Saturday 31 March 2012

Inspiration Challenge 330

Another amazing site for our inspiration challenge: Harabu House - an eclectic mix of home accents and decor and kids' stuff, and all sorts of really pretty stuff that you don't know you need until you see it, know what I mean? LOL! But what a feast for the eyes! I chose three:


This reminded me of this week's CASE study challenge - another opportunity for some nested die cuts - and who doesn't love pink and purple together (especially a little girl who still has a thank you card or two to write)?




And of course, I found some horse inspiration (from reindeer, I think):

Even from the back, this little guy reminds me of my little friend from church. He's 3 and determined and is the only boy who plays a tambourine in the group of timbrellists that I lead (more on that another day!)



But I've saved what I think is the best for last. I used a new alphabet from My Stamp Box and some copper embossing powder to transform this:


into this:



Incorrect word splitting aside, I think it's kind of cool (although if I had added another * in between happy and birthday, I could have had four rows of four to make a square! Oh, the things we think of AFTER!)

Did you hear that Canada is discontinuing the penny (the copper disks made me think of this). Now I live in a country that MAKES NO CENTS! Ha! Ha! (sorry!)

Supplies:
Thank you
Stamps: Stamps of Life
Paper: Melon Mambo, Elegant Eggplant, Gina K Pure Luxury
Ink: Versafine Onyx
Accessories: Various dies, small flower punch and stickles


Horses:
Stamps: Papertrey Ink (lines), ? horses
Paper: Whisper White, Gina K Pure Luxury
Ink: Soft Suede, Marina Mist


Happy Birthday:
Stamps: My Stamp Box
Paper: Basic Black, Pumpkin Pie
Ink: Versamark
Accessories: Copper embossing powder (Old Island Stamping Company), circle punch

CASE Study Challenge 84 - Good bye Laura!

This week's challenge is the final one using Laura Bassen as a muse. I'm sad that the month is over - I've had so much fun casing Laura's work, but I have to admit that I'm also excited to see who's next!

Here's Laura's fabulous card:

Love those colours and the nested die cuts. I still may make one more closely related to this (I don't think I have the exact dies, but I'm sure I could come up with something!)

Here's mine - another birthday card for a friend with an April birthday:




On another note, the choir sang very, very well at the festival (thank you for your good wishes) and was (in my humble opinion) rather harshly adjudicated. Performing in a festival is one of those experiences that is so important when you're growing up and you take it completely for granted, until you're one of the adults who realizes all the work that goes into providing these very, very valuable opportunities! 

After school, I took my children to see "Adam and Jamie - Behind the Myths" last night. It's a live stage show based on Mtyhbusters, which is one of the few TV shows our family agrees on (Iron Chef being the other one!). I wasn't sure how it would translate from TV to stage (less opportunity for C-4 explosive), but it was FUN! Kate waited patiently (arm PUMPING into the air) to ask Adam the only question he couldn't immediately answer ("How many myths have you guys tested?") and was very pleased to have stumped him! We saw all sorts of cool gadgets and there was a lot of audience participation - a perfect show for my 9 and 13 year olds.

Supplies:
Stamps: Papertrey Ink
Paper: Real Red, Whisper White, Pretty in Pink, Pink Passion, Basic Black, Going Gray
Ink: Versafine Onyx
Accessories: flower punches, black Pearl Pen

Friday 30 March 2012

Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge # 90

This week's Sketch Challenge at Waltzingmouse:



And a really cool card by atsamom at Splitcoaststampers:



Isn't that a great card for a teen boy?

When I play along with the Waltzingmouse challenge, I'm somewhat limited by my very few Waltzingmouse stamps. A problem easily remedied earlier this week, when I placed an order! But while I wait for my new goodies to arrive, I really only have Free Spirit and some backgrounds to play with.

I combined the two inspirations to come up with this:


Love those stripes on the black. This could be a great card for someone who just passed their driving test, or just as useful for a teen boy's birthday. Or for somebody who's Jamaican. (aren't these the colours of the Jamaican flag?) LOL!

Now I'm off to my daughter's school where I play piano for the choir - we're going to the festival today to perform our two songs that we've worked on for so long - wish us luck!

