Sympathy and the Sea

Hello Friday and hello to you, thanks for stopping by. Unfortunately I have needed 4 sympathy cards in the past couple of weeks and this design was one of my favorites. I purchased this stamp and sentiment at an estate sale held at a local stamp store and I love it.  I used the same lighthouse stamp for the inside, just off stamping it once to get a lighter shade that I could write over.

The coloring was done with Bic markers and a few of my Spectrum Noir markers.

I am entering my card at Fab and Funky Challenges and their Challenge #269 - No Patterned Paper and Stampin Royalty and their Challenge #288 - By the Sea.

Wishing you a wonderful weekend.

Stamping with Distress inks

The challenge for July at Stamplorations is to use stamps and distressing. I took it in the direction of using distress inks, I find when using the ink to stamp it gives an uneven distressed look to my images. I did a smoosh water color effect on water color paper for my tag and after it dried I started stamping my flowers and leaves. These are all from one of the newest set at Stamplorations which I just ordered, it is called Frames and Flowers. I also stamped and fussy cut some of the flowers so that I could layer them and create some dimension.

I love this layout and it is courtesy of this week's sketch challenge at The Paper Players .

For the inside I placed two of the foliage stamps on my block and created my own corner embellishment.

Although I am cutting it close on both of these challenges, you still have a couple of days to enter, why don't you join me? Thanks for the visit, hope to see you again soon.

My First Canvas

Do you have anything in your craft room that you keep meaning to use but just don't? This canvas is one of those things for me, I had been thinking about it for a while and finally just decided to jump in.

I created this using inspiration from Anything But Cute with this month's challenge "Summer Romance" and this beautiful mood board.

Although I love the ocean and shells, I took my lead from the "Romance" which is where my verse and wedding idea came from and the lovely shades of blue, white and cream.

I started with a layer of white gesso, then acrylic paint in parchment, sand and soft blue.

I added some torn design paper along with dictionary paper. I stamped, distressed and used stencils to create the background.

The quote is on vellum and backed with a piece that I water colored using distress ink re inkers.

I used Spellbinder and Sizzix dies to cut the flowers, leaves and swirls in very vanilla card stock.

Using the same acrylic paints I colored the flowers adding a script stamp when the paint was dry.

My heart and butterfly are embossed chipboard and the bird cage is wood. I painted all of them with the parchment acrylic paint, adding crackle texture paste to the bird cage after it dried. I love how the cracks stood out after I sponged it with antique linen distress ink.

I added some more of the script to the heart along with a key. I also added a hat pin with cream pearls and spacer beads. I hope you can see the bit of sparkle on the side where I added translucent embossing paste through a heart stencil with super fine glitter.

Although I am cutting this just about as close as I can, I am also entering this at Frilly and Funkie and their challenge "Something to Say" - to put your sentiment, etc front and center.

Thanks for seeing my debut with the canvas and mixed media.

Have a wonderful weekend. Hugs......

Markers, markers, markers

I have new stamps, yeah! I signed up last month at Technique Tuesday in their Greenhouse Society, in the auto ship program. This gets me the newly released stamp each month at a discount. My first month was a lovely stamp called Bootiful Tulip which I couldn't resist. Who doesn't love rain boots filled with tulips? At the same time, I was able to buy this beautiful stamp "Cosmo" at a discount.

I have grown cosmos in the past and love the soft delicate flowers. I used my Bic markers to color these and love how they turned out. Which brings me to the challenge that inspired me, Addicted to Stamps and their theme of "Make Your Mark", which is to use your choice of coloring medium-markers, pencils, watercolor, etc. to color your image. I have had some success in the past with the Bic markers and since I have been playing quite a bit and experimenting with different coloring mediums and tools lately....why not use the Bic markers?

I loved how this paper that I bought recently just blends wonderfully with the flowers.

I am also going to enter my card at Creative Moments and their challenge #72 - Anything Goes-Monochromatic.

Here you can see how I fussy cut the image and mounted it on the die cut.

Hope you like this card and will check out the blogs above, I love visiting and getting ideas and I am sure you are just like me. Have a great rest of the week.

Hugs....

Playing Around with Sketch Saturday

This week at Sketch Saturday  , they are playing with this fun sketch and I wanted to join in as well. 

