Papertrey Ink Make it Monday, Coloring Vellum

I was so excited to see Betsy share her technique with us this week and couldn't wait for my new release goodies to arrive...so I pulled out one of my summertime favorites, Strawberry Patch and Strawberry Patch sentiments sets.  I die cut vellum for the leaves, flowers, and berries using my dies.  Then I used detail white embossing powder (from Michael's) to heat emboss the stamped images on my  die cuts.  I had to use tweezers and be extra careful as the stamp went right up to the edge of the die cut pieces.  I then used spring moss and simply chartreuse with a q-tip to apply on the vellum for the leaves and berry sorbet and raspberry fizz for shading on the strawberries.  For the little flowers I used fresh snow and a little bit of Hero Arts Butter Bar.  I stamped the main focal point image from Strawberry Patch with Dark Chocolate ink on a rustic white base and layered the vellum over it.  I used a Y21 Copic to color little Recollection pearls for the centers of my little flowers and used two strips of paper to ground the image.  My sentiment is from the Strawberry Patch sentiments and is stamped in Dark Chocolate and Berry Sorbet.  My patterned papers are from an older 6 x 6 paper pad from My Minds Eye called "Stella and Rose-Gertie".  Thanks for checking my card out!  I had so much fun experimenting with this technique.

Father's Day Card

I was looking through some photos from a few summers ago and found one of my Dad taking some time with my kids.  It really touched me...maybe it was that in my heart I had missed many of these moments with my Dad myself.  I didn't see him as much as I needed growing up.  Anyway...I can't hold onto that now.  I need to be there for my babies.  I wanted to take my own spin on a card I had seen on Nichole Heady's blog and found some inspiration from a paper pad I picked up by Authentique   called "Strong" the other day at my LSS.  I used my Wonderful Words die "memories" from PTI and die cut a piece of adhesive cork to adhere a frame from Fabulous Frames with my photo matted inside.  I then used a bountiful banners die to cut a banner from the same pattern pack to layer a sentiment onto from the Strong collection.  Voila!  I had a card, super easy!

Hello, I'm Still Here!!

Okay, I know I have a habit of abandoning this...how do people keep up with this and raise a family and have a husband who is seriously on Neptune most of the time?  I try to be actively sharing my work, but between work and uploading on my dinosaur Mac, it is just so hard!  I wanted to share a carefully thought out project that I dreamt about last night.  I have never really had a vacation where I just got to be pampered.  I have always taken the short cuts in everything in my life.  I concede to what other people want, so they are happiest.  I think I was sending this card to myself (ha,ha) and saying..."It is okay to take some time away from your classroom to spend time with your kids and to craft happily."   I used my Watercolor Wonder stamp set to set the waves in motion in an ombre fashion and pulled out my flip flops from Flippin' Out to create my card.  Throw in some Hello, Sunshine and some fabulous Papertrey Ink paper and ink and I was on a creative streak!

Happy Anniversary Baby

So...I am evolving in my understanding of how you can utilize a blog to simply share...

I just want to share how excited I am to be celebrating my tenth wedding anniversary with my one, my only, true love.  You have challenged me to expand my views and pursue my happiness.  You are my joy, my pain, my everything.  I love you so completely.

I am so in love and It just keeps growing stronger.

Make It Monday #110: Collage Elements

This was such a fun inspiring way to build a card.  I followed Dawn's method of figuring out where to place my sentiment.  I have been wanting to use this sentiment since my new Stylish Sentiments: Birthday arrived last month.  I then knew that I wanted to pull out my Rosie Posie set and use my step 2 stamps from the March release.  I chose some spring hues of aqua mist and harvest gold to go with smokey shadow as my neutral against stampers select white.  I used a card front in stampers select white and used background basics farm and barn chicken wire and background basics text style #2 in smokey shadow stamped off once to build my background as well as the frame in aqua mist from pretty peonies to highlight my rosie posie die cut flower focal point that is stamped in harvest gold with aqua mist shadow layers.  The leaves also blend into the background and draw the eye to the sentiment.  They are stamped in aqua mist.  Well, last but not least, I wanted to accent my front panel and help it stand out on the card front, so I stamped a strip of background basics: herringbone in smokey shadow and popped the card front up with dimensional adhesive (which I love using!)  Hope you like my card, can't wait to see what everyone else has come up with for this challenge.  My next step is to use this on a scrapbook layout, which I am way behind on!  Have a great spring day "peeps"!

Papertrey Ink Make it Monday

I'm back and ready to share a special wedding card that I made for an upcoming wedding celebration.

I used the watercolor technique by using Tim Holtz distress ink in Victorian velvet and tattered rose on sweet blush die cut sweet life roses.  I just used my craft mat and applied the ink directly from the pad and then spritzed it with some water to get a subtle watercolor effect.  I then used white detail embossing powder to add the last layer of the roses from Sweet Life to give detail.  I die cut the leaves from stampers select and used weathered wood distress ink in the same fashion.  I used smokey shadow ink to add the detail.  I tied these colors together by adhering the flower sprays to a smokey shadow bitty dot 4" x 5 1/4" piece of patterned paper and layered it on a sweet blush 4 1/4" x 5 1/2" base.  The sentiment was added with bountiful banners and I used some dimensional adhesive for the & to make it stand out as well as one of the flower clusters.  I am so happy with it!

