Happy New Year!

Happy New Year Friends! I hope the new year has welcomed you with great joy! I've been away for awhile and taking in lots of family time.  So happy to come into the new year fresh and ready to go.  I am excited for all the new and exciting adventures this year has in store.  I hope you will join me as I share my adventures and creations with you.  Let's start off with a little rewind from last month.  I fell in love with the Make it Merry collection from October Afternoon the moment I saw it.  The vintage images are adorable and I knew this would be the collection to use for my Christmas Cards.  Since the holiday season was flying by and I was beginning to feel the pressure to complete all the things I wanted to create.  I knew the Make a Card 12x12 sheet would be perfect for making fast and fun cards.  Here are 5 of the cards I created using the images from the Make a Card 12x12 sheet and other patterned papers from the Make it Merry Collection.

 

These cards came together so quickly and I loved it! I was able to get my cards done so fast with only adding a few touches to the cards. I picked a portion of each image that I wanted to highlight and added Stardust Stickles.  I wanted to conserve my Tim Holtz Silver Tinsel Twine just in case I needed to make extra cards, so I just added a bit of  Scor-Tape to adhere to the side or bottom of each image.  This tinsel has great sparkle and I ended up barely using half of the tinsel, so I still have plenty to use on future projects.

Hope you enjoyed my little rewind and I'll be back soon to share more.
Have a great day and thanks for visiting!



Supplies:
Stamps: Holiday Sayings (Hero Arts)
Paper: Pure Poppy & Kraft CS (PTI) and Make it Merry - Patterned Paper (October Afternoon)
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Scor-Tape, Silver Tinsel Twine (Tim Holtz), Gems (Zva), Stardust Stickles and Foam Tape (Best Creation)

Farewell to the TE Sketch Challenge

Hello TE Friends!  Well all good things must come to an end and it's with a heavy heart we say goodbye to the fabulous Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge.  It has been an honor to be on the TESC Sketch Crew for over 2 years.  I have made so many wonderful friends and had a blast creating and sharing cards with all of you.  I wanted to give Taylor a special Thank You as she has not only been our fearless leader but I am also blessed to call her my friend.  Thanks Taylor for all of your kindness and support! We all love ya and can't wait for what the future has in store for Taylored Expressions.  Well you know TESC had to go out with a bang!  So there will be some amazing TE prizes up for grabs along with a great selection of sketches to choose from so you can play along.
Random winners will be drawn for the following challenges:

• One winner from each sketch to receive a $10 gift certificate to the TE Store
• One lucky person that participates in ALL 4 sketches will receive a $40 gift certificate to the TE Store

I think it's been pretty clear to see that I have been obsessed with Cuppie since the beginning of TE. I do my best to get Cuppie into every sketch challenge possible and my final TESC card just had to include Cuppie. Here's one of my all time favorite Cuppie images from the Doctor's Orders set and added the Happy Birthday sentiment from Sweet Celebration.  I love all the sketches and I know you will too, so be sure to play along with us for our final sketch challenge.

Hop on over to see the fab creations my Sketch Crew buddies & the TE Top Chef have created:

Cassie Trask

Jami Sibley

Lisa Hjulberg

Lori Craig

Monika Davis 

Tracy Clemente

Taylor VanBruggen

Rosemary Dennis <--- Top Chef

P.S. Remember the TE Sketches are always available here at Taylor's Blog, so you can continue playing along with TE.

Happy Friday! Have a wonderful holiday weekend!

TESC157 - It's your birthday...

Hello Crafty Friends! It's another fabulous Friday and time for another great sketch from Taylored Expressions. I hope you are ready to join in on the fun because I LOVE this sketch. I had a great time with it and I hope you do too! I love Cuppie and wanted to send out a sweet Birthday card to a dear friend.  I chose this adorable Cuppie image and sentiment from the Sweet Celebration set.  I colored the image with Copic Markers and used pretty patterned papers from October Afternoon.

Are you ready to join in on the fun? You can get all the challenge deets at the Taylored Expression Forum over at SCS and also at Taylor's Blog. Come on and play with us for a chance to win a fab Taylored Expressions prize and a chance to become the next featured stamper. There is lots more to see.  Be sure to stop on by and visit my TE Sketch Crew Buddies to see all their wonderful creations.

