Let it Be - DS144 & CTD285

One thing after another prevented me from getting into my craft room this week.  I finally sat down Friday night to make a card using the Deconstructed Sketch and the colors from Color Throwdown, but a cat-tastrophy prevented me from finishing it (more on that later).  Anyway, a rainy Saturday afternoon found me with some time to finish the card so here it is.

I love these colors and as soon as I saw them I knew I had to participate in the challenge.  Originally I planned to die-cut some leaves out of Pear Pizzazz and put those behind my layered flower but I changed my mind and decided to using my translucent embossing paste to add some leaves instead.  This is where the cat-tastrophy begins.  I was carefully applying the embossing paste over my leaf stencil when one of my cats jumped up onto my craft table.  I thought she was going to jostle the stencil so I must have made a noise or a motion or something that startled her because the next thing I know she's running away and manages to insert her foot in my jar of embossing paste!  What ensued was me running around the house trying to catch her so that I could wipe the embossing paste off her foot before it hardened!

She can be quite wiggly when she wants, but I finally got her calm enough that I was able to get the majority of the paste off before she licked it all off.  By the time that happened I was pooped had no desire to finish my card so I put it off until Saturday.  Cats, sheesh!

Thanks for sticking with me for the cat story!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Secret Garden (SU); Let It Be (Verve)

Paper:  Sahara Sand, Early Espresso, Blushing Bride, Whisper White (SU)

Ink:  Early Espresso, Blushing Bride (SU)

Accessories:  Turning a New Leaf die (Papertrey Ink); Secret Garden die (SU); Translucent Embossing Paste (Dreamweaver); Bluebell Smile enamel dots (My Mind's Eye)

Freshly Made Sketches 129

Hello hello!!  Today I'm the hostess at Freshly Made Sketches and as per our usual, the sketch is fresh and clean!  Of course there's lots of room to let your creativity soar and I can't wait to see how you interpret the sketch.  On my card I inked up some new Jofy stamps that have been on my wish list since I spotted them ages ago.  I stumbled across a retailer in the US who sells them and snatched up a few sets.

My card is further inspired by the gorgeous card Lyndal Higgins has created for inspiration at Muse.  The beautiful shades of blue combined with the pop of yellow inspired me to dig out my Crushed Curry, Midnight Muse and Vellum.  I colored the images with pencils and I love how it turned out.

ETA:  And thanks to Cornelia who pointed out to me that the button on my card qualifies me for the CAS challenge at House of Cards.  Thanks Cornelia!

You have GOT to check out the cards the amazing Freshly Made Sketches design team has created with my sketch.  They will blow you away!  I can't tell you how fortunate I am to be a part of this group who inspire me so much every day.  And I'm quite sure they inspire you too!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Jofy 12, Jofy 14 (Jofy)

Paper:  Crushed Curry, Midnight Muse, Whisper White, Vellum (SU)

Ink:  Crushed Curry (SU); Tuxedo  Black (Memento); Onyx Black (Versafine); colored pencils (American Crafts)

Accessories:  Woodland Park button (October Afternoon); clear embossing powder, crochet thread

colourQ 234

Ready for another gorgeous palette from colourQ?  This week the colors come to you from this pretty hair comb.  The flowers on the comb inspired me to make a little spring-time floral card.

The week 3 sketch at Viva La Verve had some interesting layers which I thought would work well with these colors.  For the little circle layer I found myself wishing I had a doily die (or even some doilies) but then I started looking through my dies and found this "circle burst" one.  The light bulb went off and I cut the Coastal Cabana card stock with it just behind where the tag sits.

I don't know about you, but I was hoping that the end of March would find some signs of spring here in New England.  Not so!  Not only is it still quite chilly, there's a big snow storm headed this way for Wednesday.  As is often the case, the forecast is a bit undecided since the track of the storm could change, but some folks around here might see a foot of snow!  Yuck!  I think I'm one of the lucky ones who will only get a few inches, but any snow is too much in my book!

