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Favorite Technique Challenge

December 11, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards, Holiday Cards

This week’s Monday challenge from Simon Says Stamp is to make entries using your favorite technique.

Well, hi!

Okay, this one was quite a, um, challenge. Not necessarily making the cards. Just trying to pick a favorite technique! I really had to think about this one.

What is my favorite technique?

In all fairness, I believe that this is something that will change with time and with new stamps, products, etc. So FOR NOW my favorite technique is ink blending. Especially for creating skies.

So here are my entries into the challenge, from least to most favorite. My most favorite really surprised me and reinforced a lesson I have learned this fall. More on that at the end.

Nutcrackers

Yes, I do love making skies but I figured if I made five entries with five skies that could get redundant. So I thought I would just use my favorite blending brushes to create a monochromatic background for my nutcrackers.

So first, I had to stamp the nutcrackers and mask them. Then I used a red, a cherry, and a dark green stamp pad to create the red background. Yes, green. Adding green just around the edges, and adding it gently, really deepened the shading.

After that, I added some metallic accents to the nutcrackers with a gold gel pen. I chose muted pastels to color each one in. An embossed Merry Christmas sentiment finishes the card, as well as embossed edges.

Snowy Trees Sunrise

Sunrise or sunset? It could be either!

Recently I purchased a set of winter tree stamps from Inkadinkadoo so I used a few of them on this card. I did mask some of the snowy evergreens before doing the ink blending with the brushes.

When I make skies I try to reference a real photo, so the Google comes in handy for that. Helps me figure out how to order the colors.

I wanted this to look like a snowy morning and since the light is behind the trees, I used gray blue Copic markers to put most of the snow clumps in shadow.

A sentiment from the most recent Simon Says Stamp card kit (which just came today!) finishes the card.

Tropical Sunset

Next year is my 30th wedding anniversary! Husband and I are planning a trip (crossing fingers for no Covid complications) to the U.S. Virgin Islands. And right now, I’m loving any reminder of that upcoming trip!

In a recent challenge, I used this same palm tree stamp for my scene. I just love the look of palm trees in silhouette. But this time I added some clouds using stamps and dies from a Hero Arts set. I used the cloud dies to create masked areas that I could ink blend over. Then, once the ink blending was done, I used the cloud shadow stamps to create dimension. Adding in some Copic marker shading helps the clouds look like they are reflecting some of the sunset colors.

Forest Sunrise

Or sunset. Again, who knows?

To create this slimline card I used stamps from the set that came with my alcohol inks kit. I was excited to use these as I’m always on the lookout for tree stamps!

Unfortunately, the quality of these stamps appears to be less than great. When inked up, the tree line (which I love!) does not stamp well and leaves a big “ink hole” where it would not stamp no matter how hard I pressed! The “And So The Adventure Begins” sentiment stamp is crooked. I had to yank them off the plastic and they don’t stick well to acrylic blocks.

So, I had to fill in the ink hole with a Sharpie. That worked since I stamped in black for a silhouette effect. But what if I wanted to stamp in green? Sigh. Oh well.

Once I filled in all the holes (I stamped it three times across the bottom of the slimline card) I did my ink blending. Okay, that’s a lie, I did do a sun shape first. I die cut a small circle from a Post-It note and used that as a stencil to color in the sun with Copic markers. Then I ink blended from the sun outward.

Luckily, the other sentiment stamp in the set stamped fairly well. Still, disappointed in this stamp set.

Snowy Greenery

This one almost did not make the cut. Seriously. It almost went in the trash.

Here’s the 411…

I started by stamping the beautiful greenery stamp in this month’s Simon Says Stamp card kit. Such a great kit this month! I colored it in with Copics and then decided that for this background I would do some Copic blending! (FYI…I don’t know what that pom-pom like plant is in the stamp but this Southern girl thinks it looks like cotton….so it’s cotton. I mean, why not?)

Silly me, most of my markers are Ohuhu which are great for the price, but many are already too dry for blending (I haven’t had them very long!). I knew I wanted a kind of teal blend and once I started I just had to keep going even though a couple of my teal family markers were dying.

