The Heart of Dixie.

The Corgi household was very fortunate to have been spared any destruction, but as I'm sure you've seen from the news, it is a tragic day for our state.  Please keep the people of Alabama in your thoughts.

I just received an email that Kate from I Heart Papers will be donating 10% of her sales from now through Sunday to the Red Cross.  If you'd also like to give directly, you can text REDCROSS to 90999 to make a $10 donation.

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone is enjoying Easter Sunday.  I have one more Easter card to share.

Tee-hee!  I love putting the Eat Cake Graphics bunny ears on all sorts of stamps, and Callie (also from ECG) was the lucky recipient this year.  The peep paper and the polka dot paper are from Echo Park, and the pink paper is from the A Muse clearance (I think I ended up with ten stamp sets from that sale!).  The sentiment is from The Cat's Pajamas.

And yes, I DO know where my peeps are!  

They are at Bashful Blogging mixing twine colors;

 at Art from the Heart making funky scallop borders;

at Paper Cupboard cutting into fancy paper;

and at the Post Office, sending mis-shipments back to me.

I hope you know where your peeps are today!

From The Corgi

Of course Miss Addison had to make a card for Mr Corgi's birthday!

She kept it pretty CAS, what with the lack of opposable thumbs and such.  Can you believe how well she colored that stamp from There She Goes "Puppy Love" set?  There was also some fur in my Antique Linen distress ink, so I think she may have used that to color in the sign with an aquapainter.  I had to help her use the cuttlebug to die cut those banners (the C plate, Addison, the C plate!^[1]), but she tiny-attached them and foam taped them all by her onesies.  And corner-rounded the top corner, too! 

Also, I just had to share this photo I took this afternoon (with apologies to all those poor Northerners still stuck in snow):

Isn't that just gorgeous?  We just got this at Lowe's this weekend and I hope the other four or five buds blossom before I kill it  (I'm all about setting realistic goals).

Anything growing in your garden yet?

^[1]Typing this line about made me pee my pants. I grew up watching Lassie every morning (shocker, huh?) and my favorite episode was where Timmy's mom gets trapped in a cougar trap, so she sends Lassie to get the C-clamp.  Except Lassie comes back with a cheese slicer instead!  Silly Lassie!  So Ruth repeats, "No, the C-clamp, Lassie!  Get the C-Clamp!"  I searched for a video to link, but I couldn't find one.  So I hope someone out there can back me up on how awesome that episode is, or you'll just have to take my word for it.

Trend Setter!

What can I say, I've known hot air balloons were the next "hot" thing ever since 2006.  Why was I so ahead of the curve on the hot air balloon trend?  Could be because Mr Corgi proposed to me in one; could be I'm just that stylish.  You decide.

Being a HABT (hot air balloon trendsetter), I had to play along in the Moxie Fab "In My Beautiful Balloon" challenge and make a card for Mr Corgi:

I was inspired by this photograph, which is even more GORGEOUS in person (ask me how I know and how well Mr Corgi picks up Christmas present hints).   I heat-embossed this adorable Cat's Pajamas stamp (hello! dog and HAB?  Had to have it!) onto two pieces of patterned paper and cut them out.  Yes, even the strings.  Yes, I'm crazy, but I also know the secret packing-tape-on-the-back-before-you-cut trick.  The cloud paper is Echo Park.  I used a Cuttlebug embossing folder (one of those tiny 2 inch ones that you bought when you first got the CB and haven't used since) to make the skyline out of A Muse yellow gingham paper.  I was originally planning on cutting down the skyline to fit inside the frame, but then I like how it looked outside (it's also on foam tape for dimension). I put some twine between each HAB and the pop dot I used to adhere it, then wrapped the twine around the back and secured with adhesive.  I tied the bows separately and used half a glue dot to attach them (I debated for about 10 minutes about adding the twine and I'm glad I did).  The sentiment is also Cat's Pajamas, stamped in Soft Suede (did y'all notice how many parenthetical asides I've had in this paragraph?).

Hope everyone is ready for Monday.  We fortunately have a short week.  I think I can make four days!  Five would have been doubtful. 

Happy Birthday, Mr Corgi Creations!

It was my DH's birthday yesterday (yes, tax day!), and I always try to do a really special card for him.  He's a pilot, so when I saw that Bombshell Stamp had a downloadable pilot outfit for their Bombshell Angel stamp, I splurged and bought it to make this, a little joke based on "remove before flight" flags that pilots use.

I pulled out my copics (btw, target has put out their summer stuff, which includes red, white, or blue steel utensil bins for $10 for copic storage) and used the full-color image from the Bombshell website as a guide for coloring.  I used E53, E33, E35, and E37 for the pants, E35, E37, and E29 for the jacket, and gray sharpie markers for the boots.  I printed the "Remove Before Flight" tag on my computer.  I bet you can guess what happens when you go to remove it...

Tee-hee!!!  I used R24, R27, R29, and R59 to color her outfit, and E50, E51, and E21 for her skin. 

