Sketchbook Saturday 9

Today I went to the bridal shower for my cousin's fiancee.  Tomorrow I will go to their wedding and though I made a card for the occasion many weeks ago, I didn't really like it.  So when I got home from the shower, I was determined to sequester myself in my stamp room until I made something that I liked.

I checked out a bunch of sketches and then I realized that the Sketchbook Saturday challenge just might fit the bill!

I took a bit of liberty with the sketch so that in my card the main image layer is not as wide as the layer in the sketch.  (I hope this doesn't disaqualify me).

I had this very cute stamp of a bride and groom so I really wanted to use it for my card.  I embossed the bride and groom as well as the sentiment in copper embossing powder since that seemed to match the colors the bride and groom had chosen.  I'm actually basing the colors of my card on the colors of the wedding invitation that I got.  It was mostly blue and a deep shimmery brown and I had some cardstock that seemed to be pretty close to the colors of the invitation.  I thought it would be a good idea to make a card that coordinated with that.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

Color Throwdown 139 and Stampin Royalty 69

The color challenge this week at the Color Throwdown was all about colors that I love!  And (as a bonus) I got to dig out the retired (but still awesome) Crushed Curry.  I paired it with the Stampin' Royalty sketch challenge and I was all set to go!

I ended up making a card in the very adorable 4 1/4" square size.  I really like this size for a square card because the size itself is so cute and also it fits into a regular A2 envelope so you avoid the postage surcharge when mailing a square envelope.

I stamped the butterfly image directly onto the white layer, then stamped it again on a scrap and cut it out.  I attached the cutout with a glue dot directly over the image I stamped on the white layer and raised the edges so in real life it is 3D. 

And I'm rather pleased with myself because I actually managed to use all five colors in the challenge.  The challenge hostess suggested that we use at least three or four colors, so I'm pretty happy that I managed to squeeze them all in.  The colors look pretty close in the picture, but the scallop panel and ribbon is Dusty Durango and the "Love is like a butterfly..." sentiment is Tangerine Tango.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

Color Lab Challenge 39

I'm not sure where my brain has been this week!  It's definitely not here with me.  Thursday is, of course, ColorLab challenge day and I usually have my post scheduled in advance to post when I'm still sleeping!  But for some reason this week, I completely forgot about it.  But better late than never!

What fabulous colors Julie has for the challenge this week.  And here's my card:

I had some pumpkin pie designer paper from the retired Island Oasis paper pack which I thought would make a cute background for my card base.  And I think it's been a few days since I've used my Fabulous Florets stamp set.  I'm pretty sure I was suffering from withdrawal, so I figured the only cure was to take it out and stamp with it!

Thanks for stopping by today.  And don't forget to head on over to the ColorLab and check out this color challenge as well as the inspiration from the design team.  We'd love to see what you do!

ColourQ 82 and Sketchbook Saturday 8

There's a whole lot of green goodness going on over at the ColourQ this week.

Isn't it wonderful?  It is if you like green (which I do).  And that little bit of Baja Breeze is a perfect complement.  I was anxious to try this challenge, so I quickly chose the Sketchbook Saturday as a layout for my card.

I think I have a weakness for scallop circles because I always seem to want to make cards with them!  I thought this was interesting because the bottom of the circles is hidden.

The stamped image I used is a little bit outside of what I normally choose.  It's from the Flower For All Seasons stamp set.  I got it as a freebie during Sale-A-Bration because it seemed like a good stamp set for watercoloring.  I don't watercolor all that often, but every time I see a card that is watercolored, I love it.  This is the first time I've used this set and I actually colored most of the image with my blender pens, so I'm not sure that is technically considered watercoloring.  There are three other images in the set, so hopefully they'll see some ink as the seasons progress!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today.

MOJO 188 and Picture Perfect Creations 56

I love the color blue, so there was no way I was going to miss participating in the Picture Perfect Creations color challenge this week.  I paired the color challenge with the MOJO sketch challenge.

The last MOJO challenge of the of the month is always a choice between a round or square card and this month I've chosen square.

Luckily I had some scraps from the Urban Garden designer paper, which had both Not Quite Navy and Baha Breeze among its pages, so I was able to use them here.  That beautiful butterfly is from the Simple Frienship stamp set that I have been eyeing for some time and finally decided to buy!  I inked it up in Pear Pizzazz then embossed it with clear embossing powder to make it a little more special!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

SSSC114 and Stamping 411 Color Inspiration 155

The Color Inspiration challenge this week at the Stamping 411 blog had me stumped.

