13 Days of Halloween Blog Hop - Day 12

*Please scroll down for Days 1 - 11 of the hop*

Welcome to the 13 Days of Halloween Blog Hop.  This is DAY 12 of the hop. This hop is scheduled from Oct. 19 at 8:00 am through Oct.31 at 11:00 pm (central time).  It's that time of year when the nights are all spooky and creatures are known to wander the forests.  So sit for a spell with a nice cup of hot apple cider and check out all the great projects.

If you just happened upon my blog, you will want to start with Lisa Peters @  http://handmadewithlove-lisa.blogspot.com/.  She is the awesome lady who pulled this hop together (thank you Lisa!) and is your first stop.  If you came here from the awesome Tami, then you are in the right spot!

We're so excited to be doing this hop and we have a fabulous lineup with some very talented ladies. There will be lots of fun projects, along with some great blog candy, and a great grand prize for this hop.

The hop is a 13 day hop with only 13 blogs to visit so you will have plenty of time to make it through the whole hop lineup 13 times.  Check out each blog and see what blog candy you can win at the individual stops.  Please come back all 13 days to see great projects.  

Here is the complete lineup:

Lisa - http://handmadewithlove-lisa.blogspot.com/

Pam - http://pammejo-scrapbookflair.blogspot.com/

Janet - http://createatdreamscrapbooks.blogspot.com/

Doris - http://mybugandmecreate.blogspot.com

Kristen - http://huneebcreations.blogspot.com/

Nicolette - www.beyondscrapin.blogspot.com

Jearise - http://lorbysworld.blogspot.com/

Tami - http://www.tamboscreations.blogspot.com/

Amy - http://lv2scrapandfibrofacts.blogspot.com/

Brynn - http://www.flairandfrillscreativity.blogspot.com

Scraps to Treasures - http://scraps2treasure.blogspot.com

CallyAnn - http://callyanncraftycreations.blogspot.com (note - Cally Ann could not finish the hop, but does have the first several days posted)

Gill - http://creationsbygillm.blogspot.com

First off, I'm so sorry for being late this morning.  Still on a funky sleeping schedule over here and it's truly impossible for me to get anything done in advance!  Aaaah!  Thanks for your patience!  I actually just made this card this morning and it surprised me that it didn't take as long as usual.  For a long time, I didn't enjoy using my Cricut because I thought it took to long to get all the layers cut, etc.  Well, I've completely changed my mind!  If you use some of the cuts they have all prepared with just a few layers, it's surprisingly quick!  I'm really happy with this little card today and it was one of the simpler ones that I've made.  I think I really need to reassess all of my cartridges and use them a lot more than I already do.  I can't believe how many options there are in each cartridge!  The Mini Monsters cart is the one I used today and so far, it's been my favorite to use this holiday season.  Last year my fave was Happy Hauntings.  Maybe I'll use that one for tomorrow's post.  I apologize for only doing cards this whole time, but I'm kinda killing two birds with one stone.  I have a friend who orders 8 cards each holiday (and even though these are late) she will use them for next year, I'm sure.  So, that's why all the cards! ;)  Alright, enough babbling from me.  Onto the card!

Front of Card -  Suggestions for the inside???

 Isn't this the cutest brad?  It's Studio G and I won it as blog candy from Heather at Heather's Crafty Space!

For the paper and cardstock I grabbed some from my stash and inked the pattern background edges with Colorbox Cat's Eye ink in Blackbird.  I used a white Marvy gel pen for the little details.  The die cuts are from Mini Monsters, with the purple and black cardstock from my stash and the green patterned paper from the Recollections - Ravenhead Manor 12x12 stack from last year's stock.  I added red and orange Stickles for a little pizazz.  There ya have it!  Easy peasy!

I hope you enjoyed my post today.  Please come back tomorrow to be eligible for the grand prize (see below) and to see my next project.  Only 1 more day of awesome Halloween projects to go!  I'm going to be sad to end this hop. :(  It's been so much fun!

To be eligible for the grand prize, you must visit each blog and leave a comment. You also MUST visit Lisa's blog and leave a comment on her blog for the day and also become a follower at "Scrapping With Lisa" and her facebook page:http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scrapping-with-Lisa/130882060268842. Please let her know if you don't do facebook and she won't count that against you for the blog candy.  Now for the blog candy, I bet you are wondering what it could be.   It will be a big treat bag full of goodies.  She will also be posting an individual prize for each day of the hop also that everyone who hops that day will have a chance to win.

As far as blog candy from me.  Well, I'm gonna scrounge something up. LOL  I'll get a picture posted as soon as I can.  It will be some fun goodies for sure.  Please leave a comment and become a follower or note that if you already are one, if you would like to be entered to win.  Please include a way to contact you.   I only give treats to my followers. ;)

Your next stop is the lovely Brynn.  She's a great friend, fellow fibrouber talented gal!  


