Getting Sketchy time with MFT #204

Working with this weeks sketch over at My Favorite Things Wednesday Stamp Club.  Here's the sketch....

......and here's my take on it.  I used MFT's dies; Accent It - Happy, Bracket Edge Duo and Bring on The Cake.  I also used Lil' Inker Design's Bunnies (bow) die, Simon Says Stamp's Birthday die, Avery Elle Balloons die for the sparkes and a corner chomper to round of a couple of those corners.  I popped up the white panel with some dimensional tape.  I didn't use any patterns or stamping on this card but I really love the fresh crisp look of all the great lines in the die cuts. 

Thanks for looking, have a great day!

Getting Sketchy time with MFT 203

This weeks sketch over at the Wednesday Stamp Club at My Favorite Things was clean and  simple.  I have a hard time with simple sometimes.  So when that's the case I usually start mixing up patterns and go with lots of color.  For this one I used a couple MFT's  background stamps; Fine Chevron and Confetti along with their Celebrate Big stamp set for the birthday greeting.  I just love those background stamps.  I don't seem to use patterned paper anymore, I go straight for those background stamps for my pattern.

The making of Siriana's Elsa

What does every 5 year old little girl want for her birthday?  Why, an Elsa cake of course!  I was tickeled sparkly blue when Little Siriana put her order in for a beautiful Princess Elsa cake to be the centerpiece at her little tea party.   Let the mixing and baking and icing and rolling and sparkling begin!

mmmmm....vanilla buttercream!

mmmmmm......chocolate cake!

A little carving and shaping for a perfect skirt.

Filled and iced and fitted for legs.

Dough hook and sky blue fondant ready for rolling.

Perfect fit!

Snowflakes and shimmer and sparkles and glitter.  Lots of finishing touches to make a princess shine.

Happy Birthday Siriana!!

And thank you so much for the beautiful thank you note.  You are quite an artist!!

Finishing touches on Christmas Cards.

I've had the best time making my Christmas cards this year.  My main goals were to keep them bright, clean and simple.   With a few new dies and stamps from Lil' Inker Designs I had a nice mix to choose from.  These little trees were simple but when used in multiples they really become a great focus.

I admit, this next card is far from simple.  I was in the mood try a few techniques on this card starting with the background.  I stenciled the brick pattern on using Tim Holtz distress inks.  I also sprinkled on some water droplets to give it a dreamy affect.  The window die and banner die are from Spellbinders.  For the tree I just punched out a bunch of little pine branches with a Martha Stewart punch and glued them in the form of a tree and added some sparkly sequins.  This is one of my all time favorite cards.

I'm always trying to find a way to use this Lil' Inker chevron background stamp.  I thought the red would look great on a white background.  Kind of reminds me of candy canes.  The little wreath was made with the same little Martha Stewart punch and then I added some touches of gold.  I love gold foiled cardstock!

This Jolly card is a total lift from Tracey McNeely.  I absolutely loved the simplicity of it and I thought it gave such a great impact.  No one can look at this card and not realize who's "jolly" tummy this is.  I used Lil' Inker jolly die and stitched diagonal die.  I also used the pierced square die-namics from My Favorite Things for the buckle and added some glossy accents.

And for this final card I was just really wanting to use this new Border Builders die from Lil' Inker Designs.  These dies are so fun.  I love the curves!!  For the sentiment I used a stamp set from Winnie & Walter and embossed with Ranger Super fine gold embossing powder. I was very impressed by how clean it embossed, especially the smaller sentiment.

So.....as much as I don't want to be, I think I'm done with my Christmas cards for this year.   I'll be busy making a couple cakes before Christmas and of course the annual gingerbread houses, but hopefully I'll find time to sneak in some scrapbooking and cardmaking between projects.

Thanks for looking!!

~Lisa~

Elsa and Anna cake for Rylee

On October 18th my little niece Rylee turned 8 years old.  As so many little girls her age, she fell in love with the movie Frozen so when she asked me to make her cake I wasn't surprised with the theme she chose.  After searching for inspiration on the internet we came up with a design that would incorporate both characters in her cake.   She wanted both Elsa and Anna. 

Now, I've made princess cakes before so this wasn't really a new concept for me.  I did a beautiful Belle cake for a cousin of mine and Rylee has also been the happy recipient of an Ariel cake on her 4th birthday.  But this cake was going to be a little different.  I had to make one skirt for two dolls.  I used a Wilton skirt pan but because it's not tall enough for a Barbie sized doll I had to layer it on top of a 9" round cake.  After binding the two dolls together with saran wrap, I slid them into a hole that I cut into the center of the cake.  The saran wrap kept the dolls nice and clean so that when it came time to take them out the birthday girl could play with them right away.

