Birthday Catch Up

I think I have about 10 cards to do for November, so I started last night. Yeah, yeah, it's a little late. I had to get them done, though, so I got to work. I made 2 for Saturday.


This one was done using watercolor paper for the top layer. I used the crayons directly on the stamp and then on the paper. A piece of elegant eggplant makes the 2nd layer and the bottom layer is basic gray put through the Cuttlebug. I rubbed white craft ink on the top of the embossed layer to highlight the top of it. I like the effect it gives. A piece of pink satin ribbon is tied around the top layer to finish it off.





The other card didn't turn out quite like I planned. It's ok, but just not what I had in mind when I started. Again, I used the watercolor paper for the top layer. The bottom layer is basic gray and embossed. Instead of white craft ink, though, I used a bit of basic black to highlight the ridges. Then, I sprayed the piece with Glitter Mist. I ended up going back over some of the ridges with a little more basic black. The hummingbird image is colored with water color crayons and blended with the Aqua Painter. A piece of organdy white ribbon is secured behind the layers.







This shows the basic gray layer a little better. It looks a little like old metal.













I'd love to hear what you think! Have a great day stamping - and a great, big, beautiful tomorrow!!

October Challenge Card

I was in charge of sending out the October challenge for our group swap on SCS. Because we were headed out on our cruise at the end of September, I made up the packs early and sent them out. I've just gotten an opportunity to try it, though. For the challenge, I used Ahoy, Matey from SU. I used the set to make several pieces of 'card candy' and also sent several separate images from the set and some ribbon. The challenge was to use at least one piece of the 'card candy' and the ribbon to make a GIRL card. They could use images if they wished and could change them in any way, but couldn't take anything away from the card candy pieces. A piece of purple cardstock was embossed with a Cuttlebug folder and included - but mainly to protect the items in the envelope. Participants could use the cardstock if they wished, but it wasn't required.

So ..... what did my card look like? Here ya go...

I used watercolor pencils to color the ship on the blue paper. I used white first and then put the other colors on top. I did use a blender pen to blend the colors a little. It tends to take away the pencil 'stripes' from the initial coloring. Craft ink was used on the sides to accent the piece, and the ribbon was tied on top. A little bit of clear Stickles was used on the little purple flag. Nothing was done to the Ahoy Matey skull piece. The purple, embossed cardstock was highlighted first with light pink pigment ink and then with white pigment ink. The ink was swiped in both horizontal and vertical directions to give a little bit of a linen look to the piece. A small piece of bling was put in the center of the flower that shows the best after the card candy pieces were put on there. It was all put on a white card base.


So ..... what do you think????? I think it turned out kind of neat.

As always, happy stamping and have a great, big, beautiful tomorrow. :)

We're Back! :)

Back from vacation and on a roll with challenges. As I think I mentioned before, I receive a challenge each month from a different person on our challenge swap thread. I have failed miserably to keep up. I did June and July pretty quickly, but got behind when I received August and September. Just yesterday, I managed to get both of those challenges done. I still need to get October done, but I still have over half of a month to do that. :)

This was the challenge for August. We were sent the images, ribbon, cardstock strip, pearl, and designer paper. We could put them on any color card base. I chose an SU green (the one in earth elements), and put the designer paper so that the lines were going horizontal so that I could have the ribbon stripes going the same way. I colored the image with watercolor wonder crayons, blended the colors with a blending pen, and put ink on the edges (going gray) to soften it a bit. This was a little more simple than I wanted, but I like the way it came out.





September Challenge - we were sent the images, flowers, pink cardstock strip, saffron tab, brad, sentiments, googly eyes, and designer paper. We were told to use some of each thing and to add some 'bling' in the form of some kind of glitter product. This is my result. The Cuttlebug was used to emboss little flowers on the cardstock strip. It's one of the border folders that I bought last month. I cut out the little dragonfly, colored him with watercolor wonder crayons, and added some stickles to the purple wings. The frog was colored and the edges of the layer was inked with green to bring it out a bit. The designer paper was used to look a bit like grass, and the sentiment was inked to make it a little 'grass-stained.' The flowers were combined to make the double colored flowers and to give some dimension. Inside the flowers, I used a white gel pen to make little accent dots. The googly eyes fit perfectly on the frog.



So ... what do you think??

October challenge will be next. I will try to get that done this week.

Hope you all have a stamp-a-riffic night and a great, big, beautiful tomorrow (I heard that 8 days ago IN PERSON. :) )!!