another SHAKER card!

ok, this is my 3rd Shaker card this month! lol! After us, the house mouse group members have decided to have a Shaker card Swap this month, I've already made two, and at last, I made this card for the swap, and it's in the mail to the recipient :-) I made the INSIDE of the card first. This month, due to the warm weather at the east coast of US, Cherry Blossoms have started to bloom early in D.C. And this year is their 100th celebration after they received trees from Japan as a gift. Everytime I see cherry blossoms in D.C. in pictures, I remember my childhood when I was living in Tokyo, Japan. Cherry Blossoms to me are not only the symbol of spring but also "APRIL"! lol! "April" in Japan is the start of school year when many kids carry their Brand New leather bags, with their new textbooks & new school supplies, IF you are the first grader and 7th grader, and because of leather, they look so new! :-) The same can be said for many new employees, after they graduate from universities in March, and Japanese companies, schools, etc. hire certain number of newly graduates, and they wear New Suit, incld. usually new leather shoes, and they also look so fresh! :-) To me, those are the SET incld.cherry blossoms, in early April, every year. I love cherry blossoms! I used old hero arts' Inches (I think they don't call that stamp that. lol) of cherry blossoms, randomly stamped to make a frame so that I can write something in "that frame". I happened to have a left over rick rack in matching color so I adhered it and I trimmed another house mouse stamp image (the mouse carrying the jelly beans) and adhere it in the end of the rick rack. I used sakura glaze pen for jelly beans, and just used the matching color for the card; Pink only. On the front page, I used Posh Impression's cherry blossoms stamp, using markers to ink it. The sentiment stamp is Memory box. I adhered the left over cherry blossoms stickers (I believe it's Jolee''s, but am not sure without the packaging...) on the corners. I'm submitting this to Simon says stamp challenge ; "Anything goes" :-)

Thank you very much for stopping by my blog today. Although Guam (where I am right now) doesn't have cherry blossoms, hope some of you see beautiful cherry blossoms in your neighborhood :-)

Happy Easter! :-)

This is the easter card I made, for Three Non stamping friends, for this easter, and I just mailed them. :-) I bought this stamp set last spring but hadn't had a chance to ink them. Since I love Chocolate Bunny (!!), this was perfect! lol! Inside of the card, I stamped "Wishing you a Sweet Easter" sentiment with an egg image. The stamp set was a Dollar at Michaels! ;-) I think this was my FIRST CAS Easter card, and I like it! :-) I used the technique, "Partial cuttlebug embossing" I watched the video clip of at Stamp tv a while back, and in her talk, she mentioned about using the same embossing folder on top & the bottom, so this is what I did. Actually when I first watched this video, I made a card for CAS-ual friday but the challenge expired before I uploaded mycard and I can't find the picture and the card is still in PA... Anyways, I used Swiss Dots embossing folder. It's pretty much self-explanatory. The petit oval die is from my stash, and I had to handcut the larger oval from brown card stock, because, I still haven't received C-plate yet... some of you know what's been happening to my C-plate... oh well... do you think my HANDCUTTING dies getting better ??!! lol! All stamped images were heat embossed.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. Hope you all are having a great weekend! :-)

I'm submitting this card to EASTER challenge at;

Cute Card Thursday

Delightful Challenge

Paperplay Challenge

One Stop Craft Challenge

Bugaboo Challenge

Masculine Birthday Card

I needed to make a Masculine birthday card, and saw this sketch at this week's challenge at Mojo Monday Blog . Here is my card. The recipient is a Pittsburgh Penguins' Fan (NHL). I don't like "Black & Gold" but it's Team's color so I can't change. lol :-) Hockey Jersey is from Stamps N'More which I bought last summer at stamp convention. I've never used this stamp til now :-) The skate is from INKADINKADO. It's a Roller skate but since he plays roller hockey, it's fine :-) I stamped Lawn Fawn's Cheveron pattern and trimmed one side, to make it close to the sketch. The sentiment is from Penny Black. All stamped images were heat embossed. The hockey jersey is adhered with pop up glue dots for a bit of dimention.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. Enjoy the rest of the WARM weekend! :)

Get Well Soon...

well, it started out to be a "get well soon" card after I heard she had a Stroke, and had to be in rehab. for 2 months. I finally made a card, and heard that she was getting out in two days! I was happy about fast recovery! So I changed the sentiment from "Get well soon" to"Thinking of You" :-) well, this is the thing. We play cards everytime we get together. That's "OUR" thing, and I found this House Mouse image so perfect, even with the wooden chair in the back!, just like their Dining table where we usually play! :-) I used a darker yellow DP (same design as other light yellow poldka dots paper I used for this card) to punch the flowers out, and I used gold gel pen for the center of the flowers.
Thank you for visiting my blog today. Have a great day! :-)
I'm submitting this to : Cute Card challenge ~ anything goes

