Monday, March 28, 2016

Text Speak


We’re kicking off a new challenge this week at The Cat’s Pajamas, and it’s all about the Dies!  TCP has the best selection of creative dies that are SO fun to use.  I really hope you’ll be inspired to create something fun!




I really love how this card came together!  I pulled together some fun TCP CutUps dies: He Said, She SaidTalk to Me and Nested Hearts, and then the TCP Stamp set Small Sayings, then I gave this the look of texts being sent with the fun colour palette.  The sentiments are embossed on each section and then only finishing touches are some white enamel dots.  I love the graphic statement it makes with all the fun colour and simple design.  

Here’s the deets about the challenge and you can head to the Cat’s Pajamas Blog for more inspiration from The Cat Pack today!  



  1. Every other Tuesday a new challenge will be posted on The Cat’s Pajamas blog and our Facebook page.
  1. If you want to play along you just upload your design to The Cat’s Pajamas blog page using the InLinkz button by the Monday, 11:55 EDT before the next challenge.
  1. You are not required to use a Cat’s Pajamas stamp or die but if you have them we would love to see them.
  1. On the following TCP Tuesday, the winner will be chosen from the previous challenge and will receive a Cat Cash Voucher for $10 or $15 if a TCP product is used.




Inspire Me Monday: Cut It Out!


Hi Friends!  Today I’ve got a tutorial on the Power Poppy Blog with the theme:  Cut It Out!  

It’s a fun new way to work with your stamps!  Hope you can pop on by and take a look, here’s a sneak peek!  





Saturday, March 26, 2016

The Gratitude Project - Week 12

\ˈgra-tə-ˌtüd, -ˌtyüd\

The quality of being thankful:  readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. 


Happy Easter friends!

Today my gratitude theme is Hope, Beginnings, New Life!

Easter means everything to me.  My life was forgiven, ransomed, and purchased by a God who loves me.  I have hope for all my tomorrows because I know what Grace given to me really is.  I am so full of gratitude for this life I have been given.

We are blessed to have been away somewhere where Spring is already blossoming.  It is the ultimate picture of the New Life that Easter is all about and I am in awe of the beauty around me.






So grateful!  





Friday, March 18, 2016

Sunny Spring Meadow



You might have already seen the gorgeous new image that Marcy released earlier this week at Power Poppy, Spring Meadow Bouquet.  Isn’t it amazing?  I just had to do some colouring with it today!  Marcy put together a wonderful assortment of beautiful flowers, bleeding heart, checkered lily, summer snowflake and lilacs to create this bouquet.  With such detail in the flowers I decided to colour them all in a basic colour family with Copic RV colours.  

As I was colouring the tiniest little spots of green in the summer snowflakes my YG03 let out a huge blob of colour.  I almost died.  It wasn’t just a little blob either.  So, I tried to rescue it with lots of work from my Copic Blender moving the colour to the center of the blob and then out to the back of the page, but it kept a light green hue near the butterfly.  I disguised it a bit with the background colouring and some shimmery glitter pen on the snowflakes and then on the butterfly and bee wings, but that will teach me for refilling the markers a wee bit too much!  There is shimmer on all the summer snowflakes, the bee and butterfly, but it doesn’t really show in the photo.  



Because I printed the image large to fit the whole card front, I really didn’t want to take away from any of the prettiness,  so I kept the design simple, using a stitched rectangle die to cut into the image, giving it a framed feel.  I sunk the middle of the rectangles in and then popped the outer frame up, then added the pretty stitched bow from TCP.  I like the look of the design extending on both the frame and center.  



Inside I placed the pretty sentiment from the set, and here’s the whole host of Copics I used below. 





Have you tried out our Power and Sparks Challenge this month?  More details here, but you could win Power Poppy set of your choice just by playing along!!  



Here’s the Bloom Brigade up with inspiration today...



Christine Okken (you are here)
Cindy Lawrence
Julie Koerber
Leslie Miller
Stacy Morgan




Tuesday, March 15, 2016

Pickles?



