Happy Birthday Becky!

This past Friday was my friend Becky's birthday (I'll keep her age to myself!). I wanted to take her out to dinner to celebrate and tonight was the day that worked best for her so she came over after school (she's a Para-Pro at a nearby middle school) and we chatted for a bit then headed out to visit TJ Maxx to see if we could find a lamp for her and then to dinner at Chili's followed by Chick-Fil-A for dessert! I can't tell you how GREAT tonight was! I loved getting caught up with Becky and making plans for next week. We've both got some milestone events coming up that we'll be working on.....Brittany's graduation and 18th birthday for me - her son & her mom's weddings for Becky. It's going to be a busy few weeks coming up!

I know that Becky needs some pampering so I made a very simple gift bag to hold the bath gel, body scrub and lotion I got her and a faux alligator skin purse to hold the bath beads. Does the card look familiar? ;o) After I made the card that you can find in the post below this one, I thought, "That card screams BECKY! I need to make one for her!" so I did! LOL! I didn't want to post these projects until after I had given them to her....just in case she visited. I would hate for her to see her gift before she got it so I waited until after we visited tonight. ;o)

Faux Alligator Skin purse, bag & card...notice how the colors coordinate...

AND they're same colors that Jaron challenged us to use?

Sorry for the glare...I had to take a very quick picture & I had already put it in an envelope.

Faux Alligator skin purse

Close-up of purse. How stinkin' cute is this?!

Bag holding bath accessories.

I wanted to keep this VERY simple so I just covered a small paper bag

with some DSP and punched the "handle" with the large oval punch....easy peasy!

What do you think? I would love to hear what you think of Becky's gifts. ;o)

Jaron's Color Combination Challenge #1

One of my very favorite Stampin' Up! employees is Jaron Winder....I should rephrase that to "former Stampin' Up! employees". He is no longer with Stampin' Up! but he's still one of my very favorite people! I would "stalk" him at each Stampin' Up! event I attended, have my picture taken with him and chat a little bit about his family. He has the most adorable little "chickens" (that's what he calls his kids) and his wife is just beautiful! He has a personality that's as big as Utah (they live there) and a heart to match! I was sad to hear that he was no longer with Stampin' Up! but happy that I get to keep track of him through his blog.

When I checked his blog this morning, I saw that he decided to start posting a Color Combination Challenge. Since it's Jaron I couldn't not do it! I mean how bad would it be for me to say that this man creates some amazing work and then not trust his judgement by not participating in his challenge? Just because his first color combination is Old Olive, Taken with Teal and Soft Sky (a retired In-Color, color) doesn't mean he's lost his mind or anything....or at least I hope he hasn't.

After I finished some projects that I had to finish today, I decided to pull out Jaron's colors and see what I could come up with....Holy Smokes - they look GREAT together! I don't think the scan of my card does it justice! Using the stamp set Bird on a Branch, I first stamped the peacock (I don't know if that's what it really is but it's what I'm saying it is!) in Taken with Teal, then I stamped it in Soft Sky and did the "rock-n-roll" technique to outline it in Taken with Teal on a separate piece of Whisper White card stock and cut it out. The sentiment is stamped in Taken with Teal and the tree limb is stamped in Chocolate Chip. I first inked up the blossoms with Soft Sky and then removed the ink off some of the blossoms and colored them in using my Old Olive marker. I "popped-up" the peacock with dimensionals after I did all the stamping. Because I wanted everything to line up in specific places, I used my handy-dandy Stamp-a-ma-jig. There is no way I would have been able to get everything lined up the way I wanted it if I hadn't!

So, tell me what you think. Do you like these colors together? Why don't you give it a try and leave a comment to tell me what you think. Better yet, send me a picture of your creation and I'll post it here and put a link to it on Jaron's blog as well (if you're okay with that). I would love to see what you come up with!