YKW & Pings

So far, I've been free of YKWs today for the first time all week. YKW is an acronym for "You Know What". That's what I call my migraines. I have chronic intractable migraines. That means lots and lots of them. All the time. Really painful ones. But today is a good day! And I've spent it well. Catching up on household chores and card making. Last night, while basking in the pain and stupor of a YKW, I had a big Ping!! So see, some good does come from those stupid things! I used my ping on two of the three cards I'm posting today. Curious? Okay, I'll cut to the chase...

First use of ping is going into CAS-ual Fridays. Embossing. Easy, right? Well, I wanted to make something unique for me. And I think I did.

So what did I come up with? Here 'tis:

What's "unique" about this you ask? Well, I'll tell you. The MFT die cut was cut then embossed with my Cuttlebug dotted swiss folder, and slid into into the negative space cut into the gray. All the papers are scraps! I masked an MFT stamp for the 'birthday' portion using gray ink from Studio G. And the enamel dots are from MME. The gray is actually more gray & the green is less garish, but lighting troubles today due to rainy and overcast skies.

My next pingy thing is for the current Dynamic Duos Challenge. I haven't played there in a while, and thought I'd give it a shot today. Might play again with these colors before the challenge expires.

And my card:

I see some flaws. I hate flaws. Really hate them. I will remake this, then edit this post tomorrow in hopefully better light too! But you get the general idea.... Again, all the paper is from my scrap box - woohoo!! Once again I embossed the MFT die with my Cuttlebug swiss dot folder and reinserted it into the negative space on the blue portion. The "Christmas" sentiment is masked from my NBUS stamp set from Lawn Fawn, and the snowflakes are old wooden one from Stampabilities, both using Studio G ink. A little bling and that's it for this one.

And my last card is going into the Muse Challenge. Have you seen Laurie Willison's card over there????!!! Totally in love with it, and I'm so glad we can CASE it. Check it out:

I was inspired by everything about this card. And I made one in similar colors. Then I pinged a bit, and went with it. I kept the washi tape along the bottom and the ampersand. It's a bit different, but I think you can see Laurie's influence here:

So easy. I might be making this over and over again using different washi tapes and letters. John will soon have his stash of Christmas cards if they all go as quickly as this.  Just some washi, Thicker glitter letters, and a masked off sentiment from Mama Elephant. SU black ink. With that, I'm done, and am going to head to the kitchen and start dinner. Go and do a little happy dance today. See you all soon.