The Cardinals

I haven't participated in the CAS-ual Fridays challenge in awhile, and loved this week's challenge along with the design team's samples!  (Waving at Dana and Laurie!!)  You can see the challenge and participate if you click here.

My friends will wonder what has gotten into me when they see this card. After all, the St. Louis Cardinals beat my beloved Rangers in the World Series.  And it was hard to take.

But this is a thank you card for one of my friends that went to the series to cheer on HER beloved cardinals.  She brought me back a World Series shirt, which I thought was very sweet.  

So, I used the beautiful cardinal stamps I recently received from a friend, and tried to make a casual card.  It's hard to make a casual card with beautiful stamps.

I created the background with the baseball from Have a Ball, the small star from Star Prints and the smallest star from Fly Away.   The background technique is highlighted for this week's Make It Monday challenge.  

Thanks for visiting My Happy Place!

Blast Off!

School has started.  That's why my blog has been so quiet.  The beginning of every year is always exhausting, but this year is also particularly challenging.  Lots of changes have occurred due to budget restraints, including adding more students and classes to each teachers' load, while taking away half the planning time we once had. So, we have a lot more work to do in half the time to do it. 

Therefore, this beginning is not only exhausting, but challenging too.

But, I can count my blessings when I say, "At least I'm not a coach."  Coaches have different challenges than I do in the classroom, and our football and volleyball coaches' seasons start within the next week.  So, the least I can do is make them a card:

Here they are:

PTI: Have a Ball, Boy Basics, Mat Stack 1 die, Woodgrain Impression Plate

PTI: Have a Ball, Boy Basics, Cloud die, Fiskars grass punch

I made 4 of each of these for all of our coaches.  The inside on all of them says, "Fired Up for a Winning Season." 

I used watercolors and blending on the flames from Boy Basics.  I'll link this up to this week's Make It Monday at PTI.  Here's a close-up:

Hopefully, my routine will begin to get, well more of a routine, and I'll be able to get more crafting done.  Hope to see you soon!

Thanks for visiting My Happy Place!

Papertrey Pages February Challenge

The challenge that Beth gave to forum members this month was to create a layout with these parameters:

1. Your page(s) must celebrate a birthday or anniversary.
2. Your page(s) must use a Papertrey stamp set, preferably a birthday or anniversary set. (Flowers, of course, work on any kind of page!)

Of course, I have had ideas floating around in my head for the whole month, but didn't execute them until the day before the end of the month.  I've got to get more on the ball in March!

My son turned 5 in May and I hadn't scrapped his birthday party yet, so Beth's challenge was perfect for me.  This will be his last page in his Baby Book!  I can't believe it!  I'll have to do another layout for his yearly scrapbook, so this gave me some ideas.

Here's my layout:

Have I told you how much I love Echo Park paper?  I do.  I especially love the Little Boy line which is where the plaid paper comes from.

I started the layout by stamping the baseball images from PTI and stamped the letters in each ball to create the title.  After stepping back to take a look, I decided there was room on the title block for the 5 and love the shape of the number from the die set. Then I did some faux-stitching with a white pen around the edges.

I mimicked the stitching on this panel and then popped it up next to my son's cake pictures.  I love the look on the boys' faces...they just really want some cake, huh?

After adding the smaller pictures on the right and the "Little Boy" sticker, I decided that a few more details were needed.  So, I die cut some stars in cardstock and some more patterned paper from Echo Park, added some buttons and twine and placed them in sort-of a triangle.

I know that Beth will have a fabulous layout, so you should go check her blog out.  She does wonderful work. 

Thanks for dropping by My Happy Place today!

All Papertrey Ink supplies (unless noted):
Stamps:  Have a Ball, Think Big Favorites #1, Big Birthday Wishes, letters from Carved Love (Practicing Creativity)
Ink:  Pure Poppy, True Black
Cardstock:  New Leaf, Stampers Select, Pure Poppy, Enchanted Evening
Patterned Paper:  Little Boy (Echo Park)
Dies:  Seeing Stars, Fillable Frame #1, By the Numbers
Other:  New Leaf, Enchanted Evening, & Pure Poppy buttons, Rustic White Twine

Good Season!

I'm beginning to shift gears in my mind and coming to the realization that I will be returning to school in 2-1/2 weeks.  They'll drag me in kicking and screaming, but I'll be there.  I suppose that it will be good to get back into a routine, and I know my son is excited about starting Kindergarten.  Lots of fun and exciting things await us.

I began these sports cards the day after I received the mini-stamp set "Have A Ball" from PTI.  I knew I wanted to do something for our coaches for their Fall sports, so this set was perfect.  I wanted to girly up the volleyball coaches' cards, so I chose all pink! 

I knew that I'd never be able to line up all the letters if I used the same alphabet stamps, so I chose the Hero Arts Small Variety Alphabet and mixed up the fonts. 

Thanks for looking!

Papertrey Ink Supplies:

Stamps: Have A Ball, Polka Dot Basics 2

Cardstock:  Hibiscus Burst, Stampers Select

Ink: Hibiscus Burst, Dark Chocolate

Other:  Spellbinders, Hero Arts Small Variety Alphabet, Kraft, green cardstock, Versamark, white embossing powder