Challenge Guest Designer : Emily Cupely

Hola chicos, this is Emily Cupely! I'm from Puerto Rico, but moved about a year and a half ago to the state of Oregon after graduating from college and getting married. I have been making YouTube videos for my card making channel for more than two years now, and recently started a planner channel where sometimes I incorporate my stamps and other of my card making tools. Talking about stamps, that is definitely my favorite part of card making along with the techniques I incorporate in my cards. Using adorable stamped images in my cards as well as the techniques I have learned with time just makes me happy!

I'm really excited to be September's Guest Designer for the Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge! Plus today is my birthday, which made this post particularly special for me. From the board above, I chose as inspiration the column in the middle: 3D Project, Blues and Greens, and Aquatic Friends. I hope you like what I came up with using those three elements and enjoy the video tutorial below! :)

Challenge Guest Designer : Anna Kossakovskaya

Hello, I am Anna, and I’m so happy to be a guest designer today with the new Tic Tac Toe challenge #17. I live in St. Petersburg, Russia, with my husband, our toddler Alice and our cat Diana. I studied environment protection in university and my first passion were PC games (still play sometimes The Sims and Final fantasy series lol). And now… I’m very passionate about scrapbooking and card making, it is really my great passion! This is my hobby since August 2011, when I made my first card. And since then, I still cannot stop making new discoveries in this wonderful world of creativity. I like to create everything, where we can use paper! Layouts, albums, project life, cards and altered items.

Last year I decided to pay more attention to card making and stamping and it literally changed my life – currently I am a design team member for such companies as My Favorite Things, Mama Elephant and Altenew. I even had two on-line classes about card making – for beginners and about interactive cards. And still making my Project Life albums with Scraptastic kit club – because nothing can be better than documenting our memories for our kids.

And of course I couldn’t say ‘no’ to Ka’s invitation to join the challenge! For my card, I chose the top layer of the challenge #17 - Window Card + Critter + Sequins. My first association with the 'window card' was to create the through the card window when you can see the inner side of the card looking at the front side. I also decided to add some layers for more dimensions – I wanted to create this card for a long time and everything went so I could finally do it!

The sequins mean the shakers for me! So I placed one shaker full of the clear sequins between two layers on the front side of the card – such way you still can see the sentiment stamped inside of the card looking at the card through the windows.

And the critter is the sweet dear, who walks in the winter forest. The palette was my old thought too – everything is white and one element is colored. This is how winter looks!

Supplies: sequins by Studio Katia, dies by Studio Katia, stamps Toboggan Together, Jot To The Woods by Lawn Fawn

Challenge Guest Designer : Keeway Tsao

Hi everyone! I’m Keeway from kiwi koncepts, living in sunny California. I love all thing fine arts, from classical music to pop culture art, and grew up immersed in it. I didn’t discover cardmaking until 2015 when my best friend painted me a handmade birthday card, and I wanted to send a handmade card back. Since then, I have become completely captivated by the craft and the community, and started cardmaking and blogging every day since. You can find me at my blog Kiwi Koncepts.

I am very excited to be guesting with Ka for her Tic-Tac-Tae Challenge! I just love the concept of this challenge and all the interesting combinations you can use to inspire you to create your card. For today’s card, I decided to combine “Word Dies”, “Sparkle,” and “Color Blocking.” What an interesting combination! So this is how I interpreted it:

Color blocking is extra fun when you use bright colors, and I decided to use yellow (Mustard Seed), magenta (Picked Rasberry), turquoise (Peacock Feathers), and blue (Blueprint). I used washi tape to mask of areas of my A2 sized white card stock, and blending in the inks. I then die cut the word “happy” out, and set it aside.

I added some double sided tape to my A2 size base card to adhere some gold glitter for my “sparkle.” Now when I overlay my color blocked piece over the base card, I can see the glitter sparkling through the word.

I stamped “birthday” through the happy, and to add some extra cuteness, I added adorable dancing pandas right above the happy to complete the card. Hope you enjoy today’s card and was inspired to try out this challenge! Thank you so much for having and have fun! :)

Challenge Guest Designer : Virginia Lu

Hello, I am Virginia Lu (Yes, Virginia...) from Canada. I'm blessed with two wonderful adult children and a loving and supportive husband. In my little world, I love creating cards, traveling and making yummy food. I am currently on Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge DT and am the host/founder of Virginia’s View Challenge. I discovered stamping nearly 20 years ago and has been fascinated by it. I have entered countless challenges and contests, with many trials and errors (and some success). But no matter how good I feel about each card, I strive to make the next one better! Being passionate about trying new techniques that intrigue, I love to share ideas and creations in my blog. I truly appreciate the fellow card-maker/bloggers' positive feedback and I hope to encourage other fellow card-makers as much as I can. Thank you for inviting me to be your guest design for July!

