Blue, Yellow, and White ATC

I made this ATC for a mingle, then forgot to sign up for the mingle, so now I have this ATC:

The paper was scraps, and the image was one that I had printed out a long time back, but never used.  It only just barely fit within the parameters. Some copic coloring,  a little bit of dry embossing and a ribbon was all the texture I felt that it needed.  It's a little cleaner than your average ATC, but sometimes less is more.

Challenges:

• Crafty Ribbons - anything with ribbon
• Digistamps 4 Joy - to be young again (okay, this is a little before my time)
• Paper Pretties - embossing
• Craft-room Challenge - use scraps
• Cheerful Stamp Pad - my kinda gal
• Lunagirl Moonbeams - Diva

Four card workshop

I liked that card formula from Club Scrap Creates so much that hen a girlfriend asked me to create a card workshop for her, her mother, and her grandmother, I decided to try it again, with different colors.  My girlfriend is the type of person who never wants to do exactly what everyone else is doing, so a very open-ended workshop is good for her, and her mother and grandmother had never stamped before, so it was going to be a challenge regardless.

I pulled out 9 of my a•muse studio stamp sets, because those are the easiest to use, and a dozen colors of ink, and showed them how to stack the cards.  The grandmother took to it right away, and made some amazing cards; the mother had her own ideas about how to stack the pieces, and did some interesting experiments; and my girlfriend was determined to not let the colors I chose influence her in any way.  However, a good time was had by all, and I made 4 cards that I liked.

Stamp sets used here include all for love, wild rose, marvelous marigolds, snail&co and vintage a•muse.  Another set that they absolutely loved using was the enjoy the ride set - they thought the bicycles were great for guy cards.

Challenges:

• 365 cards - serene scene
• Creative Moments - lots of layers
• Perfect Sentiments - funny sentiment (1st and third card)
• Love to Scrap - pastels (all but the last card)
• Stamps and Fun - CAS

Cards for patriots

There is a new cutting diagram on the Club Scrap blog that allows you to take 4 sheets of cardstock and cut them to make 4 cards (including bases) that are deeply layered with very little waste.  I decided to give this a try, using only the four sheets of cardstock, the let freedom ring stamp set from a•muse studio, and inks and embossing powder.

 

I am really thrilled at how quickly these came together.  I think I will use this same idea for my Christmas cards too!

Challenges:

• Crazy 4 Challenges - no patterned paper
• CAS-ual Fridays - red, white, & blue
• Crafts and Me - lots of layers
• Celebrate the Occasion - Memorial Day
• Artistic Inspirations - cards for men

More Pennants for Flag Month

You may recall that I was working on making a patriotic banner for what I like to think of as "Flag Month", which is the period of time that starts with Memorial Day and ends with Independence Day, and has Flag Day in the middle.  When we lived in Millington, Tennessee (aka Flag City), Flag Month is a big deal, and the whole city including the private homes would decorate like crazy.  Even the people who lived on my dead end street put buntings on their porches, and over half the homes had real flagpoles in their front yards, complete with spotlights, so that they wouldn't have to take down their flags at night.  My husband and I are fairly patriotic people, and we do have a flag on our home 365 days a year, and go to the cemetery on Memorial Day and participate in the parades, but even we were not ready for Flag Month in Millington.

But, I digress.  I was working on this banner for Flag Month, and wanted more pennants to flesh it out a little.  The let freedom ring stamp set from a•muse studio was perfect for what I wanted to do, and here are some of the pennants I made:

I kept them fairly clean looking to go with my first set.  The top left one uses the star from the set, heat embossed with silver.  I love the distressed look of the stars!  the top right one uses a word from that set heat embossed in blue, and I then used the vintage labels dies and stamp set to frame it.  The lower left pennant features stripes that I hand cut, topped with the new paper flowers from a•muse studio (because when you cut things freehand, sometimes you need to cover your mistakes).  You get a LOT of those flowers in a bag, and you can stamp or color them, but I liked them in white for this project.  The centers are flower brads that I heat embossed with the same blue EP I used for the words on the other pennants.  The one in the lower right has a stamped background from the let freedom ring set and the text is from that set, too.  There are several more great stamps in that set too - I will show you the pennants I make with them in another post.