Supplies:
Stamps: Waltzingmouse Free Spirit (car and sentiment), probably Papertrey (solid circle)
Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, Real Red, Summer Sun, Lucky Limeade
Ink: Versafine Onyx, Real Red, Summer Sun, Lucky Limeade

Thursday 29 March 2012

Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge

Paper Smooches is a new stamp company featuring stamps by Kim Hughes. She used to sell her stamps through another company, and most of my Kim Hughes stamps pre-date Paper Smooches, but I hope they'll let me play anyway. Kim's images are fun and quirky and she has a great hand-written style for her sentiments.

Here's the 'spark':


Cute little bunnies with brightly coloured ears. Just calls for an Easter card, doesn't it?


I cut a green panel and then cut out the PTI circle border from the centre and spread the two edges to create the white space for the eggs. The black in the bows was supposed represent the black eyes, but maybe too much? I think the little black dots around the scallops probably would have been enough.

So, as usual, I went back and made another one. I wanted to have more dimension and texture so I went way out of my comfort zone (how many layers are here?!):



These eggs are from the same set as the big easter egg used on the previous card, but I had to stamp the spots so that I could add the bright colours. Not sure how I feel about this one - not a lot of white space and it's HEAVY, but I do think the polka-dot eggs are very cheerful!


Supplies:
Hoppy Easter
Stamps: Kim Hughes (Cornish Heritage Farms)
Paper: Ripe Avocado, Gina K Pure Luxury 120 lb
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Versafine Onyx
Accessories: Copic Markers, stickles


Grass
Stamps: Kim Hughes (Cornish Heritage Farms) small outline circle
Paper: Lucky Limeade, Garden Green, Gina K Pure Luxury 120 lb
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Copic Markers, Martha Stewart grass border punch

Wednesday 28 March 2012

Moxie Fab Tuesday Trigger - Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy

I started walking again on Tuesday. It was cold, but sunny and I went FAR - I felt so good and could feel my pre-winter strength returning to me. Honestly, how many things can make you feel as physically, spiritually and morally good  as a great workout with great tunes on a great day?

I've been following Fit Food Junkie - a blog about fitness. Now, she seems to have it all together and she's always got way more advice than I could follow, but I try to take what I can and do what I can to improve my health, strength and fitness, because as I get older, it's becoming more and more important to me (and harder and harder to maintain!)

Here endeth the lecture! LOL!

But now you know why I was feeling so good when I saw this week's Tuesday Trigger:



OK, there is just too much going on in that for me. So I chose one element - the one that caught my eye first.



Once I accepted that I just couldn't get all the elements in, this card came together very quickly. I started with a tangerine (looking very coral in this photo) layer and cut it into 3. I then ran it through my cuttlebug with one of the new PTI flower dies. Added in the sponged circles and the sentiment and voila!

I'm really happy with this cheerful card and I have a number of friends' birthdays coming up. Who's going to be the lucky winner?

Supplies:
Stamps: Paper Smooches
Paper: Tangerine Tango, Daffodil Delight, Melon Mambo, Gina K Pure Luxury
Ink: Versafine Onyx Black, Daffodil Delight, Melon Mambo
Accessories: PTI Flower dies, circle punch

Tuesday 27 March 2012

Retrosketch #4

As you know, I play along with a lot of challenges. But different challenges pose different, well, challenges for me and it seems to have to do with the amount of direction or limitation in the original challenge.

Sometimes challenges, including colour challenges  - just use these 3 (or whatever) colours..... feel too ethereal. I don't even know where to start.

Many challenges, including inspiration and featured stamper challenges - are just right. Make a card that feels like another card (or another piece of inspiration). You get guidance - colours, layout, tone etc but you're still free to do what you like. 

And then some feel somewhat restrictive - sketch challenges are like that for me sometimes. I always want to try to do something slightly different, but not so far off that I disqualify myself from the challenge.

But when I saw this week's Retrosketch challenge, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. 



I don't know if you've noticed, but there are an awful lot of black cards out there these days. I think that there have been some challenges that asked for black and pastel and I know that the Runway challenge inspiration was a black and floral dress.  So I was also inspired to try something with a lot of black. I know it's not terribly seasonal, but black is often elegant and cool and I want to be elegant and cool, too!

