"How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!" (Persuassion)

And although my camera is out, I am going to have to "like" the quality of image captured using my scanner... :) BECAUSE, I have finally completed my very first Pile it on Challenge... I've been trying to do one of those challenges forever, partially because Dalis and Vicki are amongst the sweetest of sweet ladies that I've met through the Shoe... And they happen to be running that amazingly novel site together! :) Coming from the school of thought that every single online challenge is a chance to make one new project for my collection, I had to retrain myself to figure out how to best combine challenges to get one coherent project that met multiple requirements... SO, please bear with the picture quality until my Canon comes back from the Geek Squad :)

Pile it On: My dad's birthday card is very masculine, which is this week's prompt...
If the Shoe Fits: Ning Elements Challenge... Hee hee, this is one of MY challenges, but I played along for the first time in a while! :) The challenge was to use swiss dots (ribbon), at least four brads (corners), the color teal blue (the brads are teal), distressed edges (all over), and vellum (see inside sentiment below).
Cafe Mojo: (Thanks Karm!) for the blue and brown colors...
Colour Create: The colors of choice were sand, blue, black, and silver... (I even embossed the black chess pieces with a polysparkle embossing powder but you can only see the barest hint of shine on them in this pic...)
Project Tuesday: Was to create a Surprise Gift Card holder (see the picture of the inside below)

SO, there you have it... Not really a fan of the scanned image quality, and if anyone has ANY suggestions on how to scan a 12X12 layout using a regular at home scanner, please pass them on, lol, because I want to finish this layout and get it up onto my site but other than running to kinkos, I have NO idea how to get it up without a camera!! :) BUT no worries, because we're still encouraging happy thoughts so that the Canon is back before Melanie's recital! :)

Oh, and the AC moore card is just a placeholder, lol... we're getting dad a GNC gift card instead... it'll match better too! (Anal as always!!)