To make the slider, I first made a practice template, getting the window and slider slot in the right place.  After cutting those out, I cut a thin strip of acetate about 4 inches long (you could just use paper, but I had a different plan first that needed the clearness of the acetate) and also a strip of a paper about 3 inches long.  I adhered the center of the paper strip to the acetate strip to make a cross, then folded the ends around to meet in the middle, pushed them through the slot, and opened them up (kind of like the back of a brad).  Then I adhered another small strip of paper to keep the ends open and flat in the back.  Here's a picture showing the back.  The one on the left is when I first push the ends through, and the one on the right is the finished one.  You only need one slider, I just forgot to take a picture before I glued the second piece on. :)

And here is how it looks from the front:

Then I just simply adhered the end of the "Remove Before Flight" tag to the outfit, put a glue dot on the piece of cardstock on the slider, and attached the tag.  I adhered the entire piece to the card front using foam tape so the slider would have room to move back and forth. 

It definitely got high marks from Mr Corgi Creations, which made all of that engineering work worth it! 

You Did It!

This quick CAS card is for my brother-in-law.  He's running the Boston Marathon as a fund raiser for Elixir, a organization focused on cancer patient and caregiver support.  You can read more about the organization and my BIL's fund raiser here.

Since I do not run unless chased by velociraptors, I did not have any running stamps.  So I went online and found a free font, 4yeo Sport Font, that had this image in it. I printed it onto PTI cardstock, then stamped my new A muse Grunge Sunrays stamp using Chomomile Fresh pigment ink and heat embossed with clear embossing powder (I used the end of my embossing spoon to gently scrape away the embossing from the silhouette).   Added a PTI Lemon Tart border and adhered it with foam tape onto a Spring Rain base, stamped with a sentiment from PTI's Enjoy The Ride. 

I've also been hard at work at somebody's birthday card but I don't want to ruin any surprises, so I'll wait until the weekend to post it. 

Even Better Than a Card

I have a card to show you, but I just had to share this with y'all immediately!  Yes, I have spent the entire morning watching it repeatedly.



Will you be watching the Royal Wedding?

Ea{s}t{er} Cake Graphics

Two fun Easter cards to share with you, using two Eat Cake Graphics bunnies:

Echo Park paper and Eat Cake Graphics stamps...what more does a girl need?  Oh, maybe just this.  I used it attach all the banner die cuts togehter, then attached just the ends onto the card so they're still loosely hanging.  The paper and stickers are Echo Park Little Girl mostly, and I paper pieced Flopsy bunny's got an egg.

This next one, I'm ashamed to admit, was started using a March Viva La Verve Sketch.  Yes, I realize that today is April 7th!  Hey, there's no deadlines on art, right?

Now, let me get out my "cute Easter card checklist" and see what we have here...SU square-patterned paper (retired): check!  SU dotted line paper: check!  Corner rounding: check!  Banner cut: check!  Polka dots: check!  Felted bunny made by crumpling up a piece of a paper and then slowly peeling the papers apart, then stamping & paper piecing Eat Cake Graphics Curious Cottontail Bunny: check!

Bunny butt?

...

....

....

 

Follow The (Ink Blended) Edge!

I combined two challenges in making a card this morning: Splitcoast's Try a New Techinique "Follow The Edge" and PTI's Make It Monday "Ink Blending."

I first stamped PTI's Through the Trees tree using A Muse's French Roast and Fern ink, then clear embossed them.  I then used the Fern ink, along with A Muse's Sky ink, to ink up the background.  The sentiment, from PTI's All Booked Up, was stamped in French Roast.  I cut out the side (for the "Follow the Edge" challenged, adhered it to the Dark Chocolate base, then cut the base to match.   I wanted the inside to look book-y, so I added some Antique Linen distress ink to the edges, then stamped PTI's Text Style I using SU Crumb Cake ink.  I used PTI's Mat Stack 1 die as a mask for the PTI Enjoy The Ride birthday sentiment:

I didn't even plan it, but the curve of the mat stack die matches the curve on the outside.  Sweet!

Hello Out There!

Ok, this is getting ridiculous now.  My stamp desk and blog have been feeling so neglected.  On the other hand, my powerpoints for school have been rockin' recently, so maybe I should just start posting those instead, in case you wanted to catch up on your high school math in the middle of your crafting. 

What's that?  You'd rather see a card instead?  Ok, I guess you caught me in a good mood, so I'll share one.

After seeing this photo, I feel like maybe I should turn the card 90 degrees to the left (and also rotate the sentiment banners).  I used Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch from I-don't-want-to-talk-about-it weeks ago.  All sorts of October Afternoon Thrift store happening here.  Maybe too much?  I am in love with that Impress flower, though. 

Book Reports:
Book #9: Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer.   I was suckered into buying this when I read a review somewhere that compared it favorably to Malcolm Gladwell.  Yeah, notsomuch.  A few of the memory tricks were pretty neat, but there just wasn't much "umph" to the story.  Based on the other reviews, I may be an outlier. 

Book #10: This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper.  Perfect vacation book--laugh out loud with lots of good scenes.  Makes me want to read more of his books. 

Book #8 Update: The Help comes out in paperback Tuesday!