The Flower Challenge #37 - Reminder

There's still time to play in our October challenge at The Flower Challenge.

We are being sponsored by CASual Fridays and they are offering the winner of our challenge $25 to be used in their store.  The Design Team is also using CASual Friday stamps.

I colored this cute hot air balloon with Zigs and then added some soft clouds in the background with an MFT stencil.

Be sure to check our what the Design Team and our guest Tina Magnusson have made.  We hope they'll inspire you to make a card for our challenge.

Just Us Girls #483 - Trend Week

Angie has a fun one for us this week at Just Us Girls.

There are a number of ways to do this and you will see many wonderful examples from the Design Team and our guest Christine.  Here's mine.

I marked the 4.25 inch mark on my card and stamped the Altenew daisy half over the top.  It was partial die cut, folded on the mark and the bottom trimmed.  This way it fits into an A2 envelope.  The flower was masked to stamp the stem and then colored with Zigs.  Distress Ink and spatters filled in the background before a sentiment was added.

We hope to see your card in the gallery.  You may be chosen Chic of the Week with a chance to be a guest designer.

Just Us Girls #396

Hello all.  It's word week at Just Us Girls and Ina has chosen die-cuts (hyphenated so it's one word lol).   This should be an easy one because we all own at least a few dies - she says with a sly grin.

I haven't seen what the rest of the team have done yet, and I hope you go over and check out their creations, but I wanted to use my bear from EE and all the little things that go with him.  I even ordered the sentiments last Friday so I could use one of them and by golly Ellen HutsonLLC got them here pronto.

I used a couple of DIs to ink my card base over which I placed the PTI Polaroid die cut stamped with the sentiment.  The bear has four of his buddies in the recycle bin because I could not get the color to come out right.  I did two with Zigs on Bristol and that was a disaster and I don't know why because I usually have such great luck with them.  Number three was my stab at Copics.  I only have a few but they must be too far apart in color because blending just wasn't happening so what is left is just plain brown Copic coloring.  And I'm satisfied with him.  I stamped some of the fish from the set in the water and then die cut the pole and another fish.  (I tried to color it like a Higgins Lake perch, Judy.)

We have Estelle with us this month as our guest designer.  Be sure to check out her card and her blog.

We hope to see your card in the gallery this week.  Get out those dies and start cutting.

ETA:  At Carol's suggestion, I'm sending this card to Inkspirational whose word this week is "Windows".

CAS(E) This Sketch #167

Sometimes it seems the simpler the sketch, the more difficult it is for me to come up with a card.  This week's CAS(E) This Sketch is a prime example. I made a card but it's so-so as far as I'm concerned.

Some colored pencils from Paper Smooches, stamped and clear embossed, make up the main part of the card with a sentiment from HA.

I'm trying to catch up with all the emails from blogs I follow but it may be a hopeless task.  They come in faster than I can comment.  That's a good thing because it means you are all having a wonderful time creating card masterpieces.  But it also means that letting you know how much I enjoy your creativity may be an overwhelming task.  I'll keep plugging away though.

FMS #178 and Inkspirational #73

I went back to my roots a little for this card for Freshly Made Sketches and Inskpirational, whose word prompt is "Note".

My NBUS stamp set from Paper Smooches has this little typewriter and the sentiment, both stamped in HA Cup O' Joe with clear embossing on the typewriter to give it sort of a metallic look.  The patterned paper with type and it's reverse side were in my stash.  All it needed was some Distress Ink in Frayed Burlap around the edges of everything.

I'm still working on my organization.  I printed sentiments and filed a ton of cards that were just sitting on my shelf.  I saw what I thought was an empty envelope box only to discover over 20 Christmas cards I made earlier in the year.  I found another half dozen in the box marked "Congrats/Anniversary/Holiday".  It looks like I'm well on my way for Christmas 2015.

Thanks for stopping by.  Your visits and comments are always appreciated.

TCC #2, MUSE #52 and FM #121

Happy Groundhogs's Day!  Bah humbug!! I don't think many people around here are very happy about six more weeks of winter.  I don't really believe in all the hype but I am realistic.  I just hope it's not quite as bitterly cold as it has been.

On the upside, the cold and snow gave me a chance to spend time in my craft room and I have three cards for you today.  I don't usually show that many in one post but the deadlines are tomorrow.

First up: MUSE and this inspiration by Marion Vagg.

My brother's 65th birthday is next week so I made him this.  I was inspired by the chevron frame and the colorful element in the corner.

Next is The Card Concept.

This one had me stumped so I'm just under the wire with my Clean and Layered card.

The last one is for Freshly Made Sketches.