But I generally don't like to say "no" to a color challenge so I figured I better get to work on something!  Enter the Sweet Sunday sketch challenge.

Individually, I like all of these colors.  But contemplate putting them all together on one card and I may start to panic!  In the end, I think I played it a little bit safe as you shall see.

Once again I've chosen the Fabulous Florets stamp set for my main image panel.  It makes lovely flowers in any color you can imagine.  I really, really tried to use something else here, but I just couldn't find anything that I liked half as much, so I played it safe and created flowers using Pacific Point and Tangerine Tango.  Against a background of Riding Hood Red, I think this makes a lovely card for Mother's Day.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

Paper Players 44

Happy Easter everyone!

Today I'm heading over to my sister's for Easter dinner, but I wanted to get this card posted before I left.  This week Lesley has a wonderful sketch challenge for us over at the Paper Players.

This is my last week as the Guest Designer at the Paper Players.  Over the last month, it's been a lot of fun challenging myself as I made cards for all of their challenges.  I'm sure I've said it before, but I really believe that participating in challenges makes us all think outside of our "box" and try something that we wouldn't ordinarily try.  All of the Paper Players ladies are so talented and so wonderfully supportive and I'm glad I got to spend this last month with them.  I look forward to participating in their future challenges!

So on to my card for this week's sketch challenge.

This was inspired by a thank you note that I received recently.  The colors in the note reminded me of Soft Suede, Rose Red, and Regal Rose so that's what I chose for my card.  I used Rose Red, Regal Rose, and Pear Pizzazz to color directly on one of the stamps from the Just Believe stamp set.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoy a wonderful holiday with your family and friends today!

Friday Mashup 3 Wedding Card

This week the oh-so talented Lesley is the hostess over at the Friday Mashup blog.  Her challenge for us this week is to create a black and white card, a square card or to mash it up and combine the two.

My sister is going to a wedding at the end of the month and asked me to make her a wedding card.  I had been kicking a few ideas around in my head, but this challenge sealed the deal.

I decided to mash it up and combine the two challenges.  I wanted to do something a little unusual for my card, so I spent some time thinking about how I could make this card interesting.  Many years ago at a workshop at my friend Patti's house (hi Patti!!) we made a card using the technique I used here.  I stamped the background image (which is a retired background stamp called Floral) in white craft ink onto basic black cardstock.  Then using a stipple brush, I went over it with Pearl Ex.  The Pearl Ex creates this shimmery, iradescent look that doesn't really show up in the photo.  I sprayed hairspray on it to seal it and voila!  A very cool background!

I hope my sister likes it, but if not that's ok.  I've got a bunch of weddings to go to this summer so I'm sure I can use it for one of those.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

PPA90 and ColourQ 81

Sadly, my vacation is just about at an end.  After today I've still got the weekend, but in my book that doesn't count because I don't work on the weekend anyway.  So I've got to make the most of the rest of today.  I think I'm off to a good start since I decided to make a card combining the Pals Paper Arts sketch challenge with the ColourQ color challenge.

I'm not sure what those little guys in the ColourQ picture are, but they're awfully cute!  I used similar colors for a card I made yesterday, but this one uses the retired Soft Sky.  Luckily, I still have some of that card stock hanging around.

I even had some Soft Sky designer paper left over that I used for the large layer.  It's nice to be able to use that up!

I had this card stamped and was getting ready to glue it all together, when I realized that I stamped the pink floral images in Blushing Bride instead of Pink Pirouette.  Ack!  I blame it all on how I've got my markers stored (because no way, could it be my fault!!).  You see, I keep the In Colors separate from the regular colors.  Pink Pirouette started out as an In Color and I must have thought it still was, because I just grabbed the pink marker that was with the rest of the In Color ones.  Luckily I got it all sorted out before I put everything together!  Disaster averted!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

Color Lab Challenge 38

The colors for the challenge this week at the ColorLab are so sweet!

I mananged to take a one-day vacation from the new Fabulous Florets stamp set, but with my card today it's back!

I'm lucky that I still have quite a bit of designer paper from the Sweet Pea paper pack which includes this fabulous background paper.  Then I dug around in my stash and found some Certainly Celery buttons.  And they're so cute because they're square!

