Spring Flowers

 I was glad that Mary, the color challenge hostess on Splitcoaststampers, chose such pretty colors for the color challenge this week:  Primrose Petals, Raspberry Ripple, and Bashful Blue with the option of making either an Easter or Spring-themed card. I chose the Spring theme.

 

I don't have the new Stampin' Up In-Colors Primrose Petals or Raspberry Ripple, so I chose colors I did have on hand that I thought came close to the new ones.  I used Rose Romance (that's going back a bit, eh?) and Purely Pomegranate...both retired colors.

I inked up the flower stamp with the Rose Romance and then lightly spritzed with water for a water color effect.  The flower centers were punched using the circles on the owl punch out of Purely Pomegranate.   I also covered them with Glossy Accents.

Supplies I Used:

Stamps:  Secret Garden and Flight of the Butterfly (Stampin' Up)

Paper:  Whisper White, Bashful Blue, Purely Pomegranate

Ink:  Stamping Up Rose Romance, Memento Tuxedo Black

Accessories:  Secret Garden Framelits, Paper-Piercing Pack, owl punch, Cheery Lynn Fanciful Flourish die, dimensionals, fan fold embossing folder, Beautiful Wings embosslit, Bashful Blue brads

Color Challenge

Today's color challenge hostess, Peggy, on Splitcoaststampers, gave the colors of Crumb Cake, Chocolate Chip, and Certainly Celery. In my mind, these are fabulous colors for a masculine card.

I stamped the ferris wheel with Chocolate Craft ink and heat embossed with brown embossing powder. After I die cut the image with a rectangle Nestability, I left it in the die so I could lightly sponge Crumb Cake around it. I also lightly sponged Certainly Celery on my houndstooth embossed bg panel.

Supplies I used:

Stamps: Feeling Sentimental by Stampin' Up

Paper: Chocolate Chip, Certainly Celery, Crumb Cake, Very Vanilla

Ink: Chocolate Chip Craft, Certainly Celery, Crumb Cake

Accessories: 1" circle punch, houndstooth embossing folder, brads, corner rounder, brown embossing powder, heat tool, sponge dauber, rectangle Nestabilities

Lazy, Lazy!

I must admit to laziness occasionally when it comes to posting my creations to my blog.  I'm pretty good about uploading them to my Splitcoaststampers' gallery.  Sometimes it's all about lack of time to keep up with both and sometimes I honestly wonder if it's worth all the work to maintain a blog.  My days just get away from me with all the things to do, and I just don't get all the time I'd like to visit and comment on the blogs of my stamping friends.  If I've missed yours lately, I do apologize.  Too bad I don't have a Mini Me who I could assign this task to---ha!  ha!  Seriously, I know how much I value the input I receive, so I really do try to support my blogging friends as much as possible.  Anywhooo, here are three creations I've made in the past couple days.  I've also been designing some clean and simple gift sets for a customer that I'll share with you soon.

First up is a very clean and simple (CAS) card I made for submission to the Winter CAS design team.  Our challenge was to use designer paper and ribbon.  I stamped my butterfly onto this pretty polkadotted designer paper and punched it out with my butterfly punch.  I added the 1/8" black/white tafetta ribbon for it's body and silver cord for the antennae.  This card is actually one of five that I made for one of the gift sets I referenced above.  (Stamp set used is Flight of the Butterfly by Stampin' Up).

I love the challenges at Splitcoaststampers as they help to get my creative juices flowing.  My friend, Joan, challenged us technique lovers to make a card using snow.  I went with a gray tone card with just the one splash of color for the tree in front.  In real life, it sparkles and has a soft glow to it.  I stamped the images in Going Gray and sponged Going Gray and Basic Gray for the sky.  I used Martha Stewart Tinsel Glitter for the snowy hills, and added red stickles for the ornaments on the green tree.  I also used icicle stickles for the roof top and some of the falling snow in the sky.  (Stamps used are The Moose is Loose Kittie Kit and Christmas Phrase Set by Rubbernecker).

