The Character Cafe First Feature Friday & Freebie Template!

The Character Cafe (TCC) Design Team is having it's first Feature Friday today!!! All the DT Members are posting their creations using TCC images.

I'd like to say that I have something to post using TCC images, but I don't. My plan sort of fell apart. I did create what I intended on creating, but not with TCC images!!! LOL My computer is not hooked up to my printer and so on Wed. night at about 11pm when I realized that Thurs. was the last day of school and that I wouldn't be able to make my teacher gifts then, I worked like a mad woman in order to get them done!!! Unfortunately, that meant that they had to be created without TCC images. Plan B... create something on Thurs. during the day for Feature Friday's post... uh.... didn't happen either. I had great intentions, just very poor follow through! It seems that there's just so much work to be done, that crafting has be put off (I know you all know what I'm talking about!).

Anyway, for this week, I will share my teacher gifts as this was a "first time" creation and I think they turned out pretty good. The teachers loved them, the girls loved giving them and that's really all that matters in the end right?!


I used paper from DCWV The Glitter Stack, plain cardstock on the inside, a triscut box (cut and inside for stability), sticky note pad (3x3), stamps from Inkadinkado, Martha Stewart inks, and sakura glitter pens (of course!).

Now, when I do these again (and I will... for my mother's golf ladies league with the cutest little guy... can't wait to show him!) I want to put a closure of some sorts so that the books stay closed just in case someone would want to toss it in a bag or something. I wanted to do it to these as well, but it was an afterthought and I used scor tape and it wasn't going to budge to slip some ribbon between the papers!

So, in retrospect, I did up a template in Inkscape so you can either cut it with SCAL and the Cricut, or I also have a pdf file here for cutting by hand :) Click the image for pdf download.

SVG File HERE

The black cuts are for the cardboard cuts, the green is for the decorative paper and the blue is for the inside liner. Have fun!!!!

Well, I'm off to get something done... my kids are in a Taekwondo Competition near Toronto tomorrow, so it's going to be a long day!

Happy crafting :)
Kendra

First Ever Blog Hop at The Character Cafe!

Just a quick note to let you all know that we're having our First ever Blog Hop over at The Character Cafe!!! You won't want to miss it as we're introducing our new Design Team Members, giving away a freebie, having a couple great prizes AND giving a whopping 50% off discount code good until Tuesday :)!

Head on over there, the Hop starts at 9:00pm EST Thursday, June 18 and ends Tues. at 8am when the draw is made! (the discount code is only good until Tues!)

Kendra :)

Father's Day Card - New Release & another Challenge Sponsorship :)

Hi everyone! First off, let me just say yippee!!! I went to my first scrap store garage sale this weekend at Scrappin Great Deals and did I ever score :) I got over 250 pieces of paper for an average of $0.15 a sheet... he he he... I needed paper in a bad way so I'm tickled pink. I couldn't find the "just right" paper for my card and I'd been looking for the past week flip flopping between papers that weren't what I was looking for and finally, the garage sale...

So, without further ado, I'm going to show you my newest card (simple, yet suitable) and one of The Character Cafe's new releases! We had been holding off until we assembled our design team, but father's day is in 2 weeks and so we decided we'd just get the couple images we thought would be good for that out there!So, this is not a new character, but something I did a while back and for some stupid reason, just never uploaded to the site... Buster and Willy are there, but the sentiment image is not... hmmm Well, we've changed the digi stamp of Buster and Willy to include this one with the sentiment as well at no additional charge! If you can't read the sentiment, it reads

"He didn't tell me how to live, he lived and let me watch him do it - Clarence Buddington Kelland".

I think it's perfect for this image as well as a Father's Day card! I'm going to give this one to my dad and I think my girls are making their own edition for my hubby (on top of the "cards" they stole my stamps for today... boogers).

Card details - Buster & Willy coloured with crayola pencil crayons and mineral spirits, ribbon from my stash (can't you tell, it's a bit wrinkled LOL), a caterpillar button also from the stash, some hemp string, Deja View Sharon Ann Timeless Collection paper (yay), Bazzil cardstock, some eyelets and Tim Holtz distressing ink.

I was just over to The Cafe Blog and I have to tell you that if you haven't been there already to check out the card Kelly made, well, you've just got to go take a peek. It's gorgeous! She really outdid herself on this one.

I also wanted to let you all know that The Character Cafe if sponsoring another challenge! We are sponsoring the Sketch and Stash Challenge #12 starting tomorrow, June 8th. The winner will be able to pick 3 of our images for free so head on over there sometime this week and enter, what have you got to lose (except a bit of your stash... he he he, couldn't help myself!)?

Well, gotta go update The Cafe to reflect the new releases before it gets too late!
Happy crafting :)
Kendra

P.S. If you haven't thought about throwing your name in the hat for our design team, what are you waiting for?????? Check out the details and e-mail us... get going :)

Cute Card Thursday Challenge #62 & Sneak Peek!

Ok, so Kelly missed her challenge deadline yesterday, (is it just us, or do you all do that too?) so I figured I'll be early with mine! To her defense though, it's a Friday challenge and she posted on Thursday, but apparently their new challenge started early (or is it the darned time change - who knows?) LOL ??? This card is for the Cute Card Thursday Challenge #62 "Bit o Bling" and since it just started yesterday, I figure I should be good for this one!