I've been on vacation this week and as luck would have it, the weather has been kind of lousy.  Why is it that the sun only seems to shine when I'm at work?  I'm sure that next week, when I'm hard at work tapping at my keyboard it will be 70-degrees and sunny!

Thanks for stopping by.  And don't forget to head on over to the ColorLab and try out this color challenge.  It's bright and sunny, even if the weather where you are isn't!!

Color Throwdown 138 and MOJO187

How about a color challenge where I get to pick one of the colors?  How cool is that?  Well, that's part of the challenge this week at the Color Throwdown.  We get to use navy, white and a color of our choice.  It only took a fraction of a second for me to decide what color I was going to use.  And another fraction of a second to decide on the MOJO sketch for my layout.

As I was putting my card together I realized that I hadn't used Night of Navy in ages.  Yet another reason that participating in color challenges is a good idea.  They make me remember to use colors I have been neglecting.

As you can see I chose Crumb Cake as my other color.  So I've got a color that I use all the time paired with a color that I haven't used in a long time.  A very happy combo, I think!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today! 

Sweet Sunday 113 and SPCC 96

On Sunday, I left for a short trip to Long Island to visit my niece.  To save time on the drive down there, I take the ferry from New London, Connecticut to Orient Point, New York.  It's a nice way to break up the driving and saves a lot of time.  It's only and hour and twenty minute ferry ride, you're never out of sight of land and usually it's a very pleasant trip.  However, on Saturday we had a bit of unsettled weather and the after effects on the sea were something else.  There were white caps on the waves, the sound of the waves hitting the ferry were loud enough to have me spontaneously saying words I shouldn't be saying in public, and I generally felt like I was being tossed around the ocean like the crew of the SS Minnow!  (Remember Gilligan's Island anyone)?

Despite that, the visit with my niece was very nice and the ferry ride home was thankfully uneventful.  But when I got home I decided to venture into my stamp room and try to get back in the groove of things.  I felt a little out of sorts at first, but I finally settled on making a card for the Sweet Sunday sketch challenge and the Scrapmaster's Paradise color challenge.

I really tried to use a different stamp set than my brand new (not yet released) Fabulous Florets stamp set.  I really did.  I even stamped one of the flowers from the Fifth Avenue set before I decided that it just didn't look right and I not-so-reluctantly decided to use the Fabulous Florets instead.

I'm not keeping count, but I'm pretty sure that just about every card I've made lately has been made with this stamp set.  I had a feeling that I would like it, but even I'm a little surprised at how much I like it!  I think it's become the spring-time version of my favorite fall stamp set, French Foliage!

I thought I was running just a tiny bit low on the basic pearls that I normally use on my butterfly cutouts, so on this butterfly I used some Liquid Pearls.  I really like Liquid Pearls and I have them in bunches of colors, but the downside is that they take a long time to dry.  I had to make sure that I took this photo of this card fairly quickly because I didn't want the round pearls to run.  Then I have to set the card aside, lay it flat and just keep it that way until it dries.  It's a little inconvenient, but it's an inexpensive way to add pearl accents to your cards.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

Paper Players 43

This week Jaydee's got a really awesome clean and simple sketch challenge at the Paper Players for you to try.

It's no surprise that I'm a huge fan of CAS cards.  There's something about all that white space (even if it isn't white) that really speaks to me.  And with a great sketch like this one, you can really make it talk with color (like I think I did on my card) or you can showcase a really fabulous stamp.

I also liked the colors this week at the Color Throwdown.  The yellow and the teal looked very pretty together.  I don't have any Summer Sun anymore so I substituted Daffodil Delight.  I seem to be using that quite a bit lately.  It must be a subconscious desire to finally have spring make an appearance and stick around a bit!

Well I'm off to Long Island to visit my niece for a few days.  Hopefully the weather  will cooperate.  I've already told her I'm not leaving until we go to the Canal Cafe and have their oh-so-delicious lobster roll!

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to head on over to the Paper Players and give this sketch challenge a try.  The design team has some amazing creations to inspire you!

Sketchbook Saturday 6

As expected, I'm really loving the Fabulous Florets stamp set that is in the new, soon to be released, Summer Mini catalog.  And I'm also loving the new embossing powders that are just tailor-made for this stamp set.  The other day, I played around with the Tangerine Tango ep and for my card today I tried the Melon Mambo.  I've been stamping with Stampin' Up! products long enough that I remember when the catalog carried bunches of embossing powders in a variety of colors and I was sorry to see them retired.  So it's nice to see them back again, and as usual, the quality is excellent!