My third card is one I made as a guest designer for the color challenge on Splitcoaststampers.  We were given the colors of Marina Mist, Pear Pizzaz, and Blushing Bride with a dessert option to make a Christmas card.  Well, I obviously forgot about the dessert option, but I suppose I could still use this for a non-traditional Christmas card.....maybe????   I had to substitute Blush Blossom for Blushing Bride. I did add just a hint of Pink Pirouette to my Blush Blossom watercoloring because Blushing Bride looks like it has more of a pink cast to it. I also don't have Pear Pizzaz so I used a mixture of Certainly Celery and Old Olive to get as close to Pear as I could. I used Glossy Accents on the Embrace bloom after I was done watercoloring.

You may have noticed that these cards are all pretty clean and flat.  I'm trying to be better about not adding too much bulk to my cards because they are easier (and less expensive) to mail that way.  (Stamp set is used an oldie, but goodie called Embrace Life by Stampin' Up).

That's it for now as I need to get some beauty sleep.  Thanks for visiting and your comments.  I really do appreciate them!

Heartfelt

Vicki (vdutchr on Splitcoaststampers) gave us a beautiful color combo for this week's color challenge: Tempting Turquoise, Cajun Craze, and Kraft. Here's my design using these colors.

I stamped the image onto kraft cardstock three times, watercolored and cut each one out, and popped them up with dimensionals.  Here's a close-up of the dimension.

I like how watercoloring directly on the kraft toned down the brightness of the turquoise, which I thought blended better with the more earthy colors of the kraft and rust.  I added a few white dots with a Signo gel pen on the flower center.

Back in the Saddle Again

Howdy, Pahdners!  I hope everyone is having a whoopin' good time this fine Tuesday.   Speaking of Tuesday, it's time for the weekly Teapot Tuesday and Color challenges over at Splitcoaststampers (SCS)!  If you've never participated in the weekly challenges on SCS, it's a wonderful way to get the creative juices flowing.  And, it's so much fun seeing what everyone comes up with!

The Color challenge this week is to use Chocolate Chip, Old Olive and Vanilla.  The dessert option is to have one rounded corner in your design.  The Teapot Tuesday challenge is to use a horse in your design and include a flower somewhere. 

I chose to use this beautiful horse image designed by Theresa Momber from her Out West set (available at Gina K Designs).  I colored my horse with Copic markers (E19, E29, E35, E37, E49, E50, and E57).  I cut out the image and popped it up on a Very Vanilla oval panel.  For the flowers, I used my Martha Stewart hydrangea punch in Old Olive and Stampin' Up's double circle punch for the Ruby Red centers and glued those around the oval panel.  I cut out a larger Scalloped Oval (Nestability) panel in Very Vanilla and attached my image panel to that with pop-up dots for dimension.

The chocolate background was embossed with a paisley embossing folder.  The polkadotted Old Olive designer paper is from Stampin' up and was cut using the Topnote die.

Here's somewhat of a close up so you can see the horse and the dimension a little better.

For those of you who may not be aware, Cindy (aka Mothermark also known lovingly as da Mudder)always has a destination for the Teapot Tuesday cards.  (participating is stricly voluntary).  Our cards this week will be going to the daughter of a fellow Teapotter (Cathy, aka Mutnik).  Her daughter, Jessica, was thrown from her horse when he lost his footing on the trail they were on.  Jessica's fall fractured her skull in the back of her head, fractured her right temple and has two fractures on each side of her spine by her pelvis.  She has a long road to recovery, and her mother knows it would bring a smile to her daughter's face if she were to receive some happy mail that included horse images.

Warm Fuzzy Grass for Ralph

Meet Ralph.  Ralph is an old geezer available from Rubbernecker in their Old Characters line (SKU #78-05).  I had a lot of fun coloring Ralph's outlandish outfit with a watercolor brush and reinkers (Riding Hood Red, Elegant Eggplant, Soft Suede), and his hair, skin, and golf clubs with Copic markers.  I paper pieced his golf bag.

Lydia's Free for All challenge on SCS today is to make a warm, fuzzy card by using a warm color and something that resembles fuzzy in our design. 

Summer makes me think of walking barefoot in the fuzzy wuzzy green grass, and green, therefore, is a warm color to me, as is red. I started coloring this image on Tuesday for Betty's color challenge, but I never got back to it, so I'm combining Betty's and Lydia's challenges. Betty's colors were Elegant Eggplant, Riding Hood Red, and Soft Suede.

