Enjoy Life ~ With Coffee

Greetings, drinkers!

Thanks in part to the coffee and tea industries we have whooshed around to another Friday! Do you know after today there are only TWELVE more Fridays until Christmas!

I'm sorry! Please get up slowly. I don't think your knee is meant to be bent that way, sweetie.

Here, have a cuppa:

 

A QACAS OLC full of cuteness and mischief. I don't drink a lot of coffee or have a lot of coffee stamps so I am very grateful to Hammy for coming up with this fun design! 

The NBUS grinning Cheshire is from the "Joy to the World" stamp set by Penny Black. In the set, kitty is holding a Christmas present. I surgically removed the gift and now a NBUS coffee cup from "Hot Concoctions" by Paper Smooches is teetering in his hands. The sediment is from GKW. The Washi tape was applied twice as a border and then a wee piece of it was placed on the take-out coffee cup protection band. The schmear of ink covering the sediment is a NBUS stamp from "Jumbo Abstract Art" by MFT.

(I'm sitting here chuckling at that border. I simply laid down the first border strip near the card edge and then laid down the second strip without even trying to line up the pattern so I'm pretty chuffed that that happened!)

Challenges

• 2016 Fall Coffee Lovers Blog Hop. Sliding in just under the wire for Amy's fun hop!
• CAS On Sunday: One-Layer Card.
• CASology: Cute.
• Make My Monday: No Patterned Paper.
• SSS Wednesday Challenge: Anything Goes.
• STAMPlorations Theme and Sketch Challenge: Monochrome.

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And I'm Off!

As a lot of you know, I get together with my sisters for a few days every year, so I'm flying off again to do that. This year I am traveling to the lakes of Minnesota to enjoy their company and see other relatives and friends. I'll be gone for a coupla weeks, so please let me know if you live in the MSP area and would like to meet!

Sadly this means my visits to you will not be happening again for a while. I feel like I've been such a bad bloggie friend this whole year and I'm very sorry about that. My hope is that next year I will be able to get back into my routine. I truly miss my visits and commenting. Thank you to all of you who have stayed steadfast and continue to visit me and leave me some love!

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Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Please let me know you came by!

*Life is too short!

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Sunflower Heat Wave

Well, hi.

You doing okay? I'm having puppy withdrawals. I mean, Cisco isn't a puppy, but when you're used to having Golden Retriever or Labrador Retriever dogs your whole adult life, a tiny Havanese is forever a puppy, no matter who old. I mean how old. 

I've always loved a Jumble puzzle or ragman, so even hewn sword are typed whit their trestle in the grown order they kolo fine to me!

Need a stiff drink now? Sorry. That was a little brain exercise for you. You'll thank me later. Life can't be all about looking at pretty card art, you know. 

Well, okay, yes it can be.

I made this card a couple of weeks ago when there were a couple of sunflower challenges in Blogland, but I forgot to post it. As it happens, it is particular appropriate for our current week where the temperatures are again belying autumn and insisting on returning to full-on summer. The thermo meter got up to 103 degrees yesterday. That's 39.4444 for you Celsius watchers. I hope that drink you made yourself was a cold one!

So anyway what happened was I stamped a v.v.o. stamp from Close to My Heart called "Sunflower Patch" and then I painted it using my Ziggie watercolor markers. The sediment is from Papertrey Ink. The flowers are liberally winked and then I finished them by glossing their little faces. (The main singer in the band has a diamond in the center of her forehead. I thought I would splain that because in the photo above it looks like a bug landed on her.)

Challenges

• Cards in Envy: Goodbye Summer, Hello Fall. Well, not here.
• SSS Work It Wednesday: Use stamps.
• Uniko Challenge: Autumn (optional twist thanks).
• Use Your Stuff: Mood Board.

 

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The Playhouse critters found this while surfing for challenge ideas:

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Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Please let me know you came by, so I can be sure and return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

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Happy Mail and a Special Visit From Across the Pond

Greetings!

I hope you are well and your week is whooshing by in the best possible way.

Whatever else your day will be or has been, I am here to bring you a smile with some cyber Happy Mail in your cyber inbox! You don't even have to go outside and get rain drops on your glasses or be blinded by the sun, depending.