Sending Love your way...

from Guam, USA in the Pacific to Pittsburgh, PA. !! :-) And that's what this card front shows! :-) I found this background Cute Map stamped image in my stash. I remember this was from Stamping gathering at CTMH's consultant's house, about... 10 years ago... I had an idea using this mail box stamp & sentiment from Lawn Fawn but needed the MAP image on the background. I don't have a printer for digi image nor anywhere I can find nice DP here on the island, BUT very fortunately I found this image!:-) The background image was a bit larger but I cut off the top where it said Canada. I tried to place the mailbox "in the pacific", trying to not cover the stamped image of the words, "Pacific". I placed the envelope on Pittsburgh area. :-) I could punch those little hearts out BUT I stamped the hearts from another Lawn Fawn set, and put the strip of the red card stock with the images through Xron tape adhesive maker, and trimmed them, because I loved the shape of this heart to this card compared to the heart punch I had. I colored the WHITE background card stock, using 2 distress inks to look more like an "old map". I paperpieced the mail box, and also used the distress inks around the edges. I also "distressed" this little "envelope"! :-) At last, I used the twine to make it look like "wrapped" mail. :-)
Thank you for stopping by my blog today! Have a great day! :-)
Challenge I'm submitting to: Creative Inspirations #155 Anything goes http://cinspirations.blogspot.com/2012/03/challenge-155-anything-goes.html

Birthday Shaker card to my "house mouse" friend

I like this type of shaker card; shaker box INSIDE of the card, and almost FULL size of the card! I can decorate it more! :-) In shaker box, I put lightly peal tinted hearts, purple "Happy Birthday", yellow(Gold) birthday cake and other little things from different bags of confettis, to match the colors of the card. The corner image is an old CTMH. The sentiment inside is Penny Black. I punched out swirls on the Echo park dp on the bottom. On the front, I used the same dp, used a Fiskars flower punch on the four corners. I love this punch! :-) ... no I haven't gotten my C-late yet...BUT fortunately I found Purple scallop circle die cut out in my stash from last october, when I did lots of just cutting, using nestabilities and the cuttlebug, and this shape & the size is the only purple I found!:-) I added a couple of flowers from the different punch to finish the card:-) The setiment on the front is TPC Studio.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. Have a Happy St. Patrick's Day weekend, and stay safe! :-)

I'm submitting this card to;

Cute Card Thursday ~ Happy Birthday http://cutecardthursday.blogspot.com/2012/03/challenge-208-happy-4th-birthday-cct.html

Papertake Weekly Challenge ~ Anything goes http://papertakeweekly.blogspot.com/2012/03/anything-goes.html

Crafts and Me challenge ~ Lets' see Circles http://craftsandmechallenges.blogspot.com/2012/03/challenge-75-lets-see-circles.html

"You are my Home"

"Sentiment" is the key at CAS-ual Fridays this week. And this recipient cares for "sentiment" much more than the "design" of the card (simple is the best! loll :-) , so I made this card. Inside, it says, "Missing you" with a little heart by its side :-) Stamps are Hero Arts, in the packaging with the logo of Operation Write Home. How appropriate! :-) I'm glad I finished the card, and was being able to upload it. My camera's battery died when I was taking a picture, and I had only 90 mins. before the challenge expired.... lol...

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. Hope everyone is having a nice evening! :-)

One year later...

3.11 marks one year after that big earthquake hit northeastern part of Japan and HUGE tsunami engulfed 20,000 Japanese people. I've seen many pictures of "now & a year ago", esp. those things which was destroyed by the earthquake & Tsunami. I can see Japanese people have been working hard to rebuild. But I watched BBC documentary on youtube today; the Japan's children of the Tsunami. This BBC program is almost one hour long, but mainly focusing the interviews on the survived children. The children talks about how they physically felt the earthquake, how they emotionally felt & have been feeling ever since, the totally changed everyday life, carrying the radiation detecter, no time frame of when they who had to evacuate from their own houses can go home (20~30 year?..)cuz of the high radiation level, to their dream when they grow up. Some wants to help people who suffers from natural disaster, radiation researcher... If you are interested, you can watch the documentary at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_AxnoNrr_8&feature=share
I keep praying for people in Japan ...

