Christmas Wreaths

I had the house to myself while the guys were out camping, so I had time to stamp. I even got to pull out my new Spellbinders wreath die and make a few Christmas cards. Unfortunately, the photos don't show the nice embossing on the wreath.

On the window card, I put blue vellum behind the window die, and I used Stickles to represent berries on the wreath.  The wreath is cut from a green snippet.  I made the card for 52 Christmas Card Throwdown's challenge -- Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.  The vellum is both old (from the last time vellum was all the rage in stamping) and blue.  The wreath die is the something new.  Both the brick-embossed piece and the window were RAKs, so they are sort of  "borrowed."

I made a second, similar  card in blue and white to qualify for Sarn's "Rudolph Day", which requires not one but two Christmas cards.  That card also used a snippet for the wreath. The sentiment is a cheap stamp from Michaels. It is not mounted straight on the wood, and I always end up stamping it crooked, so I decided to do it at an angle so the wonkiness would look planned.

I'm entering  these challenges:

52 Christmas Card Throwdown -- old, new, borrowed, blue
Stamping for Pleasure -- May Rudolph Day
Pixie's Snippet Playground #126
Word Art Wednesday #134-- Anything Goes
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday -- Anything Goes

Black and yellow

Black/white/yellow is a good color combo that isn't used nearly as much as black/white/red.  Here's a birthday card I made with that color combo.

The daisies (from the Stampin' up set that absolutely everyone has or had) are stamped with Cadmium Yellow chalk ink on  yellow/white dotted paper, just to add a little more interest to the image.  The sentiment is from the same set. The layout is Sketch Saturday's current sketch.

The filigree butterfly die is from Simon Says, and I used a leftover snippet of some black/white dp for it.

I would like to enter the card in these challenges:

Sketch Saturday #311
Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge: Botanical
Butterfly Challenge #8: Bingo -- die cut/butterfly/dp
Creative Inspirations #266: Birthday
Word Art Wednesday #133: Anything Goes
Sister Act #58: Anything Goes

Antique car

I don't know why, but I love antique cars. I think it would be fun to actually ride in one (though probably not very comfortable). This image is from Rubbernecker, and I thought it would make a good Father's Day card.

The image is black embossed, and I learned that EP and OMS don't play nice together. It could be because I colored the image immediately after embossing it, so possibly the powder didn't totally set up (?), but the OMS caused it to smear and mess up my pencil coloring. (I'll have to do some testing with images that were embossed a while ago to see if that hypothesis holds up.)

I chose all the colors out of the background paper. The blue strip is embossed with a Sizzix folder. The sentiment is simply computer-generated, die cut and mounted with another circle of the same size that is offset a little. Tan grosgrain ribbon seems masculine enough to me. I did some sponging with distress ink around the main image because the white was just too stark.

I would like to enter the card into these challenges:
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge:  Travel/vacation
Crafty Ribbons #90, Drive Time
Simply Create Too #63: Father's Day
Word Art Wednesday #133, Anything goes
Sister Act #58, Anything Goes
Die Cut Divas May -- Die cuts plus an embellishment (ribbon and glitter pen)

A fishy BDay

Today is my son's birthday. Since he enjoys flyfishing, I created this card with a rainbow trout.

The image is a digi from QKR. It's colored in pencils, and popped up on pop dots. That's baker's twine with a nautical knot.  The feathery fly is a sticker.

I used Fealing Sketchy sketch 90 for this.

I am entering the card in these challenges.

Feeling Sketchy #90
Paper Crafting Journey -- For a man
Sister Act 57, Anything Goes
Word Art Wednesday #132, Anything Goes
Crafty Girls, Anything Goes

Something out of nothing

Even though I've known my son was graduating from high school, I don't have any graduation themed stamps. I ended up pulling this together from a half-used pack of graduation stickers and one piece of double-sided graduation themed paper.  I think I get an decent grade for effort, anyway.