A few weeks back I discovered a new sketch challenge, Saturday Sketchbook.  This week, the sketch was too cute to pass up!

I challenged myself a little bit with this card.  I used designer paper that was covered with flowers in Pacific Point.  This is one color that I only use sporadically (at best), but it's really quite lovely and I am resolved to use it more often.  I wanted to use the new Beyond the Garden dp so I purposely chose one of the images that was all about Pacific Point, and I'm very glad I did.  I actually think I like it very much!  It's a color that is very far outside of the colors that I normally use, but that's what this stamping journey is all about, right?  You never know if you're going to like something until you try it!

Thanks for stopping by today! 

Color Lab Challenge 37

Thursday is ColorLab challenge day!  I hope you can join us to create something with these fabulous colors!

For my card, I decided to do a birthday card.  I always seem to run out of those!  Rose Red and Regal Rose seem to want to inspire me to do some kind of floral card, but I make tons of those already so I really wanted to challenge myself to do something a little different.  I thought the latest MOJO sketch was quite interesting so that's what I used for my layout.

I ended up combining some designer paper from the Sweet Pea designer pack and a retired 6x6 pack called Patterns Pack II to make a birthday card.  The Always Artichoke provided some nice contrast to the layers and I'm pretty pleased with how this turned out!

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to pop on over to the ColorLab and check out the challenge this week.  The design team has some great inspiration for you!

PPC55 Color Challenge

The color challenge this week at Picture Perfect Creations is what I consider to be a nice combo for a masculine card.  I hardly ever make those, so it's a nice change for me!

I'm not sure why I always seem to associate a beautiful color like Not Quite Navy with a masculine card, but I do.  And for some reason I also seem to reach for the Seeing Stars stamp set, when I need to make one.  It's a very versatile set for kid's card, masculine cards, or even patriotic cards.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

ColourQ 80

The big brown truck arrived at my house today and dropped off a box full of SU! goodies!!  To celebrate, I broke out one of my new stamps sets and got to work on the ColourQ challenge.

I have a love/hate relationship with color challenges that include Kiwi Kiss.  I love them because Kiwi Kiss is (in my opinion) one of the best greens Stampin' Up! ever came out with.  I hate them, because I'm down to one full sheet plus some scraps for the sum total of my Kiwi Kiss cardstock supply and I hate to part with it!  But I'm a slave to these color challenges so I used a small scrap for my card.

One of the stamp sets I got today is the Fabulous Florets set in the new Summer Mini.  I knew the minute I saw it that I had to have it.  The combination of solid flowers and outlined flowers is very versatile and I think I'll be reaching for this set quite a bit.  For this card I went with a Tangerine Tango flower and as expected it looks very pretty!  The layout I chose for this card is one from "the binder."  It's from the Taylored Expressions sketchbook, which used to be a Friday sketch challenge, but I think is now defunct.

Thanks for stopping by today!

SSSC112 and Stamping 411 Color Inspiration 154

As usual on Sunday, I check out the Sweet Sunday sketch challenge.  Then I began hunting around for a color challenge to go with it.  I remembered that the Stamping 411 blog has a sketch challenge too and the colors were pretty awesome, so I combined the two.

Pretty early on I knew that I wanted to use flowers in place of the stars on the sketch graphic.  The dilemma was which one.  I tossed around a few ideas then I spied one of my all time favorites:  the flower from the long-retired Best Blossoms stamp set.

I'm fairly certain that I will always have this stamp set.  If only to keep my hands on this fabulous flower.  I rarely use any of the other stamps in the set, but that's okay because this flower makes up for it.  I'm not sure why I love it so much, but I do!

I think this is the first time I've participated in the Stamping 411 color inspiration challenge and the funny thing is, that I almost messed it up.  The card was made, I was almost done typing this post when I looked again at the graphic for the challenge and realized that I completely forgot the Chocolate Chip!  What's a girl to do?  Well, I pried off the Always Artichoke buttons that I had adhered to the card and put some Chocolate Chip ones on instead.  Whew!  That was a close one!

Thanks for stopping by!

Paper Players 42

Today we've got a wonderful color challenge for you at the Paper Players!