I am super excited to be the July Guest Designer here! I love the idea of Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge. We can all relate that sometimes it is hard to put a lot of techniques, supplies, designs and elements in one card. This challenge really helps you focus on the key elements and get creative.

For my project, I chose the top middle row (Shimmer, Border Stamp, Balloons).

Shimmer: The sentiment was embossed in Silver Platinum (Hero Arts). I used DCWV Glitter paper to add to the stamped border and punched out small circles as the “confetti”. I also added shimmer with Wink of Stella (Clear) to the stamped balloons.
Border Stamp: The Basic Stripes Stamp (Simon Says Stamp) provides the subtle and detailed feature for this design.
Balloons: I used two sets of balloon stamps that I have and do not seem to use enough of. Avery Elle (Numbered Balloons) and Mama Elephant (Clear Stamp Party Kit Set) are perfect solid stamps for the color-laying. With the help of MISTI, I was able to stamp the balloons in multiple colors. Stamping the balloons took some planning with masking, color-layering and positioning. However, it was totally worth the effort.

Since the stamped design is considerably flat, I added a piece of large foam as the backing. This gives the card an extra dimension yet it is still mail-friendly.

I hope that you are inspired to create with this super fun challenge. I can’t wait to see what you create!

Champion Guest Designer : Kristina Pavlovic

Hello everyone!! I am Kristina from Kristina's Art Corner. I am from Bosnia and Herzegovina, but I live in Sweden with my wonderful husband Toni. My motto is : "Be creative all the time." I started with scrapbooking but now I am totally in the cardmaking world. Sometimes I work on mix media projects, but I always combine it with beautiful stamps, embossing powders and texture paste. And other times, I'll switch things up and only work with clear stamps and rubber stamps exclusively. I love to create scenes on my card and make backgrounds with distress inks. But my greatest obsession are Letraset Promarkers.

My card was inspired by the diagonal row going from bottom left to top right: Stars and Stripes, Border Stamp, Quote Sentiment.

For this card I used Santoro Rubber Stamp Gorjuss girl -The Getaway. I stamped her on Aquarel paper with Memento Tuxedo black ink. From the same stamp set I used the border stamp, but I masked the corner part. Then I colored the image with Letraset Promarkers.

It look simple, but it is not. I spent more than 5 hours to color her dress and hair. Then I added the sentiment. The sentiment comes from My Favorite Things - Magical Unicorns stamps set. For the stars in the corners, I used Paper Smooches - Daddy Yo Icons die with my Sizzix big shot. The background paper is from 6x6 Simply Gorjuss paper pack. I also used some twine and this twine is by Doodlebug - Beatles Black. I got that in Simon Says Stamp card kit.

Hope you all have enjoyed this inspiration for the current challenge at the Tic Tac Toe and are inspired to play along to win some really awesome stamps of your choice. Thank you to Ka and the design team for having me as your guest!

Challenge Guest Designer : Therese Calvird

Hi, I’m Therese Calvird. I live in the sub tropics in Australia near some of the best beaches in the world, with my husband and furchild, a three-year-old black and cheeky cat called Lilith. I’ve been making cards for over 10 years and had always enjoyed all different crafts, that is, until papercrafting ‘took over’. I ventured into Youtube about 4 years ago and being quite technologically challenged I’m not really sure why I did, it was one of those things that I just wanted to do and so with some bumps and big learning curves along the way I’m still having heaps of fun with it. I enjoy keeping in contact with everyone via my blog lostinpaper as well as at my Youtube channel here. I was so excited to be asked to guest at the Tic-Tac-Toe challenge today and thought for a bit of fun I would share a video showing just how I made this card.

So here it is:
https://youtu.be/bX6vKiesrbs

Thanks for everything and good luck with Challenge No 12, it’s another great one (and just in case you were wondering, I used the diagonal elements today)!

Champion Guest Designer : Diana Sharapova

Hello, crafty friends! My name is Diana and I'm super excited to be invited as a Guest Designer at the Tic-Tac-Toe challenge today. I'm originally from Russia, but currently live in Slovenia with my wonderful husband and 2 year old son. I started making cards about a year and a half ago and since then I've become totally addicted to this hobby. I like to try new techniques and learn new things about crafting. But the best thing about my passion is to be able to make unique things for my friends and family. Please feel to pop over for a visit on my blog: Moments of Creativity.

