One Layer Colour Splash

Hello!

I love colour challenges with one or two colours, and this week there are TWO challenges with this theme. The restriction of using a single colour (plus neutrals) gets the creative juices flowing and I just love the effect.

I used MFT Delicate Pretty Poppies and coloured with Copics.

I'm entering this into ColourQ

I'm also entering Color Throwdown

and last, but not least, I'm entering One Layer Simplicity where the theme is Friends

Thank-you for coming by to visit me!

Michelle

xxx

Birthday card and an envelope...

Hello!

Today it is HOT, HOT, HOT!! Again! I think I may expire!

Despite the heat, I pondered the problem of packaging over-size cards.

This is my card. I've been playing around with Papertrey Ink Teach & Inspire stamps to see what I can do that is not a "teacher" card.

I used PTI Teach & Inspire and Happy Hexagons (sentiment). Colours are SU! Crumb Cake, Pretty In Pink, Pumpkin Pie, PTI Berry Sorbet (I don't have Melon Mambo). Card base is PTI Basic White.

I made it in response to two challenges - Color Throwdown #225 and CAS(E) This Sketch #11

Looking at the sketch again, I see that I didn't quite place my sentiment in the right place, but I'm sure you get the picture!

My card has a few points of the star going over the edge, which will require custom packaging. Usually I just get a bigger envelope, but this week at Make It Monday #100 we've been challenged to find a different way to package our oversize cards. I made a few attempts at this. I really like the glassine bags that Dawn used in the video, but I don't have any. So I tried a brown paper bag. It sort of worked, but I got too fancy and it didn't match my CAS card so well. Back to pondering how to get the glassine bag look... and I ended up with greaseproof paper from my kitchen drawer. Turns out greaseproof paper makes a lovely, delicate envelope!

Here they are together.

And then packaged up.

Thanks for coming to visit. Now, should I make another card, or should I jump in that pool?

Michelle
xxx

Happy 200, Color Throwdown!

Hello!

My little girl is attending her friend's 5th birthday party tomorrow. This called for some thinking about little girl presents and cards. With my own little girl by my side, I created both today.

This is the card.

What I used: Colours - SU! Pink Passion, Tempting Turquoise, Pumpkin Pie, Certainly Celery, and Chocolate Chip. Card base is PTI Vintage Cream. Image panel is watercolour paper. I used Hero Arts Envelope Pattern background stamp, and SU! Pony Party (I think this one is retired, but I still love it).

Bright, hey? The colours come from this week's Color Throwdown, which happens to be their 200th challenge! Woo hoo! When I first saw the colours, I thought that I would never be able to use these five colours on one card, with four of them being so bright. What did I know? I LOVE how these colours work together. :-)

I don't use Pink Passion very often. Or Tempting Turquoise, for that matter. The Brights probably don't get a fair go in my cardmaking. And look how happy they make my card look. :-)

The layout is from Mojo Monday. I didn't follow it faithfully. The three little dots at the bottom became three flowers around the central image, and the sentiment flag at the top became sentiment grass at the bottom.

And now on to the pressie! I made an 8" x 10" frame, using Pony Party and some gorgeous Pebbles papers, and a bit of SU! and a bit of Pink Paislee.

I sparkled up Stella's name with Dazzling Diamonds glitter (just quietly, I sparkled myself up quite a bit, too!). Those little clouds are Memory Box Puffy Clouds. The pony is coloured in PTI Fine Linen and SU! Pretty in Pink, and has liquid pearls brushed over. She's very pretty. I hope Stella loves it. I know my little girl does.

Thanks for coming by.

Michelle
xxx

A Retro Kiss?

Hello!

I have finally made a card for Retro Sketches. They are up to challenge #17, and every time I see a sketch (since #1), I want to join in, but for some reason I ALWAYS miss the deadline! Not this week-end, I made it! Yippee!

This is my card.

And this is the sketch.

I think I used my artistic license a bit with my big flower, but that flower really wanted to be on this card, and I couldn't say no. :-)

Now, I also made this card with two other challenges in mind. The colour scheme came from Color Throwdown #197, where the colour combo this week is totally irresistible.

