September AJ Page-Thankful Imprint

Hello friends!  Can you believe we’re already through September?!  Today is a scheduled post from me as I’m away in an area with spotty to no connection right now, but wanted to be sure that I had my Art Journal Page posted for this month.

It’s also hard to believe that this is the 9th page done for this year!  I’m so glad I’ve done the monthly Art Journal Page collaboration with my crafty friend, Carol (from Crafty-Stamper)! We get creative trying to use up our never-ending stash piles along with a prompt for each month.  I know she always has great inspiration to share, so please check out her blog too! Here’s my AJ page with the “SMASH OUR STASH” September prompt of “IMPRINT” (using gel plate, print machine, leaves or something to create an impression):

Really had a fun time with this as I hadn’t gotten a chance to play around with my gel plate very much and I received about 15 different prints in one sitting!  It started out like I didn’t have a clue, but the more I kept experimenting, the more fun and unique prints came out.  Do you have a gel plate and/or do you use it often? (If you’re new to Gel Printing, here’s a link to a You Tube video showing you basics on how to get started – The Basics of Gel Printing)  

For my print here, I decided to try something from nature and found a couple of maple leaves in my yard that were laying on the ground starting to turn.  I think there are about 3 layers of prints on this one…hard to remember when you just keep going!  I cut it out to fit the size of my AJ page.

FOR THE BACKGROUND – I started with my usual 6″ x 9″ Canson 140# cold pressed watercolor paper with pre-punched holes at the top and covered it with DecoArt media fluid acrylic Primary Cyan applied with a baby wipe.  Really love the blue background it gave here.  Then this is when I applied the gel print piece to my background.  I then used some orange, black and white colored acrylic paints to create some splatters over the background and gel print piece.

I die cut some maple looking leaves from the Taylored Expressions Garden Variety-Fall die set and ink blended them.  I also splattered some orange paint over them as well.  I had some gold glitter sheets that I cut down in a couple of thin strips to add to the top and bottom of my gel print piece.  I then attached the die cut maple leaves.  

I cut out the word “Thankful” from Impression Obsession three times in Pumpkin cardstock and layered them together for my page.  I also grabbed this sentiment from the Tim Holtz small talk stickers and layered it over the same Pumpkin cardstock and attached it next to the “Thankful” word on the page.

I thought about adding something more, but I then thought it would distract from the printing which already has a “busy” look to it and so I called this one done.

  • I’m very THANKFUL that you’ve taken the time to stop by and your kind support!  It’s always more fun to craft with like-minded friends!  I’m also THANKFUL to my crafty friend Carol for sharing this monthly AJ fun with me as well!  (I will stop by to see your page as soon as I can my friend!)

Have a great day and see you in October! 😊

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Let the Fall Begin!

Hello friends!  We have now started the Fall season over my way and although the weather has been quite unpredictable, I am looking forward to the temperatures dropping and pretty Fall colors outdoors.  I have just now started seeing some slight changes in some of the foliage.

  • COMMENT UPDATE:  I thank you so much for taking the time and trying to leave a comment with me…I appreciate it!  I have been in contact with a support team and they’ve been very helpful.  Here’s what I’ve been told – “In response to your inquiry, WordPress.com indeed made some changes recently to enhance security and user experience. We released the new comments User Interface on 20% random sites which we believe is better than the older version in every way. e.g. Earlier the Facebook login was treated as a quick way to fill the guest form, but now when you log in with Facebook, your subscription preferences are recorded and rendered correctly; i.e. you’re actually logged in and remembered, and you can configure your preferences. However, we understand that this might not be convenient for all users.”  
  • So basically this just means that the way the comment box looks is different.  You should still be able to leave a comment.  Just pull up the comment box and start typing whatever you want to say, once you do that, buttons will appear on how you’d like to enter your information/login.  Once you do, the “reply” button will highlight and you can leave your comment.  Hopefully you will be “remembered” the next time you visit.  Hopefully, this all makes sense. (If you have any more questions or problems, you can always contact me)

So now let’s get back to some Fall crafting!  I’ve made a birthday card for a guy that likes to go camping and eat smores by the fire….

