You Make Life Sweet

It's time for TCP Tuesday 199, and Susan is our hostess with a fun challenge to use the CutUps Cloud Border die in addition to any stamp that relates to The Great Outdoors! You can check out all of the important details of TCP Tuesday 199 at Susan's blog, and as for my interpretation of the challenge, here it is:

I know, I know--there are so many swonderful (that's swanky + wonderful) choices for The Great Outdoors theme over at The Cat's Pajamas, but I've had this idea to use the CutUps Cloud Border die to make an ice cream cone in my noggin for quite some time now and decided to seize the day, so to speak, and go with my cloudy cone idea. The way I look at it, I wouldn't really enjoy an ice cream cone unless I was out enjoying The Great Outdoors while eating it, right?!

To accomplish my idea, I used three CutUps dies: Cloud Border (ice cream), Small Pennant (cone) and Pinwheel (heart cherry on top). The seniment is from Like You A Latte, the bingo card from Build-A-Bingo, and the yummy paper is from EP This & That Graceful 6x6 pad. It's all tied up with a bit of Cotton Candy Divine Twine...all within reach, or a few clicks, at The Cat's Pajamas!

I sure hope you get a chance to play along this week and just to nudge you along, I'm going to leave you with a few TCP sets that swank the heck outta The Great Outdoors!
~Amy

Wet Puddle
Happy Camper
Wheel Love
Away We Go
Kick Some Grass

 (you get the idea...)

JiFFy {Admit One}

It's time to get JiFFy once again with my pals: Carole, Christina, Lori & Michele! As you may know, one of the JiFFy girls chooses the paper, another chooses the image and we all come up with something 'real nice' using the combination and post on the same day...and remember, it's Just For Fun!

This month our image is from my stamping Alma mater (pun intended), The Cat's Pajamas, and it is actually the entire set of Admit One (one of my most favorite TCP sets) combined with paper from Pebbles' Fresh Goods (Flower Basket). I've also used my CutUps Big Ticket die to trim out my tickets and tied them with Rose Seam Binding, also from The Cat's Pajamas. I felt like my image cluster needed a little sumpin' more, so I stuck in a couple of sweet stick pins I was recently gifted from my BSF, Carole (she's got such great taste and a big heart)!

Can't wait to see what the gals have done with my beloved Admit One and these yummy papers, so I'm signing off to get a quick look-see!
~Amy

TCP Tuesday 198

Welcome to my edition of this week's TCP Tuesday, hosted by Lori who has a sweet pastel-ish color challenge: aqua, mossy green and soft pink. I know what y'all are thinking--where's the mossy green, Rohl?! I'll give y'all a point on that one, but it's all good because my grass is very 'mossy green', don't you know?! All kidding aside, I get so excited every time I get stampy with Kick Some Grass and then throw in these yummy MME Miss Caroline papers and I lose total control...you know how that goes, right?! Just for good measure I wound a bit of Divine Twine around the image panel and threw in a few machine stitches using none other than mossy green thread. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it!

I hope you get a chance to play along with this week's TCP Tuesday Color Challenge, and when you do, link yourself up over at Alma's blog where you can also find all of the details of the TCP Tuesday challenge as well as anything TCP related!

Have a great weekend,
Amy

TCP Tuesday 197: ABC

This week's TCP Tuesday challenge is all about anything BUT a card (ABC), so I have a fun little gift tag to share with you today that uses CutUps dies, Big Ticket and Cloud Border, along with stamps from the Nightie Alpha & Admit One, and Black Licorice Divine Twine.

I suppose you're all wondering who this Carter is and what the tag was used for, huh? Carter is the sweetest young boy whom I had the pleasure of meeting in person last week while he was visiting my neck of the woods, AND he just so happens to be the son of my BSF, Carole...yep, THE Carole! It was such a pleasure to meet Carter, and as his momma said in THIS blog post, we did sorta hit it off at 'go'. Love.him. Knowing that Carter may need some cuddling duds in his future, I made up a cozy fleece Thomas the Train blanket for him and tagged it with the Carter tag shown above. You can see the tagged blanket over at Carole's blog HERE.

Before I sign off for today, I'll direct you to Julie's and Alma's blogs for the complete TCP Tuesday details and leave you with a picture of me and my new buddy, Carter! ~Amy

TCP Tuesday 196

Jen is this week's TCP Tuesday hostess with the mostest, and she's got a great inspiration piece for you all, so hop over to see it if you haven't already. Here's a hint: rainbow connection!

I started off with a kraft card base and then added another layer of kraft so that my CutUps Cloud Border could hang over each edge. Dangling from the clouds is a rainbow of CutUps Hearts strung with coordinating Divine Twine from The Cat's Pajamas Boutique, if you will! The sentiment is from Like You A Latte.

If you're a rainbow kinda gal/guy, you need to see all of the awesome rainbow connections the rest of design team has created--they'll melt your rainbow hearts! You can check them out via the TCP DT links over to the right, on my sidebar.