Here's my card (two photos so you can see how I took a different spin on the sketch)



I think this would be fun for a teenage girl!

Supplies:
Stamps: My Sentiments Exactly
Paper: Basic Black, Gina K Pure Luxury White, Sour Apple Bazzill (LOVE the acid green!)
Ink: Versafine Onyx
Accessories: Circle Nestabilities, My Favourite Things Die-Namics Dizzy Doilies Duo (smaller die)

Monday 26 March 2012

CASE Study 83, FTL183, FS 268 - ME!

How exciting to find that today's Featured Stamper is - ME! Actually it's not me per se, but it's me for me. And you for you. Each stamper should choose a card from their own gallery and case it. (trust me, if I'm ever the featured stamper, you'll hear me squealing from wherever you are!)

I chose this card from my gallery:


I decided to make more than one and participate in a couple of other challenges at the same time.

For CASE Study Challenge 83, here's Laura's card that we were to use for inspiration:

Here's my remake:



And for FTL 183:

Another remake:


I'm always amazed at how you can take the same elements and make so many different cards!

Supplies:


Stamps: Stampendous, Waltzingmouse
Paper: Whisper White, Tempting Turquoise, Basic Black
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black/Versafine Onyx
Accessories: Copic Markers, Stickles, Doodlebug bling

Sunday 25 March 2012

Stained Glass

On my own, today. No challenges, just an idea that has been in my head ever since I bought this background stamp from Paper Smooches. And then when I found this photo of a stained glass door made of tiny panels of colours on Pinterest:



I knew exactly what I was going to do!


I went with silver instead of black for the frame (I HATE embossing with black embossing powder - it's almost impossible to do it without little black flecks showing up everywhere!). And when I coloured the back of the vellum with copics, I chose just 5 spingtime colours rather than the whole spectrum. I think it's quite pretty, but I felt like it just wasn't as cool as the inspiration, so I went back and braved the black embossing powder:


If you click, you'll see the little black flecks where there shouldn't be embossing powder, PLUS you'll see little white flecks in the black, where some kind of mixing has gone on, but overall, better than I had anticipated (just don't ask me how many sheets of vellum I went through.....)


Supplies:
Stamps: Paper Smooches
Paper: Vellum, Whisper White, Silver Mirror Card, Basic Black
Ink: Versamark
Accessories: Silver embossing powder, Black embossing powder copic markers

Saturday 24 March 2012

Liebster Award

Last week, Darnell nominated my blog for a Liebster Award.




This award is given to up-and-coming bloggers who inspire you and have less than 200 followers. The Liebster award takes its name from the German word meaning "Beloved, Dearest or Favourite".

Not sure if I'm supposed to accept it a second time (the first time mentioned here), but it's so nice that people are out there 'spreading the liebster' and it's looking like it might be awhile before I hit 200 followers (although I've practically doubled my followers in the past week, did  you notice? Thank you, loyal followers!!)

Once nominated, you then:

Acknowlege the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them
Give the award to 5 other bloggers, who have less than 200 followers and let them know through a comment on their blog
Post the award on your blog

So here are my nominations:

Jean at My Stamping and Beading Therapy

Jonia at Stampin For Me

Skye at .......blue sky

Lynn at Lynn's Crafty Corner

Lyndal at Dreams and Other Realities

Please take a minute to visit these ladies and leave a comment for them - we bloggers LOVE comments!

IC 329 - Graham and Green

Graham and Green is a UK website that carries designer furniture and home accessories. And it's the source of inspiration for this week's Splitcoaststampers Inspiration Challenge.

For those of you who know how I love cashmere and scarves (and especially cashmere scarves!), my first inspiration will come as no surprise:


Look at those colours! I bet they're so soft and cozy (not that we needed cozy this week, but I'm hoping there's still a few scarf-wearing days left!)

I used the colours, the silver and the movement of the scarves to come up with my Cashmere Birthday card:


Papertrey's Soft Stone and Smokey Shadow are the perfect bookends to the swaying colours.