I think this turned out so fun!  I have used an older STAMPtember collaboration set from My Favorite Things and not sure if it’s last year or before that…but fell in love with the camp critters in the set!  (This year’s STAMPtember collaborations will be fun to play with too!  Stay tuned for some makes coming up with those!)

I have ink blended a panel in blues for a night sky and splattered some white over it for a starry look.  I stamped and colored all the images and cut them out with the coordinating dies.  I die cut a very dark green panel with a grass border die and attached it over the blue night panel that was layered onto a white A2 side folding card base.  I tucked in and attached all the pieces over the grass and behind it for the scene and then even added some shadow with a marker under some of the images.  I white heat embossed the sentiment from the set and then the celebrate banner was attached at the top.  Lastly, I’ve added some Stardust Stickles over the flames from the fire.

How about you?  Do you like to camp?  Eat smores?  Enjoy Fall weather?  I like all of the above of course!  Thanks so much for stopping in today!  Hope you’ve been inspired or gotten smile!

Challenges:

  1. Make My Monday – Create Your Own Background (starry sky)
  2. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  3. Creative Fingers – Anything Goes
  4. Love to Craft – Anything Goes
  5. Allsorts – 4-legged Friends or Anything Goes
  6. Passion for Markers – For a Man or a Boy (colored with Copic markers)

Occasional Blooms

Hello friends!  I hope that you’re having a wonderful week!  I’m excited about the changes I’m seeing outside with the weather!  Looking forward to that cooler temperature and pretty colors!

  • I wanted to do a bit of “house keeping” regarding my blog.  I apologize if you’re having problems trying to leave a comment.  I’ve had a few people contact me about this and I noticed that when I cleared the “cookies/cache” from my end…it somehow changed the appearance of my blog comment area…I don’t know why!?  I did find out that if you start typing in the comment box, buttons above the box will appear in which you can choose how to login.  I suggest that if you don’t have a WordPress/Gravatar account, to choose the envelope button to leave your name and e-mail address that way. (The Facebook login does not work.)  Then you can hit the reply button below the box to publish it.  I tried letting the commenter leave an anonymous reply (without having to type in name and e-mail), but then I’ll have NO idea who it is unless a name is given within the comment, so I had to re-engage that again.  I have also contacted a support person to help me navigate what’s going on and maybe I can get it back the way it was before.  I do apologize if it’s giving you a problem.  You can also go to gravatar.com to create an account which will work with ANY WordPress platform blog….but you don’t have to unless you want to do that!  You should still be able to leave a comment regardless.  Thank you for taking the time to care enough to share your support with me…I deeply appreciate it!

So now to get on with some crafting projects!  I’ve had to change gears on the seasonal makes and create some cards that I needed to send out to some people and they all happen to be in blooms:

First up is a “thinking of you” card creating for a friend using several Lisa Horton products.  These particular LH products all came from Inky Stamper.

I started with the craft background and embossed it with the LH Variegated Leaf 3D embossing folder and went over the texture with white ink.  I then used the LH Hydrangea Stencil/Die/Embossing Folder to create the blooms…love how it turned out!  I took some gold ink on the last layer of the stencil to go over the centers of the flowers.  I popped the bloom up over the embossed craft background and white heat embossed the sentiment from the IS Pig Cause stamp set and cut it out in a banner to place over the blooms.  I finished it with some gold gems.

My next card is a sympathy card needed for a craft friend who lost a loved one.  This person likes to cross-stitch and quilt, so I thought this MFT stitched quilt die (this one retired) would be fun to do over some pretty floral papers.  I had to die cut several white frames with it and lay the centers of the paper cut pieces on the first frame and then I layered two more of the white frames over top with the last pattern paper over that to give it that 3D look.  (Not sure where the paper came from other my stash!)

I cut the sentiment from the Whimsy Stamps Sympathy/Heartfelt/Condolences die set and layered it in the same way I did the quilt frame die.  I also white heat embossed the sentiment from the WS Deepest Sympathy stamp set and cut it out from a banner to attach right underneath the “p” in the die cut word.  I finished this one off with some clear gems.

