Poppies Sympathy

My family had an unexpected death this past week and so I needed to create a sympathy card for family. He was a good and simple man. He loved his wife and daughters and was always one to make others laugh. He will be missed terribly. With that in mind I set to creating a card for them with poppies. These are beautiful flowers that have several meanings with one of them being remembrance.

The card it self is a simple three layer card: base is vanilla then kraft and then vanilla again. For the top layer I used PTI's Botanical Silhouettes and stamped the leaves in green with the poppies in red while the sentiment is in kraft. I then took some colored pencils to the flowers to help add a little depth. Once everything was stamped/colored I used the Linen plate from PTI to emboss the whole layer. Creating these cards aren't hard for me though. Sad yes, hard not as much. It's finding the words for the inside that cause me problems because really what can one say...

Celebrate Something

Whatever it is that you want to celebrate go for it! That's the theme of this card. I found out that Curtain Call is back and for their welcome back challenge they gave us a nautical inspiration collage. Now let me let you in on a little secret...I own not one nautical stamp. This proved to be a bit of a challenge for me to get in on the fun.

I decided I would pull from the colors of the inspiration: blue, yellow, green, with just a touch of kraft/brown. While going through my stamp to see if I could use something for the nautical vibe I came across my WMS Off Beat Background. In this amazing set there is a stamp with two stripe for creating plaid, well I used them for the stripes that one typically sees with the above theme. I simply masked off the thin strip. I went with blue stripes since that royal blue purse was the first thing I saw and then the yellow shorts. I wasn't in the mood for an all stripe card so I kept digging through my stamps and came across PTI's Heart-2-Heart #5. This set is a sweet little banner building set, and what boat isn't complete without some little flags/banners. I didn't want my banners to be all one color so I pulled three from the picture. Since my blue wasn't as bright as the purse, I went with a softer yellow, and my third was the green from the palm peeking through in the above picture. The striped flag is still blue to carry that theme through (and because I wanted it to be my dominate color) while the heart banners are the soft yellow. I knew the green would be a tad brighter so I kept the green banner down to only three (and if you noticed they are placed in a pleasing triangle). I used the lined flag image to stamp it onto white c/s and then with a watercolor brush and watered down ink I painted in the flags. The sentiment was stamped in the stamp blue I used with the stripes and flags to finish it off. However, once I layered it together i felt it was missing something. I inked a strip of white c/s with the yellow ink and layered it just so that it is peeking from under the flags/banner and then with foam dots I put the image panel down. Still not right, so I die cut three small hearts from kraft c/s and covered some of the hearts on the yellow flags. I figured kraft was very nautical since it is used for straw hats, warfs, boats, etc. The other hearts I color with a glitter pen and then went over with glossy accent to help define them. For the finishing touch I add some brown faux stitching down the side with the stripes and yellow was and round the bottom corner of the card. I great card that could be used for a baby shower or just because.

Love Birds

Today's card was inspired by not only a sketch, but a talented blogger as well. Tracy did an amazing card with mini-tutorial on creating a hidden window for your card. When I saw the card I couldn't wait to try it out myself. The Fusion Card Challenge was just the ticket to get my creative juices going too.

I used a PTI mat stack die to cut out the frame. The banner was created by placing some washi tape onto vellum and then using a banner die to cut it out. Once glued down I did some faux stitching all the way around to give the frame and banner something to anchor them. The scene on the card base was created using PTI's Little Bitty Bird set because I really liked the birds from the photo of the challenge. First I stamped the image with brown Momento ink and then used my copics to color in the images. I thought the green leave accented the bird nicely and allowed me to use the colors from the photo too. To get my sky I simply coated the birds and leaves with glossy accent and once dried I lightly sponged Tumbled Glass around it. I didn't feel it was complete so I added the sentiment from the same set as well as the heart. I then colored in the heart with copics and went over it with my glitter pen. I then popped up the cover piece with the window and banners over the scene. I had so much fun with this that I created another card that I will share later this week.

Let it snow frame

Continuing with the snowy background that I have been creating lately for my cards, I created a framed one. I promise My next card will not be Christmas-y, lol. It feels great getting caught up on my Christmas card stash though. There are times when I want to just buy our cards, but then I look through my stamps and get inspired. Playing along with WMS's Christmas card challenges and Festive Fridays really help inspire me too. In fact, I am going to throw this on into the ring for the current FF challenge: Snow.

This time I decided to use the background as part of the framed scene I created. It was super easy to put together using the Country Landscape die by Memory Keepers. I simply die cut the image three times and cut them how I wanted. I then took a glitter pen and colored and outlined the parts I wanted to sparkle. A few punched, sparkled snowflakes and a sweet sentiment finished it off perfectly. A CAS card without the typical solid background.

Here is a close up of the sparkle.

Stary Christmas

I've got another Christmas card for ya'll today. This one if for the WMS Christmas Card Challenge - July. This is the month I am hosting the fun. We have made it to the half way mark. How is everyone doing with their Christmas Card stash? I admit that I fell behind, but I have now caught up and feeling the pressure (that I create for myself) go down as I watch my stack of completed Christmas cards go up.

