Boughs of Holly for Merry Monday

It's time for a new challenge at Merry Monday.

Don't forget that you'll have 2 weeks for this challenge.

You may have guessed what the challenge is.

Karren chose it and I was excited to see this.

I love this idea for candle holders!

My teammates have some wonderful inspiration for you

so be sure to go by and check them out.

I used my Penny Black Holly Berries die to cut the holly

then used the negative as a stencil.

The die cut was gently sponged with color and then touched

with a damp Aqua Painter to give it a watercolor look.

I snipped some dimensions in tiny pieces 

and put them behind the leaves.

I love the look of movement but my camera sure didn't.

It took several tries to get a photo that didn't look too blurred.

Christmas Card Challenges

and

Simon Says Wednesday

 

ANYTHING GOES

and of course

don't forget to put some holly on a card and join us at

Merry Monday.

Thanks for stopping by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  Holiday Sentiments (My Sentiments Exactly)

Ink:  Pear Pizzazz, Old Olive, Soft Suede, Markers (Old Olive, Real Red) (SU)

Paper:  Pear Pizzazz, Whisper White (SU)

Other:  Holly Berries Die (Penny Black), Linen Thread (SU)

Snowflake Ribbon with Brusho Background

Here's a card using some wonderful products that I won.

The die cut is the 

Snowflake Ribbon by Poppystamps

The sentiment is from

Merry Christmas Message by Hero Arts

The background piece was done on watercolor paper with Brushos.

I used Kylies tutorial for this.

It made me think of the movie Frozen for some reason.

So it was an obvious choice for a snowflake card.

The Poppystamps Challenge #11 

I thought this would be a good way to cool down from the heat.

and

Happy Little Stampers Christmas Challenge

is still open

I cut the snowflake from white Glimmer Paper.  It has a lovely sparkle.

and

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge

ANYTHING GOES

and

August Rudolph Days
We have until the end of the month to post a Christmas card there.

We've been enjoying some cooler weather in NC this week.

I hope your weather is nice wherever you are.

Thanks for popping by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  Merry Christmas Message (Hero Arts)

Ink:  Whisper White (SU)

Paper:  Pacific Point, White Glimmer (SU), Watercolor (Arches 140 lb. cold press)

Other:  Brusho Crystals (I don't remember the colors, sorry), Plastic Wrap, White EP (SU)

Arboscello

I used this Memory Box Arboscello Tree die a while ago on this card.

I had die cut 2 trees and this one was in the UFO box 

with the trunk and branches done in watercolor.

I used my Zigs to color the leaves.

Then I did a background, also with the Zigs.

All that was left was to adhere the tree to the background.

By the way, I looked up the meaning of Arboscello 

since I'd never heard of such a tree.

According to Wiktionary it's Italian for sapling.

Interesting...

Outside the Box Challenge for Memory Box this month is

Cool Thoughts for Warm Days

I'm not sure there'd be much shade from this little tree (sapling).

I'd head for it to get out of the sun.

I'm imagining that there's a nice pool in front of that tree.

That's where I'd be to cool off!

I hope you are enjoying a break from the heat.

Thanks for stopping by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Paper:  Solar White (Neena), Watercolor (Arches 140 lb. cold press), Whisper White (SU)

Other: Arboscello Tree Die(MB), Zig Clean Color Real Brush Markers (62, 41, 44, 43, 81, 31, 50,)

Tall Trees for Merry Monday

We're in the second week of this

Merry Monday Challenge.

Here's our challenge...

I liked this challenge so well, I made another card.

I used some Brusho background pieces to die cut 

Frantic Stampers Tall Trees.

Popped them over an piece embossed with Christmas sayings,

added a little red bird and twine and it was finished.

I can enter this at 

Addicted to Stamps

HOLIDAY

and

Christmas Card Challenge

I hope you have a creative week!

Thanks for stopping by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Paper: Watercolor (Arches 140 lb. cold press), Handsome Hunter, Whisper White, Real Red (SU)

Other:  Tall Trees Die (Frantic Stamper), Birch Trees Die (Impression Obsession), Holiday Words EF (Quickutz-retired), Cherry Cobbler Baker's Twine (SU)

Freshly Made Flower Patch

Freshly Made Sketches 

is celebrating their 200th sketch

I don't play a lot of sketch challenges.

Sketches boggle my mind.

I usually do a design then see how to fit it on a card.

This sketch is pretty easy, though.

Well I sorta did it.

I'm never sure with sketches whether to do them exactly or not.

If it isn't right for Freshly Made, I hope you'll enjoy it.