Don't forget to enter my 500 followers give-away!   Btw, Cricut owners - one of the prizes in the box (500 follower giveaway) will be some Cricut markers.  If a non- Cricut owner wins, I will add something else equally as fun.  (This is only a little of what's gonna be in the box)... There will also be some stickers and hmmm... Maybe I'll reveal a little more in tomorrow's post, so I guess you'll just have to come back!  Trick or Treat!!! Ha ha ha! 

XO ~ Amy Jo


P.S.  I'd  love it if you would check out (and I'd be oh-so-happy if you follow) my new blog, Best Things I've Found in [Maga]zines

Fall/Halloween Blog Hop Oct. 22 & 23

*Please scroll down for the 13 Days of Halloween Hop*
*Please scroll down for the Oct. 21st Halloween Hop (still time to comment -  enter to win prizes until Sunday night!) *

Good morning everyone and thanks for stopping by my blog!  Today is day one of Nicolette's Fall & Halloween Blog Hop.  We were asked to create any sort of project representing Fall or Halloween!  I am so excited to be in this hop!  If you just happened upon my page, you will want to start at the beginning with Nicolette.  She is a super sweet gal and a very talented crafter.  There will be lots of great projects and some blog candy along the way!  If you arrived here from one of my favorite crafters, Jenny - from Jenny's Scrapbooking Haven, then you are in the right spot!  I am very honored to following her in this hop.  Her creations are always stunning!

This is a two day hop, but some people will have projects for only day one and others will be posting two, depending on how ambitious we all are. ;)  Point being, you will want to come back for day two so you don't miss anything!  I'm going to try to post two projects.  Luckily I have some that have not been posted that I created last year. Yay!

I will be giving away a little surprise blog candy of my own so in order to win you must a.)  be or become a follower (only my followers get treats!)  b.) leave a comment with a way to reach you  c.)  this is totally optional, but I would be so happy if you did that I will give you an extra entry - stop by my new blog and leave a comment (follow if you want, but not necessary).  Leave a separate comment here as well so I know you did that. Best Things I've Found In 'Zines is the name and link.

Now then, enough of all that rambling, let's get on with the show!  Errrr... hop!  ;0)

The project I have for you today is onw of last year's creations, but it's never been posted.  I chose to do a Halloween card for this post because, if you know me, you know I LOVE Halloween!  I'd be happy to work on Halloween projects all year.  It's just the best!  This card was, I think, the first one I created with my Mini Monsters cartridge when I bought it, last year.  I was so excited to get this cartridge!  There are so many great cuts on it.  I use it a lot and am happy I bought it.

I just love looking back at some of the first cards I've created.  I think I've come a long way since then, but I think this one's still pretty cute. ;)  I used an epoxy sticker for the spider/web, the Boo came from one of those glossy frame punch-outs, and of course the monster was from Mini Monsters, using several layers.  I think this was before I started inking everything, which I do on almost all my creations now.  I think it just makes everything show up so much better.  I remember I wasn't sure how to do the layers correctly so for the white  parts, I had to color in the black teeth and black parts of the eyes. LOL  I tried to tie all the colors of the monster in with the "Boo" and I think it worked out pretty well for a beginner.  I hope you like it too!

Don't forget to leave your comments and follow the instructions (listed above) to enter to win some blog candy! I will pick a winner by mid-week, next week.  Thanks for stopping by today.  Be sure to come back tomorrow for another project.  Your next stop is Kathryn.  Can't wait to see what she has in store for us!

XO ~ Amy Jo

Challenge Me Monday #82 - Purple People Eater

Hi Everyone,

Wow, it has been a while since I've posted anything on my blog for Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog (FCCB)!  As some of you know, I'm now the Coordinator over there so I have been working behind the scenes and haven't been able to actually design for quite a while; however, we have a very special new sponsor today and since they were kind enough to provide us with some files to try out, I simply had to join in the fun!

First off, I'd like to personally say thank you to them and tell you a little bit about their company.  SVG Attic was founded in early 2011 by Jessica Bashaw and is a family owned company that operates in Southern California. Jessica provides fresh, cute, and easy to cut/assemble SVG files for use with your favorite electronic cutting machines. 



I'm sure many of you have heard of them, as they are one of the best SVG file companies out there (in my opinion) and we, at FCCB, are very honored to have them sponsor this week's challenge.  Friends, you will definitely want to head over to FCCB today and check out the challenge (you have about a week to get your entries in so don't worry!) because the prize this week is a $15.00 gift certificate to the SVG Attic store.  And no, I did not receive any monetary gain by posting this.  I just wanted to give them an extra thank you and a bit of a shout out. :0)

I was lucky enough to win the Sure Cuts a Lot (SCAL) program from Dirty Truth Reviews.  Please go check out their site and enter to win some awesome giveaways!  It's a very fun place to go. ;)  Anyways, I used my SCAL program to cut this adorable witch (below) from the Spooky Friends set.  Isn't this the cutest set?  For those of you unfamiliar with SVG files, they are super easy to use.  Each layer breaks down and you can manipulate the designs to make them customized very easily.  I love playing around with these!