Don't forget to check out the lovely cards made by the colourQ design team.  Lots of inspiration there!!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Bloom & Grow, Dream Big, Sweet Scallop Tag (Verve)

Ink:  Smoky Slate, Calypso Coral (SU)

Paper:  Classic White (Flourishes); Coastal Cabana, Apricot Appeal, Whisper White, Apricot Appeal DSP (SU)

Accessories:  Sweet Scallop Tag die, Elegant Leaves die (Verve); Small Circle Burst die (Memory Box); Basic Gray satin ribbon (SU); Cute Enamel Dots (My Minds Eye)

Cardabilities 95 and Dynamic Duos 95

I'm back from my recent Scottish adventure and figured I better get back into my craft room before I forgot how to make a card!  Cardabilities is on sketch 95 and coincidentally Dynamic Duos is on their 95th challenge too so I thought that was a very good reason to put them together.

Cardabilities sketches always make me wish I was a different kind of card-maker.  While I tend to a more clean and simple style their sketches make me want to grunge and layer it all up!  I did a little bit of that here with some sponged and stamped images plus some added leaf and butterfly dies.

I feel like I'm all turned around since I got home from my trip.  Yesterday I basically got nothing done except a quick trip to the grocery store.  Today I've got to get my act together and then it's back to work tomorrow.  It's so hard to come back to reality after vacation!  Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Take Note (Verve); Stitched Together (Close to My Heart); JM16 (Jofy)

Paper:  Classic White (Flourishes); Neenah Solar White; Rich Razzleberry (SU); Lavender Moon (Papertrey Ink)

Ink:  Soft Sky, Rich Razzleberry (SU)

Accessories:  Dot Fade stencil (Tim Holtz); Lorelai Leaf die, Lorelai Outline Leaf die (Poppystamps); Leanna Butterfly die (Simon Says Stamp); Banner Trio die (WPlus9); Metallic Art pencils (SU)

Freshly Made Sketches 128

Hi all!  It's time for a brand new sketch from your friends at Freshly Made Sketches and this week Rita is our hostess.  The sketch is classic and wide open to interpretation so I know you will love it!

Last week I mentioned a couple of retired SU colors that I really miss, so for my card this week I used one of them:  Baja Breeze.  It really is one of the best blues, in my opinion, and I really, really wish it would come back.  I don't have a whole lot of card stock left but I used a bit here.  I stamped the pretty feathers in Baja Breeze ink and they don't really show up in the photo.  They look much better in real life.

The bottom of my card features some burlap ribbon just because I love the texture and I thought it would be a fun alternative to some DSP.  And I outlined it all in black because things always look better that way!

I'm still in Scotland but due to the wonders of modern technology I scheduled this post last Friday.  I assume I'm having a good time but I'm pretty sure that I miss my stamping stuff!  Anyway, the ladies at Freshly Made Sketches are probably busy stamping away without me and I know they've created some amazing cards for this challenge so be sure to check them out.

Supplies:

Stamps:  Fancy Feathers (Clearly Besotted Stamps)

Paper:  Kraft (Avery Elle), Basic Black, Baja Breeze (SU)

Ink:  Baja Breeze (SU), Onyx Black (Versafine)

Accessories:  Burlap ribbon (SU); Kraft Vintage button (Papertrey Ink); Into the Woods sequins (Lawn Fawn)

colourQ 233 and Seize the Sketch 16

Happy Tuesday!  Today I've got an exciting blend of color and sketch!  The colors are the latest gorgeous palette from colourQ inspired by this bedding and the sketch is brought to you by the uber talented Jen Nelson for Seize the Sketch.  So let's get to it!

My supply of Going Gray is dwindling and I don't know where to find a substitute.  (If you know of one, I'd love to hear about it).  It's a lovely gray and I chose to use it for my card base here.  I thought that Indigo Island looked pretty fantastic next to it, especially once I added the stripes done in translucent embossing paste.  However, in true form, I discovered that once my card was made I had left off the banners on the sketch so improvised by using some hardware and ribbon on the opposite side of the square layer.

