There's A Cure...

Hi crafty folks! Welcome to October. Here in Maryland October blew in on a brisk wind. It's oh-so-cold right now, and the sun doesn't even have the decency to push away the clouds. Over in the UK our friends are experiencing a record-breaking heat wave. C'mon Mother Nature, get it together! This week also rings in a new challenge. We're putting our monthly sketch challenges on hold for a while and replacing them with fun theme-based challenges similar to the ones we always do on the 15th of the month. What better way to celebrate than to have a crafty

Free For (F)All!

Haha! Yes, I do think I'm funny. My little play on words makes me giggle. :)

Now, let's set aside all this fun and frivolity and get down to business. This week I have a little bit of spooky art to share with you. I'm participating in a "Chunky House" swap over at Craftster and this is one of my houses.

The skeleton was stamped on the My Mind's Eye Haunted "Halloween Checklist" paper and another was stamped on a separate piece of paper to cut out. Honestly, I'm pretty proud of this cutting. I have a lot of patience for this kind of fussy cutting in general, but the ribs on this guy really had me taking deep breaths. I decided before I started that I would try it only once. If I cut through or made a boo boo I couldn't fix or hide, I would not start another one. I'm happy with the results and really glad I had that patience.

Once he was cut out and all the edges were colored with a brown marker, I patted him on my Distress Ink embossing pad and sprinkled with clear embossing powder.

The vintage apothecary labels were printed on the computer and the edges were inked. The "A cure for what ails" letters were individually stamped and covered with Glossy Accents. The back is pretty simple - with more of the MME Haunted "Raven" paper and a fun pharmacy label with my info on it. The font was a free download (found ages ago...) called "Traveling_Typewriter".

Thanks so much for visiting today! I hope you return all week for more fun design team samples for your inspiration. Our Free For (F)All! challenge goes through midnight EST October 14th. Come join us - you could win a $20 gift voucher from The Beary Scrap!

Project Recipe

Image: TH Skeleton Stamp, vintage apothecary labels from Just Something I Made and Graphics Fairy
Paper: My Mind's Eye Haunted "Raven" and "Halloween Checklist"
Medium: Ranger Distress Ink in Vintage Photo; Glossy Accents; Ranger Distress Embossing Ink; Stampendous clear embossing powder
Embellishments: Dresden trim, black ribbon and TH tape from stash

Cheers,
Susan

She's Batty!

Hello and happy Monday! I hope you had a great weekend. The Husband and I went to a crab feast Sunday. Love love love the taste of Maryland blue crab but don't feel the same about crab picking.

This week the design team is showing a few more samples for our current "Happy Fall Y'All" challenge. This has been a fun one for us! In this final stretch, the DT's extra "challenge" is to add glitter to our projects. Oh yea, this is a stretch! Haha - just kidding! Really, the challenge should have been to abstain from the glitter.... hmm... that gives me an idea for future challenges. *grin*

I'm still on my Halloween kick. This week I pulled out the My Mind's Eye Haunted papers with the delicious velvety texture.

The bat lady illustration is from the magical internet. I truly appreciate sites like The Graphics Fairy which share vintage and antique images. The flocked background is MME's "Harlequin" paper and the while swirl layer is found on the B-side of "Halloween Checklist". [Yes, I'm showing my age...]. Other layers are made from Bazzill Basics.

The bat background was stamped with Distress Ink in Black Soot, then each bat was covered with Rock Candy Stickles. This is one of those cards that looks much better in person - the bats are pretty cool if I do say so myself! *ahem* I used a blend of Dusty Concord and Black Soot Distress Inks on the edges, then sewed them together. All embellishments are from my stash, including really cool web ribbon that Patricia sent as a RAK last year. I've been hoarding it with 12" left for the next project!

Thanks for visiting today! You still have a ton of time to enter your fall-themed project in our challenge. You could win $20 from The Beary Scrap!

Cheers,
Susan