Papertrey Ink March Blog Hop: Sequins!

Here is my card with a few extra sequins to add some bling to this hello card.  I die cut and stamped the hello from the Wonderful Words die and the floral image is from Mini blooms and embossed with zing embossing powder in rouge.  I also add the sentiment on a flag from Mini Blooms (because I love that saying!)  The background is a 4 1/4 by 5 1/2 pure poppy that was stamped with super stripes diagonally  in pure poppy for a little something extra, it just didn't photograph well.  Thanks for looking!

Papertrey Ink MIM #108: Inked Backgrounds

Hello all!  I have to say that this week's Make it Monday by Heather Nichols was in my comfort zone.  I have not done much distressing lately, but was really into this cool technique about a year ago.  I think I wore out all my distressing muscle and had needed a break...Lately, I have liked a more modern, clean look in my projects.  I was excited to pair up the Hands of Time set, break out the "trendy" gold embossing powder and get distressed with Broken China, Weathered Wood and Peeled Paint Ranger distress inks and my handy blending tool.  I used a little seam binding ribbon to go with the weathered look and used some ocean tides to complement the distressed background.  I think this turned out pretty well... hope you like it!  Have an awesome Wednesday!

Papertrey Ink: Make it Monday Challenge: Two-toned stamped flowers

Well... I didn't intend on entering this one, but when I started creating this card the two-toned flowers from the mini blooms set just worked!  Here's my little spring card... hope you like it!  Happy Friday!

Marvelous Monograms February PTI blog hop

Framed Art

I broke out my new "Cutting Garden" stamp set and some ink to create this framed art for my daughter's room.  I went with pink, since she adores this color and her room is top to bottom girly pink.  She also loves flowers!  I wanted to try my hand at a watercolor effect, so I misted my stamps before stamping and also wanted to use the rock and roll technique to add some depth to the flowers.  I used hibiscus burst and raspberry fizz.  I also incorporated a vellum strip, so my background wasn't lost. and I die cut a flower and some leaves to make my monogram stand out.     I used the new headline alpha stamps and dies to heat emboss the A initial with some clear ZIng! embossing powder.  I am pretty pleased with how this turned out, but it was super hard to get a good photo!  

MIM Papertrey Ink Pinwheel Challenge

So, after winning the make-it monday gift certificate for the last card that I entered I have some new-found confidence.  I create so many cards and layouts and need to get better at posting and commenting on all the inspiration I find on the papertrey ink forum and the talented people who share their work.  It is so wonderful to have a community of people to share our creativity with.  On that note, I just loved the simple fun spring look of these pinwheel embellishments on Ashley's video.  She has such a great delivery with her clear and specific directions.  This was a fun card to make, but it gave me a bit of a headache in the layout of it.  The pinwheel was easy...I just could not pull it altogether.  I went with Raspberry Fizz, Harvest Gold and Stamper's Select White for my colors.  I embossed the layer of Raspberry Fizz cardstock with the diagonal stripe impression plate (my first impression plate from PTI and I LOVE IT).  I used Fabulous Frames in Harvest Gold and die cut the frame and stamped in the coordinating ink.  I used Simply You sentiment set and embossed in detail white the YOU and the "are pretty amazing" is from the same set in raspberry fizz ink.  I used the raspberry fizz gingham paper and a harvest gold button threaded with bakers twine to finish off the pinwheel embellishment.  To ground my card I stamped polka dot basics 2 with harvest gold on a strip of white cardstock.  Hope you like it, I wanted to work with a bright color combo!

Papertrey Ink Make it Monday Take 2!

Wow, I haven't posted in months and now I am on a roll.  I craft nearly every day, but oh how I love these three day weekends.  A day off from teaching to rejuvenate and get crafty is what I desperately needed!  I am trying to finish my December Daily album and am having trouble and since it is way to cold to go out, I decided to make another entry for this week's Papertrey Ink Make-it Monday contest.  This is a floral birthday card, again with Embroidered Blooms, but this time I used a two-step embossing with clear and ebony embossing powder for the leaves and then clear and white to add my flower blooms on a raspberry fizz background.  I die cut the ovals and used limitless layers to make it POP on my base.  The happy birthday sentiment is also from Embroidered Blooms, isn't such a simple and pretty font????  I also added some black rhinestone accents to the center of my flowers to keep with my color theme and give them some sparkle.  Hope you like it!

Papertrey Ink MIM # 101

I decided to try out Heather Nichol's two step embossing with my new Papertrey Ink stamp set, "Embroidered Blooms".  I used Zing clear embossing for the flowers and leaves, then white detail embossing powder over it on pure poppy cardstock.  I layered the sentiment strip on a strip of smokey shadow cardstock and used a thin strip of 1/4 inch score tape to add some fine white glitter as a way to accent my flowers and sentiment.  All this was placed on a 4 x 5 1/4 inch piece of smokey shadow patterned paper and adhered to a white cardstock base after rounding the corners.  crossing my fingers that I win the gift card this week!