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Alan and I want to wish you the very BEST in the new year! Thank you for sharing in our life on the farm adventures, and providing your friendship and encouragement. You make our day to day chores more enjoyable. Really, you do!! We're hoping 2013 is a bit gentler on us than 2012 proved to be.
Happy New Year, friends!!
Hope wherever you find yourself today, you're keepin' cozy!
Inky Antics has very cute holiday images and I had a ball putting together this year's cards. How about this little cutie with her trio of pea babies!?
The image is stmped on kraft paper ad colored with a combination of Touch Twin markers and Prismacolor pencils. The pencils, in white, light blue, and pale green, give a brightness to the image that the markers couldn't. I love the contrast!
Merry Christmas, from all of us on the farm, to all of you!
I thought I would share a few photos of Twiggy, in her Christmas sweater.
Ruffles, a bow, and pom poms... CUTE!
Sitting pretty, ready to go. Anywhere.
Showing off her ruffles... and her need for a BATH!
Say CHEESE!
Happy Christmas Eve!
Here is another card I made using the manger image from Inky Antics. The image is colored
with pastel cool tones.
The image colored with this sweet cool pastel colors coordinated really nicely with some of the Paper Loft paper I have on hand. I like the soft colors, and subtle shading.
I made this card using an image from Inky Antics. The image is colored with mostly pastel earth tones. I sponged some color over the image before I removed it from the oval die, allowing me to create the really nice and tidy white boarder.
The imge is colored with Touch Twin markers, using slightly darker shades of color to add subtle shadows.
Happy Sunday!
Christmas is for the pets in our family, too. Here are some treats and a softie I wrapped up for Gramma's dog, Mattie. Make gifts fun to open by tucking in a small bite sized treat they can find when the gift is opened. Tearing apart tissue is lots more fun when there is a tasty morsel hidden inside!
The tags were made with a cute image by Stampendous, colored with Touch Twin markers. I used various Spellbinder dies for the layers, and my Martha Stewart holly leaf punch for the leaves.
Woof woof!
Supplies:
Stamp: Stampendous, Studio G (alphabet)
Ink: Memento Black, Ranger Distress Ink in Antique Linen
Paper: Neenah, October Afternoon, Paper Accents
Shinhan Touch Twin markers
Two-Way
Glue Pen, Ultra Fine Glitter, Button, Martha Stewart Holly Leaf Punch,
Spellbinders label, circle, and circle dies, tea dyed retail tag, bakers twine, clear treat bag
My brother Nathan and I were playing with the StarWalk app on my iPad. We were surprised when Nathan spotted Santa! And would you just look where I got a snapshot of him . . . Flying right past Uranus!
Who knew Santa would be out and about so soon before Christmas!
Ho ho ho!!
In just a few hours I will be flying to Washington state to spend Christmas with my family. I always wish for a white Christmas, and it looks like this year my wish will come true! Today in Texas was 80*. Unusually warm, but 80* just the same. It's quite a bit cooler where I'll be for the next 10 days!
Wherever you find yourself this Christmas, here's to keepin' cozy!
So.... you liked my treat toppers for dogs, but don't really have a need for creating dog themed goodies? How about using the same general idea and tools, but make treat toppers for humans instead!
I don't know one single person who doesn't like snowmen.
And hurray for chocolates!
Supplies:
Stamp: Inky Antics (snowman), Stampin' Up! (sentiment)
Ink: Memento Black, Ranger Distress Ink in Antique Linen
Paper: Neenah, October Afternoon, Paper Accents
Shinhan Touch Twin markers: PB144, PB185, R28, R3, YR23
Two-Way Glue Pen, Ultra Fine Glitter, Button, Martha Stewart Holly Leaf Punch, Spellbinders label, circle, and pinked circle dies, tea dyed retail tag, May Arts twine, clear treat bag
There's still time to enter the December 2012 sketch challenge being hosted by The Paper Loft. And, there's a BIG prize for one lucky winner! Find all the details on The Paper Loft blog!
The challenge runs until December 31st, so get crackin'! *grin*
Supplies:
Main Stamp: "Not Exactly Monday" by me, available at Whipper Snapper Designs
Sentiment Stamp: by A Muse (an oldie!)