Today I would like to share with you a card based on the current challenge and I have chosen the first line for my project which is Doily, Layers & Dimensions, and Bird/Bees/Butterflies. Here is a look at my card:

I've decided to make a cute little scene with some bright summer colors.The adorable Coffee Friends are a freebie from Craftin Desert Divas which I colored with Copic markers and fussy-cut so that I could place them in the middle of the summer scene.

The background was made in 3 stages:
1. I die cut some of Marianne Designs and Mavelu papers with Blueprints #20 by My Favourite Things.
2. Placed them on a piece of paper colored with Spun Sugar Distress Ink.
3. Then I die cut French Pastry Doily by Cherry Lynn Designs, colored its center with distress inks and placed it on top of the design papers.

Once the main scene was complete, I stamped a sentiment using Harold's ABCs by Lawn Fawn, white heat embossed it and foam mounted it on my card to add some dimension. On top of the second part of the sentiment I placed a butterfly from Mama Elephant's Butterfly Kisses stamp set. I have also used a couple of enamel dots to finish off my cards.

Hope you all have enjoyed this inspiration for the current challenge at the Tic-Tac-Toe and got inspired to join our challenge! Thank you, Ka, for having me as your guest for this challenge and I'll be looking forward to having a chance to create something else for one of your next challenges.:)

Challenge Guest Designer: Miriam Prantner

Hi! I'm Miriam Prantner and I'm really excited to be the guest designer for this challenge, thanks so much to Ka for having me!

Here's a little information about me:
I've been married to my husband Andrew for 15 years. We have two daughters, Ellie and Carina, and a beagle named Oshie. I live in Arlington, VA and have been crafting since I was a kid. When it comes to paper crafts, I started out as a scrapbooker, discovering stamps and the world of card making about four years ago. I have been designing stamps and dies for Neat & Tangled since 2013, and this year produced a class called Fresh Eyes on Your Cardmaking Supplies through Craftsy. Working and being a wife/mom keep me pretty busy, but I find time in the evenings to craft. I love experimenting, learning new techniques, and trying new products. When I'm not hanging out with the family or crafting, you might find me playing hockey or curled up with a book. You can follow me at my blog: Sooner Rather Than Later.

I was actually kind of challenged by the board. Usually I had two things where I had a good idea in which to take a project, but then the third item was a challenge.

I ended up choosing the bottom row: monochromatic, inlaid dies, and scalloped border.

I used some scalloped border dies from MFT to create an inlaid piece that was then trimmed it down to create the panel you see. I then used that gorgeous Branching Out die from PTI as a focal point over the panel.

To soften the transition between the scalloped panel and the card base, I added a vellum fishtail banner which was turned into a tag. The Lawn Trimming twine added some extra texture and interest too.

The Branching Out die was attached to the scalloped panel using my Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher. I like the movement you get in delicate die cuts when you don't adhere the whole thing. A little extra stability/adhesion was provided by the foam tape I used to attach the sentiment strip. The sentiment is from my Dala Horse set for Neat & Tangled.

I hope you like my card!

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Miriam is very generous and is giving our challenge participants a 50% off code to her class Fresh Eyes on Your Cardmaking Supplies. You can click on the link below and you will be taken to the site with the prize already reduced for you.

www.craftsy.com/ext/MiriamPrantner_10298_H

Thanks for stopping in today! Have a great weekend!

Challenge Guest Designer : Amy Tsuruta

Hello Hello!  It's ~amy~ here and I'm super excited to be guesting for the Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge #10!  Before I share my project, I'll share a smidge about me.  I've been blogging since 2007 and honestly had no idea that it would become such a fabulous part of my life.  I've met so many wonderful people along the way including Ka.  I work part time at a biotech company in Seattle.  I'm back in school, studying Graphic Design.  I have 2 awesome kids that are in college and I'm engaged to a special guy that encourages my craftiness.

For Challenge #10, I went with the following elements:

Chevron ●  Ombre   ●  Vellum

I used the following 3 Fresh Inks on the MFT Wonky Chevron Stencil:

Celery   ●  Grass   ●  Tuscan Olive

The base is MFT Jelly Bean Green card stock and I used Pretty Pink Posh's Scallop Circle Die.  Don't you love the MFT Forest Friends set?  I couldn't wait to have them peeking through the circle window.  Isn't the sentiment perfect on the vellum strip?  

Check out the awesome Fimo Button by Jane's Doodles, it even has a woodgrain texture on it!

Thanks so much to Ka + Mady!

