A bit of this and that

Good morning and happy Monday!  I hope you had a fun weekend and are ready to take on the week rested and relaxed : )  Here at our house we have been getting ready for Christmas, I still have a little shopping to do, all the wrapping (well, actually it is "bagging" as I put everything in bags), planning of the meals for Christmas Eve and Christmas, and a bit of inside decorating to do.  Seems like the list of "to do" items gets longer and longer as the days get shorter and shorter.

At some point I will do my usual baking, chocolate chip cookies, and will attempt to avoid eating the cookies as they come out of the oven (of course I have to eat a few to make sure that they taste ok : ).  The one thing that I don't like about this time of year is that I just can't seem to get much stamping time, either I am too busy, too tired or just too unorganized to manage to get much (if any) stamping done....oh well.

Today I have some fun links for you, a mixture of techniques, some templates for gift giving, and a number of other goodies, so sit back, grab your coffee and click away:

Assortment of sketches for square cards:  More and more I am tending towards square cards, and I loved this link because it had a number of great sketches for square cards!

More sketches for square cards:  Can we ever have enough inspiration? 

Everything you ever wanted to know about ink pads:  Save this link!  Great resource to share with your friends who are new to stamping and even those of us who have been stamping a while will learn something from this link.

Easy to make gift bag:  Great idea for a quick gift bag during the season.

Quck and elegant card to make:  If you still want to make some Christmas cards check out this link for a very easy, great looking card. 

Box with four drawers:  This is a great idea, loved how cute it looks, and with some practice you will be able to get these done in a jiffy.

Card templates GALORE!:  All sorts of GREAT templates here, complete with directions.  Make sure to save the link for future use, this one is a definite keeper.

Envelope bookmark:  This is so easy, and you could make a number of these in a jiffy for last minute gifts!  Amazingly simple and oh so cute.

Kris's Color Stripe Blog:  Wow!  This is a great blog if you want some new color inspiration!  Next time you just can't come up with a color combination you like make sure to visit this blog for some fantastic and out of this world ideas.

And here is a great video on a technique you are going to love!



Ok everyone, that is it for this week, stay warm, safe and remember to take care of yourself.

Card Sketches: Links to help you design your cards

I thought you might like to see a picture of Roxy and Mishgie, our two wonderful kitties. Both, sound asleep, and Roxy just casually resting her leg on Mishgie. You would not believe that when we brought Mishgie home Roxy hissed and hissed at her and we figured the two would be life long enemies, wow, were we wrong!

A few short months later, the two of them are best buddies. And, as they are indoor cats, they keep each other very busy all day, until they fall into their many naps for the day.

Ok, enough of the cats, onto the stamping!

Tonight I thought it would be fun to follow up the color theory with some links to card sketches. I already have some links to sketch sites on the "Best" list, but wanted to give you a few more. Can one ever have enough designs to use?

Before I list the sites, how about some other places you can get sketch ideas from? Don't forget to save cards people give you, even store bought ones will give you ideas on placement, layers and combining shapes and images. Another great way to come up with a card design is to cut out some shapes in various sizes and widths and lay them down on a blank card, move the elements around sort of like when you want to move your furniture around, only this is a bit easier. Keep your pieces in an envelope so you can pull it out when ever you get "stumped" or are just bored with the sketches you have been using.

Ok, here are the links for tonight:

• Two Peas In A Bucket: This is a link to all of their 2006 sketches, click one of the links, then click the link that comes up in the post. Lots and lots of sketches here for you to view and don't forget to save the ones you like the best!

• Scrapadoo: Has ten very nice sketches to check out, there may be more on the site, click around a bit to see if I missed any.

• Sketches by tamara: How about 51 sketches to add to your resources? Tamara has some very nice ones here, for both cards and scrap book pages. Make sure to check back often as she is always adding new sketches.

• AMRSC (A Monthly Rubber Stamp Club): This link will provide you with a few sketches and some ideas on how to spruce up some of the sketches you already use.

And of course, I have a few links on the side that are great, especially the SheetLoad of Cards, which should be publishing their July issue any day now, PageMaps, Our Creative Corner, and of course SCS Weekly Sketch Challenge on Wednesdays.

If you have any good sites for sketches, please email me or just leave a comment, we all would love to have more resources for our card making.

Last, but not least, I want to thank everyone who has signed via FeedBurner for updates, today we hit 100 subscribers! Wow! If you do subscribe, please note that I will be taking a vote soon on how often you want updates, right now you get them daily and I want to make sure that is ok with everyone. FeedBurner should allow me to change the frequency of the updates, not sure how, but will figure it out. (Except for when I go on vacation, I intend to post at least once each day).

Have a great evening, and may tomorrow give you a good laugh or two.

UPDATE: Wow, you are all so great! Here are a few more links from the comments, and make sure to check Laurie's Blog for some really great sketches!

• Laurie's Stampin and Scrappin Place: Almost 80 sketeches here, updated frequently by Laurie, you really have to to check out her blog.

• My Sketch World: Wait till you see these great sketches, link is to the flick page, her blog is here.
  

• So Sketchey: Link is to the sketch posts, make sure to click on the banner and go to her full blog.

• 2Sketches4You: Neat card sketches here, and also some links to some wonderful cards.

• Triple the Sketch: Another good resource, make sure to bookmark it so you can visit frequently when you need inspiration.