Paper: The Paper Loft "Huckleberry Pond", Neenah, Paper Accents
Ink: Memento Black, Ranger Antique Linen
Shinhan Touch Twin markers
Other: Button, twine, small self-adhesive pearls
Welcome to the MarkerPOP! & Shinhan Touch Twin marker blog hop! Our teams are joining today to bring you a fun filled hop featuring a
variety of stamps carried at the MarkerPOP! store that have been colored
with Shinhan Touch Twin markers which are available at MarkerPOP!.
The hop starts today and will be open until December 19th. Enter by
commenting on all the blogs in the hop (see blog list below).
For today's project I chose to use this cutie of an image by Stampavie called Flower Friends. Adorable. It might be easier for me to tell you what colors I DIDN'T use on this image ... but I'll list them for you, below.
Once I had the image colored, I added a bit of ultra fine glitter here and there for sparkle and shine.
And what about those ducklings ... ack! CUTE! You know I have a weakness for baby ducks!
Shinhan Touch Twin marker colors used:
YR27, YR142, YR26, YR32, Y36, R136, YR21
BR93, YR24, YR23, Y42, BR104
GY174, GY175
PB144, PB76, BR99, Y84, BR100, BR103, BR102, BR92, BR98
R1, R2, R3, 0, R28, R136
PB76, PB144, PB75
CG.5, CG1, CG2, CG4, CG5
About Shinhan Touch Twin markers:
Designed for artists, Touch Twin markers feature an advanced
alcohol-based ink formula that ensures rich color saturation and
coverage, with silky ink flow. Touch Twin Brush markers feature two nibs
(Brush & Chisel) to achieve a wide range of strokes, from fine
lines to wide color fills. The delivery of ink flow can be perfectly
controlled to allow precision drawing. The ergonomically designed
rectangular body is roll resists rolling on work surfaces and provides a
perfect grip that avoids smudges and smears. A specially designed
safety cap stacks neatly and prevents damage to the nibs. The Touch
Twin marker contains an alcohol-based ink that doesn’t dissolve printed
ink toner, allowing for odorless, vividly colored artwork on printed
materials.
I decided to pull out a few "oldies but goodies" for this project. The main image is a stamp by Stampassions called "Patchwork Sampler". I like the simplistic illustrations set within the quilted sampler. It's not picking up well, but there are lots of pale country blues in this image. The background paper was created using Stampin' Up!'s background stamp "Ticking" and Ranger's Gathered Twigs Distress Ink. Love that stuff!
Happy Friday!
Supplies:
Stamp: Stampassions
Ink: Memento Black, Ranger Distress Ink in Antique Linen and Gathered Twigs
Paper: Neenah, Stampin' Up!, Paper Accents
Shinhan Touch Twin markers: R1, R2, GY175, GY174, PB144, PB185, Y36, YR32, YR21, BR96
Studio G (Hampton Art) glitter glue
May Arts twine
Tracing Wheel
A blog post I wrote about one of our egg-eating snake incidents was re-published on Community Chickens, a website published by Ogden Publications, who bring us great magazines such as Mother Earth News, Grit, Utne Reader, etc.
You can read the article on the Community Chickens site here, and you will find my original post (which shows more photos) here.
Groovy!
I made a few stocking stuffer treats for some of our family-friend dogs. If these look familiar to you, I made similar treat toppers last year. You'll find those posts here and here.
This year, I chose to use a Penny Black image, "Good Boy!" from 2004. The image is stamped in Memento ink and colored with Shinhan Touch Twin markers.
I used papers from last year's Holiday Style paper pad by
Cosmo Cricket for the die cut layers. I used a Martha Stewart punch to
create the holly leaves, and added a threaded button as the holly berry.
When purchasing store-bought treats, I recommend looking for treats made in the USA or Canada. For these, I have used Sergeant's brand chews, which are made in the US.
Check out these fatties.... *grin!*
I put together this holiday card using just an EK Success reindeer punch, and a sentiment from my Whipper Snapper cling set called Christmas Blessings. The patterned paper is from Memory Box. I used this card that I made last year for my inspiration.