And of course, I had to find a horse inspiration:



Here's my card:


Supplies:
Cashmere Birthday:
Stamps: Papertrey
Paper: Smokey Shadow, Pink Passion, Sahara Sand, Poppy Parade, So Saffron, Lucky Limeade, Soft Stone
Ink: Versamark
Accessories: Creative Memories wavy cutter, Silver Embossing powder


Colourblock Horses:
Stamps: Stampin' Up (Bareback)
Paper: Whisper White, Lucky Limade
Ink: Early Espresso, Pacific Point, Poppy Parade

Friday 23 March 2012

RIC #8 - McQ by Alexander McQueen

Here's the latest Runway Inpsired Challenge inspiration:


I saw her skirt as an umbrella and used my cricut to create this shower card:


The handle is glued directly to the paper, while the umbrella is popped up on dimensionals. I think that maybe from a purely aesthetic point of view, the umbrella handle should be silver so it's not so heavy looking, but as it is, I think it ties in nicely with the elbow-length gloves. (BTW - I learned a lot about glovemaking by reading American Pastoral by Philip Roth for my bookclub last month - another fascinating art that is probably lost to our constant demand for lower and lower prices, but that's a whole other discussion for another day!). What are you reading lately? 


Supplies:
Paper: Various DP, Basic Black, Whisper White, Soft Sky
Accessories: Cricut (Create a Critter Cartridge), Stampin' Up 3 flower punch, Pearl Pen

Thursday 22 March 2012

OLW 84 - Pinks and Orange

This week's OLW Challenge is to make a card with pinks (as many shades as you want) and orange (only one shade). I've been watching Susan's blog to see the other entries, and figured I'd better get in there FAST - looks like A LOT of people are playing this one and coming up with really, really great cards - I didn't want to be last to this party!

I was inspired by a logo I saw recently to make this card:


I stamped "celebrate" and then punched a 7/8" circle and placed it over the "ce" to form a mask. I then stamped all the little petals (actually now they look a little like fingernails!) first in a lighter shade with the bigger petal and then a darker shade on the smaller petal right on top. I like how the circle mask mimics the perfect circles of the font (LOVE this modern font!).

I'm so happy with this card I just had to post again today to join in on the fun!

Supplies:
Stamps: Stampin' Up (Celebrate), ? clear petal shapes
Paper: Gina K Pure Luxury
Ink: Regal Rose, Melon Mambo, Pumpkin Pie
Accessories: circle punch for mask

Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenge #89

I found a new challenge! Waltzingmouse hosts a sketch challenge and this week's looked pretty straightforward to me:


In fact, I think that would be a pretty nice card on its own. But I wasn't going to be the one who submitted the sketch as my card (although I may make it into a card anyway!)

One of my favourite Waltzingmouse sets is Free Spirit - it has all these masculine images (including tattoos!) and guy words in a masculine font - it's a real life saver when you're making cards for teenage boys! 

Here's the card I made for one of my son's friends:



Once again, I used a Kaleidecolor pad to get the blended  variation in the tattoos/swirls. I added just enough yellow stickles to make it look like it's shimmering with heat (you can click on the photo to enlarge it if you can't see the stickles).

Last year, I also used these tattoo images to make my nephew's birthday card. He is fascinated by Zippo lighters, and our gift to him was a couple of books about the lighters themselves and the history of the Zippo company. I knew his card had to be special:




Supplies:
Dude:
Stamps: Waltzingmouse
Paper:Whisper White, Basic Black
Ink: Versafine Onyx, Kaleidecolor (Desert Heat)
Accessories: Yellow Stickles

Lighter:
Stamps: Waltzingmouse, Papertrey, HA alphabet
Paper: Gina K Pure Luxury, Brushed Silver
Ink: Black, Yellow, Orange, Grey, Versamark
Accessories: Silver embossing powder

Wednesday 21 March 2012

FTL 182

Here's this week's layout:


I had some cool ideas, but none that would work with the sentiment OVER the two elements. So I just let this one hang out on my desk for a while. Over the weekend, I discovered my new favourite colour of card stock - Papertrey's Soft Stone. It's so soft and pretty and smooth - next time I feel I can afford their shipping rates, I'll order a full package of it!

