Happy Anniversary

Hello - one more card before I am off to make lunch.

Hubs and I will be celebrating 11 years later this week. 

Two challenges inspired this lil card.  Fusion Card Challenge and Watercooler Wednesday.

Stamps by Lawn Fawn, Sentiment by CTMH, Embossing Folder by Sizzix; coloring with copic markers and I added a few extra eyelashes to the girl hedgie. 

       

Thanks so much for stopping by.

Happy Summer

Hello and Happy Memorial Day to my USA visitors. 

I am rushing to get this in to a few challenges.

Freshly Made Sketches, Addicted to Stamps and More, and Casology.

    

Thanks for stopping by.

May Card Chain Challenge

Hello -

This month my Card Chain Challenge card is going to Canada.  I try to pick an international recipient every now and then.  The postage is higher (1.15); but that is okay by me.  It does limit the die-cuts I can include though since they add weight and bulk which seems to have an exponential affect on the pricing.

This month I chose to use the colors and the sketch for my card.

The flowers are Pretty Pink Posh's Geraniums, the sentiment is a Simon Says Stamp Die. I colored the blooms with Copics (R5,R17,R38; G19, G29). I added a quick C1 gray stripe above my SSS Lemon Yellow ink blended area.  I cut the flowers and the color blocking below out and mounted them on foam to a black card base.  I ink blended a card strip and then clear embossed it before die cutting the sentiment from it.

Thanks so much for visiting; and if you'd like to play along - the June sign up is here until June 6, 2019.   My card has been received, so I am posting it earlier than the June 2nd CCC post.

CAS Stencil May 2019

Hello -

If you are the US, I hope you are getting an early start on your Memorial Day Weekend.  I had lunch with my crafty group yesterday and it feels like my long weekend started yesterday...even though I am retired I still look forward to long weekends.

I am late to the CAS Stencil party but I sat myself down with some distress inks, sponge blenders, a stencil, die, and my new Make Art Stay-tion.  I have to say I loved using it. It was perfect for holding down the stencil and the card stock. Neither piece moved when I started blending on it and through the stencil.

I started with a piece of cream cardstock and blended on cracked pistachio and salty ocean.  Next I laid the tiny leaves stencil down and added pine needles distress ink over the blended card. 

I cut the piece down and mounted it on a coordinating green card base.  Three layers of the fresh daisies die were cut from white Neenah prepared with double sided tape for easier layering; and lastly the SSS sentiment was white heat embossed on the green card.




Thanks for visiting.

Hope your day

Hello Crafty friends -

It was raining buckets as I made this card but the sun is starting to come out now.   This card is for CAS MIX UP Card Challenge.  I love this challenge.  This time I am late to the game because  --  well --  I'll admit it the technique of using baby wipes kinda scared me, not to mention I have no baby wipes.

But I put my big girl pants on and set to checking out the videos provided for players to see the techniques in action.  I loved the technique that takes the cloudy off of oxide inks.

I used peacock feathers, cracked pistachio, faded jeans and salty ocean
my colors.  They were squished on my craft mat, spritzed with water and then I dragged and swished my photo paper through the wet colors.  I dried it with a ranger heat tool and then dipped it through the colors again.

One more drying and then I took my make-up wipe and wiped all over the page.  All the cloudy "oxide" came up off the sheet leaving a perfect wash of color.  It even looks like the sun is shining down through my "ocean".

To finish my card:
I die cut a window in the card base
adhered the wipe panel
stamped and heat embossed the fish
stamped and copic colored the shark
fussy cut the shark
adhered the shark to the wipe panel
added white gel pen to the eyes and teeth
added a white heat embossed sentiment



Thanks for stopping by.

Make A Wish

Hello~

I am still on my mission to finish all my birthday cards for the year.  So far all cards I have are in envelopes with stamps and addresses. They are batched with my birthday calendar cut up into individual months which shows the date and the recipient.  The cards are getting mailed out timely.

I mail somewhere around 60 birthday cards, and I have 7 left to do as of this posting.  No surprise they are all man cards.  The family males are all getting critter cards this year. 

I followed the sketch from the Inky Paws Challenge.

I added a stripe of  line plaid stamping in navy onto my navy card base. Its a subtle look perfect for a man card. I added the same stamping to a cream card panel.  Next I stamped the Company of Cats stamp onto a cream panel and colored up only 1 cat.   That panel was cut down with a square die cut on an angle.  The sentiment was stamped, die cut and adhered under the focal panel.

I think this is a nice masculine rendering of the sketch.



Thanks for stopping by.

Rose Sprig

Oh ya I am back...with yet another card from my marathon session!

This one goes to Inspired by (the colors got me)  and Addicted to Stamps and More (anything goes).

I stamped another rose image on Bristol, this time using copper embossing powder.  I used yellow, pink and green arteza markers for the color.  I started with the yellow at the base of the flowers, let it dry and later went back with the pink.  I find the Arteza markers don't react quite so much once dried and re-wetted as the zigs.  That made this color fade possible.

 

Thanks for visiting.

