My Time Made Easy Sneak Peek

Soon, My Time Made Easy will have a brand new release for you!

This month there are 2 new templates being released this month, but i'm just showing you a sneakie peekie of one of them! And of the new digi set that will also be released on Oct 1st!

Here is my project using the Thats a Wrap template!

Don't be fooled by the colors... this doesnt HAVE to be for christmas (though it certainly could be if you are one of those get it done early types!)

I used digi paper from the Fruit Medley paper pack (remember back when there was the jame and jelly release! yum!)

Well thats where i went with this gift idea! Adding in some of my favorite jam recipes....

The box is perfect for handmade cards, photos, notecards, address cards, etc as well as all kinds of other things! I just wanted to note how perfect it is for size of these things!

This makes a wonderful gift that is very little out of pocket money!!!

Here's another shot of the template when closed...

I just love how it wraps up! So pretty!

And see the tag in this photo? Thats from the new Well Rounded digi stamp set that is also being released on Oct 1st. Trust me, it will have your gift giving craftiness raring to go!

Now be sure to also visit 3 of my favorite ladies today for some more inspiration! Lauren, Tangii and Lisa!

Have a wonderful day!

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It's time for another Digi Makeover Challenge from Paper Makeup Stamps!

I apologize that i took the day off last week! Fall weekends are a killer for me! Fortnately for me, this sunday my boys both konked out a little bit early. And though I'm about to head there with them, I did have time to work on a card for this week's challenge which is something i really really love about digis!

Changing the size! Now when I work with Digis, particularly digis from Paper Makeup Stamps, i am most often resizing them to fit my needs. I mean really, this is one of the absolute best things about having digi stamps... that you can make them smaller or larger, whatever it is you need! I am usually making them BIGGER myself. :D Since I own every rubber stamp from PMS (i mean, i should, right?!) resizing just makes sense to me! :D

This morning was a doozy of a morning. I did have a wedding today, and it was just POURING down rain the whole hour long drive there. My thoughts were, oh poor bride. She's going to be devastated! The wedding was being held in a lodge up in the mountains. By the time I got to the lodge, everything was wet but had that awesome fresh mountain air that you just EXPECT to be wet. It was absolutely beautiful. My bride (though a few trials to make her hair PERFECT) was beautiful. Just everything was really perfect. It made me think of one of my favorite quotes "The best thing to do when it's raining is to let it rain". I love it. I for one, am not a fan of the rain. it often makes me grumpy. But really, there is nothing you can do about it. You can huff and puff all you want, but the rain will stop when it's time for the rain to stop. I try to take that approach to many things in life. Things happen. And if there is nothing you can do about it, don't fight it. Just let it do what it's going to do and go forward.

When my bride arrived, she didnt seem the least bit worried about the rain. We set the chair all up inside instead of out and it was still beautiful. And she still married the love of her life.

A good day. :D

Ok, now... my card...

I used the set, Raindrops and Rainbows. The sentiment is probably pretty close to it's rubber size, but not spot on. It's a touch larger. I was more making sure it went ok with the ginourmous umbrella. Which is definitely NOT close to it's rubber size! I enlarged it quite a bit. :D This also made it super fun to color.

Ok, my clock is ticking and it's time for me to hit the hay. By the time this is posted i'll be up and at em for a new day. *sigh*.

Be sure to check out the PMS blog to see all the Digi Makeup Artists and their phenom creations for this challenge!

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Copic Creations Challenge with StampFairy.com

It's the 15th, so there is a new challenge from Copic Creations!

This week is a super fun one! To color FUR!

There are so many different ways you can create texture using copic markers and fur is certainly a fun texture! You just HAVE to check out the Copic Creations blog to see what each design team member created. So much fun!

Our sponsor for this challenge is StampFairy.com

Stamp fairy has so much fun and cute digi stamps to choose from! They also have digi paper and wordart! If you are a digi fan, you definitely need to check it out!

Here is my card using one of the images from the Lenny Camping collection!

Sorry it's not the best photo of the card. I kinda realized after the fact that my camera settings were a bit off so the back corner of the card is a wee bit fuzzy. But at least the image is clear, right? haha!

I used the E20 family of of copics for Lenny the Bear (E21, E23, E25, E27) and a little bit of E49 for the darkest areas. I started by coloring Lenny smooth, just with a nice gradient of dark to the outside (with the darkest being on the underside where the shadow would fall) and then lightest on the inside. After letting those color set a moment (let all the alcohol evaporate away from your paper so that it's "dry". You can tell it's ready if it does NOT feel slightly cool to the touch if you laid your fingers on it). Once it's dry you can begin flicking the markers on top to get your fur effect. If you had not waited, the flicks would have spread and not been so strong. :D I did focus darker marker flicks towards the outside and lighter in the center (so E23 over the E21 area, E25 over the E23 area and E27 over the E25 area)

I hope you are inspired to play with us on this challenge!

