Baby Boy Congrats!

It's release week at Flourishes and their release challenge this month is to create a shaped card - FTTC253. I chose to make a baby gift card using one of my new stamps sets 'Lots of Thoughts'. I used the colours from this week's Colour Throwdown challenge #274 .

 

Supplies:

Stamps - Lots of Thoughts, April Showers, Hello Baby (Flourishes)

Paper - Crumb Cake CS (SU), Neenah Solar White CS

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Crystal Blue (CTMH), Copics - E42, E43, E97, BG09, BG10, 100

Other - Classic Scalloped Ovals Lg, Classic Ovals Lg, pearls (CTMH), 3D foam

Timeless Tuesday #248 - Score, Pierce, Colour

Happy Tuesday all! Well, I am sad to say that this is my final week as Guest Designer at Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge. I had a lot of fun with these challenges and working with such a talented group of women. As your hostess for this week I would like you to create a card or project that includes some scoring, some piercing (not piecing!) and a coloured image.

This is a perfect challenge for Flourishes beautiful stamp sets. There is nothing I like better than sitting down to colour one of their fabulous images. This week I used one of my new favourite sets 'Bees & Blooms' with a sentiment from another great set 'Picking Wildflowers'.

 

This was a fun and easy card to make and I love how it turned out. After stamping a portion of the main image from the Bees & Blooms stamp set onto a 4 1/4" x 4 1/4" piece of white cardstock, I coloured it with Copic markers. I scored two sets of double lines across the top and stamped the sentiment from Picking Wildflowers in the space. I then stamped the bee image and used a piercing tool to pierce a path from the sentiment to the bee. A thin black cardstock border, some designer paper and three black pearls completed the card.

Be sure to check out what the Design Team has come up with for this week's challenge and leave them some blog love while you are there:

• Allison Cope
• Cheryl Lea
• Deborah Anton
• Jenny Gropp
• Katie Sims
• Connie MacFarlane (Guest Designer) - you are here

Supplies: Bees & Blooms, Picking Wildflowers (Flourishes), designer paper, white and black CS, Memento Tuxedo Black ink, Copics (see below for collections) plus W5 & Copic .1 Black liner, black pearls, piercing tool & embossing stylus

Timeless Tuesday #247 - Snow Scene

Good Morning! The Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge this week is brought to you by our wonderfully talented Deborah Anton. Deborah is asking us to create a winter scene this week. I used Flourishes recently released stamp set 'Snow Scenes' for this fun challenge.

I had a lot of fun creating this scene. It is not something that I have done a lot of with success, so I was pretty happy when this worked out on my first try. I decided to create a one layer card for this challenge so I masked off an area of my card base with post-it notes, 1" from the top and 1 3/4" from the bottom. I punched a 1 1/4" circle for my moon and adhered two more post-its side by side, trimming the top edge with scissors for my hilly landscape which I placed about 2/3 of the way down in my masked space.

I started out by sponging pink ink around my moon and then used a light blue ink over the rest. I then built up the colour of the sky using two darker blue inks, always working from the outside edges inward.

I removed the mask from the moon and keeping the other masks in place stamped the top portion of the fir tree stamp on the right twice. On the left I stamped just the very top branches of the larger tree along the horizon in second generation black (after inking your stamp, stamp off once on scrap paper).

I then moved the mask down just a bit and over (to offset the hills) sponged with some grey ink along the top edge and added some shadow below the fir trees. Moved the mask again, sponged grey again and stamped the closer firs on the right making them a little larger than the first set of firs so that they would appear closer. I then moved the mask a final time, sponging grey along the edge, shadows for the firs and stamped the tree on the left. After removing the hill mask I added shadows for the trees and inked a bit above the bottom straight mask to define the lower edge. I then removed the top and bottom straight masks and added hints of snow to the trees and firs with a white gel pen.

A sentiment and three small grey pearls completed my card.

Be sure to check out what the Design Team has come up with for this week's challenge and leave them some blog love while you are there:

• Allison Cope
• Cheryl Lea
• Deborah Anton
• Jenny Gropp
• Judy Rozema
• Katie Sims
• Connie MacFarlane (Guest Designer) - you are here

Supplies: Snow Scenes stamp set (Flourishes), white cardstock, various inks, grey pearls, post-it notes, sponges

Grab a Cup Challenge

Just a quick post today. I loved the inspiration photo at Flourishes Grab a Cup Challenge for this month's release. I didn't have any images that evoked the warm and cozy feel, but I loved the colours so went with those. The blues are a little off in the photos (no sun today)

 

It's hard to see but I added some touches of gold to the image with a Krylon gold leaf pen to tie in with the gold embossed sentiment.

