Challenge #18

The challenge for this week at Bah!Humbug! is to be green. Either by recycling, or to literally use the color green. As it turns out, I was able to do both. I had a Christmas card I received last year from a family member stashed away with some of the other cards we got in the mail. There were several parts of the original that were used: HO HO HO tags, stockings, and snowflake printed cardstock. I took the thing apart and re-arranged it differently on a green card base. The printed cardstock was cut into 2 pieces to use as top and bottom borders and I added some narrow satin ribbon from my stash to the sides. All in all, I think it's a cute card and it was pretty easy to put together. It also is to be used for CHNC's challenge this week, which was to use a photo inspiration (the stockings in the photo were my inspiration).
I hope you like it. Thanks for looking.

Graduation Card

This is the graduation card I made for our son. He just finished his MFA in Ceramic Arts, so I thought it appropriate for me to be a little "artsy" and make his card. I used a design from Sally Traidman's "Simply Cards" book and made minor modifications. I think he'll like it - I'm pleased with the results.
Thanks for looking.

Mom's Day card from Daughter

Above is a card my daughter made for me for Mother's Day. She used a kit, but customized it just for me! I love it! It had to have taken her awhile to cut out the parts and wind the metallic thread around the flower shapes to make wheels. The colors are so pretty and its a fun design.
She always surprises me with her cards - I'm looking forward to my next one.

I'm Back! Finally!

Well, it's been quite a while since I posted, and I'm sorry about that! Unfortunately, I've been ill and couldn't do much crafting. But, I am able to craft now! Oh how I've missed it!

So, this was my April project for one of my absolute favorite online places Crop Chocolate. (Sorry I'm late posting it here.) I made an Easter card using Echo Park's Springtime Collection (one of my new favorite brands). It was my very first attempt at pinwheels and I love how it turned out. I made it for my mom (since I already gave it to her, I can tell you that), and she loved it! I hope you enjoy it, too!

How-to:

Form a 5 ½ x 4 ¼-inch top-folded card from bright pink cardstock. Cut a 5 ¼ x 4-inch piece of Growing Vines paper and adhere to card front. Using scalloped scissors, cut one 2-inch square each from Delightful Stripe, Floral Fun, and Colored Dots papers. Ink edges brown.

To create a pinwheel, cut a 1-inch slit from each corner of a scalloped square toward center and fold corners to center; secure with adhesive. Thread buttons with floss, tie knots on back, and trim ends. Attach a button to the center of each pinwheel with a glue dot. Adhere pinwheels to card front as shown.

Cut out journaling card from paper, add a sentiment or sticker, and adhere to upper left corner of card front. (I cut a small rectangle from white cardstock, stamped a sentiment, and punched the corners to mimic the design in the journaling card.)

Supplies:

Bright Pink cardstock; Springtime Collection Pack by Echo Park (Growing Vines, Delightful Stripe, Floral Fun, Colored Dots, & Journaling Cards double-sided patterned papers); Buttons (1 green, 1 yellow, & 1 aqua); Creamy Brown chalk ink pad by Clearsnap; Scalloped Scissors; White embroidery floss; Glue Dots

Challenge #17

This card is for the Bah! Humbug! pleats and ruffles challenge, as well as for CHNC's die cut challenge. I used scrap printed paper for the background, edges inked in dark green. I also had some scrap organza ribbon that I folded into pleats and hand stitched down the center. Red velvet ribbon was stuck over the stitching. A felt die cut poinsettia flower and leaves from Making Memories' Noel collection and a silver sparkly card candy center was added. Lastly, I stuck on a peel-off sentiment. Fairly quick and easy - I even finished off the inside, but didn't get a pic of it. (White paper with stamped sentiment matted on the same patterned paper as the card front)
Thanks for taking a look.

A touch of Easter for Christmas

The challenge of the week at CHNC is to use yellow and/or an oval on our card. My daughter and I combined efforts for this card and decided to use both yellow (star punch with stickles on it - daughter's idea) and an oval ("snow" at base of tree is supposed to be in the shape of an oval - I did that part). We used the Dreamweaver Tree stencil I won over at Bah! Humbug! in March. My daughter suggested I use green flocking. I was worried that my glue dabbing technique would cause the swirls to run together, but it turned out quite nicely, I think, even though the glue towards the top was put on a little too heavy. (I'm excited that I was able to use this stencil - I plan on making quite a few cards with it this year.) We added a silver peel off sentiment (sent with the stencil, for my daughter - what a great treat!) and used a curved corner punch to finish it off.
Thanks for taking a look!

Challenge #16

Bah! Humbug! is having us include the Big Man (Santa) on our card this week. So, here's my entry. This was a combined effort between my daughter and me; she has a better eye for color and pattern and is a good teacher. (I had not used flocking before, and am still learning about which adhesives to use for different things.)
I had a sketch in mind, and wanted to use our new Classic Santa stamp from Stampabilities. I'm also getting quite fond of using nesties. Santa was colored using Martha Stewart water color pencils and the fur trim of his suit is flocked. Sentiment paper from Hobby Lobby's Magic of the Season paper pack was put onto black cardstock and the black satin ribbon is from our stash.
Thanks for looking!

Less is More - off center

This card is for the Less is More Off Center challenge. I needed a Mother's Day card (actually, I'll need 2; 1 for my mother-in-law, also) and wanted something simple. My mom's favorite color is purple, so I stamped a lavender paper square with a violet (rubber stamp from Michael's colored with purple and yellow LePlume markers) and matted it with dark purple. Put it on top of some sheer, shimmery ribon and did a similar treatment for the sentiment inside. I didn't have a "Mom" stamp, so I free-handed it on the front (not sure it was really needed, though). Hope you like it.

Less is More - acetate

The challenge this week at Less is More is to use acetate somewhere in the card. This card started out as a religious Easter card, but ended up looking so somber I changed it to a sympathy card. This was the first time I used acetate, so I was a little nervous about how the stamping would turn out. It worked well - I'm pleased with the results.

Supplies used were: acetate, Staz-on black ink, nesties (used on both sides of the acetate window), Sizzlet Architectural Accent corner set, and a rubber cross stamp from Michaels.

Thanks for looking, hope you like it!

Challenge #15

Our challenge for this week over at Bah! Humbug! is to use stockings in our card. I've put together one using Brenda Walton specialty papers. The red snowflake is shimmer paper. I added some ric rac from the stash and popped up the stocking. All is put on a white 4" by 8" card base. "Tis the Season" and Santa's sleigh are flocked, but it doesn't really show up in my pic.
Thanks for looking!
(And, I'm very happy to see Max is back!)
I'd like to also enter this into CHNC's sing challenge. It's a stretch, but "Tis the Season" on the stocking is from the "Tis the Season to be Jolly" Christmas song. I was hoping to make another card for CHNC, but time got away from me this week.