I iced the skirt with buttercream icing and then covered with fondant.  One side I did light blue for Elsa and sprayed with a nice coat of shimmer spray.  Since her dress was the plainer of the two I was able able to add a birthday greeting and some little snowflakes sprinkled with silver disco dust.

Anna's side was covered in a dark blue fondant and then decorated with flowers that I cut cut out using various shaped cutters.  

The finished girls from the back.

Thes dolls were just so pretty.  I think they made beautiful cake toppers.

Rylee picked out a pretty, glittery 8 candle but there really wasn't a good place to put it on the cake so I made a little snowball out of gumpaste and edible flakes.

I added a birthday greeting in purple using a set of tappits and fondant.

Happy Birthday to my sweet little Princess Ryleebug!!

You warm my heart!

~Aunt Lisa~

Caring Hearts

Today I'm sending out my little bunch of cards to the Caring Hearts Card Drive.  Jennifer McGuire is one of the sponsors for this drive that collects and distributes handmade cards to several nursing homes during the holidays. I thought this was a beautiful idea and it also gave me the opportunity to feed my addiction to making Christmas cards this year.  I'm just having so much fun with them I don't want to stop.  So, thank goodness for Caring Hearts.

I can only hope my cards will offer a little holiday cheer.  I feel honored to participate and will be looking forward to doing the same next year with hopefully a lot more!

Thanks for stopping by.

~Lisa~

Different cards using the same die.

I had a great time today playing around with this cute little Christmas Tree Cut-Out die from My Favorite Things.  I received this die as a free item with one of my purchases a couple months ago and  I was really kind of stumped as to how to use it.  So today I finally decided to give it a try. 

The first thing I thought of was that this would make a great shaker card.  I had seen it used this way on a couple blogs out there and wanted to give it a try.  I worked with some great dies from Lil' Inker Designs to add the "joy" sentiment and the bow on top of the tree.  I also used a sequin die from Mama Elephant.  I stamped the background of the tree with My Favorite Things Thin Chevron background stamp.  I glued and stacked six of these tree cutouts to make the border to hold the sequins.  That seemed to be a little quicker than using dimensional tape.  I love how each strip holds it's own sequins. This card has some great movement.

I took the cutouts from that tree and used it to make this next card for a whole new spin on this diecut.  I popped the strips up with dimensional tape and added some of the cutout sequins, a gold bow and some gold string.  The Merry is also included in this set with the tree and I love the way it looks with the red behind it.  I used a pinking edged die from My Favorite Things for a little strip of gold on the side.

For shaker box number two I used a purple foiled cardstock along with some silver glitter cardstock for the accents.  I also used a stitched wavy Border Builders die from Lil' Inker Designs to make a little snowdrift in the background.

Then, using the cutout scraps from the last card I made this card.  This time I created an outdoor theme with another snowdrift and some snow, using a white gel pen.

These cards were so fun to make.  I'm hoping to make a few more using this die this year.  Thanks so much for stopping by.

~Lisa~

Keeping it Merry & Jolly

Working on my Christmas cards this year I notice I am drawn to more traditional colors....reds, greens, silver, gold.  I was really drawn to Lil' Inker Design's selection of Christmas stamps and dies.  The "Jolly" word die, the little jingle bells the ornament die and that adorable little stitched Christmas tree die made it on to my first set of cards.  I also did some stamping with that fabulous diagonal striped background stamp by My Favorite Things.  It gives a great festive, candy cane kind of feel to my cards.    Starting out I just hung the ornament from the top of the card.   Then I remembered I had purchased that lovely little Inkadinkado Branches stamp set.

 

The Branches were so fun to stamp.  I am able to make each card look different, even if I'm making multiple cards.  I stamped on the green pine image, then I took a brown marker and added some little branches to connect the pine needle sections.  To add a little sparkle and dimension I added some Crystal Stickles to half of each branch to look like snow.  

After I did a few of these cards I thought it would be fun to add some little ornaments.  I just used the Holly Berries from another great LID die set.  I really love how festive this makes the branch look.

And for something just a bit different I added the diagonal stamped background at an angle for this card.  It adds a little unexpected element and makes this cute little LID tree look even more fun.  I used the holly berry dies once again only this time they were ornaments for this little tree.  Instead of a star I tied it up with a big bow which I think really adds to the retro look.

Thanks for stopping by and taking a look at my cards.  Have a great week everyone!

~Lisa~