random reflections

Happy Birthday, Matt!

It's hard to believe my youngest is now 41, but that's a fact! Tracy and I celebrated with Matt and Betsy on Saturday night at his favorite restaurant. Tonight we joined them for cake and opening presents. 

And a photo of my granddaughters being a bit goofier than usual. Their power was out due to high winds here so we celebrated at Betsy's father's house. I'm not sure that's an excuse but they were more wound up than usual. No outage here, but we have a generator so we wouldn't be without power for long.

Here's Matt's birthday card:

I embossed Uniko's Block Arts Décoratifs in gold on True Black cardstock. I knew I wanted to use my Iuile metallic watercolors but knew I wouldn't need a lot of water to do what I intended so went with standard cardstock instead of watercolor paper. 

I wanted to try a "fade out" technique with the gold metallic watercolor. It turned out to be pretty easy to do, and I like the end result. 

The Pinkfresh Studio Basic Banners: Celebrate was embossed with gold and die cut with the matching die. I started this card with a couple of challenges in mind, but in the end it wasn't CAS enough to enter in any of them.

 

Woodblock Wednesday

It's the last Wednesday in February (and our son's birthday!), so it's also Woodblock Wednesday hosted by Amy Tsuruta.

I'm in need of thank you cards, so I decided to pull out a favorite woodblock stamp by Paper Parachute and, for inspiration, five cards from the Color Cube which I've owned for several months but never used. As you can see, each card features a photograph (and inspiration for photography) as well as five colors drawn from the photo. I chose three of the colors from each card to color the floral design with Copic markers. I was a bit apprehensive trying to color such a small image with Copics but it actually went pretty well. I ended up with five thank you notes.

All five cards use the same products, so I'll just share them one by one. Some of the different color schemes produce cards with a different vibe which is nice when deciding which one to use for a note.

I'll be back later tonight with a birthday post for Matt. I'm hoping the girls will be receptive to a photo with their dad. Either way, I'll be back to share his birthday card. 

 

 

 

#100DayProject-Day 2

I really do enjoy how a project evolves as you work on it. Yesterday I decided to start a little notebook for the 100 Day Project.

I set a 30 minute timer when I begin, and when it ends, I jot down how much I accomplished in that 30 minute period. Both yesterday and today I continued on and finished some cards. I can't share yesterday's cards yet but today's is #1 for the stash. My internet friend, Darnell, has also started a project to help her work through her stash. Here's her plan:

Each week she choose one of the items on the list to focus on. She's been working on one a week since the beginning of February so this week it's Embossing Folders. No surprise, I had a new embossing folder in my NBUS box, so I pulled it out to play along.

Spellbinder's Tufted 3-D Embossing Folder is huge so I got two pieces from it. You can see both of them here. I ran the piece on the card through my die cut machine with Gina K's Master Layout #1 and you can see how it flattened the pattern. I decided I was fine with that although I could have easily trimmed down the other piece to use. I used Smoky Shadow for the card base and the Waffle Flower Oval Frame. They appear a bit darker in the photo, but I've retaken the photos twice so I'm giving up on accuracy. Sadly, the card is much prettier in real life than in the photos. Some days are just like that.

The floral die cut is also new--Simon Says Morning Blossom. I die cut it from white card stock and ink blended it using two orange, one yellow, and two green  Pinkfresh Studio inks. The oranges are accurate in the photo but turned out to be a much more yellow hue than I anticipated. The sentiment is from an old set by The Ton, Easy Expressions.

Good photos, not withstanding, I'm sending this over to Darnell's NBUS Challenge and to the Can You Handle the Pressure Challenge which always wants embossing as a focus of the card. 

 

#The100DayProject

Today is the first day of the 2024 #100DayProject. It's been a few years since I participated, but I had an urge to find a project this year. It took me awhile because I wanted the project to move me ahead with one of my intentions for the year. On the top of that list is getting through all the unused, but beautiful product, I have in my craft room. I also know that my time from day to day varies a lot. I just started tutoring in an ESL Special Needs first grade two mornings a week, and continue to be involved in committees at church as well as other commitments. Finally, I think I've fashioned a project that should work for me.

GOAL: to use my unused stamps, dies, and stencils. Work a minimum of 30 minutes/day using unused products with the goal of creating a “stash” of cards during the 100 Day Project.

I also know that it's perfectly legitimate to make up the time if there's a day I can't commit to 30 minutes. But actually, they should be pretty infrequent. There will be at least one week when we are away before the end of the project (May 28th) but I can certainly take some supplies with me to work on while I'm away.

I do have some cards to share today. These were completed yesterday. One of my dear friends passed away on Valentine's Day. I almost never have a stash of sympathy cards made ahead of time, so I needed one to send to her husband of 59 years after the service this morning. It ended up being a two-fer:

After I die cut the leaf for the sympathy card the green piece of Bazzil Prismatic paper looked perfect for another card.

