Thinking of Inking

That was the name of the game for me the other day.  Splitcoaststampers had a mini Virtual Stamp Night last weekend, where a different challenge is posted every hour.  Anyone who wants to participate in a challenge has 45 minutes to complete a project fitting the requirements of the challenge. 

I didn’t have the chance to play along “live” last weekend, but I had time Monday to work on a few cards.  The one I’m sharing today was my favorite.  The point of this challenge was to embellish your card in no less than three different ways.  I chose Prima flowers, brads, sponging, a corner punch, and hardware to dress up this card.  I haven’t decided yet if I’ll send this to my mom for Mother’s Day, or save it for her birthday coming up before too long.  What do you think?

Stamps: Artfully Asian, Linen (Stampin’ Up!); Tag Lines (Gina K Designs)
Cardstock: Barely Banana, Certainly Celery, Very Vanilla (Stampin’ Up!)
Ink: Certainly Celery (Stampin’ Up!)
Other: Certainly Celery marker, blender pen, ticket corner punch, Hodgepodge Hardware (Stampin’ Up!); Prima flowers; celery mini brads (Making Memories); sponge

… for a sweet birthday girl! 

OK, I apologize for the corny-ness.  But the person I made this card for is a very wonderful, smart, beautiful, delightful young lady whom I am proud to call my niece, and I do hope that she enjoyed her 20th birthday recently.

I used Lizzie Anne Designs weekly sketch challenge 73 for the layout.  I’m still not loving the Stampin’ Up color Kiwi Kiss overall, but I really liked this designer paper that uses a lot of that color.  Feel free to tell me what you think!

Supplies:
Stamps: Party Animals (Lizzie Anne Designs)
Cardstock: Pretty in Pink, Riding Hood Red, Whisper White, Raspberry Tart designer paper (Stampin’ Up!)
Ink: VersaFine Onyx Black
Other: Watercolor Wonder Crayons (Stampin’ Up!), Red Wagon ribbon (Making Memories), Marvy Giga Scalloped Circle punch, EK Success circle punch

I haven’t done much creating the last few days.  Saturday my husband was sweet enough to let me “take the afternoon off” and go to A.C. Moore, one of the chain craft stores.  That may not sound like much at first, so let me explain… the closest A.C. Moore is about 85 miles away, or about a 90 to 100 minute drive.  Google Maps gave me one set of directions and Mapquest gave a different route.  So I decided to take the Google route there, and the Mapquest route home.  The Google route was more scenic, but the Mapquest route seemed faster. 

I’m lucky to live in a quite picturesque part of my state, in between two mountain ranges.  I had to travel over one mountain range to get to the store and home again.  The route there took me over the mountain on a two-lane state route which was really twisty and curvy, but well worth the trip if you love mountain scenery like I do.  Part of the road followed the James River, and I was able to stop and take the following photo.  I apologize if the quality isn’t very good but the only camera I had with me was the one installed on my cell phone.

Unfortunately, the picture doesn’t do justice in showing just how blue the sky was, or how yellow the wildflowers in the foreground are.  But it was a beautiful view and a gorgeous day, and I’m glad I had the opportunity to capture it.

I’d love to have some feedback about the way I’ve been presenting my photos on here.  I’ve been playing around with pixel size and thumbnail vs. full size image, trying to get the photos to look clearer when you first see them on here.  I know they’ve been rather blurry, and that has really been annoying me.  So please leave me a comment and answer the following questions:

Do you like the current thumbnail-size images with the text wrapped around them?  Would you rather have a larger photo to view?  Do you ever click on the image to see it larger?  Even if I had a larger preview photo, would you click on it for a better view?

Any other opinions or comments you’d like to make would be greatly appreciated!  Brutal honesty isn’t going to hurt my feelings, so say what you mean.  Thanks in advance. 

Now, on to today’s card.  One of the teachers at our elementary school is expecting a little boy any day now.  Here is what I made to send her on behalf of the PTA Executive Board.

I just received Stampin’ Up’s Delicate Dots designer paper and decided to put it to use right away.  The color scheme is taken from Splitcoaststampers’ weekly color challenge #213, and the layout is this week’s sketch challenge, #224.  I wanted to use my scalloped Nestabilities for the mat for the two narrow strips of designer paper, but the largest die I had was still a little too short to reach across the entire width of the card.  I love paper piecing the onesie!