Sometimes when I’m headed away somewhere and I can take my colouring with me, I’ll stamp up a bunch of things and then get to them whenever I can.  Sometimes I don’t get to them all and then I forget about them!  I found this fun little jar of pickles I had stamped and thought it would be a good week to colour it and put it into a card, especially with it’s GREEN theme and St. Patrick’s Day this week.  

Created with PTI’s Friendship Jar and Friendship Jar Fillers stamp sets, stamped onto Neenah White cardstock (masking the pickes the get them where I wanted), and then coloured with Copics.  I created a little tag out of a stitched rectangle die and popped them up together adding the pickles sentiment in Memento Bamboo Green.  The swirly loops are from The Cat’s Pajamas Icing CutUps Die, and the papers are from MFT.  




Wouldn’t it be cute to give to an expecting mom?  I had my little nephew in mind though when I made it.  He loves pickles.  He’s often chooses them over dessert!  



Here’s the little collection of Copics, super easy!  



Monday, March 14, 2016

Soar Birthday Bunny!




Hello people!  Are you ready for a new challege at The Cat’s Pajamas?!  These next two weeks we’ve got a perfect theme....bunnies!  Since it’s almost Easter and since we have a famous TCP bunny, I know you’ll love it.

Today my inspiration is up in the air!  Bun Bun is soaring up to the highest heights.



I stamped Mr. Adorable from Drop In several times, once on XPress it Blending cardstock, and then 3 x on these great sheets of patterned paper from Echo Park, Bundle of Joy.  I paper pieced the different sections on the balloon to give it a sweet whimsical look.  

Of course you have to have some puffy white clouds in there from our Stitched Clouds CutUps dies.  Then I added the sentiment from another of our TCP sets, Small Sayings.    



Finished it all off with some pretty glittery enamel dots and some green baker’s twine, with the Copics I used listed below.  




Here’s the Cat Pack in action today...and we invite you to jump in on the challenge!  

You have two weeks to get your project entered.  Link your projects here by Monday (3/28) at 11:55pm, EST for a chance to win some Cat Cash up to $15.  You are not required to use a Cat’s Pajamas stamp or die but if you have them we would love to see them!






Brenda Nakandakari
Christine Okken (you are here)
Jessica Rone
Julie Elak
Nancy Thomas
and Alma at the TCP Blog!



Saturday, March 12, 2016

The Gratitude Project - Week 10


\ˈgra-tə-ˌtüd, -ˌtyüd\

The quality of being thankful:  readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. 




Today I’m thankful for these two pairs of running shoes.  They belong to my husband and I and it means we were headed on a walk this week.  All summer and fall we walked about 4 times a week, on a 5K loop in our area.  Over the winter I don’t walk outside, because well, let’s be honest, it’s winter, and it’s cold.  Plus having broken my leg a year and a half ago, I’m not excited about slipping, falling or cracking anything on the ice.  But now, with the warm weather we’ve had, the ice is gone and we can get back to that rhythm again.  We see beautiful skies, hear the birds, greet other walkers, and one time rescued a little girl on a trike that was going out of control down the hill.  She was quite a little daredevil.  :)  We’ve walked in heat, wind, rain...all at a steady rhythm that seems to right a lot of things in our world.

I like our walks because it’s about 50 minutes to an hour of uninterrupted time we have with each other.  Sometimes, like this week, we have genuine and important conversations.  We can ask each other deeper questions, listen and encourage each other.  Other times we don’t talk a lot, but just get to spend time together. I appreciate that time with him very much, plus it’s good for our physical selves too.

I have these fun new shoes too, my first pair of Brooks.  I’ve worn Mizuno runners, and wore through my Saucony’s, but these new Brooks pair are quite firm and still cushy.  A great start to a walking season.

What are you grateful for today?  Have a blessed week friends!




Sunday, March 6, 2016

Purple Birthday



My little niece’s birthday was this weekend.  She turns the big 7 this year and we’re delighted to celebrate with her.  She’s a little girl with lots of personality.  She’s soft and girly and yet is already athletic skiing down the snowslopes, skating or swimming or swinging across the monkey bars.  She loves colouring and Star Wars....she’s just a lovely combination of fun.  

