a couple of cards...

 Hello!  I'm popping in with a couple of cards to share.  The first card is for the current MFT sketch challenge.   I have been looking at the Birdie Brown Unicorns & Glitter stamps and dies for a very long time.  I went back and forth about getting them, but finally pulled the trigger.  My reasoning for getting them... my soon to be five year old great niece who likes unicorn!   So this card is for her birthday.  I stamped one of the little girl images, as well as the little puppy image in VersaFine CLAIR Morning Mist ink on smooth bristol cardstock.   I then colored the images with ZIG Clean Color Real Brush markers.  Kaia, my little niece, has blond hair so of course the little girl had to be blond!  Hendrix, Kaia's "big brother", is white (I think he is a Bichon Frise) so I just added a little bit of color to him using light gray markers and blending them out.    I ink blended Spun Sugar and Kitsch Flamingo distress oxides on some smooth bristol  and die cut it with the scalloped rectangle.  I die cut a white cardstock panel and adhered the ink blended piece and then stamped the sentiment.  I adhered Kaia and Henny to the card front and then added the two rows of sequins.  I hope Kaia loves her card!

The second card is for the Color Throwdown and Freshly Made Sketches.  I don't often do color blocking because I generally don't like how my color blocking turns out.  But I decided to put that aside and have another try at it.  I found cardstock in the CTD colors, cut strips to fit a thin piece of white cardstock cut to A2 size and adhered them.  I have had the SSS April card kit since well... April and have never used the stamp set.  So I pulled that out and heat embossed the large floral image in white on the color blocked piece.  I then die cut it with a rectangle die.  I stamped a sentiment from the stamp set on a banner I die cut from white cardstock and popped that up on the panel.   There is a butterfly in the stamp set so I heat embossed that in white on vellum, die cut it and popped it up on the sentiment.  For once I do like how my color blocking turned out, lol!

Thanks for stopping by and if you live in the Pacific Northwest I hope you can stay cool during our heatwave!  Have a lovely day!

a shamrock and a peony...

 Hello!  Hope your week is off to a good start!  We have had a little bit of snow here in my corner of the Pacific Northwest.  The weather report actually calls for rain, but it is cold enough that the rain is coming down as snow!  Won't be sticking around, tho... thankfully!  I have two more cards to share.  I have been in a crafting mood lately and finally participated in a couple of challenges that I always want to take on, but mostly never seem to get the chance to do.  First up is a card for the current Inspired By challenge.   I have a couple of rainbow dies from MFT and used one that is sort of wonky to create my rainbow.  I die cut green glitter cardstock and gold mirror cardstock then alternated the two for my rainbow.  I die cut scrap white cardstock three more times with the die and adhered those to my top pieces to create a nice sturdy rainbow.   I die cut three small hearts using the AJVD Stitched Dot Hearts die set from green glitter cardstock to create my shamrock and the stem from the gold mirror cardstock.  I adhered the rainbow  to a panel of white cardstock and then added the shamrock.  I couldn't find one sentiment in my large collection of stamps that had anything to do with luck!  So I ended up using this lovely verse that is part of a sympathy stamp set from AJVD.  Originally I stamped it in green directly on my panel under the rainbow, but it wasn't straight!  I didn't like the look of the green so I when I restamped it on my banner I used watermark ink and embossed it in gold.  I like that much better!  Also sending this off to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge to use green.

This next card is for the MFT sketch challenge.  I always want to play along with that challenge because I love a good sketch, but never seem to find the time.  I did this weekend... yay!    I pulled out the MFT Peony Perfection stamp as it is perfect fot the sketch and I had never used it!   I love floral images, but get a little intimidated by how complex they can be.  I never know if I'm putting the shadow in the right place, but I decided that I just needed to get over that and color things how I think they should be and so I did!  I used my ZIG Clean Color Real Brush markers for the coloring as well as a couple of Polychromos color pencils.  I stamped the image using VersaFine CLAIR Acorn ink on smooth bristol cardstock and started coloring.  Once the coloring was done I trimmed out the flower.  That was a trick, but I got it done!  I used the MFT Rectangle Extraordinaire to create the element across the card.  I blended on distress oxide in Tumbled Glass.  Going heavy on the top and fading down to the bottom.  I then die cut the panel with a rectangle die.  I adhered the flower in the center and then stamped the sentiment (from Simon Says Stamp) in Tumbled Glass distress oxide underneath.  I also discovered that apparently I do not own any stamps that actually say Happy Easter!  So funny!  Anywhoo.... I finished off the card with lots of sparkling clear sequins from Pretty Pink Posh.

