random reflections

Color Hues #50

Carol chose the new colors for this round at Color Hues, and in my opinion, it is just perfect for Halloween.

Although the card didn't end up the way I envisioned it, I had so much fun creating it, and the end result is so much better than what I first envisioned.

I pulled out Royal Purple (Simon Says) and Orange Zest (Papertrey Ink) for the card. After die cutting an oval into the front of the top folded purple card, I added a piece of orange to the inside of the card. Then I added the spider webs in glittery black cardstock which were die cut last fall with a friend's die. The "Scary Ghosts" are from Poppy Stamps, and I backed their eyes with a scrap of black cardstock. The ghost on the inside of the card is adhered with dimensional tape and the others were adhered to the front of the card, partially floating as ghosts are apt to do.

The sentiment is from Hero Arts, "Witch Feet" set, and the bat is die cut with one of the images from Spellbinders "Spooky Boo" which I cut three times and layered for some more dimension. Here's a look at the inside of the card.

So, one Halloween card down, and four to go! 

Not everyone on the Design Team thought "Halloween" when the colors were announced, so be sure to hop over to the Color Hues blog and take a look at all the inspiration. We'd love to have you play along!

 

 

Christmas 52 Card Throwdown

I'm honored to be the Guest Designer at the Christmas 25 Card Throwdown Challenge this time around. The challenge is their Technique Challenge, and it is a bit of a challenge since I don't often made pop-up cards. 

As usual, I tried a couple different things and had a pop-up card I thought I'd share, but then I tried something totally different which I like so much better! I turned to My Favorite Things, "Present Time." One of the things I particularly like about this set was how well two of the sentiments worked for the outside and inside of the card. 

I used the largest of The Greetery's Nordic Circles for the front of the card. I started by coloring all the snowmen and the trees with Copic markers and die cutting them. I used three of the snowmen for the front and arranged them behind two snowdrifts die cut with Papertrey Ink's "In the Meadow--Snow and Hill" dies. The white embossed sentiment is adhered with some dimensional tape.

I love the inside sentiment--finally!--the presents can be opened! These happy snowmen and the tree were arranged behind some snowdrifts as well. When the snowmen are popped up, the inside sentiment appears. I'm quite sure this card would appeal to any one of my five grandchildren, but I think I'll need four more interactive cards if one of them gets this one.

Thanks to the DT at Christmas 52 Throwdown for the opportunity to guest with them. It's been a lot of fun.

Tic Tac Toe Challenge - Guest Designer

I'm delighted to be the Guest Designer for this week's Tic Tac Toe Challenge. Here's the board for the challenge:

I chose the diagonal from top left: Stencil, Any Sentiment, Berries. I had the perfect stencil for this: Pinkfresh Studio's  "Holiday Botanical Background." I actually made three versions of the card before I arrived at this one, my favorite:

I used four different green inks for the leaves and holly: PFS Fresh Pear, Key Lime, and Olive. The darkest green was Papertrey Ink's Pinefeather. For the red berries I used PFS Berrylicious and added a touch of Candy Apple. After stenciling, I die cut the panel with one of the nested dies in Hero Arts "Infinity Rounded Rectangles," and layered it onto a red card base.

Neither photo truly shows the pretty shine and dimension of the translucent Glaze that I added to the berries. The last touch was to take a white gel pen and add some details to the berries and the leaves. In fact, the photo almost makes it look like some of the gel pen was streaked across the berries--not! that's the reflection from the light. The beautiful sentiment is from Waffle Flower--a premade foiled sentiment from the set "Essential Christmas." I purchased two sets in gold and two in silver--one of the best investments for holiday cardmaking I've made so far this year.

Thanks so much to the TTTC team for choosing my card as a Designer's Pick and the honor of guesting for this challenge!

Color Hues #49

Tracey has given us the lovely Yellow and Brown color combination for the next Color Hues Challenge.

I started out with a general idea of where I wanted to go, but as is often the case, the final card is somewhat different. I started with a Classic Kraft card base, and played around with some different design ideas as well as some different die cut leaves and sprigs. I ended up with the Essential Arches dies by Ellen Hutson. I love that they cut both an arch and a frame. By die cutting them in two colors, you get a perfect set of arches with a darker frame.

I used Papertrey Ink papers for all of the die cuts:  Cocoa Bean and Dark Chocolate for the arches and sentiment banner.