I know my proportions aren't right for the sketch but I wanted to use this NBUS stamp set.

I may have time to get another card finished before we head off to a Super Bowl party.  If you are a football fan, I hope you enjoy the game and the team you are rooting for wins.  Go Broncos!!

Thanks for stopping by and happy crafting.

-----------------------------------
Card 1
Frame: Fabulous Finds Cricut cartridge
Candles: PTI Wishes Come True
Sentiment: PTI Birthday Bash

Card 2
Embossing folders:  Bubble and Distress Stripes
Sentiment: Hero Arts Everyday Sayings

Card 3
Stamp and dies:  PTI Button Boutique
Punch:  EK Success 2" circle
Other:  UTEE embossing powder, embroidery floss

Retro Sketches #81

Quick post for Retro Sketches

This is my kind of card.  The paper is from a variety of pads, the sentiment from Hero Arts and the stamp die and stamp from My Craft Spot.  I inked everything with Walnut Distress Ink.

Thanks for stopping by and may the bits and pieces of your life fall into place.

LIM 114 & RS 58

I've been a card making fool the last few days.  It's still raining so I sequestered myself in my craft room and created away.  I know once the weather breaks, there will be spring cleaning and other such things to get in the way.

My first card is for Less is More - use lime and black.  Wonderful color combo in my opinion - but then everything goes with black.

The cut is from Lyrical Letters.  I cut it once in lime and then again in white, cutting off the flowers and attaching them to the green.  The banner is a new die cut I got from Simon Says Stamp and stamped with a Hero Arts sentiment.  Both of these are things I ordered after taking the Pattern Play class.

This next card is for Retro Sketches.

I've had this 8 x 8 paper pack from PTI called Library Ledger for some time and thought it would be perfect to use for this sketch.  The stamp is from Hero Arts and the notebook punch from Fiskars.  It needed a little something on the right (like the button in the sketch) and I found this paper clip cut on Fabulous Finds.  Perfect!   I don't want to tell you how many tries it took to line up the stamp with the lines in the paper.  Too many even with a stamp press.

Thanks for stopping by.  I hope the day is sunny and bright where you are.

Sharpened Pencils

Here's the sketch for Freshly Made this week.

There have been some "Back to School" challenges recently and the first thing I thought of when I saw this sketch was pencils.  Crazy, huh? 

Part of my driving force when creating a card is the sentiment.  I don't make cards that I won't use so I didn't want a school card.  My "Just a Note" stamp was perfect.  I made the pencils by hand, coloring them with brush markers.  I don't have Copics or anything like that, and don't intend to get into them, but I think the color came out well anyway.  The paper is from PTI's Library Ledger, punched with Fiskars Notebook punch and popped up on Kraft cardstock.  I had this all made and was loving it when I looked at the sketch again and saw that they had an extra colored panel on one end.  I didn't have anything that would look good there, so I'm taking creative liberty and leaving it off.

Stamps?

When I saw this sketch from Mojo Monday, I immediately thought of postage stamps for some reason.  Maybe because I just got a postage punch?  ( I didn't even use it for this.)   And what goes better with stamps than postcards. 

The background paper, with light writing on it, is from MMI Lost and Found.  I used the middle of the paper to cut the postage stamp background with MS Seasonal Cake cartridge.  It's actually a font but I hid the contours of the letters with DS.  I fussy cut some other paper from Lost and Found that looked like images you would find on stamps.  They are barely visible but I rather liked that look.  There's a crown, bird and bike.  The postcard section is cut from a photo stack and everything is aged with Antique Linen Distress Ink.  I wrapped the twine from My Craft Spot to look like a stack of cards (?).  This could be used for a regular note card or almost any occasion with the right sentiment inside.

Monogram Note Card

It's always nice to have a little note card that you can send a personal message on.  I thought that by combining the sketch from Freshly Made and the monogram challenge from My Sheri Crafts, I could have a really nice note card.  Here's the sketch.

And here's my card.

All the paper is from the MME Lost and Found collection.  I LOVE that stack!!  The monogram is cut from the Sophisticated cartridge and everything is inked with Frayed Burlap Distress Ink.

Anything Goes Challenge

Cricut Creative Cutter Room has a challenge this week called "Anything Goes - make it at the last minute".  The only catch is that you cannot link to any other challenge.  The premise is that you have something to make in a hurry and don't have time to search challenges to post it on.  Here's my card.

I thought this paper from a photo stack from DCWV just screamed "Write me a note."  So I cut "Just a Note" from Lyrical Letters in dark brown and matted the paper in dark green, both colors in the printed paper.  Quick and easy.