Spooky Friends

Alright, now that we've got all that covered, let's take a look at my project!  As usual, I have lots of pictures to show you, so thank you for bearing with me!  I hope you enjoy this as much as I do.  I'm really happy with the way it turned out and had no prior design in mind, I just knew I wanted to use the sassy witch. :0)  I will put most of the deets in the captions and the rest at the bottom of the post.

 5 1/2" x 7" Card - Front on Purple cardstock from my stash

 I used a green colored cardstock for the witch, PKS stamps for her cute face and used a white gelly roller for detail.  I used my Cuttlebug Swirls folder on my Sizzix Texture Boutique for her pink hair, inked with Red Colorbox Cat's Eye ink.  I used gold Stickles over yellow cardstock for her hat buckle and used Glossy Accents on the black witch's hat.  I used Stayz-On black ink for her face.

 I also Glossied her boots and belt, added some more details w/white gelly roller and used my Zig two-way glue pen to put all of her pieces together.  Her dress is from a Halloween stack I had from last year. It's one of my favorite stacks, but can't remember the name offhand and since it's 3 in the morning, I'm not gonna get up and go look. LOL  She is from Spooky Friends.  Pretty cute, right?

 I asked my hubs for his opinion on what should go in this corner and it was pretty cool b/c he had the same idea!  He said a moon and I was thinking a moon and bats so here it is, from the Pumpkin Carving cartridge in yellow and black (cardstock scraps).

 How awesome is this stamp?  It came from the other DT I am on and is available to purchase A Jillian Vance Design.  I love their amazing Halloween sets that they came out with this year.  Please be sure to stop by our DT blog as well:  A Jillian Vance Design DT Blog. I used a 1 1/2" strip of the same paper as her dress for the "ribbon" border.

I made an accordion-fold rosette and added a square epoxy that I created with my Epiphany Crafts Square Punch and Blank Epoxy Buttons, also available to purchase from AJVD.  These punches are fabulous and I own about 5 different ones.  They are coming out with a star shaped one that I simply must have! 

Adhesives used:  Pop dots, ATG, Zig 2 Way Glue Pen, Tombow Fine Point Glue Pen, Joann's Craft Glue.

Well, that's all for today folks!  Thanks for stopping by today.  I'm gonna go see if there's any challenges I can enter this little cutie in. ;)

XO ~ Amy Jo

Challenges Entered:

Paper Sundaes Challenge 91 - Halloween or Fall

Jillian's Blog Hop Day 4 - Birthday Card For Jillian

Welcome to Jillian's Birthday Blog Hop!

*Be sure to scroll down a few posts for my 500 follower giveaway*

We are so glad you are here! If you came from My Favorite Blog you are on the right track.  If you just happened here by chance and want to start from the beginning, please go to the beginning at Deanne's Creative Juice. For those of you who don't know who Jillian is, I think you'll want to know her. Go to her blog for her own hop at http://www.ajillianvancedesign.com/Blog.html.  She is turning 12 years old and already has made for herself an amazing business!  She has some of the best stamp sets I've seen.  In fact, I went over there a few nights ago and bought 4 sets of her stamps because she's a smart chick who created phrases for particular Cricut cartridges which I really need!  I do have some awesome ones from a few of my other favorite blogs, but Jillian is just 12!!! OMGosh!

For this awesome hop, we have four straight days of birthday fun lined up for you all.  Each day, each blog is going to post a new project and there may be some blog candy involved. ;)  Am I doing blog candy, you ask???  Well, OF COURSE!!!  What would a hop be without some fun goodies?  All you need to do is leave a comment below and please become a follower if you are not.  You don't have to comment each day, but if you do, you have more chances to win the blog candy I'll be giving away after the hop is over.  This hop goes from June 10th through June 13th.

Every participant is linking their project back to the hostess' blog.  Bloggers will vote on their favorite projects.  CLICK HERE to vote for the project you believe deserves to win a new Cricut cartridge:) If you like any of my projects best, PLEASE be sure to vote for me.  I'd greatly appreciate it because I really want to win the cartridge being offered!  Thanks for taking the time to do so each day.  :0) (If you haven't seen yesterday's project, please go down one post to check it out and vote on it if you like it.)  I have been unable to link yesterday's and today's post so please come back and click on the "Click Here" link again.  I'll try to get it fixed by tomorrow morning.

