Happy Wednesday!  Welcome back for another fun challenge from Freshly Made Sketches!  This week’s sketch is courtesy of the amazing Jen Mitchell from I Create and boy does she ever create!  Her style is so cool.  She has a knack for wonderful clean lines but her cards always have a “wow” factor!

I took another non-holiday turn for this card.  I don’t know about you but I have some family members who have December birthdays.  I always try to make something for them that makes them feel special and that in no way reflects Christmas.  So out came the Beau Chateau DSP and off I went.  This paper seems to call out for a flower but instead of stamping one, I created one from my Fun Flowers die.  I folded up a piece of wrapping tissue paper and ran it through the Big Shot.  Since my tissue paper was white and this paper has a sponged element I sponged the layers with some Crumb Cake ink.  The center of the flower is a Crumb Cake button from my Neutrals pack.  The little banner is stamped on another piece of DSP from the set and grounded with an additional button.   A little bit of Linen Thread was tied onto both buttons to complete the look.  Between the Big Shot and the DSP, this is one of those cards that looks harder than it is…love it when that happens!

Thanks so much for dropping in today.  Make sure you go see what the rest of the team has created to inspire you.  They always amaze me!  I certainly hope that you get some crafting time this week and will show us your version of the sketch.  I will be off for a few days for the Thanksgiving holiday but next week promises to be full of posts!  For those of you in the US, I wish you a safe and blessed Thanksgiving!  See you soon!

Stamp:  All Holidays (retired); Paper:  Beau Chateau DSP, Soft Suede; Ink:  Soft Suede, Crumb Cake; Accessories:  Big Shot, Fun Flowers Die, Neutrals Buttons, Linen Thread, Stamp-a-ma-jig, Sponges, Wrapping Tissue Paper

Welcome back for another Wednesday challenge from Freshly Made Sketches!  This week’s sketch is courtesy of Linda Callahan from Stampin’ Seasons.  She is a remarkably talented stamper and her sketch has so many fantastic possibilities.

I figured it was time to pull out a Christmas card for you so here is my tall snowman from Snow Much Fun.  I will warn you about the hazards of stamping with people like the design team at FMS.  I had resisted this set all the way until my last order.  After I saw SO MANY cute cards, I realized that “resistance is futile”!!  So…here he is!  The best part is that the watercoloring takes almost no time at all.  Fabulous!  Now in order to make this guy work for the sketch, I had to, um, cut off his legs.  There are some (Karen Barber – who also had a hilarious set of cards about the two snowmen) that believe snowmen should not have legs.  Frankly, I can see the virtues of both but today losing them worked.  I made this card with Basic Black, Real Red and Baja Breeze.  I find that I don’t use black nearly enough and since it was already out from yesterday’s card, it seemed perfect.  I added a little dimension by embossing the Real Red layer with the Snow Burst Embossing Folder.  Some little snowflakes finished it up (another enabled purchase…these ladies are dangerous!).  I colored a Basic Pearl with a Sharpie Marker to make it coordinate.  Cool!

I’ll be back tomorrow with a card from my Christmas Wow Class this week.  Yep…another snow man!  Thanks for dropping by today.  Don’t forget to drop by the Freshly Made Sketches challenge to see the amazing cards from the whole team.  Hope you can play this week!

Stamp:  Snow Much Fun; Paper:  Basic Black, Whisper White, Baja Breeze, Real Red; Ink:  Stazon Black, Real Red, Basic Black, Baja Breeze, Basic Gray; Accessories:  Big Shot, Snow Burst EF, Northern Frost Die, Basic Pearls, Sharpie Marker, Dimensionals

It is time for the Freshly Made Sketches latest challenge.  Oooh, take a look at this one!!  The fabulous layout is courtesy of the super talented Rita Wright at Rita’s Creations!  I love her style and her choice of the sketch shows why.  Just look at all the possiblities with this one!  If you have any questions, you just have to see the variety of projects from the team this week.  Lots of inspiration there!

Normally by November I am making all Christmas cards all the time.  Somehow this year, I continue to be inspired to make fall cards.  It might be because I LOVE fall in Virginia.  It might be because we are having lovely cold crisp mornings with warm afternoons.  Or it might be the Spice Cake DSP.  Hmmm!  I leave that to you to figure out!  More Mustard is, I admit, not a go-to color for me in general.  But this pattern called out to get used in this cool sketch this week.  I looked at my leaves (and I have lots), I looked at my flowers (lots there too) and then I realized that my Every Moment stamp was at the back of the stack.  That clearly had to be remedied!  I love this stamp set and the little bird here is awesome.  I have made him into several types of bird but today he is an orange fronted yellow finch.  Yep, look it up!  Of course I just colored him how I wanted and then figured out what he looked like but now we can all recognize a new kind of bird.  *smile*  I watercolored him with my Blender Pen after stamping him with Stazon Ink.  I added a sentiment from Teeny Tiny Wishes and a button to finish it.

The sketch does all the work here so it is perfect for beginning and advanced stampers alike.  Hope you will give it a try this week!  My boys are have some days off from school this week so I will be enjoying the beautiful weather with them.  I’ll be back next week though with lots of fun new things.  Thanks so much for stopping in today!

Stamps:  Every Moment, Teeny Tiny Wishes; Paper:  Spice Cake DSP, Early Espresso, Watercolor; Ink:  More Mustard, Early Espresso, Soft Suede, River Rock, Always Artichoke, Stazon; Accessories:  Blender Pens, Neutrals Buttons, Linen Thread, Dimensionals