Howdy y’all and welcome! I’m thrilled to have you along for this month’s Squirrelz Stash Bash, were my friends and I, aka the Squirrel Squad, use the monthly prompts to use supplies we’ve squirreled away and perhaps neglected. We have a fun prompt for you this month… and I am betting you have not seen this one elsewhere! Ready for it? (drumroll…. ) Rainbows and Rodents!!! LOL! 🤣 Yes, you read that right! And no, we were not intoxicated when we came up with the idea! (Well, at least not all of us. 😉) You might think there aren’t that many ways to combine these 2 seemingly random ideas, but I guarantee you will see 5 of them if you hop along me with me and the other Squirrels! And I’m betting at least 1 of those will be a very creative idea… which was actually the inspiration for my card. Before I explain how, let me give you the hop lineup:

• Marie Bingaman
• Lounon Riviere
• V Fairchild
• Karen Page – YOU ARE HERE
• Anna Mahtani
• Bory Yankova – taking this month off

So back to my inspiration… I’m usually very literal in my thought process, and admire Anna and the others for being more creative with able to think “outside the box”. So I thought if I’m more of a “inside the box” crafter, why not take *that* literally as well. Have a look to see what I mean:

Get it? My rodents/squirrels are all in squares or boxes! I knew I wouldn’t have time to create some elaborate scene, so I took this box idea and tried to make a CAS, rainbowy, rodent card with stuff in my stash. This squirrel set from Lawn Fawn, called Let’s Go Nuts, has only seen ink once before. Ironically it was for another hop with these same lovely ladies back in October 2020, which you can see here. This card has a completely different vibe even though I tried to use fall-ish versions of my rainbow colors. For this card, I die cut each squirrel into a stitched square (using Simon Says Stamp stitched dies). Then each square was watercolored using Tombow markers. I came up with a layout I liked, then had to find a sentiment to fit the layout. I wanted a friendship theme, so I was fortunate to find this sentiment in a Jane’s Doodles set called Girlfriends (which needs to see ink sometime soon too!). I heat embossed the sentiment in white and added a couple smaller images to bring in another aspect of white.

To be honest, I had intended the squares to either have a white edge or white mat, but spacing didn’t really allow the mats, and my skill level didn’t allow the edge. Ha! I glued everything down before I thought to splatter white paint, and white epoxy dots seemed to clash with all the squares. My brain tells me I need another white element, but I am unwilling to mess it up with gel pen or splatter, and my mojo is too rusty to think of another way to incorporate white. Doh! I just realized I could have white heat embossed on the edges of the squares 🤦‍♀️ *sigh* Maybe next time! Well, that’s all for me… a relatively quick, CAS card… and a peek inside my creative process, or lack thereof! But never fear, because the rest of the Squirrel Squad is far more creative than I and they are going to wow you with their Rainbow Rodents! (Now there is a sentence I never thought I would ever type! 😄)

Next up on the hop is uber talented and creative Anna Mahtani of Crafty Anna Studios!

If you are a regular subscriber, I thank you so very much for your support. And if this is your first time here, I really appreciate you hopping here from V’s amazing blog, Passions and Distractions. Don’t forget, there are only 5 of us hopping this month so take just a few minutes to check out all the rainbowy goodness the Squirrel Squad has for you today!

And to my dear fellow Squirrels, this card is for ALL of you!!! Truly, your friendship means the world to me!!!!!!! Mwah! 😘 😘😘