Stamps: By Ones & By Twos, Hugs & Wishes (Stampin’ Up!)
Cardstock: Bashful Blue, So Saffron, Close to Cocoa, Delicate Dots designer paper (Stampin’ Up!)
Ink: Close to Cocoa
Other: Nestabilities scalloped rectangle die; Cutterbee scissors; dimensional adhesive

That’s me.  I’m stuck in a creative rut.  Despite having some new stamps to play with, I just can’t get focused on creating anything with them.  But I did want to post *some*thing. 

I made this card a year ago for one of my longtime friends.  I chose colors that she liked.  I used a Cuttlebug folder to emboss the designer paper, and then I swiped my ink pad over it to make the embossing stand out even more. It’s hard to tell in the photo, but the Chocolate Chip punched circle just underneath the rhinestone brad is crumpled/distressed a bit. I popped the alignment guard off of my corner rounder punch and used the punch to make the scalloped edge at the bottom of the designer paper.

I have to confess that I borrowed the layout idea from a birthday card that another longtime friend made for me.  Dee, if you read this, thank you for the inspiration!

Stamps: Riveting (Stampin’ Up!); Wavy Wishes (Hero Arts)
Cardstock: Blue Bayou, Whisper White, Chocolate Chip, Fall Flowers designer paper, Spring Showers designer paper (Stampin’ Up!)
Ink: Blue Bayou, Chocolate Chip (Stampin’ Up!)
Other: Rhinestone brad, corner rounder punch, and Soft Sky stitched ribbon (Stampin’ Up!); “Harmony” alphabet [for scalloped circle] and “Happy Birthday” embossing folder (Cuttlebug)

I enjoy stamping challenges.  I often don’t have the time to take part in the ones offered at Splitcoaststampers or Lizzie Anne Designs, but I like playing with them when I do have the chance.  Using only a certain few colors, or a certain layout sketch, or a limited choice of embellishments is always a good way to get my creative juices flowing.

My friend Victoria (from Eat Stamp Sleep Repeat) posed a challenge among our group of friends few days ago.  She posted the link to this set of dishes to be used as inspiration for creating something.  I have to confess that when I clicked on the link, my first reaction was “Say WHAT?!?!?”  I had no idea what I was going to do. 

But that just helped push me even harder to try to figure out something.  I toyed with the idea of doing something floral against a dark background, but I wasn’t liking the mental pictures I was coming up with for that idea. 

Finally I decided to take the colors in the dishes and use them in my creation.  I’ve had the Stampin’ Up! “Season of Friendship” set since last fall, but hadn’t even assembled the stamps yet (oops!) , so I decided to put that to use.  I did the rock-n-roll technique on the leaves to get the varied shades of green.  The grass is just a narrow strip of cardstock that I cut into many, many times with my Cutterbee scissors.  The flowers and the bird were stamped onto a separate piece of cardstock, cut out, and glued into place on the tree.

So there you have it.  Even though I couldn’t decide on a sentiment to put on this card, I’m pleased with the end result. 

Supplies:
Stamps: Season of Friendship (Stampin’ Up!)
Cardstock: Gable Green, Chocolate Chip, Ballet Blue, Groovy Guava, Very Vanilla (Stampin’ Up!)
Ink: Chocolate Chip, Gable Green, Garden Green, Ballet Blue, Groovy Guava (Stampin’ Up!)
Other: Cutterbee scissors

Today I’m sharing one of the birthday cards I’ve made for the classroom teachers at our local elementary school.  It’s a layout I’ve used many times before.  My friends have named it “the rectangle square card”, which actually is a pretty good description of it, lol.

You can click on the thumbnail for a clearer view of the card.  One of these days I hope to figure out the correct dimensions so the thumbnails aren’t blurry!

I really love the versatility of this layout.  By changing the designer papers, the colors and the sentiment, it can be used for just about any occasion and for any age person, male or female.  You can sponge the edges of the panels for a softer look, or you can swipe them with an ink pad for a more distressed look.  Instead of using commercially made designer paper, you could stamp your own “designer paper” and cut that for your panels.  No matter what you do with it, you’ll end up with a great looking card.

Supplies:
Stamps: Happy Everything (Stampin’ Up!)
Cardstock: Blue Bayou, Groovy Guava, So Saffron (Stampin’ Up!); designer paper from Inque Boutique “Cabana” 6″ x 6″ pad
Ink: Blue Bayou (Stampin’ Up!)
Accessories: sponge