Today I'm sharing my second card for 'anything goes' Stencil Week over at Just Us Girls that is picking up the 'stencils only' option for my kid-themed card over at Just Add Ink: 

My card today features pumpkins - which might seem an odd choice for a kid-themed card, but bear with me - all will make sense! So here's my card:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

I stencilled a panel of colourful pumpkins using the Spellbinders Colourful Pumpkins layering stencils; I took my colour inspiration from the Painted Patch designer paper, as I liked the mix of pinks, oranges and yellows with blues, which were ideal for the masculine recipient of my card. I didn't have an appropriate sentiment stamp, so created my own custom sentiment using the Simple Alphabet stamp set. I must confess I have a ton of alphabet stamp sets, with letters in various case, shapes and sizes but couldn't resist adding another to my collection - the letter size in this set is in between my existing sets, so offers more options. It was perfect to create a 'hey pumpkin!' greeting for the centre of my card:

This is a term of endearment I have used with the James Junior since he was small and still call him 'pumpkin' occasionally, so I know this card will be sure to raise a smile when he receives it as happy mail now that he is back at uni - he is still a big kid at heart! I deliberately staggered the letters so that the weren't straight (just thought I'd best put that out there, in case anyone thought I was having trouble with keeping a straight line!) as I wanted to add to the playful feel. A few Secret Sea enamel dots complete my card.

I love those pumpkin stencils - such a fun way to create a colourful background and would work in lots of colourways and it's always fun to create a custom sentiment - the Simple Alphabet set is great for cards but will be especially useful for scrapbooking too.

Here is the visual summary of the key products used on today's project for you to pin for easy reference:

You can see all of my 'How To' summaries on my 'How To - Tips and Techniques' Pinterest board in case you've missed any. 

Enjoy your day and I'll be back tomorrow with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!

Stampin' Up! Supplies Used:

SIMPLE ALPHABET PHOTOPOLYMER STAMP SET (£23.00)	POOL PARTY A4 CARDSTOCK (£14.00)	SECRET SEA A4 CARDSTOCK (£14.00)	BASIC WHITE A4 CARDSTOCK (£14.00)	PETAL PINK CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£10.25)	CALYPSO CORAL CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£10.25)
GOLDEN GLOW CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£14.00)	SECRET SEA CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£10.25)	POOL PARTY CLASSIC STAMPIN' PAD (£10.25)	BLENDING BRUSHES (£16.00)

Today it's Sunday and time for this week's new challenge over at The Paper Players! It's the turn of the fabulous LeAnne to host this week and she has a warm, seasonal colour challenge for us to work with:

Lots of my teamies chose to go with leafy fall creations this week and I'll be honest, I considered it ... but I had some new goodies that I had yet to play with that were not leafy in the slightest that I thought would be perfect for these colours, so I grabbed the sketch over at Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge and set to work! Take a look at what I came up with:

Here's the low-down on today's card:

Yes, today it's all about the pasta! I totally blame my fellow teamie Jaydee for today's card; she has made some fabulous cards with a whole bunch of pasta-themed sets from both Spellbinders and Concord & 9th in recent months and I finally decided that I just had to have them too - so into my shopping basket they went! Today I used everything from Spellbinders: the little animated pasta shapes in the Pasta Friends Dies are so cute but the star of the show is most definitely the Al Dente embossing folder that I used for my background - the dimension is amazing! I blended all three challenge colours onto my panel before embossing it - just look at all those pasta shapes:

The 'Stay Saucy' stamp set is full of hilarious punny, pasta-based sentiments - perfect for the 'J is for Just Kidding' challenge over at The Alphabet Challenge Blog where I'm also linking up - and to align with the sketch, I added a (retired) thanks die (Amazing Thanks Dies) from Stampin' Up! to my sentiment for added impact. I'm not sure I've got the face on my pasta bow quite right (I think in hindsight the dots were cheeks and mouth instead of eyes and mouth) but this card just makes me smile - and those colours are perfect for a touch of saucy, cheesy pasta goodness!

Before you reach for your ink and papers, check out what our amazing team has created to inspire you this week:

Enjoy your day; I am having a quiet weekend, trying to get over my jetlag, as I spent my birthday week in New York doing all things touristy and having a fab time. So much has changed since I was last there some 26 years ago so it was great to experience it all. This time I took James Junior with me as my travelling companion and we had a ball! Unfortunately the hubby was in China on business, so not able to join us. Today will be the first time we've all been together in over a week so it will be fun to swap stories on what we've all been up to! I'll be back in the next couple of days with another project. Until then, happy stampin'!