Loose Watercoloring

Good Thursday everyone! I was up rather late last night finishing this card for the Freshly Made Sketches Challenge and for Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge where the theme is "A Bit of Sparkle".  I wanted to try some "loose" watercoloring which I always struggle with.  The OCD side of me thinks I need to fill in the coloring space - lol - so it's difficult to leave white space.  My sparkle elements are the gold foil stripes, gold embossing and clear sequins.  I colored using Zig Clean Color brush markers.

STAMPS: Bamboo Rose (Altenew).
PAPER: Blush and Mint (Recollections); Ranger watercolor CS.
INK: Versamark.
DIES: Bamboo Rose (Altenew); Stitched Rectangle (Lil' Inker Designs). 

Color Throwdown

Hello blog peeps! It's Wednesday and that means a new Color Throwdown Challenge! LOVE, love, love Broni's colors she chose this week! They just scream summer to me and that means flowers and more flowers! I took this week off to plant some flowers outdoors and while I was in my craft room, I planted more flowers on my card!  I'm also playing along with Reverse Confetti's May Sketch For You To Try.

As you can see, I took a rather loose interpretation of the sketch but

was happy with the results.  A young friend of my DIL just learned she has breast cancer on top of already having a MS diagnosis.  When my DIL asked me for a card, I added this one to her options.  I started by adding Peacock Feathers distress ink on Ranger watercolor cardstock.  I then splattered water droplets and dried them to "bleach" out some spots.  I used three different stamp sets by Reverse Confetti:

BLOOMS 'N BUDS

GOD IS GOOD

ELEMENTAL STRIPES

I was thrilled to see Reverse Confetti added four new inks in the yellow color family, so I went with all four in stamping the florals (Buttercup, Bumblebee Yellow, Sunshine, Rust). The leaves were stamped with Lime Green (RC) and Garden Green (SU).  It took three inkings with my MISTI to get the Versafine Onyx Black ink to stamp well on the WC cardstock.  Don't know how I lived without this tool! LOL!  

For more details on how to play along, head over to the Color Throwdown Blog and you'll find the information on the right sidebar!  You can also visit the rest of the design team's creations for more inspiration by clicking on the links below:

Amy Rohl 
Amy Rysavy
Barbara Anders  
Broni Holcombe (sitting it out this month) 
Jodi Collins 
Lisa Henke
Lori Tecler
Lynn Put  
Vickie Zimmer 
Wanda Cullen (you are here)   

Amy Tsuruta - May Guest Designer

Sunday Stamps Challenge

I finished up this card late last night and wanted to post it quick before my hair appointment today. I went with a vintage feel (as in

Victorian style wallpaper) with this great sketch design by my BFF, Teresa, over at Sunday Stamps.  I started with a couple of patterned pages from FSC's "Pretty Posy" 6x6 paper pad.  I discovered a handy layering guide on Altenew's website that helps so much with getting the 3 steps lined up properly with their Vintage Flowers stamp set. The sentiment banner die is from PTI's Tag Sale: Quilted Die and the sentiment is from PTI's Blooming Button Bits.  You can barely see the circle element, but I used a Martha Stewart doily tag.

INK: Little Piggy, Sweet Gelato, Cranberry Crush, Beanstalk, Last Leaf - all by WPlus9; Versafine Onyx Black.

Mojo Monday

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Good Monday everyone! I was blessed to have a wonderful Mother's Day weekend with all three grandchildren together and now I can look forward to being off this week until the weekend!  Doing the happy dance here!  I needed a card for a lady who has gotten more bad news about her health, so that is what started the thought process for my card sample for the Mojo Monday Challenge.

I used papers from The Citrus Mat Stack by DCWV.  My diagonal stripe is opposite from the sketch, but that was the direction of my stitched die, so I went with it. :-)  The poppies were fussy cut, popped with foam tape, then had black Enamel Accents added to the centers.  Part of the sentiment was paper pieced.

STAMPS: Poppy Birthday (Verve); Wonderfully Made (Verve).
DIES: Stitched rectangle and Stitched diagonal stripe by Lil' Inker Designs.

We'd love to see how you interpret this challenge!  You'll want to post your creation on the Mojo Monday blog.  If you need more inspiration, check out the design team's creations below:

  Julee Tilman (Owner)

Justin Krieger
Lori Tecler
Marisa Ritzen 
Sarah Bigelow
Teresa Kline
Wanda Cullen (you are here)

I'll leave you with a few photos from the weekend... 

