At the Beach

Happy Saturday! I hope it's beach weather where you are! Edna has her bathing costume on and she and the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers are challenging you with B IS FOR BEACH. I may soon have my licence to snark revoked, as there is no snark here today, just beachy thoughts: 

Sun, sand and sea. I could use a little of that right now, after all the rain we've had in my corner of the world. I decided to make that sentiment the centrepiece of my card by stamping it onto a large tag shape. The three seashells are stamped in the same colour ink and fussy cut for accents. Luckily I found patterned paper with a matching blue for my background, then chose some cord that would pick up on the red in it. 
For more beachy inspiration, be sure to visit the Snarky Stampers blog, as well as that of our guest designer, Margo. Then we hope you'll grab your sunscreen and crafty supplies and join us! 

Supplies: Stampin' Up naturals ivory cardstock, Authentique Anchored patterned paper, Unity/Iron Orchid Designs Beach Cottage Collection stamps, Versamark & Altenew sapphire inks, Wow clear matte dull embossing powder, EK Success 1" circle punch, scrap cord, pop-dot tape

Tag You're It Reminder

We're partway through the latest challenge at Tag You're It, where *gasp* I am the featured artist with this tag: 

Even as I was making this tag, I was thinking the colours would lend themselves to Christmas. So to encourage EVERYONE to play along, I made that thought into reality! 

These poinsettias are from the first layering set I ever bought, and one of my easiest sets to use. Probably because the veining in the flowers and leaves don't have to be perfect, which is often above my pay grade. 😉 Just the centre of the larger poinsettia is popped up for some dimension. For the background, I again sponged a rectangular panel with light blue distress ink, but this time sparkled it up with some perfect pearls powder, in honour of the festive theme. To pick up on the gold embossing, I cut the sentiment and mat from gold glitter paper. Two ribbons again to finish the tag. 
The sunlight today almost allowed me to catch the shimmer of the blue panel... 

As this is my VERY FIRST Christmas anything of 2017, I'm going to enter it in the May Happy Little Stampers Christmas challenge, where anything goes and the masking is optional. 

Supplies: white & American Crafts gold glitter cardstock, WPlus9 Pretty Poinsettias stamps & dies, Versamark, Altenew crimson & velvet, Memento bamboo leaves & cottage ivy & tumbled glass distress inks, gold glitter embossing powder, white confetti Perfect Pearls, Hero Arts merry die, scrap ribbon & elastic cord

Remember to Smile!

It's the middle of the month, so the Naughty or Nice Troublemakers want to remind you of our current challenge, Share a Smile! I took the theme very literally this time. 

I decided to use this month's sketch from Stamplorations. 

And it only took me four tries to get a card I liked! 

My first three attempts used a stencil and distress inks for the vertical strip. First try: my colours were too reminiscent of Halloween, so that's in the future use pile. The second panel: better colours, but I brain-gapped and used the "hello" sentiment instead of "smile". Another future use panel. Third attempt: different colours, also good. Stamped and embossed the correct sentiment this time. Stamped and embossed three flowers, popped them up in the appropriate places. Decided the next morning... ugh. Into recycling it went. And so we come to the fourth and final version. Stamped and embossed "smile" in sparkly embossing powder. Masked off the three spots where I wanted my smiley faces. Stamped "smile" several more times in pale grey. (My MISTI was invaluable for getting these right.) Stamped the three happy faces and again broke out the sparkle embossing powder. Popped the panel up on a black card base and, TA DA, a cheery card. 
You still have two days to share a smile with us! 

Supplies: white & black cardstock, STAMPlorations Bold Sentiments & Simon Says Stamp Color & Sunshine stamps, Versafine onyx black, Versacolor sky grey, Memento Luxe lilac posies, love letter & Danube blue inks, Hero Arts clear sparkle embossing powder, fun foam

Hatching, Matching, and Dispatching

Happy Saturday! We're offering lots of options with the latest Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers challenge, HATCHING, MATCHING, AND DISPATCHING!

In case this phrase is new to you, hatching=birth, matching=marriage, dispatching=death. I do believe it's British in origin, but is used in parts of Canada as well. I hadn't actually heard it until CBC had a tv series titled that a few years ago. Anyway... all this is to say we're looking for cards (etc.) for one of those events. Of course, the real challenge would be to combine all three. 😉

I needed a wedding card anyway, so that's the direction I went: 

No snark here AGAIN! My snarky mojo seems to be on vacation. (Although, when you think about it, fairy tales are full of trolls and ogres and child-eating witches...) This perfectly nice card uses a technique demonstrated by my friend Ardyth recently (the link will take you to the card and accompanying how-to video). Each layer of the flowers and leaves was inked then misted with water before stamping for a more watercoloured look. Extra added bonus: no need to feel every layer has to be stamped perfectly. This set doesn't have a solid base stamp for the flowers, so I simply flipped over one of the other layers to use. I filled in a few spaces with twigs and unknown small shapes inked in platinum, which is very close to the moonstone embossing of the sentiment. Both panels are popped up on a green card base. 
Have no fear, not all the sisters went snarkless for this latest challenge! We also have a talented return guest designer, and current Queen, Helen. For a chance at a snarky crown of your very own, come and join us! 