Have a great weekend, all! We're off to watch the Hankster wrestle today, and by the way, our big-little Hankster took first last week in our conference wrestling tourney, whoot whoot!
~Amy

YNS Friday Fun: Ticket To My Heart

Welcome to YNS Friday Fun! I'm featuring a fun little adult-style Valentine using the newly released set, World Love from YNS.

I've got a little bit of everything going on here from machine stitching to die cutting to Silhouette cutting. I just love all the options out there in the papercrafting world today and putting them all together. The ticket strip was a freebie from Silhouette last week, so I cut that out, stamped the image from World Love and then Copic colored the heart on each figure. The sentiment is computer generated and then layered on a Big Scallop die cut after stitching the upper and lower edges of the sentiment strip. Just to add a bit more 'love' to the card, I stamped an additional heart background over the patterned paper using the heart from World Love.

Head on over to the YNS Blog for a fun Susie-Q Tip and more Friday Fun samples!
~Amy

YNS New Release Blog Hop

Welcome to the YNS New Release Blog Hop! If you hopped here from Susan's blog, you're on the right track, and when you're finished here, you'll hop on along to Jen's blog.

Meet Zina from Africa, now a member of the World Kids Collection! I've done my best to dress her up using Copic colors to match patterned paper from Daisy D's Autumn Collection (Fall in Love). The giraffes in the background were cut with my Silhouette and then placed in a row of die cut grass. The gold embossed sentiment is from Mixed Bag of Greetings, also from YNS.

Here are the official blog hop details:

Blog Hop Starts: Wednesday, February 8th
Blog Hop Ends: Monday, February 13th at midnight (EST)

Hop Prize – World Love stamp set – one of the YNS DT Members is a secret blogger, so leaving comments on each of the hop participants gives you the best chance at winning! The winner will be announced on the YNS blog on February 14th.

Hop Specials – 15% off entire order – online code is YNSFEB2012 (code valid until Feb 15th).

Thanks for stopping by and remember to leave a comment for your chance to win World Love (I'll be back with a card using that set on Friday).
~Amy

YNS Sneak Peek:

Welcome to Day 3 of Sneak Peeks from Your Next Stamp! I'm pleased to introduce you to Kichiro from Japan, another addition to the adorable World Kids Collection. If you're not familiar with this line of stamps, check out the entire collection HERE, and be warned--you're going to fall.in.love.

I colored and paper pieced Kichiro using Copics and patterned paper from Crate Paper and then put it all together using Jen's SFYTT for February. By the way, YNS is Jen's February SFYTT sponsor, so all the more reason to jump in and use your YNS stamps and the SFYTT this month!

Stop by and see Karen today at the YNS Blog for the entire lineup of sneak peeks and I'll see you back here tomorrow for the YNS New Release Blog Hop!
~Amy

YNS Friday Fun: Go For The Gold!

Happy Friday, everyone! This week has gone by at a snail's pace for me, so I'm more than happy to say TGIF! I'm guessing that the snail's pace could be, in fact, because my oldest son, Hank, is competing in a pretty important wrestling tourney this weekend, so I'm anxiously waiting to see how he's going to fare on Saturday! Go, Hank, Go!

Ok, so in honor of the Hankster (as we affectionately call him), I created a Friday Fun YNS Good Luck bottle tag for his beloved Gatorade using Seasonal Icons Set I. In lieu of traditional rainbow colors, I've opted for shades of our school color: Panther Purple! That's the beauty of the stamping world--you absolutely do not have to abide by traditional color schemes. In fact, the less traditional, the better...in some cases!

Here's a closeup of the ribbon/pot of Panther-gold...with a sweet pocket for a personal note and gift card using a cut file with my Silhouette (love that machine).

Remember to stop over at the YNS Blog for a complete listing of Friday Fun posts! I'll be back on Monday with a YNS sneak peek...see you then!
~Amy

TCP Tuesday 195: Happy Happy Birthday!

Welcome to this week's TCP Tuesday post! Leigh is our hostess this week with a great sketch for you, so hop over to her place to see the sketch in person. I've turned the sketch on it's head for my card which just happens to be in honor of my dear daughter Kendra's 19th birthday this Friday! Last year, for her 18th birthday, we went to her favorite restaurant, Fiesta Mexicana, and she's requested a repeat for this year's bash, so I just had to pull out those margarita-loving penguins from Hola Tequila!

Along with those fun-loving penguins, I've thrown in some yummy Mango Seam Binding that TCP carries and a banner made with the CutUps Pennant die. I was so excited thinking about those yummy margaritas that I just about forgot to tell you where the sentiment and '19' came from! The sentiment is from Birthday Bunny, and the number 19 is from the new Build-A-Bingo set, cool beans!

Head on over to Leigh's and Alma's blog for complete TCP Tuesday details and have a great Wednesday!
~Amy