Fall Foxes with Freckled Fawn

This week we're going Embellishment Crazy at Pile It On! Our sponsor, Freckled Fawn generously supplied our DT with some of their great goodies to work with, including adhesive gems (available in their September kit) and wood embellishments (available in their October kit). As soon as I saw their little wood veneer foxes I knew exactly what I wanted to make:

I usually decorate my wood pieces somehow, but in this case I just left them as-is, except for adding a bit of red paper behind the heart in the mushroom. The large gemstones on the corners are also from Freckled Fawn. They come with adhesive foam, and so really stand up nicely on the card.

I made the fox/chevron pattern with Cali Arroyo's Chevron Tile Silhouette cutting file, and cut it on my Silhouette from kraft, orange-red, orange, and cream papers. I mounted the kraft frame onto a white card, and then indivudally placed in the different colors to make the chevrons. This seemed like a better idea when I thought that all the pieces would be the same size; I didn't realize that each piece was unique until after I had taken them all off the mat. Sigh. Oh well, it kept me busy for quite a while! And was absolutely worth it.

I used some plastic templates to trace the hearts on white paper & a scrap of DP. Even with my die-cutting machines, sometimes handcutting is still the best!

Inspiration/Challenges:
Baffies Kreativladen: Autumn
Lady Anne's Challenge: Autumn/Fall
Our Daily Bread Designs Challenge: It Is Fall
Perfectly Rustics: Pattern Paper
Stamping Sensations: All Creatures Great and Small
Use It Tuesdays: Creatures (hoarded supply: "Family" plastic embellishment and small gemstones)

Thank you for visiting,and hope you'll join us this week at Pile It On,

One Way of Looking at a Blackbird / Favorite Color Challenge at PIO

This week at the Pile It On Challenge, we want you to use your Favorite Color as the main color on your project. Just between you and me, their challenge coordinator picked this theme with the plan to use her favorite color, purple (that's me, CG!)

There are many reasons that this card is special to me; for one, not only is purple my & my husband's favorite color, it's the official color of our local [American] Football team, the Ravens. I don't care much about football, except for the fun of rooting for the home team, but I also attended the University of Baltimore, the unofficial home of the Edgar A. Poe Society (the author of the poem "The Raven" for which the team is named). Their Creative Writing program also focused on the Wallace Stevens poem "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird", so long story short, I used the first stanza of that poem: "Among twenty snowy mountains, / The only moving thing / Was the eye of the blackbird." I had a particular design in mind, so my husband helped me out by hand-writing the stanza on a piece of notebook paper.

excerpted from "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" by Wallace Stevens

click to enlarge - ohdeermekit.com

Freckled Fawn generously supplied our DT with some of their great goodies to work with, including Geotag paper clips (available in their September kit) and feather wood embellishments (available in their October kit). Their products are so delicious; you've got to join in at Pile It On, as one lucky participant will win a $20 gift card to ohdeermekit.com.

I was playing with the Geotag paper clips (available in their September kit) and feather wood embellishments (available in their October kit), and found that they made a cute little bird. I used adhesive pearls for the eye and the tummy. I heat-embossed the feathers with black embossing powder that had just a touch of glitter added.

I really wanted there to be twenty mountains, so I made them myself in SCAL and cut them on my electronic cutting machine using two patterned papers I had in my stash. I also made backing layers with a silver paper (Recollections). I added some silver, elastic ribbon, punched one corner with a Marvy punch.

Inspiration/Challenges:
Crafter's Cafe #31: Just a bit out there (I think this is definitely a unique project; it also has some 3D elements)
Crafting By Designs: Anything goes
Crafty Creations: Winged Things
Creative Craft Challenges #20: Anything Goes
LEJ Designs: Things With Wings
Paper Minutes: Bizarre, Strange & Weird (I think this is kind of bizarre!)
Sister Act Card Challenge #27: Anything Goes
Sweet Pea Stampers: Purple Power

Update: This was an honorable mention at Crafting By Designs!

Thank you for visiting,and hope you'll join us this week at Pile It On,