since those days. :) What "personal craft challenge" have you "overcome"? I'd love to hear from all of you!

Curious Cupid

I'm getting ready for our Curious Cupid celebration at school. It's just like Secret Santa, but between the craziness of the December holidays and the fact that not all the staff celebrate Christmas, many moons ago folks decided to liven up February with Curious Cupid. I have to say it is wonderful! We deliver little gifts, with or without a hint, for three days prior to Valentine's Day (or this year right before vacation week) and then have a big Reveal Breakfast before school. You have never seen so much red, white, and pink in one place! All the big reveal final gifts are passed out and there are many hugs. :)
This card was made using Memory Box cards, Marvy heart punches, StazOn saddle brown ink, flourish stamps and a french/latin? stamp for the patterning. I used stickles to ad bling to the hearts and the paper with flourishes is a poor man's polished stone technique. I call it that 'cause I didn't use true glossy paper. It was some scrap paper that had enough thickness to handle the Adirondack inks and enough shine to give a little polish effect.
I really enjoy our Curious Cupid tradition. At my church growing up we used to bake cookies and put them into decorated coffee cans to deliver to shut-ins. Some of the classrooms write letters to folks at the senior center or sent care packages to soldiers. Do you have any Valentine traditions? I'd love to hear about them, so please share them. Your tradition may be an inspiration to someone else. :)

Here's to hoping your week is filled with joy, love, and happy surprises!