For the sympathy card, I die cut two rectangles from Ellen Hutson's Essential Rectangle dies and layered them on top of one another. I then added the leaf before adding it all to the card base created with cold press watercolor paper. The gold embossed sentiment is from a new set from Honey Bee, Be Still.  I always love a CAS design, but I almost always rely on a CAS design for sympathy cards.

The birthday card came together quickly. I trimmed the edges of the die cut piece and layered it twice-once with cold press watercolor paper and then with a piece of Bazzil Prismatic black cardstock. The Prismatic paper has a wonderful texture. I purchased it years ago, and rediscovered it when I redid my craftroom in the fall. This is the only piece of green I have, but I have a pretty large folder of it in different colors. I don't know if it's still available. 

The silver embossed sentiment was one that I had embossed earlier and was in one of my "sentiments to go" envelopes. It's from Pink and Main's Special Day sentiment set--one that's seen a LOT of use. 

I'm sending the sympathy card to Simply Clean and Simple for my second entry this month, and to Time Out Challenge where they are celebrating their 10th birthday! (I'll have another 
one for them later.) 

.)

 

 

Color Hues #81

A new Color Hues Challenge is live, and Stef is our wonderful hostess. She's chosen Lilac and Mint as our inspiration.

I'm continuing with my goal to use all my unused products this year and started out with an elaborate die set. About halfway through the process, I totally changed directions, choosing a new die from Simon Says and a new 3-D embossing folder from Altenew. I love the simplicity of the Fresh Cut Floral and the Basic Plaid embossing folder added wonderful texture to the background.

The floral was die cut with "Lilac Grace" cardstock from Papertrey Ink, adding a darker hue from a 6X6 paper pack from Memory Box. The leaves were die cut from "Mint" by Paper Source. I wanted a bit more dimension so added some soft ink blending to the leaves and petals with Catherine Pooler's "Wintergreen" ink, and Simon Says "Lilac" ink. 

The arched design is a CASE of a card by Joan Bardee that was posted on the Spellbinder's blog. I die cut the "Soft Stone" cardstock with an arch from Ellen Hutson's Essential Arches. The sentiment is from Pinkfresh Studio's Basic Banners: Celebrate. I added some clear Raindrops by Lucy's Cards to finish it off. 

I'm always happy with a Clean & Simple card and glad to have another birthday card in my stash. I hope you'll hop over to the Color Hues Blog and check out the wonderful cards created by our Guest Designer, Bonnie, and the Design Team. Hope to see your creations in the gallery in the next couple of weeks.

I'm sending this off to the Seize the Birthday: Anything Goes and the Simply Clean and Simple Challenge--Anything Goes.  And another one for NBUS! I'm hoping to fill Darnell's gallery in the next few weeks with Never Before Used Schtuff!

 

 

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day--one of my fave holidays, and I'm glad to be home to celebrate it. We had a fabulous trip with lots of stories to tell. I'm hoping to get the trip photos edited in a much more timely fashion this time. But for now, I have some valentines to share. The first two went to Wisconsin before we left in a padded envelope to be held by my daughter until today. When I mailed the Halloween cards to them, Hannah's came two days before Halloween, but Caleb's arrived two weeks AFTER Halloween. Not going to let that happen again!

I recently picked up some sale items at Concord and 9th, and thought I could fashion a valentine for a 12 year-old boy (who wears glasses) from the Spectacular Shades die set with accompanying sentiments. 

I die cut strips from The Stamp Market's 1/4" Strips die in Green Parakeet, Bright Buttercup (Papertrey Ink), and Red Hot (Gina K Designs). To die cut the letters for the words, I used a variety of cardstock from my scrap boxes. The spectacles themselves were die cut four times from the Red Hot cardstock and layered. A layer of acetate was added first before adhering the letters. 

The sentiment was stamped with The Greetery's Sentiment Suite: Love and die cut with My Favorite Things Itty Bitty Strips.  Here's a peek at the inside of the card. The sentiment there is from the Concord and 9th set.

Last year I made the three Rochester girls valentines with the My Favorite Things Gnome Matter What stamps and dies. This year it was Hannah's turn. I started out by creating a shaped card with Hero Arts Infinity Hearts die and adding a second smaller heart to the front. I stamped the greeting on the heart and then stuck a variety of glittery pink and red heart stickers all over it. The gnome, colored with Copics, is tossing hearts out of a bag. 

Here's a peek at the inside of Hannah's card. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Just Sentiments: Valentine.

After seeing Jennifer McGuire's card here, I knew I wanted to give it a try. All three granddaughters in Rochester gifted me with homemade pop-up cards for Christmas, so this seemed like a perfect time to return the favor.

