MMSC12 Birthday Beach Hedgie for my Baby's Birthday : ) 4 Challenges

Lots of B's in that title : ) This card was made for the MMSC12 challenge (and a few other challenges :)) and for my youngest's 8th birthday. I loved making this card for him, because he has from the very beginning been my biggest fan. He tells me every single card that I make is beautiful and wants to have every one of them for his own. That boy is one day going to make some lucky lady very happy!! So, anyway, I wanted to make this special for him. His birthday was today, July 27th, and he so LOVES the water, the beach and summer. The cute hedgie with the present just tops it off. I was a little leary of putting the yellow bow on there, but he didn't say anything, so I don't think it bothers him at all.

I think I am at the end of my beach cards for the summer. I have used up most of my images, and will have to wait until next summer for some more. I have had lots of fun making sand on my cards and putting seashells all over them. Are you ready for your shot at this week's challenge? Go ahead, give it a try. Once you get started, you will have so much fun. I look forward to seeing your entries. Please keep following the MMSC challenges. There are some really fun and exciting things coming up that you won't want to miss!

Thanks for stopping by, and let me know what you think of my card.

Have a great week!

News Flash.....For the next two weeks,

my husband will be home for a visit, so I will not be on my blog or updating it too much. I will still be posting my MMSC cards which are already scheduled to post, but please be sure to go to Priscilla's blog to keep up on the latest news regarding the MMSC in case I miss something in these next couple of weeks. There is always something going on over there that is fun and exciting. I am hoping to have a fun couple of weeks spending time with my husband and kids as a family! I will be back to my normal blogging after he goes back. I am thinking of having a back to school blog candy offer coming up, so keep your eyes open for that soon.

Thanks for dropping by my blog. I appreciate all of your support and kind comments!

MMSC11 Butterfly Lace Sunflower Collage Card

Before I start my post, I want to congratulate Grace N. on your masterpiece award this week. Your card was amazing. Thanks for sharing your talents with us. Also congratulations to my DT sister Kimmie for her mischief award which she so diligantly earned ; ) with her fun and risky cards. Please visit Priscilla's blog for all the news this week. One exciting thing to share from her blog is:

We have a very special treat for the Bonus Winner of MMSC11. I would like to introduce you to, the very talented Michelle Perkett. Michelle Perkett is an artist who believes that the world can always use more happiness, innocence, color and inspiration. Each of her enchanted and inspirational fairies, mermaids, goddesses and angels share these wonderful things with the world.Michelle started her "World of Enchantment and Inspiration" in 2004. Before that she began her art career working as an active duty graphic artist in the United States Air Force and then in the corporate world for 10 years. Since it's beginning, her enchanting line has continued to grow and make people smile all over the world! I am so excited to share with you that coming soon, Michelle's enchanting designs will be made available as rubber stamps and digital stamps! I for one, will be first in line to get some. You can see her at her Etsy Shop. Thank you so much Michelle for being our sponsor this week and your very GENEROUS prize give away of your
“Enchanted Inspiration Fairy Collection Set”

Ok, now on to my post:

This was definately another of Priscilla's work-for-it challenge cards for me. I made two attempts at this sketch before I was happy with the result, but after the work was done, it was worth it as it always is. I took the pictures with a dark background and a light background to see the different effect that you can get and shared one of each on here for you to see. I am really excited to see what you guys come up with for this sketch. Put on your creative thinking caps, and have a go at it. It really is fun once you get started.

I would like to enter this one into A spoon full of sugar challenge and Stampin' B's Challenge #15 this week too.

Thanks for dropping by, and please leave me a comment to let me know that you came by for a visit and what you think of my card.

Have a great week!

The Next Level Challenge..Summer Tilda Wading

I had some issues with links on my pictures that would not allow you to enlarge them. I have since added new pictures, and they should now be able to be enlarged. Sorry about that!

