Six New Cards

 

I finally had time to take photos of the recent cards I created!

I was working on them before I went on a road trip over Labor Day to Kentucky to visit family. I just didn't get a chance to photo and blog them.

I'm happy to be back in the North where we don't have the humidity that they have in the South. It just about kills me, I hate it! I know we have humidity here in Minnesota, but nothing like they have there. Normally when we visit we either go in May, June or July when it's even worse. We had one day that we could tolerate and that was the first day we were there! Anyway, it was nice to see family.

Moving on.....my first card the background was created blending distress oxide inks - fired brick, worn lipstick and fossilized amber. I then spritzed the background with water to get the droplets where the water reacted. The leaves are from a die called Outline Clustered Leaves from Simon Says Stamp. The sentiment is from a stamp set by Reversed Confetti called The Most Beauty.

 

For the card above and below I used a stencil called Wonky Grid from Altenew. 

I used Brusho Crystal Colours (which are similar to Ken Oliver's Color Burst). I used the colors gamboge, turquoise and cobalt blue. I laid my stencil down then sprinkled the power over the stencil and spritzed watered over it. I set a stamp block on top for a few minutes then lifted it. I cut the panel in two for two cards. The stamp used on the top card is called Bold Colour by Visibile Image. The sentiment used on the bottom card is from Simon Says Stamp called Handlettered Encouragement.

 

 

For the card about and below I used a stencil from Altenew called Ombre Stripes.

I applied distress oxide inks over the stencil on both. The colors used for the top card are cracked pistachio, salty ocean and blueprint sketch. For the card below I used blueprint sketch, hickory smoke and wilted violet. After I blended the inks I spritzed both cards with water to get the inks to react. 

The top card uses a sentiment from Visible Image called So Much Stronger. The card below uses a stamp for Gina K Designs called Lettered and Lovely. 

 

 

For my last card I used a stencil from Gina K Designs that I applied distress oxide ink through. The colors I used are fossilized amber, ripe persimmon and candied apple. I die cut my panel using a die called double stitched rectangles from Our Daily Bread (they've changed their name to Divinity Designs LLC now). The sentiment is from Gina K Stamps called Lettered and Lovely.

I am working my way through the pile above. I'm basically just deciding what sentiments to use on them. I may decide at last minute to add stenciling, embossing paste or die cut into flowers......the possibilities are endless...... I'm trying to keep the pretty clean and simple.

I've been working on the details for a crop I'm hosting the end of October/beginning of November. This will be our second year going to this particular retreat. It's always so fun to get together with others for three nights. I never get anything done, but that's okay! I hope we keep going year after year. The place is always booked so you reserve it a year in advance. 

This year I'm going to be doing a very casual card class. So, I'm thinking of ideas so that I can make a few sample cards for them look at. We'll be doing watercolor, stencils, paste etc so all cards will turn out different. 

We also have one of the ladies doing a Chalk Couture class, so that will be fun. I took her class back in April and loved it!

That's it for now! Thanks for stopping by!

Freshly Made Sketches Challenge #360

 

Where does the weekend go?!

I feel like it was just Friday and I was so happy to be leaving work and looking forward to two days of doing what I want to do. The weekends never last long enough. At the very least they should always be three days long. All I can say is thank God I'm super close to retirement! I can't wait!

I watercolored some mixed media cardstock Friday evening and Saturday morning with distress inks. The colors I used were peeled paint, dried marigold, barn door, wild honey, crushed olive, spiced marmalade, mustard seed and rusty hinge. While letting my panels dry I started looking through challenges to see if there were any that I wanted to link up some cards to. I found a few with one being a sketch challenge for Freshly Made Sketches. 

I started by stamping leaves using the Reverse Confetti stamp set called Fall Foliage and then die cutting them with their companion die set.  

I used mustard seed distress ink first on my background. Then using a Tim Holtz layering stencil called linen, I used a stencil brush to lightly ink the background with spiced marmalade distress ink. 

I die cut my circle from one of the watercolor panels using a double stitched circle die from Our Daily Bread. 

The sentiment I used is from the Gina K Designs Autumn Wreath Builder stamp set. 

Thanks for taking the time to stop by! 

Dream Valley Challenges: Challenge #185 - Autumn Colors

Dream Valley Challenges #185 Autumn Colors

I'm linking my card to the Dream Valley Challenge.. The theme is Autumn colors.

I love the colors of Autumn but not what comes after that.

I wish we could have a combination of spring with all the beautiful flowers and fall with all the gorgeous colors that the leaves turn all year long. I also want to wear sandals year round. 