The month of July for Americans and Canadians is important because we both celebrate our country's birthday (on different days). It is important to me personally because it is also my birthday month. In honor of all of these big celebrations and the "stars" of them, my challenge to you is to use at least one STAR on your card. Also, be sure you used at least one WMS stamp on your card (this doesn't have to be the star).

I created two cards again with each one being just a touch different but both using the same sketch from CASE(E) this Sketch!. With the one you see above, I splattered some Iridescent Gold Glimmer Mist. The one on the right below has no glimmer mist but I did stamp a trio of stars in the upper corner of them main image. The card base is vanilla that I lined in gold. I used a navy c/s for the next layer and stamped three different stars (the largest and smallest are from WMS sets) in gold ink. The gold glitter strip if sticky back paper I found in my stash. Bonus b/c this means the glitter won't come off and create a mess. I used WMS's Festive Foliage for both the sentiment and image. The bottom layer of holly is the second generation stamping for a softer look while the main leaves and berries are popped up and stamped full force.

Be sure to head over to the WMS gallery to link up your card so that we call all "ohhh" and "awww" over them too.

Snowy Christmas

Another Christmas card for ya'll. Hope you aren't getting tired of them yet as I have at least three more to share in the next week. Today's and at least one other this week (and another later this month) use the same background technique I used for the last two posts. I love how fast these backgrounds came together.

This time I focused the technique on the top third of the card to create a snowy nighttime sky. For the scene I used Memory Box's Country Landscape and cut it out three times. The first layer was taped directly onto the base with the other two layers popped up each. I coated the back and top layer with sparkle and outlined the middle layer. The sentiment is from WMS's Compliments of the Season. to finish it off I lightly watercolored the middle house and tree to create a cozy Christmas home. I even added a small bling on top of the tree for the star. To soften the whole then I rounded the bottom corners. I am putting this card in the CAS on Sunday challenge, Christmas in July as well as their DT call.

Let It Snow

Maybe not just yet but a little cooler weather would be nice. Like maybe in the low 90's and it feels like it isn't over 100, lol. While dreaming of cooler weather, I used a few challenges to inspire today's WMS CCC catch up. Last month's theme was "snow" and I found a few challenges that worked perfectly with it too: Festive Friday's challenge this week is to be inspired by the trigger word of snow, Addicated to CAS's trigger word was 'water' (which snow is a form of, thank you elementary science class, lol). and One Stop Craft Challenge was the every popular Anything Goes. I ended up creating two slightly different cards and played with the longer, standard business size cards too.

The card on the right is a carry over from the glitter challenge of May over at WMS CCC. I lined score tape along the sides and up to where I wanted the sentiment in the opening and then rubbed in the glitter. To create the background, I covered white c/s (enough for both cards) with Chipped Sapphire DI, let it dry, stamped two sizes of snowflakes from WMS (the same ones I used here) in white ink, splattered pearlized spray and plain water. For the card on the right I cut the background apart so that I could stamp the sentiment and the frame around it (with Chipped Sapphire DI). For the card on the left I choose to use a MS snowflake punch on some computer paper and use it as the border to the design. Also, instead of the opening for the sentiment I went with heat embossing it with white directly onto the background. If I had time I believe I would have done a third one where I merged the two together...maybe I will make the time.

Santa Claus is Coming

So, he isn't coming until December 25th, but I do have a Santa card to share with everyone. I have been playing catch up with my Christmas cards and the WMS Christmas Card Challenge (CCC). The challenge from back in May was to add glitter. So I did; only I added it in small amounts for these cards (I made two of them). I was also in the mood to play with a different size card. These fit in the standard legal envelopes so there won't be any extra postage. With the longer card I thought it would be fun to use the ornament from WMS's Santa's Coming to Town set. And to play on the sentiment found in the image I added the date from the set too. It also gave that side a nice anchor and didn't make the card so heavy on the left side. The background was created by directly inking/covering white c/s with DI Chipped Sapphire and then stamping the large snowflake from Complements of the Season and the small one from 'Twas the Night Before Christmas with white ink. To complete the background I flicked some Perfect Pearl mist and then plain water for a subtle glitter and texture. The background didn't sparkle enough but I didn't want it competing with the ornament so I simply added a thin strip of sticky tape to either side and rubbed glitter into it. Perfect! The image was white embossed onto navy c/s, cut, and popped up with foam for just a touch of depth. The corners were rounded to soften up the card.

I'll be back soon with my June CCC, and then it'll be my turn to host the July challenge.

Happy holidays

A quick post for ya'll. I created these two cards for the Festive Friday challenge: include a tree element. I knew just the stamp I wanted to use too. PTI's 2011 Holiday Tags. I kept the card simple and followed a sketch from somewhere (and now can't remember where). I think I may just go back and add some faux stitching to give it a nice finish.