Some of you had asked if you could see a picture of the inside of the card, so I posted a picture below. Thanks for all the nice comments on this card!! I really appreciate them!!

Hi Again~

I know this is not common for me to get two posts in one day, but I had to try out the challenge over at The Next Level this week. I was surprised to be able to get one done for them, but it was pretty fun to do. They already provided the sketch, and I just had to add some dimension to my image which I did. I popped the main image as well as the circle that it is displayed on, added some sparkle and glaze to the water, created a blue sky, and there you have a fun card with Tilda taking a very cautious wade in the water.

Thanks for dropping by for a look. What do you think of my first TNL card?

MMSC10 Beach Baby Girl Gathering Seashells Card

Congrats go out to Connie this week for winning the MM Masterpiece Badge! and to our featured DT! Also to Jess for the MM Artistic Award.

Don't forget to play this week to have your chance to win 118 digital images from Dustin Pike!

Now, onto my entry for this week...

Can you tell I'm on a beach kick this month? I am really enjoying using my beach stamps while I can. This is one of my favorite images, and I think that it fits this card really well. With the MMSC10 sketch this week, I really pondered how I could make this card different and still pretty and beachy. Well, what I decided was to make the oval scalloped nesties for the top and bottom to sort of portray a clam shell and put the image of the little girl on the beach in the middle of it. I was so pleased with how it turned out. I dry embossed the background paper to make it look like a big beach and added some real seashells to the bottom. If you enlarge the picture, you will see her sunkissed skin and some sparkle in her hair and her dress. I hope you enjoy my sample card for this week's sketch, and I look forward to seeing how many ways that you come up with to work this sketch.

I am also entering this card in the Belli challenge which is asking for texture on a card this week, and in the 365 challenge which is asking for bubbles. I love that I could fit this card into 3 challenges. I am getting better. I will try to do more as I go.

Please do leave me a comment and let me know what you think. Thanks for dropping by. Have a great week!!

An Exciting Announcment From Priscilla's Midnight Madness Blog

I am really upset that I can't get the pictures to load up on my blog here. I don't know what is going on with Blogger today, but I am having alot of trouble doing anything on here. Please hop over to Priscilla's Blog to see all that you can win. You won't be sorry!!

Here is the announcement:

Midnight Madness & Dustin Pike (I can't hold back on the big Announcement)
I just can’t hold back any longer….guess what?? The Midnight Madness Weekly Bonus Winner for MMSC10 is going to Win
“Dustin Pike’s"
COMPLETE LINE OF Digis
That is 118 images!! That’s right, you heard me correct!!! Dustin has so GENEROUSLY offered to our weekly bonus winner his complete line of images he has created to date. WOW what a prize!!!!
If you were to break that down, it is a
"Prize Worth over $300!!!!! INCREDIBLE!!!" If you are not familiar with Dustin Pike, this is what I have learned about him.…..he has been drawing/doodling for as long as he can remember. Even his homework in school had more doodles in the blank parts than it did answers...In school he tried to have more art classes than any other, he just didn’t get math, English was OK, but in art classes he knew what he was doing. He joined the US Air Force in 92 with the idea that he would do commercial art, advertising, something in a creative field and boy was he wrong. At Basic training he was informed he would be an AMMO troop, driving bombs and missiles around the flight line delivering them to the jets. He still doodled in the Air Force, designing tattoos for friends, drawing on the bombs before they were sent away. He just kept it going to keep up the practice. After that he worked for a printing company in Bountiful, Utah. He designed a whole line of clip art for the yearbooks that they published. After he left there, he found a few places to free-lance and do drawings here and there. 6 or 7 years ago he found a company that would scan and sell his designs for scrapbooks. He did that for a while and then learned how to do it all by himself and went out on my own. He drew a lot of moose, bears and bugs, but somewhere a dragon popped in, He doesn’t remember exactly when but he was born and he's been a part of his wonderful art ever since. With his rubber and digi stamps a very good friend of his Rikki sent him an email telling him he needed to look into rubber stamps, his style has clean crisp dark lines that would transfer over very well into the stamping world. He contacted a few companies, joined a few groups and had his first rubber set coming out May 2nd and the second set around the second week of May. In the meantime he found Digital Stamps. Drew a few, put them on Etsy just to test the waters and found himself dragged in...He has since started his own website mainly for digi stamps...and the rest is history.
Here is just a sample of what the MMSC10 Weekly Bonus Winner will WIN!!