My card started as just an experiment, I had bought this retired two step stamp set which is a retired set from Stampin' Up a while back and never inked it. I taped off the front of my card base to keep the back clean and started stamping....I love these big beautiful flowers. I then stamped the stem which is also part of the same set. After seeing this week's sketch, it was fate, a simple matter of putting this card together. 

Be sure and give Sketch Saturday a visit and see how their DT interpreted the sketch and then give it a go yourself, there is still over a day before the challenge ends. Thanks for the visit.

CASEing Virginia Lu

Hello everyone, are you having a great week? We have been enjoying a few days of cooler temps, which I love!!! Windows open, birds singing in the tree outside and me crafting away--a perfect day.

In between working on an order for some requested items, I decided to create one more card for the 

June Caseploration challenge at Stamplorations   , this time CASEing June's guest designer, 

Virginia Lu. Her card is gorgeous and I love everything about it.

I was inspired by the vellum, her embossed flowers and the washi tape on her sentiment.

I used Ranger's platinum embossing powder to emboss some of my favorite images, they are from an older retired set by Stampin' Up "Botanicals".

I colored them with alcohol markers from the back side of the vellum, I added a couple of patterned papers for my backdrop, love the script paper. 

Be sure to stop by the Stamplorations Blog where they are celebrating their 2nd birthday with loads of inspiration, new stamps and prizes. I will soon have my very first Stamploration stamps as I placed my first order today. If you order at least $22 --- free shipping, I am always drawn in with free shipping, lol.

Thanks for taking a look at my card, have a great rest of the week and may you find something here to inspire you.

Pencil's Again

I am back with another card using the beautiful "Countryside Bouquet" image from Power Poppy, I have always been a fan of Marcella Hawley's beautiful images and I am so happy to be able to purchase them. Please stop by the store and take a look around, she has both stamps and digital stamps available. I posted a card using this same image yesterday, just in a different color palette and using just a part of the image.

Today I used most of the image to fill up my card front which I cut using a MFT stitched blueprint die, the sentiment is also from Power Poppy.

I am entering my card at Power Poppy Blog in their June challenge "Pencil me In"--use a different medium, any pencils. For my card, I used Prismacolor colored pencils, I am so happy for the challenge and to use my pencils as they have sadly been neglected.

I am also entering my card at Simon Says Stamp , their Wednesday challenge- Anything Goes.

Thanks for stopping in, have a wonderful day....

Digital Flowers and Pencils

I am joining in again this week at Sketch Saturday  , I am enjoying their sketches as it gives me a jumping off point for my cards, do you love sketches as well?

The image is digital and from Power Poppy, have you shopped there? They have digital images but if you love stamps....they have those as well. Something for everyone.

As you can see, I used just a small part of this lovely image...I have another card to post soon, using more of the image and different colors. My coloring was done using Prismacolor colored pencils. I am also entering this at Power-Spark Pencil me in Challenge at the Power Poppy blog where June's challenge is to use a different coloring medium-pencils.

I created a 5 x 7 card today, not my usual size but thought it gave me a larger canvas for my flowers.

I started with Recollections 120lb white card stock, layering GinaK Designs chocolate card stock and a piece of design paper. I pulled the melon card stock from my scraps and used the Scor pal to make my scored background for the sheer ribbon and bow.

Thanks for the visit, hope you will stop by both blogs and the store, I know, I am enabler.

Have a great day.

Happy Birthday and a CASE

I am love with watercolor smooshing and this is the technique I used to create my background for this card. I used distress inks for this, you simply stamp the pad on an acrylic block, craft mat or some other non porous surface-spritz with water, then taking a piece of acetate or anything similar smoosh in the wet ink. Place the acetate with the ink however you want it on your paper (I used watercolor paper for my card). After placing the color , I heat set the first layer, then smooshed more ink and dried until I had the look I wanted. I love the dried water spots this creates. I hope I haven't confused you too much, just google this technique or look at YouTube.

My inspiration comes from this card by Vicki Dutcher at All I Do is Stamp , I love the CAS look of her card and took my inspiration from the water colored background and her layout, I did flip flop my sentiment and main image on my card, Thanks Vicki for always inspiring me with your cards. I am entering this in the Caseplorations June challenge at Stamplorations --- CASE one of the DT members cards and tell who and how.

m 

I am also entering it at Addicted to Stamps in their Challenge #149 Clean and Simple where they are celebrating their 3rd birthday.....Happy Birthday.

