random reflections

September Woodblock Wednesday

Clearly, it is not Wednesday, but yesterday was the first time I was able to get this card completed for this month's Woodblock Wednesday, hosted by Amy Tsuruta

I pulled out a favorite snowman image so I could add another card to my Christmas collection. This stamp by PSX even lists the date-1995. I've been at this long before I started blogging; actually before I had a computer.

I stamped the snowman on a piece of textured cardstock I found on my desk and die cut it, as well as the background, with Simon Says Stitched Rectangles. The background was stamped with My Favorite Things Snowfall Background and embossed with a sparkly Bridal embossing power which was also a PSX product.

I colored the scarf with Copics, used an orange Stadetler Fineliner for the nose, and Jane Davenport's Golden Age pen to outline the halo. I also added glitter to the wings which proved to be very difficult to photograph. The sentiment is from Savvy Stamps.

 

 

Just Truckin'

In the past month or so, Spellbinders has had a couple amazing sales and I managed to pick up a couple dies I'd been eyeing for a long time, but unwilling to spend the money for them. During the sales, everything I bought was 50% or more off the original price. Here's a card that features a pick-up truck that can be used for every season of the year. I needed a card for a male friend who's birthday is in October so it was the perfect opportunity to break out the die.

I die cut the truck and all its parts from scraps. The pumpkin, leaves, and wheat were die cut last fall and filed with the Pretty Pink Posh Fall Basket dies.  I layered it all with some dimensional tape on a piece of Ellen Hutson's woodgrain cardstock after adding a piece of patterned paper from My Favorite Things to ground the truck.

Another buy during the sale was Spellbinders So Many Sentiments giving me ample sentiments for the license plate. 

Amazingly, I had nearly a complete set of sentiments stamped on orange and die cut with Pinkfresh Studios Basic Banners: Celebrate. The two leaves added with some dimensional tape from the Pretty Pink Posh set were all the embellishment this card needed.

This will be my second entry into The Four Seasons September challenge, and my third entry to Seize the Birthday, working with the Topping (Fall Colors) once again. And since the truck is making its first appearance, another card for NBUS.

Altenew's Stargazer Lilies

The Flower Challenge has been on almost all month and the challenge is to use a die cut. It happens all too frequently that I put off getting a card made until nearly the last minute. The Altenew Stargazer Lily die has been on my desk at least all month, but finally I made a card with it.

I die cut the lilies with the. Spellbinders Specialty flower paper which does make it easier to shape the petals once you've colored them. I pulled out my ink daubers for these and used several different inks from Pinkfresh Studio. After I assembled the lilies, I splatter some white ink over the them.

For the background I chose a piece of Smoky Shadow cardstock which I die cut with Altenew's Dotted Scales Debossing Cover die which adds subtle, but lovely, texture to the card. The sentiment is from The Ton's Easy Expressions: Birthday. 

In addition to The Flower Challenge, I'm entering the challenge at Addicted to Stamps and More: Any Occasion, and another entry to Darnell's NBUS--the lilies first run!

Happy Birthday, Skylar!

Today is the 12th birthday for my oldest granddaughter. You couldn't ask for a nicer young lady--serious about school and passionate about horseback riding. We gave her a gift certificate to the local tack shop which is loaded with all kinds of things for horseback riding. I'm sure she'll find something she'll like. Unfortunately, my stamp collection does not include images of horses. Well, there's one wooden stamp but I forgot about it when I was making her card. She also loves rainbows and pretty colors so I went with this:

I was lucky a month or so ago and won the Sneak Peek kit from Waffle Flower that included this Stacking Cake Die.  I used glitter paper for the frosting, and purple and bright pink for the candles--adding a bit of glitter to them with a Nuvo glitter pen. The sentiment strip was also included in the kit. For the background I used the Pinkfresh Studio Layered Sunburst stencil which I ink blended with a variety of Pinkfresh Studio inks.

I'm sending this off to the Seize the Birthday challenge without the topping this time. The colors of Skylar's card match pretty successfully with the STB logo designs. And also to NBUS since this is the first time I've used the stacking cake die. 

Hope you're having a great day! Sun is shining here which is always a mood booster!

Fall Wreath

When Hero Arts announced their last kit, I decided to order one knowing I had nothing like it, and would be able to use it during the fall season when I have lots of birthday cards to send. This is the first iteration, but not the first try. A white lacquer pen was included in the kit to be used to add details to the mushrooms. I could not manage to get consistently small dots with the pen, so started all over and used a gelly roll #10 pen for the white this time around. 

The kit comes with a set of three stencils. In the sample directions, they used one ink color for each stencil, but one thing I love about autumn are the multi-colored leaves so I did a bit of masking and used tiny blending brushes to add a bit more color to the wreath.

Once it was completed I decided to add it with a bit of foam tape to a Hero Arts card that's been in my stash for a long time. If I were to name it I'd call in "paper bag brown" and I'd like to have some cardstock the same color. 

The kit also comes with a stamp set filled with sentiments--they were all a bit busy for me and none were specifically birthday messages so I chose one from Gina K's Wreath Builder set. 

Not surprisingly, a variety of challenges are looking for fall inspired cards: The Four Seasons Challenge, Just Us Girls which has a fall-inspired moodboard as does Inkspirational, and finally, Seize the Birthday where the topping is Use Fall Colors. 

Color Hues #72

Today, I'm honored to announce a very special Challenge at Color Hues!  

In conjunction with our normal Color Challenge, The Color Hues Design Team and a few guests, from our sister challenge Seize the Birthday, are participating in a Blog Hop! 