Rose Birthday

Hello-

I've grown very fond of a small sentiment stamp set from CTMH.  I love that I can squeeze in a small greeting while not having it overtake the card front image.

Two more challenges for this card.  Just Us Girls (pick three colors from a photo) and The Flower Challenge (heat or dry embossing).  This new MFT rose stem is lovely and fun to watercolor.

I chose red, yellow and green from the JUGS photo. The stamp was white heat embossed then colored using Arteza brush pen markers and a water brush for blending. The small sentiment fits nicely and these lovely blooms need no additional embellishments.

 

Thanks for visiting.

Happy Birthday

Hello-

I've had a marathon card making session- I was in need of 31 more birthday cards to finish out the year; now it's down to 20.

One of the cards made was inspired by two challenges - Always Fun Challenge (Embossing Folder) and The Flower Challenge (embossing heat or dry). 

I dry embossed a panel of white cardstock and cut it down. I layered this on a cardbase that matched the colors in the mums. I wanted the white panel as the flowers were cut with matching dies that left a white edge.  By placing them onto a portion with a white panel, those edges are not so glaring.  Mounting them on a white base would accomplish the same, but I wanted color.  Next the sentiment was heat embossed in white as well.



Thanks so much for visiting.

Happy Purrthday

Hey there -

I just love this Newton's Nook Stamp.  The cat head shaped balloon makes me smile every time I see it.  The stamp is perfect for several challenges -

Inky Paws Challenge  - Colors Yellow, Teal, Green
Seize the Birthday - With Toppings - Balloons
AAA Birthday- Anything Goes
Work it Wednesday - SSS Pet Project


I stamped a grid stamp tone on tone on a yellow card base. Then I sponged ink in teal and yellow onto a card panel using Newton's Nook Bokeh stencils.  I felt they gave a feel of lots and lots of balloons.

I added smaller dots with a copic marker in green to fill in some white space.  Next, I stamped the sentiment and partially stamped the Newton Balloon image. After coloring, it was die cut with a circle and popped up against the bokeh inked panel and the card base. 

There is a lot going on here for me and not my usual style.  But I think it is definitely festive as a birthday card should be!

 

Thanks for visiting!

Thanks

Hello!

My card today makes use of a lovely washi panel sent to me by my friend Betty.  I believe the washi is from The Ton.

I die cut W&W's thanks from the panel and mounted it on a coordinating cardstock base. I added a bit of  rose gold metallic trim to match the bits in the washi to finish off the card.  The design elements were inspired by two challenges - Case This Sketch, and Just Us Girls.

 

Thanks so much for stopping by.

White on White

Hello -

I am spending Mother's Day working on a few challenges. Two challenges seem to call for a white on white look.  Just Add Ink and CAS on Friday (white on white) have a similar theme and inspiration photo and since the theme at Shopping our stash is May Flowers, I am playing there too.

I die cut two of the Memory Box Blooming Peony stem flowers, layered them up having removed the interior petal pieces.  I then mounted it onto the same shade of white cardbase.  I added a small sentiment with black versafine ink to keep the card crisp and clean.

 

Thanks for stopping by.

Cherry Blossoms

Hello!

I got into my stash of new stamps - several were birthday presents and I just hadn't gotten around to them yet.  

Pretty Pink Posh has some sweet line art flowers.   These cards feature the Cherry Blossom stamps.  I've only used one of the several blooms in the set.

For the AAA Cards Game Challenge #140  Up to 1/3 with the option of bright colors I made this card.  Coloring is done with Copics (RV52, R83, R56, R39).  I used Painted Stripes by EE for the heat embossing on the left side.

Next up is an anniversary card inspired by the Inspired By Challenge -in the graphic I focused on the colors of pink, white and gray. 

My clean panel was mounted on a soft gray card base. I used a large sentiment and a few sweet cherry blossoms colored with copics (RV00, RV02, RV21).

Thanks so very much for visiting!

Make a Wish

Hello-

I had a few of the Japanese Mum flowers left over from my Mother's Day card and I decided to make a few more cards for birthdays.

This time I was inspired to complete the card by the mood board from Double D Challenges.  The upper right corner image specifically caught my eye. The texture of the hat reminds me of the lattice die I've used.

The next card uses a stamped vase on the card base, with the two blooms added on top. The bigger front bloom is popped up on foam dots. The mum stamp set has no stems so I just drew some in with the copic markers and outlined them in black for continuity with the other images.

Thanks for visiting!

Happy Mothers Day

Hello-

I finally got out the Japanese Mum from Altenew for some play time.  It is so striking.
Several challenges inspired this card along with the pink loving recipient!  The challenges are Shopping our Stash,(May Flowers), Simon Says Stamp  (For a special lady), Die Cut Diva's(flowers) and Casology (Mother)


I used the Cherry Blossom set of inks for the mums, and the original greens from Altenew for the leaves.  The lower bloom was attached flat to the card base, the upper was popped up with foam tape.

A little ink blending at the bottom of the card front was my starting point, then I added two blooms and the leaves. Last touches - the Sentiment from CTMH and a few clear gems.

   
  

Thanks for stopping by.