Ready for Spring

OK, enough cold. I'm ready for spring. Luckily, several challenges this week let me indulge that urge. First off, Kim introduced pink along with Christmas red and green for this week's Off the Wall Craftiness challenge (OTWC 38) -- see inspiration photo below. And Etsy Inspired Challenge (EIC 119) this week looks at the beautiful pendants made by artist Ling Glass, which feature glass and delicate metalwork. I liked this one called "love stained glass pendant." Finally, this week's Teapot Tuesday challenge was to do something artistic or painterly, so I made a still life.

Stamp is an old one, purchased from the company now known as Sparkle and Sprinkle. Sentiment is by Impression-Obsession. It's colored with pencil and OMA. The Ling Glass pendant gave me the inspiration to use the heart-shaped clip, to which I added a little gingham ribbon. (Someone else liked that pendant too. It moved from "for sale" to "Sold" between the time I picked it out as an inspiration and the time I'm posting this card.)

Merry Christmas everyone.

Merry merry

It's time to get serious about making Christmas cards (and doing everything else Christmas -- I am so behind this year....).

I used the current Card Positioning System sketch (CPS196) for this card, which also qualifies for this month's SmArt-Word Challenge, "merry."

The flourish is from Autumn Leaves, stamped in Versmark and covered with Winter Wonderland (sparkly-white) EP. There are little green gel dots at the ends of some of the swirls. The ornament is by Stampabilities, done in StaZon and watercolored. I used a glitter pen to add some glitz to the ornament and ornament holder. The sentiment is taken off another stamp -- I used a marker on the part I wanted to stamp and hoped I got the placement right when I added it to the image.

Striped paper is from a Christmas stack from Hobby Lobby -- several people have told me they liked the appearance of crimped paper it gives.

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness challenge (OTWC 36) is a monochromatic challenge -- using shades of brown. (The inspiration photo is to the lower right) Actually, I like monochromatic brown, which is kind of a peaceful calming combination.

My monochromatic brown card will probably be a birthday card for my Dad. I've probably given him a shirt or tie in every shade of brown in the card -- he's a real traditionalist when it comes to clothes, so brown is right down his alley.

There's only a little stamping on this. The sentiment is from SmArt Works, stamped in Chestnut Roan (Colorbox fluid chalk ink). I've had that marbled paper for ages, and haven't wanted to cut it before, but it worked perfectly for this challenge. (And marbled paper is a pretty tradional design, too, along with the polka dots.)

Simple Cards

The theme for this month's SmArt-Word Challenge is "Simplicity." I had this idea for a CAS card for the holidays, and this was a perfect chance to make it. It couldn't be simpler, really. It's a one-layer card. The angel's dress is paper pieced with vellum, and there's a little piercing around the edges. I used glitter pen on the angel wings. That's it for embellishments.

Stamp credits -- sentiment is from Serendipity, angel is unknown to me.

Girly Christmas

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness (OTWC33) colors are springy pink and grass green. (See the inspiration photo below -- it sounds like Kim is trying to put winter off as long as possible.) Nothing says Christmas like pink and green, right? OK, I just have Christmas cards on the brain, but I also had this plaid paper that worked perfectly for the challenge, so I paper pieced the tree. The card is also for a VSN challenge calling for "floating sentiment" (the sentiment is popped up on pop-dots and "floating" into the main image.)

Once I'd gotten all that done, I needed something down in the lower right corner corner, and added a few ribbon tabs. And since it still needed something, a little paper piercing. (Seriously, I so rarely go into these things with a plan, it's amazing anything ever comes out useable.)

I kind of like it, non-traditional colors and all.

Let's try "elegant"

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness challenge (OTWC31) challenged us to use the "Halloween" color combo of orange, black and white. But Halloween is history now, so I got as far away from Halloween as I could. Instead, I went elegant, focusing on the black and white with just a hint of orange. (And elegant realy seems more fitting for the inspiration photo at right, especially the chandelier.)

The flourish is from Purple Onion Designs, embossed with black detail EP. The layout is CASEd from a recent "queen for the day" challenge at SCS -- she used a long quote in place of an image. The sentiment is stamped on a tiny acrylic oval, adding just a touch of orange to the color scheme.