And on a happier note, I’ve made another bloom card to wish someone turning 75 years young a happy birthday!  This is the first chance I’ve had to use this fun die set from Taylored Expressions!  The bottom container came from the TE Antique Pails die set.   I stamped the TE Burlap Background over it with the same color ink as the cardstock as well as Butter Cream ink to give it some texture.  The flower arrangement was cut out from the TE Garden Variety die set in various colors.  I also brushed some of the same colors in the centers of the flowers.  The centers of the flowers have a silver metallic enamel dot.

For the frame, I’ve used the TE Diagonal Stitch Rectangle die that only leaves the marks but doesn’t cut anything out.  The sentiment was stamped and cut out with the TE All Together-Occasions 2 set/die and popped up with foam squares over the panel.

I think the most fun was arranging the flowers in the container!

I hope you’ve enjoyed my cards today and you’ve been inspired!  Thank you so much for stopping by!  I appreciate you!  Have a wonderful weekend!

Challenges:

  1. Addicted to Stamps & More – Any Occasion
  2. The Sisterhood of Crafters – Die Cuts/Anything Goes
  3. Lil’ Patch of Crafty Friends – Anything Goes
  4. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  5. Cardz 4 Galz – Use a Stencil, a Sentiment, an Image (top card only)
  6. Crafts Galore Encore – Anything Goes
  7. 613 Avenue Create – Anything Goes no twist
  8. The Corrosive – Anything Goes

Alice in Wonderland for Sparkles Monthly

Hello friends!  Hope you’re doing well and have had a great start to September!  It’s hard to believe we’re almost into Autumn already!  I’ve been enjoying the outdoors for as long as I can and Autumn around my area is so pretty, so I need to go out in it!  Crafting will be waiting for me soon!

Today starts a new challenge for Sparkles Monthly with the theme of: Alice in Wonderland!  So I hope that you will stop by the blog to check out the inspiration and join us this month!  Here’s what I’ve come up with:

This was really fun to put together!  I have always loved the Alice in Wonderland stuff and I actually have quite a bit of it for crafting, but this stamp set by Visible Image was new to me and something that I had gotten from a win for a challenge I entered a few months back.  I also used the Supernova Stencil for the background from the same company.

For the background:  I ink blended several colored and then spritzed with water for the watermark effect.  I went over it with the stencil in a darker blue ink and spritzed it again.  I then added some gold and white ink splatters over top for more texture.  It was cut out with the wonky stitch rectangle die and layered over mirror gold cardstock.

I had some Alice in Wonderland papers and used s strip of the blue checks to cut out a wavy border and attached it to the bottom of the stenciled panel.  I added these layers to an A2 top folding blue card base.  I had some old-fashioned looking stamps which I had for years and stamped a few on the background in blue ink.

I colored “Alice” with Copic markers along with the piece of cake and key and then used the coordinating die to cut them out and attach to the card front.  I added some pink glitter to Alice’s drink in her hand and the filling in the cake.  I also added some gold sequins over the card.  The sentiment was cut out with a banner die which I thought would make for a fun birthday card.

Thanks for stopping by to check out my card and I hope you’ve got some inspiration with it!  (I’m a bit behind with so many things, so I will be checking out to see what you’re up to!)

Challenges: 

  1. Crafter’s Cafe – Clothing Styles for Children
  2. Lil’ Patch of Crafty Friends – Anything Goes
  3. Alphabet – ‘L’ is for Literature (inspired by a book) Alice in Wonderland
  4. Creative Fingers – Anything Goes
  5. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  6. Penny’s Paper-Crafty – Anything Goes using Paper
  7. Love to Craft – Anything Goes

August AJ Page-A is for Adventure

Hello friends!  Wishing you a happy weekend!  We’ve had a heat advisory in our area all week, so I’ve been staying indoors organizing, cleaning and crafting!  Hope that you’re taking some time to enjoy your weekend even if it’s just for a moment of time.

