Patina Birthday

Last weekend my lovely cousin came down for the day and I showed her how to do a bunch of different techniques.  I'd been wanting to try out this fauz patina technique for a while, so this was the perfect time to do so.  I loved it!  We were super impressed with the lovely gradient of colours, and the embossing powder gave it a lovely vintage feel.

Today is the 18th birthday of one of my best friends and I wanted to make her a nice card but I wasn't really feeling any of the ideas that were swirling around in my head.  Then I noticed this panel sitting on my desk still and I started to envision something suited for a young woman of her age.  She's not really a kid anymore so I wanted the design of my card to reflect that.

Since I had the panel made already, this card actually only took me about ten minutes to make.  I layered it with some distressed Pool Party and then stuck them onto a base of Soft Suede.  I love these little rolled roses and the extra dimension they give a card.  And of course I needed ribbon.  The Victoria Trim was a no-brainer.

I'm looking forward to hearing from my friend tomorrow morning about how a house full of teenagers goes.

SUO Challege - Thank You

 After spending about five hours out in the craftroom today, I decided to call it quits.  After one more card.  Okay two, but anyways....

I bookmarked the Stampin' Up Only Challenge page a while back and finally got around to it today.  This week's challenge is a special thank you.  I love using layers, textures, ribbons, brads, and distressing.  This card gave me a chance to do it all!

The image is Hello Doily.  I stamped it in Primrose Petals, then stamped it off once to lighten the colour a bit.  Then I used my sponge daubers and added a little Soft Suede.  Next I inked up the inside of my Vintage Wallpaper EF with Soft Suede (just a little but) and ran my stamped piece through the Big Shot.  Finally, I punched the layers and added the ribbon.  The seam binding ribbon is perfect for this style, and I made a decadent three layer bow to go behind my vintage brad.  The sentiment is from Apothecary Art.  I love how elegant the font is.

Life Gets in the Way

Holy moly.  My life has been one big whirlwind for the last month.  Between soccer tournaments, starting my masters, work stuff, and a social life, I don't seem to have any downtime recently.  After a couple of hours reading up on the brain and its crazy abilities, I made an appearance in my craftroom.

At the beginning of the month I received several new sets that I've had my eye on for some time, and I pulled one of them out today.  I knew that I wanted to have a masculine themed workshop next month but hadn't really thought about the cards for it much.  Extreme Elements was one of the sets that I hadn't played with yet, so that was a match.  Then for colour scheme.  I have a bunch of More Mustard Scallop Dots ribbon that's been sitting there for months that I decided needed to be used.  I love Not Quite Navy with More Mustard, and Always Artichoke rounded things out nicely.

Now, I must admit that my Stampin' Wheel has been sitting in a basket unused for more than a year.  It's just too fussy for me and I don't want to buy 40 uninked cartridges and refills.  However, I recently purchased the Speckles wheel and LOVE it.  It makes a really nice understated background.  I can see myself using it on lots of things in the future.

Apparently I was in the mood for grunge since I roughed up and distressed all of my layers on this one.  The ribbon even got a bit of ink smeared on it.  I don't usually use ribbon on masculine cards, but I like the effect of having the ends showing.  I think it makes it less girly.  I wanted to add some brads as well, but I couldn't find the container.

Inside I used the footprints from the set, as well as the Father's Day sentiment from Delightful Dozen.  My stamp shifted on my block before I stamped the image, but I actually like the crookedness for this card so I left it.

Stamping 411 Saturday Sketch Challenge 243

On Monday night after work my husband and I came home and had leftover turkey dinner and sat down to watch a movie.  The plan was to watch a movie and then go to bed and read for a bit, but the movie was over at 8:00, and I couldn't convince him to go to bed that early.  So what did I do?  Came into my craftroom and started blog surfing.

I found this sketch on Stamping 411 and the card popped into my head immediately.  I love it when that happens.  Instead of taking an hour from start to finish, I whipped up this card in less than 30 minutes.  It's amazing what you can accomplish with a sketch and a stamp in mind.

I love the colour combo of Soft Suede and Very Vanilla.  I usually want to turn cards like this into wedding cards (think "Happy I Do Day" in place of the "Stay" sentiment), but I figured I'd stick with friendship for now.

The card looked nice with the Doily stamp but I felt the need to emboss it as well.  Makes it nice and rich.  I love layers and textures so I'm pretty please with the whole thing.

Vintage Butterflies

While I was eating dinner the other night this card popped into my head.  As soon as I finished eating I raced to my room and started putting it together.  The lighting in my craft room isn't great, but I knew that it was going to be beautiful as soon as it started coming together.

You really can't go wrong with blues and browns (I think I've said that a few times before) and Pool Party with Soft Suede is no exception.

I usually use my brayer when inking an embossing folder, but this time I just rubbed directly from the pad onto the folder so that the ink wouldn't be uniform.  I was delighted when I pulled the paper out, but felt that the Pool Party was a little bright so I daubed a little ink over a few of the raised parts as well.  I played with a few of my vanilla ribbons before settling on the Victoria Trim.  None of the others could hold a candle to its match with the distressed antique look.  The French script (thank you once again En Francais) and the little pearls on the butterfly put this card over the top.  Though I didn't want to part with it, I sent it off to my mother in law for her birthday.