I'm so glad you stopped by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  Flower Patch, Gorgeous Grunge (SU)

Ink: Daffodil Delight, Pear Pizzazz, Blackberry Bliss (SU)

Paper: Solar Whtie (Neena), Daffodil Delight, Whisper White (SU)

Other:  Daffodil Delight Chevron Ribbon (SU), Crochet Thread

Christmas Tree for Merry Monday

It's time for another

Merry Monday Challenge

It's Debbie's turn to choose our challenge this time and this is what she chose.

Last Fall I took a short watercolor class at our Senior Center.

One of the assignments was to do a Christmas tree.

No stamps, just paints and paintbrush.

I wasn't at all impressed with my project.

Recently, when I was looking through my folder, I spotted this tree and thought

maybe it would look better if it was on a smaller piece.

And it was perfect for this challenge.

I like it lots better done up in a card.

I don't think I'll be giving up my stamps anytime soon!

I'd love to see what you can do for this challenge!

Put some light green, dark green and red on a Christmas card

and join us at

Merry Monday.

I'm glad you could stop by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  In the meadow (Papertrey Ink)

Ink:  Real Red (SU)

Paper:  Solar White (Neena), Watercolor (?), Real Red (SU), Glimmer

Other:  Watercolors (Koi), Star Punch (SU), Stitched Mats Rectangles (Lil' Inker)

Hot Summer Flowers

Both of the Penny Black Challenges this month are related

Penny Black Saturday Challenge August

HOT SUMMER COLORS

and

Penny Black and More

SUMMER FLOWERS

When I saw these challenges  

I thought of this NBUS flower stamp.

And I colored this Summer flower hot!

and

Addicted to Stamps #157

MAKE YOUR MARK

I inked the stamp with Stampin' Up! markers using

Tangerine Tango, and Garden Green.

Then I "thumped" the flower head with a Real Red marker

and stamped it on hot press watercolor paper.

I used a damp Aqua Painter to move the colors around a bit 

and do a light wash around the flower.

After stamping the sentiment, I used my wet brush to pick up

some ink from the lids and flicked it over the design.

I did it again on Whisper White

When I tried to move the color on the cardstock, it wasn't pretty.

It kind of muddied up.

So I took the Tangerine Tango marker and drew the lines back in.

Then I sponged a bit of blue around the flower

and flicked some ink over it all.

I made the first card a little bigger than the normal size.

It will go to someone extra special ;)

I'm really glad you stopped by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  Dreamy (Penny Black)

Ink:  SU Markers (Tangerine Tango, Real Red, Garden Green), Soft Sky, Tangerine Tango, Crushed Curry

Paper:  Watercolor (Arches hot press), Real Red, Whisper White, Tangerine Tango ( SU)

Other:  Aqua Painter (SU), Scallop Trim Corner Punch (retired SU)

Lorelai Leaf with Bokeh

This card was done with a Watercolor Bokeh technique.

We made these backgrounds in a watercolor class I held recently.

We wet the watercolor paper then dropped re-inker onto the wet paper 

and blended it around until we were happy with it.

When it was dry, we used a die cut template of different size

circles to stencil the white dots.

The leaf is cut from the Lorelai Leaf die from Poppystamps.

I did some texturing on the leaves with a stylus but it doesn't show very well.  

IRL you can see the veins.

Poppystamps Challenge #11 

THE HEAT IS ON

I'm thinking cooling off  in the shade beside a spring fed mountain brook. 

The sun makes the water sparkle.

It's a wonderful respite from the hot, August sun.

LOL. That cooled me off.

How about you?

I don't have many Poppystamp dies but I recently won one just by commenting

on Marybeth's blog.

I would have commented anyway because I always love what she does.

But I'm excited about getting the die.

It's the snowflake ribbon and I know I'll have fun with it.

I hope you are staying cool.

Thanks for sitting by the brook with me.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps: Four You (retired)

Ink:  Island Indigo, Whisper White 

Paper:  Pool Party, Whisper White, Watercolor (Arches 140 lb. cold press)

Other:  Lorelai Leaf Die (Poppystamps), Aqua Painter, Re-inkers (Pool Party, Island Indigo, Daffodil Delight), Sponge Dauber, Painters tape (?), Template made from scraps of acetate and circle dies. 

All supplies are Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted 

Banners for Baby

There are a couple of challenges out there calling for banners.

I wasn't sure what to do but ended up taking the sketch literally

and making a baby card that I'm going to be needing this month.

