Monday 31 March 2014

Fun with Circle Scribbles

Here are some cards I made using another new Papertrey set, Circle Scribbles. My daughter told me the first one doesn't really feel like an Ardyth card, but I thought it was riotous and fun! I overlapped the circles using various colours of ink, added shadowed letters and a doodly-feeling Memory Box Happy.


The second one is much more soothing and elegant. Embossed in gold pearl, it has a slight shimmer. I love how the spindly Avery Elle sentiment has a similar feel to the scribbled circle.




Sunday 30 March 2014

Happy Mothering Sunday!


Today is Mothering Sunday, which is UK-speak for Mother's Day. I have a Scottish mother-in-law so each year I try to remember to figure out when Mothering Sunday is (it's like Easter - it shifts every year!).

In the UK, the tulips are probably already up - I'm pretty sure ours will be here in July or so at the rate we're getting through winter here in Toronto!

Very simple  little card using a Magnolia image and Verve Happy Phrases sentiment. Coloured in Copics in magenta, my mil's favourite colour. This card is 3.5x4.5 - it fits into a 3.5x5 envelope, but I like the proportions better!

Saturday 29 March 2014

Fun with Wet Paint

Oh my word! Has there ever been an easier set to use than Wet Paint by Papertrey? I was inspired by Lauren Anderson's take on this week's Muse (deadline is Monday, by the way) and kind of separated out a few of her ideas to come up with 3 cards.

My first card is masculine and uses Lauren's idea of repeating the stamp in different colours.


The next two use her idea of different colours, but I did it on one stamp. If you ink your stamp along the edge of a rectangular (like Stampin' Up) pad in one colour on the top two-thirds and then in an other colour on the bottom two-thirds, the overlap blends and you end up with something like these two cards.



 The scale and handwritten feel of these words is very trendy - Winnie and Walter have similar sets which also arrived at my house last week. I'm busy making cards (mostly thank you and birthday cards) for the silent auction at our church next Saturday, and having big sentiments that look so good and don't require a lot more on the card is just perfect for this kind of project!

Friday 28 March 2014

CFC130 - Good Egg


This is my second post for today. For my Festive Friday post, please scroll down.

Time for the next CAS-ual Fridays Challenge - Good Egg!



The challenge is to use at least one oval on your card. 

I was inspired by a quilt I found on Pinterest. I love the simple, graphic clean feel of this. I didn't have an oval die the size I wanted, so in the end, I used the centre of the 0 die from Papertrey! I finished it off with a grey sentiment from "Sands of Time".

Now it's your turn - the deadline is April 18 - hope to see you there!


FFC28 - The Light of the World


It's time for a new Festive Friday challenge! Here's the inspiration photo:


It seemed that the obvious element was a pine cone, but I don't have a pine cone stamp so I had to go with something else. I chose to focus on the candle in the jar. Christmas is about joy and peace, but it's also about light. Or The Light, and this Stamps of Life sentiment was perfect for this card.

I built a shaker with a dark brown (pinecone-coloured) frame and little golden beads to represent the jar, and kept it neutral and as uncluttered as possible.

Now it's your turn - the deadline is Wednesday, April 9 - hope to see you there!

Thursday 27 March 2014

Merry Monday 101


This card is for this week's Merry Monday colour challenge - red, white and grey:



I was inspired to make this poinsettia by Deborah's card  HERE. I used an Impress outline stamp, stamped and embossed with white embossing powder on vellum. I then used a Copic marker to colour the back  and then coated the petals with a very thin layer of stickles for some sparkle. The thick outlines made this very easy to fussy-cut. The Stickles made the vellum crinkle up a bit so the flower has some amazing dimension.


Tuesday 25 March 2014

Muse 60 - Happy Birthday!


I was so excited when Lyndal sent me her card for her week as Guest Muse.



I don't know that we've ever had such a dramatic, atmospheric Muse before. The rich colours broken up by the white trees just really spoke to me and I really can't wait to see where it's going to take all you Muse participants!

Here's where it took me. I glued strips of Night of Navy (yes, it looks black), Brilliant Blue (I'm down to my last few scraps of this old but retired favourite!), Tempting Turquoise, White and Summer Sun to a white card and then used this Papertrey Happy die.  I cut it out a couple more times in navy, so that I could pop it up. I finished the card with a gold-embossed PTI sentiment.

ETA - for Janelle - the glitter is just Stardust stickles carefully applied and 'smooshed' with my finger to take a bit of it off.

I hope you'll find time to play along with us! The deadline is Monday at 8:00 am eastern. Voting starts at that time and goes until Tuesday at 8:00am and results will be posted at noon on Tuesday.

CASology 88 - Lucky!


This week's CASology Cue Card is Lucky!