Collectively as a team and with other crafters, we are hopping in memory of our dear friend, fellow cardmaker, and Design Team member, Lindsey Martin-Penny, who sadly passed away last year from a rare and aggressive form of Ovarian Cancer. 

 

The purpose of this hop will be to honor Lindsey, celebrate her life and all that she loved, as well as spread the word to raise funds for Clear Cell Ovarian Cancer Research.  

How can you Help? You can find all the fabulous details and the start of the hop at Emily's Blog HERE!

In honor of Lindsey, the Design Team has created a variety of cards using her favorite color combo of Purple and Red.

In honor of Lindsey, I chose a CAS design with hearts of red and purple. I'm not quite sure where I first saw the technique of using recessed die cuts, but I think it was one of Laura Basson's cards. It worked perfectly for this card.

I first die cut a square of 110# Neenah cardstock with one of the Simon Says Stitched Rectangles and popped it up with dimensional tape on a square cardbase. Using Simon Says TicTacToe dies, I cut hearts in two hues of red and two hues of purple, and adhered them to the card base.

The sentiment was a preprinted one from The Stamp Market's Foiled Card Phrases. The final touch was to add a gold pearl to six of the hearts.

I hope you'll join the Color Hues Design Team and our Special Guests, Barbara and Glena from Seize the Birthday Challenge, and create a card in red and purple in honor of Lindsey. Please hop along and support the cause in any way you can!

A Fall Plaid with Color Throwdown

I loved this week's Color Throwdown Challenge: orange, red, maroon, and gold. The Double D Challenge is looking for Fall Plaids, and this fits that challenge as well. 

Pinkfresh Studio's Dainty Plaid and stencil were laying on my desk so I decided to see if I could use these colors for a card.

To use the stencils properly, you'd use six different inks, but I experimented and came up with a plaid using just three inks: Papertrey's  Orange Zest, Pure Poppy and Scarlet Jewel. I gold embossed the plaid and used a preprinted gold sentiment from Pinkfresh Studio. 

I've totally depleted my stash of Thinking of You cards which, sadly, are the cards I seem to need most often. This is the third card I've created this week, but I still need a few more. 

It's not often I post twice in a day, but the Color Throwdown Challenge closes tomorrow, and I don't want to count on remembering to get it up in the morning.

Just a Note

In addition to the Fall Folk dies used here, I purchased the Fall Folk stencil from The Greetery. Like the dies, I can see this stencil used in many seasons beyond fall depending on the colors you choose. For this first card with the stencils, I opted for a color palette of teal, red, and orange, not at all what I might choose if I wanted a fall palette.

I used both ink cubes and cardstock from Concord and 9th: three hues of the teal, two of red, and one for the orange. 

Because the stencil creates a rather busy pattern, I decided not to add any embellishments after adding a gold foiled sentiment from Pinkfresh Studio's Perfect Sentiments. I cut down the stencil with one of Hero Art's  Infinity Rounded Rectangles,  and then die cut the next two layers of Juniper and Marmalade cardstock to add a bit more color before adding it add to a Tidepool card base. 

It's been a busy weekend here--two memorial services (for me), and a three day celebration for Tracy's high school graduating class. It's been a small gathering--about 40 in all, but fun for Tracy to reconnect with friends he made in high school and for me to reconnect with a few I've known for quite some time as well as to get to know a few I don't believe I've ever met before. 

Sending this card to Darnell's NBUS blog to share my NBUS Fall Folk stencil.

Fall Folk Dies

The Greetery just had a new fall release and there were several items that spoke to me. The Fall Folk dies were one of them, and I had time yesterday to get a few cards made. I'm sharing my favorite here today, and will be back with a couple others with the second die in the set.

With a palette of navy, white, and some red accents, this die doesn't scream fall to me, and I can see replicating this design for a variety of occasions. I didn't like any of the sentiments I tried, so decided against one, and will use this particular card to send a note of encouragement to a friend who is undergoing chemotherapy.

The Fall Folk die was cut into a white square cut from Papertrey Ink's Window Dressing Scallops. I die cut just one of these when I was with friends months ago, and now wish I had a pile of them as it's just perfect with this die. 

I backed the die with some navy shimmer paper I purchased in Milwaukee at Broadway Paper. The tiny red pearls are from AMuse. I have quite a collection of these, and hope I never run out, I use them so often. 

I'm throwing this in the NBUS gallery since the die has never been used. For once, I used it very promptly after it's arrival. 

 

 

Color Hues #71

Tracey has chosen a bright and very fun color combination for the new Color Hues challenge.

I have to admit I do purchase products specifically because I think they'll do well with a two color challenge. In early July I won an Altenew gift card and waited for a sale before spending it. One of the items I purchased was the Geo Tiles Cover Die, and I do think it works well for a two color challenge. An added bonus is that I ended up with two cards.

The first challenge was to find the right hues of tangerine and violet. I decided on two Papertrey Ink papers: Orange Zest and Amethyst Allure. After die cutting the cover panel, I added them to a card base from the opposite color and inlaid all the circles. Interestingly, the purple circles looked best on both cards, so I had to die cut one more purple panel.

The sentiment on both cards is also from a new purchase, Pinkfresh Studio's Basic Banners: Celebrate. I knew as soon as it was released that I wanted it but waited long enough that it went out of stock, so I had to wait awhile. I love the fact that the sentiments are all on one stamp, and then one die cuts them out with a variety of banner shapes. It will get a lot of use.

They didn't photograph particularly well, but I added gold pearls to the centers of each circle.

I hope you'll have as much fun with this challenge as I have, and will join us in the gallery. Be sure to check out the fabulous designs by the DT and our Guest Designer. 

I'm also adding this to Darnell's NBUS Challenge as nothing I used for these cards has ever been used before.