I know it was very fun for me to break out of my normal coloring pattern!

Have a great day!!!

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Digi Makeover Challenge 2

It's a wonderful Monday which means the 2nd installment of the Digi Makeover challenges brought to you by the PMS Digi Makeup Artists!

In case you missed it, Paper Makeup Stamps now has a digi design team! And each week the team brings you a new challenge, with a new prize! This weeks challenge is a sketch challenge!

Here is this week's sketch!

And here is my card using Moody for Fall and the sentiment from the new set Color it Autumn!

My card total size is 5.25 by 5.25. Since I knew I was covering a large sqare card, I knew I had some space to fill. Which is one of the reasons i do love digis! P printed out Moody for Fall a bit larger than the rubber version. She's so much fun to color! I even gave her a bit of makeup including glitter pen around her eyes and lips. :D

The Rules

- You must use a digital image on your entry
(hey, it is a digi challenge after all)

- The challenge will be every Monday

- A winner will be selected every week by random.org

- The winner will get to choose any 3 digi images from PMS as their prize. If the winner used a PMS image on their entry, they'll get 2 bonus images (for a total of 5!)

- You may enter as many times as you want, there is no limit; however, you may not link back to old posts (prior to the challenge post)

- You may combine our challenge with any other challenge you like

- Please post a link directly to your individual blog post using Mr. Linky so we can find and admire your creation!

Note: These are the rules on the PMS Company blog! So you'll need to go there to find MR Linky and link back your entry for this week's challenge!

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You Color My World

Today is the final day for the release in review on the PMS blog. GO check out the other wonderful creations from the design team today!

Here is my card using Baby Jamie Silhouette and the word art, You color my world

These silhouettes are so much fun and make a card super quick and easy to put together! I just stamped it right on top of the patterned paper and just to make sure it was nice and dark and I didnt see any variations because of the very brightly colored dots on the paper, I embossed it as well with black embossing powder.

The paper I used is from Sassafrass Lass. :D

Thats all I have for ya today! Be sure to tune in tomorrow for my Digi Makeover Challenge card!

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My Time Made Easy Sketch Challenge

Did you know that My Time Made Easy has weekly challenges on the MTME blog?!

The challenges even has their own design teams supplying new and wonderful creations for you each and every week! You should really check it out! hehe!

This week I got to play hostess and made a card for the sketch challenge!

And this sketch makes it super easy to whip up a fun card that would be different than your typical layout (or at least different than mine!)

Here's the sketch...

And here's my card...

I used the So Fortunate stamp set to create my card. Isnt that fortune cookie look yummy enough to eat? Ok, now i'm hungry again. haha

Be sure to stop by the MTME blog and check out all the other fabulous creations!

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It's a PMS blog hop!

Today is the release day for Paper Makeup Stamps and we have LOTS of fun new rubber and digi stamps for you!!! If you are just coming by my blog, you'll want to start at the beginning to get all the details of the day! And you DEFINITELY want to do the blog hop so you can catch glimpses of all the fun stamps being released tonight at our Release Party!!!

First, before I forget (because it wouldnt be the first time) let's make sure you are on track. If you are going thru the hop, you should have come over from Andrea's awesome blog!

And before i get even more excited showing you my card, let me give you your letter for the discount code... the letter R. :D

And here is my card using the new Color it Autumn set!

I am actually the illustrator for this set! And I think I had as much fun stamping and coloring it as I did drawing it in the first place! I've always been a fan of sketchy/doodlie looking stamps, and I love to color things in so this set has been in my head for awhile. :D

The sentiment on my card is actually a previously released sentiment that you can find HERE.

The leaves I colored in with copics and they were FUN. So fun, i think i colored about 20 of them. Although the first time i stamped them on too small a piece of paper when i decided to make more of a cardfront. Then gabe decided to stamp some of his own after I completed my first card. *sigh* Soooo... then i got to working on my third and final version. :D

I used the following group of copics and just mixed it up with which ones i used on which leaves afterall, autumn leaves are a little bit random. :D

YR14, YR23, Y21, E27, E23, E21, YG95, YG91

And then i doodled around each of the leaves and the letters using a Sakura gelly roll pen in stardust. :D I love that thing!

