TAWS December Release Blog Hop!

Good morning!  Today is the blog hop for the new December release at The Alley Way Stamps!  The Design Team has been very busy showing you little sneak peeks of the new stamps and today is the blog hop where you have a chance to win ALL THREE new sets!  Yay!

I made a card using the super fantastic images from True Colors.  And in an homage to the name I used lots of bright happy colors on my card.

So would you like to win the new stamp sets?  Well, if you do then read on.  All you need to do is a few simple things.  You can pick and choose the ones that you want to do, and the more you do the better your chance of winning! 

1. Comment on THIS post at The Alley Way Stamps blog;
2. Comment on the Design Team blogs (you'll find links to their blogs below);
3. Post about the new release on Facebook or your blog;
4. Like us on Facebook;
5. Follow us on YouTube;
6. Follow us on Pinterest. 

That's it!  Make sure you leave one comment on THIS post for each of these things you do.  You have until 9:00 TAWS time tonight to leave your comments for your chance to win!

And if that's not enough, during the month of December if you spend $40 or more in the TAWS store you will automatically receive a FREE stamp set!  It will be automatically added to your cart!  This months freebie is Meltdown.

Don't forget to leave a comment on the Design Team blogs to increase your chance of winning.  Just click on their smiling faces and you'll be magically transported to their blog!

Freshly Made Sketches 114

Looking for my TAWS Sneak Peek?  Click HERE.

It's Thanksgiving Eve here in the US and I'm celebrating with a card I made with the new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches!  This week Linda Suarez is our hostess and her sketch is classic and full of possibility!

Tomorrow my head will be filled with visions of turkey, stuffing and all the other yummy things that go along with Thanksgiving but today my head is full of Christmas.  This sketch had the perfect element to show off this gorgeous poinsettia.  I accented it in the center with silver glimmer paper then continued that theme with the little dots around the sentiment.

Be sure to check out the cards from our amazing Freshly Made Sketches design team.  And Happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Signature Christmas (Papertrey Ink)

Paper:  Old Olive, Cherry Cobbler, Silver Glimmer (SU)

Ink:  Old Olive (SU)

Accessories:  Blooming Poinsettia die (Memory Box); Sizzix embossing folder; washi tape (SU)

TAWS December Release Sneak Peek Day Two

Bazinga!  Welcome to the second day of sneak peeks for The Alley Way Stamps!  Today I've got a fun card to show you with some images from the soon-to-be released Bubbling Over that will appeal to the scientist in all of you!  For a chance to win this stamp set keep reading!

This ain't no Sheldon Cooper, but I love him all the same!  Finally, the perfect image for this mathematical washi tape that I love so much!  (The Wanna Sketch was perfect to show it off)!

For a chance to win this stamp set just leave a comment on THIS POST at The Alley Way Stamps blog and by sharing that sneak peek on Facebook.  Be sure to leave a comment on THIS POST for each that you do by 9:30 TAWS time.

Good luck!

colourQ 217

Hi everyone!  Are you ready for a new palette from colourQ?  I love this one because it's got two of my favorite colors:  Kiwi Kiss and Early Espresso!

I dug into my never-ending, somehow mysteriously multiplying DSP stash and found this Kiwi Kiss paper to use as a background for the tag.  Then I stamped this subway style sentiment (they're so popular right now and I love them) and surrounded it by some sweet colorful flowers.  I'm also playing along with the sketch at Fab Friday.  I took a little liberty and flipped the sketch, so I hope that's okay with the folks over there!

The colourQ team have created some beauties this week so you should definitely check them out!  And thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Flower Fusion #9 (Papertrey Ink); Confidence (KaiserCraft)

Paper:  Early Espresso, Kiwi Kiss, Whisper White (SU)

Ink:  Tangerine Tango, Tempting Turquoise, Early Espresso (SU)

Accessories:  Tag Sale #5 die (Papertrey Ink); Early Espresso baker's twine (SU); Iridescent Chocolate sequins (Ellen Hutson); white seam binding ribbon

Trim the Tree DS128

Thanks to everyone who sent me birthday well wishes yesterday!  I had a lovely day, went out to eat and had barbecue chicken pizza (my favorite).  Then I settled down to watch the Patriots.  I was really hoping for a win as a birthday present and boy did they deliver!  Although technically the win didn't happen until after midnight, I'm still going to count it!

Today I've got a fun Christmas card to show you using the latest sketch at Deconstructed Sketches.  I love those sketches because they've always got fun layers and usually give me a good excuse to dig into my huge stash of patterned paper.

I love this tree from Jolly Holiday and I use it a lot at this time of year.  It's so versatile and can be used on card stock and patterned paper alike for different looks.  I wish it came in a bigger size **hint** hint**!

Sadly, today is the last day of my vacation.  It's back to the old grind tomorrow :(  I'll have Thursday off for Thanksgiving, of course, but otherwise it's work, work, work.  Why is it that 15 minutes after you're back in the office after a nice, long, relaxing vacation it's like you never left?