 

Supplies:

Stamps - Autumn Blossoms, Winter Blossoms (Flourishes)

Paper - Classic Ivory CS (Flourishes), Brown CS (Bazzill), designer paper - Teresa Collins

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Krylon Gold Leaf, Versa Mark, gold EP, Copics - B91,95,97,99, BG72,75,78,E31,35,37,40,41,42,43,44,49

Other - Perfectly Pieced Hourglass (Flourishes), Decorative Labels Eight, Argyle EF (Darice)

Timeless Tuesday #246 - Pick a Sketch

Happy Tuesday everyone! This week's Timeless Tuesday Challenge at Flourishes is to create a card using one of the two sketches pictured below.

I find sketches a great way to jump start your creativity. For this challenge I went with the sketch on the right and stayed pretty true to the layout.

I started out with a brown card base and a piece of woodgrain designer paper which I ran through a striped embossing folder to add a little more dimension (see photo below). I used one of my all time favourite Flourishes stamp set, Hydrangea, for my focal image. I stamped the image onto white cardstock with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, coloured it with Copics and fussy cut it out. I popped it with 3D foam onto two cardstock squares that I cut with Spellbinders square dies, inking the the top square before removing it from the die. I added a little interest to the top left side of the brown square die cut by using the outer edge of the Perfectly Pierced Victorian Oval on diagonally striped paper. I added a narrow strip of the diagonally striped paper to my fish tail banner and used the same paper for my sentiment. A button, some hemp and randomly placed little pearls completed the card.

The sentiments for the outside and inside of this card are from the stamp set Anemones.

Be sure to check out what the Design Team has come up with for this week's challenge and leave them some blog love while you are there:

• Allison Cope
• Cheryl Lea
• Deborah Anton
• Jenny Gropp
• Judy Rozema
• Katie Sims
• Connie MacFarlane (Guest Designer) - you are here

Supplies:  Hydrangea, Anemones stamp sets (Flourishes), Designer paper, White, Brown & Off White CS, Memento Tuxedo Black Ink, Brown ink, Copics (see Collections below) plus G99, & E41, Perfectly Pierced Victorian Oval Die (Flourishes), Classic Squares Lg & Sm (Spellbinders), pearls, hemp & button

Timeless Tuesday #245 - Guest Designer

Good morning, I am thrilled to be joining all of the talented and lovely women at Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge as Guest Designer for the month of November. Thank you Allison for this fun opportunity, let's get started!

 This week's challenge, FTTC245, is to create a card or project using the negative space of a die cut shape.

There are a lot of different directions that you could go with this challenge.  I created this card for a very special person that is facing some difficult challenges in her life right now.

I started out by stamping images from the beautiful stamp set 'Bees & Blooms' onto a 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" piece of white cardstock using Memento Tuxedo Black ink. I coloured in the flowers and bees with Copic markers and then filled in the white space around them with copic B95.

You are probably wondering why I stamped and coloured such a large piece of cardstock considering how much of it I finally ended up using. My original idea was to use this piece as my top layer and use a white negative space for my sentiment. Well, as often happens when I am creating, my card started out as a germ of an idea and ended up in a different direction from where I started out. The bonus, I had plenty of the coloured image left to add a piece to the inside of my card and I still have a strip left that will be perfect to create another quick card in the future.

For my negative space, I laid a square die onto the left side of my card front and with a pencil lightly marked where I wanted my open spaces to be. I made the cuts using the pencil marks as my guide and then gently erased the marks when I was done. I then added the sentiment, sparkles and wrapped the cord and heart charm just above it.

I cut a strip from my coloured piece to fit behind the open space and added some black seed beads to the flower centers before adhering it to my card base and then popping the card front over top with 3D foam.

Be sure to check out what the Design Team has come up with for this week's challenge and leave them some blog love while you are there:

• Allison Cope
• Cheryl Lea
• Deborah Anton
• Jenny Gropp
• Judy Rozema
• Katie Sims
• Connie MacFarlane (Guest Designer) - you are here

Supplies: Bees & Blooms (Flourishes), White cardstock, Memento Tuxedo Black, blue ink, Copic Collections (see below) plus G17 & B95, black hemp, blue sparkles, heart charm, black seed beads, A2 Matting Basics A & Classic Squares Small (Spellbinders)

Masked Birthday Greetings

Happy Halloween! Hope you are enjoying your ghoulish day, although it has been raining here all day and it is supposed to continue through the evening I think. Not much fun for all the little ghosts and goblins (or their parents I'm sure). I have a masked birthday card today, but not in the Halloween sense of the word. I used post-it note masks and inks to create this almost single layer card for the Birthday Party challenge at Flourishes in honor of Christine Okken's birthday and for the sketch this week at CAS(E) this Sketch #52.

Happy Birthday Christine!