Champion Guest Designer : Ashwini Rao

Hello! Today we are so happy to have our 6th Champion, Ashwini joining us all the way from India! She is here to share a gorgeous card that was inspired by our current challenge. Take it away, Ashwini!

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Hello! I am Ashwini, over the moon to be here today as a guest designer! I live in Bangalore, India, with my family. I have always loved crafting, but stamping and card making are something I discovered just over 3 years ago, got completely hooked, and started with my blog shortly after. I don't exactly stick to one style - preferring to try my hand at anything and everything possible! Do stop over my blog, it would make me really happy! :)

My card was inspired by the diagonal row from Challenge 10 Badge - Chevron, Ombre and Vellum. I used Altenew Persian Motifs to stamp on some vellum and heat embossed it using Wow! copper embossing powder. I then colored the backside with Copics and fussy cut them, just outside the embossed lines. For the background, I used Heidi Swapp Chevron Stencil and blended in Mustard Seed distress ink to create an ombre effect. I then trimmed this panel and used Paper Trey Ink Stitching Lines to add some fancy edges. After mounting this panel on the card base, I adhered the flowers using Ranger Multi Medium Matte and then added the sentiment from Neat & Tangled Everyday Labels, which I stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black.

I hope you enjoyed my card and will be inspired to join the Tic-Tac-Toe challenge! Thank you so much Ka and the design team for having me as your guest! I completely enjoyed it!

Have a great day!

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Thank you so much for being our guest, Ashwini! Your card is absolutely beautiful! We love the bold colors too! Please swing by Ashwini blog to check out all her amazing cards! I know you'll not be disappointed!!

Challenge Guest Designer : Rubeena Naz

Hello, hello, hello! We're back today to share a fabulous post and gorgeous card by our guest designer, Rubeena Naz from A Rare Ruby. Ruby had always created such beautiful floral cards, and this one is no exception!! Check out the full details below!

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Good morning! I'm so excited to be a guest designer for Stamping Smiles Designs' Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge #9! A little background about me: I am in my early 30s and discovered papercrafting about two years ago. Professionally, I work as a social worker, but I spend a lot of my downtime creating cards. Some of my favorite techniques include heat embossing and watercoloring. I currently design for The Ton and Coffee Loving Cardmakers. You can find me at A Rare Ruby, where I share my work as well as organizations tips.

For Challenge #9, I knew instantly that I wanted to use flowers on my cards. I picked the first row down: Flowers, Birthday, and Masking Technique. My card features Altenew and Mama Elephant. I started with a watercolor card cut down to 4" x 5.5". Using masking tape, I stamped the rose from Penned Rose several times as well as some of the leaves in a black waterproof ink. I used my Mission Gold watercolors to color the images. On separate cardstock, I stamped 'hello' from Halftone Hello onto white cardstock and die-cut with the coordinating die. I die-cut the word several times from black cardstock and stacked them together for dimension.

I stamped 'happy birthday' from Mama Elephant's Monster Jam with VersaMark and heat set with white embossing powder. Finally, I arranged all the pieces together on my cardstock and added some clear sequins from The Ton.

I hope you enjoyed today's inspiration! Thanks so much for having me as a guest!

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So?? Isn't Ruby so talented? We love Ruby's beautifully colored roses along with the bright colors, and the added touch of the black stripe on the side. Such a lovely design! If you love creating floral cards, check out Ruby's blog because she has many floral cards along with cool techniques that I'm sure you'll love! :)

Thanks for stopping by! Have a lovely day, friends!

Champion Guest Designer : Michelle Chan

Hello and Happy Friday everyone! Hope everyone has fun plans this weekend. If crafting is part of your plan for the weekend, then you'll want to take this sweet inspiration from our 5th Champion Winner Michelle Chan. She created an adorable project inspired by our 9th Challenge.

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Hello, hello! Michelle from Craft Cradle here and a very big thank you to Ka and the wonderful team at Tic-Tac-Toe for sharing the stage with me today. As a child, I always had a liking for handicrafts, having made simple cards and felt plushies. It was only in July 2015 that cardmaking became a bigger part of my life as I discovered clear stamps, steel dies, inks and many other crafty toys. Of course, this would not have happened if it were not for my husband who gifted me a Sizzix Big Shot on my last birthday (yes, he is amazing but equally to be blamed). Today, I document my adventures in the magical crafting world over at my blog and more often on Instagram and Facebook.

