CASology #238 CRUNCH

Happy Tuesday friends! This week we have an interesting cue card at CASology -

Can go many ways with this one...I thought of exercise crunches, crunching on food, crunch of fall leaves when you step on them, and of course, the one that seems to be always present in my life - the time crunch! No matter how good the intentions and how many birthday cards I have in my stash ready to send, I inevitably forget someone's birthday from time to time because time isn't always on my side! Sound familiar? 

So for my card, I wanted to use this three dimensional sticker from Jolee's Boutique that I had in my stash. I stamped a band of lines from PTI Ombre Builders in PTI Soft Stone to ground my focal point. I added the clock and the sentiment from PTI The Skinny. But my daughters thought it was too sad for a birthday card so I added the little heart sequin on the other end. On the inside I added a more elaborate happy birthday greeting so the focus wasn't on the negative (missing the birthday). 

So start getting those thoughts crunching for an idea for this week's challenge. Keep it clean and simple to win a prize from our fabulous sponsor Lawn Fawn. 

 

And for more inspiration, check out what the rest of the DT did with CRUNCH! 

Deidre Payne
Hannelie Bester
Hazel Hodgkins
Jacquie Southas
Janet Ribet 
Jen Wills
Joyce Mehrberg
Judy Marino
Kymona Tracey
Melissa Chipperfield
Rachel Bergfeld

Guest Designer:  Amy

Can't wait to see what you come up with! Thanks for stopping by! 

Creating Like Crazy Instead Of....

Hello friends -

Good news is that I've been busy creating a lot lately. Bad news is that its keeping me from working on what I really need to be doing - TAXES! UGH. The evil procrastination monster strikes again!

But on to fun stuff! My first card was inspired by the Muse challenge this week where the fabulous Tracey is the inspiration. I wanted to make something light and airy so I went back to my tried and true PTI Circle Scribbles set. I stamped in the same colors and general placement of her flowers. In place of sequins, I stamped smaller scribbles in gold (like Tracey's embossing).

Tracey's gorgeous card - 

Next card is for the fun ColourQ challenge this week - 

I used the PTI diagonal stripes coverplate to create my black and white background. This is so easy to use when you adhere the card stock to a double sided adhesive sheet first. Easy peasy to place down on the card base using the coverplate as a guide. I die cut the Hip Hip Hooray from the Phrase Play line in Hawaiian Shores. The stripes look even better in real life. 

Next up is my card for the PTI Make It Monday this week which challenges us to customize our patterned paper. I definitely wanted to try this because I have SO MUCH patterned paper that I never use. I have a few of the PTI patterned paper packs but I NEVER use the big polka dot paper. Lizzie's idea to stamp randomly on the paper is brilliant.  It took me a while to find a good image that I liked and was the right size but I ended up loving this little flower from the Cup of Cheer set. 

Patterned paper is the from the soft stone collection. I stamped flowers in Enchanted Evening, Melon Berry, Aqua Mist, and Sweet Blush. Sentiment and die from Sentiment Splits. 

Last card for today is for the February One-Layer Simplicity challenge - FRIENDS. 

Sentiment is from PTI Choose Joy, flower from Flower Fusion, and "grounding" lines from Ombre Stripes. 

Whew, that's it for now. I'm really gonna stop crafting now and eat the frog. REALLY! :)

Have a great weekend! Thanks for popping in!

Make It Monday #197

Why had it never occurred to me to make my own foam stickers? Seriously? I have TONS of American Crafts Thickers and still love them but never thought I could make my own until I saw Laurie Willison's easy DIY sticker video for PTI Make It Monday challenge this week. 

I needed to make a card for one of my daughter's friend's birthday party next week so thought a glittered number nine would make for a perfect homemade foam sticker. And what little girl doesn't love glitter?

I stamped the dotted lines stamp from Ombre Builders in the four pretty colors from this week's ColourQ challenge which are perfect for this girlie card. I took the stamped card panel and placed it on an angle on a Raspberry Fizz card base. 

I cut the "9th" from double sided adhesive foam and covered on side in purple glitter. This was a bit harder than I had anticipated because the adhesive foam is SO sticky and I got it stuck to my finger and couldn't get it off without wrecking it. I was much more careful the second time. 

Thanks for taking a peek! 

Colour Me....Monochromatic #36

Happy Wednesday friends! It's time for a new Colour Me challenge. This week features a bright and sunny yellow for the monochromatic scheme. Its simply perfect for the summer that's winding down....

For my card I stamped a wavy graphic border from PTI Ombre Builders inking only once but stamping three times starting from the bottom. I believe this technique is called generation stamping. 

I stamped the sentiment from Thank You kindly in a neutral brown and adhered the panel on a piece of kraft card stock with only three sides peeking out. I put the panel on the yellow card base flush right (seems to be my favorite side for cards these days) and added a Jenni Bowlin butterfly. Love the yellow pearls on the butterfly which adds to the softness of the stamped background. 

I hope you will join me at Colour Me this week. The Colour Me team has made some beautiful cards for your inspiration this week so head on over their blogs and check them out.