My teamies at colourQ and Seize the Sketch have got some projects that are designed to amaze and delight you into joining us this week in our challenges.  And this week we welcome two new designers to our Seize the Sketch team!  Katie Melhus and Lee Ann Barrett!  Be sure to pop on by their blogs and say Hi!!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Summer Silhouettes (SU); Truth Is (CAS-ual Fridays Stamps)

Paper:  Going Gray, Island Indigo, Lucky Limeade, Whisper White (SU)

Ink:  Lucky Limeade, Calypso Coral, Basic Gray (SU)

Accessories:  Diagonal Stripes stencil (Simon Says Stamp), Translucent embossing paste (Dreamweaver); Pewter Hodgepodge Hardware, Mistletoe ribbon (SU); Gray baker's twine (Doodlebug Designs)

Online Card Class Homework

I signed up for the latest Online Card Class for one layer clean and simple cards.  One of the first lessons was to embed die cut shapes into your card stock so that the result is still a one layer card.  The instructor for the class advised keeping a bowl close to keep all the little bits that have to be fit onto your card like puzzle pieces and I can't stress enough what good advice this is!

For my card I combined the uber-cool color combo from The Paper Players with Chupa's not-so-new Sketchbook Saturday sketch.  She's already moved onto to #117 and I'm stuck on #116.  Go figure!

You'll see what I mean about all the little fiddly-bits if you look at where the end of the "thanks" die cut is in relation to the little yellow flower.  There were a lot of teeny-tiny pieces that I needed to keep track of in order to fit them back in to my puzzle card. 

I'll be taking a bit of a stamping vacation over the next week as I'm leaving for Scotland on Saturday.  I am anticipating going through some sort of stamping withdrawal, but hopefully I'll recover quickly when I get back home!  I've got a couple of posts scheduled for next week so I won't be completely out of touch, but if you don't see me around, you'll know why!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Paper:  Smoky Slate, Crushed Curry, Marina Mist (SU)

Accessories:  Thanks die (Simon Says Stamp); Beautiful Blooms die (Papertrey Ink)

Freshly Made Sketches 127

This week at Freshly Made Sketches our hostess is Jennifer Timko and she has designed a great sketch with a trendy banner!  Oh, I love the banner!  It's perfect for this subway-style stamp!

I combined this sketch with the super-cool color inspiration at The Card Concept for my clean and layered card.  I've been on a bit of green kick lately and for this card I used some of my precious Kiwi Kiss card stock and DSP.  And combining the green with the espresso is an ooh-la-la moment for me!  A color combo for the books, I say to myself!  

Hopefully you have time to join us this week at Freshly Made Sketches.  Every week we've got so many crafters joining our challenge - those joining us for the first time and those that are with us every week.  We love all of you!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Let It Be (Verve)

Paper:  Early Espresso, Kiwi Kiss, Whisper White, Urban Oasis DSP (SU)

Ink:  Early Espresso

Accessories:  Cambridge Court enamel dots (My Minds Eye)

colourQ 232

Now you might think that the new color palette from colourQ is perfect for a St. Patrick's Day card, but since I did that last week I thought this week I'd try a little floral theme.  Nothing like a bit of green to get me in the mood to take out a leafy stamp, especially when the green is one of my most favorite of all!

I hadn't quite forgiven Stampin' Up! for retiring Kiwi Kiss when they came out with Lucky Limeade.  It was a good substitute but then they got rid of that one too.  I don't know what they've got against greens like this but I think they should bring one of them back.  Along with Baja Breeze.  Just sayin'.  Anyway, I carefully hoard my supply of card stock of both but I'm happy to use them when I get the chance.

My card today uses the layout from CAS(E) This Sketch and incorporates a little something different for colourQ:  newsprint!  It makes such a wonderful background so I stamped a few leafy sprigs onto it then followed it up with a fussy cut flower and some black sequins.

I bet you've got some newsprint buried in your stash somewhere, and if not you can probably create some pretty easily on your own just by googling images for newsprint or by creating some with stamps you've already got.  And when you've got some head on over to colourQ and join us for this challenge!  The design team has got some beauties to share with you this week!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Summer Silhouettes (SU); Textures 2 (Florileges Design); Poppy Birthday (Verve)

Paper:  Kraft (Avery Elle); Basic Black, Whisper White, First Edition DSP (SU)

Ink:  Lucky Limeade, Crumb Cake (SU); Onyx Black (Versafine)

Accessories:  Midnight Blend sequins (Avery Elle)

Freshly Made Sketches 126

Its Wednesday so that means there's a brand new sketch reveal at Freshly Made Sketches.  This week Amy is our hostess and you are going to love this sketch!  It's absolutely perfect for using up some of that patterned paper I know you've been hoarding!