While we are having a warmer-than-usual Autumn here in New Zealand, Spring is my favourite season, hands down. I have nothing close to a green thumb, but the softest spot for pretty flowers so naturally, I was drawn to the left-most column to create my Spring-inspired card: Flowers, Birthday and Masking Technique. Coincidentally, my only flower stamps were from Lovely Spring. Other stamps used include Better Together, Carnival Cupcakes and Happy Everything. The list of supplies used is available on my blog.

With the puppy plushie masked off, I stamped the little girl on a piece of white card stock. I then stamped a cupcake bottom above her head, and transformed it into a wicker basket with a few simple strokes of a black Artline pen. After stamping some flowers in Mustard Seed and Picked Raspberry distress inks and leaves in Evergreen Bough, I coloured with Copic markers and fussy-cut the image.

I blended in Evergreen Bough distress ink on a piece of white card stock and die-cut twice with the Cloud Border die from Landscape Trio. These were going to be shrubs to help ground the little girl. I also stamped and die-cut smaller flowers to dress up the shrubs. Then, using Antique Linen and Spun Sugar distress inks, I blended in a sunset sky to match the colours of the blooms.

To pull the entire look together, I die-cut a frame using the two largest dies from Die-namics Stitched Rectangle STAX and heat embossed the sentiments with silver embossing powder. Some drops of Glossy Accents were used on the flowers for a dewy look and added dimension.

I hope you like what I created for you and don’t forget to take part in the Challenge! All the best and see you!

Hugs,
Michelle

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Isn't her card just so sweet and adorable?! Whoever receives this card would be so lucky! Thanks Michelle for sharing your card with us and being our guest designer. It was an absolute pleasure to have you! Please swing by Michelle blog for even inspiration! Thanks everyone! Have a great weekend!

Challenge Guest Designer : Shirley Karnos

Hello! Running a bit late today to share our 8th guest designer. Our weekday mornings are usually crazy busy with packing lunches for the kiddos, getting them ready for school, and then dropping them off at school. I'm sure some of you can relate to morning routines during the school year.

Anyway, today, we have Shirley Karnos from Karnos Blog sharing not only one, but two simple, but fabulous cards. If you're stuck on our current challenge, make sure to make use of the fabulous inspiration below by Shirley!

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I've been a fan of crafting since I was little, but it was making wedding invitations the second semester of senior year in college that started me on papercrafting as a more serious hobby. I mostly scrapbook and make cards, but I also dabble in making mini-albums and other crafts.

For the current challenge, I made two cards using the top row of: 3 of a kind, enamel accent, and square card.

For the first card, I started with a square kraft card base and punched rounded corners. I watercolored three die cut feathers and cut them in half, sandwiching the “congrats” sentiment in the middle. I also paper-pierced two lines to better define the middle. I embellished with trios of enamel dots, as well as heat embossed a flourish on the corners.

Supplies: Mama Elephant feather stamp and die; Papertrey Ink flourish and sentiment stamps; Eyelet Outlet enamel dots; Kuretake Gansai Tambi watercolor; JoAnn white embossing powder; We R Memory Keepers Corner Chomper; Paper Source cover stock; VersaMark ink pad

For the second card, I started with a small square metallic brown base. Using a ruler, I traced a square using a VersaMark marker and heat embossed with white embossing powder. I then added the white embossed “congrats” sentiment, as well as the enamel shapes.

Supplies: Papertrey Ink sentiment stamp; American Crafts Shimelle enamel dots; JoAnn white embossing powder; VersaMark ink pad; VersaMark marker

Thanks to Ka for the opportunity to be a guest designer for this challenge! Will you play along too?

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We love the Clean and Simple designs of both of Shirley's cards and how she used those enamel accents like a Tic-Tac-Toe grid on the second card. Beautiful and creative! If you have a little more time today, hop over to Shirley's blog to see more card inspiration. She also share scrapbooking layouts for those of you who loves scrapbooking! :)

Champion Guest Designer : Giovana Smith

Hello! Today we have our 4th Champion Winner, Giovana Smith from Believe guest designing for us. Check out below for her project info and details, inspired by our current challenge.

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Hello everybody!! I am super excited to be guest designing this time. Here is a little bit about me. My name is Giovana Smith, born and raised in Lima, Peru, Spanish as a first language and English as a second one. I am married, I have a daughter who loves to craft, although now she is very into music (clarinet and violin). I run a little daycare/babysitting job, and I love it very much. I started crafting in 2006, cutting rolls of paper and using scissors, LOL, things have changed a lot since then. I have been blessed to be part of several design teams and be published in different magazines. I love to craft as often as I can. I invite you to visit my blog "Believe" and check out my creations.