I had also saved the photo of this card by Stampercamper at Splitcoaststampers as inspiration a little while ago:


I love how the sponging in the centre of the flowers adds so much dimension.

Here's my card for FTL 182:



Pretty and soft - perfect for a spring birthday!

Supplies:
Stamps: Flower Fest,  Pony Party
Paper: Soft Stone, Gina K Pure Luxury 120 lb
Ink: Versamark, Regal Rose, Summer Sun, Cool Caribbean, Almost Amethyst
Accessories: White Embossing Powder, Word punch

Tuesday 20 March 2012

OLW 83 - A child's Birthday gifts

Poor Jennifer at stylesink - she's one of the hosts of the OLW challenge and last week her family was ill, so the challenge wasn't posted until the weekend. The inspiration for this week is the whole lot of items that her son gave her for her birthday - a hotwheels Mercedes, a blue block (her favourite colour), a hand made fan and lots of notes, with rainbows and lots of hearts on them.

This made me smile - I get presents like this all the time from my daughter - especially the notes. She seems to never get tired of writing "I love you mom" and I certainly never get tired of reading these little notes!

I chose to focus on the love notes and the rainbow elements and came up with this very simple, but, I think, effective card, which I will give to my daughter:



Enough said.

Edited to add: Apparently not enough said. I missed the part of the challenge that said the card should be a BIRTHDAY card. Well, I'm going to stand by this one - you can tell someone you love them on their birthday, right? LOL! Remember way back in school when the teachers kept telling you "Read the instructions!"? Yep, it's been that kind of day!

Supplies:
Stamps: Crayon Alpha Lower (Stampin' Up!)
Paper: Gina K Pure Luxury 120 lb
Ink: Cherry Cobbler, Perfect Plum, Pacific Point, Tempting Turquoise, Lucky Limeade, Marigold Morning, Only Orange, Poppy Parade

Monday 19 March 2012

FS267 - Pinkberry

 I've taken some Tylenol cold and while my cold symptoms (headache, stuffy nose, general aches and pains) have been alleviated, I'm feeling a little, well, loopy. Leave it to me to get 'high' on cold meds!

A good reason not to go anywhere, but stay home to play along with this week's Featured Stamper challenge. I chose four this week.

Here's the first:

When I saw this, it reminded me of another photo I had copied for inspiration:

Not that Diane's card reminded me of a shower curtain, but the gold in both photos spoke to me and I ended up with a very elegant birthday card:


I let the vellum layer overhang the white background to create two borders. In real life, this Egyptian Gold embossing really sparkles!


Second inspiration:

I love the long stemmed flowers and the colour combination. 

Here's my card (yes, I used that set AGAIN!)


My colours seemed a bit more muted, so I made it into a sympathy card. I learned from Susan at Simplicitybylateblossom that it's always good to have sympathy cards on hand because when you need one, you may not feel like making one!



Third inspiration is just my style:



I initially chose this one because I love the bright spring colours, and also because I have that embossing folder, but ended up not using it:


The tricky bit here was getting the stickles right into the holes in the flowers' centres!


Finally, one for the boys:



I knew just what to do - designer paper, my favourite new car and a cool sentiment:


Voila - a perfectly sleek card for the next boy turning 13! (or 33 for that matter!)

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:
Shower Curtain Birthday:
Stamps: Impress Rubber Stamps (sentiment), Papertrey Ink (various circles)
Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, Vellum Cardstock
Ink: Versamark
Accessories: Egyptian Gold Embossing Powder


With Sympathy
Stamps: Stampin' Up (Both Way Blossoms), Hero Arts (with Sympathy)
Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, Gina K Pure Luxury 120 lb
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Copic Markers, Waterall Stickles


Rows of Flowers Birthday
Stamps: Papertrey
Paper: Yoyo Yellow, Melon Mambo, Lucky Limeade, Basic Black, Gina K Pure Luxury 120 lb
Ink: Versafine Onyx
Accessories: EK Success Flower border punch, Stardust Stickles


Car Birthday
Stamps: Stampin Up (Need for Speed), Papertrey (5 lines), Printworks (Happy Birthday)
Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, Basic Grey DP
Ink: Versafine Onyx, Sahara Sand