Non-traditional Christmas colors

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness Challenge (OTCW30) uses the colors of brown, white and green (you can see the inspiration photo below). I used them to make a Christmas card in somewhat non-traditional colors. The card is also a CASE of this week's Queen for the Day at SCS.

The stamps are really old ones -- the tree is from SU and the other a cheapy from Hobby Lobby. I used winter wonderland (sparkly white) EP. I love how it shows up on dark colors, and I use it a lot instead of white ink (which I have no luck with). The lace is an adhesive paper lace from K & Co. and the snowflake is actually a button.

Early holiday card

To me, it's really WAY too early to start thinking about Christmas (even though I end up doing a bunch of holiday-themed writing assignments about now every year). However, I kind of got in a Christmas groove for VSN over the weekend at SCS. I used the current CPS sketch (CPS 189) as the layout for one of my VSN cards.

I went with a silver and navy color scheme. Angels stamp is Stampabilities, and the stars are an SU background stamp. I used a detail silver EP, though I got a little more stray dots than I like. The ribbon is a quick way to work in a sentiment.

In a way, this echoes one of the first Christmas cards I made after I started stamping. I used the angel stamp and the star background stamp for it, and there was blue involved. I think I stamped the angels in navy blue, matted on navy and then matted with white stamped with navy stars. (Back then, I did production style Christmas cards, but I find that boring and make everyone different now.)

In honor of fall

It's finally starting to feel like fall, my favorite season of the year. A couple of different challenges inspired me to make a fall-type card.

This week's inspiration colors for Off the Wall Craftiness (OTWC28) were goldish yellow, white and brown. (See the inspiration photo at right below.) And this month's SmArt Word challenge is "brown" so those colors immediately made me think of doing fall leaves.

I used this week's CPS sketch (CPS188) for the layout, which made me want to use a quote in the center. I chose this one from SmArt Works -- it's actually part of a birthday set, but "revel in the gift of time" seems so appropriate to fall to me. The sentiment is stamped in chestnut roan chalk ink

I stamped the oak leaf (SU) in cadmium yellow chalk ink repeatedly on white paper, then cut the curves. I decided to distress the edges, both to add texture and because hand-cut curves look, well, uneven.

I stamped another oak leaf in the chestnut ink, colored it with pencils and added gold microbeads to the acorn. It's cut out and popped up (see detail photo).

Piercing to the rescue

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness (OTWC27) challenge colors are light blue, and medium and light brown/tan. Awesome colors -- seen in the inspiration photo below.

I used the colors in a card I CASEd for the Queen for the Day challenge at SCS. The stamp is by Hero Arts -- isn't she cute? I got the ribbons ages ago in a fiber swap, and actually was able to find them right away when I wanted them. (Can't tell you how unusual that is.) I had finished the card and taken photos of it, but I kept thinking that it looked unfinished. I decided to add the piercing around two panels. Piercing to the rescue, once again. It's a great way to finish a piece, especially when layers aren't matted. Just my 2-cent advice for the day.

A little fairy dust

This month's SmART Words Challenge is the word "juvenile," which SmArt Works owner Susan said could refer either to a card featuring a child or a card intended for a child.

What little girl doesn't love fairies, so this card is designed with a little girl in mind. Lots of delicate pastels, and glittery fairy wings should appeal to girls.

Stamps are from Faerie Song. I colored the flower fairy with pencils and OMS, and used a spica pen to add glitter to her wings. All the papers are from Cosmos Cricket. Stacked a couple of Prima flowers and attached them with a mini brad -- you have to imagine the fairy dust yourself.

Pastel paradise

This week's colors for the Off The Wall Craftiness Challenge (OTWC26) are lovely sherbet pastels. Love them, because they are such happy colors. You can see the inspiration photo below.

The butterfly is an old A Muse stamp. The colors are SU Yoyo Yyellow and Rose Romance, and a light blue from a Colorbox pigment set. I found grosgrain ribbon that matched pretty closely as an accent. With the pretty colors, I wanted to keep it simple.

Favorite color combo

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness Challenge (OTWC25) is one of my all-time favorite color combos -- pink and gray. Kim added a little twist by using an inspiration photo that has both a pale pink and a darker, rosier pink. (See below).