Give Dustin a visit and check him out!! I would like to thank our own MMDT member Charlotte for introducing me to Dustin and his work. Charlotte is also on Dustins DT :) Dustin is an awesome person and it has been fun getting to know him! :) So Be sure to check back on Tuesdays for the Midnight Madness Sketch Challenge details and Newest SKETCH!!! You will not want to miss playing this next week for sure!!! :) Thank you for stopping in!!!


Be sure to check back in for the new MMSC Sketch challenge on Tuesday. Have a great Sunday!

Carolyn

Win $1,000 at TheCuttlebugSpot.com!

I have just discovered that The Cuttlebug Spot is having a contest - "The Journey to 1,000"! They are trying to reach 1,000 followers by the end of July and need your help. To enter all you have to do is go to their site, sign up as follower and complete a few easy steps and you could win a $1,000 gift certificate to Custom Crops (http://www.customcrops.com/)! GO NOW and check it out at http://www.thecuttlebugspot.com/

Hedgehog and Ladybug Friends Card for Jaimie

I have chosen to send this card to Jaimie.  You can read her story here:  http://spreadthelove-forjaimie.blogspot.com/

I decided to try out a challenge over at High Hopes and create a cute hedgehog card. You don't see nearly as many of these around as you did a year ago, but I still think they are cute and enjoy making them once in awhile. The challenge was to make a card using lots of polka dots. What better card with polka dots than one with a ladybug theme. So, I used a black and white polka dot ribbon, polka dot flowers, some pearl gemstones as dots and round/scalloped nestabilities. I think I did what I was suppose to. I've never done a challenge with High Hopes before, so I hope I did everything right. I am also entering this into the Creative Card Crew challenge this week which requested to use ribbon. It was fun to be able to find two challenges to fit this card into. Thanks for having a look at it, and I would love to know what you think.

Have a great day!

MMSC9 Beach and Sandcastle Shell card

Hi, and welcome to the MMSC9 challenge. This one was so very much fun to make. It is by far the heaviest card I have ever made to date. It is full of seashells and so beachy looking. My daughter is begging me for this card! She says this is her favorite card that I have made. It really was alot of work, especially to get the border shells all in place and to stay there. It took several days to accomplish this whole thing. There was alot of mess and alot of touching up, but it is now a very secure and clean card. I am on a bit of a beachy trend with my challenge cards, so there may be some more of these themed cards in the month of July. I have to get them in while I can.

I hope that you are all enjoying the MMSC challenges and I look forward to seeing what everyone comes up with for this sketch.

Have a great day and a wonderful summer!!

SOME INFO FROM PRISCILLA'S BLOG:

Midnight Madness Week #9 (MMSC9)
Welcome!! I am so excited about our Guest Designer spot! So be sure to check that out below and show us what you have this month. Ok, remember, you have till Midnight EST 7-7-09 to get your MMSC8 entries in for last weeks sketch. One winner will be drawn for our weekly BONUS GIFT give a way Wednesday, so check back for that. If you miss the deadline, you are still welcome to leave a comment with your url so we can still check out your work.

MIDNIGHT MADNESS MASTERPIECE AWARDEach week we awarding a special Badge Award to one person for their outstanding sketch submission. If you would like to be considered for this award, please make sure your card link is posted to Mr. Linky by Sunday of each week. This is our way of let you know how wonderfully talented you are and how much we appreciate you sharing your craft with us. This week we are proud to say the“MIDNIGHT MADNESS MASTERPIECE” Gold Star Award goes to.....

