ACK! This was a tough one!

It's Monday and that means the CSAYL divas and I have a new challenge for you!
This week the challenge is to
MAKE A CARD WITHOUT STAMPS!
If you want, you can use a stamped sentiment, but that's it!

As a gal who loves to stamp and color, I had a really tough time with this challenge.

Here's what I came up with...

To make the base, I cut some Real Red cardstock to 5 1/2 x 11" and then scored it at 5 1/2 to make a large square. The patterned paper is from a retired SU holiday collection and for some reason, I have gobs and gobs of it.

For the focal point on the card, I used my Nestabilities "Labels Two" and then Cuttlebugged the Vanilla piece with the Swiss Dots embossing folder. Then I used punches to create the cardinal.

Here's how...Using Real Red cardstock, I placed it into my Marvy Mega circle punch as shown and punched. (This will be the cardinals body)

Then I placed some cardstock into my SU 1 3/8" circle punch as shown.
(this will be the wing)



Then I placed a small piece of black cardstock into the SU Word Window punch.
(this will be for the eye area)

Next, I took some Pumpkin Pie cardstock and placed it in the corner of the SU Photo Corner punch as shown. (this will be the beak)

Last, I punched out the two larger hearts from the SU triple heart punch.
(I used these for the tail feathers)

Here are all the pieces punched out...

And this will give you some idea of what it will look like once you layer and adhere them together.

Here is my finished bird.
I trimmed the black piece and added an eye with my white pen. And to give my cardinal a little texture, I added some red velvet flock to the tail feathers and wing before I assembled them.

Before I adhered him to the card, I cut some branch shapes out of Chocolate Chip cardstock and layered the cardinal on top.

Here's another look at my finished card for the "Stampless Challenge".

I hope you're up for the challenge and ready to play along with us!
You can check out what the rest of the design team did and post your own project by clicking here.

There were lots of great entries for last weeks "White Christmas" challenge, but I think this card by Kaylou was my favorite.

Keep up the great work gals! Can't wait to see what you come up with this week!
Until next time...