I hope you are ready for Fall, because I am! I am sad to see summer go. I will miss our fun times at the pool and playing in the sun, but i do LOVE the fall so I am welcoming it with open arms!!!

Now onto your final stop in the hop today... the always fabulous, Ginger Schwerin!!!

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It's the final day of sneak peeks for the September release from Paper Makeup Stamps!!!

That means we have a blog hop tomorrow so you'll have to be sure to tune it!

I decided to go a different route than making a card today. I love altering things and sadly have a huge trunk along with boxes and boxes in the garage of things to alter and I just never do it!

The sentiment i'm sharing today "A Picture is a Poem without words" really speaks to me! The moment i heard it, i knew i wanted it to be a stamp. Since i've been dabbling in photography, it seemed even more important to me, but it also seemed so perfect for scrapbook pages and all kinds of importrant things that us crafters like to do!

Here is my project!

I used the bay windows from the Beyond the Page collection from kaisercraft. I LOVE the kiasercraft beyond the page products! So sturdy and made out of strong particle board instead of chipboard, you know they will last and they are very budget friendly and easy to alter!

Here's a close up of what i'm supposed to be showing off today!!!

This is one of the new wordarts being released both as a rubber stamp and as a digi stamp this month from Paper Makeup Stamps. Be sure to check out the PMS Company blog to see what other fun new wordarts are being released!

And here's what i love to show off... my kids! I love this picture of them!

And now I better get to bed! The long weekend has gotten me off my game of getting the boys ready for school AND Gabe also starts preschool tomorrow! Wish us luck!!!

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Did you see?! The PMS Digi Makeover Challenge!

Woohoo! We recently added a digi team to the Paper Makeup Stamps family! A huge kudos and thanks goes out to Jami who is in charge of this team! And i just get to play along!

Yes PMS has offered digis in the past, but in limitation. We have decided to up the anty a bit and have weekly digi challenges and with that. And some of your favorite digi stamps that we "retired" as digi format on the site will be returned! So stay tuned on that!

Jami has issued our very first challenge to use PMS colors! That should be easy right?!

Now just like many paper crafters, i really enjoy having a stamp in my hand!

BUT there are certain things that digis can do that a rubber stamp can NOT!

For one they are much easier to "mask" when layering. But thats not what i've done today.

You want to know the number 1 best reason to have a digi in my opinion? To CHANGE IT'S SIZE! Thats right, which a digi you can make it match whatever project you are working on. So that means if you want it mega large for a scrapbook layout, you can! or pretty small to fit on a tag, you can do that too!

Here is my project...

Obviously, I went the enlarging route! This is one of the new Color Kids that actually won't be released until September 7th. Yeah, the owner won't fire me. ;)

But isnt she CUTE? I enlarged her quite a bit (the gray cardstock is a full 8.5 x 11 sheet, i put it up against my cricut for size reference!) I also mega enlarged the sentiment to match. Wouldnt this be a fun little encouragement gift for a little girl? She culd even put it in her locker at school! Or maybe just hang it on her wall. :D

here's a close up...

Enlarging digis also makes them mega fun to color!!! This was just the perfect excuse!

Be sure to check out the PMS Digi Makeup Artists and their take on this challenge today!

While you're there be sure to check out our other sneak peeks so far for the September 7th release!!!

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MTME group Post: Year in Review

I survived my wedding madness weekend! I'm only hanging on by a thread, but i survived! In less than a 48 hour period, I did no less than 33 Makeup applications and somewhere near 37 Hair styles, though I had some assistants to help me set curls, etc. And this doesnt include the touch ups, travel time, etc of my last 48 hours. I'm definitely exhausted after this weekend!

So please bear with my sweet and short post today for My Time Made Easy!

On the 5th of every month, the MTME team does a year in review post to highlight some of the past templates, stamps, cut files and more that you may have forgotten about!

Well there is one cut file in particular that I never got around to using and I just think it's adorable and such a wonderful gift idea! I also think that sometimes the cut files get overlooked!

Gabe starts preschool on tuesday! He did go to the 1 year old class last year 3 days a week, but this year he'll be going 5 days and has a more official school schedule. I'm so excited for him! And for ME! Yeah for quiet catch up and craft time in the morning! So here is my little sweet and OH so easy gift idea for his teacher on his first day!

This is the An Apple a Day cut file! I used some already embossed red cardstock, quickly cut this out using my SCAL and cricut and then topped it with a green prima flower and button combo! Inside are a few of the turtle treats left over from my project the other day. :D But lots of treats could go inside!

Here's a close up shot of the little tag I made to go with the apple treat...