That's a lucky rabbit's foot, there, my friends! Do you remember when kids actually had rabbits' feet on key chains? That always creeped me out a bit, so for this card I left my lucky rabbit foot attached to the rabbit. If it's still too creepy for you, think of a lucky family getting a lovely little baby girl!

Remember my CAS advice from last week? About choosing one or two little items to add interest while keeping your card CAS? I chose to have a monochrome colour scheme with one pop of colour. I cut the Impression Obsession bunny 3 times in Regal Rose, to make him thick and stand out a bit.  I could have added a pom pom for the tail. I could have added a little black bead for his eye. I could have covered the bunny in Stickles for some sparkle (having a hard time not doing this actually!). I could have layered the white strip with Brown Sugar (same colour as the Stampin' Up sentiment). These were all things that I considered for this card. But in the end, I left it plain-jane and I do think it has some charm. And talk about an adaptable design! Make the bunny blue for a boy or brown if you don't know what 'kind' of baby is coming!

Now it's your turn - who wants to get lucky?! First, check out the inspiration that the other members of the DT have come up with:

Sunday 23 March 2014

CTS 69 - Happy Birthday, Maria!


Today is Maria's birthday and it's a special  one! I don't want to say it's a big one, because I'm getting closer to this milestone myself and it looks younger to me every day! :-)

Shirley is hosting a linky party so everyone who wants to can attend this party!

I used the sketch from this week's CAS(E) This Sketch challenge for this fun and graphic card.



I used PTI Raspberry Fizz cardstock, a Simon Says Stamp die and a Clearly Besotted sentiment.

Maria - I hope you have a fantastic birthday - I wish you all the very best for today and the year ahead!

Saturday 22 March 2014

Muse 59 - Thank You


Oh, I had fun with this week's Muse by Marion:



I focused on the repetition, the bold colours and the placement of the black sentiment. I used a technique that Jennifer McGuire showed us a while ago in this video, where you easily create so much dimension, just by blending two layers of ink. I still need a bit of practice getting the layers exactly on top of each other, but I love the rich results. I used an old Stampin' Up sentiment, stamped in Versafine and embossed in clear and cut it out and popped it up.

There's still time for you to play along - the deadline is Monday at 8:00 am Eastern. Voting starts at that time and continues until Tuesday morning at 8:00 am. Results will be posted at noon or when someone reminds me, like last week (sorry about that!)

Friday 21 March 2014

FFC27 - Green Christmas (Take 2)


A mid-challenge reminder for the current Festive Friday challenge:


I made this card at the same time as the one from last week - I had the die, silver foil paper and stamp out and I thought this was an interesting idea - I stamped the sentiment down the left side of the panel and then started the tricky bit. I cut the snowflake out of the stamped panel and again in silver foil, and then fit it all back together, fitting the white cut bits back into the 'holes' in the snowflake (I mixed two up - can you see where the stamping doesn't line up?)

Anyway, how are you doing keeping up with making your Christmas cards through the year? Don't forget that the deadline for this challenge is Wednesday March 26 - hope to see you there!

ETA (Dec 6/14) - this stamp was custom made for me by Minna So, who also designed my blog header. I found her on Etsy originally, but seem to have lost touch.

Thursday 20 March 2014

Big News!


By now, most of you know that one of my sisters is an equine surgeon. I often make cards for her to give to friends and clients. But now, she's making a big move - she and her husband are leaving Wisconsin and moving to Virginia! She's busy organizing, packing and saying good bye and I know that one of the hardest good byes will be to a certain 'redhead' named Harley and the people who are involved in helping her learn to ride him in various horse shows.

This Whippersnapper Designs image is perfect for this occasion (almost - I changed the horse's face a bit with some masking and a black pen) - I don't often colour this much, but I was happy to make 3 of these for my sister's friends (along with 20 other much more generic "May the Horse be with you" cards).


Wednesday 19 March 2014

The Card Concept Challenge 6 - Birthday Card


Time for Card Concept Challenge #6 - Create a Birthday Card!



I used the colours from the inspiration photo, but simplified them by turning all the different shapes into circles. Circles are fun and a staple of graphic style. They're great for birthday cards - you can use them as balloons, or even just on their own, as in this card, they feel bubbly and fun!

Our Rules
  1. Use the Challenge to create a card.
  2. Choose one of the design team "styles" to create your card. Click HERE for the different styles summary.
  3. Explain in your post which style you used.
  4. Link up your blog post here, not your whole blog.
  5. Comment on the card ahead of you and behind you in the linky. Everyone loves comments!

This challenge will end on Monday, March 31 at 3pm EDT.

Tuesday 18 March 2014

CASology 87 - Blush


This week's CASology Cue Card is Blush!



