One seed can start a garden, one candle can light a room, one step can begin a journey, one conversation can start a friendship, one smile from a handmade card can lift one's SPIRIT!

Saturday, June 29, 2013

A Wedding Shower Card

My nephew is getting married in August and today I am going to a shower for the bride to be.  I have been gone all week in HOT and sunny Arizona...we are talking 104 + degrees...in fact the day we left it was 118!  Now that is HOT...but a dry hot.  We came home to sunny Oregon and it was 90 but felt much warmer because of the humidity...sticky hot!

Anyway, I had to jump right on making a card and buying a gift...the bride to be is definitely a "vintage" kind of young girl...so I pulled out Simply Jane and went to town.  Her colors are shades of pink.  I kept the card really simple, added some bling for her neck ( white embossed pearls!) and a pink flower for her hair.  It is actually a "tea party" for the shower and they asked us to wear flowers or hats or something special in our hair...so I gave this little lady some flowers for her hair!

I might just make one more card using the Tea for Two set...just because it is a tea party...we have two gifts for her, so another card would be just fine.

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

MIM # 191 ~ Coloring on Vellum

The new MIM over on Nichole's blog is coloring on vellum.  The very talented Betsy demonstrates how she used q-tips to color in flowers after first embossing with white powder.  The cards on display are absolutely stunning, you should go take a look!  I kind of went a different route and used a butterfly from Butterfly dreams and then flowers from Flower Fusion # 8, which I did emboss with white powder, but the leaves from TANL I embossed with zing "leaf" embossing powder then I colored in with some spring moss and ripe avocado.  The flowers were done with summer sunrise and the butterfly was first colored with winter wisteria, then I used royal velvet to draw some darker lines on the butterfly.  I also embossed the sentiment from Boutique Borders:  Birthday with the zing embossing powder...and then finally added some sequins the color of the flowers.  Thanks for taking a look.

Friday, June 14, 2013

Freshly Made Sketches #90



Wow, I don't make square cards very often...in fact NEVER!  But it sure looked like this sketch was square, so I went with it!  Now I will need to make a square envie!!  You can go HERE to access the challenge.  And here is the sketch by Linda C.  All products are Papertrey Ink,
paper:  white, pure poppy gingham, black
stamps:  flower garden
ink:  pure poppy, new leaf       

Seize the Birthday #19 {A Sketch by Jen Nelson}



                                                                      
One of my granddaughter's turns 6 in July and I am going to be in Arizona and Oklahoma for the first part of the month, so I thought I would make her card now and use this sketch:
                                                                            
You can access Seize the Birthday Blog here, you have two weeks to make a card and link it up!

Paper:  MME "lime twist", PTI white
stamp:  Baby Button Bits,Little Princess
button, sequins, glitter, twine

A Special "Anniversary" Card

A little bit ago I posted a card for my daughter's FIL who will be celebrating 20 years with a transplanted heart.  I made another card today for my daughter to give to him...I used the NEW SKETCH FOR YOU TO TRY (SFYTT) from the Reverse Confetti  blog...go check it out...they are doing one sketch a month.  AND they have some new stamps called Reverse Confetti!!
                                                                                http://reverseconfetti.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/RC_SFYTT1.jpg
I hope you will go check it out and play along, you have a chance to win some of their two new stamps sets!
paper:  MME "dolled up", 
stamps:  Beautiful Butterflies
dies:  by the Number 

Well, gosh darn...the link is closed!  There is only one sketch a month and it closes on the 14th...too late...oh well, I still like the card and it will be given to the recipient on June 30th!!

An Anniversary card

My older daughter and her husband are going to be celebrating their 14th Wedding anniversary on Wednesday.  They are going to go to Coeur d'Alene, Idaho for three days...just themselves...NO kiddos!  And they have someone to stay with their children...so that means I don't even have to babysit, although I am sure I will see plenty of them as we live right next door!  We released butterflies at their wedding, so I thought it only fitting to make a butterfly card...and of course I had to use PTI's Beautiful Butterflies.  Her flowers were daisies...and I happened to have a vellum sheet with sort of daisies on it...so I incorporated that with my card also.  I am happy with how it turned out.  I used Background Basics: Tin type in sweet blush for the subtle background.  Her colors were similar to Winter Wisteria, so I went with that...and now they have three children, so I made a family of butterflies for this card!  I was inspired by Debbie Olson's card I saw in Pinterest HERE .
This is the daughter who is in clinical remission from Stage 4 Lymphoma...she and her husband deserve a few days away by themselves!