The sentiments are from the Boxed Lunch stamp set and the apples are from the Well Preserved stamp set (both acrylic)

One last view of the completed project...

SO really... it took me not long at ALL to whip this up! Perfectly little thank you for helping my kid treat to a teacher, etc. Just when something more than a thank you email is warranted, but maybe not something so lavish that you would do for a teacher's holiday gift, or end of the year gift. :D And there are lots of other uses for it! Think of the decorating possibilities!

And now there is MORE to see! Check out these fine ladies for their projects today!

Lauren Meader

Debbie Marcinkiewicz

Kathryn Berthiaume

Katie Cotton - thats me!

Lisa Kind

Monique Hansen

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Paper Makeup Stamps sneak peek!

OMG, ok I should totally be in bed, but i'm typing up my post for tomorrow!

I will keep it short and to the point!

Paper Makeup Stamps is having a much anticipated release on September 7th!

Today we start our sneak peeks and we are debuting a new line a-dorable images!

They are called the Color Kids and man, i love to color them! So stinkin' cah-ute! I can say that because I didnt draw them. hehe. Diem, our fabulous illustrator of the fairies and critters is also the illustrator for this new line. :D

Here is my card using Color Kid: Star Student

Here is a close up of the image itself...

There are 2 more color kids that are being released! But you'll have to head over to the PMS blog to check them out. hehe.

Now i'm off to bed, i have to be up in 6 hours for a 12 hour work day! Yipes!!! Which me luck!

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My Time Made Easy: Turtle Treat Tote

Well... I'm pretty sure i've nailed into your brains what all is happening with the My Time Made Easy release over the past few days! So i wont mention it all yet again (if you missed it... scroll down and check out some of my projects too!)

For my project today I used the Tricky Treat Tote, though I assure you, this fabulous tote could be the tote holder for all kinds of gifts! I did decide to stick to some pretty yummy treats though this time around!

Ok, enough of a teaser pic. Here's the front of this fun tote!

See?! It could be used for so much! And that turtle! Is he not cah-ute! In fact, i love ALL the animals from the Wonderful Woodland Creatures stamp set! I mean they are all just ADORABLE! I would have used them all if I could think of a candy to go with each! haha!

But turtles will have to do! My sentiment is just one that I typed up on my computer to match my project. :D

Here is a closer image of the turtle just so you can see how stinkin' adorable he is!

GAH! He just makes me happy!

Ok, thats what i have for ya today! Now i'm off for my marathon of weddings! A 2 parter starting today with a ceremony tonight and tomorrow and then again in the day so I stay for a "flip" which means to change hair and makeup. Then a double header wedding on sunday as well! I will have a post up in there, but i'm not promising to be very chatty!

Wish me luck!!!!

Be sure to check out Lauren and Lisa today for some more fabulous gifties!

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Copic Creations with Susana’s Custom Art and Card Design

DOUBLE POST DAY! If you scroll down (and I hope you do!) I mention how the 1st is always a fun day of the month. So much going on in the crafting world with new releases and and challenges, etc. It's definitely a fun (but BUSY) time each month for many of us!

Today the Copic Creation team has a new challenge for you.. and it's an easy one! USE PINK!

Now last time we had a color challenge, i was a bit literal! Using ONLY copics from the BG family. This round, i did use some favorite pinks, but I did allow some other colors to be used! haha!

Our challenge is being sponsored by the generous and fabulous Susana from Susana’s Custom Art and Card Design. I just adore Susana! She has been an "early friend" in the online crafting world and was a big supporter of my starting my own stamp company. She's just sweet as can be and helpful and I love her to pieces! Susana carries many different stamp company lines in her store, one of them being EXCLUSIVE Elisabeth Bell stamps. And she was so generous to send us each our own to play with!

Here is my card using paper from October Afternoon (Go Fly A Kite)

For my pinks, I used R30, R32, R35 and R39. Normally i would have also used R37 but it has mysteriously disappeared from my craft room? So far, I havent found red marker traces anywhere... so we'll see where it decides to turn up!

Other copic colors used... for the purse... BG09, BG07, BG05 and a little BG45.

Skin is E21, E00 and E000 (with some R30 for her cheeks)

Money (happy day, i want to find some money!) is YG17 and YG13.

Hair: E99, YR23, Y21 and a little YR14 just to warm it up a bit.

The Sentiment on my card is from a Paper Makeup Stamps set called Retail Therapy. :D

SO there you have it! Be sure to check out Susana's store for some shopping as well as the copic creations blog to see all the other fabulous creations from the design team!

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