Happy St. Patrick's Day and a Giveaway

Well blog friends today is St. Patrick's Day...and it is also my blog's first birthday...so I have a giveaway today (stay tuned for that at the end of the post). I started this blog to help me with my scrapbook jornaling, and I find that I have made more cards than anything. One of my goals for 2011 was to get back to my scrapbook roots, and still I find myself making a lot of cards. But that's OK!! In fact, I have two cards to share today!! I do have some big scrapbooking plans coming up. I am going to try to make a layout-a-day in April. Right now that's the plan, but I may push it off until May. And hey, May is 31 days, so that would push another layout out right!! I am still undecided, but that personal challenge is coming.

Now on to the cards that I have made for this, my favorite holiday and my blog birthday. First up...my St. Patrick's Day card. For this card I used some Hero Arts layering papers from my stash and some new (or almost new) stamps.

For the sentiment I decided to use the first set in the Tag-its collection. I also finally inked up my Delightful Doilies set, and used a brand new dot cling stamp from Hero Arts and Basic Gray. Love that dot stamp and I couldn't wait to ink it up! I used some Hero Chalk ink in Grass and some Wild Wasabi Stampin Up ink as well for this card.



I love the ribbon for the tag. It's from Tim Holtz and when you get it it's plain white seam binding (there are two other styles of ribbon in the set also white). I used some distress ink to make my own green ribbon. Love that I can make my own color!!

My second card is my birthday card. I had been waiting patiently for this cupcake stamp by Belles & Whistles to come back in stock, and once I saw it had I scooped it right up. I wanted to color this image!! I love all of the details!! I am already eyeing a few more of these stamps to add to my collection!!

This is a closer shot of the image. I used my colorless blender copic marker to distress the jeans a bit. Love how this turned out! Can't wait to color this image again...so many different possibilities!

And now for the giveaway. As a big THANK YOU to everyone out in blog-land, I wanted to giveaway a $10 gift certificate to one of my favorite craft companies...but which one there are so many that I love. Since I love stamping and I love Papertrey Ink, I decided my first giveaway would be for them. So all you have to do is leave me a comment and let me know which holiday is your favorite and why. Let me know by Sunday at 6pm eastern, and I will pick a random winner which I will announce later that evening. If you want to follow my blog, well that would be awesome too, but not required!! Thanks so much for welcoming me into the crafty blog community, thanks for a great first year, and thanks so much for stopping by!!

Deb