I can’t believe we’re at the last weekend of August, because it’s time for the monthly Art Journal Page collaboration with my crafty friend, Carol (from Crafty-Stamper)! We get creative trying to use up our never-ending stash piles along with a prompt for each month.  I know she always has great inspiration to share, so please check out her blog too! Here’s my AJ page with the “SMASH OUR STASH” August prompt of “LETTERS”:

Thinking of YOUR stash, what do you come up with from the prompt?  I think as crafters, we probably all have some type of lettering in our stash!  I have stamps, stickers, chipboard, wood, stencils, ephemera, etc so I knew this would be a good opportunity to pull out something.  And if that doesn’t work for you, I suppose you could take the prompt literally, and attach an actual written letter or make one up yourself to add to your AJ page.  Lots of ways to interpret a prompt which makes it easy to come up with a plan to inspire you.  So this is what I came up with.

For the background:  I started with a 6″ x 9″ Strathmore Acrylic paper with pre-punched holes at the top and stenciled some crackle paste over my Tim Holtz alpha stencil and let dry.  I then took some Distress Oxide sprays in the colors kitsch flamingo, salvaged patina and speckled egg and mixed with sprayed water to let the the colors run over the stenciled areas.  After it dried, I used the Tim Holtz Grunged stamp set and stamped more letters over the background with black archival ink.  The edges were blended with dark gray ink and then I splattered the page with gold and white paints with a fan brush.  Lastly, I took some white gold metallic wax and went over the stenciled letters.

The film strip came from the Whimsy Stamps Slmiline Film Strip die cut out from black cardstock. For the three image sections, I found some packaging with maps images on them and cut it out with the same die.  Since the packaging had a slick surface, I painted it with clear gesso so I could stamp over it.  After it dried, I stamped the three panels with the TH Grunged stamp set in the same colors of Oxide inks as the background and then stamped the travel images with black archival ink from an old Stampin’ Up! set called “Traveler”.  To finish is off, I used an old chip board letter “A” from my stash, painted it black and added some more of that white gold wax along the edges, found a TH “small talk” sticker to go over it and then I drew some lines around it and sponged it to make it look grungy.  I finished it with more ephemera I found in my stash from Tim Holtz and Stamperia… and decided to call it done.

  • Thanks so much for stopping by today!  I hope you’ve found some inspiration with my project!  Enjoy your day!

Challenges I’d like to enter my page for:

  1. Art Journal Journey – Where in the World? (travel theme)
  2. Crafting Happiness – Any type of craft
  3. Creative Artiste – Anything Mixed Media
  4. Paper a la Mode – No Cards – I was inspired by grungy things
  5. Crafting From the Heart – No Cards – Anything Goes
  6. Ally’s Angels – Anything Goes

Bugging Out With Sketches

Hello friends!  I hope you’re having a good week so far and staying safe wherever you are in the world.  Sending hugs to all experiencing a troubled time.  I hope that my post can bring a smile to you today.

I needed to create some get well type of cards and so I thought I’d try to incorporate some challenges while working on them which helps me to concentrate more in what I’m doing and maybe think outside the box a bit.

My first card is made with the Beccy’s Place Challenge freebie this month and she also challenged us with a sketch which I’ve decided to use for my card. (see sketch below)  I was really happy to use up some more pattern papers with it and I also decided to add a tiny dragonfly at the top to enter another challenge and to adhere to my “bug” theme today!

I printed the image in black and white and colored with Copics.  The dragonfly and the center pink strip were stamps that I cut out and added to the design.  The rest is pattern paper from my stash except the scalloped kraft border in the center that I cut out with a die.  I stamped the sentiment and cut it out to go with my twine around it. *You will notice in ALL of these cards that I’ve used some sparkly gems.  I wasn’t aware until posting them!  I must be on a kick of wanting to use them!*

Challenges for 1st card:

  1. Beccy’s Place – August challenge + sketch
  2. Paper Dragonfly Creative – Anything Flies (Goes) or Party
  3. Kreativ-Tanten – Anything Goes
  4. The Crafty Addicts – Anything Goes
  5. Crafty Calendar – Anything Goes
  6. Dragonfly Dreams – Dragonflies

And for this next card, I’ve played with a large bug:

Around my area this time of year, you can hear the sound of these cicada bugs with their distinct noise throughout the trees.  My husband likes the sound when a bird catches one! EEW!  This bug is a cute one from Inky Stamper called Cicada and I’ve colored it up with pencils this time.  Hard to see, but I’ve also added some shimmer with a glitter pen on his wings.

