random reflections

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!

Color Hues #96

Julie B's choice, Purple and Orange, for the first of October Color Hues Challenge sent me right off to find my Halloween die cuts. 

I reached for my favorite purple (Simon Says' Royal Purple) and orange (Papertrey Ink's Orange Zest) cardstock. Most of these images were die cut two or three years ago when I got together with two friends and used some of their Halloween dies. I die cut enough that I've used some of those for the last two Halloweens, and still have some left for more cards this year and next! All of the dies are from Papertrey Ink. The sentiment is from the Tricky Trio die cuts, and is no longer available. I layered three sentiment together, two purple and then the orange slightly offset. 

The sparkly moon is from the Boo Black Cat and the three ghosts were stamped and die cut from Ghost and Ghoulies. I love their tiny googlie eyes that I found in my stash. Once I arranged them, I decided the card definitely needed something more, so cut a panel of purple and then used Spellbinder's Stargazer embossing folder--just what it needed.

I'll need a few more Halloween cards, but it's good to have one on hand early. I hope you'll join us in the gallery of the Color Hues Challenge. You'll find plenty of inspiration from the Design Team there. 

Clean and Simple Florals

Knowing full well I'd be away when the latest Pinkfresh Studio Create & Connect event took place, I signed up anyway. The truth is I have a terrible time keeping up with the live videos. And too frequently, the card the designer is sharing is a bit over the top for my taste. By doing it this way, I could watch the videos and make some decision about what and how to create with the (always) fun product that comes with the class. 

In addition, I can watch the videos in any order I want. This time I started with a cling stamp, stencil, and die called Modern Botanicals. I colored two sets of the florals, knowing I want to eventually create the first card Kristina Werner designed for her class. For one set, however, I decided to make three CAS cards, using a variety of precut card fronts and dies I had in my stash.

The black piece was dry embossed with The Greetery Crimped Circle dies. I thought I was going to use it on a previous card, but ended up putting it in my envelope of card fronts instead. I trimmed off the top and bottom and added a thin strip of black cardstock as a border, and added it to a bright pink card base. All the florals are from Modern Botanicals. The sentiment is a Betterpress one from Spellbinders' Always and Forever Sentiment Strips.

The background for the next card was die cut and given to me by a friend several years ago, and I'm just now finding the perfect use for it. It's Scalloped Stackers: Medium from Papertrey Ink.

Teal isn't a color I often choose, but it was perfect for this floral. I added a Stitched Circle from Simon Says and a another Betterpress sentiment from Always and Forever Sentiment Strips. I added some dimensional tape to it before adding it to the circle.

The last card uses some Stitched Scallops from The Greetery. A friend loaned these dies to me, and I die cut a good stack of them in several colors. It didn't take me long to find a use for these.

This sentiment, too, came from the same Betterpress plate by Spellbinders. I added some thin dimensional tape to the smaller Stitched Scallop for a little interest. I gave thought to embellishing all three with some pearls or enamel dots but in the end, decided I liked them as is. (Easier to mail, as well.)

I'm sending these off to The Flower Challenge: Include a Stamped Image.

We're off on our next adventure tomorrow. I have a group of posts written, and depending on my time and internet access, I may get a few posted. For sure the next Color Hues Challenge will go live on October 1. I gave some thought to totally getting off the internet while we were away until Tracy asked me how many emails I thought I'd have on my return. I shuddered at the thought. I'm taking my iPad so I can read my Kindle books on the flights, but because I usually use a laptop, I'm not terribly adept at using the iPad for much other than reading. 

 

 

Just A Note

Yesterday I had time to create a card for three different challenges. The first is Addicted to CAS: Just a Note, and as soon as I saw the challenge I knew what I wanted to do. Then I realized that the card fit both Freshly Made Sketches and the Word Power challenges. I've never played along with the Word Power Challenge, so I was happy to finally have a card where the focus was on the words. This makes my second post for the day, but the Freshly Made Sketches Challenge ends today, so I couldn't wait. 

The card was created with just dies from The Greetery. I had already die cut and assembled some of the pens from the Pen Pal die, and I also had precut several panels from the Postal Frame die. All I needed to do was the stamp and die cut the fabulous sentiment from Scripted Sentiments.

