A Peek at Fall!

GOOD NEWS!  

THIS CARD IS NAMED A

SPLITCOASTSTAMPERS FAVORITE OF THE

WEEK ENDING - SEPTEMBER 23, 2017!!

I have been mulling over creative ideas in order to use my Adirondack chairs, which is part of the new die set in Stampin' Up's annual catalog named, "Seasonal Layers."  It a great set with many different dies besides the chair, and it coordinates with the "Colorful Seasons" stamp set.  I went to a card class in June and made several cards using both items, but I have not cracked the seal on my own set, and I was anxious to do so.

I had an idea for an anniversary card, which was my focus when I started this card, with the sentiment inside..."Life is better when there are two," thus the reason for using two Airdondack chairs, but I am undecided, and may use it for one of the many October birthdays on my "To Do" list.

I also wanted to enter the card in several Splitcoaststamper challenges, which helped me come up with my color scheme and making it a fall card.  Take a peek to see how my Adirondack chair card turned out.  Unfortunately, the colors are a bit washed out.  They are much more vibrant in RIL!

Ingredients:  Stampin' Up products:  Cardstock--Old Olive, Cherry Cobbler, Gold Glimmer.  Stamps--Hardwood, Happy Scenes (retired).  Inks--Crumb Cake, Daffodil Yellow, Pumpkin Pie, Cherry Cobbler.  Dies--Leaflets Framelits, Seasonal Layers Thinlits.  Embossing Folder: Woodgrain.  Linen Thread.  Dazzling Diamonds Glitter.  Glitter Enamel Dots (colored).  Other products:  Inks--Encore Gold Metallic, Memento Tuxedo Black, Colorbox Chestnut Roan.  Copic markers.  Offray Burlap Weave.  Techniques:  Stamping, Sponging, Coloring.  Size: 4-3/4" x 6".  (Woodgrain stamped bg  and the chairs are also Woodgrain embossed to add texture.  Chairs are popped up).

Birthday Jazz for Youngest Son!

SMILES ABOUND!  

THIS CARD IS NAMED A

SPLITCOASTSTAMPERS FAVORITE OF THE

WEEK ENDING - SEPTEMBER 16, 2017!!

When making birthday cards for people I know well, I try to choose a theme for the card that relates to that person in some way.  For my youngest son, and the youngest of my four children, I thought I would make a card focusing on his talent as a musician.

During his youth, in elementary school and as a teenager, he was very much into music.  He first learned how to play the clarinet and was promoted the next year to a saxophone.  He was really very good and became a member of the jazz band and concert orchestra starting in his junior high years.  With the jazz band, his focus was on his alto sax, but for concert orchestra, you could see him on his sax, playing the oboe, or any of a variety of other reed instruments in which the orchestra might be short of instruments for a particular piece of music.  Mark was a quick study and able to pick up many other reed instruments very rapidly.

I wanted to enter Mark's card into several challenges at Splitcoaststampers, so I did a little research before beginning.  The result was a Nu-Jazz style focus, using black, white, cream, tans, and reds.  "The Story" follows below if you are interested in more tidbits about the whys and wherefores of this birthday card.  Meanwhile, take a peek just below at the musical, jazz card that I ended up making for Mark's birthday...I think he will really like it!

Ingredients:  Papers: Stampin' Up--Basic Black, Cherry Cobbler cardstocks; Recollections--Antique Parchment stack.  Patterned paper: Graphic 45--Fashionista Collection/ Debutante (stripe); A Proper Gentleman (paisley).  Googled digital images.  Ink: Colorbox Chestnut Roam (age distressing).  Dies: Reverse Confetti--Edge Essential (black square edges); My Favorite Things--First Place Ribbon (fishtail).  Darice Foam Sheets.  Pink Posh: sequins.  Stash: black/ gold metallic baker's twine.  Knit fabric covered button.  Computer-made sentiment (Font: Budmo Jiggler/ 32).  Stampin'Up Marker: Cherry Cobbler (sentiment circles colored...very difficult to see).  Size:  5" x 6-1/4".

"The Story"

Because I wanted this to be a birthday card for son, Mark, about his musical talent, but I also wanted to enter it into SCS challenges, I did a little research on the challenges available before beginning my card.  For the Alphabet Challenge - Round 7, I needed a card using some element that starts with the Letter N, with the double challenge that it be "not feminine."  Well, that one was easy...a card for Mark would not be feminine and because his jazz band played a great variety of types of jazz, including the Nu-Jazz style, my card would focus on that style of jazz.

The second challenge I wanted to enter is the Inspiration Challenge, using inspiration from the website Design Seeds and their color palettes.  From their coffee hues, I decided to make my card, black, white, creams, tans, and reds.

The third challenge that would work well is the Mix-Ability Challenge, which requires the card to focus on Black, White, and "Read" All Over...a challenge all about colors as well.