KathyJ (Wattle)Enjoy your award and please display it proudly!(if you would like the blinkie code, just email me ;)

MM DESIGN TEAM AWARD This week the MMDT has nominated this person for the “Midnight Madness Tecnical Wiz Award" She is always so knowledgeable about computer issues. It seems as if she is the first to offer up a helping hand and walk you through the ever changing and confusing computer world. Thank you for being out "Computer Smarts" Girl. Not only is she a Wiz at the computer, she is a Wiz at card making. Be sure to stop by and check out all that she has going on over at her blog. She has recently announced some very exciting things and Just opened up her new Online Store.
This week we would like to honor.....SueStop by and check out her Blog and NEW STORE!Thank you for all your help and for being our Tec WIZ Gal!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
GUEST DESIGNER CALLThe Midnight Madness Design Team is on a SEARCH!!! We are looking for our very first “Guest Designer Diva”
Is it YOU? If you are chosen as our first "Midnight Madness Guest Designing Diva" here is what will happen…..1. You will be working side by side with our design team for one full month and be submitting one sample card per week for our Midnight Madness sketch Challenges.2. Reap all the benefits and sponsor perks of being on the team for that month.3. You will get to display and keep a custom“Midnight Madness Guest Designer Diva” badge for your blog. NOTE: We welcome EVERYONE to play and a blog is NOT required to be on our design team. We are currently seeking a Diva(or Dude) for the month of Aug. Here is what you need to do if you are interested.

1. Leave us a comment below stating that you are interested
2. Enter as many MM challenges in July as you can.
3. take note of what we are looking for….CONSISTENCE WITH WEEKLY ENTRIESQUALITY WORKMANSHIPCREATIVITYAND A TOUCH OF MADNESS (we are a fun group ;)

We will be judging the cards submitted for the weekly challenges in July. We will announce our very first Diva (or Dude) on July 29th. JULY GRAND PRIZES and OUR VERY FIRST SPONSORSHIP..

This month are sponsore is..“Lindy’s Stamp Gang”
Did I mention that they donated hundreds of dollars of products for our team to try out. We are just loving getting pampered by them. This week I used The "Starburst Stain"in "Hydrangea Blue" on my card. If you enlarge my Mermaid card and look at the embossed swirl back ground paper, I have just lightly stained the raised embossed part of it. Take a close look at how pretty the shimmer of the Hydrangea Blue just sparkles. They have such a huge verity of Stain and Spray colors you can view them HERE!! I invite you all to check out their wonderful line of products and be sure to tell them the “Midnight Madness” sent you. They even have fabulous videos Here! And if you get a chance you should really check out their GALLERY. I promise you will not be disappointed in their fantastic Stains, Powders, Glitz Spritz, Inks and two-toned Embossing Powders, just to name a few. Along with “Lindy’s Stamp Gangs” awesome donation, I have thrown in some Stampin Up products to sweeten the pot even MORE for you :)

Drawing #1
From “Lindy’s Stamp Gang” 1 pack of (3) Filigrees vintage style Keys1 Moon Glow Blazing Copper Pigment Powder1 Moon Glow Angel Wings Sapphire Embossing Powder1 Moon Glow Tiger Lily Red Orange Starburst Spray1 Moon Glow Frosted Forget Me Nots Starburst Stain1 Moon Glow Bluebeard Blue Violet Moon Shadow Mist1 Fern sample direction cardFrom Priscilla’s "Stampin Up"store1 Soft Subtles Brad Set (200 count)2 Anywhere Glue Sticks1 Snail Adhesive refill1 Stampin Dimensionals pack (300 count)1 pack of Whisper White Medium Envelopes1 Polka Dots & Paisley Stamp Set of 6From kc242 Designs by Denise“Challenge Blog Candy”??? Oh Yeah!!It is a double bonus for our players this month.. Our team member Denise has so generously offered up some challenge blog candy as well this month. For every entry to the Midnight Madness Sketch Challenges this month, you will go in the drawing for the GRAND PRIZE Month end awards. As an added BONUS…if you "FOLLOW" Denise’s blog and leave her a comment, you will get an EXTRA entry in the month end drawing, so hop on over to Denise’s blog, stay a spell, post a comment and be sure to click the follow button.Check our her“Challenge Blog Candy” below!!