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

pinwheels and flowers...

 Hey there!  Popping in to post a couple of cards that I made today.   I seem to be in a clean and simple state of mind right now so both cards are pretty simple.  First up is a card for the current Color Throwdown challenge.  I love pink, blue and gray together so couldn't pass up this week's challenge.  I finally made something with my Pinwheel Party stencils, dies and coordinating stamp set from the Greetery.  I used Spun Sugar and Faded Jeans distress oxide inks for the pinwheels.   The sentiment was stamped using VersaFine CLAIR Morning Mist ink and the panel die cut with a rectangle die.  I adhered the panel to a white cardstock base and then added the pinwheels.  I finished things off with sequins in white and blue to the centers of the pinwheels and a few pink sequins on the panel.  Super clean and simple!  I will also add this one to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge of anything goes.

The second card is for the MFT sketch challenge.  I have played along with an MFT sketch challenge in ages.  I almost combined it with the MFT color challenge, but decided to just do the sketch.  I stamped one of the images from the Magnolia Blossoms stamp set on white cardstock with Memento Tuxedo Black ink and then colored very simply with Copic markers.   Once the image was colored I die cut it with the largest stitched mini scalloped oval die (no longer available).   The sentiment is from the MFT Flowers in Bloom stamp set.  I adhered the oval to a panel of light gray cardstock and then to a white cardstock panel.   Again, very clean and simple. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

a deer and snowflakes...

 Hey there!  I got some crafty time today and I managed to make TWO cards!  Pretty proud of myself although I'm sure I have made at least two cards on the same day in the last few weeks, lol!   First up is a card for Color Throwdown and Freshly Made Sketches.    Amy Rohl, who is one of the designers over at CTD, created the most amazing cards using die cut poinsettias and die cut deer.   My card is something of a shameless case of her brilliant designs.   I die cut a tag from green cardstock and then two more from white cardstock and adhered them together.  The poinsettia was die cut from white cardstock using the AJVD poinsettia die and the deer from aqua cardstock using another AJVD die.   The AJVD deer die set includes a pair of glasses and other items to decorate your deer.  I die cut the glasses and a little dot from pink cardstock and adhered those to the deer.  The poinsettia was adhered to the tag and then I added the deer.  I looped pink baker's twine through the hole in the tag and tied a knot at the end.  Everything was adhered to a rectangle die cut from white cardstock.  The sentiment is from the AJVD Light of Christmas stamp set.  I stamped it using VersaFine CLAIR Morning Mist and die cut it with a banner die.  As a finishing touch I added Glossy Accents to the glasses for a little shine and realism. 

The second card is for the MFT sketch challenge.  I tried my hand at creating a tree from snowflakes!  I have an older set of MFT snowflake dies and I cut all of them from white and light gray cardstock.  I then layered one white and one gray of different snowflakes together.   Once they were dry I arranged the snowflakes on a panel of aqua cardstock.  When I had roughly the shape of a tree I adhered the snowflakes with liquid adhesive.  I added aqua colored jewels from Pretty Pink Posh to the centers of all the snowflakes.  The sentiment is from a now retired MFT sentiment set.  I stamped it on vellum with watermark ink and heat embossed in white.  Trimmed it down to a thin strip, wrapped it around the panel and adhered it in the back.  The panel was adhered to a light gray cardstock base.  Adding this to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge of let it snow.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Christmas Cheer!

 Hello!  I'm back with an other post.  This one is for the current MFT sketch challenge, the Paper Players challenge and Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge.   I have never been into stamps of animals.  My preference for images is florals.  But... I absolutely adore the sweet little images of foxes, bunnies, birds and other animals designed by Stacey Yacula.   So last week I received an MFT/Stacey Yacula stamp and die set called Christmas Cheer.  I just love the little bunny in the stamp set.  So using the theme from Paper Players, the sketch from the MFT sketch challenge and dies (for the SSS Wednesday challenge) I created my little card.   I stamped the bunny, the Christmas tree and the treeline on watercolor paper from Tim Holtz and then colored the images with watercolor pencils.   Once everything was mostly dry I die cut them with their matching dies.  To create the more angled slope of the treeline I trimmed off the little trees and then angled the little hills so they were a little steeper and then die cut with a rectangle die.  The same die was used to diecut some very pale blue cardstock.  I stamped the sentiment at angle directly on the snowy slope.  I adhered the treeline to the rectangle and then added the smaller trees, the Christmas tree and finally the little bunny.   