Hmmm. The blend was sucking pretty bad. So I thought I’d try a new product that I *thought* was for after inking. Um, no. It’s for before. So after I sprayed and it dried (and did nothing but add shiny blobs all over) I just about quit.

But, as I have learned in the last few months, you can often make lemonade out of lemons when it comes to card “fails” so I soldiered on. I tried ink blending white pigment ink over the blogs. Nope. That looked weird.

Well, I can always add snow splatter and see what happens.

And that did it. I watered down some white goache and splattered it liberally over the entire card surface. Sure enough, it covered my many sins and I think it looks great!

A computer printed sentiment mounted onto red cardstock finishes the card.

And that’s a wrap!

Just a heads up, Mr. Snowy Greenery Card will be doing double duty by appearing in the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge theme, Let It Snow. He’s so beautiful how can I not use him twice?!

Y’all take care!

“Fun with Dies” Challenge

December 8, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards

Hey, this “Fun with Dies” Challenge is the part 2 from the “Alcohol Inks” Challenge, basically. Two birds, one stone.

We last left our heroine (me) with lightheadedness and some kind of ugly first tries at alcohol inks. But now you get….the rest of the story!

If you read that last post, you’ll know that I decided to die cut my rather unsightly first alcohol ink attempts hoping that this would make them usable.

And it did!

I much prefer the look of the one color plus gold mixative, but the others aren’t too bad. Artsy fartsy and all that. So after die cutting them, I chose background papers and built then cards based on the mood and colors in the die cuts.

Here are my double-duty entries into both the “Alcohol Inks” Challenge and the “Fun with Dies” Challenge. And since ’tis the season, I made them all Christmas themed.

Merry & Bright Wreath

This is my least favorite of the five. I love the die itself, but it’s larger than a standard A2 size so I don’t use it very often. I allowed it to be trimmed short on one side and just positioned it flush with the card top fold as if I had always intended it to be that way.

Hey, work with what you got!

The colors on this one ran together so much that it made for a rather busy color combo so I kept the background papers simple and solid. I did, however, use trim the red cardstock with some scraps from the experiment. I also used those scraps to back the sentiment.

The Ornament

Using a die from a recent Hero Arts kit, I made one of the alcohol inked cards into an ornament shape. This was pretty busy too, but looked kind of high end and glam so I paired it with a gold and white patterned paper and a simple gold trimmed sentiment.

Merry Christmas Wreath

This wreath die cut, unlike its cousin in the first example, actually does fit the A2 card size! Huzzah! I thought this one looked nice on some cardstock from a recent Simon Says Stamp kit that I then trimmed with gold metallic tape.

Joy

This card turned out just lovely. I used one simple leaf die to cut the cardstock at random places that had a lot of color variation in the teal ink. I arranged them into a wreath shape onto gold metallic cardstock.

Using an alphabet die set, I cut out the letters for the word “joy” from the leftover scraps. The overall effect is so much prettier and more elegant in person. Hard to photograph the metallic papers for me.

Peace

My favorite one. It’s not what I would normally design. But the overall look of this card….yeah, I just really love it.

I paired this orange-red and metallic gold alcohol ink experiment with some patterned paper from a Simon Says Stamp card kit. Die cuts were used to create the branches and the word “peace.” And I used some gold scrap from the Joy card to trim the edge by the word “peace.”

And that’s it, y’all. I flirted with death (why am I so dramatic about the fumes?), lived to stamp another day, and now have five entries into both the “Alcohol Inks” and “Fun with Dies” challenges.

Now, I’m off to write my memoirs about my near-death experience. Pretty sure I’ll be on a TED talk soon, so be on the lookout for that.

Y’all take care!

“Alcohol Inks” Challenge

December 4, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards

Simon Says Stamp challenge for this past Monday is for using Alcohol Inks! (And this will be kind of a part one, so stay tuned for next Tuesday’s post to see how it ended!)

Each Monday and Wednesday I look forward to the announcements for new themes. I’ve really come to appreciate the creative challenge it offers me.

However, this past Monday I was disappointed. Alcohol inks? Yes, they are cool. Yes, I want to try them. No, I did not have any.