Heretis:

C'mon, so cute! When I decide to retire from making cards, I'm still going to make this card. That's how perfect this is for any occasion. I'm ashamed that I have already had this NBUS stamp of "Harry the Stuffie" bear from Stampingbella for (cough) months before using it.

The coloring was done with my Ziggie markers and aqua dulce. The NBUS sediment is from the same "Happy Mail" set. The cross-stitched frame border die is from Memory Box. The stamp was heat-embossed with Silhouette Black e/p and the glossy nose and heart were gussied up with my Modgepodge Dimensionals. 

Challenges:

• Addicted to CAS: Stitched.
• Addicted to Stamps and More: Use your markers.
• CASology: Frame.
• Inkspirational: Photo below

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Company!

I was super excited to have distinguished company from England visit us on Tuesday and Wednesday! It was none other than the Lady of Less is More, Christine Stokes! I had the pleasure of meeting Chrissie and her husband Phil on my recent trip to England and I was fortunate to be wined and dined at their home. Later, both Chrissie and I attended the Happy Little Stampers Retreat in Swindon.

Chrissie and Phil are now spending a few weeks in northern California and I was thrilled that the Playhouse was a stop on their tour!

Next time we will have to allow more time for actual crafting, but it was still a pleasure just to have Chrissie visit my little place. (And you'll notice that Cisco got in on the action, too!)

Even the husbands enjoyed themselves! Here we are following dinner out:

Phil Stokes, me, Chrissie Stokes, and the Mister (Kevin)

You can see that we all got along so well, we swapped spouses! I'm kidding. Settle down. Thank you Chrissie and Phil for a very fun visit! Safe travels to you as you journey onward!

~~~

Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Please let me know you came by, so I can be sure and return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

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Mwah!
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Hammy's Birthday!

Hello and welcome to Monday!

I hope you had a wonderful weekend and you are becited to see what this fresh new week has in store for you! I have special company arriving tomorrow so this will be another awesome week in the Playhouse!

It started on Sunday when we celebrated Hammy's birthday! I thought you might enjoy this photo of the happy event:

Joining the celebration is Hammy's old girlfriend ... oh, sorry, that word gets people in trouble! I should say Hammy's former girlfriend/baby mama. You all remember Ms. Thing! Well, some of you won't remember her, but you can go back and meet her if you have time. The whole shebang is liberally awash with Stella, but natchrally, it doesn't show.

[Both stamps are NBUS: "Birthday Hamster" from Stampingbella and "Hamster" from Deep Red (thank you again, Sam!). The sediment is a sticker from SRM.]

Here is another photo of Hammy, this time with Freckles and Sofia.

Wait. What? Who is Sofia?

Well, Sofia is a lady mouse my friend Ros sent to me following my trip to England. It was lovingly and meticulously made and hand-stitched by Ros's 89-year-young Aunt! Thank you again, Ros!

So with the addition of little Cisco, The Real-Life Dog, we had a festivas time celebrating Hammy's birthday! In his famous words, "May all your cupcakes be crumby!"

Challenges

• ColourQ: Below.
• {PIN}spirational Challenge: Hammy!! (My first time here! How could I not play?!)
• Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge: Clean and simple.
• Virginia's View Challenge: Splatter.

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New Friends Corner

Please join me in welcoming these lovely new friends to the Playhouse!

Gwendolyn of Desperate Housewife Craft. Gwendolyn is another blogger brand new to our community! She only started her blog in February of this year, but you may have already seen her exceptional work recognized in some of the challenges you enjoy. Originally from Singapore, Gwendolyn has lived in New Zealand, France, and now Germany. Retired from the corporate world, Gwendolyn is enjoying being at home with her children and exploring her creative side. In addition to her love of paper craft, she also loves to paint, crochet, and make soy candles. I know you will enjoy sharing Gwendolyn's journey!

Brenda of Floral Fantasies. Brenda started her blog in 2009! She really needs no introduction as she is a well-known and well-loved lady in Blogland! Even though Brenda suffers from MS, she creates the most extraordinary card art imaginable and she is a source of great inspiration to those of us with health challenges! (And I love her doggie profile photo which reminds me of our Salty who was with us for 16 years.)

Isabelle Siry of Izzy Scrap. Izzy is from France and she just started her blog in May of this year at the encouragement of her supportive husband and children. She has been scrapping since 2010, but she bought her very first stamping supplies about 20 years ago in order to make her own Christmas cards. I think a lot of card artists did that! In addition to paper craft, Izzy enjoys traveling, reading, and spending time with her family and friends. I know when you pop in to welcome Izzy to our fantastic community, you will be enchanted and inspired by her beautiful work!

Cathy Cates of Cathy's Creative Corner. Cathy is from Adelaide, Australia and she also started blogging in 2009! In addition to paper craft, Cathy loves photography, quilting, beading, knitting, crocheting, and cross-stitch. She is one busy lady, so she hasn't been blogging as much this past year, but there is still plenty of beautiful card art and inspiration for you to enjoy on her blog!

Sam of Whispers Cards. Sam is from the UK and she has been blogging since 2010. Sam is a huge Penny Black devotee and you will see that represented throughout her blog as you scroll through and see how she makes those images sing. Adorable, colorful, cheerful, and expertly made are words that best describe Sam's delightful card art and I know you'll agree once you've seen them for yourself!

Thank you for joining, ladies, and welcome to the Playhouse! It's nice to have three bloggie experts and two bloggie newbies!