Lady Catsby

I love this cat from My Paper Moon:

There is just something about the expression on her face that just cracks me up.  That store has some of the cutest cat stamps I've seen anywhere.  I used Marker Watercoloring and the Out of the Box techniques on the focal image, then tried to decide what to use for a background.  I ended up gluing whatever scraps I could reach onto a 3x5 card, then trimming it to size.  A few strips of tissue tape  covers the spots where the papers don't quite mesh.  There wasn't a lot of room for a sentiment on this card, but then, what would you expect Lady Catsby to say?

Challenges:

• Clear It Out - 2 or more patterned papers
• Shopping Our Stash - use only scraps
• Try It On Tuesday - feminine and fancy
• Fashionista - vintage
• Incy Wincy - animal antics

Clean/Dirty

I knew I needed one of these magnets for my new dishwasher, but nice ones are hard to find, or overpriced when you do find them, and they are never the right color for your kitchen.  It wasn't until I found a flat magnet in my laundry (my son picked it up from a take-out restaurant and never took it out of his pocket) that it occured to me how easy it would be to glue something suitable onto the magnet and make my own.

It was easy to find paper in my stash that coordinated with my kitchen colors, because I like what I like. I slapped it onto my dishwasher even before the glue was dry.

Challenges:

• Scrapping Everyday Miracles - celebrate something new (dishwasher) using something old (designer paper)
• Cheerful Stamp Pad - natural
• Get Inky - diecuts
• All crafts Challenge - something other than a card
• Dream Valley - no squares

Okay, I know, stop crafting and blogging and go empty the dishwasher!

Porridge again?

I thought this image from Dover was darling, but I had no idea how to use it on a card until I looked at it with Mother's Day in mind:

On the inside left it says:

Mother Bear felt vindicated when her family saw that someone was willing to break into their home in order to eat the meal they had snubbed earlier that day.

I thought it would be an amusing card for a girlfriend.  I colored the image using the Penciled Twinks technique.

Challenges:

• Digi Haven - Mother's Day
• Southern Girls - sentiment
• Vicky's Place - bears with food
• Rhedd and Rosie's - fantasy
• The Stamping Chef - Animals

Azalea paper

My azaleas are past their best - the blooms are starting to fall off, and then I remembered that there was something that I wanted to do with those blooms.  I gathered a few handfuls and smashed the blossoms between two sheets of white cardstock in my Big Shot, and got some very interesting paper.  As soon as it was dry, I set to work putting some on a card.

I thought that the sentiment might be good for Mother's Day - good for a lot of things, I suppose.  The sentiment is from the all for love stamp set by a•muse studio, and the sketch is this week's challenge.

Challenges:

• Sweet Stampin' - CAS
• Chocolate, Coffee, and Cards - for Mom 
• Totally Papercrafts - CAS
• Crafting for all Seasons - monochromatic
• Paper Shelter - Love
• Cardmania - Flowers

Bee's Knees

Going back to my roots with this card:

Nested rectangles with a touch of ribbon - that's how I used to make all my cards, until it got boring.  I like mixing it up a little, but sometimes all you need is a clean, basic card.  It's funny but the stamps set that has the sentiment (a springtime day) doesn't have a single bee in it, but snail&co does.  Both stamp sets are from a•muse studio.  It's a good Mother's Day sentiment - appreciative without being too mushy.

Challenges:

• Kenny K's - flowers
• No Matter Which - things with wings
• Corrosive Challenges - Mother's Day
• Sweet Stampin' - create a scene
• Alota Rubber stamps - bugs