Thanks for stopping by and have a lovely day!

More Christmas cards...

Yep... still making Christmas cards!  I think I still need a couple more, but need to make out my list to know for sure.  The first card is for Color Throwdown.  I recently got the Spellbinders Kaleidoscope Plaid die set and have been wanting to make a card with it so I used it for this card.  I die cut the bottom layer from green, the middle from red and then the top layer from aqua.   I was going to go in one direction and tried the idea I  had in mind.  The idea didn't turn out quite the way I wanted it to, but that happens, right?   So I just moved forward with the rest of my idea and finished the card.  I used my Glimmer hot foil system to foil the senitment in silver on green cardstock and then I used two dies from a Spellbinders small die kit to create the little bow for my present.  I die cut white cardstock using a Spellbinders Essentials Rectangle die and adhered the kaleidoscope plaid piece to the rectangle and then added the bow.  To bring in a little more silver I added silver flatback pearls from Spellbinders to the center of the bow and to the present.  Going to add this one to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge of anything goes. 

Don't forget that Spellbinders is having a huge sale going on through tomorrow.  Click here or on my side bar to head to the sale.  Lots of great deals to be had!

The second card is for the MFT sketch and color challenge.  It looks alot like the first card in layout and honestly I didn't plan it that way.  I actually made this card before I made the CTD card!  I love snowflakes (seriously... who doesn't?) and have several older snowflake stamp and die sets from MFT so I pulled out one set to create my card.  I used inks from MFT and PTI for the snowflakes.  To bring in the red I stamp the sentiment from an older MFT sentiment set with watermark ink on red cardstock and heat embossed with white embossing powder.   The sentiment was die cut with an MFT fishtail flag stack die.  I used an MFT scalloped rectangle die for the center panel.  I arranged the snowflakes and the sentiment strip on the panel and adhered them with liquid adhesive and foam dots.  Once I had everything adhered down I added Nuvo Crystal drops in Morning Dew.  I was going to add more around the snowflakes, but I just didn't have the nerve to commit to that, lol!  So... I kept it clean and simple.  

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

Cards for MFT...

 Hey there!  I'm popping in with a couple of cards that I made for some MFT challenges.  Their annual card design superstar contest is going on.  I decided to challenge myself and enter the coloring virtuoso contest, as well as the clean and simple challenge.  First up is the card for the coloring challenge.  I have a lot of MFT's beautiful floral stamp sets and I used the Rose Garden set to make my card.    I stamped the image on smooth bristol cardstock with VersaFine CLAIR Nocturne and then colored with ZIG markers.  Because this is a coloring challenge I challenged myself to color the images using two very different colors.  I started by coloring the flowers using a pink ZIG and once that layer was dry I added in light yellow.  I pretty pleased with my coloring on this image.  I die cut a piece of white cardstock with a label die from MFT (I think it is no longer available) and then trimmed down the two pieces even further to widen the center.  I had inked up a piece of bristol with Speckled Egg distress oxide ink, die cut it with a mini scalloped rectangle die from MFT adhered it to the center of my card base and then trimmed down the sides.  I adhered the other pieces with foam tape and then added the rose image to the center.  The sentiment is from another MFT set and was embossed with white on vellum and die cut with an MFT fishtail banner die.  A larger fishtail banner was die cut, layered with the first one and adhered to the card front. 

The second card is for the clean and simple challenge for the Card Design Superstar.    For this card I used the super cute Stacey Yacula Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes.  This card is going to my sister-in-law who has a couple of turtles.  I stamped the little guy  and a cupcake on smooth bristol and colored with ZIGs just like I did with the first card.  After coloring everything I die cut the images with the matching dies.  I used another small rectangle die from MFT to cut the little piece behind the turtle and the cupcake.  I cut a strip of black and white striped patterned paper and adhered that on one side of my cardstock base.  I trimmed down a panel of white cardstock and adhered that to the front with foam tape.  I then created a messy loop of black thread, adhered the rectangle on top and then added the turtle and cupcake.   The sentiment from the same set was stamped on a fishtail banner with Nocturne ink, trimmed down to fit the design and adhered.  