~~~

Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Please let me know you came by, so I can be sure and return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

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Mwah!
If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me
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Autumn Leaf Thank You

Hi there!

How's it going?

We are having an Indian Summer with temperatures soaring again. I wonder if that's why some leaves have such a riot of color, layer upon layer.

I can hear them sighing, "Ah, cooler temperatures. I think I'll turn a lovely shade of amber."

And then, suddenly, a wail of "Yikes! What the heck?!" can be heard from high in the trees as temperatures do an about-face and climb. Because they've released their lovely green protection, the leaves then turn bright red from sunburn.

And so it goes. Until they look like this:

I used Impression Obsession leaf dies for the large maple leaf. I liked the dies so much that I bought the mini version some time ago, so the smaller maple leaf is NBUS from that set. The NBUS thank you sediment is from Altenew's "Magnolias for Her" set. A rummage through my v.o. papers turned up this cool sheet that reminds me of wood veneer.

You may have seen in Blogland that Altenew is holding a hop showcasing many of our favorite challenges. Certainly favorites of mine! Seeing Kathy's fabulous 30-Day Marker Challenge in the line-up made me wish my NBUS Challenge had been among the participants, but you all know that I join May and the ladies of Altenew in wholeheartedly thanking these challenges for all the hard work they do, sometimes week-after-week. That takes tremendous dedication! I couldn't wait to join in the hop and I hope you can, too!

I give the same sincere thanks to so many other amazing challenges that I am constantly inspired by and love to play in. I never have to draw a blank when it comes to card design with so many ideas to spark my creativity!

Challenges

• CAS(E) This Sketch: Below.
• City Crafter Challenge: Turning a new leaf.
• TIME OUT Challenge: Photo inspiration.
• Ultimate Challenge Blog Hop
• Uniko Challenge: Autumn. Optional twist: Thanks.

  

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Wait. What?

Now don't go beciting yourself! I didn't get a pooch, but I am happy to be dogsitting this little guy for a week:

His name is Cisco and he's a Havanese. He owns the Mister's sister. She and her mister are off on vacation. Yes, Hammy and Freckles are jealous. Duke and Jack would be jealous, too, if they only knew!

And, yes, you'll have to forgive any typos. His chin is literally on the keyboard!

Awwwww!

~~~

Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy! LITS!*

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to join as a follower! Please let me know you came by, so I can be sure and return the flavor!

*Life is too short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

Click CTL + Home. 
Click the Home tab under my blog banner which resets the post.
Click Page Down to reach the end of the post.
Click Comments and a pop-up box opens.
Click "Jump to Comment Form" and walla, no more car pool tunnel!
Mwah!
If you ask me a question in your comment, please remember to leave me
your email address so I can respond. Thank you