We're gearing up to launch our search for a Design Team (for some reason, this is something that has taken us a bit longer than it should have to do, but oh well, can't turn back time!) and so we've been holding back all of our images for release... easy to say, but it's like keeping a secret... you're dying to let the cat out of the bag, but know you shouldn't, (so you just drop hints here and there ~ at least when it's not THAT important...). Well, I'm here today with my "slip o the tongue".... and I'm heading over to The Cafe blog to do it there too (for a different challenge & different image!) - tee hee :)


This is Fairy Belle (to be released by The Character Cafe) and I just LOVE her!!!!! I'm not sure what it is about these new images, but I adore them... maybe because we're not so focused on the paper piecing (yeah, sorry, no svgs for these ones!)? I coloured her with copics, used paper from a kit I had, cut with my new spellbinder nesties (yay), embossed with my new cuttlebug folder (yay again!), added some sakura glitter pen, flowers, end cap, brad, stickles and voila! I haven't done the inside of the card yet, but I think I'll use the nesties again, keep it simple... we'll see... Oh, almost forgot, the Penny Black "make a wish" stamp... and acrylic rhinstones :) (duh, that's part of the "bling"!!!! LOL - long week)

Anyway, hopefully, the search will be on by Monday!!! Well, I'm off to post to The Cafe blog with another "to be released" image...
Happy crafting!
Kendra

My Computer Woes... & Cafe News

Hi all, We're having a wonderful Holiday Monday here in Canada... sun was shining all day :) I had some computer trouble earlier and boy was I upset. I was using my computer this morning with no problems, then I moved from one room to the other being careful as I could while juggling my coffee, mouse and the laptop. When I set my computer down, it turned off (you thought I was going to say I spilled my coffee on it right?! LOL)... I turned it back on and continued on my merry blog reading way. Well, I went to type a comment and nothing... hmmm... my mouse worked fine, but NONE of the rest of my keyboard worked! I spent 2 hours on the phone with HP tech support and still did not have a functioning keyboard! Ack!
Well, my wonderful partner/neighbour, Kelly has an equally wonderful brother who fixes computers and he just so happened to be coming out this way... it turns out that my battery pack for my laptop wiggles just enough to wreak havoc at times. Don't get me wrong, I am very thankful that it was a hardware issue and not something happening to my files, but all he had to do was remove and re-insert my battery pack... aughhh.....
It usually happens in threes right? Well, I've been dealing a bit with spam, then today's keyboard woes, what's next??? I'm afraid... very afraid... LOL

So, onto my news! The Character Cafe is sponsoring Inspirational Card Sketches challenge for the week. The challenge starts tomorrow (they usually post around 6am... gosh, I'm hoping NOT to be awake, but I'm kind of torn... it is our first sponsorship). The winner of their challenge this week gets to choose 3 images from The Cafe as their prize!
Also, a few of their design team members are going to be working with our images (I'm so excited for that as well).
Well, that's about it for now... make sure you check it out and play along this week for your chance to win some goodies!

On another note, we're holding back images in order to gather together a design team real soon, so keep an eye out! We're just working out final details :)

Happy crafting!
Kendra

Mother's Day Gift - My first canvas creation

Hi all, just wanted to pop in to show you what I made for my mother for Mother's Day. I already showed you the card, but I'm really excited about the wall hanging that I made her. I've never used canvas before, but I bought a whole bunch when I found it on sale, thinking that my kids and I would make some stuff with it for their rooms. They like to craft so I figured this would be a good way for them to splatter some paint on something that would end up somewhere besides the blue box or a drawer (my fridge wont hold magnets too well). I also figure my plethora of stamps might come in handy in just such a case... along with a Cricut cart or two (ok, maybe more!). That is the plan, however I'm not always good at following plans. There just never seems to be enough time! This is when I remind myself that my word is "accomplish" for 2009 :)

Anyway, on to the goods...

I'm so happy with how it turned out. I didn't add the pics (they're black and white old pics from when my mom was little with her siblings and grandparents) because we don't have one yet of my uncle and I figured it was best to wait to have that in order to make sure they go in the right spot. I also thought that maybe she'd want different ones too, like the great one she has of my grandpa, or my grandma/grandpa's wedding.

I'd never used any of my Say It With Crystals because I love them too much... but tada... I did it.
I also finally used some big flowers (Heidi Swapp) and the cool brads that I found matched the paper perfectly. Oh, my new fav is the Sakura Stardust Glitter pens!!! I'd say it all worked out... what do you all think? Any suggestions/tips for next time when I do this for/with my kids? My mom doesn't like frilly, fancy or swirly, but I gave this to her today and I'd have to say that I got a genuine ohhhh, it's beautiful, so I think she liked it and it was low key enough for her!

Well, time to organize... I've got the bug and well, my craft room could use some organization, then maybe it'd be more fun and efficient to play in there!

Happy crafting!
Kendra :)

P.S. If you really want to know what I used for anything, let me know and I'll go find out :)

A Spoon Full of Sugar - Challenge #50

Another challenge! Yay! This is my first time entering the Spoon Full of Sugar challenges (which is to use texture) and I'm so excited (ok, so I've only entered a handful of challenges... there's bound to be tons of firsts right?!). I used a new image we're going to add to The Cafe this week. We've actually had these done for a while, but somehow in all the kafuffle (not sure how to spell that) we didn't realize we hadn't added these! I know, shame on us right?!

Anyway.. another first is that I used my Big Kick!!! I also bought Spellbinder Nesties from Scrappin Great Deals, (my LSS and no, we're not affiliated with them, just like them, they've got a great selection and they're super nice!) so I was playing and this challenge worked out perfectly!


For this card, I used Pink Paislee paper, Offray ribbon, Flower Simon from The Character Cafe coloured with Copics, Cuttlebug embossing folder, Nestabilities and (I'm not sure you can see it) Sakura Gelly Roll Stardust pen.


Reminder: The Buck or Two sale at The Cafe ends Wed, May 6th at Midnight so if you haven't been to check out the great deals, head on over there now, while you can :)

I'll be back soon with some other goodies that I've been working on too.
Until then, happy crafting!
Kendra