Thematic inspiration comes from this week's Etsy Inspired Challenge (EIC106) shop, Pegasus Maiden, which is the place to go for stunning hair accessories that feature feathers. They are all simply beautiful, but I chose this lovely, delicate dusty rose one as my inspiration.

In honor of Pegasus Maiden, I stamped feathers (from SmArtWorks) with Versamark on both the gray and pale pink layers. The bird stamp is from Inkadinkadoo, stamped in SU Rose Romance. And how perfect was it to find that bit of two-tone pink-gray ribbon I have been holding onto for ages.

doggone it.

I was working on several challenges with this card, and intended to do the colors for this week's Off the Wall Craftiness challenge (OTWC24). Unfortnately, I relied on memory -- I knew it was a corally orange and a blue, and went with a light blue. So, just pretend the background is actually navy blue (or as my neighbors might say, think Auburn U. colors).

The inspiration photo for the OTWC challenge is to the right:

Both of the stamps are from grab bags, so I'm not entirely positive where either comes from. I think the hydrant is DRS and the dogs might be Viva las Vegas. The ink is SU cameo coral. I also used a piercing tool, Swiss Dot embossing folder, mini brads and twine.

Sketch is from last week's SCS sketch. Theme was this week's MMTPT.

Rose among thorns

It has been busy, busy, busy for me. Looks like it took a 3-day weekend for me to finally make it to my stamping supplies. I combined several challenges to take advantage of the rare stamping opportunity.

The colors are inspired by this week's Off the Wall Craftiness Challenge, OTWC23. As you can see the inspiration photo, the colors were deep red, a medium blue and black. I'm finally learning how to handle color challenges -- my first impulse is always to use LOTS of each color, and that hardly ever works. This is a less is more kind of challenge.

The image is inspired by this week's Etsy Inspired store, Glamasaurus, which features unique jewelry -- some fun, some vintage, some glamorous. My card for EIC104 was inspired by these rose ear studs.

The sketch is CPS sketch #183. The actual sketch features lots and lots of horizontal lines, but I pared it down to the 4 lines of sentiment and two lines of ribbon. Less was more, here, too.

Rose stamp is from Inkadinkadoo. Sentiment is an old one from SU that I've been using a lot lately, cause I like the thought behind it. Accessories include white eyelets and thin silk ribbon.

A little fishy

[Did you ever notice how colors sometimes change in a photograph? Case in point, this card. The scalloped circle is purple but it insists on being photographed blue. Not sure why, because the rest of the purple looks purple. ]

This cute little fish guy is for CPS 120 and Off the Wall 20. OTWC20 is a color challenge incorporating light blue, purple (hence the concern about purple) and white. You can see the inspiration photo below.

This fish is actually a pre-painted little wooden piece, mounted on a nestie. I used mini brads for his little breathing bubbles. Waves are from a little Zimprints stamp I've had forever -- I just thought that would be a fun way to do the lines the CPS sketch calls for (colors are Versamagic Sea Breeze and Rubber Stampede Metallic Purple.)

That's it, classic clean and simple.

Soaring with Etsy

The Etsy Inspired Challenge is celebrating 100 weeks. Wow! I started doing the challenge one Saturday when Ashley and I were both VSN hostesses at SCS, and I noticed her little tagline about the Etsy Inspired Challenge. I think it was like EIC15.

This week's shop is Cathy Walters, a photographer who makes really interesting pendants. I was inspired by her pendant called Soar, which features a hot air balloon. Those things fascinate me -- every once in a while one flies over my house, and several years ago, one made an emergency landing in a neighbor's yard. (That counts as big excitement in my neighborhood.)

This is a digistamp from Bird's Blog, colored with pencils and OMS. The buttons were added for the Ways to Use It Challenge this week at SCS, and the layout started to be the SCS sketch challenge for the week, but my image was too big and I had to eliminate some elements from the sketch. The papers are all by Making Memories.

The hummingbirds have arrived

Combining several challenges here into one card. The color scheme comes from Off the Wall Challenge 19 OTWC19 (see inspiration photo at right). The color combo was pale pink, pale yellow and a limeish green (I had to substitute SU Kiwi Kiss for lime).