So I decided I wouldn’t participate. It’s fine. I can try alcohol inks another time I guess.

Psych!

Well, I really did think that but when I was buying paper supplies for a church youth activity, I spied this little alcohol inks starter kit from Ranger at my Hobby Lobby.

Hmmm. With the 40% off coupon I figured it was worth a shot. It comes with all that you see in the picture (regular price was $24.99). All I really needed were some colors, the blending solution, and appropriate paper. So the rest was bonus. This would give me a chance to play! Maybe I could enter the challenge after all!

A Word of Warning

Um, they don’t say to work in a “well ventilated area” for nothing, folks. I made myself sick.

The kit comes with 5 notecards to use. So I figured I’d quickly play with the five notecards and I was in my craft studio which I thought was a fine place to work.

Nope.

After three cards (and mind you, I worked quickly) I was feeling dizzy and, um, just weird. I stepped outside for a few minutes and breathed some cool autumn air. Then stepped back inside to quickly finish the other two cards. (Note to self: in absence of blower thingy, don’t use a drinking straw and then huff and puff your way through faking having a blower thingy.)

Then I spent three hours resting in bed till I felt normal again.

Yep. Be careful. Next time I will likely work outside. I don’t know if I’m super sensitive or what but I do NOT want to feel like that again!

I do, however, want to keep practicing with alcohol inks!

How It Went Otherwise

The basic technique is very fun. Lay down some blending solution, some ink, more solution, move it around, play, add the mixative, play some more. Not super complicated.

I can’t say that I loved my results. I don’t have one of those little blowers that effortlessly moves the color around so my end products are less “ethereal” than I would have liked. But hey, it’s my first time.

Three of the cards have all three colors plus the mixative (the metallic gold). Two cards have just one color plus mixative. Meh.

The cards, I thought, were a loss. A worthy experiment, yes. But for a card? Ick.

Then I thought that maybe I could just die cut some shapes out of them. Maybe they’d be prettier then?

Lo and behold, the next challenge was announced and it was “Fun with Die Cuts.” Well, there you go. That’s my answer.

So for the first time since starting the Simon Says Stamp challenges (see my very first “batch” entry here), I decided that I would enter the same 5 cards for both the Alcohol Inks Challenge and the Fun with Dies Challenge.

What did they look like? You’ll have to wait for my next post on Tuesday of next week!

“Anything Goes” Challenge

December 1, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge this time is no rules–just anything goes!

As much as I love freedom, you’d think I’d cheer with an “Anything Goes” challenge theme. But what I’ve found is that I actually enjoy some light parameters within which to work. Still, I do love me a challenge, parameters or no.

So, without further ado, here are my five entries into this “Anything Goes” challenge.

Camellia Thanks

Well, I don’t really know if it’s a camellia, but it looks like one to me! I stamped it on cardstock, colored it in with Copic markers, fussy cut it out, and mounted it onto patterned paper.

You can’t tell it from the picture but there’s also super fine glitter on the center parts of the flower.

Simple card, but the camellia is the star of the show!

Birthday Wishes

I have really come to love ink blending. That’s the technique I used to make this rainbow starburst card. Post It notes were used to section off the “rays” and I ink blended between them.

The lines were not as crisp as I’d like so I used different colors of metallic tape to cover them. I love that look!

A simple white-embossed sentiment finishes off the card.

Busy Bees

The star of this card, in my opinion, is the inked and embossed background. It was touch-and-go for a while there as I got the hang of which colors seemed to work best, as well as which embossing folders worked best.

Simply put, you ink up one side of an embossing folder, carefully lay a notecard down on that inked side, close it, and run it through your die cut machine.

Sometimes it comes out looking like a fail, but once the ink dries, the color usually evens out.

Discomfort

This may seem like a strange quote to put on the front of a card, but I sent this specifically to the author of the quote, Brooke Castillo. She’s a life coach, trains other life coaches, and is the host of my favorite podcast (The Life Coach School Podcast).

I just wanted to send her a note of thanks for all the good she puts into the world! And I thought that using this letterboard die set from Sugar Pea Designs was a perfect way to highlight her contributions.