Happy Little Stampers Sketch Challenge

and

Addicted to CAS

I used my banner punch and some snippets of paper to make this.

So I'm off to

Pixies Snippet Playground

Virginia's View Challenge #17

I think these banners qualify as homemade embellishments.

Something else I'd like to share with you....

dressed up version

This was made from the bed that I slept in as a toddler.

Several of my nieces, all 3 of our girls, Luke and Jack have slept in it.

Jack has graduated to a bigger bed now and 

I suggested that the bed would make a cute bench.

My very talented son-in-law went to work on it.

He even upholstered the cushion.

I LOVE it!

It still functions, doesn't take up as much space

and brings back some happy memories.

Thanks for the visit.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps: Baby Words set (a gift with no markings)

Ink:  Pacific Point

Paper:  Pacific Point, Whisper White, Snippets of DSP

Other:  Banner Punch, Baker's Twine

All supplies are Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted

Happy Little Stampers Butterfly with Mixed Media

I was so excited to get my new Happy Little Stampers sets.

This butterfly is from the Butterfly Birthday set.

I stamped the butterfly with Archival ink on watercolor paper

and colored with my Zig markers.  After it dried, I fussy cut it out and

covered it with clear Wink of Stella.

I popped the butterfly over a snippet of a background piece done

with the saturated watercolor technique. 

Long after it was dry, I used the Ghosting Technique.

I place a stencil over the inked watercolor paper and spritzed with water.

Removed the stencil and blotted with a paper towel after a couple of seconds.

I love the way it turned out!

And it was the perfect background for this butterfly.

I'm going to take this over to the

Mixed Media Challenge #14

I've stamped the butterfly and heat embossed it.

Then colored it with Zig watercolor markers and added WOS.

The background uses inking and ghosting.

The  Simon Says Monday Challenge asks for

HOMEGROWN SUMMER

I've been working on growing a butterfly garden in my yard.

Since I used a snippet of watercolor paper and background, I'm off to

Pixie's Snippet Playground

I'm glad you stopped by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  Butterfly Birthday (HLS)

Ink: Archival (Ranger)

Paper:  Watercolor (Strathmore and Arches 140 lb. cold pressed)

Other:  Zig Clean Brush Markers (50, 70), Clear Wink of Stella (Zig), Flourish Stencil (Tim Holtz), Re-inkers (SU)

Just add Sparkle

I used part of the tree stamp from White Christmas

and stamped with Marina Mist.

The snowdrifts were sponged over some torn sticky notes used as masks.

When all the ink was dry, I smacked the whole piece with VersaMark, 

sprinkled Heat and Set Powder, heat embossed and sprinkled

Dazzling Diamonds over the sticky. 

I heat embossed again to make sure it was all melted together.

It's very sparkly!

Merry Monday


and

Happy Little Stampers Christmas Challenge

for August is

and

Happy Little Stampers CAS Challenge

for August is

and

Simon Says Wednesday Challenge

says to 

TIE IT UP

I've used some Baker's twine to tie it up.

I'm so glad you stopped by.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  White Christmas, Bright and Beautiful (retired)

Ink:  Marina Mist 

Paper:  Marina Mist, Whisper White

Other:  Heat and Set Powder, Dazzling Diamonds, Kars Snowfall EF (retired Cuttlebug),Cherry Cobbler Baker's Twine

Summer Silhouette and Nature Shares

This is a card I did for a watercolor class a while back.

I'm pretty sure I never posted it here.

I used Kylie's acrylic block stamping technique for the background.

When it was dry, I stamped the flower stem with green and then the blossom

with Whisper White and heat embossed.

A swipe down the stem with an Aqua Painter gives the stem that watercolor look.

Addicted to Stamps Challenge is having an

ANYTHING GOES Week.

We've had some new visitors in our yard.

DH gave me a hummingbird feeder for our anniversary.

Some hummers finally found it.

I was on my way out the door when this guy landed in the dogwood tree over the feeder.

I never would have spotted him/her if I hadn't seen him/her fly up there.

He's (or she) so tiny!

And DD#3 got this photo outside her work building last Friday.

She said it was quite large. As near as I can find, it's an Imperial Moth.

God's creations never cease to amaze me!

Thanks for the visit.

Enjoy!

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Card Recipe

Stamps:  Summer Silhouettes, Endless Birthday Wishes (SU)

Ink:  Garden Green, Whisper White, Early Espresso

Paper:  140 lb. Cold Press (Arches for design, Strathmore for card)

Other:  Small Acrylic Block, Water Mister, White EP, Aqua Painter