The real key to a CAS card is knowing when to stop. There are a million ways to take this simple monochrome card further - more layers, more colours, more shine, more bling, more pattern etc., etc. In the end I chose only one (maybe two?), by replacing the centre of the 'o' with a flower and adding a pearl. These little things plus the shimmer and texture of the blush pink Bazzill layer add plenty of interest, without moving away from the fundamentals of CAS (lots of breathing room, minimal embellishment, clean lines).

So next time you are setting out to make a CAS card (ie for this challenge!), start with a very basic idea, and then ask yourself what else can be done to it to make it fun, interesting and consistent with the message you're trying to get across. You can think up as many as you want, but then just choose one or two and leave the rest of your ideas for another CAS beauty!

I used a Memory Box alphabet, an old McGill flower punch and a Stampin' Up pearl.

Now it's your turn - show us how you do CAS! Remember the deadline is next MONDAY at 1 pm Eastern. But before you do, check out the rest of the DT blogs for more inspiration!







Happy Birthday Anita!


Today is NOT a very special day. FEBRUARY 18 was a very special day, but the 'owner' of that day kept it a secret from us and the day went by, unmarked by any blog hop or cards made or even any mention!

LIM 3rd Birthday, WPlus9 4th Birthday 1, OLS 2, SSSWIW 1

But we've tricked the trickster and Bev has organized a bunch of us to join in and wish our friend Anita (in France) a belated Happy Birthday! Darnell has posted a link-up so you can join in the fun too!

I cased one of Anita's cards, using a Papertrey coverplate, an Ink Essentials sentiment and a bit of bling!

Happy Belated Birthday, Anita! I hope you had a great day and that today will be another one!

Monday 17 March 2014

IC432 - Packaging of the World


I haven't found time to join in Splitcoast's Inspiration Challenge for a while, but Susan is the guest host this week, (and one of my pins inspired her to choose the website she chose) so I absolutely had to play along!

On the site (Packaging of the World)I found this wine bottle that inspired this dramatic Christmas card.

I love to look at packaging pin boards for design inspiration - they're full of cool ideas both beautiful and functional.  To represent the tree, I used a Simon Says Stamp snowflake die, filed with red bling. I also love the design on the outside of the packaging (the black 'circle' with the red 'cheers') and thought that would make a fun one-layer Christmas card, so I may go back and double dip on this inspiring gift!


Saturday 15 March 2014

Muse 58 - Happy Happy Birthday!


Phew - a last-minute Muse card for this week! We've had a lovely (except for the blizzard on Wednesday) March break, and Kate and I have been very busy. Most of this week's posts were scheduled and I spent a good chunk of Saturday catching up and commenting and finally creating my take on Therese's bicycle Muse:



I focused on the colour scheme and the placement of the sentiment and image. Once I finished stamping, I gave some thought to how to incorporate something to represent the vertical lines of the woodgrain. I found this embossing folder and partially embossed the panel. I think it provides some balance to all the 'action' on the left side.

There's one day left for you to play along - the deadline is Monday at 8:00 EDT and then you can vote until Tuesday at 8. The results will be posted on Tuesday at noon! Hope to see you there!

Happy Birthday To You


Here's a birthday card just for fun. We're having a silent auction at our church in a couple of weeks and I like to donate cards (we don't have people bid on them, they just pay for the ones they want), so I've been stocking up, even if they don't fit any challenges.

These bits were actually scraps I had on my desk from other cards (the silver dots are from yesterday's snowflake!), so I popped the Neat & Tangled words up so they would have some dimension, and used the snowflake-leftovers as confetti.

Friday 14 March 2014

FFC27 - Green Christmas


Time for a new Festive Friday challenge! Here's our inspiration photo:


I really struggled with this photo (sorry, Meredith!) - as pretty as it is, I found it so hard to make a Christmas card with NO RED!

I used an Old Island Stamp Company branch and a Minna May sentiment on the card base. I tried to get the dreamy, out-of-focus feeling of the photo by using a layer of vellum and then a silver foil Simon Says Stamp snowflake die. I doubled it up to give it some substance and texture and I only adhered it in the centre, leaving the 'arms' free to add more texture.

The deadline is Wednesday March 19. I can't wait to see what you come up with!

Thursday 13 March 2014

40X2


The backstory to these cards is here. This is the first card I made for Mrs W.  I started with this pretty MackIntosh-esque image and added the Papertrey sentiment and numbers. I embossed it all in gold and coloured it in with Copics and then diamond Stickles. I created a frame out of gold foil paper and cut the focal panel a bit smaller, so I could get an additional red border without an extra layer. This card is 5.5x5.5.


Here's the second card, I loved it when Darnell filled in all the little dots with the starburst die for this card, so I used some red glimmer paper for some sparkle. I finished it with a Clear and Simple Stamps sentiment. This card is 5x7.