Happy Thanksgiving

Look how versatile that letterboard die set is! I get to use it on another card!

The possibilities are somewhat endless for this set as it can be used for any season, any (short) saying, any mood. I love it!

And I think we all know that the vibe of this particular card is especially true. I don’t know about y’all but those Thanksgiving leftovers…..phew. They ’bout did me in.

Embellishments are from a recent Simon Says Stamp card kit of the month (items from that kit also used on this card).

“Food and/or Drink” Challenge

November 27, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards

The most recent Monday challenge from Simon Says Stamp has the Food and/or Drink theme.

Well, hi!

Hey, it’s a non-holiday challenge this time. Whaaaaat??

And, it’s one that I had to stretch a little for. Don’t have a ton of food related stamps. Luckily, I pulled it off! Five entries for the Food and/or Drink Challenge await you below!

Burger and Fries

I like this simple card. I think sometimes I overcomplicate a card, or maybe it’s just that I like to do more complicated techniques. But a clean and simple card (CAS) is pretty satisfying when it’s done well.

And I think this one is.

I used stamps from this Sunny Studio set (the same one I used to make this card). To make the plate, I used circle dies. Some patterned paper and a stamped sentiment, and we done, y’all!

You’re The Zest

While perusing Pinterest the other day, I saw a similar card and thought I would recreate it using what I happen to have on hand.

The orange stamp is from a Stampin’ Up! set from way back. You’ll see most of the set in a card further down in this post. I stamped it in a warm gray color but stamped it once in black and colored that in with Copic markers. I used a blue marker to color in the negative space. There’s no gradation in that blue background. It’s just the weird lighting!

I made a sentiment on Canva and printed it out onto cardstock.

Breakfast

This card features another Sunny Studio stamp set that I used to make this card as well. It comes with lots of fun sentiments that can be mixed and matched, but because of the size of this slimline card, I made my own sentiment on Canva and printed it out onto cardstock.

The foods are stamped in black, colored in with Copics, and fussy cut out. I mounted them onto patterned paper and mounted the sentiment above.

And whoever I give this to better believe that sentiment….if I say this to you, I freakin’ love you cuz I love me some breakfast foods!

Fruits

Here’s that old Stampin’ Up! fruit stamp set I mentioned above. There are a couple more stamps in that set than what you see in this card, but these are the big ones!

Just stamped in black, colored with Copics, and filled in the negative space with Copics as well. I did some very subtle shading around the outside edge of each fruit. But it’s still blue on blue. Loving this…I mean, it almost looks like it’s just patterned paper and it came this way!

The scripture is printed out using Canva.

Cookie Sheet

I think this one is my favorite because I had fun making the cookie sheet. I tried to make it look like my cookie sheets….kinda hammered and discolored. But I don’t know that the look translates well on camera.

I cut out some metallic paper and made a score line near the top edge to simulate the slanted edge of a cookie sheet. Using a mini hole punch, I made the hole (I’ve never used that hole on a cookie sheet IRL!). Using brown, rust, and golden stamp pads and sponge daubers I tried to layer some color to give the look of age to the paper.

Now, I don’t have any suitable sized gingerbread men or cookie stamps so I bought some digital stamps on Etsy. I bought a couple of sets….this one and this one. Digital stamps are kind of fun because they can be resized or tweaked before you print them out. I colored them and fussy cut them out and then glued them to the cookie sheet.

Leftover cookies got glued to the, yes, Canva-made sentiment. All items then were adhered to patterned paper on the card front.

You can kind of see the “aging” coloring on the edges in this pic. My cookie sheets are way more, um, aged than this one.

So. The Food and/or Drink Challenge entries are done! What is your favorite one? And if you can’t answer that….what’s your favorite food and/or drink? 😉

Y’all take care!

“Christmas” Challenge

November 24, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards, Holiday Cards

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge entries for the “Christmas” theme

Well, hi!

Another Wednesday happens, another Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge! Y’all I don’t know what I’m gonna do once the holidays are over because making Christmas cards is my literal favorite. And the challenges have been lining up pretty well with that lately!