Supplies:
Stamps - Chrysanthemums, Tag Lines (Flourishes)
Paper - Neena Solar White CS
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Juniper & Buttercup (CTMH)
Other - Birthday Trio Die (PTI), sparkles (CTMH), post it notes

Timeless Tuesday #243 - Fussy Cutting Fun

Hello all, hope you are enjoying this brisk weekend. The challenge at Flourishes Timeless Tuesday this week is to cut an image with a detailed edge. I love to fussy cut and usually cut right up to the stamped edge but for this image I left a bit of white since there were some tiny detailed areas. I didn't pop up the image on this card, just the birthday sentiment since I am trying to make my cards a little flatter for mailing. I used a sketch from Pals Paper Arts #177 and the colour palette at Colour Throwdown #265 this week.

 

Supplies:
Stamps - Garden Gate, Tag Lines (Flourishes)
Paper - Gathering DP (Authentique), Navy CS (Bazzill), Neena Solar White
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Desert Sand, Sorbet (for inside) (CTMH), Copics - R000, 01, 02, 14, BG10, 72, 75, E41, 42, 43, 44
Other - Birthday Trio Die (PTI), pearls (CTMH), corner rounder, 3D foam

Flowers on Canvas - Timeless Tuesday #242

Hey all, hope you are having a good weekend. Put together a card this morning for Flourishes Timeless Tuesday challenge this week, which is to use Burlap or Canvas on your card. I used both today.

I purchased a length of canvas a while back and have used it for a previous card here. I just stamped onto the canvas with Memento ink and coloured with Copics. You can't really blend on this canvas due to the texture, so you don't need a lot of copic colours. After cutting the piece down to the size I wanted I sewed it to a piece of cardstock to give it some stability. I cut down some burlap ribbon to the size I wanted and then gathered it up and sewed it down the middle to keep it in place.

Supplies:
Stamps - Chrysanthamums, Orchids (Flourishes)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics - E08, R59, YG93, YG95, YG97
Paper - cardstock (Bazzill)
Other - burlap ribbon (CTMH), button, canvas (fabric store), Argyle EF (Darice)

Non Traditional Christmas Colours

The October release week challenge at Flourishes is 'Christmas with a Twist' - create a Christmas project without using green or red. My first thought was to go blue but then I came across this retired Designer Paper from Stampin' Up and decided to go for a more masculine card. I paper pieced this beautiful image from Pointsettia & Pine and adhered it to a very simple card base design. I tried a few more complicated layouts and kept falling back to a more basic design so that the image and gold embossing remained the focal point.

 

I stamped the image twice onto the cream dot pattern, cutting out the entire image from one and some of the flower petals for layering from the second. I burnished the separate petals to give them a little more dimension. I stamped the image once more onto one of  the brown patterned papers from the Mocha Morning pack for the ivy leaves and once onto a black on black print from CTMH's For Always for the berries and the one large leaf. I embossed some bitty pearls in gold for the center - you can see how I do that here. 

Supplies:

Stamps - Pointsettia & Pine (Flourishes)

Paper - Mocha Morning DP, Black CS, Brown CS (SU), Classic Ivory CS (Flourishes), For Always DP (CTMH)

Ink - Versa Mark, Gold EP, Copic E49

Accessories - Bitty Pearls (CTMH)

Timeless Tuesday #240 - Paper Piecing Blue Orchids

The Timeless Tuesday challenge at Flourishes this week is to create a project using paper piecing. The twist to this week's challenge is that there will be up to four winners and each of those winners will win a stamp set from Flourishes and get the opportunity to be Guest Designer for one of the Timeless Tuesday challenges in December! So get those scissors snipping.

A few months back I was walking down the main street of my home town and was stopped in my tracks by the sight of gorgeous blue orchids sitting in the window of the local florist shop. I had never seen blue orchids before, they were absolutely stunning and the image has stayed with me. When I saw this week's challenge I knew it was the perfect opportunity to recreate those blue orchids in paper. My mother has a magic touch with orchids, so I made this card to send to her in the near future. We lost my dad earlier this year and she finds it very lonely after 65 years of marriage to be on her own, so I try to send little surprises in the mail to her whenever I can. Can't wait to send her this one.

 

First I stamped the orchid image onto my white cardstock front - 4 1/4" x 4 7/8". I stamped the image twice on blue designer paper and once on yellow DP. For one of the blue sets I cut out the full orchid flowers (except for the little tongue), shaded them a bit with a copic marker and adhered them to the card front. For the second stamped image on blue I cut out only the top two petals of each flower, shaded them and adhered them to the first blooms applying glue only to the center portion so that the petals could be pushed up slightly to give more dimension. Then I cut out the center portion of the yellow flowers, shaded them with copics and adhered. The stems and buds are coloured with copics.