The fourth and final challenge is the Featured Stamper, who is Rachel (stampinrachel).  The goal is to visit the Featured Stamper's gallery and find a card for inspiration in making your own card.  I chose a card from Rachel's gallery that used the inchie-style for the layout.  It was the inspiration to use that style in my card as well...check out Rachel's card with this link: Winter Thank You by stampinrachel.

Improving on the Christmas Oldie but Goodie!

WONDROUS NEWS!  

THIS CARD IS NAMED A

SPLITCOASTSTAMPERS FAVORITE OF THE

WEEK ENDING - SEPTEMBER 16, 2017!!

In my last blog post, I made a card from an old, never used 1995 PBX stamp with a verse from the poem, The Night Before Christmas.  I entered it in several Splitcoaststampers challenges, and one in particular, the Alphabet Challenge, Round 7, it was entered for Letter J = "Just color...no dies."  The kicker is, the very next challenge for Letter I is "Improve upon your last card," which means I needed to do another card using this same stamp, CASE the card, and change it somehow by improving upon it.  Now, I really like my previous card, so all the while I was making it, I kept saying to myself, "Now, don't go overboard, because you have to leave something to do to it to improve upon it."  Take a peek below...here is my improved upon card.  I have also included the original below it so that you may see what I did to improve it:

Newest Version...improving upon the original.

Original version.

Ingredients:  Papers: Master's Touch 140# Watercolor Paper (WalMart); Core'dinations Silk Glitter Opulent Oval cs; Stampin' Up--Dazzling Diamonds Glimmer cs (retired), Night of Navy (card base).  Stamp: PSX (Personal Stamp Exchange)--Dasher Dash Away All!  Ink:  Stampin' Up--Night of Navy, Rose Red, Marine Mist; Versamark--Watermark Ink.  Paint: Folk Art Metallic Pearl White (splatters).  Gelly Roll White Gel Pen.  Stampin' Up White Embossing Powder. Dies:  Spellbinders--Layered Poinsettias; MemoryBox--Poinsettia Trio Blooms.  Offray Ribbon: White/Silver Striped Organdy (stash).  MISTI Stamping Tool.  Techniques: Heat Embossing; Watercolor background; Splattering.  Size: 4-3/4" x 6".  Inside: Computer verse.

Christmas Card from an Oldie But Goodie!

 MORE GOOD NEWS!  

THIS CARD IS NAMED A

SPLITCOASTSTAMPERS FAVORITE OF THE

WEEK ENDING - SEPTEMBER 9, 2017!!

I own what is now considered a vintage stamp, produced in 1995 by Personal Stamp Exchange (PSX) Stamps.  It is a stamp I have actually never used, but always wanted to.  There is, of course, a story behind my owning it, but never using it.  Well, I decided it was time to dig it out and use it to make my second Christmas card for 2017, and enter some challenges at Splitcoaststampers as well!  Take a peek below at my finished card, and then jump down to "The Story" below if you are interested.

Ingredients:  Papers: Master's Touch 140# Watercolor Paper (WalMart); Core'dinations Silk Glitter Opulent Oval cs; Stampin' Up Night of Navy (card base).  Stamp: PSX (Personal Stamp Exchange)--Dasher Dash Away All!  Stamp: Ink--Stampin' Up: Night of Navy, Rose Red, Marine Mist; Versamark--Watermark Ink.  Paint: Folk Art Metallic Pearl White (splatters).  Gelly Roll White Gel Pen.  Stampin' Up White Embossing Powder.  Offray Ribbon: White/Silver Organdy (stash).  MISTI Stamping Tool.  Techniques: Heat Embossing; Watercolor background; Splattering.  Size: 4-3/4" x 6".  Inside: Computer verse.

"The Story"

In 1996, I was the office manager for a brand new elementary school to which our staff had been transferred.  The principal was a very classy lady with whom I got along famously.  She really wanted our Christmas card for our new school to be very original, handmade, and using our school colors, which were navy, forest green, and maroon.  I went out on a search for the perfect idea, thus visiting Joanns, Michaels, and the local craft store.  I found this Night Before Christmas stamp that I fell in love with, but didn't really know if it would suit the principal...I could see it with gold stamping mat layers of navy and forest green, with some possibly in navy and maroon.  

I was crafting, but if you've read my blog at all, you will know that I did not become a cardmaker until 2008!  I knew nothing about papers, stamping, ink, embossing, etc., etc....so I had no idea how any of this could be accomplished, but I decided when we made a decision on what we'd do, I learn somehow!

I bought the stamp personally, because I thought it was too pricey for our school budget, and I love it.  My youngest daughter, who was a teen-ager, loved to stamp thinks and had lots of little stamps and cheap inks, so I figured eventually it would not go to waste, right!  I inked up the stamp and tried to stamp it, and found it had lots of gaps in the printing, and I could not get a good, clean image...so we did not use it at school.

When I began making cards, I did not learn embossing right away, so still didn't use it.  I did find that I did not LIKE wood stamps because it was difficult to tell where they would land and were often difficult to ink up, especially if large...so my stamp continue to stay buried away.  As the years passed, I see it every now and then at Christmas time, but by then I really didn't like wood stamps and knew it didn't ink up well.