I liked this one so much I found two more assembled pens and created masculine cards with those. 

 

What I really like about these cards are all the sub-sentiments that are included in Scripted Sentiments which means I can use these for birthdays, anniversaries, or encouragement cards--to name a few. I'm quite sure I'll come back to this design in the future. 

 

Blue and Pink for Color Hues 95

Cindy has a great color combo for us on the Color Hues Blog this round: 

I pulled out two new products (NBUS) from Alex Syberia: Garden Tweets and Signature Tags for my card, and I'm really happy with how it came out.

I chose two Papertrey Ink papers for the main blues: Blueberry Sky and Spring Rain. The foliage was die cut with one of my favorite neutrals: Soft Stone. The pinks all came from my scrap box as most of the die cut pieces were very small. After assembling the bird and flowers, I arranged them on one of the two large tags from the Signature Tags set cut from a piece of patterned paper in an older My Favorite Things paper pad, Road Tripper. I like the subtle light blue pattern which adds some interest but doesn't detract from the main images.

After tying a bow with gold thread from Altenew, I added a sentiment that was hot foiled in gold with Spellbinders Better Press Plate, Fancy Sentiment Strips. I used some dimensional tape under the sentiment strip, and adhered the tag to a card base of Spring Rain cardstock. 

There's always a lot of inspiration from our Guest Designer and the Design Team at the Color Hues Blog, so hop over and see what might inspire you to join us in the gallery.

This is off to Darnell's NBUS Challenge.

 

 

With Sympathy

I don't tend to make sympathy cards ahead, so when I need one in a hurry I head to my envelope of card fronts or embossed panels. This time I found two pieces I had previously embossed with embossing folders, so made two cards. Now I have one in the stash.

Altenew's Magnolia Ballerina 3D Embossing Folder is so beautiful, it needs no embellishment. I decide to off set the oval and trimmed off the excess.Then I added a simple die cut sentiment from The Greetery's All Occasion Script Sentiments which I embossed in gold.

Gina K's Tapestry Embossing Folder is also beautiful. I cut down the panel, and added a narrow gold border and then used dimensional tape to add it to a white card base. For this card I used an already gold foiled sentiment from Spellbinders, You Are Everything set. I did add three gold pearls from Pinkfresh Studio.

These will be two more entries into the Can You Handle the Pressure Challenge and I'm also adding them to the AAA Card Challenge that's looking for CAS sympathy or get well cards. 

Just Because

My blogging friend, Darnell, posted a card using Altenew's Streamlined Sprig die for her I.D.E.A.S. project--D is for dies. When I saw it, I told her I'd try to get a card up that week, but it's taken longer than I anticipated. But looking at the current challenges I saw two that might help me get this die into use. Time Out Challenges: Friendship or Encouragement, and Can You Handle the Pressure? I'm not using the Optional Leaves theme, but it's always using an embossing folder. I had one of those in my NBUS box along with the Altenew die. 

I have to admit I just love this die. The die includes the stem and outline but separate die for the fillers behind. I chose my colors from scraps in my scrap box, and did some ink blending for dimension.

The graphic nature of the embossing folder (Spellbinders' Geo Screen) was just perfect for this stylized flower. 

The sentiment is a Betterpress one also from Spellbinders, You Are Everything.

Hope you are having a day filled with sunshine! It's cool here, but very bright and likely to warm up by the afternoon.

Color Hues #94

I knew September would show up long before I was ready to say goodbye to summer. I remember Tracy once saying that now that we're retired "it's  endless summer." Sadly, not. I will miss the long hours of sunshine, the pretty flowers in my yard and garden, and the warm weather. It will still be nice for a few more weeks, but once Labor Day arrives, summer seems to end for me.

Knowing fall is on its way, Carol has a wonderful color challenge for us at the Color Hues Challenge blog:

For this challenge, especially, remember that this is a color hues challenge so there's always room for a variety of hues. I chose two hues of cardstock for rust and two hues of green. I also included some dark brown and white--neutrals are always welcome. I immediately thought of two die sets in my NBUS box:  Spellbinders' The Botanical Solarium and Altenew's Through the Window. 

