Happy Little Stampers: Stencils

It's time for the September Happy Little Stampers STENCIL challenge! My generous friend Barbara recently sent me a pretty stencil she happened to have a duplicate of (happens to us all!), and I thought I'd show my appreciation by using it for a card: 

This is a full background stencil, but I decided to isolate two of the flower images on it for the opposite corners of my card panel. (By coincidence, my teammate Swapna used this same stencil, and you can see how it looks as a background on her card.) I adhered my panel to a neutral card base, and added the die cut sentiment and some clear Nuvo drops. Quick and easy! 

The design team's cards are a great showcase of the many ways stencils can be used, so I hope you'll visit and be inspired! 

Supplies: Neenah white, Papertrey Ink soft stone & scrap black cardstock, Hero Arts Large Lotus Pattern stencil, fired brick distress ink, Paper Smooches Thanks & Winnie & Walter Katharine Cutaways pierced rectangle dies, Nuvo clear drops

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The Sisterhood are Paper Piecing

We are ready for a brand new challenge at the Sisterhood of Snarky Stampers, and we're going old-school with P is for Paper Piecing! Of course, old-school made me think of apples, so here is my card: 

 

I have two or three stamps that are my go-tos for paper piecing, but I wanted to do something different. After looking through some of my stamps, I chose this cute little apple - partly because I knew I had this snarky apple-related sentiment. I stamped the apple on the white card base, and then of course on a whole bunch of different papers. I tried to find a patterned paper for the apple flesh, but nothing looked right until I stamped it on some cream coloured cardstock. I ended up stamping the core so many times, I was seeing all kinds of rude things in it! :D I did give up trying to paper piece the tiny seeds, and just coloured them with a Copic marker. I don't know it it's strictly *allowed*, but I decided to add a few backing layers to my paper-piecing, so it has some definition to add interest to the otherwise very clean and simple design. 

The Sisterhood has come up with all kinds of paper piecing brilliance, as has our current Queen of Snark and guest designer, Rachel! Grab your tiny scissors and join us! 

Supplies: Neenah white & natural white cardstock, My Mind's Eye Lost & Found patterned paper, Unity Mix Up of Cuteness & Ellen Hutson Everyday Punnies stamps, MFT extreme black ink, Copic marker

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Inkspirational: Autumn Leaves

It's time for a Designer's Choice at Inkspirational - my choice! And I picked Autumn Leaves... what was I thinking?!? Obviously when I chose it, I _wasn't_ thinking about how tenaciously I try to hang on to summer once September appears. Luckily, a lot of people (not me) embrace the cooler weather and changing colours of fall, so I hope this proves to be a popular theme! Here's my autumn leaves card: 

I do love this intricate maple leaf die, and come to think of it, I always use it in fall colours! I already had one cut out of some cream coloured, speckled cardstock, so chose to start with that. I blended some deep red ink in from the edges, leaving the centre quite pale. I swiped the ink directly onto the border die cut. For my backing panel, I used the same ink with a maple leaf stencil. The sentiment came in a Unity grab bag once, just in case you were wondering how I came to own it. :D 

Fan of autumn or not, I think you will love the variety of beautiful inspiration from my Ink teammates! Be sure to head over to the challenge blog. I hope you will join us! 

Supplies: Neenah natural white & desert storm & Stampin Up naturals ivory cardstock, Unity sentiment stamp, Versamark & fired brick distress ink, Simon Says Stamp antique gold embossing powder, PoppyStamps Maple Leaf die, ARTplorations Autumn Falling stencil

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For the Birds at Scrap 'n Stamp

Happy September Blog Hop! This month, the Scrap 'n Stamp design team are ruffling their creative tail feathers with a FOR THE BIRDS theme! I managed to find a few birds to put on my card: 

I'm using the fun Concord & 9th Birdie Talk turnabout stamp set and coordinating dies. Confession time though: I have yet to master this particular turnabout stamp. Luckily, the design itself is funky enough that I can get away with things being slightly off... that's what I tell myself, at least! :D It did help me come to the design decision to add a vellum panel over it - of course, it's really to make sure the big die cut bird doesn't fade into the background. ;) The bird, branch and speech bubble are cut from various colours of cardstock scraps. I picked one of the set's sentiments to white emboss on the speech bubble. It was easy to adhere the vellum onto the card base - I just added my adhesive under the bird, branch and bubble! 

As we do every month, we are offering a $50 gift certificate to one lucky blog hop commenter! Here's the master list: 

Tara

Susan

Kia

Chala

Deborah

Lindsey ---> you are here!

Jessica ---> next and final stop!

And we have a sale to go with our hop! 

Have a great weekend!

Supplies: Neenah white & scrap coloured cardstock, vellum, Concord & 9th Birdie Talk stamps & dies, Versamark & Memento cantaloupe, new sprout, teal zeal & nautical blue ink, Wow white embossing powder, MFT stitched rounded rectangle die

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Happy Little Stampers: CAS

A new month means a new round of challenges at Happy Little Stampers, and today it is time for a new CAS challenge! Our theme this month is Winged Things. I took the obvious route and put a bird on it: 

It is possible I'm pushing the clean and simple envelope by using a gelli plate print as my background panel - but I'm pretty sure the "clean" refers to a clean design, not how messy the production might have been ;). And if you have any experience with making these, it can be a quick and simple process. This background was simply three inks swiped on the plate, brayered to smooth and blend them, and then printed onto the cardstock. To make sure the rest of my card was CAS, I die cut the white bird silhouette and stamped and embossed the sentiment. A trio of Nuvo drops finished everything off. 

You will see a variety of winged things on the HLS challenge blog! I hope we have inspired you to join us. 

Supplies: Neenah white cardstock, Altenew Inky Bouquet stamp, Versafine onyx black & shaded lilac, tumbled glass & spun sugar distress ink, Wow clear gloss embossing powder, CUTplorations perched bird & MFT diagonal stitched rectangle dies, Nuvo drops

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Seize the Birthday: Pastels

Here we are with the first Seize the Birthday challenge for September! JoAnn has picked our new optional *topping*, and it is Use PASTEL Colours Only. Wow, who knew that one simple word could cause such an immediate brain freeze? :D Eventually I created this card: 

Clean and simple and very pastel! I started with my card base, masking off most of it with a torn paper mask. I blended three pastel shades of distress ink along the left side. I then used the same inks to stamp a music background over top. I angled the stamp on purpose - way better than trying to stamp a background cling stamp straight and being just a tiny bit off. ;) I die cut my flowers and sentiment banner from white cardstock, using the same pink ink to colour the sentiment border and stamp the sentiment. 

Jenny returns as our surprise party guest, and she and the design team have worked wonders with pastel colours! With or without the the topping, I hope you'll join us with your own birthday card creation. 

Supplies: Neenah white cardstock, Local King Rubber Stamp Notes & Clearly Besotted Sweet Little Sentiments stamps, Versamark & spun sugar, milled lavender & tumbled glass distress ink, Wow clear gloss embossing powder, Simon Says Stamp Fresh Daisies & Paper Smooches Bannerific dies

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