Stairstep scene

Is it my imagination or is there a sudden influx of cards featuring fancy folds around the Internet?

This is my attempt at a fancy fold, a side stairstep card.  (You can find directions at SCS if you've never done one.)  I wanted to make it look like a little scene of a room, and it took more work than I expected.

To start, I used paper from "The Sweetest Thing -- Tangerine" collection from My Mind's Eye to create "wallpaper".  The collection also has a pattern that looked like woodgrain, so I used that to make a hardwood floor. I had the die-cut window (an RAK gift) at hand.  I watercolored an outdoor scene to put behind it, and added a snippet of lace as windowdressing.

The plant is a die cut (cut into two pieces and artfully arranged to look like a healthy houseplant), and the urn was stamped on a snippet of terracotta paper and cut out. There are tons of lovely chair stamps out there, but unfortunately, I don't own any of them, so I found some line art of a chair, printed it on brown card stock and again on another co-ordinating piece from the MME set, and paper-pieced the lovely upholstered wing chair.

The card is for these challenges:

Love's Rubber Stamps #100, Fancy Folds
Pixie's Snippets playground #121, use a snippet (the lace, plant and urn are all from snippets)
Word Art Wednesday, #128, Anything Goes
Sister Act #53, Anything Goes.

Caged Bird

I got this bird and cage die on clearance -- after everyone else was tired of it, probably. This is the first time I've used it on a card and I sort of went all Tim Holtzy, with lots of ink applied DTP and layers of stamping. (Well, OK, Tim would have lots more color and lots more stuff on it....)

For the background, I stamped text in Versamark and applied clear EP on it. (My clear EP is getting a little dirty and probably needs to be replaced....) The edges of that panel are sponged in Creamy Caramel.  The cage and bird were die-cut with cream paper. I applied some copper-colored ink directly on the cage, and added a brown ribbon on top. For the bird, I stamped a music score stamp in Creamy Caramel and a darker sepia and applied the sepia ink around the edges. I also stamped the two layers of white flowers with the musical score.

The card is for the following challenges:

Really Reasonable Ribbon #93, Monochromatic with Ribbon
Crafty Ribbons #85, anything goes with Ribbon
Feeling Sketchy #87, sketch
Simon Says Monday Challenge, Winged Things
Simon Says Wednesday Challenge, Animal Antics
Sister Act card challenge #53, Anything goes.

Butterfly card

I'm probably not unusual in that I have loads of designer paper that's never even been cut into. That was the case with these papers, from a Cosmos Cricket stack I got ages ago. I had to make something for a "Printed Paper" swap, and this is what I came up with.

The sketch is the current Sketch Saturday Sketch, #305.  The center circle is the same paper as the base.  The orange/white/gray layer has distress ink on all the edges -- the original paper is made to look distressed around the edges, so I had to keep the theme when I cut the paper. The pretty white filigree die cut was an RAK gift, and I added some black half pearls to draw a little more attention to it.

The butterfly is cut out of coordinating paper and topped with a vellum filigree butterfly. (The dies are from Simon Says; they come separately, and I frequently use one or the other, not always together.)

This card is for these challenges:
Simon Says Stamp Monday: Winged Things
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday:  Animal Antics
Sketch Saturday: #305
Creative Inspiration: Lots of Layers (I count the filigree and both butterfly dies as layers, resulting in a total of 6)
Word Art Wednesday #128: Anything Goes.

Three and three

Here's a CAS card inspired by the BE Inspired challenge at The Alley Way Stamps. As you can see, the inspiration photo was all about red and white polka dots. I thought it would be fun with a leaf cascading down the page, and maple leaves are red, right?

The leaves (from TAWS set It's Fall About You) are paper pieced. The stems are colored in pencil. Sentiment is from TAWS set Delicate Doilies.

The art of casually placing the embellies around the card escapes me; I hope these gems don't look too random.

I'm submitting this card to these challenges:
TAWS BE Inspired #51: Photo inspiration
Word Art Wednesday #128: Anything goes
Sister Act #52: Anything Goes
Pixie's Snippet Playground #120 

How crunchy do you like your cookies?

I am such a nonconformist. Everyone is making spring/Easter cards, and I decide to make a Christmas card. As you might know, I love playing with paint sample cards and I came up with this idea of doing gingerbread men on some brown paint chips. What do you think? Does it look too much like a chart telling you when the cookies should come out of the oven?

The gingerbread men (it's a stamp by DRS, I think) are white embossed, and the ribbon allowed me to cover up most of the paint names.  (I have no real problem allowing the names to be visible, especially if they sound related to the card. Wouldn't it be funny if one of the paints was called "gingerbread"?)

The sentiment is red embossed, and there's a gem on either side of the smaller "merry," although they aren't terribly visible on the photo.  The red piece was from the scrap file, already embossed; the color isn't the same as the ribbon, but I think they are OK together.

This card is for these challenges:
Simon Says Wednesday: Sweet Treats
Holly Jolly: Ribbon and Bling
CRAFT 254, Christmas
Word Art Wednesday #127, Anything Goes
Sister Act #52, Anything Goes

Spring brings birds

Well, it is finally beginning to look and feel like spring -- a few weeks behind the norm for here, but I guess we take what we get, right?
I'll dedicate today's card to the bluebirds I've seen flying around. We have a couple of bluebird houses that look exactly like the birdhouse on the left up here (except most of them aren't painted, as my husband found out after painting one that birds prefer the wood unpainted).
The three birdhouse image is a digi that I printed out a while ago, so I'm sorry I can't give credit for it. The birdhouses are colored with pencils. The sentiment comes from a Stampin' Up set.
The papers are from a Making Memories Stack, and I added twine and a chipboard button to finish the card off.
I'm entering this card in the following challenges:
Sketch Saturday, Sketch 304
Paper Players 190, three of something (three birdhouses, obviously)
Challenges 4 Everybody, Anything Goes
Papertake Weekly Challenge, Spring has Sprung
Word Art Wednesday #127, Anything Goes.

Cute as a puppy

Don't you love it when you find a use for something you started then set aside? I made this paper-pieced dog a while ago and just couldn't figure out what to do with him. Finally, it came to me -- it would work in a

sketch from SCS.  I used a snippet of bright yellow from my scrap file to add an unexpected color to the card and counteract the rather dull blue background paper.  I used some gel dots as the pup's nose and in place of the "i" in the sentiment for another fun touch.

The puppy image is a freebie from The Alley Way Stamps, which you can get from their website.

I'm entering this card in these challenges:

Simon Says Wednesday, Birthday
Word Art Wednesday #126, Anything Goes
Sister Act 51, Anything Goes
Pixie's Crafty Workshop 119, Anything with a snippet