I’ve used the Picket Fence Tree Bark stencil over kraft on the background and then splattered it with brown and white paint. The leaves under the bug and the accent came from the Lisa Horton Variegated Leaf EF+die that I cut over light green cardstock.  I used some metallic green wax to go over the details in them.  I also used some gel pens to make some doodles around the strip, the circle and under the sentiment along with following a sketch. (details below) You will also notice more sparkly gems!  I’m also entering this in the Inky Stamper FB challenge this month which is using an IS bug image.

Challenges for card

  1. Sketch Saturday – #732 sketch + twist: add a doodle
  2. Creative Knockouts – #501 Anything Goes
  3. We Love Stamping – Masculine
  4. Lil’ Patch of Crafty Friends – Anything Goes
  5. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  6. A Place to Start – Anything Goes optional: leaves/trees
  7. The Corrosive – Anything Goes

For my last card I decided to keep this one simple’ish’:

So, I know these aren’t real bugs because I’m not squealing, but these guys are too cute! They’re popping up out of the dirt for a special greeting!  I mixed in both a new and older stamp set from Lawn Fawn on this one. I’ve used another sketch for this one and decided to keep it very simple.  The hardest part of this was the coloring which honestly wasn’t all that difficult either because they’re small images.  I’ve also added some shimmer with a glitter pen on the wings and of course, there’s those sparkly gems again!

Challenges for card

  1. Sunday Stamps – SSC316 in the corner sketch
  2. The Paper Players – CAS using any Bug
  3. Simon Says Stamp Wednesday – Clean and Simple
  4. Krafty Chicks – CAS (Clean and Simple)

Thanks so much for stopping by today!  I appreciate your time and thoughts!  I’ll be seeing you again on Saturday with another AJ page!

I Scream, You Scream

Did you say “We All Scream for Ice Cream”? or did you think this was about Halloween?  Well although that season is quickly approaching and I do love all the spooky things, this one is actually about ice cream today.  As hot as it has been and going to be this weekend, it might be nice to have!  However, I do have some on my card today:

I made a birthday card for someone that loves a local ice cream parlor that sells lemon ice cream, so that’s why it’s all in the bright yellow colors!  I’ve used some yummy goodies today from Newton’s Nook for my card.  I also followed along with a sketch challenge for the Inky Paws Challenge, and it’s about over, so I needed to get it in! (see details below)

I pulled out the NN Summer Scoops stamp set and stamped a couple of the cones, colored and cut them out with the coordinating dies.  I also took a strip of vellum and heat embossed the sentiment in black over the pattern and black layers. The striped pattern was from the NN Birthday Woofs paper pad, and I used the largest of the NN Frameworks die set to cut it out. For the center of the striped panel, I used the heart die from the NN Furr-ever Friends die set and cut out the center where the vellum sentiment strip was placed.  I added a piece of yellow cardstock behind the heart so that the sentiment would show up and layered the striped panel onto a black layer which I placed over a top folding A2 sized white card base.  After popping up the ice cream cones, I added two black strips above and below them to fit the sketch design.

The Summer Scoops set also had the extra heart which I colored and cut out to place next to the sentiment. I added some shimmer to all of the hearts with a glitter brush pen and then I took some individual sprinkles from the NN Celebration Embellishment Mix and glued those on top of the ice cream.  I saved the twine that came with my order from Newton’s Nook and tied a couple of bows to go on top of the ice cream cones.  It was the perfect color to go with the sprinkles!

Of course, I need to make the envelope yellow too and I stamped an additional cone image on the bottom left corner of that too.  And yes, the birthday person was also gifted some lemon ice cream!

I hope you’ve enjoyed my lemon ice cream card today or found some inspiration with it!  Thanks for dropping by and I hope you’re able to enjoy yourself something refreshing this weekend even if it isn’t ice cream! 😉

Challenges I’d like to enter:

  1. Inky Paws Challenge – #204 Sketch challenge using NND productIPC204
  2. Cupcake Inspirations – CIC575 Add a bow/ribbon
  3. AAA Birthday –  Game #52 Anything Goes Birthday#52 bottom
  4. The Crafty Addicts – Anything Goes
  5. Tic Tac Toe – TTTC222 I used middle down: patterned paper, free, birthday
  6. Penny’s Paper-Crafty– #553 Anything Goes using paper
  7. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – PIP2332 Anything Goes

Feeling Tropical at Sparkles Monthly

Hello friends!  I hope that whatever state you’re finding yourself right now, that you’re able to find a bright spot in your day somewhere.  In watching the news, there are so many variable patterns in the weather and my heart goes to those in Hawaii dealing with the wildfire disaster.  My card today is not only for the DT challenge, but also a tribute to our tropical friends in Hawaii.

