witticisms: October Release in Review

Yes, I am bribing you with yummy food pictures;)

The following bajillion pictures are here to show you the rest of my October Papertrey Ink projects featuring all the fun new releases. You can get your hands on all of it starting tonight, right at www.papertreyink.com.

You know me. I'm always going to start with the food...

yummy, yummy fries and ketchup.
And by that, I mean yummy, yummy cookie fries and frosting, of course :)

You guys know I have a not-so-secret love of all those fantastic baking blogs out there, and when the lovely and talented Bridget of Bake at 350 came up with the idea of cookie fries, I knew without a doubt that there must be cookie fries in my future.

And if only I could pair them with a little custom food service basket, it would be the perfect storm of this whole baking + paper crafting idea. Hey, wait. I know somebody that makes dies, don't I? ;) So I passed that little idea along to Nichole who then made all of my food service basket dreams come true with the new Favor It Box #7 die...

I'm a happy girl :)

Here's how it went down. I started by die cutting the box from white cardstock and stamping it with the new Background Basics: Super Stripes. I used the offset corner of the box as my straight line guide so that the stripes go diagonally across the box.

Those stripes are loooong, but I needed to stamp them twice across the box at some points because this box is not a tiny one. When that happened, I just connected them on the bottom portion of the box so that no one is the wiser ;)

The corners simply fold in together and were held together with a small stripe of ScorTape at each side. A little piece of parchment or wax paper on top gives it the food service touch.

I added a few flags to my "ketchup" using the new Over Under Easy set. I masked off the large sentiment to just stamp "smile" and used one of the single sentiments for "happy birthday." A few of the Super Stripe images stamped along the flags liven things up (and give it that McDonald's look, ha!).

{Sidenote... I so love food flags :) They couldn't be easier and they make every thing cute. What's not to love, I ask you?}

The best part about this little baked surprise?
It simply could. not. be. easier.
Seriously.
{Bridget is a *genius.*}

You just take your baked cookies out of the oven, wait a minute, and use a spatula or straight edge to cut them into strips. An extra little notch at the ends to give them angled ends finishes them off.

And, let me tell you... store bought works juuuuust fine.
I even went with pink icing to make coloring it to red as easy as could be. I was *that* determined to go with quick and easy.

I didn't even do individual cookies. Yup, that lazy. I just broke the cookie dough into 2 sections, rolled each into a ball, and basically rolled out 2 giant cookies. Next time, I'd leave the dough a smidge thicker, but that's the only change I'd make.

For extra realism, I sprinked the baked cookies with sugar for that "salty" look :)

Let me tell you, folks... this is the *perfect* party food for a kiddo party. Quick. Easy. Inexpensive.
And you will be FAMOUS.
{Or at least win the Mom/Grandma/Auntie/Friend's Mom of the Year award.}

I felt super accomplished when my 8 year old came home and asked me if I had made fries.
Winner, winner!

And, look, I made some non-food projects this month, too ;)

I broke out this month's new Peaceful Pinecones set and combined it with one of the dove die cuts from the new Heart-2-Heart #9 die this month. It has to be said... those two are a match made in paper crafting heaven.

If you get one, I beg you... get the other. They are meant to be.

The branch dies are made so that you stamp both the branch and the pinecones within the die cut, so since I just wanted to use the branches, I trimmed the little areas where the pinecones would be off. That left me with a perfect little limb to hold the dove.

The sweet dove is holding a sweet little felt heart {used my super loved Love Lives Here die once again}. I'm really digging the little bit unexpected holiday color combo of the Limeade Ice cardstock (stamped with Simply Chartreuse ink) and the Rasperry and purple-y tones.

So much so that I used the color combo and both sets again to come up with a non-holiday card, too...

Peaceful pinecone branches again, but this time I added a little "birdhouse" made from the Love Lives Here house. The addition of the kissing dove image and sentiment from Heart-2-Heart #9 makes it a newlywed birdhouse ;)
Sweet right?

Next up... Winter Hills...

I stamped one of the Winter Hills images on Fine Linen patterned paper and did some simple Copic coloring. A little strip of felt made an appropriately warm place for the sentiment...

Not sure why the sentiment has a slightly purple tone in these pics... I used Dark Chocolate ink on the felt and it has a pretty, soft brown tone in real life.

This month's new Menorah Medley seemed just perfect for a clean and simple look, so I paired it with Super Stripes. {Those stripes got a lot of use out of me this month, didn't they?}

I pulled out all of the blue toned inks and made a simple plaid pattern.

I used a gridded border block to line my stamp up on... this is super simple to do if you just lay your stripe stamp out (image side down) right alongside the edge of a piece of cardstock. I simply did that, laid my border block down over the image, and pressed down to get my stripe stamp attached straight every time. Easy as that.

Plaids of all different color combos are in in my future ;)

Next up... the all new Snowflake Flurries set...

Maile's modern take on snowflakes totally floats my boat. I used Aqua Mist, Spring Rain, and Limeade Ice (which is getting quite a lot of play from me lately) for this fun pattern.

A few snowflakes stamped with VersaMark and embossed with clear ink add some extra depth and interest while the rhinestones bring some shine...

You know me and my love of all-purpose images.
This one totally fits the bill... love it.

Last up... a quick and easy one for you...

This one features the brand new Layered Postmarks set.
Those holly leaves... they get me every time :)

When it comes to clean and simple cards, the details make all the difference. A little curling forward of the holly points (just a few pulls on each point with a fingernail) makes this card so much more dynamic.

And who doesn't love button holly berries? :)

Well... that's all for me this time around.
Not to fear, though... more to be found with the rest of the dt, of course!
Nichole Heady

Cristina Kowalczyk
Erin Lincoln

So what are *you* most looking forward to from this month's release?
Anybody think they are up to the {simple} challenge of some cookie fries?

{Cookie Fries}
Supplies not available now but available 10/15:
Stamps - Over Under Easy, Background Basics:Super Stripes
Die - Favor It Box 7
Supplies availble now:
CS - White
Ink - Pure Poppy; Summer Sun (SU)
Other - parchment paper, paper cup, washi tape (Target), toothpicks

{Peace & Joy} card