I just noticed earlier on today that I haven't updated my blog in almost 2 weeks! *Gasp!* I can't believe how busy I've been trying to get all my DT work done before we leave to go camping, so I decided to play hooky tonight and participate in this week's Sketch Challenge (SC238) over at SCS. I really needed something to show you all and it gave me a great excuse to play with one of my new stamps that I picked up during Amuse-a-palooza :) But I will tell you a little more about that in a bit...first off, the card!

Here I was thinking that I would plan ahead and colour up these adorable little Noel birds earlier in anticipation for the challenge to be posted. I was thinking of making a sweet little clean and simple card a la Amuse Style. Then I saw the sketch and thought to myself that it really made my coloured image hard to work with...then my little lightbulb moment happend.

I ended up cutting apart my image and popping them up on the individual squares to be connected with silver cording...easy right? Um....lets just say that those pretty stickles are covering up some nasty ink smears due to stamping little birdie feet on those itty bitty squares. Oh, and all that extra card stock layers that I have going on...not really clean and simple is it? That happened when I picked out my papers, cut everything up and then held it up to my good lighting. It really didn't match in the end, but I wasn't about to waste any more time re-cutting all that paper so tossed the offending DP into my scrap bin and added more matting. I figured that those layers needed to work out for the best! lol In keeping with the clean and simple style that my card is clearly not...I put my foot down and said "No" to my sewing machine ;)

Remember that I mentioned Amuse-a-palooza? Well my local stamp store was hosting the event and I signed up for one of Glenda Wyatt's Christmas Card Classes on Sunday and had a fabulous time :) It was a wonderful break away from my work and I got the opportunity to meet Miss Alli Miles - talk about a sweetheart!
Speaking of work...I know that you are just itching to know when you will be seeing it! lol Starting July 23-25 the Dirty Dozen and Alumni are hosting the Dare to get Dirty challenges and I have been making up some samples for that and then the last 4 days of the month, you will get to see all of my CDS sneak peeks that I....um....am still working on *cough*... I did say that I was playing hooky tonight! lol
Card Recipe:
Stamps: Amuse
Paper: Gina K, Burmuda Bay, Watercolour, Bazzill Bling, Misc DP
Ink: Versafine Onyx Black, More Mustard, Taken with Teal, Soft Suede
Accessories: Cuttlebug, Nestabilities, 1 1/4" Square Punch, Ribbon, Stickles, Clear Embossing Powder, Silver Cord, Tombow Markers, Aqua Painter, Sponges, Dimensionals, Corner Rounder, Scallop Punch, Liquid Applique