Freshly Made Sketches 596

Hold on to your hats folks, because we've got a fun new challenging sketch for you at Freshly Made Sketches!  Our hostess this week is Judy and she has challenged us to keep the bottom part of our sketch completely BLANK!  Say what???!!!

I flipped my card to horizontal to accommodate these mountain dies.  I stumbled across them as I was searching my stash to find something suitable for the sketch.  I feel like this card is a tribute to my fellow design team member Jen as she is a bad-ass mountain climber!  Check out her Instagram and you'll see what I mean.  And at Just Us Girls they are looking for three of something and I've got three mountain ranges here, so I'm going to add this to their challenge as well.

At Freshly Made Sketches there's lots of inspiration so I hope you'll play along with us!

Supplies
Stamps:  For the Graduate (SugarPea Designs)
Paper:  Solar White (Neenah); Gray Granite, Buckaroo Blue, Midnight Muse (Stampin' Up!)
Ink:  Onyx Black (Versafine)
Accessories:  Mountain Landscape Layers die (Impression Obsession)

Freshly Made Sketches 390

Happy Wednesday!  We've got a great new sketch for you at Freshly Made Sketches.  Judy is our hostess this week and I love her sketch.  It was a jumping off point for a graduation card for me.

The circle in the sketch is my graduate jumping in glee!  I've spent a lot of time lately obsessing about graduation cards because I've got two nephews who are graduating this year.  I've bought many dies, SVG files, and stamp sets trying to find just the right images.  For this card I chose the colors of the school for one of my nephews (with some black too) and I really like how this turned out.  Lucky for me the challenge this week at Addicted to CAS is graduation!

Thanks for stopping by!  My Freshly Made Sketches teammates have some great cards to inspire you to play along with us so be sure to check them out!

Supplies
Stamps:  For the Graduate (SugarPea Designs)
Paper:  Solar White (Neenah); Fresh Snow, Amethyst Allure (Papertrey Ink); Black Licorice (My Favorite Things); black glimmer (Recollections)
Ink:  Nocturne (Versafine Clair)
Accessories:  Washi Tape die (My Favorite Things); Graduation SVG (ZecWorkshop)

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I have graduation on the brain because I've got two nephews who are graduating this year - one from graduate school at New York University and another from law school at Boston College.  So pretty much every card I contemplate has got me wondering if I can incorporate a graduation theme.  I haven't been very successful lately with that but today's card made for the latest challenge at CAS)E) This Sketch gave me an opportunity.

That horizontal layer on the sketch became my group of graduates throwing their caps into the air!  I love how the image captures the caps as they are airborne!

Thanks for stopping by! My CAS(E) This Sketch teammates have got some great inspiration for you this week.  We hope you will join us in the gallery!

Supplies
Stamps:  For the Graduate (SugarPea Designs)
Paper:  Solar White (Neenah); Black Licorice (My Favorite Things)
Ink:  Nocturne (Versafine Clair)
Accessories:  Graduate SVG (ZecWorkshop)

Addicted to CAS Guest Designer

Well I am pleased as punch to say that I'm a guest designer over at Addicted to CAS for their newest challenge!  The code word is "baby" which is very fortuitous for me because there just happens to be a whole bunch of new babies this year in my family so I've been making quite a few baby cards lately!

I really loved the sketch at Sunday Stamps and thought for a bit about how I could use it and still keep my card CAS.  I was pretty sure that I wanted to use a onesie as my focal image so after cutting out one with this pretty awesome plaid paper I used the die cut to emboss a couple more of them off the edge of the card in a topsy turvy way.  I think they are pretty hard to see in the pic, but trust me they are there!

I want to thank the ladies at Addicted to CAS for inviting me to play along with them for this challenge.  I am always humbled when a card I've made has caught someone's eye enough that they want to reward me with a guest designer spot!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies
Stamps:  Baby Face (Momenta); Welcome Baby (Sugar Pea Designs); Baby (Simon Says Stamp)
Paper:  Solar White (Neenah); Perfect Plum (Stampin' Up!); Perfectly Plaid Rainbow (Lawn Fawn)
Accessories:  Welcome Baby Accents die (Sugar Pea Designs); Clear Droplets (Pretty Pink Posh)

Freshly Made Sketches 337

My nephew and his wife had a baby boy last Thursday so I had babies on my mind when I sat down to make my card for the latest challenge at Freshly Made Sketches!  Our sketch hostess is Linda and her front and center layer has great possibilities.

I filled that layer with a super cute onesie and some blocks that spelled out "baby."  A rare "easy peasy" card for me!  At CAS on Friday they are looking for a cute stamp.  That's rather subjective but I think this onesie plus those blocks are pretty cute so I'm adding this over there as well.

Our Freshly Made Sketches design team has got some great cards to inspire you to play along with our challenge this week so be sure to check them out.  I hope to see you in the gallery!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies
Stamps:  Welcome Baby (SugarPea Designs); Baby Prints (Stampin' Up!)
Paper:  Solar White (Neenah); Baja Breeze, Smoky Slate; Twitterpated DSP (Stampin' Up!); Enchanted Evening (Papertrey Ink)
Ink:  Enchanted Evening (Papertrey Ink)
Accessories:  Welcome Baby Accents die (SugarPea Designs); Stitched Mini Scallop Square die (My Favorite Things)

Lesley's Baby Girl Blog Hop

The secret is out!  Today is the day!  For these many long weeks friends of Lesley Croghan have been secretly planning a special baby blog hop just for her!  Our fearless leader in this super-secret mission is Lori Turner and I just want to start out this post by giving her a huge shout-out for conceiving of this idea, inviting a vast stamping community to play along, and for organizing the whole thing!

I am sure that many of you reading this know Lesley.  And if you don't know her personally I am sure that you have been touched by her in some way (even if you don't realize it).  She's been the driving force behind a multitude of stamping challenges all across blogland, many of which you might play along with every week.  She always has a word of encouragement for her stamping friends, a smile to offer, and is someone who I would really like to meet some day in real life!

Many years ago, back in early 2011, I got an email from Lesley asking me if I would like to be a guest designer at The Paper Players for the month of April 2011.  I was just a girl that liked to make cards and play along in challenges and here this rock-star was asking ME if I would like to join her band of merry card-makers.  Once I contained my excitement I said yes and I am forever grateful to her for giving me a chance to flex my card-making muscles and for encouraging me in this wonderful paper crafting community.  Although she probably didn't know it, she gave me the courage to continue on this crafty journey I had set myself on.

So today I get to be a small part of another community of friends that collectively thanks Lesley for her friendship, her mentorship, and her endless crafty inspiration.  Lesley is expecting a baby girl soon and I wanted to send her and her husband my heartfelt wishes for a healthy and beautiful baby with this wee card.

Now, there are quite a few of us like-minded crafty souls who have also made cards for Lesley and you can find them all here on Lori's blog.  There's a link party going on over there and we would love to have you join us.  Just make a baby themed card and link it to the gallery.

Over the last several weeks Lori collected all of our cards, packaged them up and sent them to Lesley with strict instructions to not open the box until today.  I wish I was there to see the look on her face when she saw what was inside!

Finally I am sending many blessings to you, Lesley and Corey, for a beautiful, healthy, and happy baby!

Supplies
Stamps:  Welcome Baby (SugarPea Designs)
Paper: Solar White (Neenh); Pixie (Avery Elle)
Ink:  Pink Pirouette (Stampin Up)!
Accesories:  Welcome Baby die (SugarPea Designs); Alpha Whimsy die (Paper Smooches)