I made up several of these cards for my good friend's family. I used her favourite colour for the rose. It made me think of a song we both learned to play on the piano growing up called, The Rose. 

 I have a friend who LOVES chocolate SO much! So of course, I HAD to make a chocolate card set for her for Christmas :).

My package from Taylored Expressions arrived just in time the other day to make up some Father's Day cards. I just love all of the names that come in this Building Blocks - Him stamp and die set and think it will be great not only for this occasion, but for birthdays, too! The plaid stencils will be awesome for masculine cards - something I often struggle with! I was inspired by Taylor Van Bruggen's use of these products and set to work with some Chipped Sapphire + Pine Needles distress oxide inks and some Toffee, Earl Grey, and Blue Corn cardstock.

It is Christmas in the heart that puts Christmas in the air 

- W.T. Ellis

Isn't that a beautiful sentiment? I thought it fit perfectly with this gorgeous layered tree from The Greetery set amidst a snowy background. I used my new blender brush from Studio Katia with this stencil and cannot believe the difference and the ease with which I am able to create such a beautiful background! I even had to add a touch of white to my inside for my sentiment :).

Here is a card I recreated similar to one I designed last fall. You can view my original version here. For this card I decided to do a sentiment inside the card and use a plaid banner along with the navy. Instead of popping up the beer image I decided to keep it flat amidst a blue hue. I coloured the beer mug with my Tombow markers this time and used some distress watercolour paper.

Check out this amazing paper collection now available at Close To My Heart - Cedar & Pine! When I was prepping for another project and cutting this paper I happened to set it on top of a pile of kraft. It looked really lovely together so I decided to make another project with this pairing! I started out with Freshly Made Sketches. I added in some pine boughs behind the 'Merry' sentiment. I haven't decided which embellishments I like best or if I need any at all! I used both kraft and paper bag backgrounds. There is a slight difference to these Lawn Fawn cardstocks and I like them both :).



Christmas Card Count: 52 + 12 = 64

The cooler rainy weather has me looking towards fall so I put together this fall words card the other day. Using a stamp from an older Close To My Heart set (thanks, Auntie Karen!) I kept it simple so that I could play around with some more texture paste and stencils in the background. I also attached a couple of leaves and pumpkins at the bottom to add a little more interest and a pop of colour! I found some cotton sprigs at our local florist and I am in love with them - they may be in all of my next photos :)!

A fall birthday card for an upcoming family birthday. I know it's not exactly fall yet; however, as I painted these leaves and pumpkins at the lake a few days ago several little ones curled up close by to watch intently what I was doing (scroll down to the bottom of the post to see a lake picture). One of them has a birthday next week so I am interested to see if she recognizes the images on the card. I wanted to use the awesome simple sketch from Mojo Monday this week and set to work to create a textured background using one of the Knit Wits stencils from The Greetery. This is my first time playing around with textured paste so I look forward to trying it out some more. I wanted to create some scattered leaves with the tall rectangle feature of the sketch and then placed my pumpkins and sentiment on top.

How exciting is it for mail day when you actually end up having some time to play with your new stuff?! I happened to luck out the other day when I opened my package from The Greetery and had some free time during nap time to play around! Since I am having trouble getting the painted effect I want on the plantable paper I thought these stamps would be perfect to achieve the watercolour feel I am going for and they did not disappoint! I cannot wait to check out The Greetery's latest release next week!

Father's Day cards have hit Lane & Meadow this week just in time for the coming weekend celebration. I wanted to create a watercolour look with this sailboat and decided to colour right onto the stamp with my Tombow markers. I really like how delicate this Verve sentiment font is and like how it coordinates with this seaside set.

It's often challenging for me to design a more masculine card but I finally set to work with this older Close To My Heart seaside set. I played around with the colour a bit...I knew I didn't want to stamp it in black ink so I was trying to colour in each part of the lighthouse with different Tombow markers, but the translation just wasn't happening to my liking. I finally decided to keep it simple by colouring the entire image with this beautiful Marvy navy hue and I love how it turned out.

It is the Spring & Summer Coffee Lovers Blog Hop and I just couldn't resist creating a sunny little tag. These Verve products will always be a favourite in my stash!

The new Feels Like Home paper collection from Close To My Heart has my attention in the craftroom right now and I cannot stop creating with this beautiful paper! Here is a sympathy card I put together using CAS(E) this Sketch. See the picture links below for some of these products!