• Cassie Trask
• Jami Sibley
• Lisa Hjulberg
• Lori Craig
• Monika Davis
• Tracy Clemente
• Taylor VanBruggen <---- get all the details here
• Colleen Begley,  Featured Top Chef
     
   

Thanks for visiting and Have a Great Day!

TESC155 - Thinking of You!

Happy Spring! Wow! I can't believe Spring is already here! It's been gorgeous outside the last couple of days so I knew I had to create a card using fun Spring colors for this week's challenge. The perfect set to coordinate with Spring is TE's beautiful Friendship Blooms set.  I love all the different pretty flower combinations you can create with this set.  I paired this set up with the Thinking of You sentiment from another great spring set Garden Party Critters.  To create the main image I stamped the stem & leaves portion with green chalk ink and stamped the flowers with a lavender chalk ink.  I added some clear gems to the centers for sparkle.  I really enjoyed the simple stamping and the card came together so quickly.

Ready to join in on the fun?  Don't forget, Taylor is on the look out for the next Featured Stamper.  It could be you!  You also have a chance to win some great TE prizes, so be sure to head on over to Taylor's Blog or the TE Forum over at SCS for the details.  Can't wait to see what you create!  Be sure to hop on over and visit my TE Sketch Crew buddies along with our fabulous Featured Stamper to see their lovely creations:

• Cassie Trask
• Jami Sibley
• Lori Craig
• Monika Davis
• Tracy Clemente
• Taylor VanBruggen  <---- get all the details here
• Chaitali Narla, featured Top Chef

Thanks for visiting and Have a Fabulous Friday!

Happy St. Paddy's Day!

Hello Friends!!! Happy St. Paddy's Day!  I couldn't wait to share with you this fun Lawn Fawn card.  I created my little Leprechaun using the face and body portion of the Gnome from the Gnome Sweet Gnome set and added the hat from the Hats Off to You set.  I really love the new Bright Side Collection of papers and the 2 green patterned papers coordinated perfectly for this St. Paddy's Day card.  This little Gnome is just a perfect image to create lots of other characters.  He's just so cute and fun!  Hope you all have a fab day today and be sure to sport your green!

Have a great day and thanks for visiting!

TESC154 - Happy Birthday!

Hello Friends! It's time for another wonderful Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge! Hope you all have been having a great week and are ready to kick off your weekend by playing along with us.  I love this week's fun sketch and since Spring is so close I decided to use the adorable Garden Party Critters set for this week's sketch.  I paired up the set with some pretty papers from Echo Park's This & That collection.  I colored with butterflies with Copics and added Stardust Stickles for sparkle.  A fun and girly Birthday card ready for my stash. 

Are you ready to join in on the fun? You can get all the challenge deets at the Taylored Expression Forum over at SCS and also at Taylor's Blog. Come on and play with us for a chance to win a fab Taylored Expressions prize and a chance to become the next featured stamper. There is lots more to see.  Be sure to stop on by and visit my TE Sketch Crew Buddies to see all their wonderful creations.

• Cassie Trask
• Jami Sibley
• Lisa Hjulberg
• Margie Cortina
• Monika Davis
• Rachel Sztonyk
• Tracy Clemente
• Taylor VanBruggen  <---- get all the details here
• Linda Suarez, Featured Top Chef

Have a Super Friday and Thanks for visiting!!!!

TESC152- Love is Sweet!

Hi TE Friends! Happy Friday and Welcome to another fun Taylored Expressions Sketch Challenge! This week's sketch was just perfect for inking up one of my fav Valentine sets - Love is Sweet!  I loved all the different elements to the sketch which allowed me to use lots of different patterns of paper.  After I assembled the card base I stamped the kissing Cuppies image onto white cardstock and colored the image with Copic Markers.  I added some Christmas Red Stickles to add sparkle to the heart. Next I added some bling with a bright red heart gem at the tail of the banner strip. 

Are you ready to join in on the fun? You can get all the challenge deets at the Taylored Expression Forum over at SCS and also at Taylor's Blog. Come on and play with us for a chance to win a fab Taylored Expressions prize and a chance to become the next featured stamper. There is lots more to see.  Be sure to stop on by and visit my TE Sketch Crew Buddies to see all their wonderful creations.