Claire Broadwater

Hayley Kew
Joanne James

Julia Altermann

Tara Bourgoin

And our featured designer for September......
Holly Endress

Hope you can play along. Can't wait to see you in the gallery! Thanks for taking time to visit. 

Happy Summer!

I was up late last night making some cards for end of year camp counselor gifts. I should have made them all the same but was inspired by some of the challenges going on.

First card is inspired by the colors at ColourQ this week. 

I stamped the wavy lines from Ombre Builders in the two different shades of blue to mimic the ocean. I die cut brown flip flops (Flippin Out) and stamped them in brown and added the green decorative flower with foam dots for some dimension. Sentiment from Flipping Out as well.

Next card is inspired by the One Layer Simplicity challenge - Shades of Summer.  The challenge offers several color palettes to choose from, all of them just gorgeous. If you've never checked out Design Seeds, its a must....you'll be so taken by the fabulous color combinations and amazing photographs. 

I chose to use Shades of Summer #3: 

I used created the same waves using three different shades of blue and added the same sentiment in the darkest blue. The sun is a pretty flower image from Friendly Flowers. 

Next card is inspired by the Moxie Fab World challenge which features this pretty clock with a triangle design on it. 

I started to create a background using several triangle shapes in my stamp stash but none of them quite captured the coolness of the clock. Then I found this wonderful hexagon shape made of triangles (from Sketched Shapes). I loved the range of colors in the inspiration photo so decided to create a border across the bottom in a range of colors. 

Sentiment from Keep It Simple:Thank You stamped in black so as not to compete with the rainbow. 

My final card for today features the creative card border using non-border dies technique for Papertrey Ink's Make It Monday challenge. 

I used the popsicle dies from Summer Sweetness to create my border and stamped a simple thank you at the bottom. The rest of the card panel seemed a little plain so I scored it to create a striped background. Entering this into the CASology:Stripe challenge this week. 

After I stamped the popsicles in red and orange, I embossed them in clear to give them a wet glossy look just like popsicles. Love how they turned out. This detail pic not so great but hope you can see a bit of the shimmer. 

That's it for me for now! I actually have a few more cards to make but that might have to wait for another day! 

Hope you are having a great weekend! Thanks for taking a peek. 

CASology #107: Stripe

So back in June, the CASology challenge had a contest to celebrate it's 100th challenge....you had to guess the 100th cue word.  I didn't win that one :( but they did pick one of my guesses for their cue word.

I'm honored and excited to be their guest designer this week using the word I suggested STRIPE.

I've been in love with the Ombre Builders set so I wanted to use the dotted stripe stamp. I love this stamp because the stripes are subtle and can be used for making great CAS backgrounds. 

I stamped a monochromatic background using three colors - tropical teal, aqua mist, and hawaiian shores. I embossed the big sentiment from Wet Paint in black and stamped the rest of the sentiment below. To make the background stand out even more, I mounted the panel on a black card base. 

And while I had this set out, I made another card.....

What I love about this dotted stripe stamp is that it reminds me of string. I stamped it in four bold colors on a smaller card panel slightly overlapping to look like string being tied around the panel. I mounted it on tropical teal card stock to highlight the bold colors. 

Head on over to the CASology challenge to see what the DT has created with STRIPE. I'm excited to see what you all make....so many possibilities!  And thanks to CASology for the opportunity to play along with you all! 

Now maybe I should put this set away now and give some other stamps some love..... 

Thanks for stopping by! Hope you are having a great week.

July 2014 PTI Blog Hop

The 25th means its Blog Hop Day! 

This month's theme is to draw inspiration from this photo. There's lots design inspiration in there but generally speaking I'm not drawn to it as a whole.  Maybe its too shabby chic for me? Birds, buttons, and sewing aren't really my thing so I don't have stamps along these lines in my stash (though I really wish I could sew on a button!)  And if you've read my blog before I'm not a bird person though I will admit that stuffed polka dotted one is quite cute. 

I can't wait to see what others create with these.  

I did find a few details to draw inspiration from. I liked the bit on the bottom right - the doily heart with the red flower.

My card uses a kraft doily I've had in my stash which I used as a background for my flower. My card bases is vintage cream instead of white. Haven't used vintage cream in a while. I cut the flower from Happy Hydrangeas and paper pieced the stem and bloom together. The hydrangea was cut from textured dotted paper from Bazzill. I liked the weathered wood background in the inspiration photo so I used woodgrain patterned paper for my sentiment banner.

I was inspired by the colors in the inspiration photo to make a second card. Love the cute little spools of thread in aqua mist, sweet blush, and pure poppy.  I used the dotted lines from Ombre Builders to create a background and used a die cut Wet Paint 'Happy' along with the birthday from another stamp. (UGH, can't find my 'birthday' Wet Paint sentiment!). 

That's it for me today. Can't wait to see what everyone made using this photo. It's always amazing to me how very different the Blog Hop cards look from the same starting point. Love that. Thanks so much for stopping by and see you around the Hop!