What is your favourite kind of tea?

I am a lover of many kids of tea, but my ultimate tea drink is a London Fog! I also like a good cuppa Chai, too. I was inspired to get into my craft room today and create a tea themed tag. I pulled out some digi-stamps from Verve that I had printed awhile ago and played around with this fantastic Holiday Tag Along Kit from Papertrey Ink that I got last year. I even figured out how to elongate the tag die so that it could fit this fun stack of cups. I realized afterwards that these cups were probably intended to be coffee cups, but today they're tea for me!


Favourite Places to Get My Tea Locally:

Purcell Organics - I love their Northstar Chai
Tigz Tea - Lavender Earl Gray is my fave!
KRC - they make a great London Fog
Timber Hitch - excellent iced Chai Lattes
Hot Shots - Chai Mist is my favourite drink there!

When my friend, Nadine, asked for some Christmas cards I knew just the stamp set I wanted to incorporate. Nadine has an inspiring blog, Zero Waste Living in the Kootenays, that details her zero waste journey. She has been a huge influence in my plastic free journey and my goals to cut down on waste, plus she is an amazing friend that I am happy to have grown up with and now be living in the same town again! While she loves her coffee, and I love my tea, getting together for a walk or a chat indoors with some cozy beverages often leaves me inspired.


I am stoked to have another link up for the Coffee Lovers Blog Hop, too!

It's the Fall/Winter Coffee Lovers Blog Hop!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm SO EXCITED! Even though I LOVE tea instead. I love all of the inspiration that is out there and I cannot seem to resist a fun coffee set. I found these wood slice tags at our Farmer's Market this year and thought they would be amazing for Christmas tags. I really wanted to see how my Verve coffee stamps would turn out on these and loved them using Memento ink. I'm hoping to find some more time to participate in this hop, too. Fingers crossed :)

I have managed to get in some good crafty time lately to build up my Christmas tag stash! I'm loving all of the fantastic inspiration over at Tracey McNeely's 25 Days of Christmas Tags. These particular tags were inspired by Zsofia Molnar on Day 9. I pulled out some of my favourite Verve and loved how these came together.


Christmas Tag Count: 16 + 12 = 28

It's November and my Christmas tag stash has officially been started now thanks to the amazing inspiration over at Tracey McNeely's 25 Days of Christmas Tags! I was inspired right off the bat on Day 1 with Tracey's gorgeous purple snowflake tags.  Since Day 1 is sponsored by one of my favourites, Simon Says Stamp, I decided to pull out some of their snowflakes for my tags and add in some blue and green oxide inks in addition to the purple that I had. I'm quite pleased with the colour combo and am stoked to be starting my tag stash! Fingers crossed I will continue in this way throughout the month :). I am also linking up with the "anything goes" challenge over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge.

Christmas Tag Count: 3

I was SO excited to see a favourite sketch challenge come back this week - Mojo Monday! I needed a birthday card for my friend's daughter and set to work. She is born on Halloween, 5 days after my son! Jamie and I grew up across the street from each other, so it is pretty neat to have our kids so close in age.
Last October I was stoked to see the arrival of a beautiful fall set from Verve stamps. I fully intended on making a few fall cards with it, but SURPRISE! Harvey decided to come a few weeks early and then once I got back into my craftroom the snow was flying :). I knew that I wanted to incorporate these Verve pumpkins somehow without making a full on Halloween card. I had intended on colouring the pumpkins but ended up quite liking them in the white. This sweet little owl seemed to be fitting and I know I'll get lots of use out of this October birthday set from Papertrey Ink. Finally, I paired all of this with some fun paper I received from Lawn Fawn in my package - check out the name of it! I am linking up with the Lawn Fawnatics "bling it out" challenge and the "animal antics" challenge over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge. I also decided to make a little matching tag to go along with the card!



FabricLand released some NHL prints this fall and I thought it would be cute to do up Brooklyn's gift in a little bag of her Daddy's favourite team.

I've been wanting to get this older Close To My Heart wreath set for awhile now this fall. When I saw the current layout over at Freshly Made Sketches, it just screamed wreath to me! Needing some sympathy cards, I felt the wreath could serve as a warm heartfelt sympathy card. I intended to add the "three" items to the wreath at the bottom like the sketch, but it just looked too busy with this wreath, so I chose to make this paper bow instead.