A year ago or so, I learned wood stamps can be unmounted and made into rubber stamps used on an  acyrlic block, but not being too familiar with this trick...the stamp continue to sit.  Then came my MISTI, and I seriously became interested in unmounting this lovely Christmas stamp to see if I could get a better imprint with my MISTI.  Recently, I saw a challenge on Splitcoaststampers called "Oldies but Goodies," and I seriously became interested. 

A few nights ago, I wasn't sleeping well, so up I popped, the stamp to the microwave and stripped it with foam pad attached from its wood.  The image on this stamp was not an acyrlic sheet glued to the wood, but rather it varnished right onto the wood, therefore, I could not remove it.  My solution for this problem is to ink up the stamp and stamp on a small sheet of white printer paper just larger than the stamped image.  I take this stamped paper and many strips, vertically and horizontally, of my tape runner, and glued it down to the foam pad.  Next, I cover this stamped paper with 3" wide clear 3M tape covering the entire paper surface (at school, we called this library tape) and then fussy-cut around the taped paper up to the edge of the rubber.  When I'm ready to stamp with it, I run a few very small tape strips on the clear tape and stick it to my MISTI.  Now, it's ready to use just like any other stamp!

My first card above is done with Versamark Watercolor Ink in order to apply an embossed finished...in this case white embossing powder, which is heat set with your heat embossing tool (like a very hot mini blow dryer).  When the powder is heated, it becomes shiny.  The stamp was still difficult to ink up and took 6 applications over and over of Versamark to get it all inked, especially the word Vixen and Away, after Dash!  But, I managed and I do LOVE the stamp!!  I'm so excited that I finally used it!

First Christmas for a Little Husky Named Zhanna!

OVER THE MOON!!!

THIS WAS ONE OF TEN OF MY 2017 CARDS 

RECEIVING A 2017 SCS BEST OF FAVORITES!!

HAPPY MAIL TIDINGS!  

THIS CARD IS NAMED A

SPLITCOASTSTAMPERS FAVORITE OF THE

WEEK ENDING - SEPTEMBER 9, 2017!!

You would not believe how long this card has been in the making!  I colored the image at my Girls' Craft Get-Away in late May!  I only brought coloring with me because it was so soon after my knee replacement surgery, and I knew I wouldn't be getting up and down a lot.  See my first Christmas 2017 card below.  The "story" follows.

Ingredients:  Papers:  Recollections--Punchy Florals Pack (card base); Core'dinations Silk Glitter Opulent Oval cs; Stampin' Up--Silver Glimmer; Stampin' Up--Winter Frost dsp (retired).  Digital image/ Copic coloring.  Dies: Spellbinders--Floral Ovals; MFT--Stitched Oval Scalloped Frame; MemoryBox--Snow Burst (snowflakes).  Punch: Recollections--5/8" Snowflake.  SU: Glitter Enamel Dots.  Size: 4-3/4" x 6".

The Story!

I was about half way through coloring my little image and was putting finishing touches on my little girl before moving onto her shoes and the puppy, when I applied the wrong color of Wink of Stella (gold instead of clear) onto her furry coat bottom.  After getting back from my craft retreat at the end of May, it took two weeks before I could get into my craft room...the knee was just too painful to sit and twist in and out from under a table.  The get-away kind of took a tole on me and my recovery.

In the second week of June, I re-colored my little image once again.  I used some mojo and came up with a pretty clear idea of my layout, and completed the white oval glittery frame for her, which is actually two dies together.  See Ingredients below for die names.  That's when I came to a screeching halt! I wasn't able to do much crafting yet, and I had two get well cards, two graduations, five birthdays (that I got done), two Father's Day cards, an anniversary, and an award card that interfered with finishing this card.  Three months later, I've actually finished the card!  (Theatrical bow being done!)

I worked on this cute little image so long that I gave my little Eskimo girl and her little female Siberian Husky puppy names.  The little girl is Lara and little husky's name is Zhanna, which is a Russian name.  This puppy will grow up to be a sled dog, and I wanted her to have a strong name, because she will be a glorious sled dog, probably a lead dog, and her name needs to fit her heritage and who is is!  Because of Zhanna, I will be able to enter my card into the Splitcoaststamper's Alphabet Challenge, Round 7, Letter Z.

I will also enter this card into two other Splitcoaststamper challenges.  To finalize my card, I used the colors from a fellow Splitcoaster in the Featured Stamper Challenge, and Christmas in July, because that was my original intended time to finish this card.  Alas, that did not happened, but I'm entering late.

In addition, she will be entered into a fourth challenge that was her original purpose when I first got started on the idea for the card, which is the very first Christmas 2017 for January with the theme of making a card using a sled, snow tube, snowboard, or skiing.  We have all the themes for the year, and we can make them whenever we want, BUT, I think I can safely say I am way behind!  My challenge to myself was to make 24 cards/ two each for each month's challenges, and here we are in September and this is my first!  Shame on me!