The "Leafy Sprig" by Poppy Stamps is one that's been in my die collection for years. I originally thought I'd have a cluster of them, perhaps tied with twine, but ended up preferring just two, one from Lemon Tart and one from Summer Sunrise. 

The sentiment is from my favorite Pink & Main set: Special Day, stamped in Dark Chocolate ink on a Cocoa Bean banner die cut with My Favorite Things, Itty Bitty Strips die. I thought about adding some embellishment, but decided on a set of five scored lines behind the focal image and the sentiment. 

I'm sending this one over to the current Addicted to Stamps and More Challenge: Birthdays. 

This was actually the second card I made the challenge. I like the first one as well, but it was an almost complete CASE of one Debby Hughes made several years ago when the stamp set, "One With Nature" was released by Simon Says, so I decided to make a second card for the Color Hues blog. Here's the original:

This one was a lot of fun to make. I layered the solid and open leaves in two colors of yellow and brown on white cardstock, and then cut it down for the card. The side panel is cut from Dark Chocolate cardstock.

Then I added the tag with two die cut leaves and a sentiment from Gossamer Blue that was included in a scrapbook kit years ago. 

Be sure to hop over to the Color Hues blog to see all the creative takes on this color combo by the Design Team and our two guests this time around.

 

Sunflowers with "A Freshly Made Sketch"

If you've followed my blog for long, you know I'm a fan of Clean and Simple cards. One of my favorite designers of CAS cards is Cécile Ribon. It's her turn to design the sketch for Freshly Made Sketches, and I just had to play along.

As soon as I saw the sketch, I thought of a die, "Stitched Film Strip," from Pretty Pink Posh that would work perfectly. I still had an envelope of sunflowers left from my first go with the My Favorite Things kit, "Sending Sunflowers," so I pulled those out next.

I chose Fresh Snow Linen cardstock from Papertrey Ink and die cut a panel from Gina K's "Master Layout #1." I added the frame and then had to find a sentiment. This one from Simon Says, " Best Friend Ever" seemed just right and I embossed it in white on black cardstock and trimmed it out. All that was left to do was arrange the sentiment and the sunflowers. I popped up the sentiment and two of the sunflowers with dimensional tape and added a piece of foam for some dimension to the main panel before adding it to the card 

It's been so nice to have real crafty time the last few days, and it looks like there's some more time before the week is out. I'll be back tomorrow with the new Color Hues Challenge.

 

A CAS Sympathy Card

I found two challenges this week, both CAS challenges which I thought I could combine easily. First the AAA Cards Challenge which is asking for a one layer sympathy card. I was pretty successful with my last one layer card (it won the challenge) so I thought I'd try another one layer card again. I combined it with the Less is More Challenge which is looking for black and white.

I chose a lovely floral frame from Simon Says "Mandy's Flowers" which was one of the sets in their monthly kits a few years ago, and stamped it on a square cardbase. A sentiment from Gina K's "Natural Silhouettes" fit inside the frame perfectly.

The only embellishment was to add a black rhinestone to the center of the flower.

 A very simple card, but perfect for the occasion.

 

 

A Festive Celebration

The current Time Out Challenge: Festive spurred me on to create a card for two of our best friends who will be celebrating their fiftieth wedding anniversary early next month. 

Unlike many cards, this one turned out pretty much the way I envisioned it. The background of the card is a CASE of a card created by one of the most creative card makers I know, Hannelie, who created this card for the Color Hues #30 Challenge. I pinned the day I saw it, and bought the Altenew die, "String Panel," shortly afterwards. It's the first time I've used it, but it definitely won't be the last. 

I die cut the string panel twice--one in gold glitter paper and once with silver glitter paper and arranged them on a white card base, rotating the gold one on top of the silver panel. I wanted a big bold 50 and Papertrey Ink's "By the Number" which I've had for years (and love) fit the bill perfectly. I stamped the rest of the sentiment with words from another oldie by goodie, Winnie and Walter's "The Big, The Bold, and The Happy." After arranging it on a pierced oval by My Favorite Things, I adhered it with dimensional tape. 

Since the "String Panel" die is being used for the first time, I'm sending it to the September NBUS gallery as well.

Sunflowers

We bought a wonderful pot of sunflowers for our patio last week, and overnight some animal ate every leaf! Such a disappointment, although I did cut all the flowers and brought them inside. These sunflowers won't get eaten.