I combined that with this month's SmArt Word Challenge, which is "bird." I chose to do a hummingbird in celebration that we have a ruby-throated hummingbird coming to our hummingbird feeder. This is the first year we've had one actually come to our feeder (probably because I actually got it out at the right time of year for once.)

Finally, the RESQ challenge for this week was "tape it up." The lacy strip running is actually a fancy adhesive strip.

The details -- stamps by Impression-Obsession; Inks are SU Kiwi Kiss and Stampcraft Baby Pink; accessories are nesties, lacy strip, Swiss Dot embossing folder, and black half pearls in two sizes.

Bright for me, anyway

The SmArt-Word Challenge for July asks us to use "bright". Hmmm, bright colors are a little out of my comfort zone, so I've been pondering this challenge all month. As luck would have it, Kim's colors for this week's Off the Wall Craftiness Challenge (OTWC17) are bright pink, turquoise and purple (as you can see in the inspiration photo below).

Well, since I was prodded from two directions, I decided to have a go at it, but I counterbalanced the brights with a good bit of white to get more in my comfort zone. I CASEd a card at SCS by MariLynn (this week's Queen for the Day) and made it much more of a CAS than hers, in working on this card.

The fabulous pink butterfly came from a prize pack from Kim for winning a previous OTWC. (Thank you Kim!) It's from the Gilded Bee, an Etsy store. Once I decided to use the butterfly, it was fairly easy to add the other colors as accents/frames for my simple card. What do you think?

Quick and Easy

I made this card for this week's MotherMark's Teapot Tuesday Challenge. It's for a little girl in New Zealand, daughter of an SCS member, who had her tonsils out. She loves hearts, so I'm giving her hearts. That explains why this card is much more "cutesy" than I usually do.

This was a quicky, using the current Card Positioning System Sketch CPS176. I used an old SU image, and an acrylic heart I've had for ages. The blue and green on the heart matched the printed paper almost perfectly -- how lucky is that? The lacy ribbon is an adhesive paper ribbon I picked up at Tuesday Morning, and it is pretty cool stuff. (I saw it one day, resisted the urge to buy it, then went back the next day to pick it up. Since it was Tuesday Morning and I only saw one package of the stuff, I knew it wouldn't last long. I'm still mad at myself for passing up some highly-discounted border punches at TM, which were gone by the time I came back for them.)

Sea-glass inspired

The shop for Etsy Inspired Challenge #97 (EIC97) is called Mermaid's Tear Jewelry. Isn't that a wonderful name? The store specializes in jewelry made from sea glass, and I love this stuff because most of the color palette is blues and greens, my favorite colors.
I was inspired by this lovely necklace in shades of blue. It inspired me to use my favorite two-toned blue ribbon; which also has a silver element for the silver in the pretty pendant.
The layout is the CAS sketch for this week at SCS, and I incorporated the "sea" idea as well by stamping seashells on a sand-colored paper. A button and twine finish it off.

Gray and pink irises

This is my card for Off the Wall Craftiness challenge #16. The colors this time are pink and gray, which is a combo I love. Here's the inspiration photo on the right.

I used the colors to do a CASE at SCS honoring hobbydujour's work. I borrowed her layout and used a wide ribbon, which is kind of her trademark. She's also much better at tying wide ribbons than I am. Everything else is changed.

The iris stamp is one of the first I ever purchased. It's fun to pull it out every now and then and find new ways to use it. The two grays are actually two sides of double-sided printed paper, and they look much more gray in real life -- the photo made the colors a little off.

A three-fer

This is a simple card for three challenges.
The sketch is CPS175.
The colors were inspired by the Off the Wall Challenge, OTWC15, for this week -- teal and tangerine.
It's also for Etsy Inspired Challenge #96, an Etsy shop called Octavia & Brown, which sells vintage items, such as tableware. I was inspired by these lowball glasses, especially the color and the criss-cross pattern, which inspired the crossed twine on my card.

The details: Stamp is from Faerie Song's Michelle Perkett plate. Used colored pencils and OMS, and a spica pen for the glitter. Accessories include twine, mini tag punch and paper piercer.