I made this card at a stamping get-together, and I am horrible at packing for these things. I always forget something important -- this time it was an acrylic block. Unfortunately, no one else had brought one either, so I used the lid of an ink pad as my block, and I didn't get the world's best image transfer.

After stamping the owl (from Hero Arts), I fussy cut the mortarboard to go on his head.  The bit of paper left after cutting the mat had a border of motarborads on it, so I cut a few more out to go with the "hats off" theme of the sentiment, which is a sticker.

His school colors are blue and white, so I added blue ribbon and blue matting to the card as well.


I'm entering this card in these challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Monday -- M is for (mortarboard)
Ribbon Carousel #91 -- Party time
Word Art Wednesday #132 -- anything goes

Watercolor wash

I have really liked some of the watercolor effects I've seen on various cards, so I wanted to try one for myself.
This card was inspired by the photo for The Alley Way Stamps BE Inspired photo challenge #52.  I white embossed the largest doily from TAWS Delicate Doilies set on watercolor paper, then made a wash from re-inker (Ranger Stream), and washed over the image with a brush. I used a paper towel to soak up a little of the ink and help get variegations in the color.

The sentiment is stamped in Stream in its regular strength.  Scattered sequins seemed the perfect embellishment.

The card is for these challenges:

TAWS BE Inspired #52, inspiration
Paper Take Weekly, pretty pastels
Word Art Wednesday #131, anything goes
Sister Act #56, anything goes

For Mother's Day

I finally got around to doing a Mother's Day card for my MIL. I CASed a card I found on someone's blog, and I don't know whose it was, so I can't give credit. (So sorry if it was you.)

I bought a bag of doilies at a yard sale last week, but they are solid and rather plain in the center, so I ended up die-cutting another doily to go in the center. The rest of the card is pretty self-explanatory. The dark purple layer is embossed with the CB textile plate; the butterfly is also embossed a little in the center.  The two bottom layers of flowers are sponged with purple ink.

I'm entering the card in these challenges.

Ribbon Girl: Flowers
Pixies Snippet Playground #123: snippets (lavender layer, butterfly both from snippets)
Paper Players: Mother
Simon Says Monday Challenge: 5 things (5 kinds of embellishments -- doily, die cuts, flowers, ribbon, brad)
Butterfly Challenge #7 -- butterfly and doily
Clear it out -- favorite style and product (flowers)
Simon Says Wednesday, Spring Flowers
Challenges 4 Everybody: Anything Goes
Papertake Weekly: Anything Goes
Word Art Wednesday #131:Anything Goes
Loves Rubberstamps 102: Anything Goes

The Robot says thanks

Just a brief moment of motherly pride -- my son's robotics team won third place in a huge international competition last week. And, since some folks hear "robotics" and think stupid fighting robots they've seen on TV, no, this is a big deal in the world of engineering. The competition's sponsors include NASA and Northrop Grumman.

The kids were supposed to send postcards from California back to the companies that donated money to the robotics program at their high school, but in the excitement of winning their division, that sort of fell through the cracks. When I found out, after they got home, I said I'd make thank you cards for them to send out. 

In all, I made five cards of three different designs, using the same major elements. I don't have a robot stamp, so I found this robot on a coloring page when I went online to look for an image.  (I added the 1961C on the robot because that's the team's number in robotics competitions -- 1961 is for their school, and they are team C).  The binary spells out Tha -- the start of Thank you -- (and I learned that there is different code for capital and lower-case letters. I was kind of surprised to find out there was such as thing as a capital letter in binary, actually). I'm sure no one could read it, but I actually did the research to make sure it is correct.

The sketch is the current one at Papertake Weekly Challenge.

The card is for these challenges:

Papertake Weekly, sketch #89.
Simon Says Wednesday, Anything Goes
Sister Act Card Challenge 55, Anything Goes
Word Art Wednesday #130, Anything Goes