And I did a bit of kissing for A Blog Named Hero #6.

The stamp sets I used were PTI Rosie Posie (and dies), Postmarks, and Think Big Favorites #16. I stamped the backgrounds in Versamark. Colours are Crumb Cake, Cameo Coral, Ruby Red, and Old Olive with Tuxedo Black for the sentiment.

Thanks for dropping by!

Michelle
xxx

Bright Christmas

Hello!

I wanted to make a card for the last week with Laurie Schmidlin as muse at CASE Study. CASEing Laurie definitely stretches my creativity, and the card inspiration for CASE Study #88 is no exception.

This is Laurie's card.

It's so pretty! But for me, there is a LOT on there. I really love those embossing folders, but I don't own many. In fact, I own ONE and I have borrowed TWO. I wanted to have a dry embossed layer, so I had a choice of dots, stripes, or snowflakes. Oh my! I think I need to invest in some more folders, LOL!

I wanted to use a different colour combination, so I called on Color Throwdown #189.

At first glance, this colour combination frightened the socks off me. But then I realised it was really only three colours - red, yellow, and blue. I can work with that! I think it has been a while since I entered a challenge at Color Throwdown, it's good to be back!

Here is my card.

Stamp set is PTI Snowflake Serenade. Colours used are Stampin'Up! - Pool Party, Night of Navy, Barely Banana, Ruby Red, and Cameo Coral. I distressed using Crumb Cake. I didn't have all of the exact colours, so I used the closest option. My card base is Night of Navy. The background is white, dry embossed using Sizzix Northern Flurries - I wiped the folder with Pool Party before embossing to make the background aqua. I then went back and embossed the other side. My flower is made using two scallop circle punches. I like how my flower softens the card a bit (after all those spikey snowflakes). The ribbon and rhinestones are from my stash. The brad is SU! Everyday Enchantment.


Wow, another mega ingredient list. At least it was only one stamp set this time. :-)

Thanks for coming by. And WELCOME to all of my new followers! I was very excited this week to have a few new faces show up in my followers list. I have tried to visit you all, and I really enjoyed my visits!

Michelle
xxx

CTD #171 & SSSC#147

Hello!

Just a quick one before I head out to work. I'm entering a card into the Color Throwdown Challenge #171 and the Sweet Sunday Sketch Challenge #147.

The colours are:

The sketch is:

My card:

I used (mostly SU!)
Inks: Ruby Red, Creamy Caramel, Soft Suede, Old Olive, StayzOn Black
Stamps: Curly Cute, Circle Circus
Card: Early Espresso, Soft Suede, Old Olive, Very Vanilla
Paper: Mocha Morning, something retired, vellum
Twine: Twinery capuccino
Button: Papertrey Ink

So what do you think? I'd love to hear your thoughts. :-)

Michelle
xxx

CTD#160 Take Two with a Kite

For my For Your Inspiration post, please scroll down, or click HERE

Hello!

I told you I'd probably come back for Color Throwdown Challenge 160.  I meant it, I love these colours!  It is very last minute, but I think I'm going to beat the deadline, LOL!

Yesterday I spent the day with my stamping friend, Manda, having a stamping play date together while our kids had a more traditional play date (building tents in the back yard, riding the scooters, filling the living room with every little toy in the house. . . you know how it goes when the Mummies are distracted by stamping. . . ). At the end of the day, I decided to use her Big Shot and punch out some shapes to take home. One of those shapes was her brand new, not yet used, Die-Namics Fly A Kite die. Manda commented about making a baby girl card with a pink and chocolate kite, and I thought, "That's it! That's my other Color Throwdown card!"  Not only could I use Manda's brand new kite die, but I could use my own brand new twine, yippee!

I didn't make a baby card, I made a birthday card. I'll keep the baby card idea in mind for later.
To remind you, the Color Throwdown colours are:

And my card is:

It's a really simple card, but I like my cards that way.  And I like this card.