A bright, sunshiny day

Let me just say, having kids out of school sure eats into the crafting time. And that's one reason I'm finally getting around to posting my card for EtsyInspired this week, even tho I actually started it Saturday when the challenge went up.

This week's Etsy Inspired Challenge (EIC95) uses the Etsy shop kimmieprout. Kimmie makes polymer clay buttons that are, well, cute as buttons. Seriously cute stuff in this shop.

I was inspired by a set called Sunshine, and pulled out this Michelle Perkett stamp from Faerie Song. Sun is stamped and paper pieced and matted on a scallop circle. The mini-tags are attached with twine. The card seemed sort of bare in the corners, so first I doodled in hot pink along the edges, and when that didn't seem enough, I added some corner detail using a doodling stencil. Not my usual style, but I think it's kind of cute.

Diamonds and Butterflies

This card doesn't really look like my typical card, but I like the way it came out. It's the result of combining three different challenges.

Etsy Inspired Challenge EIC93 is a shop called White Birch Designs, which sells lovely jewelry, mostly made from beads. I was inspired by this one called Black and White Flower Necklace. I loved the combo of black, white and silver, especially the bold diamond shapes. That was pretty much the guiding element in putting the card together.

I used the sketch from Card Positioning Systems, CPS 172. And for RES-Q Challenge RESQ50 -- a celebration of getting to the 50th challnge (we had a choice of several old challenges to choose from), -- I chose adding a felt embellishment, because I thought the pink butterfly brought some real life and contrast to the card.

I used two different diamond stamps -- the one embossed in silver on the left is from DRS; the one on the right is from Studio G. The sentiment is from SU. Other ingredients: silver brads, silver metallic paper and nesties.

go ahead, make my day.

This week's challenge for Kim's Off the Wall Craftiness blog OTWC12 is to use mint green, black, white and possibly red. I combined her challenge with the Queen for Day CASE at SCS to create this card. (It's cased from one by zgirlsgranny, but I changed colors, theme, layout, stamps and embellishments, so it is more "inspired" by Linda's card)

Love the light-green dotted paper here, and I think this was the last piece I have. Poppy image from Stampin' UP and the sentiment is from SmART Works (the owner sent a goodie out to everyone who participated last month in the SmART-Words challenge, and this was part of what she sent). And since Susan was nice enough to do that, I'm entering this in the June SmART Words challenge to use ribbon.

I took Kim's challenge to be "really daring" and add a touch of red to the combo, and the other colors really make the red pop.

Baby, it's hot outside

Yikes, it's been 90+ for a week, with no end in sight. How about a popsicle to cool down?

The Technique Challenge at SCS this week was to create a one-layer card. If it's one layer, it has to be CAS, right? Somehow, clean and simple seems like the way to go when the themometer is showing 94 degrees.

I used CPS sketch 171 to create this simple card, which features ice cream treats from Studio G. Colored them with pencils and OMS, added a little pierced frame and a few gem-stones, and it's done.

Fun with new techniques

I created this card for this week's Off The Wall Craftiness challenge, OTWC11 which is to use brown and robin's egg blue on a card. The inspiration photos included a bird's nest, so I pulled out this bird's next stamp by Impression Obsession. It's stamped with Colorbox Chalk chestnut roan ink, and sponged on the egdes with SU Blue Bliss.

I used a Technique Junkies technique called torn frames to highlight the image. Now, normally, I don't go for distressed anything, but I really like how this came out. I added some silk flowers (sponged with the SU ink) and a little tag. Once I had all that put together, I decided the card needed a little more, so I tried faux stitching -- piercing holes around the edge and connecting them with gel pen. I must say, when you're at just a short distance away, it really does look real.

Neither TJ techniques are "new" -- as in from the latest newsletter -- but I hadn't tried either of them until now, and I am really pleased with what they add to this card.

Sponged dragonflies

Purple and green -- especially pale purple and an olive or celery green -- is one of my favorite color combos. I have a nice stack pack of papers in that combo that got buried in my stamping area and I recently uncovered it. (Someone at SCS refers to this as "shopping in your stash" -- what a great way to put it.) (I should note the base piece photographed much more blue that it is in real life.)