My first St. Patty's day card this year :-)

I'm a "wanna be Irish"! lol ;-) I've always celebrated this day, with Green Cookies to Green Beer, even I'm FAAAR from Irish! lol! I don't have anything green to wear, except for St. patty's day shirt! lol :-) And I totally forgot that I'm now on the island where I can't find any Irish people, on this US soil... maybe only the military personel from US mainland. So, I couldn't find Shamrock confetti, which I've seen so often when I was in Pittsburgh.... I punched out some shamrocks, found a red heart, red LIP shape, and shimmery tiny hearts confetti from my old stash here, for the shaker box. Since those shamrocks are papers, I needed to put the real confetti which helps things in the shaker box to move, rather than stick.... oh yes, this is for my Special half Irish person (!!) and that's why I put those hearts & lip confetti :-) I used this week's sketch at CardPatterns challenge. Apparently I forgot to pack my fav. St. Patty's day DPs for layering, so I had to stamp & heat embossed! And for lighter green card stock, I embossed with swiss dots embossing folder. I used sakura clear star gel pen to give a bit of shimmer around the both edges on the green circle card stock for the shaker box. The main image is an old Posh Impressions Stamp, and the background shamrocks are old hero arts stamp. Two shamrocks in the background stamped paper above the shaker box are cut outs. I found the spaces there, and used the shimmery paper to punch out, the same one I used, inside of the shaker box, and adhered them for more shimmery look!:-)

Thank you for visiting my blog today. I really appreciate you to stop by in your busy schedule and leave some comments :-)

I'm also submitting this card to

Delightful Challenges

(http://delightfulsketches.blogspot.com/2012/03/weekly-challenge-st-patricks-day.html) where they are having "St. Patty's day project" challenge.

One Stop Craft Challeng (http://onestopcraftchallenge.blogspot.com/2012/03/challenge-172-button-it.html) where they are having "button it"! challenge.

Sketch Challenge at Lawnscaping!

This is the sketch at Lawnscaping's challenge this week, and this is my card :-) This is the first time I used picasa software for better picture look! :-) All stamps are Lawn Fawn. I layered the rectangle piece with foam tapes, and added another layer (oval) with foam tapes over it. I used Stickles over "steam" image. I stamped a tiny heart with white ink, on each cup on the oval card stock, went over to color them in with Uniball white pen. I used tiny heart embossing folder for background paper. yes, I DO have 2 B-plates, so I can use my cuttlebug to, at least, Emboss, at the moment. I "doubled" the ribbon, to make that look.

Hope you all are having a nice night. Thank you for stopping by my blog today!

Sugar and Spice...

and Everything nice! This is the theme at House-Mouse & Friends Monday challenge. I took "Sugar" part & Everything nice on my HM buddy's birthday! :) As some of you know that I recently moved, and brought Cuttlebug (in carry-on luggage! ha!~of course, they asked me what it is at the security check point!! ) and mailed B-plates, rubber mat, all of my nestabilities & all my embossing folders... See what is missing here??!! "C-PLATE!" :-( No set date for C-plate to arrive here... I was overwhelmed when I was packing and I don't remember where the C-plate is now.. I know it's somewhere in PA! lol...Anyways, it's not PERFECT like using nestabilities for the oval shape to be cut, handcutting! and I really wanted to have pink Scallop oval paper to layer the main image. So, I came up with this idea, to make a similar background paper; Ribbon! I've put Strong adhesive tape on the back of the main image, and made frills from straight ribbon. I'm surprised to find the matched colored ribbon from 10 years ago, to a year old papers! But now I ran out of red tape and hopefully I can find the similar strength adhesive tape later today. ... it's hard to find things on this small tropical island When I NEED something... lol.. You do become Patient in life in general, though! lol :-) I use 10 year old gel pen from Pilot for faux stitching lines. From my experience, Sakura gel pen works Perfect after 10 years, Pilot, still works, not perfect, but those cheapy gel pens, made in Korea, I had to through all away. So, for your info., if you think you'll be stamping for next 10 years, I recommend you to buy Sakura Gel Pens! lol :-) I used sakura clear star pen over doiley image, to give a bit of shimmer. I also used the same pen for "blowing the candle" on inside image. I used sakura glaze pen over candles for more "wax" look. I used Ballon punch for inside image, and just hand draw the strings. I still need to improve the pictures, for sharper image. ... yellow stickle was used for the flame.

Thank you so much for stopping by my blog today. Have a great week! :-)

Get Well soon!

My HM stamping friend is in rehab, after the foot surgery. I wanna cheer her up when she sees this in her mail box after she comes home, to show that I'd been thinking & praying for her. I saw this sketch at Mojo Monday, and made a card using the Square sketch. Good thing I remembered that they are closing the challenge in about an hour! ha! I bought this new camera; Nikon. I'm not sure it's about this camera OR my New Setting of photo shooting place at my new place.. it doesn't show as clear as I want it to be... anyways, here is the sketch & my card. Hearts on the corner are adhered with pop up glue dots to give a bit more dimention. I punched out the tiny white hearts, adhered them onto the larger red hearts for extra design. The sentiment is the part of an old Hero Arts stamp.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today. Hope you all are having a relaxed sunday! :-)