What I used:
Card: (all SU!) Chocolate Chip, Pretty In Pink, Very Vanilla (yes, this time I remembered I was using Vanilla)
Ink: Chocolate Chip
Paper: a retired SU! paper in Pretty In Pink
Die: Die-Namics Fly A Kite
Twine: Twinery Capuccino and Blossom (oh, I just love my new twine)

Here I am going to throw a plug in for Jay Gee's Nook. For those of you in Australia (and International customers, the postage will just be a little more), who haven't yet discovered Jay Gee's Nook, go and take a look. Jay Gee has a great selection, great prices (and low postage prices because she's in Australia), and excellent (outstanding) service. I got my Twinery Twine from Jay Gee (and the Die Namics die, and the Jane's Doodles stamps, and some other wonderful things. . . ) and with every order, I have never had to wait or follow up, I just order, and it arrives with perfect service. With my email enquiries, no matter what time of night or day, I get REALLY FAST responses. I truly LOVE great service like this. Thank-you, Jay Gee!

So what do you think of my little kite?

Michelle
xxx

Baby girl card for CTD#160

For my For Your Inspiration post, please scroll down, or click HERE

Hello!

It is a stunningly beautiful day here today, and I am on holidays! Yippee!  

Yesterday I spent the day with a couple of stamping friends, and got a lot of chatting accomplished, but not a lot of stamping, LOL.  I did stamp out some friendship jars, so hopefully I'll do something with those elements soon.  

Today I actually did some housework BEFORE starting stamping. Yes, floors and bathrooms are sparkling, a load of washing is swinging in the breeze, and I even emptied and reloaded the dishwasher.  The kids played around taking photos. I haven't looked at the photos yet, I'm a bit scared of what they might have come up with...

This card was supposed to be an entry into the Sweet Sunday Sketch challenge, but when I got to the point of making my circle, I realised I gave back my borrowed circle cutters yesterday. . . oh well.  

It is also supposed to be an entry into Color Throwdown #160, and despite one very obvious flaw, I am still going to enter it, and I am going to ask you all to pretend that the white is Very Vanilla *wink*.  These are the colours:

I'll probably have to make another card, because I truly LOVE this colour combo, I just forgot that I was supposed to be using vanilla and got all excited and carried away with how nicely my card was turning out.

This is my card:

Mmm, that looks a bit out of focus. . . let's try another one:

I really like how this turned out.  I hand-folded that ribbon and stuck it down with lots of sticky strip. I like it. I think I'll do that more. I paper-pieced the little birds, they're so sweet.

What I used:

Stamps: Jane's Doodles Garden Friends, PTI Inside and Out: Babies (sentiment)

Card: SU! Pretty in Pink, Whisper White
Ink: Chocolate Chip

Paper: SU! retired DSPs with Regal Rose, Pretty in Pink, Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie

Ribbon: Regal Rose grosgrain

So, what do you think?

Oh, I wanted to say thank-you to everyone who has been nice enough to leave me comments recently. I have made an effort to get back to visit everyone, I hope I didn't miss anyone.  It took me a while because I got distracted by all the beautiful blogs that I ended up visiting. Isn't it always the way?

Michelle

xxx

Last minute entries. . .

Hello!

When I saw the Color Throwdown colours this week, I immediately knew I wanted to use them. BUT, I had a 4th birthday party to organise and NO time over the last week to do much card making. I also have Fathers Day coming next week-end, so had to find a little time to help my eldest daughter make a card for her Daddy. My card for him is yet to be created, eek. I also need to get a card sent off to my own Dad. It most definitely won't make it to him in time (he lives a long way away) but at least I made it before the day. . .

On Sunday evening, we sat down to make some cards. The big girl and I had chosen the colour scheme, we had chosen the papers and card stock, we had chosen the images, but the layout was eluding me.  We finally got the first card made, but I was still struggling. So last night I went looking for a sketch to use, because my own inspiration was sadly lacking. I found Dawny's Sketch at Simon Says Stamp, and I liked it.

