Sunset on the lake

 I hope to get out on my kayak over the holiday, so I've made a card with a lovely on-the-water scene. The orange setting sun is paper pieced over the main image, which is black-embossed. I was inspired to make the orange sun by the Inspiration Station's "cue" photo for this month, which you can see below.  For embellishment, I used baker's twine and an interesting flat bead that has been in my stash for years. (I went through a brief period of collecting beads until realizing they make cards hard to mail.) 

 This card is entered in these challenges:

Inspiration Station #50 -- sunset

Double Trouble #141 (all 3 challenges -- something, slimline, linkng with past partner)

Simon Says Stamp Monday -- vacation

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday -- anything goes

Simply Create -- lazy days of summer

Word Art Wednesday #601-- anything goes

Pattie's Creations #207 -- use an image

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2325 -- anything goes

 

 

 

Alcohol inks on vellum

I tried something different for this card -- I colored vellum with alcohol inks (a green and a blue AI, plus some blending solutions). 

To create this card, I began with a variety of snippets (see photo). The tree shape was cut from a large white snippet. The vellum (also a snippet) was placed behind the apperture (inked side down), then another white snipped was placed behind it to keep the green matting from showing through. The green mat was also a snippet. I went with blue ink for the sentiment to help the card from being too green (or to make the bit of blue in the tree make sense, however you want to look at it.)

 This card is entered in these challenges:

Rudolph challenge, June -- Christmas

CRAFT #682 -- Christmas

Snippets Playground #457-- use snippets

Word Art Wednesday #601 -- anything goes

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2325 -- anything goes

Vintage book page

 Have you ever found out you were siged up for a  swap you don't remember putting your name down for? That just happened to me, Turns out I signed up for a "vintage" swap, and the deadline for sending cards out was already past when I realized I'd been assigned a partner. Time to figure out how to do vintage...

One fun way to do vintage is called vintage book plate -- it's an old Technique Junkies technique that I've had good luck with, so I decided to go down that route. It works well with botanical stamps, and since I'e been cleaning out my craft space I'd come across some stamps I haven't used int a while that I thought would work. 

The result is this citrusy, lemony and quite antique-looking bookpage/card. I used Distress antique linen ink to create the aged page, with Memento black ink for the script so I could color the lemons with regular markers.I used a fine back marker to create the page border, and I used a few brads for another pop of color.

This card is entered in these challenges:

Double D - Lemonade (the color yellow)

Simon Says Stamp Monday -- masculine

Word Art Wednesday #599 -- anything goes

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2323 -- anything goes

Pattie's Creations #207 -- must use an image

All in a box of Kleenex

 A swap group I'm in has a challenge they're calling dumpster dive - the challenge was to use something you would usually throw away on a card. I used part of a flower-patterned tissue box -- it's the three-part panel in the middle of this card. (You can tell it's a box, because it has a bit of a sheen on it that resulted in a glare on the photo). It really made a nice background and pairs well with the die-cut flower too. (flower was in my stash, used the navy blue paper left from cutting the center panel to white-emboss the sentiment.

This card is entered in these challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday -- flowers

Use your Stuff #486 -- flowers

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2323 -- anything goes

Word Art Wednesday # 599 -- anything goes

Sunshine Shaker

 

I had a little fun with color blending and stenciling to make this card. I took white card stock, placed this honeycomb stencils on it, then blended blue, pink and yellow Distress inks to get the colors of the rainbow. Die-cut an oval in the center, and stamped a happy sun and clouds on the card beneath, then added some clear sequins and a clear plastic cover to make a shaker card. 

This card is entered in these challenges:

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday -- interactive

Crazy is our fame, stencils are our game (May challenge)  -- stenciling 

Word Art Wednesday #595 -- anything goes

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2320 -- anything goes

Pattie's Creations #206 --  anything goes

Fresh Cherries

I'm trying to organize my stamping space, and I've come to a realization that I impulse buy supplies when they are on deep deep discount. Case in point is this stencil (seen under the card), which includes pears and apples as well as cherries. It's really an old wall stencil I bought cheap and I can't remember using before now.  I'm glad I finally got around to it, I think it came out cute.

The cherries were stenciled, then cut with an oval die and framed on a scallop oval. The black base card left from a fancy fold I tried recently -- this half of the paper got in the way of a diagonal cut, so I had to trim part of it off. I decided to use it as a fold that reveals part of the inside of the card. The gingham print was a natural choice with the cherries, as was the "sweet" sentiment, which is part of an old SU set. The sentiment is white embossed. A few acrylic drops finish off the card.

This card is for these challenges:

Double D: Fresh picked.

Stencils are our game -- use a stencil

Word Art Wednesday #593 -- anything goes

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2318 -- anything goes

Butterfly -- positive and negative

 I got the idea for this card from a video by Laurel Beard, although I made several changes to make it my own. You can see the snippets I started with on the right. I just knew I wanted to do a patchwork, so I chose a solid and several prints, eventually narrowing it down to just one print. The larger white snippet I used as the backing behind the patchwork pieces to give me something sturdier to die-cut. Before die-cutting, I embossed the square, which added some much-needed texture to the blue.

I wasn't planning on using the die-cut butterfly at all, just the negative, but it sort of flew to that corner of the card and seemed to fit there.  The sentiment is from Purple Onion Designs.

This card is for these challenges:

Butterfly Challenge #181 -- colors straw and sky blue, plus butterfly

Snippets Playground #453 -- use snippets

Can You Handle the Pressure? -- use an embossing folder 

Pammie's Inky Pinkies #2317 -- anything goes

Word Art Wednesday #592 -- anything goes

Crafts Galore Encore #111 -- anything goes