I used the papers to make this sweet and simple card for CPS sketch 170. The dragonfly stamp is an old Stampcraft one, colored with pencils. I added some piercing to give the dragonflies a flight path and sponged Versacolor Petunia ink around the edges. The sketch calls for scallops along a horizontal layer, so I pulled out the rope border punch, which always adds a nice touch.

Impossible Things

This is one of my rare 4-fers -- Off the Wall Craftiness, Etsy-Inspired, SmArt-Word and SCS CAS challenge.

Let's start with Off the Wall Craftiness -- the challenge this week is to do something related to Alice in Wonderland. Since I have no Alice stamps, I thought perhaps something related to a tea party combined with an Alice quote would be good, so I went looking for quotes.

Etsy-Inspired Challenge EIC91 is a shop called howbeadyful, which features absolutely wonderful vintage, fabric covered buttons. I found some adorable tea-cup buttons that gave me the color inspiration.

CAS -- was to use a quote. Since I already had the quote, but a more complex layout in mind, I just simplified the card to make "CAS".

The SmArt Word challenge this month is to use ribbon. I sort of collect ribbon, but probably don't use nearly as much as I should, based on how much I own. For the challenge, I wanted to do a slightly different treatment (than just wrapping a ribbon around the card), so I used a brad that has a "eye" and tied a ribbon through that.

When life gives you lemons

I made this card for Off The Wall Craftiness Challenge 8. The inspiration piece was a variety of shower (as in bridal or baby shower) related pictures. One of the photos was of a nice closeup of lemonade with lemon slices in it -- hence this card.

I used card positioning system sketch CPS168 for it. The stamps are by Flourishes, colored with pencils and OMS. The only embellishment is a few snips of grosgrain ribbon, but I wanted to keep it sunny and light, just like the inspiring lemonade.

Vintage look

This week's Etsy Inspired Challenge EIC88 is Creation Designs, an interesting shop that sells a variety of vintage-inspired designs, including windchimes made from spoons and other old items.

I was inspired by this vintage-looking crocheted flower. Creation Designs's flowers are made out of acrylic wool, but several months ago, I crocheted some myself, using linen embroidery thread I scooped up on clearance at Hobby Lobby.

Since the CAS challenge at SCS was to create a shabby chic card, I combined the two challenges. I used an Anna Griffin floral background stamp with Memories Soft Rose ink to create the top panel; the bottom is a piece of printed paper that looks like eyelet lace fabric. The ribbon is a piece of vintage ribbon I got at a yard sale, and I colored with by sponging more soft rose ink on it. For the "shabby" part I sponged the edges with still more Soft Rose ink.

Owl post

This week's Off the Wall Craftiness Challenge #7 was simple and direct -- use a bird on your card. I decided to pair this cute owl (a digi freebie from Pollycraft) with this week's Card Positioning System sketch (CPS167). The sketch called for little do-dads in all the corners, so I added some leaf-shaped brads. Sentiment is from Purple Onion Designs.

The owl is colored with pencils and OMS. (Don't know what it is about owls, but there sure are some cute owl images out there, don't you think?)

(Harry Potter fans out there will recognize the title.)

Poppies

When I saw the "word" for this month's SmART-Words challenge was "flowers" I was already mentally going through my huge array of flower images. I'm going to bet I'm not alone in owning dozens of floral stamps. And I keep looking at more.

I spent part of the weekend playing with the techniques from the newest Technique Junkies Newsletter. They all looked so easy on paper, but I didn't have much success with several. I tried the one called Metallic Parchment a few times, as I've seen lots of cards done with it, and it looks stunning. I was reasonably happy with my second attempt, and decided to use it for this card. To complement it, I turned to this recently acquired poppy digistamp, which I got from Bird's Blog (she does freebies quite frequently). I colored it to match the Metallic Parchment colors (poppy doesn't grow around here, and I've only ever seen red poppies in pictures) so the colors may not be botanically correct. I picked up the gold metallic from the "parchment" with gold ribbon and cording and a very thin border from a gold pen around the main image panel. The button dropped out of the box when I was cleaning up the stamping area and it matched -- it seemed like I just had to incorporate it somehow.