So my card uses, Color Throwdown #156, which is these lovely colours:

and Simon Says Stamp, Dawny's sketch:

And my card looks like this:

 I used:
Stamps - Garden Friends by Jane's Doodles
Card - Crumb Cake, Perfect Plum, Barely Banana
Patterned Paper - So Saffron pattern from Washington Apple
Ink: Perfect Plum, Crumb Cake, Barely Banana, Memento Tuxedo Black
Googly eyes came from my stash

My daughter's card is this one:

It took us ages to come up with this design. My girls take after their Mummy a little with their perfectionism, sigh!  She wasn't happy with her colouring, but I think she did a great job. She's 8 (going on 18).

I hope you like the cards. You can see that my love affair with Garden Friends has not yet ended. It is such a lovely set of images, and the stamps work SO WELL. I'm really enjoying them.

What do you think?

Michelle
xxx

Yellow flower for CTD 154

Hello,

I have a couple of cards to share with you today.

One is an entry into Color Throwdown #154.  The colours this week are lovely:

Here is my card, a nice CAS flower:

This flower was a bit tricky. I'm sure there is an easier way to create it than the way I did it, sigh!

What I used (all SU):
Card: Old Olive, Daffodil Delight
Paper: Basic Grey patterns, So Saffron (not sure which DSP these are)
Ink: Old Olive

The other card is another birthday card, using Garden Friends, and my hoppy friend from yesterday.  Not a response to a challenge,  I am just enjoying this stamp set. :-)

This froggy is so cute! I used Inktense pencils - Apple Green (ground), Fern (frog & leaves), Cadmium Yellow, Bright Blue, and Hot Red. I only have 6 pencils, LOL, I'll have to expand my collection. . .   The cardstock is Whisper White and Old Olive. The patterned paper is "Chirpy" from Happy Go Lucky by Pebbles.

We have an afternoon thunder storm happening today. Very weird. We get these in Summer, all the time, but rarely in Winter. At this time of year we usually have the westerly winds bringing cold, dusty wind to us, but not today. Today it is pretending to be Summer (without the heat).

Michelle
xxx

Color Throwdown #125

The last two weeks have been challenging in a number of ways, mainly as a result of the flooding in Qld, and particularly in Brisbane.  While our home is high and dry, so many people, some of our friends included, were not so lucky.  The good news is that all of our family and friends are safe. I will write another post to talk about the experience and to share some photos.

I loved the colours this week at Color Throwdown #125

and so I used them to make a very simple card for someone special.  No sentiment, just a simple picture with a ribbon.  I didn't have blushing bride or pear pizzazz, so I substituted  blush blossom and certainly celery instead.  I threw in a bit of creamy caramel to do the beak, legs, and wing edging.  The light wasn't good when I took the photo, so the kraft looks a bit grey.

The outcome was:

I hope you like it.

All products used were Stampin' Up.

CAS #122 and Color Throwdown #123

Well, here I go, entering my first challenge!  In fact, I am entering two at the same time, just to give myself an extra-special challenge.  For a while now I have been watching my friend Cassie  create some absolutely stunning work in response to challenges, and every time I see a new card that she has made she inspires me to give it a go too.  After months of thinking about it, here I am actually doing it.

So the two challenges are Clean and Simple #122 layout:

And Color Throwdown #123 colour palette:

I have to admit, these colours did not excite me, particularly because I don't have Always Artichoke or Baja Breeze in my stock of colours, and also I wasn't sure how they would turn out together.  Luckily for me, I do have cameo coral, and also the Color Throwdown people were kind enough to share some digital coloured paper for me to use for the green and blue.

So here is my effort, I'm not sure how I feel about it yet.  What do you think?

What I used (all SU other than the designer paper from Color Throwdown):
Stamps - Butterfly Prints, Flight of the Butterfly, Vintage Labels
Cardstock - whisper white, cameo coral
Ink - cameo coral, mellow moss (the closest match to always artichoke that I have)
Clear embossing on small butterfly and Dazzling Diamonds on large butterfly

Thanks for visiting!

Michelle
xxx