We've been enjoying some fabulous spring time temperatures here in Massachusetts so I'm in a springy mood.  And Poppy Parade is such a fabulous red, well suited for spring.  It fell right into my plans to make a nice floral card for the challenge.

I wish I had more Baja Breeze designer paper.  The one I've used here as my background is an oldie but goodie from the Urban Garden paper pack from a few years ago.  The color is quite soothing to me and helped to set a nice soft tone for my card, which I then kicked up a notch with the splash of Poppy Parade.  I love doing that.  Your eye is immediately drawn to the dramatic flower as it takes center stage against the soft background.  And I think the vintage brad, just sort of finishes off the look.

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to head on over to the Paper Players and give this color challenge a try.  The design team has some amazing creations to inspire you!

FTL135 and a New Friday Mashup Challenge

I feel like I'm behind on my projects.  Last night I opted to go see my nephew compete in the "Mr. Easton" contest.  It was a  tongue-in-cheek spoof of "pageants."  For his formal wear he wore a kilt, and for his "talent" he did his own spoof of a Saturday Night Live skit where he pretended to play the saxophone...badly.  It was great fun, and he ended up coming in third place!  The weather here today was too fine to spend cooped up in the house, so it wasn't until evening before I set foot in my stamp room!

The Friday Mashup challenge has moved to a new site, so I thought I'd participate in their inaugural challenge to use butterflies with dimension.

A little help from the FTL sketch challenge and I was off!

The Cottage Wall designer paper I used actually has butterflies already on it, but as luck would have it the scrap I used didn't have any showing.  But that's okay because I cut two from the Sizzix Beautiful Butterflies die.  I embossed the Old Olive one with the Perfect Polka Dots embossing folder and stamped the Rich Razzleberry one with the Fine Flourish stamp.  I finished them off with a tiny row of pearls.  Once I finished it, I thought it would make a perfect mother's day card, so I embossed that sentiment with white embossing powder.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

PPA88

Springtime continues with a wonderful color challenge at the Pals Paper Arts blog.

When I first contemplated this challenge, I thought of the of the Greenhouse Gala dsp because it had both Daffodil Delight and Pear Pizzazz amongst its pages.  And of course, since the challenge also included Crumb Cake, I was completely incapable of not participating!

I ended up lightly sponging the edges of the leaves so that they would show up a little better against the desigher paper.  This is one of those card that I love: the one with no sentiment so that I can add one later to suit whatever occasion I need.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

Color Lab 36

The more I use Poppy Parade, the more I like it, so I was happy to see it in this week's ColorLab challenge.

It's a very interesting red.  It's bright without being too over-powering and has a deep color well suited to practically all of my floral stamps.  I think it looks particularly good with the stamp set I chose here, Greenhouse Garden.

And look how great it looks with Early Expresso! 

The only thing I don't like here is the flower in the middle that seems to be floating around like an astronaut in space!  I don't know what I was thinking...Oh well.  Too late to change it now.  Even still, I do love the flowers with the Early Espresso accents in the center.

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to head on over to the ColorLab.  The design team has some great inspiration for you and I hope you have a chance to play along with us.

Color Throwdown 136

The colors for the Color Throwdown challenge this week are very soft.  And the more I looked at them, the more I liked them.

And it was nice to use Soft Sky again.  I even found some old designer paper called Afternoon Tea that had a pretty pattern in Soft Sky.

I started out trying to follow the sketch challenge at Splitcoast, but almost right away I veered off course and did something different.  I happened to find a card on my desk that I had made a while back that had a scallop border I made from circles like this.  I thought it looked pretty good, so I decided to try that again.  It's fun and gives the card a sort of light an airy look.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have time to stamp today!

SSSC111 Bridal Shower Card

I have to go to a bridal shower at the end of the month, and I actually managed to get an early start on the card!  (That almost never happens to me)!  When I first started making this card, I didn't intend it to be for this shower, but as I was going along I realized that the colors I chose are very similar to the wrapping paper I already bought for the gift, so I thought it would be nice to have a matching card.  The Sweet Sunday sketch challenge provided the very cute layout.

This is such a lovely sentiment to use for two people just starting their journey together.  I also used it on an anniversary card once, and I think it's a great sentiment for that too.  For the newlyweds, it shows them a glimpse of the future, and for the long-married, it affirms what they already know.  Sweet!

Thanks for stopping by today and I hope you have time to stamp today!