To add a little textural interest to the top of the card I took my PTI heart border die and used it to emboss across the top of the card first. Then I added a section of the heart border that I die cut. A sentiment, sparkles, black border and yellow print rounded out the card.

Supplies:

Stamps - Orchids, April Showers (Flourishes)

Paper - Stardust, Chantilly DP (CTMH), Neena Solar White CS, Black CS

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics - G05, 12, 14, Y21, 35, B34

Other - Blue sparkles (CTMH), Heart Border Die (PTI)

Timeless Tuesday #239 - Pointillism

The Timeless Tuesday Challenge at Flourishes this week is to colour an image using the colouring technique called 'Pointillism' - which is basically creating your image using layers of dots. I have to admit that this is not my most favourite look, but I thought I would give it a try. I am actually quite happy with the way my image turned out. You can learn all about this technique by checking out these two great tutorials: one on Allison Cope's blog here and one by Christine Okken on the Flourishes blog here.

 

Honestly, I thought I would never get this card put together. The colouring and cutting of the image went well, but when it came time to put this image onto a card I kept hitting a brick wall. I just couldn't seem to decide on paper, style, layout etc. (you should see my craft table, it looks like a tsunami hit it). I am happy with the final result since I wanted a fairly clean, not too fussy thank you card.

 I stamped the brown cardstock using the Berry Sweet Frames set, did a little scoring above and below the sentiment and added a little textural interest to the top left corner by inserting the card front into an embossing folder and rubbing over a small area using a bone folder (just a word of caution here - it just came to me to try this, so I am not sure how this will affect the integrity of the embossing folder, it seems to be fine but you wouldn't want to do it repeatedly in the same spot). The embossing ended up being a little higher than I intended because I forgot that I needed to cut a little bit off the top of the card front - I was not starting over again so it stayed. I also noticed after I took my pictures that I forgot to colour the little end of the apple on the left, it's coloured now.

Supplies:

Stamps - Apple Of My Eye, Berry Sweet Frames, Picking Wildflowers (Flourishes)

Paper - Brown CS (Bazzil), Vanilla Cream CS (CTMH), Neena Solar White

Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Chocolate (CTMH), Copics - Y00, 02, 11, 21, YG01, 03, 13, 67, 93, 95, 97, YR20, E13, 31, 42, 44, R000, 01, W00, W3, BV00

Other - Argyle EF (Darice), embossing stylus, bone folder, 3D foam

Timeless Tuesday #237 - Make a Good Impression

The Timeless Tuesday challenge at Flourishes this week is to incorporate dry embossing on your card. I inked up my Bloomin Aussie Florals for the first time and used the chevron cover plate from Papertrey Ink for my embossing. I used this week's sketch at Clean&Simple.

Supplies:
Stamps - Bloomin Aussie Florals, Botanical Bookplate Vol 2 (Flourishes)
Paper - DP - Madeline (Prima), Heavenly Blue CS (CTMH), Neena Solar White
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Copics - R81, 83, 85, 89, YG93, 95, 97
Accessories - black seed pearls
Other - Coverplate: Vertical Chevron, Heart Border Die (PTI)

Flourishes September Release Challenge - Get In Shape

The September Release Challenge at Flourishes is to create a shaped card (not rectangle) or a 3D item. I decided to make a 3D item since I tend not to do that very often. I created a Christmas Ornament by rolling squares of paper into cone shapes. I quite enjoyed making this and I do love how it turned out - there are all kinds of variations that you can create with this. Had a hard time photographing this since it is overcast today, looks very pretty in person.

The instructions are pretty simple (you can watch a video by Anna K here). I used fourteen 2" x 2" squares of DP, formed them into a cone shape using Tombow glue runner. I punched out a 2" circle and divided it into four quadrants with a pencil. Apply a fast drying glue to one quadrant and start gluing your cones down to the circle, lining up the points of the cones with the center of the circle. I gathered an 18" piece of 1 3/4" wide lace into a circle, glued it down to a small cardstock circle and then layered my sentiment on top. I used a 2 way glue pen along the inside edge of each cone and sprinkled with prisma glitter (I did this step after gluing my cones to the base circle, but I think it would be easier to add the glitter before gluing the cones down).

Supplies:
Stamps - Pointsettia & Pine (Flourishes)
Paper - Frosted DP (CTMH), Classic Ivory CS (Flourishes)
Ink - Memento Tuxedo Black, Ponderosa Pine, Grey Wool (CTMH), Copics - YR000,00,02, BG72, 75, 78, 93
Accessories - Prisma glitter, sparkles (CTMH), lace
Other - Classic Circles Lg & Sm (Spellbinders), 3D foam, 2 way glue