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!

Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Seize the Sketch # 21

Seize the Sketch  has a new sketch up...you must go check it out!
My BFF has this MFT stamp called Big Birthday Wishes
and I thought she would be a perfect image
for my soon to be teenage granddaughter Ellie!
Seriously, she is going to be thirteen, but going on 17!
And she will love this sentiment, because sometimes it is "all about Ellie"..
we try to keep her humble, especially "Papa", he works hard on that girl to be humble!
I colored her with the inktense pencils and because I really like this sentiment,
 I stamped it then cut each word so it would fit on the side without covering up her perfect leggings!  Oh if only my legs looked like that!!
And you know we will be celebrating that girl because she brings such joy and laughter to our lives!

Thanks for taking a look friends...go out and make it a great day!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

MIM second card for debossing a stamped image

My granddaughter has a birthday in July, and I decided to get a jump start on her card.
I tried the technique over at Nichole's blog Capture the Moment
This is my second card for this technique.
I used my friends stamp Balloon Bash and also a Heart to Heart # 2 to get my 7 balloons
because she will be 7 in July.
Again, after stamping I laid the dies down with the brown mat under them,
so it did not cut the paper, just debossed.
The sentiment is from Keep It Simple:  Birthday!

Okay, off to try out more stamps and coloring!

MIM ~ Debossing stamped images

Over at Capture the Moment Dawn has a video showing debossing a stamped image...so the first thing you do is stamp and then lay your die cut on top, but using the rubber mat so it does NOT cut out, just debosses the image...gives a very nice touch to the card.
stamps  PTI Garden Grace, Fancy Folk Art
ink:  simply chartreuse, raspberry fizz, versafine black

I am having fun at my BFF's Linda, we have until Friday to play together.
I was up in the Seattle area for my two granddaughter's Volleyball tournament.
Lily, the 10 year old won her division (my husband coaches her team) and
Ellie the 12 year old played for the finals in the 14 and under gold division and lost the match, but they played strong and she played really good.  We love watching them play and we tell them that all the time!
We have the final BIG tournament in Phoenix, AZ in June, so all the family will be down there for that, then we will stay a few extra days for a vacation.  There will be 12 of us in the house!

thanks for taking a look!  Hope you all have a great week!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Seize the Birthday!

WELCOME FRIENDS!
Today we have a topping of "TAGS"!
We would love to see your "birthday card" with a tag on it...
or you can always just do "anything goes" kind of birthday card!
I hope you will join us over at
and check out all the sweet cards by the DT!
I kept mine pretty simple this time...
after taking two weeks of the online water color class it felt good
to go back to my roots and do a clean and simple kind of card!
Paper:  PTI white, pure poppy
stamps:  Embellished Elegance
dies:  PTI tag ##
stencil:  the Crafters workshop:  mini chicken wire
sequins:  doodlebug
 
 


Tuesday, May 20, 2014

Merry Monday ~ A flower

I thought I would continue with my water coloring.
Seems everyone thinks of poinsettias when it is a Christmas Flower.
I am no exception!
stamps:  WPlus 9: Merry & Bright, PTI Garden Variety
inks:  distress
wink of stella, glossy accents
paper:  Ranger Water color, DCWV: glitzy glitter
 
Thanks for taking a look friends!
have a great day!
 
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Make it Monday ~ Artsy Water Color Background

Well, wasn't this good timing!
Just after completing the Online Water Color Class,
the new MIM HERE  is about "artsy water color background"!!
I was thinking I needed a really bright and cheerful birthday card...
I pulled out Simply Sunflower and inked up pure poppy,
orange zest, raspberry fizz, and berry sorbet, along with simply chartreuse.
The leaves are from embellished Elegance.
I am kind of getting into this watercolor artsy thing that seems to be the rage right now...
will have to keep at it!
We have the sun back!!  Yeah!
Go out and make it a good day!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Monday, May 19, 2014

Water Color Class Day 8 ~ free hand painting with stamped image

I actually watched THIS  video on Dawn's blog (a teacher for the online watercolor card class)
and set to work.  It totally works for Day 8 class which Dawn had also demonstrated.
The watering can is from PTI Garden Variety
The flowers are WPlus9 Fresh Cut Florals.
I used distress ink pads and markers to color it.
Thanks for taking a look!

Online Watercolor Class Day 11

Jean Manis gave another video on freehand water coloring.
I used PTI Birthday Style balloons and sentiments.
Inktense pencils were used for the coloring.
Lil' Inkers was used for the stitched mat.
 