I used Distress Oxide inks in these colors for my leaves: tea dye, ripe persimmon, crushed olive, wild honey and barn door. 

The leaves are from the stamp set splatter leaves from Rubbnecker Stamps as well as the sentiment. I diecut the circle using the double stitched circles from Our Daily Bread Designs. 

Thanks for taking the time to stop by!

Addicted To Stamps and More! Challenge #306 - Anything Goes

Happy Saturday!

The card I'm sharing today is for the card challenge going on over at:

Addicted To Stamps and More! Challenge #306

I am participating in several challenges this week. I get an email everyday letting me know what challenges are going on. I go through them all to see what I can come up with. I generally stay away from any challenges that have to do with using digital images. I have way to many stamps for that! I love the "Anything Goes" challenges and the ones I tend to gravitate toward are color, sketch and CAS (clean and simple) challenges. Today's challenge is an Anything Goes challenge.

Since I knew I wanted to play in several challenges, I scanned them all and started creating my card backgrounds. After I did that I narrowed my sentiments down for each card.

For this card I used Distress Oxide ink in fossilized amber, carved pumpkin and salty ocean. Because I always have leftover ink and I don't want to waste it, two cards for two more challenges use the same color combination.

The sentiment is from Reverse Confetti called The Most Beauty. I diecut it using the Double Stitched Circles from Our Daily Bread Designs. I stamped the sentiment using VersaFine ink in black onyx. After I finished the card I flicked ink over it using the Tim Holtz Splatter Brush.

Check back for the rest of the cards I post today!

Thanks for stopping by!

CAS(E) this Sketch #285 - Welcome Autumn

 

I'm playing along with the CAS(E) This Sketch! Challenge again this week!

CAS(E) this Sketch #285

My card from the challenge last week got an honorable mention, so that was pretty cool!

 

 

I watercolored a piece of Strathmore Mixed Media paper with the distress oxide inks shown above. 

I used Memento in Rich Cocoa to stamp the leaves. 

 

I always love all the Fall cards that I see every year. 

I only have one stamp set that is Fall related and I always forget to pull it out.

I picked up this stamp and die set at the Rubber Stamp show I went to in July. It's from Rubbernecker Stamps. The stamp set is called Splatter Leaves and the die set to match is called Fall Leaf.

I want to play around with some more inks to create some different colors for the leaves. 

I really love the colors of Fall! 

The only thing I don't care for is that for me when I think of Fall I think of Winter and I'm not a big fan. I don't like having to wear coats and closed toed shoes. I want to be able to wear capris and sandals year round. I guess I grew up and live in the wrong state!

Be sure to check out the challenge this week!

CAS(E) this Sketch #285

Thanks for stopping by!

Color Throwdown Challenge CTD505

 

I'm participating in the Color Throwdown Challenge this week!

I do like this color combination.

 

The sentiment on the card is from the Flower Turnabout Stamp Set from Concord & 9th.

I used the Double Stitched Circle die on this card and the one below from Our Daily Bread Designs. 

 

 

 

Distress oxide inks were used to watercolor some mixed media paper.

I pulled out an older Sizzix Tim Holtz Alterations Frameworks die for my background.

The greenery was die cut using Sizzix Tim Holtz Garden Greens. 

 

Since I have extra die cut pieces and greenery I decided to make a second card.

I set aside the rest of my pieces to create more cards later. 

 

The sentiment on this card is from the Wreath Builder Set from Gina K Designs.

 

Be sure to stop by the Color Throwdown Blog to check out all the cards that their Design Team created and all the entries from the challenge!

Thanks for stopping by!

Simon Says Flicker Challenge #102 - You Are Wonderful

 

This is my card for the Simon Says Stamp Flicker Challenge #102!

The theme is "Favorite Technique".

My favorite technique is creating watercolor backgrounds with Distress Inks. 

 

I just love all the different patterns that can be made by either dragging your card through the ink or by splashing or smooshing your card into the ink. I don't think I can ever get board creating watercolor backgrounds. 

 

I just used two Distress Oxide inks for this background. 

I created a frame that I popped up around my stamped sentiment. 

I watercolored a second panel that I die cut the frame out of. 

This card is linked to the Flicker Simon Says Stamp Challenge. 

