random reflections

More Buttercups

I've always been a fan of bright colors on a dark background, so that's where I started with these two cards. Both use Spellbinders Fresh Picked Buttercups. 

I die cut these buttercups with Concord and 9th's Buttercup cardstock (a perfect match!) I added some ink blending with the same C&9th ink to the middle of the flower before adding a die cut center from orange cardstock. The leaves were die cut with Paper Source's Clover cardstock. 

I die cut a piece of black cardstock with Concord & 9th's Triangle Background die and added it to a Buttercup card base. The sentiment, gold embossed, is from Pinkfresh Studio's Basic Banners: Celebrate.

The flowers here were die cut from white cardstock and ink blended with Spun Sugar Distress Oxide ink. I added yellow enamel dots for the centers this time.

This time I die cut the black panel with Simon Says Detail Petal Coverplate, and added it to a black card base with dimensional foam. The sentiment is from Pink and Main's Special Day which is one of my most used sentiment sets. 

I'm sending these off to TicTacToe where I used the diagonal Flowers, Free, Die Cuts and to Triple B - always looking for Birds, Butterflies, and/or Blooms.

  

 

Woodblock Wednesday: April 2024

Having been away for a week, April has disappeared more quickly than usual, and here we are at the last Wednesday. It's time for Woodblock Wednesday.

This month I chose to CASE a card I made in a class over 25 years ago! I replicated the card multiple times for several years, but it's been a long time and as soon as I saw the stamp I decided to create an updated version.

The layered lighthouse scene is layered much the way it was on the original card. I changed a very dark purple card base for brighter cardstock, added an embossed background, some yellow for the light in the lighthouse as well as a sentiment on a tag. The original had no sentiment on the front and a tag with a charm hung from the top left side of the card. The wooden stamp is from Paper Parachute, and the embossing folder is from Lifestyle crafts. The embossing of the stars was almost too deep, but die cutting the panel with Gina K's Master Layourt #1 flattened it just the right amount. The sentiment is from Simon Says' Your Light set.

Even with a closer look, it's hard to see that I added a bit of metallic gold to each of the circles in the border as well as the centers of the stars in the sky.  The little tag for the sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Tag Creations: Modern Gift. In addition to the dimensional tape added to the layers in the scene, I added a layer of dimension behind the embossed panel. This was a really fun project!

I'm just in time to add this to the Can You Handle the Pressure Challenge where using an embossing folder is a requirement. The card is also going to the Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Anything Goes.

Buttercups #1

Before we left on vacation, I die cut quite a few buttercups from Spellbinders Fresh Cut Buttercups. I've been entranced by the series of Fresh Cut flowers Spellbinders has introduced, and the designs that cover the card completely have been very eye-catching. But I wondered if I could create several versions of a CAS card. This is the first of several you'll see. Ultimately, I'll try one of the more elaborate designs as well, but as usual, I ran out of time.

I added just a bit of ink blending to the flowers with some Spun Sugar Distress Oxide.  For some visual interest and texture the Basket Weave Cover Plate from Gina K was added to the pink cardbase. After attaching the blossoms to the stem and leaves I added them to the cardbase, with a tag from a very old Papertrey Ink set, Tiny Tags with a sentiment from Be Still, by Honey Bee.

I"m sending this off to Colorful Options: Pastels, The Card Concept: Spring Flowers with a lovely inspiration photo, The Flower Challenge: Add Layers, and to NBUS since this is the Buttercups debut.

      

 

 

Color Hues #85

It's mid-April and time for a new Color Hues Challenge. Hannelie has chosen Yellow and Pink for this challenge. 

I was determined to create something a bit out of my comfort zone. The first card I created was just OK. I'll send the card, but I wanted to try something else for the challenge. As I was looking through my dies I came upon a Memory Box die set (dated 2015) that I've had for many years, but never used. The images in Rain or Shine, are small so it took me awhile to figure out how to use them. The old familiar saying "April showers bring May flowers" was going through my head as I looked at the dies. The rain and the umbrellas were right there, but I needed to find the sentiment as well as some flowers. 

By lining up the "rain" image and repeating it I got a square of rain drops. The two cute umbrellas paper-pieced with old AMuse papers fit right on there. Luckily I had two of the (also very old) Papertrey Ink sets from the Monthly Moments sets that gave me most of my sentiment.

I layered the umbrellas with two pieces of heavy cardstock and the handles with two of the handle die cuts for a bit of dimension.

Finding the word "bring" turned out to be the most time-consuming part of the card. I could have used the computer, but I wanted the message to be on one layer. My collection of Christmas stamps turned out to be the best option. I found a couple different ones, but this one from Waffle Flowers Oversized Joy fit perfectly. I found the little flowers in The Greetery's BotaniCut Strawberries set, and I popped them up with teeny pieces of dimensional foam.

We're hoping for lots of May flowers here, but the bulk of them won't be planted until Memorial Day so there's still lots of time for April showers. Personally, I'm hoping for lots of April sunshine!!! When this post goes live, we'll be in South Carolina so we're more likely to be enjoying sunshine than we would be in Rochester.

I hope this color combo inspires you to create a card for our gallery at Color Hues. Be sure to check out the Design Teams clever and beautiful cards!

This is going to the NBUS blog. This might be one of the oldest unused die sets in my collection! It's also going to Juat Us Girls where the Word Week Challenge is Rain. How lucky am I as this challenge closes at 9:00 tonight!

 

 

 

Be Happy

There is a pile of partially-finished projects on my desk, but I did complete one made specifically for a few challenges: Seize the Birthday-Spring Florals, Stencil Fun-Spring/Flowers, and Colorful Options-Pastels. The challenges offered me an opportunity to use a NBUS stencil by Papertrey Ink and a new set of sentiments by Honey Bee.