I am just going back and catching up on more of what I didn't get a chance to do.
thanks for taking a look!
Heart Hugs, have a good week!
Colleen

Saturday, May 17, 2014

Online Water color Card Class Day 11 and Bonus Day

Day 11 started us out with a Tim Holtz video.
Here I used an MFT stencil called spring flowers.
I do not have any of the mini distress ink pads, but they would definitely allow you to place the ink in a lot of different locations...the bigger pads are harder to keep confined to small spaces.
 
The second card is also from the Tim Holtz demonstration.  I used another MFT stencil (looking for stencils that have a lot of white space) Funky Florals.
Both sentiments are MFT Cheerful Blessings.
 
There are a couple of ladies from church who are going through some difficult times, I thought these cards would be fun to send to them.
 
Was I surprised to wake up this morning and find a BONUS day at the class!  I shouldn't have been
surprised, really! They do that a lot...they give us a lot of bang for our buck!
So here are two cards from the Bonus Day:
This card was really fun it was by Laura Sterckx.
What a fun technique, will try this again using different colors.
The butterfly is a die cut from a friend in The Netherlands.
Sequins and a sentiment were added!
 
This was another card from Yana...
A big bold sentiment was used and I chose another one from MFT Cheerful Blessings,
added some black hearts from the same set and also some more sequins and pearls.
 
Well, that is it for now...can you believe I still have more that I can do in order to try every single demonstration...I may not get to every one, but I am hoping I can do a few more!
 
Thanks for taking the time to look at all these cards!
Hope your weekend is turning out to be fabulous.
I went to the mall with my youngest daughter (35 today!!  what? how did that happen?)
And we shopped till I dropped and didn't come home with very much at all.
Nothing fun at least, she couldn't find anything that she wanted and actually neither could I, depressing, huh?
But I came home, laid down to read and ended up sleeping for an hour!!
OMG that is hard work and I don't do it very often!
 
Have a blessed Sunday! 
Colleen


Day 8 Faux Water Painting for Online Water color class

I have a friend whose birthday is coming up and she really likes "pansy's".
I went online and looked at the gallery of pansy's...so many color combinations!
I was really drawn to the yellow one with a touch of orange in the center.
The stamp is a PTI Year of Flowers:  Violet
I actually used inktense pencils to color the flower and leaf.
The sentiment is from SSS Birthday Sentiments
and it was embossed with ZING apricot.
My husband was pretty impressed with this one!
Thanks again for taking a look!
 
Heart hugs, friends!
Colleen

Friday, May 16, 2014

Day 10 of the Water Color Card Class

I am skipping around now trying to get a few more cards made.
I have yet to do the free hand water painting!
Well, this was kind of close to free hand. 
We were instructed to trace around a stencil and then do our water coloring
and adding layers of paint.
The sentiment is from SSS.
 
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

A birthday card for my grandson

My grandson is going to be 7 on Tuesday
and he is a huge fan of football, basketball, golf, even volleyball
(he can't escape volleyball because his sisters play it all the time).
he has been playing flag football for three seasons now and just loves it.
 
I had to get the PTI Football Frenzy just for him.
His favorite number is "7", and it just so happens he will be turning 7.
He is also a big Duck fan (U of Oregon),
so I went with those colors...because every once in a while he throws in some black and orange
(OSU colors!)
His Papa and I are graduates of the U of O!
I think he will like this card!
 
have a great weekend!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Make It Monday # 164 Cluster Stamped Sentiment

You can go HERE  to play along with the latest Make it Monday, which is cluster stamping.
Heather has a video demonstrating the technique.
I white heat embossed the think big # 3  stamp
and then used a butterfly from Butterfly Dreams to stamp all around the sentiment.
I used Melon Berry, Berry Sorbet, Simply Chartreuse and Harvest Gold.
I attached the face to a melon berry card stock.
 
Thanks for taking a look,
it felt good to do some normal stamping
instead of all the water coloring I have been doing lately.
Sadly this is the last day, but I will have more from the class to show you!
 
Have a super weekend friends,
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Thursday, May 15, 2014

Water color Day 9

I tried my hand at another "splatter tree".
This time I thought I would keep it to spring colors,
I used 5 different shades of green, a bit of yellow and then I threw in some light blue to
give the impression of the sky between the foliage.
 