Products used for this card:

Distress Oxide Ink: Mermaid Lagoon, Fossilized Amber

Our Daily Bread: Double Stitched Rectangle Dies

Simon Says Stamp Stamp Set: Uplifting Thoughts SSS101623

Thanks & Hello

Today I'm sharing some cards I've created for the 100th Simon Says Stamp Flickr Challenge. I love their challenges! I've been MIA as far as creating cards, blog posting and participating in challenges. There just isn't enough time in the day or week. I hope to get back to it more regularly because it's something I love to do and it keeps me sane. 

For my first card I tried a technique that I saw Gina from Gina K Designs do a tutorial for. Quite awhile ago I bought an card class from the site Online Card Classes that Jennifer McGuire and Kristina Werner run. The card class is called Crafted Kindness and there are 30 card making videos in the bundle. It is well worth the price. There are tons of technique tutorials. I'm all about technique video tutorials!

For both cards I used distress oxide inks. I used bundled sage, broken china and vintage photo for the thanks card. I used hickory smoke, fossilized amber and blueprint photo for the hello card.

Other products used for these cards were the texture fade lace and roses embossing folders by Tim Holtz for Sizzix, the double stitched rectangle dies from Our Daily Bread, the Simon Says Stamp painted thanks and hello dies and the Simon Says Stamp Thanks For Being There stamp set. I also used my Big Shot, waxed paper and an iron.

I die cut my sentiments three times and adhered them together to add dimension. 

I have two more cards that I created because you get two for one with this technique. I'll share them in another post. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Mr & Mrs Wedding Album

 

This is my second book using up the leftover paper from the Echo Park Wedding Bliss collection. I also used more of the Recollections flowers and enamel dots on the cover. All the flowers on the cover may be a little overkill, but since I have them, I may as well use them. Besides I can't really use a lot of dimensional embellishments on the inside because this is a pretty compact book. 

Dimensions of this book are: 4-5/8 - inches wide by 8-1/2 - inches tall. There is only one page, a pocked on the inside cover and a waterfall on the back cover. I really enjoy making these smaller books. 

 

The inside pocket holds three of the cut-a-parts from the collection that I've matted. You can see them below. The first side of the one page has two flaps.

 

I left the second side of the page blank. There is a photo mat that pulls out. I forgot to take a photo of it. 

 

I added a sticker from the collection to the back cover with an enamel dot. 

Now I need to get a card made for the design team that I'm on. Then I'm off to start another book!

Thanks for stopping by!

Hello Friend

I have another card for some challenges today! I was actually planning to use this card for the Color Throwdown challenge. After I had published my post and linked to all the challenges I realized I hadn't linked to the one I was originally going to! I thought no big deal, I'll just create a new card since I still had some time.

I had a whole list of challenges to link to and you can only link so many to some of the challenges. Some are unlimited. I tend to try to only link to one or up to three per card. If I had unlimited crafting time I would create one card per challenge, but I don't always have that kind of time unfortunately.

I used a Prima stencil with my Clarity brushes and some Distress Oxide ink to craft my background. I stamped the sentiment with Versafine onyx black ink heat embossed clear embossing powder. All supplies are listed below.

Color Throwdown #458

Addicted To Stamps and More! Challenge #257

Craft Stamper Magazine: Anything Goes Stamping

I've linked my card to the three challenges above. Please take time to check them out. There are some beautiful cards on each blog that their design teams have created. 

Supplies:

Distress Oxide Inks: twisted citron, fossilized amber, candied apple

Prima: Flourish Stencil

Our Daily Bread Designs: double stitched rectangles

Plus 9: Hand Lettered Hello stamp set

Doodle Bug Designs Sprinkles: beetle black, limeade, bumblebee

Thanks for Stopping by!

Spread Kindness

I created this card for two different challenges that I am linking to. The challenge over at CAS(E) this Sketch #234 is a sketch challenge (sketch is below). It's a great sketch!

For the second challenge over at CAS Watercolor Card Challenge, salt is added to the wet watercolor. I've done this technique before and I love the results!

I used three different colors of Kuretake Gansi Tambi on my card panel. While my panel was drying I accidentally got another panel with blue a little too close. There's a tiny bit of blue mixed at the bottom. All supplies are listed below.  For the salt I used table salt and water softener salt. The die is from Sizzix. It's Scribbles & Splat, a Tim Holtz Alterations die. Simon Says Stamp makes the sentiment that I used. 

Supplies:

Cardstock

Stamp - Simon Says Stamp - Uplifting Thoughts

Die - Sizzix - Tim Holtz Alterations Scribbles & Splat

Die - Our Daily Bread Designs - Double Stitched Rectangles

Kuretake Gansai Tambi Water Colours - #51 May Green, #52 Ocean Green, #53 Mid Green

Thanks for stopping by!