This is the card I created for the current challenge, very simple but yet elegant. I used the top line for my project, 3 leaves (3 layers), 3 enamel dots and a square card (6" square).

I started stamping the leaves in Antique Linen Distress Ink on a piece of watercolor cardstock, then colored them using the wet on wet technique, with Kuretake watercolor paints, allow the colors to dry naturally and add more color if desired. The sentiment I think invites to create more, I added this sentiment because I am trying to do better with watercoloring techniques, inviting myself to keep creating. I added a layer of shimmering cardstock to the watercolor panel and added it to the square card base, finally added 3 clear enamel dots.

Thank so much Ka for inviting me as a guest designer.
Hope you all like my creation.

Giovana

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Thank you, Giovana for sharing your beautiful project with us! We absolutely love it! Don't forget to check out Giovana's Blog for even more amazing creations!

Have a great day, everyone!

Challenge Guest Designer : Amy Lee

**Make sure to check our post below or click here to see if you are a winner for our Creative Fools Blog Hop!**

Hi Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge Fans! Did you get a chance to make something for Challenge 7 yet? If you haven't gotten the chance to participate or stuck on deciding which rows and elements to go with, then take today's inspiration from Amy Lee! She have a fun story-telling card to share!

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Hello there! I'm Amy, also known as The Craft Bunny. I am from Hong Kong but now I live in Seattle, WA. It was hard to adjust to a completely different lifestyle and I was so bored at first. That was why I started cardmaking LOL. I love telling stories on cards and stretching my stamps to make unexpected scenes. I also love bright and happy colors.

For my card today, I went with the left column using the current Tic Tac Toe Challenge Board - Bunny, Decorative Frames and Washi Tapes. I love bunnies so that was an easy choice. I have used the bunnies from MFT Let's Strike Up the Band set. My card design was inspired by rock band music. I think of black and red colors when it comes to rock music. So, I used these two colors with a hint of brown/gold.

1. I first made a black plastic record with some circle dies and distress inks 
2. Using the same circle die, I created an opening in the card front. I also used MFT Wonky Stitched Rectangle 
3. Next, I stamped and colored the bunnies with Copic markers. To give them a ground to stand on, the washi tape came in handy 
4. I also stamped the music notes all over the background. The sentiment "You Rocked It" is stamped inside the card to finish the story of my card 
5. Lastly, I embellished with gold star confetti from SpiegelMomScraps

I had so much fun playing along here! Thank you for having me for this challenge! I can't wait to see what you will come up with :)

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Is this card AMAZE-ZING or what?! Amy totally "Rocked" this challenge!! Everything on her card was perfectly executed! We love it! We hope her card spark an idea or two for you too! Thanks so much to Amy for sharing this fabulous, adorable card for us to enjoy! Please stop over to Amy's blog to give her some blog lovin' for her awesome post today!

Thanks for stopping by today and have a wonderful week!

Champion Guest Designer : Riti Poddar

Hello and Happy Hump Day! Although, the weather here today in the mid-west is yucky with rain and cloudy sky, Riti Poddar, our 3rd Tic-Tac-Toe Challenge Champion had brighten our day with a bright and cute project. She created a giant tag with a bright color palette and an adorable critter, which makes us so happy! Check out all the details below!

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Hi Friends! I am Riti Poddar from A Lil' Piece of Heaven and I'm so excited & honored to be here as the Guest Designer. I'm from India & I have been crafting since I was a little girl. I enjoy Paper Crafting of all kinds, from Card Making to Scrapbooking, Altered Art to Mixed Media. I love them all! I love trying out new techniques with different types of inks, mediums & other supplies. I also have found my new love in planners...I just bought one for 2016 and I'm loving it!

Well for the Current Challenge I Chose the Top Most Row with 'Bunny + Pocket + Tag'.  And this is what I came up with...a huge tag!!

The tag measures 8"x 5" (I told ya it's huge!!). I cut it out from a heavy chipboard. The die cuts - bunny, flowers & carrot have been cut on my Cricut Expression, using the 'Create A Critter' Cartridge. I pop dotted the layers for the extra dimension & also distressed it using my distress inks. I did some doodling on them using my Signo White & Black Gel pens to add some interest. The pocket has been hand drawn & cut using some pattern papers from my stash. I also added some faux stitched lines using my Gel Pens all around the pocket & tag.

I stamped the Sentiment from the "Oh Deer" Clear Stamp Set from Your Next Stamp using my Opaque White Stazon Ink. I also added a strip of pink cardstock to the top of the tag & punched it using my Martha Stewart All over the Page Punch - 'Bubble Bath' & added a couple of twine for the bow. Lastly, I added a cute button on the bow to finish my tag.