After die cutting all the elements, I added a bit of ink blending to the greenery and backed the window with a piece of cloud vellum. When I started to consider what I could use I remembered some of this, but I had no idea if there was any left. I had plenty for the window, and enough for several more when I use this die again. 

I had several contenders for a rust card base but chose Papertrey Ink's Terra Cotta Tile. The rust cardstock for the pots is Gina K's Rusty. The sentiment is from My Favorite Things, Sunflower Sweetheart. The only embellishments were the pearls for the flower centers and one for the butterfly. I had a few die cuts left over, and decided to use a few of them on the inside:

The sentiment here is from My Favorite Things Sweet Birthday Wishes. I'll bet there are a few stamps or die in your collection that would make for a great entry to our Rust and Green gallery. Be sure to check on the Color Hues Blog for more inspiration, and come join us!

As noted above, this card definitely benefited from my NBUS box, so it will be an early entry to Darnell's September NBUS challenge. I'm also adding it to the gallery at Addicted to Stamps and More: Die Cuts and Stencils.

 

Woodblock Wednesday-August

The fourth Wednesday is always Woodblock Wednesday, and this month the last Wednesday in the month. I read an Opinion piece in the New York Times recently saying that although most people see Labor Day (Monday) as the end of the summer, you don't have to buy into that. Most of my adult life Labor Day was the last weekend of summer because it brought the beginning of the new school year. I actually loved the start of a school year, but this year I'm going to try to hold on to that summer feeling for a few more weeks. 

We got home last yesterday from a fun week on Intermediate Lake in Michigan and two days with friends in the wine country of Traverse City. I'll have some photos up by the end of the week. Luckily, I made my Woodblock Wednesday card before we left, and you can see that summer was definitely on my mind. 

This is another old woodblock that's been in my collection for years. The manufacturer was Fred B. Mullet, and I have no idea where I picked it up. I stamped it on watercolor paper and water colored it with Distress Oxide Inks. Both the narrow frame and the card base were created with woodgrain papers from Simon Says.

The sentiment is from Colorado Crafts' A Fox's Life which a friend gave me. It's never been used so it's off to Darnell's NBUS.  Thanks, as always, to Amy Tsuruta for hosting Woodblock Wednesday! 

Color Hues #93

Tracey has chose perfect summer colors for the new Color Hues Challenge.

I pulled out an old favorite for some bright and cheerful Coneflowers by Honey Bee. The layers and size of the florals make a big impact on an A2 sized card.

Catherine Pooler's Chic Chevron coverplate made a good background for the florals. I added a sentiment stamped in dark brown and fussy cut from Pinkfresh Studio's Friendship Blooms stamp set. 

The colors in the photos are quite a bright as they are in real life--a too frequent result of living in an old house with limited light. I added a few yellow enamel dots was the only embellishment. 

I hope you'll join us at the Color Hues Challenge. The gallery is open until August 29th so there's lots of time to create with us! 

 

Pinkfresh Studio August Challenge

I was excited to see the theme of the Pinkfresh Studio Challenge this month: Washi tape. I immediately knew what I wanted to use, but had to wait until my friend received the card before posting it.

I hadn't pulled out the beautiful, gold enhanced Pinkfresh Studio Washi tape, Sunflowers, in a very long time. They are perfect for a summer birthday. I used a card design I learned from Anett Gelencsér during the Create & Connect event held in February. It creates a middle portion that "pops up" when the card is released from the envelope.

To create the card, we used two of the Notched Corner Frame dies as well as the Stitched Octagons coverplate. I did some light yellow ink blending on the coverplate die and chose two dies from the washi tape collection to decorate the frame. You can see the dimension better in the photo below.

The sentiment is also from Pinkfresh, Perfect Sentiments, hot-foiled in gold. 

I have more Pinkfresh Studio washi tape, but my crafting time for August is just about up, so another entry is probably unlikely. We're off to Michigan this weekend with our daughter and her family, and then to visit with friends we met on our tour of Portugal and Spain last year.  So many ideas, so little time!