So, to celebrate our sweet girl, I’ve got out this sweet little Elly from My Favorite Things...Adorable Elephants.  Coloured with Copics and playing with this week’s Sketch Challenge 270 from MFT as well.  

I stamped the pretty heart balloons as if they were floating away, and added some clear sequins to accent, and some pretty twine to the top of the tag.  






Here’s the Copics I used to colour.  




Saturday, March 5, 2016

The Gratitude Project - Week 9


\ˈgra-tə-ˌtüd, -ˌtyüd\

The quality of being thankful:  readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness. 


Today I’m grateful for Signs of Spring!  



In the office I share with my co-worker, she has a lovely Christmas Cactus that I watched begin to bloom this week.  They’re such a unique plant when those little blossoms start to open up.  It’s such a reminder of life beginning to bloom and be vibrant again after a long stretch of stillness.  I’m grateful for those colourful reminders of hope.  




This crazy kid is someone I’m grateful for.  He is our youngest and he’s a little excited about spring because that means ball hockey season is about to begin.  He’s been working all fall and winter doing a paper route with his friend and has been earning some of his own money.  He saved up enough to buy himself a new hockey stick that he’s thrilled about.  It’s more expensive than one we would have bought for him, but because he diligently worked to earn the money for it, he could make that choice for himself.  He’s so thrilled to be able to have it and already be dreaming about the goals he’ll score with it.  He said "mom take a picture”,  on the way home from the store, "I want to see how good it looks!"  I’m proud of his persistence and work ethic and to see how what it means to him to be able to then do something for himself.  Good life lessons.  



And here’s another reminder of spring.  I looked just yesterday and realized that my tulips have started to come up beside the house.  It’s the earliest I can ever remember them popping their little selves above the ground, but we’ve had a really mild winter.  I know many of you probably already have yours blooming, but here in Northern Alberta this is unusual.   Tulips remind me that there is new life after hard times.  When the ground gets warm, hope will spring up again.  So many metaphors to life you could find there.  Snow and rain may still come this spring but their persistent little selves will continue to shoot up and bring colour again.  I’m so grateful for signs of spring.  


Friday, March 4, 2016

Stargazers



Happy Friday people!  Today we’ve got a brand new Power & Spark Challenge at Power Poppy!  This month Stacy’s our hostess and she’s come up with the most fun and unique sketch that showcases a peek-a-boo design!  



I’m so excited to give you a sneaky-sneak-peek at a brand new digi coming out tomorrow from Marcella called Joyful Lilies.  It’s stunning!  And....it comes with more than one version plus two sentiments including a beautiful section of Scripture.  

I love the vividness of a Stargazer lily, and though Easter Lilies are gorgeous, I had to try this design first, and see if I could incorporate Stacy’s fun sketch.  Without fail, I just can’t help myself from colouring them up this way to start with.  

I printed the digi quite large to be able to fill a 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 inch card, coloured it up with Copics and then layered over the peek-a-boo vellum.  I really wanted to showcase the lilies and it’s kind of fun to have the pops of colour peek through the cut out circles, and still be showing in a softer version behind the vellum.  





I kept everything really simple, adding a sentiment from a Christmas set actually - Botanical Tree, it’s stamped on vellum white white embossing powder and anchored by some large rhinestones.  




Here are the Copics I used to bring colour to these lilies.  

We hope you can join us in the Power & Spark Challenge!  It runs all month long and you could win a Power Poppy set of your choice just for playing, or also have your entry be featured in one of our Peeps of the Week!  




Here’s the Bloom Brigade in action today...

Christine Okken
Cindy Lawrence
Julie Koerber
Katie Sims
Leslie Miller

Stacy Morgan
Tosha Leyendekker




Wednesday, March 2, 2016

Reversible Folk Art


Hi Friends!  Today I’m up on the CardMaker Blog to show off some pretty folk art and how to create a reverse colouring set of cards.  I hope you can join me!