A witchy boo

Halloween came back to me, finally! It's funny how the first costume went together so well and the second just didn't. I still have two days before trick-or-treating so there's still hope. But in the chaos of the costumes and the pull toward Christmas there was still one more Halloween project to get done. The second Boo Box. As we are trick-or-treating on Saturday instead of Sunday we decided to postpone giving the boxes until Halloween just so the little people in the house will have something festive to do that day.

This one is a bit cute, but still fun. And so very witchy! This is the box and the card that will go inside with the goodies.

Here's a closer look at the card.

All four sides are decorated, of course! Here's a look at them.








I think I used almost every witch stamp I have. And while I made sure there was a hint of orange, I'm happy it isn't the main color. We're baking special Halloween cookies on Sunday and then filling the box up to deliver in the afternoon. The neighbors will like it as much as the little people.

Challenges:
Stampin' for the Weekend - Halloween/Fall
Raise the Bar - Orange, Black, Purple
Stamptacular Sunday Challenges - Halloween Color Challenge
The Corrosive Challenge Blog - Halloween
Tuesday Taggers - Deep Purple Halloween
Crafty Creations Challenge Blog - Halloween
Charisma Cardz Challenges - Match Master
Paper Play Challenges - A haunting we will go
Cupcake Craft Challenges - Sweet Treats with a Twist

I hope you like the witches! Thanks for looking.

Simple little Christmas

Another Christmas card. Halloween costumes are still not done, but the red and white with snowflakes was screaming at me from the photo challenge on Christmas Stampin' All Year. It came together so fast and was so simple.


Thanks for taking a peek.

A confused brain

The last few days my mind has been flip-flopping between Halloween and Christmas. One minute I'm singing Christmas carols and the next I'm trying to find a good Halloween cookie to make. My brain can't seem to decide which holiday it wants to celebrate. Today I'm offering a Christmas card. I guess Christmas won out in the art room.

Today's offering:

Here I've used the Vintage Ornaments from PTI. A little sanding and distressing and the broken glass technique.

Challenges:
Winter Wonderland - Give it a vintage look!
The Corrosive Challenge Blog - Get rid of the white!
For Fun Challenges - Red, Brown, and Cream

Thanks for looking!

TRICK or Treat

Ted over at Happily Ever Crafter is having a super fun challenge this month. His trick or treat challenge is, well, challenging. Basically you must ring his doorbell (email him) and he will respond with either "trick" or "treat." If you get a treat your challenge is to make a Halloween card with traditional images and colors. However, if you get a trick you must use nontraditional images with pastel colors for a Halloween card. I guess the TRICK is on me. Yep, I got trick. Now what to do?
I was flipping through my index of stamps and there it was screaming at me. A Halloween card for the hubs. I had found the image and the idea. A little help from PaperPlay Challenges with a sketch and in my head it was done. It was time to get to work. And here is what I did.

But what's going to make the hubs like it? Well...

Take it as you will.

Thanks for looking!

Happy Halloween

Today's offering is the Halloween card I made for my older son. He is going to be a hedgehog for halloween this year so when I sat down to make his card it seemed fitting to pull the halloween hedgehogs from Stampin Up out. Luckily I still had them as I nearly sold them a few months back. What was I thinking??
Here is his card:

This image seemed most appropriate for him. And then I had to add the felt pumpkins he likes so much and a card for him would not be complete without buttons. He LOVES buttons on cards. I love orange and brown this time of year. They make everything seem a little cozier.

Challenges:
Sweet Sketch Wednesday - sketch
Charisma Cardz Challenges - Autumn Colors
Stampin' for the Weekend - Autumn Inspiration
Paper Sundaes - A change of season
Cupcake Craft Challenges - Scary Creatures
Tuesday Taggers - More than two legs
Papertake Weekly Challenges - 3 of a kind

Thanks for looking!

Boo to you!

We're still gearing up for Halloween here. I love Halloween. There are so many things one can do, but there is no pressure to do anything. I think that fact alone makes it a wonderful holiday and reason to celebrate.

This year we're adding a few things to our Halloween traditions. The first one is Boo boxes for two of our neighbors. As we can barely communicate with most of our neighbors we will be wishing them a Happy Halloween without attempting to explain what "Booing" really is. It'll be fun all the same.

The first set to be taken care of is for the old lady across the street. This particular project uses a lot of goodies that had been forgotten about. Thanks to For Fun Challenges for encouraging me to pull them out and give them their chance to shine.

I know the box looks kind of blue, but it's black, really. I used a netting/lace piece of material that had the spiderweb pattern to make the spiderwebs on the sides using a combination of embossing powder and glitter. I really loved this material and had wonderful ideas for it, yet here we are years later and I'm just now getting around to playing with it. And while I had a really hard time taking a decent picture, there are black spiders with red eyes in the webs popped up on dimensionals on all four sides. The spiders are from a stamp cube from Northwoods Rubberstamps. I bought it for the bats but have never used the spiders.
Here's another view of the box.

This is one of those really big gable boxes. I bought them forever and day ago and then they got lost. I found it during a recent reorganization of the art room. Since I had two I decided to use them for the "Boo" boxes this season. This way they can't be lost or forgotten again. See how that works?! And thanks to One Stop Craft Challenge Blog for giving me a kick in the pants to get this done with their Alter It Challenge.
And here's the card/tag we'll be putting inside with all the goodies.

This image is also from Northwoods Rubberstamps. The sentiment is made from an alphabet set from Purple Onion Stamps. I think the googly eyes give it just the right amount of fun.

Thanks for taking a peek.

Have a drink

Today's card was inspired by two challenges. The first, Happy Hour over at Cupcake Craft Challenges led me to the second, Congratulations at One Stop Craft Challenges.

When I first saw Happy Hour I almost passed. I wasn't working on nor did I need to work on any kind of project even close to Happy Hour. Then I looked at my general To-do list. A friend of mine has a birthday later this month so her name was on my list to get the card mailed out. Her husband is currently out of the country for an entire year doing the military thing so I thought if anyone needed a drink it would be her. I didn't want to encourage her to drink alone just because he was gone, though I know there are days when doing just that might be the thing to do. That's where Congratulations came in. What about a card to congratulate her on making it this far into the year. Trust me, she's about a third of the way through so she deserves some congratulations.

Here's what will be popping in her mailbox.

It's a pretty simple card - just her style. The image is from Stamping Bella, the sentiment from PTI.

Thanks for taking a peek.

Fall is in the air

I know it's been awhile since I've posted. No big or exciting adventure this time, just a little reassessing. I have let my desire to participate in challenges trump my creativity and so I've stopped to take a look at my approach. I think I'm finding a better one. Plus, I've been going crazy with Halloween stuff. It seems the costume ideas this year were much easier on the drawing board than in real life. Luckily I still have a few weeks - I'm going to need them!

But none of this is why you are here. You are here because fall is in the air, at least in theory. We went from summer to winter, back to summer, and now the weather seems to be thinking about at least trying to be fall.

JUGS has a super simple, super sweet sketch going on this week. My take:


This little flower was one of the very first stamps I ever bought way back when. It's from Hero Stamps.

Paper Sundaes has a challenge this week to use something from your stash which made me think of this little charm which has been in my art room so long I can't remember buying it.

There you have it. My little bit of fall.

Thanks for taking a peek.