There’s a new challenge today over at the Sparkles Monthly Challenge with the theme of: TROPICAL and/or BEACH

Since I live in the Midwest area, I don’t get a chance to see too many scenes like this, but maybe someday hubby and I will get a chance soon!  The inspiration for my card came from my computer background photo and I loved the look of the water with the setting sun.  Everything I’ve used on my card today came from Lawn Fawn.

The entire background was done with stenciling using the LF Beach Sunset Stencils and inks.  I added that mice couple from a freebie stamp set that came with one of my orders.  I colored them pretty dark with cool grey tones so that they blended into the beach and looked like a silhouette.  The sentiment at the bottom was white heat embossed from the LF Butterfly Kisses set.   I’ve used a glitter brush pen over the sun and purple reflective water.  I think I got a little carried away with the white gel pen, but I was trying to make it look like the dark areas were highlighted with some of that setting sun over it and there’s just no removing any lines! (If you’ve done this, then you know what I’m saying!)

I hope that you’ve enjoyed my Tropical themed card today or found some inspiration with it.  Thanks so much for dropping in and please check out the challenge details with inspiration from the DT and play along!

Challenges I’d like to enter this card for:

  1. Four Seasons – Anything Goes Summer
  2. Crafts Galore Encore – Anything Goes
  3. The Paper Funday – Anything Goes optional: Great Outdoors
  4. Penny’s Paper-Crafty – Anything Goes using paper
  5. Get Creative – Summer Nights
  6. My Time to Craft – Stenciling
  7. Creative Fingers – Anything Goes

July AJ Page-Always Look Up!

Hello friends and happy weekend! As we finish off another really hot day…probably for most of the U.S. right now, I do hope you’re staying cool and enjoying the rest of the month of July.  We’ve been in a heat advisory in our area for the last few days, but hopefully it will cool down soon.  In the meantime, I will be crafting inside!

It’s time for the monthly Art Journal Page collaboration with my crafty friend, Carol (from Crafty-Stamper)! We get creative trying to use up our never-ending stash piles along with a prompt for each month.  I know she will have some wonderful inspiration to share, so please check out her blog too! Here’s my AJ page with the “SMASH OUR STASH” July prompt of “STRIPS/STRIPES”:

I don’t know why this makes me giggle, but it does!  I thought the best way to create the “STRIPS/STRIPES” prompt would be to pull out some more of those never-ending stash of pattern papers!  So I pulled some out for the strips at the bottom that I cut out with a hillside border die and one of the pieces happened to have stripes on it which worked out for both!  I thought it would look great for the field that the cow WAS on.😆

For the background:  I started with my usual piece of 6″x 9″ pre-punched at the top from Canson Watercolor paper and made a galaxy background with watercolors.  I had fun making a mess with it!  I let it air dry underneath some heavy books to keep it flat as it dried.  Once dry, I splattered some Copic opaque white with a fan brush over it.

This is where I added the strips of cut papers at the bottom.  Before I cut the green layer at the bottom, I ran it through my printer to create the quote on my computer.  I sponged the edges of it with green ink.  I also sponged some black ink around the edges of the galaxy background too.  The striped paper was painted with a light green ink and then splattered with a darker green color as I was trying to mute it a bit.  The “fence” behind it was cut out with white cardstock and placed behind the striped strip piece.

For the flying saucer and alien, I used an UFO die set from Whimsy Stamps and cut it out with several different specialty papers like holographic, silver glitter, green metallic, black glitter, vellum and acetate (for the front window of the saucer).  I popped it up with foam tape over a die cut piece of vellum that I’ve colored with a yellow marker and sprayed with shimmer spray…hard to pick up in a photo, but you can barely see it.  I attached it over the background by using my Xyron sticker machine, so you can still see through it.