I have a lot of designer paper and for a long time I've been saying that I won't buy any more until I've used up what I've got.  And then I saw this pretty Sweet Sorbet paper in the SU sale-a-bration catalog and coudn't resist it.  And it was free, so technically I didn't "buy" more for my stash.  At least that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

As I was putting this card together I intended to cut those ginkgo leaves out of Pistachio Pudding.  But for some reason I kept pulling Coastal Cabana from the drawer with all my card stock, not realizing my mistake.  I even said to myself that I thought that Pistachio Pudding was more green.  It wasn't until I started to put my card together and saw how my ginkgo leaves compared with the colors of the DSP that I figured out what I had done.  Oops.  I kind of liked what I saw so I kept it.

The challenge this week at The Paper Players is "thank you" and "where the heck is spring" so this card is for them too.  I used a butterfly instead of a flower because I figured that if I see an actual butterfly around these parts I definitely know it's spring.  And in case you're wondering, the challenge at The Paper Players is actually something more along the lines of using spring colors on your thank you card, but after the winter we've all had I think a little poetic license in order.

My friends at Freshly Made Sketches have cooked up a gorgeous batch of cards for your viewing pleasure this week so be sure to check them out.  Can't wait to see you in the gallery!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Another Thank You (SU)

Paper:  Sahara Sand, Basic Black, Coastal Cabana, Crisp Cantaloupe, Vellum (SU)

Ink:  Onyx Black (Versafine)

Accessories:  Leanna Butterfly die (Simon Says Stamp); Grove Branch die, Flutter Vine die (Memory Box); Basic Pearl, Clear Embossing powder (SU)

colourQ 231 and Seize the Sketch 15

Happy Tuesday!  Today there's a new color palette at colourQ and a new sketch from Seize the Sketch designed by Cathy.  Since St. Patrick's Day is just around the corner it's appropriate that Arielle chose the colors from this tea set.

I found this shamrock stamp in my stash.  I'm pretty sure that I got it in the dollar bin at Michael's a million years ago.  I don't own a lot of St. Patrick's Day stamps (my Irish grandfather would be so sad), but this one happens to be my favorite.  And in an effort to use my stencils and embossing paste, I created the vertical layer in the sketch with these hexagons.  I thought they looked a little plain so I dusted them with some green Perfect Pearls.  Big mistake.  Although they are kind of sparkly in real life, here they looked smudged, like they got run over by the car in the driveway.

Go check out the colourQ and Seize the Sketch challenges and see all the amazing card the design teams have created.  Hopefully you'll have time to join us!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Distressed Grid (Creative Embellishments)

Paper:  White Linen (Ellen Hutson); Basic Gray, Glorious Green, Urban Oasis DSP (SU); Neenah Solar White

Ink:  Gumball Green

Accessories:  Chevron stencil (Heidi Swapp); Starburst Framelit (SU); embossing paste (Dreamweaver); baker's twine (American Crafts); Cakewalk button (October Afternoon); Perfect Pearls (Ranger)

Fight Like a Girl

My sister recently was underwent surgery for breast cancer.  Luckily, her mammogram caught the cancer in its very early stages and her doctors are quite confident that surgery caught it all.  In a few weeks she'll begin her radiation treatment and I wanted to make her a card to help keep her spirits up and to let her know that I'm thinking of her.

I'd been kicking around an idea for this card in my head for a few days and after I saw the sketch at CAS(E) This Sketch this week, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.  A few years ago I got this freebie stamp set called Fight Like a Girl from a.muse studio and I put it to work here.  I picked it up, sadly, because I figured some day I might need it.  I already have cousins and co-workers who are breast cancer survivors but I never imagined I might need it for one of my sisters.

I hope this post doesn't sound too sad!  My sister is doing quite well and is in very good spirits.  She won't need chemo, just radiation, and we are all (including her doctors) positive that she'll beat this handily!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Stamps:  Fight Like a Girl (a.muse studio)

Paper:  White Linen (Ellen Hutson); Basic Black, Strawberry Slush, Vellum (SU)

Ink:  Strawberry Slush (SU)

Accessories:  Sweet Scallop Tag Die (Verve); Pretty Pink Color Mist (Mister Huey's); Chevron stencil (Heidi Swapp); embossing paste (Dreamweaver); crochet thread