But enough about the holiday obsession, let’s get on with this challenge’s entries, shall we?

Popcorn Strings

I used a popcorn stamp, stamped it with white pigment ink, and also used white embossing powder. Then I used what I think is probably a blueberry stamp for the cranberry! I added some shading around the edges.

The sentiment is an old Printworks (now defunct) stamp. I trimmed the cut-out sentiment with metallic red tape. The whole thing is mounted onto kraft cardstock.

Winter Stencil

Recently I purchased this Carta Bella Winter stencil and have been itching to use it. Initially I figured I would use red, green, or blue ink onto white cardstock but at the last second I opted for white pigment ink on red cardstock. Oh what fun!! I love it. And it kind of has a pinkish hue.

On top of that background I mounted three layers of a Merry Christmas Wreath die cut from Sissix. I have to admit that it looks better in person; looks a little busy in the photo.

Christmas Bell

When I saw this stamp set in action I was amazed at how realistic the bell stamps! I mean, it totally looks metallic! This is due to stamp layering. This bell is stamped using three layering stamps and three ink colors. The results are so much fun!

This is a simple card; I really wanted the bell to be the focus. All the images you see are from this stamp set by Sunny Studios.

Forest Snowman

This card features another stencil that I recently acquired, but this one is from Crafters Workshop. I’ve been in search of an inexpensive Aspen tree stencil or stamp or die to use. I see so many amazing cards that have these beautiful trees and I just wanted to make that look a reality in my cards.

So I used a pink, a purple, and a blue ink pad along with these amazing blending brushes to create a lovely winter sky behind the trees. Then I stamped this Stampin’ Up! snowman (from 1997, y’all!), colored him with Copic markers, and fussy cut him out. He’s mounted just in front of the trees, which I also die cut using a Waffle Flower stitched rectangle die.

The sentiment was made using my computer!

Christmas Beach

Can I go here for Christmas? I mean, we don’t get white Christmases here anyway so I might as well just go to a tropical island right?

Okay, well, anyway….this is my favorite of my Christmas Challenge entries. The water and Hello! stamps are from a Hero Arts stamp set (the water is made using three layering stamps in three different colors) and the palm trees are from some random stamp I bought many moons ago.

I used a white pen to add the foam to the water and sand. The sky was made using ink blending. The Christmas lights? Well, those took a little more thinking. There are no string lights in my stamp collection, sadly. So I drew a string line between the palm trees with a black felt tip pen and used a super fine brush to apply little dabs of acrylic craft paint for the bulbs.

Gosh, I love a good tropical Christmas scene!

Here’s a close up of the sea foam:

So, there they are…all my Christmas Challenge entries! I hope that one of these will win the random drawing or the a designer spotlight! Did I tell you that I won one of the random drawings the other day? Yep. And I love me some free merch!

Y’all take care!

Thanksgiving Challenge

November 17, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards, Holiday Cards

Simon Says Stamp has offered the Thanks/Thanksgiving theme for the most recent Wednesday Challenge.

Because I’ve done a bunch of “thanks” cards lately, I chose to focus on Thanksgiving for the theme. I typically don’t make Thanksgiving specific cards.

I’m still working on building up my supply of stamps, dies, and supplies from a loooooong cardmaking break. And one of the challenges for me with these, um, challenges is that I have to be extra creative to figure out how to use what I already have. Or use what little I have recently accumulated.

So this week’s entries are a combo of old and new. Old and new papers, stamps, and supplies.

Autumn Thanks Stacked Card

So this one was posted earlier this week (which is why it’s not in the group pic above) along with more info and a YouTube video. I’ll post the picture here, but to learn more about the card, check out the blog post.

I used paper and stamps from Simon Says Stamp.

Old Fashioned Stove

If you’ve read my About Me page you’ll know that I used to be a Stampin’ Up! demonstrator. Hence, the majority of my stamps are from that company. Not only that, but the majority are from back in the 90s!!

Back then, a cozy country feel was all the rage. I still love looking at this old fashioned stove stamp on my stamp shelves but find that I rarely use it.

