It is Saturday afternoon and my kids are thriving on the slowness of the day.  It has been a real blessing today, since it seems our week has been crazy busy.  It really is the little things in life that makes it wonderful.

My son is in a gadget coma as he tries to save the pretend world of Zelda and Link, so we won’t be seeing him anytime soon unless it is to raid the pantry.  My daughters and I are eating chips and salsa and watching a cartoon marathon on Disney.  And I thought since everything was still and quiet, I would take a moment to share the selfish work I did yesterday on my first day off in a while.

I meant to get these cards out yesterday to share, but my kids begged for a marathon game of cards, and well, that always will win out.

The first card for today is a holiday fare from the little elves of Christmas over at 52 Christmas Card Throwdown.  This week they were hosting a theme challenge looking for designs that sported snow people.

Well of course I went for my favorite winter friends, snowman.  But I also wanted to make a card that wasn’t just about coloring.  So I pulled out a Darice embossing folder and embossed some white card stock giving the card a bit of holiday feel right off the bat.  I pulled out some snowman stamps from a Paper Smooches stamp pack and stamped them out, masking them when it needed it.  I added a bunch of snowflakes and snow drops in the back ground to add some more flare.  I pulled out my copics and started coloring in my snow people.  Now here was where things got a little weird.  I am so over using grey to shadow my white images, so I tried something.  I pulled out my B60 and B63 copics and tried using just them plus my colorless blender and tried to make it work.  I think in it did, giving the snowman a cool look about them.  I added some silver washi tape to the sides of the card form, and a bunch of dimensional tape under the card stock and assembled the card.  But as I looked at everything, I realized something was missing.  The snow flakes needed something.  So I pulled out an embossing pen and some blue perfect pearls powder, I detailed the snow.  That gave the card exactly the shimmer it needed.

The next card I assembled yesterday on my day of selfish crafting was a real hoot to whip up.  It was a color challenge from the gurus of color over at Color Throwdown.  This week they were looking for the colors purple, magenta, poppy red and yellow.

I loved how the back ground of the inspiration photo look and
wanted to see if I could replicated it for a Halloween card.  I pulled out four bottles of Distress Stain Spray in the shades of Squeezed lemon, Festive Berries, Picked Raspberries, and Seedless Preserves and sprayed them in abundance over some good quality watercolor paper.  I let everything air dry (for a very long time) so the colors could blend naturally, and loved how it came out.  I pulled out a fence and light post stamp pack from BO Bunny and stamped it in the foreground.  Then using the color shifts in the spray, I drew a hill in the background for a house to sit on.  I don’t have a spooky house, so I pulled a cool house set from Stampendous and then colored in the houses with a black water-based marker.  I then added some steel gray perfect pearls over it.  I drew in the side walk, and stamped in the spider and bats from a Graphic 45 stamp pack.  I trimmed the card up and backed the side of it with black card stock.

Everything turned out a little dark in the end, but I still think it works, well sort of.

Up next in today’s line up is another color challenge from the queens of color over at Colour Q.  This week they are sporting some really great fall colors, looking for a CAS design featuring ruby red, pumpkin pie, hello honey, soft suede and white.

I knew I wanted to do a fall like card, but again didn’t want to do one that was color focused.  I pulled out a sheet of the right shade of honey yellow textured card stock (which has a white core) and embossed it with a  Darice embossing folder.  I rubbed my sandpaper block over the raised portions to show some of the white core.  I wove some orange satin ribbon around the honey card stock and adhered it to a white A2 card.  I then glued red sequins and beads to the tree so it looked like they were leaves falling (I am not sure that it looked like that in the end, but I tried).  I pulled out another scrape of card stock and stamped out a Paper Smooches sentiment in some deep brown ink.  I also distressed the scrape of card stock with frayed burlap Distress ink to give it that soft suede look.  I left that card at just that.  Simple and with a nice flourish of fall.

I am trying out a new challenge this week that is run by the same admin as a couple of there challenges I participate in.  It has a fun twist where you fuse two different ideas together to make one design.  This week there was a layered sketch plus a theme of birthday bash.

Now I failed the theme part of the fusion, but I liked my design in the end.  I am in Halloween card mood at the moment, so that is where my card went.  I wanted it to look like a Halloween birthday card, but ended up falling short.  Regardless, I pulled out some Halloween card stock and trimmed it up to be the center panel.  Then I grabbed a bit of black and white card stock and made it the horizontal section.  I finally pulled some orange printed paper and laid it under everything.  Finally I die cut a circle from a Little B die and stamped out some Newton’s Nook Halloween critters, masking where I need it.  I colored in the images with my copics (and thought I did a pretty nice job despite the small spaces).  I distress with a bit of Hickory Smoke Distress Ink around the circle and adhered it with dimensional tape.  I stamp out the sentiment know I had fallen sort of the birthday theme, and called it a day.  However, I like the card in the end.

Finally today we have a sketch challenge from the gals over at Freshly Made Sketches.  This was one of my favorite sketches they have put out because there were so many possibilities to make from it.

Again, in Halloween card mode over here, so I wanted to see if I could make this sketch work for a spooky design.  I pulled out some deep blue textured card stock and embossed it using a Sizzix by Tim Holtz embossing folder and with my sandpaper block wore down paper to show its white core.  I then trimmed up some Halloween card stock and laid it out over some black card stock.  I pulled out an Inkadingadoo stamp set and stamped out the skull and candle.  I colored them in with my copics.  I then die cut out ‘trick or treat’ from the same Tim Holtz set the embossing folder came in, and adhered it.  I should have die cut the sentiment in a different color, because the black card stock did not photograph well.  I finally took some really pretty and delicate silver washi tape and added it to the card.  Yes, the card came out dark, but I love it anyway.  Very much my personal design aesthetic.

That’s all for today.  The girls are now laying on me regardless of my typing status, and the dog, who weighs 40 pounds and thinks she is a lap dog is trying to find a spot on my lap, so it is time to go back to my laziness and slow Saturday.