I got the idea to color my white Fun Flock with Garden Green (SU) and Lettuce (Adirondack) reinkers for the grass around Ralph's feet. At first, the Fun Flock and reinkers resisted blending with one another as the reinkers just balled up and rolled off the Fun Flock. However, I used a popsicle stick to stir up the ink and Fun Flock together and they finally got the message that I wasn't giving up! The two different colors of ink helped to provide shading of the grass.

My camera is giving me fits with not focusing properly when I try to take close-up shots; otherwise I would've provided a close up of how cool the grass looks.

I'm leaving off a sentiment for now until I decide for which occasion I want to use this crd.

Love for Lindsay

I made this quilt-like card for several challenges. Betty and Cindy are combining the Color and Teapot Tuesday challenges today.  Mothermark's Teapot Tuesday challenge can be seen here for the full story. Betty's color challenge is to use Bashful Blue, Certainly Celery, and Melon Mambo (Pink Passion), and Jen's CAS challenge from yesterday to layer two different shapes (mine are octagons and hearts). Most importantly, I made this card for Lindsay. You can read about Lindsay's story in the Love for Lindsay thread on Splitcoast.

I stamped, cut, and layered three of the hearts. I don't have Pink Passion dp, so I used some of my background stamps for those two panels. I also used my ScorPal to score the background for a quilt-like effect.

Thanks for looking and won't you consider playing today and sending Lindsay some much needed love and encouragement?

Abner the Abominable!!!

Alright, all you Olympians....have you seen today's SCS color challenge? Betty and Leisa have come up with a fabulous Olympic theme; you can even do up to FIVE colors for those of you who are over achievers! Giggle.

I'm no Olympian when it comes to doing that many colors, nor can I be accused of being an over achiever, so I went for the silver medal by using the Brilliant Blue and Brocade Blue colors from the Olympic colors---with a hint of silver matting---for my Olympic trees (trees courtesy of Rubbernecker in the Kittie Kits Cause a Scene set). After I stamped them, I covered them in clear embossing powder to bring out the richness in their color.

Now, there's another side to this story, see. Da Muddermark (aka Mothermark) has her Teapot Tuesday challenge up, too, you see and it seems Abner, the Abominable Snowman is desperately in need of a splash of color in his life. He is sick of white, white, white. You can get the full story on da Mudder's blog.

Now, da Mudder didn't want us to overwhelm Abner with too much color nor were we to put snowflakes, divinity, or vanilla milkshakes on our card, but Bertie convinced me that a few snowflakes were needed in the background for my Olympic theme. You see, the tea partiers are getting free snowboarding lessons today, so I definitely want us to have some snow to board on! Yeah! Hang ten, dude....oh, wait, that's surfer talk.

Okay, so if you're still with me in this story, the other reason that Bertie wanted me to add the snowflakes is cuz she was traumatized as a child when she first watched Rudolph the Rednosed Reindeer and that skeery ol' Abominable Snowman came on the television screen. Bertie figures he needs some niceness knocked into that thick, furry skull of his. When ol' Abner sees these snowflakes while learning to do the Loopy de Loop in his snowboarding lessons, she says he's sure to get real mad, flub up on his Loopy de Loop technique, and fly right into these blue Olympian trees. She says it serves him right for skeering all the little kiddies in the world with his meanness. But, more importantly, mebbe it'll knock some niceness into him
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So anyway, why not come along and join all the colorers and tea partiers in these challenges today? I'm sure there'll be about 42,000 of us having a great deal of fun!

Be there or be square!

StampTV Color Challenge #28

I've recently had the honor of serving on the StampTV August Center Stage Spotlight Design Team and have enjoyed working and chatting with some of the other CSS DTs. This past week, Vicki hosted the color challenge on StampTV to use pink, gray, black, and white. I just couldn't resist these pretty colors and had to play!



The pink butterflies were stamped with Pink Pirouette with a Basic Gray outline. The small polkadotted butterflies were stamped in black. I then stamped one butterfly onto Pink Pirouette cardstock and punched it out with the corresponding SU butterfly punch to add it to the upper right corner and lift one of the wings for dimension. I used Pink Pirouette designer paper for the background and punched that with one of my favorite border punches: the zig zag punch.

I hope you're having a great day today and get to spend time doing the things you love to do....whatever that may be. And always remember to tell the ones you love how much you appreciate and love them! I sure appreciate all of you who stop by my blog and leave such wonderful, uplifting comments!

Stampin' hugs,