Last night when I should have been packing for our camping trip, I came across the new ColourQ challenge, and thought it would be perfect with the current CAS(E) This Sketch challenge. And I had the perfect (new) stamp set to put to use:  “Doodlie Do” by Papertrey Ink. Here are the challenges:

And here’s my interpretation:

I love these bright colors! I embossed and masked the flower, then the leaves and colored them with Copics. The sentiment is from the same set. And it’s another one for my encouragement card stash.

I’ll pop this into the Curtain Call Anniversary challenge, “Anything Goes,” as well. 

In about an hour we’re off to Selkirk Shores on eastern Lake Ontario for two nights of camping with our friends, Bob and Cathy. It’s supposed to be pretty decent (80’s during the day), but chilly at night (50’s), with a chance of showers on Sunday.  I had lunch with a friend on Tuesday who recommended driving up to Clayton, NY on the St. Lawrence River. There’s an antique boat museum and a classy new hotel that just opened up as well as some “cute shops.” Not sure the guys will be interested in the latter, but I think Clayton’s the plan for Sunday afternoon.

Alexa once again shared her photo and digital gifts with a download this week. As soon as I saw these delightful typewriters, I knew I’d make some simple, one layer cards. Sadly, I’m in almost constant need of encouragement cards, so it’s nice to have a little stash.

After printing the typewriters on Lumijet Fine Art Ink Jet paper, I stamped each with two sentiments I cut apart from Hero Arts “Everyday Sayings.” Then I found color coordinated cardstock in my scrap files to match each of the typewriters, and adhered it all to top folding cards made from Papertrey’s Rustic White cardstock which almost perfectly matches the Fine Art Ink Jet paper.

I just love these, and there are four other colors yet to print and use for another set of cards. Thanks, Alexa, for sharing your gifts!

I’m linking these up to the Curtain Call Anniversary challenge “Anything Goes.“

A quick post to share a card that uses, yet again, a new die for the first time and links to two challenges. I ordered the Block Talk die from Papertrey Ink last month, but haven’t had a chance to pull it out until today. “Celebrate” is just one of three words included with the die.  

I cut the die twice–once in gold metallic and once in silver metallic and inserted the silver strips into the gold die. The stars came from two “matching” dies from Simon Says:  “Holiday Shapes” and “Large Holiday Shapes.” Those dies get lots of use! The beautiful, slightly textured purple paper is (I think) from Bazzill that I picked up during Archivers going-out-of-business sale in January. The silver metallic paper is from Paper Source, but I’m not sure where I purchased the gold paper.

This is another entry to Virginia’s View Die Cut Challenge.

And it will be my first entry to the Moxie Fab “Wonderful Words Challenge,” which was to include a die cut word in your project. 

My niece and her husband celebrated their second anniversary this weekend. Their wedding was one of the most fun weddings I’ve ever attended, and the two of them couldn’t be sweeter! Here’s a more elegant verson of the anniversary card I made for friends a couple of weeks ago.

You need to see it up close to get a good look at the metallic papers.

The embossed silver cardstock came from Michaels, and the gold is from Paper source. I used Simon Says woodgrain again for the Phrase Play #5 die cut from Papertrey Ink. The stamp is from the same set. I couldn’t seem to get a good picture of the sequins, but there’s a pretty clear sequin from Pretty Pink Posh nestled into a larger gold one from Michaels.

The inside sentiment is from Papertrey’s Delightful Dahlia’s Additions. The hearts on both the front and the inside are from the Hearts and Arrows die from Savvy.

The next card was inspired by the current CAS-ual Friday challenge to create a card with hearts in summer colors. 

I die cut the Tic Tac Toe Hearts into the front of the card, then colored the hearts with my Copic markers and laid them back into the original die cut. The sentiment comes from two Simon Says sets: Happy, and Color and Sunshine. 

It makes for a nice one-layer, flat card that will be winging its way in August to friends on the west coast.

I’ll link both up to Virginia’s Die Cut Challenge as well.

Before I go, I thought I’d share a few photos (all from my phonte) from our Fourth of July birthday celebration.

We had bruschetta chicken, and orzo salad with spinach and feta, potato salad, a green salad, and rolls for dinner. I didn’t get a photo but we had chocolate mousse cake from Joey B’s for dessert. My mother-in-law requested it, but didn’t expect we’d be able to get it direct from the restaurant. It was delicious.

Here we all are—a couple folks are looking rather serious, but I only took one quick photo so the food wouldn’t get cold.

After dinner we drove to Canandaigua Lake, boarded the Canandaigua Lady, and watched the fireworks from the lake. It was a bit chilly, but we were well-prepared, and the fireworks were wonderful. We got a beautiful sunset as well.