Bundle of Joy

Today I am sharing a card that I submitted for the Go To Sketches call at Paper Crafts. It wasn't accepted, but I'm participating in a blog hop over at Amber's blog for all of the rejects!! Okay, this is such great idea....I have loved looking at all of the rejected cards. There is some serious talent out there....I had to keep reminding myself that these are the ones they didn't pick up!! Crazy! This was the first time I have ever submitted for publication, so I had zero expectations! Good thing, huh? lol! Paper Crafts reported they had over 2700 cards submitted for consideration! WOW....that's a lot of cards!
Here is my first rejected card based off of sketch #35:



Be back soon with reject #2!

Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies

Cardstock: Stampers Select White, Summer Sunrise, New Leaf, Hawaiian Shores (Papertrey Ink)

Stamps: Tiny Treats:Valentine, Fresh Alphabet, Bitty Background Blocks, Mega Mixed Messages (Papertrey Ink)

Ink: True Black, Hawaiian Shores, Summer Sunrise (Papertrey Ink), Clover Meadow (CTMH)

Other: Button Card Collection die, 1/4" White Silk ribbon, Cream Button Twine, button (all Papertrey Ink), Cuttlebug tag die (Provocraft)

Papertrey Ink February Blog Hop Challenge

TGIF....and as an added bonus it happens to be the 25th!! This month's PTI blog hop theme was all about scallops. I know there will be a lot of great cards to check out so I'll keep the chit chat to a minimum!



So, I layered strips of scallops cut out with the medium scallop border punch, glued them all together and ran it thru my cuttlebug using the cloud dies.


I wasn't sure it would cut it cleanly, but it did. I had to make a few snips here and there with my scissors, but it did cut it better than I thought it would! I sponged some fresh snow ink over the "humps" before I adhered it all together to give it some depth. I really like how they turned out. I'm not sure the picture does them much justice! I'm already thinking of scalloped trees or a sunrise.....if only there were a few more hours in the day!
Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies (all Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise indicated)
Paper: rustic white, spring rain, harvest gold
Stamps: Up, Up and Away
ink: true black, pure poppy, fresh snow, simply chartreuse, hibiscus burst, orange zest
other: limitless layers die, clouds die, medium scallop die, sunshine impression plate

"Make It Monday" Challenge....

...on a Friday. This week's PTI's "Make It Monday Challenge" was to use a vellum sentiment strip. Sounds easy, right? I've discovered that I'm not a fan of vellum. Don't get me wrong, I would love your card with vellum....just not mine. It's kind of like salad for me. I love eating salad as long as someone else makes it, but if I make one it never tastes as good. Does that happen to anyone else!!?!? So, anyway, here is my attempt at a card with a vellum sentiment strip:

This is for my nephew's birthday next month. I am loving these weekly PTI challenges...I might actually make a few cards before I need them!



Thanks for stopping by,
Melanie

Supplies (all Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise noted)
Cardstock: Harvest Gold, Pure Poppy, Hawaiian Shores, Simply Chartreuse, True Black
Ink: True Black
Dies: Banner Borders, By the Numbers, Seeing Stars, Double Ended Banner
Impression Plate: By the Numbers
Other: Lemon Tart button, DMC black floss

"Make It Monday" challenge

Have you seen all of the exciting things going on over at Papertrey Ink? This is my absolute favorite company related to this hobby I love so much! February is their anniversary month and it's one big celebration! I'm sure if you are reading this you have gotten here from their new facebook page, but if not here is a link to Nichole's blog (one of the owners of PTI) to see what I'm talking about!
Here is my entry for the very first challenge in the new Make It Monday series:


Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies (all Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise indicated)
card stock: Rustic white, berry sorbet, sweet blush
Stamps: My Punny Valentine, Heart Prints, Around and About Sentiments, Everyday Button Bits, Mega Mixed Messages, Say It with Style
Ink: Berry Sorbet, Sweet Blush, Dark Chocolate
Other: Fiskars border punch

Welcome, little baby bee

Hello! Hope everyone out there is keeping warm. Here in St. Louis, we are hunkering (is that a real word?) down for what the meteorologists are calling a historic winter storm. Great. We have already had 8 snow days and if we get what they are predicting, this whole week could be a wash. The kids are going to be going to school until July at this rate! Hopefully, there will be a few clear hours tomorrow before it all starts....I really need to get to the bank and post office. I'm keeping my fingers crossed!
This is a card that I made for a friend of mine to donate for a fundraiser. (I'll have to update with more information on that later!) I made two sets of cards and I will post them over the next week or so. I have to mention that this was kind of tricky for me, because they had to be mailable. So, no ribbon bows or too much extra stuff that makes a card so cute! I did sneak in a few buttons and some flatter ribbon treatments on some of the cards, but that's about all.

Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies- both cards (all Papertrey Ink unless otherwise indicated)
Cardstock: Harvest Gold, Vellum (wings)
PP: Bitty Dot Basics
Stamps: Baby Button Bits
Ink: True Black, Chamomile-vintage touch tea dye duo
Other: Medium Scallop die, black button, button twine

Papertrey January Blog Hop Challenge

Gosh, where to begin....It's been a long time. Wow! Nine months to be exact...and no I did NOT have a baby! Get it? Nine months....okay, that's probably only funny to me!
I wish I had some great reason for my absence, but fortunately it's just been life. Everyone is healthy and happy and, well, busy! I think I've been gone so long, I need to update my profile picture! Those kids look cute and little, mine are bigger and still pretty cute, but definitely older!
This month's blog hop at Papertrey Ink was just what I needed to get back into the swing of things.

This month's blog hop challenge involves you challenging yourself to use a Papertrey stamp set that has yet to see ink or even one that might be collecting a little dust! Go through your stash and see what little used treasure it might hold.

Okay, so this is just speaking to me. I just might have a stamp set (or ten!) that has never seen ink!! The real challenge here is deciding which one to would use! :) I finally decided on Up, Up and Away. I loved this set from the minute I saw the sneak peeks....


First let me just say, I love PTI's dies and Impression Plates!! Those little cloud dies are to die for!! (pun intended!) Love them. I also used the Sunshine Impression Plate on this card and I just love how it gives the card a sense of movement under those balloons. Surprisingly, it even photographed well... Bonus!


On this next card, I used the Fancy Flourishes set in addition the the Up, Up and Away. FF has always been one of my favorites and it has definitely seen plenty of ink!



Now that I'm back, I hope to continue posting. I love it and just wish there were more hours in the day or maybe a few less extra-curricular activities for my kids. Either way, I have several more cards to post over the next few days, so please come back!
Thanks for stopping by,
Melanie

Supplies- both cards (all Papertrey Ink unless otherwise indicated)
Cardstock: Spring Rain, Stampers Select white
PP: Bitty Box Basics
Stamps: Up, Up and Away, Fancy Flourishes
Ink: True Black, Pure Poppy and Simply Chartruese all PTI , and Sunflower (CTMH)
Other: Sunshine Impression Plate; Cloud, Hot Air Balloon and Ric Rac dies; Simply Chartruese felt; gems (other)

Papertrey Ink Blog Hop

This month's blog hop at Papertrey Ink is all about incorporation tissue paper into your project. I decided to make a couple of tags for my project. I have been wanting to try these flowers for awhile and it didn't seem practical to put them on a card as I don't see how you would fit it into an envelope! If I need a card to go with them, I can always make something that coordinates without all of the puffiness of tissue paper!






On this second tag I also used tissue paper for the border along with the felt. I intentionally left off the sentiments on these tags, so that I could use them for whatever need comes up.
Thanks for stopping by and have fun tonight!
Melanie

Is everyone keeping warm?? We were teased with a touch of spring only to be shocked back to winter this weekend! Hopefully this is it for the winter-like weather...now here comes the rain every other day. But, I'll take it and I'll try not to complain too much!

This is a card for the Paper Crafts Gallery challenge featuring babies and brides. One of my favorite new Papertrey Ink stamp sets is their baby button bits which I used on this card. The striped pattern was created with the Faux Ribbon stamp set.

I am supposed to be working, so I better get off here. Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies (all Papertrey Ink unless otherwise indicated)
Cardstock: Ripe Avocado, Spring Rain, Stampers Select white
Stamps: Baby Button Bits, Background Basics: Tin Types, Faux Ribbon
Ink: Ripe Avocado, Spring Rain
Other: Ripe Avocado button, Spring Rain ribbon, twine, Nestabilities Label 3, Copic markers

Moxie Fab World's Olympics of Stamping challenge

I read that today was the deadline for the Moxie Fab World's Olympics of Stamping challenge so I thought I would enter the few Christmas cards I made into the Season's Greetings category. Thanks for looking...