Drawing #2
Denise's Candy includes:1 48pg. 12x12 Cardstock stack Debbie Mumm Travel1 87 Sheet Cardstock Border Punch Strips Brights1 New Birthday Stamps Happen Large Wooden mounted stamp1 Home Sweet Home Accordian Book Kit by KC& Company4 sticklesGrand prize entries will last MMSC8-MMSC12 and the winners will be drawn on Aug 5th WAIT…WE'RE NOT DONE WITH THE MAD MONEY YET!! click HERE for all the details. Our first side bar name was drawn and it was Stef H. Unfortunately she missed her window to post a comment. Stay tuned for the next name to be drawn. Names are drawn randomly, on random days, for random amounts….nothing like keeping you in suspense!!! :)

Happy 4th of July! and Another Birthday Surprise From My Husband. I Am Lucky!

Just when I thought he was finished with the birthday surprises, the doorbell rings with these beauties for me. I have to admit, it did make my day. The day started off with my vacuum cleaner breaking, so I knew the highlight of my day would consist of shopping for a new one...that was until these arrived. The new highlight of my day was that my thoughtful husband went to the trouble to send me something that he knew would make me smile. We are planning a "quiet" holiday at home this year. I am not sure about the quiet part, but we will be at home. I wish the weather would warm up a bit so that we could at least be outside for some of it.

I hope everyone has a very happy and safe 4th of July!!

e.

Wow, Look What My Husband Made For Me!!

Ok, I know it doesn't maybe look like much to most of you, but for my husband to sit down and do anything craft related really is a big deal!!

My birthday is July 4th, and my husband is away from us this year, so he has been pretty homesick, and we miss him too!! Anyway, with some more of this sort of thing made for the kids too came a box filled with lots of sea goodies....starfish, sand dollars, shells and some other sweet gifts for me. He is so thoughtful. I couldn't help but share something that he gave me from the sweetness in his heart and made with his own two hands. It's worth more to me than any expensive piece of jewelry or anything else that he could have bought me. I know I am so sappy, but what can I say.... handmade things are priceless treasures : )

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY EVERYONE!!!!!!

Announcing The Summer Blog Candy Winner.........

First, I want to take a moment to thank everyone who came to visit my blog and follow me and for all of the wonderful comments that you left for me. I appreciate them all and have really enjoyed visiting so many of your blogs as well. The response to my giveaway far exceeded my expectations. My goal was to build my blog, gain new followers and discover new blogs, learn from some of these new friends and share our mutual joy of crafting. I have plans to expand my craft and my blog in the near future and want to share this with all of my new friends, so please continue to follow and be updated on my plans as they unfold.

There can only be one winner in this giveaway, so if you were not the winner chosen this time, please do not be too disappointed. I will be having these types of giveaways again, and there will be plenty of times to have a chance to win. Thank you again to everyone who entered!! Now, for the moment that you have all been waiting for......... THE SUMMER BLOG CANDY WINNER IS............................................................................................

KELLYJEAN

CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR WIN, KELLY!!!! Today is your lucky day! : )

Please e-mail me with your address so that I can mail your prizes out to you. I hope you enjoy everything, and I look forward to seeing what you create with your winnings.

Keep watching my blog for the next blog candy giveaway coming again soon.

In the meantime, enjoy looking at my cards and other creations. I love to read your comments, and if you feel up to a challenge, give the MMSC challenges a try. They are so much fun. You can find the link to the main MMSC page on the upper right sidebar. Have a great day everyone!