Have you mailed your holiday cards yet for the season?
More holiday tags, and they're being featured on the Inky Antics blog today. How fun is that! Consider these a bonus project for this month's Challenge Chicks theme!
Supplies
Stamps: Inky Antics
Paper: Neenah, Simple Stories, Stampin' Up!
ShinHan Touch Twin Markers
Ink: Memento Black, Antique Linen Distress Ink, Gathered Twigs Distress Ink
Other: PTI tag die, twine, buttons, Tracing Wheel
Alan and I moved Sweet Potato into the barnyard on Sunday, so she could interact with the goats, and have plenty of room to stretch her legs. She also has a new friend in the barnyard, too! Princess's baby, Leia who was born yesterday morning.
She explored the hay bale. Fascinating stuff! She's been eating her bottled milk well. By recommendation of our vet, we're giving her dextrose injections, to help keep her stable while she adjusts to being taken off of her mother's milk. She's not too hip on the injections part of her day.
She hid from me on the far side of the hay, clearly not wanting to be caught. Freedom is a glorious thing!
You can see her little umbilical chord still hanging from her belly. Such a young thing! And you can still see the auction house sticker we haven't been able to get off her yet. It's REALLY stuck. There was a second one on her as well, but we got that one off without too much trouble. The remaining one is not so easy to remove.
...Are YOU my Mother?...
It will be great fun to watch her grow up next to Princess's little Dexter calf. Who, honestly, can almost walk under the belly of Sweet Potato. There's quite a size difference. I will continue to try and get some photos of them together. Leia is still doing a lot of laying and snoozing, but soon enough they will be bouncing around enjoying each other's company.
Life on the farm is full of fun these days, wouldn't you say!?
Alan and I were busy going about our morning yesterday, like any other Sunday. Chicken chores were done. Dogs and cats were fed. And we were just getting started on getting Sweet Potato her breakfast. That's when I noticed our cow, Princess, coming up from the far end of the pasture with a BABY by her side! WHOA! We weren't expecting her to deliver for another month or so. I guess our calculations were a bit off!
Princess delivered a beautiful little dun heifer calf. Alan's dad named her Leia. Princess Leia. *grin*
She's a cut little thing, and while she's about half the size of Sweet Potato, they will be good friends!
If you're a stamper and you like challenges, or you're new to the idea of challenges and want to give participating a whirl, I invite you to participate with The Challenge Chicks! We're a small group of stampers hosting monthly challenges.
Won't you join us?! Our first monthly challenge is being shared today!
This month's challenge is timely, and easy: Christmas Tags!
I used a couple of my Whipper Snapper cling sets to create four coordinating gift tags. I'll tell ya who's great at making tags ... Danielle Lounds
I used a Sizzix die for the base of the tags, and Spellbinders pinking and standard circle dies for around the image. Old mother of pearl buttons and some punched out holly leaves add a little bit of detail to each tag. These tags will come in handy later this month!
Check out the rest of The Challenge Chicks projects:
Diane Zechman
Lydia Fiedler
Jeanne Streiff
Kelli Hull
Kelly Schirmer
Vicki Gee
Anna Wight (that's me!)
And, finally, you'll find this month's challenge gallery on SplitCoastStampers using keyword CHXDEC12 . We invite you to play along! Upload your project to your SplitCoastStampers gallery, add the keyword above, and your project will be automatically added to the gallery. We look forward to seeing your holiday tags!
PS: Please excuse the odd lighting in these photos. I have two different kinds of light bulbs in the lamps on my desk, and it's really playing games with the light sensor in my camera.
Note to self: buy new light bulbs!
Supplies
Stamps: Whipper Snapper "Gardening Snowman" and "Think Snow" cling sets
Paper: Neenah, October Afternoon, Paper Accents
ShinHan Touch Twin Markers
Ink: Memento Black, Antique Linen Distress Ink
Other: Sizzix tag die, Spellbinders dies, Martha Steward holly punch, string, antique mother of pearl buttons, Tracing Wheel
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