I tend to be very heavy-handed when ink blending, but tried my hardest to keep this one soft and subtle. I love the Wild Blooms stencil and the sentiment set, Be Still, is filled with lovely greetings in both print and script. I opted for the dies as well, and they work perfectly.

I struggled to find an appropriate pink ink for the sentiment and although I have several to choose from they were all either too light (even with multiple stampings) or not quite the right hue. I'm still not thrilled with this one. I added some Pinkfresh Studio light pink jewels and called it done.

Tanzania Adventure

Odysseys' Tanzania Adventure tour was accurately titled. It met every one of our expectations and then some. There was additional "excitement" for me because my passport disappeared the very night we arrived. It's a long story, but we do know I had it in my hand when I got on the van at the Killimanjaro Airport (thanks to the CCTV cameras at the airport,) but that was the last time anyone saw it. Needless to say, I got home, and Tracy and I had a couple adventures the rest of the group missed. Actually, they were wonderful adventures, and the biggest take-away I have from the trip is the kindness, coooperation, and empathy we received from everyone we encountered. The wonderful manager of Leopard Tours in Arusha who facilitated my trip to the American Embassy in Dar es Salaam said it all one day. "Karen, as long as you are in Tanzania, you are family." And that's how we were treated everywhere!

I'm posting a few of our favorite images from the trip here, but at the end of the post you'll find a link to my SmugMug album from the trip. There were many, many more photos but we tried to organize the SmugMug album with some of the most interesting. Once thing you'll see is the variety of landscapes in Tanzania. When I thought about a safari my vision was of the savannah or open plains. In Serengetti, that was true, but it was very different in the other three parks. If you view the SmugMug album you'll see captions for many of the photos, as well as all the photos I'm sharing here. 

You have to look closely but you'll see several beautiful black and white Colobus monkeys in the Arusha National Park-the largest monkeys we saw.

One of the first of many lions we saw. His full belly tells you he has recently eaten, is very sleepy, and won't need another meal for several days.

Mt. Kilimanjaro was only visible in the Arusha National Park. On the day we were there, just the tip of the mountain was showing.

This was not the only time we waited for elephants to cross the road.

I didn't know a group of giraffes is called a tower, but it makes a lot of sense, and I won't forget it. We counted over 20 in this spot.

We visited a Maasai village on the trip and were introduced to their culture. The Maasai are one of the few tribes that have managed to retain their traditional way of life.
We had a chance later in the trip to talk to a Maasai doctor who trained in the United States. He spent 10 years working in Denmark, but has now returned to his village
and is working with a small group to improve their health card and develop some ways to make their lives easier without impinging on the culture.
Two of the men who who conducted our tour of the village had B.A. degrees from universities but have returned to their village.

Our first view of the The Ngorongoro Crater. It was the area I was most excited to see, and it did not disappoint!
We spent one day in the crater and part of a second day in the Nogorongoro Conservation Area.

Sunrise over the Ngorongoro Crater. 

Getting up early to see the sunrise also meant that the light in the crater was perfect for taking photos.

One of many, many Wildebeast 

Both the zebras and the wildebeasts are part of the huge migration that takes place annually. A million wildebeasts and over 800,000
zebras migrate from Kenya to Tanzania and back in search of food during the dry season.

A

Cape Buffalo with Cattle Egrets

A final view of the crater at the end of the day, taken from our lodge which sat on the edge of the crater. 

It didn't happen often, but if word got out to the various driver/guides that there was an excellent viewing, a traffic jam
ensued. Our driver was exceptional, and we never left without a good photo. See below.

Our last two days were spent on Zanzabar, the Spice Island. This is a traditional boat called a Dhow.

We visited a spice plantation. The red is nutmeg, and the surrounding yellow is mace. 

There was just one photo I wanted from this trip, and luckily I got it. A dhow with the sun setting in the background over the Indian Ocean. Tracy and I left one night ahead of the rest of the tour so I could get to the American Embassy to get my emergency passport. Thanks to one of the women in our group, we did not miss the farewell dinner because she asked to have it a night early before we left. It turned out to be a very lovely event, and we are so appreciative of being able to attend. Like the Tanzanian people, our tour group was wonderful, as was our tour guide, our driver/guide, and the two men we traveled with on each of the game drives. We had so much fun!

Thanks for sticking with me through the photo tour. If you still have an interest here is a link to the SmugMug album. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Color Hues #84

Peach and Green are the new colors for the April 1st Challenge at Color Hues. Cindy has chosen the duo, and I had a lot of fun with it.

Rather impulsively I ordered the February Clear Stamp and Die of the Month from Spellbinders. I have no regrets. It was just perfect for this challenge, and I'm a big fan of lilies!

The feature that sold me on the set was the die cut which cuts the arched frame and all the inside areas at once. After coloring the image with Copic markers, I backed the arch with black cardstock, and the lilies just popped! Concord and 9th recently introduced a new set of colors. I usually invest in a sampler pack, and it arrived just as I was trying to find a piece of peach cardstock. Their Creamsicle paper was just what I needed. 

The stamp set included several lovely sentiments as well as the dies to cut them out. I added some dimensional foam behind the arched lilies, and then stacked several sentiments to provide more dimension. 

April usually hold some promise of consistent Spring weather in western New York, so hopefully we'll soon see lilies beginning to peek through in the garden. In the meantime, hop over to the Color Hues blog to see the what the Design Team and our Guest Designer have created. We hope you'll join us!

Thanks to this new stamp and die set, I'm likely to be one of the first in the gallery at Darnell's April NBUS post.  I'm also posting this in the Seize the Birthday Challenge: Spring Florals, and The Four Seasons Challenge: Anything Goes.