But with Thanksgiving and all it’s turkey, dressing, pie, etc., I figured a cooking themed card would fit just right. It’s paired with lots of stamped and cut out accessories and food. A Simon Says Stamp background paper and sentiment complete the card.

old fashioned stove thanksgiving challenge

Stained Glass Cornucopia

One thing that always bothered me about the set of stained glass stamps from Stampin’ Up! was that it wasn’t card sized. But I’ve solved that by pairing the embossed and colored image with some patterned paper and a sentiment.

I’ve shown a close up here so you can see that the gold embossing powder has glitter in it. That powder is still going strong from back in the 90s when I first bought it. It’s called Motherlode. Not sure if there’s an equivalent powder out there now.

Here’s a close up of that glittery embossed image.

Autumn Scene

Back in my demonstrator days, I would often act as “hostess” for various groups of orders and would consequently earn hostess stamp sets. Sometimes this was great. Other times I was like, meh.

The two stamps used below are from a hostess set that I have NEVER USED. Nope, not even once. I just didn’t think they were very practical.

So–and this is one of the things I love about participating in challenges–I dared myself to use these stamps and make it pretty. Surely I could challenge my creativity here and look beyond the outline image on the stamp.

I have to say, I’m pretty happy with the result. I’d like to do this scene again but for a spring look. Hey, maybe they’ll do a spring challenge in a few months.

The card is framed with some new paper from the monthly Simon Says Stamp kit. I also trimmed it with some bronze metallic tape and a leaf die cut out of bronze metallic cardstock.

Autumn Floral

We’ve come full circle here as I’m using that sunflower and leaves floral stamp from the first card I’ve featured in this post. This is another embossing project. And I decided to do everything embossed in a copper powder.

I used alcohol markers to color in the embossed images. I’ve used a metallic brown and a metallic copper tape at the top and bottom to give some accent. I really love using this stamp but doing completely different color palettes each time. It’s a fun challenge in and of itself.

If I could start this card over, I think I would double or even triple emboss the big “thanks” stamp to give it a more even finish. But I think it still looks great.

So there you go! These cards will be sent off soon to some ladies from church to wish them and their families a Happy Thanksgiving!

I’ll see you in the next challenge!

Y’all take care!

“Remembrance” Challenge

November 13, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards

The Monday challenge from Simon Says Stamp is Remembrance.

Well, hi!

Welcome to another installment of entries for the Simon Says Stamp Monday Blog Challenge. This week’s theme is Remembrance/Thinking of You.

Because I already did a “Thinking of You” challenge very recently, I decided to lean more into remembrance as the focal point for my challenge entries. And to be more specific, I wanted to work with old photographs.

My Sisters’ Birthdays

Because I have two sisters’ birthdays coming up in December, I figured I’d go ahead and crank out all three sisters birthday cards for this challenge. (The other one is in July, but why not do it now too?)

I found old photos from their birthdays on my computer and built the cards around their photos using similar color palettes for two of them. The other one seemed to have all pink in the photo so I went with all pinks for the card.

For this first one, I just layered paper in the background. Then cut strips of coordinating colored cardstock for the candles and glued them on randomly. The “flames” are a tear drop hole punch that I colored in with markers. The sentiment is perfect!

anna's birthday card remembrance challenge

Here’s that pink themed card. I stamped the cake layers as actual cake layers, but then used them vertically as candles on the envelop flap as well.

I used dies from Altenew (I have the matching stamps but didn’t use them) for the balloons on this card and envelope. The balloon strings are baker’s twine. Also, look at my gorgeous Mama! More on her later.

My Beloved Rosie

Unfortunately, on Easter Sunday this year we lost our beloved Rosie girl. She was hit by a car and passed away from her injuries. It was a shock and we all miss her terribly. She was the sweetest dog.

Each morning when I walk our other dogs, I pass the spot where we found her and spent our last moments stroking her and telling her it was going to be okay. Each morning, I see that spot and my heart just aches.

So I decided to make a sweet little remembrance to keep in my craft studio. It’s not a card, just a sweet little display of my Rosie…my shadow…my girl. Just to keep near me. It features two of my favorite pictures of her.