Thursday, June 13, 2013

Merry Monday # 66

                                                                                
Another different sketch from the Merry Monday Challenge.  If you want to play along, then go HERE to access the blog and join in the fun of making your Christmas cards without all the holiday stress!
Here is what I used to make this card:
Paper:  MME: Lost & Found Christmas, soft stone pattern paper, enchanted evening, rustic cream
stamps:  Nativity Silhouettes and Nativity Additions, Holiday Spirit Sentiments
misc:  versamark, perfect pearls (gold)                        

Monday, June 10, 2013

Festive Friday Challenge # 10 ! Vintage Theme!

I was just telling my BFF (as we are skyping and playing with stamps and paper!!) that vintage is NOT something I do well, or that I even choose to do because I don't get it.  Of course I love so many things that I see that are layered and have the vintage look, but when I do it, it just seems blah...like a hodge podge of 'stuff'...so with that being said, I did try to make a vintage Christmas card for the Festive Friday.  Now, Meredith, please don't judge too harshly, yours are always fab...it is just better to not say anything if you don't have anything nice to say, okay?  (*wink...although your comments always lift my spirits!!)
Does this even count?  It was a piece of paper that I found...then I embellished it with a stamp from Holly Jolly, added a die cut poinsettia from Bells and Boughs and stamped off the leaves a couple of times.  Next I decided to add some Christmas gifts which were made easy by using the Make a Wish die for the boxes and the ribbons on top.  To finish it off I took the "Believe" from that same stamp set and embossed it in GOLD on Santa's hat.  So that is it folks...nothing more to say except to thank you for forcing to me to go outside my comfort zone and try something different.  It took me FOUR hours to make this ONE card, and my BFF has made FOUR cards in the same time it took me to make this...of course to be honest I was off on a different tangent (which didn't work at all)...so went this route instead.

Friday, June 7, 2013

Color Throwdown # 245

 

                                                                                    Want to play along with the Color Throwdown Challenge?  Go HERE to access the blog and play along.  here is my card for this challenge.
 I used an old Papertrey Ink stamp set called Flower Garden...I stamped it on white paper, sewed around the edges, then mounted it on the lemon tart Bitty Box Pattern Paper.  I stamped some melon berry polka dots from Background Basics:  Polka Dot II.  I added a little dashed line with a jelly roll pen on the yellow band strip.  The sentiment is from a Hero Arts sentiment set.  I can see that I didn't line up the polka dots all that well...that is one thing that I always struggle with!  Sorry about that...

My PTI colors are:  berry sorbet, melon berry, spring moss, lemon tart and white!                                                                                

Muse # 20

We have a fabulous card to inspire us this week...it is from Laurie Willison over at the Muse Challenge # 20
Here is Laurie's card:
                                                            
I loved her color choices and the three stamped images, so I decided to go with the same color theme and I chose three butterflies that I stamped in Orange Zest and colored in with copics yellow.  I added a little bit of glossy accents to the center of the butterflies.
My ribbon is the satin hawaiian shores ribbon from PTI.  Paper is PTI white, aqua mist and hawaiian shores.  the stamps are Butterfly Dreams and a Hero Arts sentiment stamp set.  As you can see I also scored a line under the three butterflies.  Thanks for taking a look...hope you all have a wonderful weekend!
                                         

Thursday, June 6, 2013

A Special Card

On Sunday June 30, my daughter's father-in-law is celebrating 20 YEARS with a  transplanted heart!  This is HUGE!.  They are having a big celebration at the local Golf Club...so I have been thinking what kind of card could I make?  If I were 'buying' a card, what kind I would be looking for?  That is a tough one...so I started pulling out some stamp sets and looking for something that might be appropriate and I came up with the set "Simply You".  Then because it needs to be a masculine kind of card, I knew I didn't really want to add flowers or anything like that...then I thought perhaps this week's MIM would fit it nicely with this kind of card.  Banners are just kind of a generic card that depending on the colors and the design could certainly work for what I need.

