Race to the finish line!

Well, the end of the year is looming and so is the end to this year's 52 week challenges over at Personalscrapper! This is a layout I quickly created tonight for the "Use stamps" challenge. This makes my 27th layout done for the 51 challenges that have been issued so far. As you can see I am lagging behind by almost 1/2 a year lol! But I still have a little over a week left, think I can do 25 more? Now that is what I would call a "pipe dream!" So since my time was limited to around 2 hours tonight to get this done before my Pilates class I decided to use some inspiration from my early Christmas gift to myself- my Scrapbook and Cards Today 2012calendar with sketches by Beck Fleck of Page Maps! This layout is based on a sketch by Becky included in the calendar and is also almost a direct lift of the sample page for this sketch, of course, I have altered it a bit to fit the supplies I had on hand, but it is definitely inspired by this AWESOME calendar! I am so glad I spent the $12 or so to get it, WELL worth it! Becky has the most awesome sketches out there in my opinion! These pictures are some of the less desirable ones from our trip to the Pumpkin Patch this last October. I decided shrinking them down this small lets me use them without the flaws being so noticeable. Papers on this layout are by Bo Bunny, Stickers from Bo Bunny, sticker letters by Basic Grey, cardstock Bazzill....and then stamps are from the set Fantastic Foliage by Stampin Up and here is the neat part, are you wondering how I get the image to look like this? Well, I stamped on the rust cardstock with BLEACH! The image bleaches out the color of the cardstock, it is so cool to see what color it will bleach too as you can never tell til it completely dries! Helpful hint: use the "gel" bleach for best results as liquid bleach is a bit to runny. Also these stamps had almost too "detailed" of an image making them look a bit "blobby", the less detailed the image the easier it will be. However, this is my only leaf stamp set, so I had to use it. If you decide to try stamping with some bleach, please link up your project in the comments section so we can all see your results! This is a fun fun technique and really simple too! Well, off to wrap up some gifts, gotta get going on that front so I won't be up all night Christmas Eve! Look for my holiday card share coming soon, I just mailed my cards yesterday, but hey, they should arrive the day or so before which isn't too bad right?