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!   I just have to say that I really dislike the new blogger!   I don't know why they had to fix it when it wasn't broken!  

flowers...

Hello and happy Monday!  I'm popping in with a couple of cards that I have shared on Instagram.  One card is for the MFT sketch challenge and I was just going to use Instagram to enter the challenge, but decided to post it on my blog since I still have a little bit of time before the challenge closes.  The second card was just something I colored up last week and turned into a card.   With the card for the MFT sketch challenge I used one of the images from the MFT Magnolia Blossom stamp set.  I stamped the image with Memento Tuxedo Black ink and then colored the flowers with two Copic markers (R81 and R83).  The stems were colored with one (YG67) and the center of the main flower with just one color, as well (Y02).  I had originally started coloring the image with different colors, but it was too bright.  I really took my time with the coloring and I'm very pleased with how it turned out.   I fussy cut the image once it was done and then finished up the rest of the card per the sketch.  I have a medallion die from MFT that I used for the background.  I don't know what it is called and I don't think it is available any more, but it is sure is pretty.  This is my first time using it.  I stamped the sentiment (from a retired MFT stamp set called Spring Blossoms) on vellum with watermark ink and heat embossed with Ebony embossing powder from WOW!

With the second image I used my ZIG markers.  I love the Mondo line of stamps from Ellen Hutson and one of my favorites in the Mondo Gerbera Daisy.  I used that one and stamped it on smooth bristol cardstock with VersaFine CLAIR Acorn ink.   This is another one that I spent along time on the coloring.  Once I was done with the ZIG coloring I added a little bit of depth with a brown Polychromos color pencil.  The image was die cut with the matching die.   To make the card I kept it simple and just added a little strip of yellow cardstock that I embossed and a simple sentiment that I stamped with the same Acorn ink.  I think coloring with my ZIGs is my favorite way to color. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

a quick post...

Hello!  Popping in with a quick post of a card that I made for the MFT sketch challenge, as well as the MFT color challenge.  I'm also going to add this to the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge of anything goes.   The card is pretty simple.  I die cut the image panel using an MFT fishtail flag stax die (cutting off the fishtail end with the straight end of the die) and then stamped it with the MFT Fresh Cut Flowers stamp in VersaFine CLAIR Nocturne ink.  I die cut the butterfly from the Brilliant Butterflies Die-namics set and then stamped it with the two shades of pink from the color challenge.  To bring in the other two colors I cut strips of yellow and green cardstock and adhered them to a white cardstock base.  I stamped the sentiment from another MFT stamp set on the image panel, adhered the panel and the butterfly to finish off the card. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!

celebrating your special day...

Hello!  Popping in with a card for a few challenges:  Color Throwdown, MFT sketch challenge and MFT birthday challenge.   In my last MFT order I got the Freshly Picked Die-namics die set so I pulled that out and created a little pitcher of flowers in Color Throwdown colors.   Since the theme for the MFT birthday challenge is flower posting it there made total sense!   I found scraps of the colors from the CTD palette and a piece of patterned paper from MFT for all my colors.  I did end up having to use more of the coral cardstock as I decided to create a mat for the main panel, but I did manage to use up a lot of scrap cardstock!   After I finished all the die cutting and assembly of the pitcher of flowers I die cut the rounded rectangle die (no longer available from MFT) from off white cardstock and the green plaid strip of green paper.  I adhered the strip of patterned paper to another piece of off white cardstock and die cut it with a stitched rectangle die (from AJVD).  Then I layered up the smaller rectangle and the pitcher.   A sentiment banner was die cut from the teal cardstock, stamped with the sentiment in VersaFine CLAIR Nocturne and adhered to the pitcher.  I then die cut the second rectangle from the coral cardstock, adhered the two together and the adhered everything to an off white cardstock base.

Thanks for stopping by and please stay safe!

bunny... love...

