Bouquet in a Box

I wanted to make something really special for my sister's birthday, so when I saw the directions for this card on Extreme Cards and Papercrafts, I knew I had to give it a try:

I used all kinds of flower and leaf punches and dies, and the sentiment is from amuse studio.  The card folds flat and fits in a 6x6 envelope.

Challenges:

• SweetStamps blog - spring flowers
• Quirky Crafts - secret garden
• Sunflowerfield - birthdays/flowers
• Challenges and Candies - flowers
• Inky Impressions - 3-d

Holly Dolly

The Challnge this past week was to make an art doll attached to an ATC base, with limbs that could fold up into the ATC for storage.  This was a fun idea to me - I like making paper dolls of all sizes.  However, I couldn't think if a theme until I saw a diecut Christmas tree in my pile on the desk (POTD for you Canadians) and thought it would make a fun skirt.  Thus, Holly Dolly was born.

The holly print paper happens to be the reverse of the green snowflake paper.  I think you've seen me use this doll body (I printed a sheet of them) before on other projects, but this is the first time I've used it for a jointed doll. However, the assignment wasn't just to make a doll, but attach it to an ATC base.  As I was doing that, it occurred to me that it would make even more sense to put her on a Christmas card, so she could be displayed for the holiday season before being stored an an ATC album.  I figured out that by attaching elastic cord to the card base, I could easily display an ATC without making it difficult to remove later.

 You can see the ATC, the silver elastic cord, and the card base here.  The tree die is from A Muse Studio - I use it a lot this time of year.

Challenges:

• Hiding in my Craft Room - scraps
• Crafts for Eternity - anything but a card (there are two things that aren't a card here)
• Art Impressions - Holly Jolly Christmas
• Creative Knockouts - punches (holly is punched)

Stamping (and coloring) on black

I love the sharp contrast of stamping on black. A dark background really makes the colors pop.

Unfortunately, the colors popped so much, I went a little crazy with the background papers.  I don't think I did myself any favors with the dayglo color palette.  However, it was fun using some techniques that I haven't used in a  while - dry embossing, watermark stamping, punching a border all around the image (I wish I had remembered the easy way before I started, it looks a little chewed up now, I think), and I don't think I've applied a strip of ribbon without a bow in forever  (I wanted a bow, but the black bow with the black cardstock was too heavy, and other colors just didn't look right).

Are you wondering how I got those bright colors on the black?  I embossed silhouette stamps with white, then colored them in with copics.  I then added little dots of color with my souffle pens.  The stamps are all amuse studio;  The challenge there this week is, of course, stamping on black.

I'm entering this card in the following challenges:

• Card Crafter's Circle - sketch
• Crafty Creations - winged things
• Fab n Funky - ribbon
• Flutterby Wednesdays - open
• Nutcrafters - coloring
• Sweetstamps - borders

Square Sympathy Card

I needed a quick sympathy card for my bowling league to sign - one of our bowler's father passed away.  The sunshine chair told me that it would be hand-delivered, so I used the opportunity to make a square card, since I didn't have to worry about mailing it.  However, I did have to be concerned about dimension - I have found that large bumpy embellishments on the front of the card made it hard for people to write on the front inside of the card.   The problem then was to make a dramatic card without too much dimension.

The papers I used to frame the sentiment were all scraps from my gelli plate experiments.  They all have metallic paint as part of the mix, so the pieces all have  nice shimmer (and as a result, they don't scan their true color).  The butterflies were also punched from the same group of scraps.  The sentiment is from the wild rose stamp set by amuse studio; I embossed it with iridescent EP.  I couldn't resist a tiny bit of bling in the corners.

Challenges:

• Delicious Doodles - bling
• Jelly Park Challenges - sentiment as focal point
• Creative Moments - frame
• Flutterby Wednesdays - open
• Lollipop Ladies - Smarties + punches 

Warhol Cupcakes

I needed to make a 4x4 with a cupcake theme for the altereddesigns group.  I have a  tiny cupcake punch, so I thought about what I could do with that, and ultimately came up with this:

This was so much harder than I thought it would be.  Trying to glue down 36 tiny bits of paper in some sort of organized fashion is no officially beyond my skill level.

Challenges:

• 4 Crafty Chicks - squares
• Ruby's Rainbow - food

April Showers bring May Flowers

Trite, isn't it?  But if you have a stamp of an umbrella and you don't know anyone having a baby or getting married, it's about the only theme you can do with it.  This is an ATC.

I began by stamping the umbrella, then coloring it with glaze gellies which not only give a glossy embossed look, but resist ink.  I used the clear glaze gelly pen to draw in the rain.  I then burnished the image with distress inks.  the flowers were all punched.  I thought it needed a little black doodling to bring in the black from the umbrella.

April Showers Challenges:

• Amusing Challenges
• Anything but a Card
• Rogue Redhead
• Daring Cardmakers
• Polka Doodles

Powerpunch

This is an awesome tool; I can't believe I never heard of it before now. I spent a shameful amount of time putting holes in paper.



This is done on glimmer paper from the PaperTemptress, of course. It was starting to look very boxy, so I used the Out of the Box technique on the lady. I will need to practice holding my paper still while punching, but pressing the button on those punches just got very easy. If you have button punches but avoid using them because it is so hard to press them, you have to have a Powerpunch.

World Card Making Day

I had to make a card today!



This was for a WCMD challenge issued by 2 Sketches 4 You. The paper seemed too bright for the scene that I wanted to put on it, and after I toned it down with Tea Dye distress ink,and I used a bit of gesso to create mist. Virtually everything on this card is punched.