So this is what I came up with...the papers are all Papertrey Ink:  kraft, simply chartreuse, berry sorbet and an assortment of the pattern papers.  The big YOU was embossing with black zing embossing powder. 

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

ColourQ Challenge # 192

Such pretty colors for the challenge this week.  HERE is the link to play along.
                                                             I  have been playing with the Ruby Rose set since I received it...such a fun flower to play with and add all sorts of color combinations.
I stamped the background script sentiment (MFT Poppy) with memento London Fog ink.
I then stamped the flowers and the die cuts using Blueberry Sky and Spring rain.
The leaves are stamped in Spring Moss ink.  
The birthday sentiment is also from the MFT Poppy stamp set.
I added some faux pearls to the center and to random places on the card.
The card is backed with MFT "steel gray" color, placed then on a white card base.

                                                     

End of Year Teacher Gifts

It was so timely to have the design team revisit the Take Note stamp set.  I had some packages of those notepads and decided they would make perfect little gifts for my grandkids teachers.  Sadly I gave 6 away to my daughters before I took a picture!  darn...but this one is special.  the music teacher from the grade school is retiring...she has been an awesome teacher, she inspires and dedicates of lot of her own time to bring music to these children. 


First up is the notepad...since she is a music teacher I stamped the Background Music Sheet with kraft ink.  Then because I am really liking the flowers from Ruby Rose, I added those in the corners along with a few little flowers and leaves from Birds and Blooms.  I stamped off once each time I stamped those flowers in scarlet jewel and berry sorbet ink, the leaves are in new leaf.  The sentiment is from the Teacher's Apple stamp set.  All from Papertrey Ink.



Again, because she is a music teacher I kept with the theme of the background sheet music stamped in black.  My inspiration was from Dawn and you can see the card she made HERE. I used different colors, but followed her design.
I added some dimensional tape to the back of the flowers and then because I added some 'faux pearls' to the center of the flowers and also had the big leaf go off the card, I pulled out a glassine bag to use as my envelope. I made a little cover for it using the Half and Half die and a smaller flower and leaves from the Ruby Rose Set.  The Thank You sentiment is from Teacher's Apple.

I think my 9 year old granddaughter will be delighted with giving this card to her teacher.  She is going to miss her for sure!

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Merry Monday ~ sketch

Another fun sketch from the Merry Monday Challenge.  You can access the blog HERE and get busy on your own Christmas cards!
                                                     


                                                                                                       paper:  PTI ripe avocado, pure poppy, Authentique Bundle collection:  Wonder
stamp:  Hero Arts
die:  Holly Jolly
white embossing powder
Impression Plate:  PTI holly                                                  

Monday, June 3, 2013

One more Addicted to CAS # 14 "Circles"

One more Addicted to CAS card...go HERE to access this challenge.  the code word is "circles"...I am sure my three balloons will qualify for circles!!

           

                                                                                     Papertrey Ink products:
                                              paper:  white
                                              stamps:  Birthday Style, Boutique Birthday
                                              ink:  melon berry, orange zest, ocean tide

Addicted to CAS # 14 ~ Circles

Addicted to CAS:  code word circles!  You can go HERE to access this weeks challenge.  I think I have a lot of circles, but not sure if it is CAS enough...I guess I will find out!
 


Papertrey Ink Products
paper:  white, simply chartreuse, hawaiian shores pattern paper
stamps:  Baby Button Bits, Sweet Baby
dies:  small scallop border die, baby die
 

Saturday, June 1, 2013

Another Graduation Card ~ CAS-ual Fridays

I had an idea and wanted to see if I could pull it off...I think I did!!  I had just gotten the stamp set "Pedal Pusher" from Papertrey Ink and was thinking about the bike, (my grandson rides his bike all around the neighborhood) and thinking I could add stars to the back tails (it comes with hearts on cans, what you might see on the back of a bike or car for someone who just got married) and then I used the hat from "For the Graduate" and had it blowing off the bike...I stamped the lines with class of 2013 in memento london fog hoping it would resemble cement...I think that worked pretty good too. So I am linking this up to the CAS-ual Fridays challenge which you can access HERE. 
The school colors are red and white...so I kept with that theme.
                                                          


cfc103
All products are Papertrey Ink
stamps:  Pedal Pusher, For the Graduate, Birthday Sentiments (the stars!)
Ink:  pure poppy, black memento, memento london fog