Hey there!  Popping in with a couple of cards.  The first one is for the current MFT sketch challenge, as well as the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge.  The SSS challenge is about pets and while I don't have a bunny for a pet when I was younger our family had several different rabbits.  So it was a no brainer for me to pull out the MFT/Stacey Yacula Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes to color up the cute little bunny from the set.  I stamped the image on smooth Bristol cardstock with VersaFine Acorn ink and then colored it with ZIG markers.   Once the image was dry I die cut the bunny with the matching die.   I found a piece of patterned paper (from MFT) that I liked cut it to fit the card front and then die cut an oval using an MFT oval die set that they don't have any more.  I adhered the patterned paper piece with foam tape.  I then decided to stamp the banner from the set twice with VersaFine Morning Mist and colored with the same blue ZIG I used to color the bunny's hat and the cupcake holder.  The were die cut and then adhered to the card front.   The bunny was then adhered inside the oval using a double layer of foam tape.  I finished with the sentiment that I stamped in Morning Mist and die cut with an MFT fishtail flag die.  ETA:  Just realized that this card would work perfectly for the current Fusion challenge.  The sketch is even similar to the MFT sketch and my goodness... isn't that little critter in the photo just too darn cute!?

The second card is for Color Throwdown.  Normally I combine Color Throwdown with Freshly Made Sketches, but this time I was using the dies from the January Spellbinders small die kit of the month and as you can see it is a pretty large die.  It just didn't work with the sketch.  I die cut everything from pink, green and navy cardstock and then adhered thing.   Since the word love really takes center stage and I wanted the word you to be part of the card I first experimented with stamping the word you, but there wasn't really a good spot to place the stamped word.  So I pulled out December small die kit of the month and die cut the word you from navy cardstock and adhered it to the card in a spot the totally worked.   This card will be in the mail soon and on it's way to my little niece in California.  I hope she likes it!

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!  If you are interested in finding out more about the Spellbinders monthly small die kit  you can find out more by clicking here.

flowers and hearts...

Hello!  Popping in with a couple of cards for a few challenges.  Currently MFT has their Card Design Superstar contest going on.  I don't consider myself a card design superstar, but it is good to challenge yourself to take on something that can help you improve your skills and to that end my first card is for their coloring virtuoso challenge.  I'm not a coloring virtuoso by any stretch of the imagination, but thanks to videos by the very talented Kristina Werner I have substantially improved by coloring skills to the point where I have more confidence to try things like no line watercoloring.   I inked up the MFT Flowers in Bloom stamp set with Antique Linen distress ink and stamped it on the smoother side of the Ken Oliver watercolor paper.  I then colored all the flowers with the Coral Crush color from the Ken Oliver/MFT Fresh Flowers Color Burst Trio.   I colored the stems with the Jellybean Green.  Once the image was dry I then added in some additional shadows with coral and brown Faber-Castell Polychromos color pencils.  The image was then die cut with the matching die.  I decided to use the current MFT sketch for my layout so I will also be posting the card there.  The banners were die cut with a fishtail flag stax die and the sentiment (from the Stacy Yacula Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes set) was stamped in black ink. I did all my die cutting with my Gemini Jr.  I'm pretty pleased with how my coloring turned out and really enjoyed using the Color Burst medium.  Think I may need to get some additional colors!  (Compensated affiliate links used where possible.)

My next card is also for the Card Design Superstar contest.  This one in the clean and simple category.  I used the current FMS layout for my card, as well as the Paper Players challenge to use metallics on a clean and simple design.  I looked through my MFT dies and settled on a birthday theme using the Celebrate die, as well as a cute little heart shaped balloon die and the banner die from the Stacy Yacula Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes die set.  I die cut the balloons from a dark pink and orangy-pink metallic cardstock from Stampin Up!  Boy was it a bear trying to photograph those balloons!  The banner was die cut from silver.  I die cut the word celebrate three times from MFT smooth white cardstock and adhered them together with Nuvo Deluxe Adhesive.   The balloons were then arranged on a panel of MFT Smooth white cardstock and adhered with the Deluxe Adhesive.  I then adhered the banner and the word celebrate also with deluxe adhesive.  All my die cutting was done with my Gemini Jr.  I finished by stamping the sentiment (also from Sending Sweet Celebration Wishes) on vellum with VersaMark watermark ink and embossing with silver embossing powder.   In retrospect I should have used black embossing powder as it is hard to see the sentiment, but over all I'm also pleased with how this card turned out.  (Compensated affiliate links used where possible.)

Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful day!