A new month means a new sketch on the Reverse Confetti blog for the Sketch For You To Try #44 challenge! I started with these beautiful papers from Recollections "Blush and Mint" 6x6 pad and used Reverse Confetti's sentiment from "God is Good" stamp set as the focal point. I embellished with "Leafy" and "Garden Bunch" Confetti Cuts. I cut two of the "Beautiful Banners" dies so I could extend it beyond the flowers.
STAMPS: Garden Bunch (Reverse Confetti); God is Good (Reverse Confetti).
INK: Mint Macaroon (SU) to sponge leaves; Little Piggy and Sweet Gelato inks by WPlus9; Versafine Onyx Black.
It's back to work time for me this afternoon. I'm sad to see vacation come to an end, but that's life and that's how bills get paid - lol!
Happy New Year to all my blog friends! The Mojo Monday Challenge is ready to roll in the new year with a really great sketch by Julee! My youngest brother had a birthday on 12/31, so this sketch was perfect to combine some masculine papers from Authentique's "Original" Collection with stamps from Verve's "Small Packages" set. It's always fun to paper piece the cupcake and add Crystal Stickles.
Remember it's contest time on the first Monday of each month, so you can earn the chance to win a free stamp set if you participate - one winner for every 50 entries! Come and join us and link up your card HERE. For more inspiration, check out the first 7 thumbnails of cards made by the mojomakers!
The holidays are great, but it's always kind of nice to get back into a routine again. Tomorrow I'll be heading back to work after about 3 weeks off and though it will be nice to see coworkers, I would much rather stay home and have more crafting time! ✄ ✄ ✄ 😀
My blog has been rather neglected lately though I've been working on design team work and have 3 posts scheduled for next week! For two days I've been babysitting our 2 year old grand daughter while her 5 month old brother is fighting RSV in the hospital. Sad to say, they didn't release him today as hoped. Once off the IV and oxygen, his fever went up again this afternoon, so no discharge. I cooked up some Untidy Josephs for supper (always a quick and easy thing to fix). If you're wondering what that might be...it's a goofy name for Sloppy Joes! LOL!
I'm playing along with the current CAS(E) This Sketch Challenge but will probably get gonged for my entry. I just didn't have a good horizontal sentiment that went with the star theme and I liked this sentiment from Verve's "Shining Star" set, so went with the circle instead. The "Falling Stars" background was stamped with an ancient Blue Breeze Kaleidacolor inkpad - a gradient pad with 5 different blues. I used Lil' Inker Designs' stitched stars dies to embellish.
As Bugs Bunny would say..."That's all, folks!". I've watched more cartoons in the past 2 days than I have in the whole year! :-)
I decided to hit my craft room today after being on hiatus with all the busyness of Christmas! I wanted to play along with the Papertrey Ink Blog Hop which has this really festive inspiration photo to trigger our mojo! I was drawn to the happy colors and those rolls of washi tape for my inspiration. I raided my washi drawer and found several rolls that had confetti-like backgrounds and they were in the colors I wanted!
I love this PTI happy die and thought it would pop more if I placed it over a solid Bermuda Bay background. The scribble flower (die cut from PTI Raspberry Fizz CS) was paired with Layered Leaves DieNamics by MFT (cut from SU Cucumber Crush CS). An easy peasy birthday card to add to my depleted stash!
Here's hoping everyone had a really happy and blessed Christmas! We were missing one of our 3 children and his family as they were in Ontario with family. Our fried oyster and honey baked ham dinner yesterday was so yummy and we thoroughly enjoyed trying to spoil our youngest grand child - Matilda - who is 3 months old!
A dear stamping friend recently gifted me with the Gansai Tambi Starry Colors palette by Kuretake and I finally took time today to experiment with these GORGEOUS metallic watercolor paints!
One of my goals in 2017 is to master the art of brush lettering. I did practice a bit today, but my samples were too embarrassing to show you - lol! I watched some YouTube videos and pinned some resources to a Pinterest board and I must say...it's harder than it looks! I've dabbled in traditional calligraphy and the strokes and steps in the way you "break up the steps" of a letter are very different. Where the angle of your flat edged pen is the key in traditional calligraphy, the pressure of the brush application seems to be the key in the more contemporary brushed lettering. If any of you reading this post have suggestions on products, etc. that work well, I'd love to hear from you!
I decided to see how these paints could be applied to stamping and tried it with Concord and 9th's gorgeous Lace Leaf stamp set. I heat embossed the leaf using JudiKins Malachite embossing powder. I then applied some yellow gold paint to the shadow "splatter" image and stamped it onto the watercolor CS. I then dabbed some of the paint using a paint brush onto the leaf to give more concentrated splotches. I also tapped my brush against another brush to add some fine splatters. My photo doesn't capture the beautiful shine that is there IRL. I still have some Forest Foliage CS in my stash (a very OLD retired color from SU) which matches the malachite embossing perfectly. The sentiment die was cut 3 times - twice in gold and once in Forest Foliage so I could offset it slightly to make it pop!
So, why am I making a card of thanks? One year ago we were still in the middle of our kitchen renovation and I had no running water and no counter tops in yet. Christmas dinner with out of town friends was not going to be put on hold because of those minor details! My husband came to the rescue by placing a large piece of plywood over my island and some tablecloths soon covered the evidence. My nearby laundry tub was where we washed dishes and it was the year of cardboard "china" - lol! So, this year I am VERY grateful for my completed kitchen!
Many challenges are on a holiday break, but I found that I can just beat the deadline today with the current Tag, You're It Challenge #62! Laurie Willison is the hostess and she has a fabulous talent for CAS designs! I was inspired by her scallops, tree theme and traditional color scheme in my take on the challenge.
I used Reverse Confetti products...with Jen Del Muro in my thoughts and prayers while I was creating. Jen just recently received a cancer diagnosis, so many of her fans are saddened yet inspired by her #beastmode attitude as she starts her treatment this week. If you get a chance...add her to your prayer list!
Here is my enabler's list which uses some favorite RC goodies:
STAMPS: Winter Word Coordinates.
PAPER: Very Merry 6x6 pad; Avocado, Lime Green (RC); Silver glitter CS; Smoky Slate, Real Red (SU); White (PTI).
INK: Versamark.
DIES: Branch Out, Wreaths, Holly, Winter Words, Tag Me Too, Edge Essentials.
Thanks so much for stopping by...
Happy Saturday and welcome to another Inspired By...All The Little Things challenge! Isn't this inspirational photo the sweetest?! Hopefully it will have gingerbread peeps dancing in your head - lol!
I was inspired to use kraft, red and white as my color combo and went with SU's Sleigh Ride Edgelits to create this fun winter scene. The wooden snowflakes were the perfect embellishments and I topped them off with some enamel dots!
Here's what else I used:
STAMPS: Peaceful Pinecones (PTI) - sentiment.
PAPER: Warm and Cozy 6x6 pad by Bella Carta; Kraft (PTI), White (PTI) and Real Red (SU).
DIES: Stitched circles (Lil' Inker Designs); Stitched Fishtail Flags Die-Namics (MFT); All Framed Up (Reverse Confetti); Sleigh Ride Edgelits (SU).
We're happy to have Natalie Murdock as our guest designer this week! Be sure to stop by her Simply Sweet Stamping blog and say hello.
So...we'd LOVE to have you play along and let us see how you were inspired! Just link your card up on the Inspired By challenge blog HERE. The rest of the design team has some really awesome samples to inspire you! Stay warm everyone and hope to see you in the gallery...