I Heart Hearts + Pals Paper Arts 128

This evening I've got a workshop booked with 16 ladies!  I usually plan my workshops for about 8, so when my hostess told me there would be 16 stampers coming to play, I knew I had to change my game plan.

The first card was a quick fix - I'm just going to make 2 samples using 2 different sets.  I'll post the pics of these tomorrow sometime.  My second card is a Valentine's day card.  Here's what I had planned on doing.

However lovely this set is, it's not a card to do with such a large group of ladies.  I did it with my stamper's club last month and even with only 5 of them it took a long time.  

While drinking my morning coffee and surfing, I found a perfect Valentine's Day challenge.  Pals Paper Arts this week is a colour challenge using any three reds.  I always like to showcase punches in my workshops and I have a TON of red & pink paper lying around so I came up with this little baby.  Not only it is a great way to use up little scraps that I've been hoarding, but you get the chance to play with the small heart stamp and the amazing new Framelits collection.  I love the combo of Riding Hood Red, Real Red, and the Red Glimmer paper.

It still needed a little something extra so I ran the matting piece through the Big Shot with the Vintage Wallpaper EF.  After that I took a pearl acrylic paint dauber and ran it over the cardstock to give it a nice shimmer.  I'm pretty please with the outcome.  Now I just need to get started cutting the paper for it!

Mixed Bunch

I have a couple of workshops this weekend and pulled out Mixed Bunch to play with.  This set is great for versatility.  I wanted to showcase how you don't need a hundred sets to make a good variety of cards, and this certainly did the trick.

This one is great for showing off what you can do with different textures.  One of the ladies "messed up" (her words, not mine) and used the Perfect Polka Dots folder on the base layer and the Vintage Wall Paper on the top layer.  I actually like how hers turned out better than mine! :)

 

This next one's a little more striking with the bold colours.  I think this one would work just as well for a wedding/anniversary card too.

I originally wanted to make this one with Bashful Blue, but I was out of that so I used Pool Party instead.  Turns out Poppy Parade and Pool Party make me happy when they're together.  This card is pure fun and sure to put a smile on the receiver's face.

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Daring Cardmakers 01

Again, I was surfing around the good old internet, and I found a fun challenge site.  This one's by some lovely UK ladies.  I mashed it up with an old Mojo Monday sketch and am pretty pleased with the outcome.

I got this set a number of months ago, but haven't been inspired to use it.  As soon as I saw this combo though set practically jumped right off my shelf and into my lap!  Pool Party and Island Indigo aren't exactly these shades, but they're close enough, and they look great with Crumb Cake and Soft Suede, so it all came together nicely anyways.

One More

Ok, I thought I was done with the Christmas cards.  Guess not.  My husband was up at 2:20 this morning to drive down to Kelowna for a course, and naturally, I had a hard time getting back to sleep.  So what did I do?  Went to the happy place (aka - craft room).

I'm having a card buffet with the ladies that I work with this morning, so I have all of their packages made up nicely, ready to go.  I wanted to throw in one more, so here's what came out of my brain this morning.

The first version was with Pear Pizzazz and Early Espresso, but it just wasn't doing it for me.  Crumb Cake and Chocolate Chip fixed that one.  I brayered the CC ink onto the Vintage Wallpaper embossing folder and then ran a piece of Very Vanilla through it.  I've only done this technique with coloured cardstock before, and the result with the thinner Vanilla was quite a bit different.  The coverage isn't quite as uniform, and I think it looks antiquey (pretty sure that's not a word).  Then I layered it all together and punched the ornament through all three layers so you could see through to the inside.  I had a heck of a time finding my Stampamajig, but it finally showed up.  You really need it for this one so that you can line up the ornament stamp on the inside correctly.

I still wasn't totally happy with it at that point, so I gave it a little shimmer spray, and outlined the ornament with glass glitter.  Much better.  This photo doesn't really do the card justice (the lighting here this morning isn't great), but the card is very lovely in person.

True Friend

I am slightly obsessed with this layout right now.  I love using my embossing folders whenever I can, and this layout is perfect for it.  It lends itself nicely to simple statements such as this.  I have had a package of Pink Pirouette sitting around for ages, just waiting to be used, and this seemed the perfect thing for it.  I really like how it contrasts with the brilliant tones of Rich Razzleberry and Old Olive.

Stamps:  Love and Care, Elements of Style
Ink:   Pink Pirouette, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive
Paper:  Pink Pirouette, Rich Razzleberry, Old Olive, Whisper White
Extras:  Vintage Wallpaper EF

Wedding Cake Part II

Since it's summer and there are always a plethora of weddings, I've decided that I need to make a few more cards for this occassion.  I have a few styles that I like for wedding cards, but I wanted something different.  In my wanderings through the internet, I came across a card that someone made using the embossing folder to make a giant cupcake and I figured I could do the same for a whole cake.  This afternoon when I sat down to make a wedding card, this little guy came together from that inspiration.

Stamps:  Word Play
Ink: Chocolate Chip, Smooch Spray
Paper:  Very Vanilla, Chocolate Chip, Crumbcake
Extras: Very Vanilla seam binding ribbon, Vintage Wallpaper embossing folder, Boho Blossoms punch