CSAYL Anything Goes Challenge with Bugaboo Stamps

Happy Friday, all!  It's time for a new CSAYL challenge, and this week it's Anything Goes.  My project this week is this cute little wine tag...

This adorable little snowman is from our sponsor this week, Bugaboo Stamps  Play along with us this week and you can win 7 free digi stamps from Bugaboo Stamps!  Be sure to upload your Christmas project over on the CSAYL Challenge Blog and also check out all of the other fabulous projects from the team this week.

Thank you so much to Bugaboo Stamps for such a wonderful prize package!  Pop on over to their site and check out what you can win.  You will not want to miss out on the chance to get some of their wonderful images!

Can't wait to see what you all make this week!

Michelle

SP & Company October Blog Hop!

This month's color is Black! After you're done hopping around today, make sure you play along with this month's Black challenge (click here for details) for a chance to win some amazing SP and Company prizes!

OK, so you may have noticed that my card base is brown and not black.  Yep.  I know.  Funny story...I got way wrapped up in this new Christmas Day Carta Bella paper.  That is what all of these patterned papers are from and they are beautiful!  Love, love, love them.  Anywho, I got my layout all done, pulled out a piece of black cardstock, thinking I would just mount it on a black card and....no...it totally didn't work.  So, it became brown....

Now, TECHNICALLY, I have still used black, since my image and sentiment are both stamped in black, lol!  I have used a mix of images from two of October's brand new releases Glam Girl Emma and Handmade Holiday Gift Tags.  These sets are just AWESOME and go together so well!  I colored Emma with a combination of colored pencils, markers and used some of those patterned papers to paper piece her clothes.  The papers were just perfect.  I love how her skirt turned out with the chevron stripe.  So cool!

Do you want to win some amazing SP & Company Product? Then don't forget that the random prize patrol is watching! Leave a comment on every blog to be eligible for the prizes!! The more blogs you comment on, the better your chances are of winning something fabulous!

Make sure you check out the SP Blog to see what Samantha did with the new stamps! And don't forget to hop around to each Design Team Member's blog - there are brand new projects with the stamps that came out TODAY to inspire you!

Here is the list of designers that will inspire you today:

Chrissie
 Kelli
Michelle
Amber
Vicki 
Guest DT - Sonya

A Merry Little Christmas

Have you checked out Christmas week over on the SP & Company blog yet?  Lots and lots of great holiday projects for you, if you haven't seen them yet! 

Today I have a Christmas card to share with you that I made using the new set Filled With Cheer Emma. I have to say...this might be my favorite SP&Co stamp set EVER!!! Little Emma is so cute, and there are so many fun stamps in this set.

For my card, I stamped Emma and colored her in with a combination of markers and colored pencils. I used the little candy cane stamp in the set to stamp a background on the white strip and stamped the sentiment in black. Emma is popped up on some dimensional foam dots. The patterned paper is from Happy Holidays Journaling Paper by Echo Park.

I can't wait to play with this set some more! Lots and lots of ideas for this one.

Happy Christmas Week,

Michelle

CSAYL Friday with Fred She Said

Hello!  It's Friday and there is a new Christmas Stampin' All Year Long challenge up for you.  This week is being sponsored by...

Fred She Said has some adorable digi stamps and this weeks winner is going to win a $15 gift certificate to use in their store!  Awesome, right?

OK, so this weeks challenge is All Sewn Up.  So do something that involves some stitching on your project.  This can done on your sewing machine, stamped stitches, done with a pen, etc.  However you choose.

 

Now don't laugh, but you might notice that my stitches are not showing up in this picture.  Why is that, you ask?  Because I got ahead of myself and snapped this picture before adding them.  So I ripped my card apart (yes, literally), added some stitching and then it was too dark to get a good picture!  So.  When the sun comes up tomorrow - or today as you will be reading this on Friday - I will snap a new picture and update it.  It's just been that kind of week, lol!

 

Be sure to pop over to the CSAYL Blog to see all of the other projects this week!

 

 

Happy Friday,

 

Michelle

Spooky Treats for School

Hello again!  Is everyone else enjoying the Fall weather that is starting to set in?  It's still getting pretty hot here during the day, but the nights are cooling down.  I love Fall!  Of course, that means I do a lot of crafting for the Fall holidays, too.  So today I am sharing a sweet little treat for Halloween! I like to make lots of little things for the kids to take to school for the holidays and this is one of my goodies going to Emma's class.

I used a small cellophane bag and filled it with some candy corn. Using some patterned papers, I have made a little bag topper for decoration. I wanted to personalize them, so I made a little nameplate using one of the journaling stamps from the Scallops and Lines stamp set. For this one, the letters are die cuts, but with long names I will probably just hand write them.

Here is a close-up of the topper, so you can see the little bats. Had to add some Stickles to the bats for a little extra fun!

Honestly, the hardest thing about these is not eating all of the candy corn!

Happy Stampin',

Michelle

Laugh Until Your Face Hurts!

Hello everyone, today I have a card to share with you that is sure to spread some laughter and happiness! We can all use a little more of that, right?

For this card I started out by stamping my background with some of the happy faces from the Cutest Gingerbread Man set.

I lined up 4 of them on my acrylic block and inked them up on my Kaleidacolor pad. These faces are actually small enough that you can ink them with just one color from the pad, which is what I did here.

Those faces make for a whole lotta happy! The words are from the Pure Happiness set. I have cut my stamp that says "Pure Happiness Is" apart so I can stamp each word individually, and I just added the "..." after "is" with a marker.

On the inside of the card I stamped the sentiment with one of the not-so-happy faces. That little frowny face just cracks me up. That's about how you start to look when you DO laugh so hard your face hurts! Which is something I happen to do a lot, and hope you do too!

Happy stampin',

Michelle

Halloween Pencil Toppers

Hi!  It's September now, so Halloween is totally fair game now.  Woohoo!  In fact, it is Halloween Week over on the SP & Company Team Blog, so check in over there each day this week for some fun, Halloween treats! 

Today is actually my day over on the blog, and I have a bonus project for you here as well.  I always like to make treats for the the kids to take in to their classes for the holidays.  A really fun one to do is a holiday themed pencil with a fun topper.

Now, my number one rule for making things for the kids is...KEEP IT SIMPLE!  As much as the kids will love whatever you make for them, the simple fact is that they will tear it to shreds in front of your crying eyes!  Trust me.  You don't want to put too much labor into these sorts of things.  Keep it simple and you can save yourself from flipping out when the shreds hit the floor, LOL!

 

I used the Nested Bats dies from Spellbinders to cut out the bat from some black paper.  The edge is inked with some white ink.  Had to add some googly eyes, because let's face it...they make everything better!  I wanted it to say something, but wanted to keep it pretty general, so I chose these stamps from Mix 'n Match Sentiments: Kids.  With this particular pencil it becomes "For the scary kiddo".  Hee hee!  Because kids are pretty darn scary, right?  

 

You can whip a bunch of these out in no time.  Emma's class only has 16 kids this year so I am very lucky!  But with some classes pushing 30 kids, something like this would still be simple to pull off. 

 

Pop over to the Team Blog and see the other project that I made for Halloween week.  Ever wish that candy grew on trees?  Here's a little sneak peek...

 

 

Happy Halloween Week!

 

Michelle