My Mother

My mother lost her battle with Alzheimer’s in June of 2016. If you’ve lost a loved one you know that you can go for periods of time and remember fondly with no longing. But then suddenly you get triggered by something, and you just have an intense longing to be with them.

This happened to me just a few days ago. I was having a rough, hormonal kind of day already. But I decided that, to help me get going into the holiday spirit for Christmas card making, I would listen to an old Christmas album that I grew up with. I listen to this album ALL THE TIME. But as soon as it started play, I just started balling.

I began to think of my mother and my childhood and how much simpler things were then. And I just felt that intense longing.

So when remembrance was chosen as a challenge topic, I knew I had to make something around my mother. She was just such an amazing woman and I miss her so much. Plus, I mean, she was just gorgeous!!

So these are my entries. And now I have two beautiful and touching mini memorials to keep in plain sight in my craft studio.

I’m off to work on some more projects.

Y’all take care!

Autumn Thanks Stacked Card

November 12, 2020 Handcrafted Cards, Holiday Cards, Quick Tips

Easy technique to create an interesting card by using stacked cards–a card on a card. This Autumn Thanks Stacked Card was created using stamps from Simon Says Stamp.

Well, hi!

Hey, guess what? I have a new card video and it’s not a Christmas card! I know, right?

The thing I love about this type of card is that you don’t need any special tools to make it. No dies or mechanisms. Heck, you don’t even really have to measure! Just make a smaller card to stick on top.

I really love the large autumn floral stamp. It came in the Simon Says Stamp card kit this month. Currently, I receive monthly kits from Hero Arts and Spellbinders as well. Monthly kits are a fun way to build your collection and also to challenge your creativity! I admit that I sometimes turn up my nose at some kits but then quickly have to repent when I see what amazing things people create!

I’m trying to do shorter video posts on Thursdays (as opposed to my Monday posts) so take a few minutes and check out this video to watch the Autumn Thanks Stacked Card come together.

Also, someone please tell me how you avoid smudging your cards with ink! It seems to be my mistake of choice lately as I have done it here and here.

There you go! And happy fall to you all!

Y’all take care!

“Thinking of You” Challenge

November 10, 2020 Challenge Cards, Handcrafted Cards

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge last week is the theme of Thinking of You.

Well, hi!

Here’s a new batch of challenge cards from the Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge blog. The theme from the most recent posting is “Thinking of You.”

I don’t have a ton of stamps that imply that sentiment. In fact, I believe you are seeing all of them in the image above. The one on the truck is printed from my computer.

All of this challenge’s cards are pretty simple, and that was by design. I wanted to focus more on the sentiment so I kept everything else pretty clean.

I’ll list a close up image of each of the cards below, going from least to most favorite.

Thinking of You at Christmas

Using a greenery stamp from Sunny Studio and an ornament stamp from Stampin’ Up!, I created a simple layout. However, there was so much white space that seemed very empty. So I used an ink blending tool to create shading around the edges of the card. The sentiment stamp is also from Stampin’ Up!

Fall Tree

Four stamps make up this design and are all from the same Stampin’ Up! set (I have lots of Stampin’ Up! as I used to be a demonstrator). Patterned paper and metallic tape complete the design.

Fall Tree with Baker’s Twine

Same tree, stamped with darker leaves. And I added more patterned paper behind. The very simple design is completed with brown and white baker’s twine.

Pick Up Truck

This stamp comes from an inexpensive stamp set I bought on Amazon. It comes with various items that can go in the back. I figured the class blue truck with pumpkins would look nice. I used ink blending to create a ground of grass, and also added light blue shading for a hint of sky.

As stated previously, I printed this sentiment from my computer.

Watercolor Flowers

Another Stampin’ Up! stamp set and the sentiment is from them as well (although from a different set). I stamped the flowers using Memento Tuxedo Black ink onto watercolor paper. I then used a very loose watercolor technique to color in the flowers and leaves.

This is my favorite of all the cards because the technique itself is so liberating. I love painting outside the lines and allowing the paintbrush to go…just….wherever. It’s a thoroughly enjoyable process for me!