It's a Word Challenge at Just Us Girls this week. The word is BASKET and it came at the perfect time. I couldn't pass up My Favorite Thing's latest kit: "Sending Sunflowers," and it had just arrived.

I decided to use the sketch at this week's Freshly Made Sketches, (linked here if you're interested in the sketch), but missed the deadline by just a few minutes! It's so annoying when I let that happen. But, the challenge at CAS on Friday is stripes, and I think this works there as well.

When my friend, Michelle, receives new dies, she cuts out lots and lots and assembles them. That's not usually my style, but this time I did make a lot more than I needed for this card, so you're sure to see a few more sunflowers before September ends. The MFT kits are a wonderful value, and this one came with two sets of dies, a sentiment stamp set, as well as a patterned paper pad with houndstooth papers (see above!) I used a Stitched Rectangle from Simon Says, but otherwise everything except the kraft cardstock came with the kit. There's also a mason jar and a cute watering can in one of the die sets. The kit has already sold out, so I'm glad I didn't wait.

It's a sign of my age, probably, but I'm in need of new Thinking of You cards. I had a nice stash of them, but I'm down to the last couple. This is a start. 

 

 

Color Hues #48

How is it that it's already September first, and the second birthday for the Color Hues Challenge!?! It's been so much fun to be part of the creative team at Color Hues, and we have a fun challenge for you. We've asked the DT at our sister challenge, Seize the Birthday, to make birthday cards using the great colors Sheri's chosen: Navy and Lime Green. 

So the change to this challenge is to not only use the Colors below but also to make a birthday card to help us CELEBRATE! 

After you link up a card for this challenge make sure you head on over to Seize the Birthday and link up with them as well!  This challenge and their challenge will be like any other, as each challenge blog will pick its own Winners! Here’s the link for Seize the Birthday.

I love this color combination, and thought the Pinkfresh Studio hot foil plate, "Stained Glass" would be just perfect. Thanks to a lovely birthday gift certificate to Pinkfresh, I have the whole suite of products for this set, but used just the hot foil plate and selected parts of the stencils.

Creating hot foil cards is not as big a challenge as photographing them. No matter how hard you try, the card is much more beautiful in your hand than it is in any photograph. I chose to color just selected sections of this beautiful design, using a bright navy ink from Pinkfresh, and Twisted Citron Distress Oxide for the lime. I die cut the panel with Gina K's "Master Layout 1" and then the coordinating thin frame from Enchanted Evening (Papertrey Ink) cardstock. Green Parakeet (Papertrey Ink) was a perfect lime.

I did cut the sentiment from Pinkfresh Studio's " Scripted Greetings" and added a gold shadow die behind it. 

I hope you'll come celebrate our birthday with a card of your own. You can check out all the wonderful cards by the Color Hues Design Team right here. And don’t forget to link up with the Seize the Birthday Challenge, too.

Sending Birthday Hugs

I have a card to share for a couple of challenges. First off, Addicted to CAS: Pink. I debated whether or not this was CAS enough, but in looking at the Design Team's cards, I think it's just fine. This is the first embossing folder/stencil combination I've ever purchased, and the first time I've used it, so I'll be adding it to the NBUS collection for August.

When I first saw the Altenew "Victorian Lace" Embossing folder with accompanying stencil, I knew right away I wanted to give it a try. I'm not totally pleased with this first attempt, but I know what I want to try next time. I think the stenciling could be a bit more subtle. Although the Altenew stencils work well, they're not as easy to use as those by Pinkfresh Studio. Now that I've tried them, I have a better idea of how to used them.

Altenew's 3-D embossing folders, however, are one of my favorites, and I love that I have a main image and the beautiful textured background with one pass through the die-cutting machine.

We've been home from our trip for about a week now. I've done the first round edit of the 800+ photos the two of us took, and deleted over 300 of them. Now Tracy and I need to go through them and decide which ones we want to share and which ones we'll keep just for the record. Our goal for sharing is no more than 120 which you can flip through relatively quickly. Those, however, all need captions, so that's the next big project. 

I've also been busy at the crafting table, but much of what's been created can't be shared here quite yet. I do have a list of challenges I want to participate in, and my week has opened up a bit. Last week there were multiple committee meetings and appointments--plus jet lag to contend with. Hopefully, this week I can get back to a more regular schedule of creating, reading, and walking every day. It's hard to believe that August will end in just two more days!