Supplies: Strathmore mixed media paper, Hero Arts layering cardstock, WPlus9 Pretty Little Peonies & Unity fairy tale stamps, Versamark, Altenew blush, crimson & velvet, Colorbox platinum & iced spruce and peeled paint distress inks, Stampendous moonstone embossing powder, MFT blueprints 24 & Sizzix circle dies, pop dot tape

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Gardening Muse

Today was finally a day to work outside, yay! And it was also a day to make a card for the current Muse challenge. This is the card by this week's muse, Tracey: 

I was inspired by the clean design, the cluster of images, and the overall layout. After a few left turns, here's my version: 

Initially, I was stuck on what set would give me an appropriate cluster of images. Then I thought of this garden set. I stamped the watering can, some gardening gloves, and a set of gardening tools. Next, I decided I wanted the seed packet design in the background with some flowers to ground the other images. Eventually the gloves just didn't fit. (I'd also be content without the watering can and tools, but that wouldn't really work with the inspiration, would it?) You could compliment me on the sponging of the patterned paper... but it came that way. 

Supplies: white & Neenah desert storm cardstock, Studio Calico Classic Calico v. 3 patterned paper, Papertrey Ink Garden Variety stamps & dies,Papertrey Ink fine linen, Stampin' Up real red & garden green & Memento rich cocoa inks, pop dot tape

Sketch and Colours

Making a card combining the My Favourite Things Sketch and Colour challenges worked so well a couple of weeks ago, I thought I'd try it again. 

It seems I've made a lot of floral cards in the past few days, so for a change of pace... I made a cat card. 😹

This all started when I got out my two distress oxide inks to experiment with again. So far, I haven't found the magic, but I was somewhat happy with this panel I made with a stencil and fossilized amber ink. I added my little cat watercoloured with spiced marmalade and shipped sapphire distress markers. It practically took an engineering degree for me to figure out the white panel between getting the circle just right and adding the stitching. 😜  I've interpreted both sketch and colours rather loosely, but I think that's allowed. 

Supplies: white, light blue & navy cardstock, Strathmore mixed media paper, MFT I Knead You stamps, Versafine onyx black, Versamark & fossilized amber distress oxide inks, Ranger clear & Wow white embossing powders, Distress markers, Dylusions It's Raining Cats stencil, MFT blueprints 24 dies, pop-dot tape

Featured Artist at Tag You're It!

 There's a brand new challenge up at Tag You're It... and I'm this month's featured tag artist! 

I wanted to offer a tag inspiration that could be interpreted a few different ways, and I hope this does the trick: 

I made this on a cool rainy day when all I wanted was something to remind me that spring will eventually be here. I started by lightly sponging tumbled glass distress ink on a white panel, then stamped the two tulips. As I'd hoped, the layers of inks covered the light blue, meaning there was no masking necessary, yay! I found some scrap red cardstock that coordinated with the blooms and used it to mat the tulip panel as well as to die cut the "hello" sentiment and a reinforcement. No die for the tag, I merely cut it to the size I wanted. The two ribbons finish it off. A little tulip close-up:

Thank you, Tracey, for the invitation to play along with the talented tag design team! I hope this inspires you to join this month's challenge! 

Supplies: white & red cardstock, Altenew Tulip stamps, tumbled glass distress, Altenew velvet, crimson & blush, Memento cottage ivy, bamboo leaves & new sprout inks, Winnie & Walter Katharine & The Big, the Bold & the Happy dies, May Arts ribbons

Fussy Cutting

(How could I resist?)

There's a new challenge at Shopping Our Stash, and it's all about going back to basics... using *gasp* scissors instead of those marvellous things called dies to cut out something! One way to accomplish this is to use something where dies wouldn't work anyway. That's what I did! 

When you use masks to put a few different images together, there's really no option other than to cut them out by hand if you want to be able to pop them up on a background. Also, I have yet to buy the dies for these tulips, but that's beside the point. Along with the tulip stamps that I bought last fall, stash items also include the ancient green patterned paper, the yellow cardstock that came from who knows where and the love sentiment, that I triple cut for dimension and added stickles for shine. And yes, "love" was NOT hand-cut, I hope that's allowed. As for the curved edge, I did use a die for the stitching, but it doesn't cut an edge! I had to fussy cut parallel to it. I added two scored lines on the left for balance. 

A close-up of my tulips in all their imperfect layering... 

These tulips are showing up here again tomorrow, in a post I'm kind of excited about... 😉

Supplies: white & yellow cardstock, Crate Paper Random patterned paper, Altenew Tulip stamps, Memento dandelion, cantaloupe, new sprout, bamboo leaves & cottage ivy inks, Paper Smooches stitched & Little B handwritten dies, SCISSORS, Studio G clear glitter glue, dimensionals

Share a Smile at Naughty or Nice

The double M — May and Monday. Luckily, there's a new Naughty or Nice challenge to distract me! 

We want to SHARE A SMILE... first, the design team making you smile (we hope), and then you making us smile with your creation! Here's my attempt to tickle your funny bone:

A slightly naughty birthday card, depending on just how far past the age of 29 the recipient is. I have used the current design from CAS(E) This Sketch for my layout. I felt like using a stencil, so I did for the base layer, before colouring my laughing kitty and embossing a sentiment. I think this little cat would take any possible sting out of the sentiment. 
I'm also adding this to the current Seize the Birthday anything goes link-up and the Simon Says Stamp Anything Goes Wednesday challenge.  
There's lots more to make you smile over on our challenge blog! You have until the 25th of the month to join us. 

Supplies: white cardstock, Paper Smooches Nine Lives stamp & die, Taylored Expressions Party Grumplings sentiment stamp, Versafine onyx black & tumbled glass, broken china, mermaid lagoon & dusty concord distress inks, ranger clear embossing powder, Spectrum Noir markers, Memory Box scraped paint stencil, MFT blueprints 24 dies, pop-dot tape