• Cassie Trask
• Lisa Hjulberg
• Lori Craig
• Margie Cortina
• Monika Davis
• Tracy Clemente
• Taylor VanBruggen  <---- get all the details here

Thanks for visiting and Have a wonderful day!

InLinkz.com

Crafty Super Bowl Sunday: CHA 2012

Hello Pals!  Happy Super Bowl Sunday! Thought I would give you a little Half Time Show presenting the Super Bowl of the Craft World - CHA!  Please enjoy the slideshow of this year's CHA Winter 2012 Show featuring many of your favorite brands.  I had a blast and took lots of photos. I had the wonderful opportunity of meeting many of my blog buddies for the first time in person as well as catching up with some old friends and making new ones.  I'll be featuring them in a separate post as I didn't want them to get lost in this huge slideshow.  Have a Super Sunday and thanks for visiting!!!!



P.S. I thought that the premiere of SMASH was coming on right after the Super Bowl and was sad to see it's tomorrow. I was shocked when I headed onto Netflix and found it there. Woo Hoo! Get to watch it early! Just wanted to let my gals know in case you wanted to catch it tonight!

Stampendous Saturday Challenge - Texture!!!

The first Saturday in February means it is time for a brand new challenge with Stampendous!  This month we are challenging you (and ourselves) to add a little texture to your projects.  Need a few ideas?  You can emboss using enamels or powders, use fun flock, glass glitter, mica fragments, color fragments, or use some embossing folders.  The possibilities are endless!

My favorite way to add texture is with GLITTER!!!!  This adorable NEW Icing Fluffles is just perfect for adding lots of sparkle with some fabulous Crystal Glitter Mix.  The different sizes of glitter really add lots of texture and glitz.  I also added some texture to the background by using a polka dot embossing folder.  There are so many ways to add texture to your cards. I can't wait to see what you all come up with for this challenge.

Here is a list of the Stampendous team members playing along today:

Stampendous Impressions

Taylor Usry

Jennifer Dove

Wendy Price

Jennifer Ingle

Suzanne Czosek

Krissy Fossmeyer

We want YOU to play along with us!  Just add you direct link to your card (make sure you've loaded it up with tons of TEXTURE) to the linky tool below my signature (or on the Stampendous blog) no later than March 1, 2012 at 11:00 PM EST.  You do not have to use Stampendous products to play along, but we sure love it when you do!  And as an extra incentive for playing, one lucky person (drawn at random from all the entries) will receive this gorgeous Corset Ladies Perfectly Clear Stamp Set:

Due to shipping restrictions, the winner must have a US address.  We hope you get a chance to play along with us - happy stamping!  And make plans to join us next Saturday, for a fun blog hop, complete with prizes you don't want to miss.  We'll be showcasing all sorts of products just released at CHA!

Thanks so much for visiting and Have a Stampendous Saturday!

TESC151 - You take the cake!

Hello Friends! TESC is back! I am so excited to be back and kicking off the new year with another fabulous TE Sketch Challenge.  There have been some exciting changes to the TE Sketch Challenge which I know you will LOVE! You can find all the deets at Taylor's Blog and also at the TE Forum.  It seems like forever since I have stamped and this week's sketch was just the thing to kick start the new year.  I adore the super cute cake image from the Sweet Friends set and couldn't wait to ink it up.  I colored the cake using Copics (RV02 & RV23) and it came a pretty bright pink.  A cake any girl would just love!  I added some sparkle with some Stardust Stickles for the icing.  I added the "You take the cake!" sentiment from the Sweet Celebration set along with some bright pink gems for more girly fun.  The cute 4.25 x 4.25 square size makes it a perfect fit for this week's sketch.  I hope you will join in on the fun and I am looking forward to seeing who will be the next featured stamper.

Ready for more?  Visit my TESC Sketch Crew buddies to see all of their outstanding creations:

• Cassie Trask
• Jami Sibley
• Lisa Hjulberg
• Lori Craig
• Margie Cortina
• Monika Davis
• Tracy Clemente
• Taylor VanBruggen

Be sure to stop by the Taylored Expressions store for the What's the Deal? SALE.  You will find some incredible discounts on lots of great products!

Thanks for visiting and Have a Wonderful Day!