I have three elderly aunts and I thought they would love to get this card from me, and especially like the little blue bird sitting in the tree.
thanks for taking a look
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Online Watercolor Card Class

Another card for DAY 8 by Dawn Woleslagle
Well, this does not look anything like Dawn's card and I am so glad that you can't see my graphite lines!  Now the whole deal with the different water splotches behind the flower was to give you the illusion of more flowers, well that didn't work so well for me, because I don't see any extra flowers behind my two!  ha ha
I must say I am learning a lot, but I am also learning that this is probably not my forte!
I am impressing my husband though...although with this card he said,
"Okay now you need to paint this free hand" !!
Well, that is so NOT happening!!
I figure my 94 year old aunt will love to get this card from me!
 
have a great day!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen
 


Watercolor Class Days 7-8-9

One thing I have learned about water coloring is that they need to dry
between petals or leaves...just so they don't bleed!
so I start one, set it aside, start another, go back add a petal or so, then continue.
 
therefore I have 4 to show you today!
This is DAY 7
FAUX Hand Painting!
I used Sweet Life...two steps of it so that I could leave some white space.
this was demonstrated by Joni Andaya.
You need an outline stamp, distress ink, markers or memento inks.

DAY 8 Tasnim Ahmed More Faux Hand Painting
And outline stamp was used, this is a Hero Arts stamp and distress inks were used.
I put down clean water first, then dabbed in the colors.
DAY 8 by Laura Bassen...she used this die cut, laid down the negative and colored in between.
A pretty simple card, just need to be sure your brush is not too wet so that it runs under your
"stencil".  Water color paints were used for this card.
DAY 9
Jennifer Rzasa splattered paint and it made a tree?  Really?  I had to do it about 4 times!!  I added the little blue bird just because...!! 
 
Okay, that is it for me, I may be back later as I do have some more in the works!
Hope you all have a great day and only two days left in this work week, if ya'll work!
Me?  I don't work!!  So I can play a lot!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Monday, May 12, 2014

Online Card Class ~ Watercolors!

I have a lot to catch up with people.
This weekend was busy sitting and watching granddaughters play volleyball...
You know this is hard work, right?
The 12 year old (plays on the 14 & under team) played in the 16 & under division and they took 4th!!
The 10 year old plays in the 12 & under and they took 6th.
Overall a great weekend, but exhausting...
okay I did have to walk from one facility to another on the Oregon State Campus!!
That has to count for something, right?
I managed to squeeze in a few samples each night (or the middle of the night)!
then I put the cards together today.
DAY 1...Laura Bassen's technique using an acrylic block and applying distress inks to it...
stamped Hero Arts Tall Wheat over the top and added some wink of stella to the wheat!

these two cards are from Day 2 using rubber cement (or liquid frisket if you have it!)
As you can see the rubber cement didn't totally cover the flower image, but not bad.
Then I tried the smaller image from "PTI Life" and applied the rubber cement a couple of times to get better coverage.  Okay, I see the water mark right under the sentiment...DARN!
 

DAY 3 Water color stamping.  Kristina demonstrated a beautiful card using Art Impression stamps..
I used PTI Ionic Images and distress ink.  I added some green with the brush, then stamped the stems and added more water.  The flowers were added by simply putting the brush into the blue water color paints and dabbing them onto the card.
DAY 4 Shari Carroll used gelatos and water with a bod stamp...I used PTI Water color Garden and some gelatos...actually only gelatos for the flower, distress ink was used for the stem and leaves because I do not have any green gelatos!
DAY 6
Jennifer McGuire suggested embossing with white and then coloring in, but when coloring, instead of using plain water, add shimmer to the water.  I had a spritz bottle already filled with perfect pearls, so I shook it up and put a couple of drops onto my pallet and then used that in place of the water when dipping into the water color paints...there is a really nice shine to the whole image.
Phew, okay that is it for now.
I hope I can make a few more and play with some new techniques...
or practice what I have already learned because by no means am I an artist.
I did tell my husband I wanted to go buy the liquid frisket and he said,
"Oh, because you think you are an artist now?"  ha ha
 
NO, because the rubber cement in a little difficult to work with, just getting good coverage, so I was hoping the frisket would spread easier!
 
Thanks for hanging in there and taking a look!
Heart hugs,
Colleen
 
 
 


Thursday, May 8, 2014

Seize the Birthday ~ FLOWERS!

Hi Friends!  Want to make a birthday card with flowers for a special person?
This is the challenge for you! 
However you can always go with no topping and just make a card of your choosing,
just be sure it is a birthday one!
and see the inspiration from the design team!
I used Lawn Fawn's Penelope Blossom
What a fun stamp set and the banner and sentiment
are also from that set.
It's like giving a flower box to a friend!
the Topping this time is "FLOWERS" if you choose to use a topping.
You can always go with "anything goes" too!
 