Today's post is an easel card I made for the Birthday girl herself!  Jillian, I hope you like it.  It will be on the way to you tomorrow. :0)  For the deets see below.

I saw this awesome sticker from Creative Imaginations and just knew it was perfect for Jillian.  There's way more to her than meets the eye!  I didn't focus a ton on the birthday aspect because I wanted her to be able to display this and look at it to remind her how special she is.  I used some fun bling from Creative Charms, Flowers, Stickers and pop dots.  Background teal cardstock is from my stash.  Purple glitter paper is from DCWV.  I inked all the edges with an awesome deep purple Studio G ink pad. For more details feel free to ask!

Thanks for your patience today!  Sorry this is up so late.  Don't forget to get your votes in as today is the last day to vote.  I'm going to post this card now.

I hope to enter this into some challenges and will post them at the bottom of this post when I do.

Thanks so much for hopping with us, now be sure to head on over to Funky Cards  to check out what Madison has in store for us today!  She makes some great projects!

Here is the blog list!

Deanne's Creative Juice

Anniebees Craftroom

My Favorite Blog 

Scrapping Card Making and Living with Fibro - You are Here

Funky Cards  - Next

Scrappin with Cricut 

Courts Craft Corner

Handcrafted Simply by Us

Don't forget to leave a comment and become a follower for a chance to win my blog candy (fun tags, stickers, accents and rub-ons from Colorbok)!  1 comment per day please. :0)  If you are unable to leave a comment b/c Blogger has been acting up, try using Google Chrome or a different Internet browser to open my blog in.  That should do the trick.  You don't want to miss out!

Jillian also has a hop going on over at her Blog! Head over and see what's going on there. Tell her that you came from Deanne's Blog Hop and give her some birthday love.

http://www.ajillianvancedesign.com/Blog.html

Challenges Entered:

Getting Cricky - Vintage Appeal

Challenge Me Monday #57 and Cricut Crawl WINNER!!!

Hi Faithful and Loving Followers,

First off, I want to say thank you so much for your patience with me for picking a winner for the FCCB Cricut Crawl!  I have FINALLY gotten around to that and the random generator drew a very sweet winner... #43 - KATIEO!  Katie you are the lucky winner of the Paisley Cricut Cartridge.  Please email me at amyjrockstar at gmail dot com with your info so I can get it right out to you!

katieo said... 43


I am so glad I found your blog. I love your style. Your card has so many elements and details. I am a new follower, who also found out recently the advantages of owning a Gypsy

Lucky gal huh?  Well no worries, as I will be having many more giveaways and lots more fun in the future.  Hopefully you will all continue to hang in there with me as I battle these health issues!  I will do my best to post as often as I can and keep creating.

Now, onto the FCCB challenge for this week.  This week is challenge #57 - Mom's The Word.  As part of the Design Team (and for others who want to enter the challenge), the challenge was to create a card with the word Mom, Mommy, Mother, etc. somewhere on the card and of course at least one cut on your card must be a Cricut cut.  Well, I kinda skimped on the "mom" word, but it is on there!  I decided to make a card for my mom that I knew she would like, using her favorite color, purple.  FYI, the inside is not finished yet.  I am looking for the perfect quote from one of my vellum quote books to put in there.  Below are my pics and details.

Mother's Day Deer Card

Mother's Day Deer & Butterfly Closeup

Mother's Day Border Closeup

Mother's Day Dimensional View

For this card, I had the original idea of making a card with a big "Mom" on there, but I've done that so often that I decided to go in the complete opposite direction and this is what I ended up with.  I wanted to use colors my mom likes and she loves deer so I thought that was appropriate for a card for her. 

Supplies

• Cardstock - From stash and from Recollections, Used paisley cuttlebug folder on background
• Printed paper for butterfly border - Stampin' Up
• Deer and butterfly, butterfly border - Give A Hoot Cricut Cartridge
• Flower sticker & heart border sticker - Basic Grey, Kioshi element stickers
• Butterfly brad - My newest and favorite embellishment shop from whom I won awesome blog candy, Creative Charms!!! I have to give a little shout out here b/c if you haven't checked out this shop yet, you absolutely must!  They have the most unique embellishments and the prices are very reasonable for the amount and variety you get.  I was really pleasantly surprised with my first order and then I won blog candy there too!  I will be ordering from there a lot in the future.  If you head there and place an order please let her know I sent ya!
• Inked edges - Colorbox
• Pop dots - Recollections
• Adhesive - Tombow Liquid Glue
• Mom, Butterfly on nose details, eye of deer - Zig pen

There you have it!  My first, but not last, Mother's Day card for the season.  If you have any questions, please feel free to ask and as always, I love your comments!  Don't forget to head over to Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog to create you own card and play along for a chance at a great prize!

Thanks, you guys, for following my blog and taking the time to check out my creations.

XO ~ Amy Jo