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Jolly Holiday (The Alley Way Stamps)

Paper:  Scarlett Jewell, Ripe Avocado, Spring Moss, Holiday Cheer (Papertrey Ink); Very Vanilla (SU)

Ink:  Tuxedo Black (Memento); Ripe Avocado (Papertrey Ink)

Accessories:  Pierced Circle STAX (My Favorite Things); Stitched Sentiment Flag (Lil' Inker Designs); Guidelines Impression Plate (Papertrey Ink)

BE Inspired 42

Happy Friday!  Today is the start of a brand new BE Inspired challenge at The Alley Way Stamps blog and  your chance to win a free stamp set!  The warm colors of the inspiration photo made me think of Thanksgiving so I made this card to celebrate that iconic Thanksgiving image:  the turkey!

 I think I've been waiting forever to ink up this turkey from It's Fall About You!  I love his fun plumage and can envision him colored in lots of fun ways, but today I stuck to the colors at the Color Throwdown because they were totally in keeping with the inspiration photo.  The layout of my card comes from Sketch Saturday.

Don't forget that one of the best parts of the BE Inspired challenge is that you have a chance to win a free stamp set from The Alley Way Stamps!  All you have to do is play along with the challenge using an image (or two, or three!) from The Alley Way Stamps.  And as always if you don't own any stamps yet you can find FREEBIES HERE!  One lucky participant in the challenge will be hand picked to win a free stamp set and one participant will be randomly selected to win a free stamp set!  How cool is that?

I hope you have a chance to play along and good luck!

Freshly Made Sketches 113

It's Wednesday so that means it's time for a new sketch reveal at Freshly Made Sketches.  This week Cindy is our hostess and she's given us a super clean sketch.  I embellished mine a bit and did a Christmas theme since I'm busy working on my Christmas card stash *insert smile here*

As luck would have it this week CAS-ual Fridays is teaming up with Curtain Call for a Christmas themed challenge and the inspiration photo gave me the colors for my card.  I liked the rustic stockings hanging from the fireplace so I grabbed Kraft card stock.  And the blue around the fireplace reminded me of the retired Bayou Blue so I used that for some accents   It didn't photograph well but it really is more blue than it looks here.  And finally the sparkly ornaments on the tree called for Silver Glimmer paper and a few sequins.

Beautiful cards abound from the ever-amazing Freshly Made Sketches design team (but you knew that anyway)!  I hope to see you in the gallery this week!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Christmas Carols (CAS-ual Fridays Stamps)

Paper:  Kraft (Avery Elle); Blue Bayou, Soft Sky, Silver Glimmer, Whisper White (SU)

Ink:  Blue Bayou

Accessories:  Snowflake Trio die (amuse studio); Make a Snowflake die (Taylored Expressions); Winter Blend sequins (Avery Elle)

Hi for US231 and SSC63

As soon as I saw the latest sketch at Unscripted Sketches I knew I wanted to play along.  All those cool rectangles are just so darn fun!  Then I saw the color challenge at Sunday Stamps and thought the two together would be perfect.

I used some old scraps of DSP in Basic Gray, Kiwi Kiss and Taken With Teal to create the background then added the super adorable "hi" speech bubble from Spell Check.  I love how it looks against the patterned paper.

A cute and easy card!  Just how I like 'em!  Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Spell Check (The Alley Way Stamps)

Paper:  Solar White (Neenah); Basic Gray, Sweet Pea DSP, Walk in the Park DSP, Urban Oasis DSP (SU)

Ink:  Basic Gray (SU)

colourQ 216

We are continuing the theme of autumn-inspired colors this week at colourQ.  And I just love that bit of Bashful Blue thrown in!

Aren't those colorful acorns adorable?  I didn't use acorns on my card but I did use some leaves from the same kinds of trees.  The multitude of little flags on my card were inspired by the sketch at Cardabilities.

As you can expect, the colourQ design team have got some fabulous designs to share with you this week so head on over there and check them out.  I hope you have time to join us in the gallery!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Paper:  Crumb Cake, Pumpkin Pie, More Mustard, Bashful Blue, Whisper White

Ink:  More Mustard (SU); Spiced Marmalade (Distress)

Accessories:  Stitched Leaves die (Lawn Fawn); More Mustard button (SU); baker's twine (American Crafts)

Merry Christmas DD#79 rs90

I tried to knock out another Christmas card using the colors at Dynamic Duos and the sketch from retro sketches.  This one looked better in my head than in the execution.

I used Brushed Silver card stock instead of Smoky Slate because I wanted this to be a bit more sparkly.  I had a bit of trouble getting the "merry" die cut out of the die before I remembered that putting some wax paper between the die and the card stock helps to get it out.  It worked really well.

My mother is taking me bowling with her tomorrow (she's in a league and practices on Mondays).  I'm a little afraid because I think I've been bowling a total of three times in my life and once was when I was a little kid so I'm not counting that one.  What's worse is that we're bowling candle pins and according to my niece, who went bowling with my mother a few weeks ago, Nana is a hard task master when she gets in the lane.  Oh boy.  Wish me luck!

Thanks for stopping by.

Supplies:

Paper:  Basic Black, Brushed Silver, Vellum (SU)

Ink:  Onyx Black (Versafine)

Accessories:  Expressions Thinlets (SU); Burlap stencil (Tim Holtz); silver embossing paste; Midnight Blend sequins (Avery Elle)