This was so much fun to make. I hope you like it & will take on this challenge. Get your crafty hats on & take the plunge! Good Luck everybody! Can't wait to see what you all come up with!!

Hugs & Love
Riti

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Thanks Riti for guest designing for us for this challenge! We truly enjoy having you here with us today! Don't forget to leave Riti some love over at her blog too! Enjoy the rest of your week, everyone!

Challenge Guest Designer : Daria Grushina

Happy Friday, everyone! Today we have Daria with us from Falling Into Cardmaking as a guest designer.  I fell in love with Daria's creations from the start when I accidentally stumbled onto her lovely blog after searching for an idea for a particular stamp set. I am glad I did, because I absolutely love everything she makes and I know you will too!

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Hi Everyone :) I'm Daria and I am very exited to be here with you today! I'm a 30-plus-a-few girl, now living in Petrozavodsk that is in the North West of Russia. You probably already guessed by now, but I love cards! :) I have started to make them in October 2014 and couldn't stop since. I am 100% card-maker with a style toward Clean & Simple.

When Ka wrote to me asking to participate - I was more than happy :) And I still am! I really love the idea behind the challenge - that each and everyone can find their own inspiration in so many options! At first I though I would chose the diagonal line...but I remembered that I have already made that type of card (you can check it out here).

So for today's card, I have decided to go with the second row down from the current challenge #6: Glossy Accents - Clean & Simple - Twine! It was both easy and challenging at the same time. Usually, I use those to embellish my card if I feel it needs it, but I have never before started to plan the card from embellishments :) It was really fun! :)

Here is the project. It is basically a one layer card. I heat embossed some flowers from Altenew over the whole front panel in white and then masked central area to blend in some color. Colors used are: Spun sugar and Picked Raspberry of distress inks. I die-cut my sentiment twice from craft and glitter cardstock. I used craft color to coordinate with the twine, and glitter to make the card more bright. I also covered some of the petals inside the colored area with Glossy accents - it adds interest and fun dimension.

Hope you like my card and got inspired to join the fun! :) Thank you so much dearest Ka for the invitation, you are the Sweetest! I am very honored to join your challenge!

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Was this card not amazing or what?!! The result from this simple card is gorgeous! With just a small collection of supplies, you can make yourself a gorgeous piece like this too. :) Thanks to Daria for sharing an exceptional card that sure inspired us all! Swing over to Daria's blog to see even more amazing inspiration!

See you back here tomorrow for another inspiration post from our Social Media DT member, Rachel. Have a great weekend, everyone!!

Champion Guest Designer : Kitty

We are back today with a guest design post from our 2nd Champion winner, Kitty from KT Fit Kitty. She created this kitty shaker card that stole our hearts and so we wanted to bring her out and feature her.

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Hello, everyone! I'm Kitty and I'm super excited to be here today as a guest designer! I live in Nova Scotia, Canada, with my hubby and three kitties. Unlike many crafters, I have not been particularly creative my whole life. I discovered my love of card making about ten years ago when a friend invited me to do some stamping. I took a few workshops, and I was hooked! My card-making style is "cute" and I especially enjoy kitties and other critters on my cards. I started my blog KT Fit Kitty in 2013, and I would be so happy if you would pop over for a visit!

My card was inspired by the third column: Umbrella, Critters, and Clouds. I made a cute little scene with some bright spring colours! The adorable bunny is Breezy from Your Next Stamp, and I coloured him with Prismacolor pencils and fussy-cut so I could pop him up with foam tape. I added Snow Writer on his tail and Glossy Accents on his eyes and umbrella.

The background was made with Twisted Citron Distress Ink using a watercolour smooshing technique and then die-cut with a Simon Says Stamp Stitched Rectangle. The three layers of grass were die cut with Lawn Fawn Grassy Border and I inked the edges with Twisted Citron. The cute picket fence is from Your Next Stamp, and I added lots of die-cut flowers (Impression Obsession), each with a gem in the center. The bunny die-cuts are from Impression Obsession Rabbit Set. I haven't seen any purple bunnies in real life but they are so fun on a card!

The clouds were die-cut using Lawn Fawn Spring Showers and I stamped a sentiment from Newton's Nook Birthday Flutter. The stitched panel was layered onto a scalloped stitched rectangle from Waltzing Mouse Stamps, and I finished it off with some tiny heart sequins.

I hope you enjoyed my card and will be inspired to join our challenge! Thank you to Ka and the design team for having me as your guest! I had fun!