I glued the “confused cow” from the MFT The Whole Herd stamp set within the “beam” vellum.  The hillside borders that I cut the bottom strips with came from MFT as well. 

I hope you’ve enjoyed my AJ page today and been inspired in some way!  Thanks so much for dropping in and don’t forget to look up!!😆

Challenges:

  1. Art Journal Journey – Come Fly with Me!
  2. Crafting From the Heart – Anything Goes except cards
  3. Creative Artiste – Anything Mixed Media
  4. Ally’s Angels – Anything Goes
  5. Crafting Happiness – Any Type of Craft
  6. Penny’s Paper-Crafty – Anything Goes Using Paper
  7. Through the Purple Haze – Anything Goes

Margarita and a Rainbow

Hello friends!  I hope you’re having a great week so far and that you’re able to keep cool as I know it seems to be pretty warm for many of us in the U.S.  It’s a great time to do some crafting, so I thought I’d share a few cards that I made that I needed. (Scroll down in this post to see the ‘rainbow’ card.)

I think a margarita sounds pretty refreshing in this heat!  Newton here seems to be enjoying it anyway!  All of the stamps I’ve used are from Newton’s Nook and I’ve made this card for a special person’s birthday.  This person I’m making this card for had gotten me hooked on mango margaritas and I wanted to represent that in the card.  (Note the salt rim on the glass.)  The color is more a strawberry color, but I wanted to go with the colors for the Inky Paws Challenge. (See below in the challenge list.)

I stamped the “happy birthday” sentiment (retired set from Newton’s Nook) repeatedly in the background on the pink panel and then I splattered it with white Copic and water with a brush.  The panel was cut from the Newton’s Nook Framework die set and layered with colors that match with the challenge.  The blue card base was repeated stamped with the taco and I stamped, colored and cut one out to place behind Newton with the margarita.  I took a strip of Doodlebug green polka-dot paper and white heat embossed the sentiment.  I cut a tiny strip off and turned it over to glue at the top of the strip.  I used foam tape to add the margarita kitty, finished it off with white twine and sequins with a spot of Stickles in the centers.

Challenges for margarita card:

  1. Inky Paws – #203 color challengeIPC203
  2. Country View – 4 legged friend
  3. The Diva’s That Cut Paper – Birthday theme
  4. NBUS – #52 July (Never Before Used Schtuff!)  New Newton’s Nook products!
  5. Crazy for Cats – Anything ‘CAT’ goes optional: festive
  6. Daring Cardmakers – summer drinkscover
  7. Simon Says Stamp – Anything Goes

Here’s another card I wanted to make for Beccy’s Place challenge using the free image that was provided this month and I thought it would make a great card for encouragement to send for a special cause I’m donating for:

I’ve used the non-colored version of this image and before printing it out, I’ve added a sentiment at the bottom from the Seasonal Window digital set from Beccy’s Place.  (There are quite a few uplifting quotes in that one.)  I colored the image with Copics and added a bit of shimmer on the sun with a glitter pen.

I think I’ve made this popped up frame around the image more complicated than what it needed to be, but I cut out the scallop frame twice for thickness, and also printed out a piece of the rainbow looking papers that was also a part of this month’s Beccy’s Place Challenge free image.  I cut it out with the scalloped frame and attached it to my double thick frame layers.  The image was placed over a black cardstock and the popped-out rainbow frame was placed over the image keeping a portion of the black frame showing.  These layers were mounted over a 4 1/2″ square white card base.

Hope that you’ve enjoyed my cards today!  Thank you for stopping in and I’ll be seeing you Saturday for another Art Journal Page!

Challenges for ‘rainbow’ card:

  1. Beccy’s Place Challenge – July Anything Goes using Beccy’s Place image optional: animal(s)
  2. Crafts Galore Encore – Anything Goes
  3. The Corrosive – Anything Goes
  4. The Crafty Addicts – Anything Goes
  5. Pammie’s Inky Pinkies – Anything Goes
  6. Love to Scrap – Anything Goes
  7. Love to Craft – Anything Goes