All three of the grands - Cash (10 months), Quinn (2 1/2), Matilda (8 months) 

What you don't know is how funny this really is!  Our one DIL was singing and dancing a super funny song and we adults were all cracking up.  Two of the littles just weren't going for it - lol!  They kept their serious little faces the whole time!

 

Happy Matilda on May 12 - her 8 months birthday 

Inspired By All The Little Things

Hope everyone is having a super Saturday! I'm in seventh heaven with our oldest son and his family here from Washington, DC to visit this weekend! Eight month old Matilda Mary is such a sweetie and I don't get to see her in person very often. Facetime helps but it's just not the same as kissing those little cheeks!  Anyway...earlier in the week I came up with this card for my take on the new Inspired By All The Little Things challenge.  I was drawn to the blue window frames against white and those gorgeous, multicolored blooms in the basket!  

It's been awhile since I've colored this image by Concord and 9th and this time, I went with my Zig Clean Color brush pens which I'm still very much a novice with.  I definitely need more practice!  The frame was diecut then popped with foam tape.  The grateful sentiment was cut twice from heavier weight cardstock.  I had it out on my desk following my Color Throwdown card on Wednesday, so I simply grabbed it again. 

STAMPS: Hello Lovely and Lace Leaf stamp sets by Concord and 9th.
DIES: Grateful Leaf by Concord and 9th; Mix and Mat: Scallops die by PTI; Stitched Rectangle die by Lil' Inker Designs.

Color Throwdown

Good Wednesday everyone! Barbara Anders is our hostess for Color Throwdown Challenge #442 and she has a fabulous color palette for us based on this rustic home decor photo: gray, aqua, yellow and kraft!  Speaking of Bar...she is the glue behind the scenes that helps the challenge blog and design team stick together and run so smoothly and we love her for all she does!  She creates the color swatches every week, adds the linky, reminds us to keep guest designers lined up...well, you get the idea! The team wanted to acknowledge all of her hard work week after week and say THANK YOU for all you do!  So...that's how my grateful sentiment came to exist on my card.

I started with a watercolor wash background using distress inks: Pumice Stone, Tumbled Glass, Squeezed Lemonade, Brushed Corduroy.  I tried several gray colors for the leaf stamping and it just didn't pop, so I simply used Versamark ink and added gold embossing powder.  That was the pop it needed!  Good thing I had it positioned on my MISTI so I could keep stamping it over and over.   The tiny zig zag edge is from Reverse Confetti's Edge Essentials die set - a favorite group of edge dies that I go to over and over!  The patterned paper is from K&Company's Julianne 6x6 pad.   The grateful die was cut 3 times to give it the look of chipboard.  The 'feeling' part of the sentiment was stamped with WPlus9's Silver Lining ink.  I adhered the dew drop embellishments using SU's fine tip glue pen.

STAMPS: Lace Leaf by Concord & 9th.
DIES: Grateful Leaf by Concord & 9th; Edge Essentials by Reverse Confetti.

Congratulations to Sue Blamey from Sue's Card Craft who is our guest star stamper this week!  Be sure to stop by her blog and say hello.

For more details on how to play along, head over to the Color Throwdown Blog and you'll find the information on the right sidebar!  You can also visit the rest of the design team's creations for more inspiration by clicking on the links below:

Amy Rohl 
Amy Rysavy
Barbara Anders  
Broni Holcombe (sitting it out this month) 
Jodi Collins 
Lisa Henke
Lori Tecler
Lynn Put  
Vickie Zimmer 
Wanda Cullen (you are here)   

Amy Tsuruta - May Guest Designer

Graduation Cards

I was asked by a coworker to create a couple of graduation cards, so this is my first try at it. I'm playing along with PTI's Make It Monday Challenge where Melissa has challenged us to stamp a sentiment all over the background.  Mine is very subtle but it's there!  I used the "Congratulations" stamp from the newly released Pen and Ink stamp set by PTI (LOVE the fonts and the great variety

of sentiments!) and stamped it using Fairy Dust ink by WPlus9.  The main image is from PTI's For The Graduate set that is an oldie but goodie 'go to' set for me!  I used my MISTI to stamp it 3 times with Versafine Onyx Black ink to get a really bold image.  I added a tiny dot of Black Enamel Accents to the button on the cap.  I'm also including a view of the inside->->-> of the card.

STAMPS: Pen and Ink (PTI), For the Graduate (PTI).
DIES: A2 Vertical Scallop Die, Tag Sale: Quilted Die, and Mat Stack die by PTI; Numbers Die-Namics by MFT.