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Isn't Kitty card just absolutely adorable and so full of life?! We love the bright colors and all the Spring elements in this super cute card. Thank you, Kitty for sharing your talent and providing us with more inspiration! Please hop on over to Kitty blog and give her some bloggie love!

Have a beautiful day, everyone!

Challenge Guest Designers : Kay Miller

Hello and Happy Thursday! Today I am thrilled to have Kay Miller from My Joyful Moments guesting for us! I have been a longtime fan of hers so I was especially excited about this post! I love everything she creates! To me, everything she touches turns into beautiful pieces of art! :) If you don't believe me, stop over to her blog after this and you'll be AMAZE!

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Hi, I’m Kay Miller. I live in Missouri with my husband and two great kids. I first discovered stamping about 20 years ago when I wandered into a small stamping store in Anacortez, WA, while visiting my grandfather. I spent many years in the digital scrapbooking industry creating digital page kits for my own personal website, for the paper industry and participating on several creative teams for other companies. After completely burning out trying to come up with new designs, I quit, and rediscovered my love for stamping and card making, and started blogging. Along with card making, I also enjoy photography and creating whimsical Christmas ornaments with polymer clay. You can find me at my blog My Joyful Moments. I am thrilled to be guesting with Ka for her Tic-Tac-Toe challenge today!

For my card today, I am using the top row of the current Tic-Tac-Toe challenge board: green, beads, and geometric shapes. I love all three of those things! In my spare time (that means late at night when I’ve turned my craft room light out) I love to create little patterns out of mini Hama beads. They are tiny beads that I order from Europe. They are similar to the Perler beads that we loved to play with when we were kids, but only smaller. They are about 2.5 mm in size and come in such pretty colors. Anyway, I used one of my mini creations for the bead part of my card. I cut my shapes out with some stitched square dies and then added the pretty dark brown leaves and sentiment.

Thanks so much for having me! This was a fun challenge!

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Did your jaw just dropped after seeing this gorgeous card? I did when I first saw it! I absolutely love how she interpreted the elements so beautifully! I would have never thought of that! So creative!!! Thanks so much to Kay, for inspiring us with an awesome out-of-the-box project! Make sure you hop on over to Kay's blog and leave her some bloggie love too!

Champion Guest Designer : Hussena Calcuttawala

Hi everyone! Today we invited our 1st Champion winner, Hussena Calcuttawala to guest design for us! We adore her card for our 1st challenge so much we just wanted to share her talent with you once more! Below is a short bio about her followed by her gorgeous project!

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Hello friends,

This is Hussena here and I am so thrilled to be invited as a Guest designer at the Tic Tac Toe challenge today. I am based in Kolkata, India and I go by the blog name - Quill and Punch works. I started this blog about 5 year's back and my crafting style has evolved over a period of time. I have tried my hand at various crafts and my new found love is stamping. I am a SAHM of two kids and a card maker by passion. :)

Today I have a card to share based on the current challenge and I have gone with the Tic Tac Toe grid and have chosen the middle line for my card which is Friendship, Gold and Layers. Here's a look at my card :

To create my card I first die cut a card panel using the largest of my stitched rectangles die from a Kraft paper, then I die cut some square frames using various sizes of Spellbinders Square nesting dies and I lightly colored them using various pink ink shades from Altenew. I glued these squares on my card base creating a geometric grid like pattern.Then I stamped my flowers, leaves and foliage from two different Altenew stamps and gold heat embossed them. The flowers and leaves are all colored by using various Altenew inks in shades of pink and green using a foam applicator to give them two tone shading.

The sentiment is from a Hero Arts set and I stamped it on a piece of card stock using Versafine Onyx Black ink and cut it in a banner shape and colored it lightly using a green ink and foam applicator. It was then foam mounted on the square frame. The stamped and embossed flowers and leaves are also foam mounted on my card panel and they give quite a nice dimension in real life. I matted my card panel on a light pink cardstock and attached it to a kraft card base. I have used a few Pretty Pink Posh sequins to finish off my card.

Hope you all have enjoyed this inspiration for the current challenge at the Tic Tac Toe and are inspired to play along to win some really awesome stamps of your choice.

Thank you so much, Ka for giving me this opportunity for this guest spot. I really enjoyed creating this card for it. ​:)

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Thank you, Hussena for guest designing for us! We enjoyed your post and project! Everything about your project is just stunning! If you also enjoy today's project from Hussena, then make sure you hop on over to see all the cards she shared on her lovely blog! I promise, you'll not want to leave! :)

Have a great week everyone!