Wednesday 12 March 2014

OLS3, LIM162 - Spring Flowers and Water


I admit it, I'm afraid of water! Not swimming, but water on my cards. I have held out this long for OLS3 (Add Water) because I really don't like using water. It's wet, messy and unpredictable! Karen, the host of this challenge, uses it all the time, and achieves stunning results and I've looked through the OLS3 gallery, over and over, seeing lots more beautiful cards, working my way up to making this card.

It was this week's challenge at Less Is More that finally made me move. The challenge is one-layer spring flowers, so I saw a chance to use one of my old favourites, Both Way Blossoms and combine these two challenges.

I inked the stamp with green and the bud colour, misted it with water and stamped it. The house did not fall down and in fact, I really liked the slightly softer edges. Then (figuring I may as well dive in with both feet) I took a waterbrush and added some ink to colour in the buds and the leaves. I even used different shades on each tulip bud, to add more dimension to my shading.

And now I'm thinking, why the big fuss?

Tuesday 11 March 2014

CASology 86 - Roots


This week's CASology Cue Card is Roots.



The DT had lots of discussion about this one and came up with some really fun interpretations! I went with "I'm rooting for you!". I created the pom-poms with a stamp from Neat & Tangled's Party Kit set, used the YOU from MFT's Bold Statements, and Kelly Purkey's Plain Jane Alpha for the 'GO'.

I decided to use yellow because its cheerfulness reinforces the encouragement and happiness intended for the recipient of this card. I think that after white space, colour is one of the most powerful tools in CAS design. When you don't have a lot of elements on a card, each one has to work hard to support the message.

I added Stickles to add to the movement of the tassles in the pom-poms.

We've got other news too - a change in our timeline so you have more time to play along!

We are:

extending the deadline for entries to Mondays at 1pm Eastern.

announcing our winners and honorable mentions on Tuesdays at 8am Eastern

Challenges will begin at the same time as usual, 9 am Eastern on Tuesdays.

Now it's your turn - I can't wait to see what you come up with!



Monday 10 March 2014

Happy Birthday (inspired by Lisa)


This card was inspired by Lisa A's card:


I love how she nestled the 'happy' along the b of the birthday. So I found a little happy and then decided that once wasn't enough - you can never have too much happy, right?

I used this PTI birthday die and various colours of ink to create my happy rainbow. I thought about placing the birthday up on the line of happiness, but in the end, I preferred the cleaner look by putting it slightly below.

We've started spring break. Struan is leaving for NYC with the Air Cadets at 6:00 am this morning, leaving me and Kate to enjoy a week of girl time - perfect timing since she received lots of gift cards and money for her birthday and we'll have lots of time for shopping, movies and lunches out!





Sunday 9 March 2014

FFC26 - JOY


Just a late-challenge reminder that the current FFC is still running until Wednesday!



This time I focused just on the colours of the inspiration photo. This MFT Joy die doesn't have a centre cut out of the o (it comes with a snowflake and a heart so you can customize it). I chose to leave it filled in and add the holly accent.

The deadline for this challenge is Wednesday March 12 - I hope to see you there!


Saturday 8 March 2014

A Funny Thing Happened on the way to the Anniversary Card


Let me refresh your memory about my neighbour, Mrs W. She and I have become good friends in the last couple of years and I've made a few cards for her to give to people, including a 90th birthday card for Mrs M.  Mrs. W's daughter is married to Mrs. M's son, but we'll come back to that later.

A couple of weeks ago in the hairdresser (they meet up there every Friday at 1:00), Mrs M was saying that she couldn't find a 60th wedding card for her friends in England. Mrs W very kindly offered that I would make her one - and then she sheepishly told me that evening, hoping that it would be ok. Of course, I was delighted to make the card and here it is. (60th is diamond, by the way)

Fast forward to yesterday, again at the hairdresser, where Mrs M reminded Mrs W that this week is the 40th (ruby) wedding anniversary of their married children. You guessed it! I now have two commissions to make two cards for the same couple - one from each of the mothers. So tomorrow afternoon, I'll be trying to figure out how to manage this whole thing - two different cards, both good, but the one for Mrs W will have to be just a smidge better, to keep this tricky relationship in balance! Wish me luck!

Muse 57 - Butterfly Birthday


For this week's Muse challenge, where Vicki has provided this lovely springtime inspiration:


I focused on the white space, the butterfly, the colours, the script-y black sentiment and the circle die cut. I used an old Hero Arts butterfly, coloured with Copics and Stickles and an Ink Essentials sentiment. I cut a larger circle layer out of vellum to add interest without adding clutter.

I hope you'll get a chance to play along - the deadline is on Monday at 8:00 EDT (that's one hour less this week, due to the change in clocks!). Voting will start at that time and end on Tuesday morning and then the results will be posted on Tuesday at noon.