It's hard to photograph metallic and glitter papers, but it's bit easier to see in the photo below.

The background is a new product from Gina K- Poly-Glaze Foiling Sheets: Tiny Hearts which I foiled with gold foil. I've owned a laminator for at least five years, and this was the first time I broke it out. Who knows why? It was so easy! The red glitter paper is from Gina K and the gold metallic is from Michael's. I die cut the largest heart from cardstock so I could inlay all three of the hearts with the specialty papers. Here it is popped up. 

The three girls are also getting a goodie bag with a notebook, two Valentine pencils and a Target gift card. The Wisconsin grandchildren will find cash in their valentines today.

The die for the bags is another unused prodcut from The Stamp Market-Scalloped Gift Bag die, and the patterned papers were from my scrapbook paper stash. When I gave up scrapbooking (still regretting that decision a bit), I did save some of the holiday papers. 

Not too surprisingly there are still a couple challenges with heart related themes. I'll be sending these to The Double D Challenge: Heartfelt, Inkspirational: Hearts, and to NBUS (of course) since I finally got my laminator out and did some foiling with the new Poly-Glaze sheets as well as using The Stamp Market's Scalloped Gift Bags and Concord & 9th's Spectacular Shades.

 

 

 

Color Hues #80

It’s an unusual occurrence, but this is my second post of the day. My post as the Guest Designer for the AAABirthday Challenge went live at 3:00 this morning due to a time difference in England. 

It's February 1st and time for a new Color Hues Challenge. Sheri is our hostess this time and has chosen Red and Pink. Perfect for Valentine's Day if you're so inclined. And check out our new graphic--an awesome design!

My card could easily be a valentine, but I was somewhat surprised to find I had several valentines left over from last year. I'm thinking this is more likely going to be an anniversary card for close friends of ours. I do have to make new valentines for the five grandchildren, but this one doesn't seem quite right for any of them. 

I've kept my New Year's Intention in a big way here. Every product I used was in my To Be Used Box of products purchased, but not used. I'm quite happy with all of them. I started by stenciling Papertrey Ink's Happy Hearts with Kitsch Flamingo and Lumberjack Red Distress Oxide inks, masking off the bottom of the panel for a space for the sentiment. I die cut the panel as well as a slightly larger red panel with dies from Gina K's Master Layout #3. I use her Master Layout #1 all the time, and purchased several more versions during sales over the past year. It's way past time to put them to use.

The sentiment was die cut with a very recent purchase during the after Christmas sale at Waffle Flower. The Print and Script with Love die includes two versions of the words as well as shadows for all of them. I chose the block print ones and die cut them from a scrap piece of paper that I ink blended with the two Distress Oxide inks. 

I hope you'll hop over to the Color Hues blog and check out all the amazing designs by our Guest Designer, Bobby, and the Design Team. We look forward to seeing what you create in the gallery.

If all goes as planned I'll be on Day Four of a Tanzania Safari Tour when this goes live, and most likely will be checking out your creations on my return. Aside from lack of time, my understanding is internet service is hard to come by. Nancy, our fearless leader on Color Hues, has graciously offered to cover for me while I'm gone. It's an incredible offer as she's one of the busiest card makers I know as well as running two challenge blogs. Many thanks, Nancy!

AAA Birthday Challenge Guest Designer

My card for Ella's Birthday was one of two winners at the AAA Birthday Challenge in December. I am delighted to be a Guest Design for the new challenge which this month is Hearts.

Although the theme is Hearts, the challenge requires a birthday card. I had the perfect stamp and die set for this--the Spellbinder's Parcel and Post dies and sentiments. The sentiments come both as a stamp and as a hot foil plate. I purchased the stamps this time. I've had this set for well over a year, and this is the first time I've ever used it! It surely won't be the last.

I first die cut and assembled the mailbox, and then die cut lots of the flowers and hearts from scraps of cardstock. I have lots left over for the next card. I decided on silver glitter paper for the hearts to add some sparkle to the card. Finally, the sentiment was embossed in gold and added to the front of the mailbox. I love the little envelope sealed with a heart popping out of the mailbox among the pretty florals and sparkly hearts.

Once the mailbox was fully assembled I die cut a panel with Honey Bee's Fluttering Hearts Pierced Cover Plate. Before adding the mailbox, I adhered the fluttering hearts panel to a white card base.

Since there was so much dimension with the florals and the heart in the mailbox, I decided not to add any more dimension behind the panel.

The AAA Birthday Challenge is open until the end of the month, so you have lots of time to join in. I have several February birthdays so finding a recipient for this card will be no problem.

I'm sending this card to Darnell's NBUS to celebrate the use of this fun die and stamp set.