Tis the Season:


Supplies {all Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise indicated}:
Cardstock: Kraft, Dark Chocolate, Raspberry Fizz, Vintage Cream
Ink: New Leaf, Dark Chocolate
Stamps: Tree Trimming Trio, Signature Christmas, Text Style
Other: EK Success edge punch, Queen and Co. gems, sewing machine


We Wish You a Merry Christmas:


Supplies (all Papertrey Ink, unless indicated otherwise)
Cardstock: Kraft, Dark Chocolate
Stamps: Vintage Ornaments, Signature Christmas, Polka Dot Basics 2
Ink: Pure Poppy, Fresh Snow, Dark Chocolate
Other: glitter-Martha Stewart, ribbon- unknown, button and twine-Papertrey Ink


Love Peace Joy:


Card Supplies
paper: Smokey Shadow, Pure Poppy (PTI)
stamps: Tree Trimming Trio, Holiday Button Bits (PTI)
Ink: True Black (PTI), Versamark
Other: Stickles, Spellbinders label 1 die, EK Success paper edger, embellishment (Michaels), clear embossing powder

Papertrey Ink Blog Hop

This month's Papertrey Ink blog hop is a fun one! As soon as I read the details, I knew I wanted to participate.
From the Papertrey Ink website:

Since we just finished up our 3rd Anniversary Festivities, we thought we would do something extra special for this month's Blog Hop! Design Team Appreciation Day! Your challenge is to go through the Design Team gallery or any of the Design Team Members' blogs and find a project that is especially inspirational to you! Then recreate the project with your own spin, making it unique! Be sure to share a link and photo of the original project that inspired you! And you can also use this opportunity to thank the team for all their contributions this past year! I know they inspire ME daily and I never seem to thank them enough! We look forward to seeing your projects!

I have always said that I think Papertrey Ink has some of the most talented designers in the industry. They are each so unique and inspiring in their own way. I'm excited for them to get a lot of *love* tonight!! So, the agonizing decision of who/what to showcase was extremely difficult!!! I ended up choosing something that when I first saw it...It was one of those WOW! moments for me. It was on Mish's blog and it is something she calls rib-n-strips. Here is the blog post where she introduced this very clever idea.
Here is Mish's card featuring her rib-n-strips:

Such a clever idea...and a great reason to hang on to those ribbon scraps!

Here is my card featuring Mish's rib-n-strips:


This was such a fun blog hop idea and I truly can't wait to visit everyone's blog. Thank you to Mish and all of the design team members for their daily inspiration! I seriously could of picked any one of them for this blog hop. They are ALL truly awesome!!

'til next time!
Melanie

Supplies (All Papertrey Ink, unless indicated otherwise)
Cardstock: Stamper's Select white, Spring Morning, Raspberry Fizz
Stamps: Turning a New Leaf, Baby Button Bits, Everyday Classics (annv. set)
Ink: True Black, Spring Morning
Other: Ribbon (all PTI), EK Success edge punch, Nestabilities Label One die, Copic markers, buttons from stash

"I'm in pieces..."

Hello! Hope everyone is having a great week so far! We spent last weekend in Kansas City with some family and came home to a few inches of snow on the ground. The kids were already off for Presidents day on Monday, but I'm sure they would of been anyway. So, with the short week I feel like it's flying by! Normally a good thing, but we are celebrating my middle son's birthday this weekend and I'm not even close to being ready!
Anyway, on to the card! I made this for Betsy's challenge "I'm in pieces" Basically, she challenged us to do some paper piecing. The umbrella card she made with this technique is amazing...No surprise that this girl is the sole reason I have purchased so many Papertrey Ink stamp sets! In fact I've added Scattered Showers to my cart just because of this card! I love it!! So, I don't think if I've ever paper pieced anything before....so I dusted off my Cricut that I gave myself for Christmas *wink* and got busy!

I'm totally new to the whole Cricut thing, but I have to tell you, I'm hooked! I pieced together this cute little snail from a cartridge FULL of cute little critters called Paisley. I only have a few cartridges that I picked up on Black Friday last year, but I can see that I'm gonna have to do something about that... very soon!
Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies
Cardstock: Smokey Shadow, Summer Sunrise-Papertrey Ink
PP: all from DCWV 'the Spring stack'
Stamps: Turning a New Leaf, Pond Life
Ink: Smokey Shadow, Spring Moss
Other: Spring Rain button-PTI, Cricut and Paisley cartridge, sewing machine

{embellish magazine} color challenge w/ribbon

Hello! I wanted to quickly post a card for the recent Embellish magazine challenge. I am having all sorts of camera issues this week. I can't seem to find the battery charger to my camera and it has finally died, just before I could photograph my card. Anyway, to make a long story short, I almost didn't get this up in time and I've just about got my house torn apart! I still haven't found the charger, but fortunately I hung on to my old camera. The picture quality isn't as good, but it will have to do!
So, here are the details for this challenge:




I lined a piece of cardstock with Terrifically Tacky tape and placed my ribbon strips at a diagonal across the cardstock. After the ribbon was secure, I cut the cardstock with my trimmer to the size I wanted. Fortunately, I had just replaced the blade, so it cut through it pretty well! I first saw this technique on a blog somewhere...I'll try to find the link. I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to give it a try! It's a good way to use up those ribbon scraps, too! Edited to add: I found the link...here. I knew it had to be one of the PTI girls!! lol
Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies
Cardstock: Stampers Select White, Hibiscus Burst, Dark Chocolate-all PaperTrey Ink
Stamps: Say it with Style-PTI
Ink: Dark Chocolate-PTI
Other: all ribbon-PTI except the teal (unknown from my stash), EK Success paper edger, Cricut Storybook cartridge, Copic Markers, gems-unknown, Terrifically Tacky tape-Provocraft

The Pink Elephant Birthday Blog Hop

Happy Birthday Ella!!
Welcome to my stop on The Pink Elephant birthday blog hop! Hopefully, you started at the The Pink Elephant Blog....If not, click on the link above and get on over there!! {You don't want to miss anything!} For our participation, we were able to choose any of the challenges from the first year for our project. I went back to the beginning and picked the very first challenge, which was to create card using the colors Pink, Black and White. In honor of Ella!
Here is my card:


Your next stop on the hop is BJ Owens-DiCandia.....Have fun!!!

Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies (all supplies from Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise indicated)
Cardstock: True Black, Raspberry Fizz
PP: Bitty Box
Stamps: Heart Prints
Other: Cricut & Accent Essentials cartridge, EK Success border punch, Marvy heart punch, button and True Black saddle-stitch ribbon-PTI

CPS 153

The sponsor for the CPS #153 is Papertrey Ink, so of course I had to play along!


While I had the supplies out from the last 2 sketch challenges, I made this for the CPS challenge. I'm still loving this cupcake...but I'm ready to move on!! There are so many cute images in this set that I can't wait to ink up!
I'm keeping this short and sweet as it's almost 2 am here. School has already been called off for tomorrow, so I will get to sleep in a little. I'm kinda excited about that! I do have my post ready to go for tomorrow's blog hop celebrating one year of The Pink Elephant challenges. I can't wait!
Hope to see you then! ;)
Melanie

Supplies (all Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise stated)
Cardstock: Lemon Tart, Stampers Select White, Hibiscus Burst, Dark Chocolate
PP: Making Memories Cheeky Collection-Abby
Stamps: Baby Button Bits, Mixed Messages
Ink: Dark Chocolate
Other: Button, Rustic twine, Marvy Punch, Copic markers, Cuttlebug tag die. Melon Berry twill ribbon, safety pin

"Just Us Girls" Challenge #19

Here is a super fun sketch from "Just Us Girls" for their 19th challenge:




Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies (all Papertrey Ink, unless otherwise stated)
Cardstock: Lemon Tart, Stampers Select White
PP: Making Memories Cheeky Collection-Abby
Stamps: Baby Button Bits, Say It With Style, Vintage Labels
Ink: Dark Chocolate
Other: Buttons, Rustic twine, Marvy Punch, Copic markers

Card Patterns #50

It's been awhile since I have participated over at Card Patterns...I had almost forgot how much I love their sketches! This week they are being sponsored by a digi stamp company called Inktegrity. Cute stuff! I haven't dipped my toe in the digi world yet, but these images may give me a push to give 'em a try.

This adorable cupcake is from the Baby Button Bits stamp set from Papertrey Ink. I don't have much need for another baby themed set, but I *needed* this cupcake...Isn't it sweet!?! Don't get me wrong there are plenty of other cute images in the set...but this one is my favorite. Love it!
Anyway, I will be back tomorrow with a card for The Pink Elephant Blog Hop. I also have more challenge cards to post from this week...I know, I can't believe it myself!! ha! Hope to see you then! ;)
Thanks for stopping by!
Melanie

Supplies
Cardstock: Lemon Tart, Hibiscus Burst, Stampers Select White
PP: Making Memories Cheeky Collection-Abby
Stamps: Baby Button Bits, Mega Mixed Messages
Ink: Dark Chocolate
Other: Melon Berry ribbon, button, Rustic twine, Marvy Punch, Cuttlebug tag die, Copic markers