Check out both of these challenge blogs, so much fun and loads of inspiration.  

Off to finish watching the US Open golf match and see if my fave wins, Thanks for stopping in.

Sketch Inspiration from Freshly Made Sketches.....

Hello all, hope you are enjoying the weekend, I am staying in with the AC and my stamps today, hope you are cool wherever you are.

My inspiration for my baby card came from this week's sketch at Freshly Made Sketches . I am making a few cards for a friend, with baby cards as one of her requests.

The stamps are from different sets, love the tiny sweet feet which is a wood stamp from I don't know where???? I love using the lace, makes me happy to see it with these sweet baby images.

I kept the inside very simple as well.....

I hope this inspires you to create something with this fun sketch, you still have another day or so.

Thanks for stopping in,here's hoping you enjoy the rest of your weekend.

A Sympathy Card for Sketch Saturday...

Hello all, how was your weekend? Very hot and muggy here in Virginia. I spent some of mine outside enjoying the day and part of it in my stamp room creating this card. 

I used a retired SU set "Early Spring" , don't you love the brush stroke style of this? Copics were my medium with a background created using distress ink and a stencil. I love the soft fade I got with this one. A Spellbinders nobel rectangle die gave it the lovely frame. A snip of ribbon, a sentiment and gem and we can call this card front done.

My inspiration came from this week's challenge at Sketch Saturday with Sketch #365.

Be sure to stop for a visit to see what the team has designed and play along if you have time.

You can see I added a piece of matching design paper with a punched edge to the inside.

Thanks for the visit, it is so good to be back blogging and sharing my cards....have a great week.

Butterflies and CAS

I love this card and hope you will enjoy seeing it as well.  So simple and quick to make. I used an embossing folder on my card base to create my butterfly scene after which I punched and die cut two different butterfly shapes creating a three layered butterfly. One of the layers uses patterned vellum and the other is from paper painted with Folkart metallic paint which I am in love with, I placed these over the embossed butterflies.

A simple sentiment and a few pearls and we can call it a finished project.

I am entering this in the challenge at Addicted to CAS  - Butterfly, hope you will check out the challenge and join in as well.

Thanks so much for stopping by for a visit, please leave a comment if you have a moment and I hope to see you again soon.  Have a great rest of your weekend. 

Getting Sketchy with Stamplorations

Hi everyone, I am sharing a card I made using a technique I found on Pinterest. You can see this beautiful card Here.  I have done a couple of practice runs and as of yet still have not made one that makes me as happy as her lovely card....but I will keep trying as I love this look. 

You use chalk pastels as a base, I chose pinks, yellow and green which I smeared with my fingers after putting the color down with the sticks. Then I off stamped a leaf image on copy paper to soften it before adding it to the background. Added a flourish stamped with Versamark, heat embossed with a fine detail embossing powder then a run through the Big shot with my Script folder finishes my background.

Love the sketch this month at Stamplorations , they also have a Case challenge if that is more your style. 

Here are a couple of quick photos I took while in process and before putting my card together.

I think my embossing folder was a bit too busy but I still like it, just not perfect yet.....oh well, just an excuse to try again.

Stop by Stamplorations and play along, I still don't have any of their stamps but I really need  to order some, don't you think?

Thanks for the visit and have a great week.

A Color Throwdown

Welcome Spring and everyone back to my blog, it seems I have been hibernating for a bit, but with Spring popping up here in Virginia my mojo has also returned. Boy, does time get away from me anymore. Due to the need for some birthday and all occasion cards and a desire to try something new in my Silhouette software, I came up with this design. It all started with this video on YouTube by Clever Someday showing how to use a stencil font to make a shaped edge card. I tried it using a floral cut file and it worked for me, yeah! You can find her video Here .

The file from the Silhouette online store is called Poppy Fields and can be found Here.   It takes up more of the front than her example but I am still happy with the way it turned out and can't wait to try some of my other shapes. I ungrouped the file and cut additional flower tops in design paper. The shading on the design paper was done with alcohol markers. These are Glitz Travel Papers paper pad ,the backing I placed behind my flowers doesn't look as mint in the pictures as it does in real life, especially next to their color block. Color Throwdown #336   is where I got my inspiration. I am going to enter my card there today, why don't you visit them with me.

Hopefully I haven't been forgotten and you will visit me again soon, I am setting a goal to get back to posting again and trying some new things. Take care and enjoy your week.