 Thanks for taking a look and I hope to see your creations on the challenge blog!
You have until May 21 to link up a card!
 
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Wednesday, May 7, 2014

Online Watercolor Class Day 3

Today Jennifer Rzasa did basic stamping with watercolor.
just so happened I had the stamp set she used, so I pretty much copied hers, just changed out the colors as I do not have very many memento inks.
I used distress inks instead.
Basically it was stamping and then spritzing with water to get the look of watercolor.
Sadly this was the only card I made today...not that I didn't try to do more,
most of the rest ended up in the recycling bin!
 
I am learning a lot about the different watercolor mediums
and it is always good to learn new things, right?
I just wish mine would turn out as good as the instructors,
they make it look so easy!!
 
Tomorrow is another day, though...so
more inspiration to come!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen

Watercolor Day 2 and the MIM envelope wraps

I thought I should get these cards posted before another day of videos shows up in my inbox!
I managed to make two before the end of the day.
The first card of the day was a soft watercolor wash...well, I don't think mine is so "soft", but I do like it!  And at the end I splattered some black to give it interest.  This was made with watercolor pencils, even the splatters!  Notice the wadded up thread behind the sentiment? 
I made an envelope to go with this card, using the Make it Monday: Envelope Wrap from Papertrey Ink. I used Tag Its # 5 and placed it on the Big shot so that it was hanging over the edge and not cutting the top shape and hole, that way I could make it as long as I wanted.  It does wrap around to the back of the envelope as well, with another heart to keep it closed!
I added some additional splatters of black paint also.
 
 
This is one of many that Jennifer McGuire demonstrated...I white embossed the background, did my wash using distress inks and a brush with lots of water.  I had taped it down on all sides to keep it flat while drying...then left to go watch my granddaughter play T-ball! 
When I came back I used an iron and a piece of computer paper to "lift" the embossing OFF the paper.  By doing that it allowed me to stamp my sentiment over the whole thing.
The inside of the card reads:
We are never alone.
Now I need to buy me some rubber cement and try another one of Jennifer's cards!
Are you curious about rubber cement? 
Stay tuned!
 
Heart Hugs,
Colleen
 


Tuesday, May 6, 2014

Watercolor Online Card class

Here are DAY 1 cards for the Online Card Class "Watercolor"
I have been looking forward to this class,
I am NOT an artist, so I will wait to see if I like this technique,
so far, so good.
 

 
Day 1 showed three instructors giving videos showing water coloring with three different techniques. The first card was water colored, then  stencil was laid down and pressed into the colors to leave a slight impression.
The second card used distress ink onto a stamping block, spritzed with water and them placed in the center of the card..each color was overlapped and dried, a second stamping was applied to add depth to the color.
The third card was a heat embossed and then a resist water color.
 
Thanks for taking a look!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen
 


Monday, May 5, 2014

Merry Monday # 107

Two weeks ago I was surprised with a Merry Monday win!
You can see the card HERE .  I was honored to be asked to be a guest designer this week.
We have a fun sketch for you to try!
 

 
 
And here is my card:
This is what I used for my card:
Paper: PTI paper white, spring rain, Lawn Fawn:  Peace Joy Love,
stamps:  Paper Smooches: Swanky Dudes, Winter Penguin
Dies:  PTI winter Penguin (snowflakes)
SSS: Falling snow Stencil
Wendi Vecchi white embossing paste
 
I hope you will be inspired by this wonderful group of ladies and give this sketch a try and make a Christmas card for your stash!
 
Have a great day!
Heart Hugs,
Colleen
 


Thursday, May 1, 2014

Card Concept # 9




 
This card is for the Card Concept Challenge :
We are to use Purple!!
 
The first thing I did was pull out all the "purples" I have and smeared them on a paper with a dauber.
some of them I was not liking the color.  I ended up using
PTI Winter Wisteria, Royal Velvet, memento grape jelly, distress ink: Dusty Concord.
I used three of those colors for the base of the card, using a swiping motion with my dauber.
Then I went back and laid a TCW Stencil: chicken wire and daubed it with the royal velvet, using the same dauber I sponged on some butterflies from a Heidi Swapp butterfly collection stencil.
I die cut a PTI mat stack # 1 in winter wisteria and heat embossed the sentiment with white embossing powder.  The sentiment is from SSS:  Blessed.
 
Thanks for taking a look!
We are having a glorious day...suppose to be 86 degrees today!!
I have already been out and planted my sugar snap peas!
I really need to wash some screens and some windows...
 
Heart Hugs,
Colleen