This week's PaperPlay Challenge is sponsored by a Inky Impressions. I haven't heard of this group myself until this week's challenge, but after scouting their website, I found some super cute stamps that will fit any occasion. To win a stamp and a goodie bag, you'll have to complete a cards for Mom/Mum. For those of you living in the US, it is never too early to be thinking about those Mother's Day cards!
My color scheme is inspired by a dear friend's card that I saw recently. Who can go wrong with cheery orange, pink and blues? 'Sides with all the cold weather and snow forecasted to come down on Thursday and Friday, I needed something warm and cheery.
A fun cheery card to wish the most important female person in your life some cheery wishes. Pair it with a fun colorful bouquet of fresh flowers and you'll be Mom's favorite person ;)
So here is hoping you will get going with your Mother's Day cards...Don't forget to throw it into our PaperPlay Challenge.
Last week I was telling you about the bake sale that was coming at work. A quick update - we raised around 1500$ and each dollar will be match by my awesome company. I was really amazed and touched by how many people participated, either by baking or by buying. In fact, we had so much left over that we put out the left-overs out on Friday and had a little donation bowl. That easily contributed 100$ to the total. People are often amazing & willing to help in capacities that they can. Isn't this a great story?
I've been catching up on Glee last week and I finally watched the last episode aired to date. The song that Rachel sings is one of my current favs. Her lyrics remind me of what it means to learn...So if you want to play along to this week's Music Saves My Soul, go post a song here.
Embellish Magazine Challenge is one my favorite challenges to partake in, because it pushes my boundaries when it comes to themes & color combos. I'm not a bold, colorful person, and tend to grab blacks, krafts, browns, whites and let the stamping, pattern paper, or color penciling do the color-talking. Anyone else out there feel the same? So this week, Embellish is challenging me to two areas: masculine cards (arg!) and colors.
Another fun challenge that is going on this week is happening on Jenny's blog. The WeeMemories team is sponsored by My Favorite Things, one of many companies whose stamps I adore. This doesn't get any easier, since the theme this week is:
The tricky part for the creation process was wrapping my head around blues, green and red as "masculine" colors prescribed in the Embellish Magazine Challenge. I get the gray and blue, but the red was way too cheery.
You know what I really liked the most of this challenge? The visual poster - two weeks ago you heard me swoon about the macarons; this week you'll hear me swoon about planes. Ashley sure knows how to put these posters together, right? I fly a lot and often find myself living at the airport (for better or for worst) for the past two years or so. The best parts are sitting at the gate and watching planes land and take off. It's quite fascinating to see all the operations go back and forth - the lil truck that pushes the plane from the gate back, the dudes with their glowing sticks to help navigate the plane in and out of the gate, the baggage wagon zooming back and forth. Perhaps I should have been an aerospace engineer or a flight controller. But alas, I detract.
What I meant to say is that this card was inspired by my loads of travel and my joy in finally being able to use my impulse purchase. Yes, I picked up the little airplane punch at Michael's about half a year ago and it hasn't made a debut on any projects yet - hey, it was on sale for $2 and better late than never ;)
Stamps: (Goin' Places) My Favorite Things; (Free Spirit - Sentiment) Waltzingmouse Stamps Paper: (Paper Basics Card Stock - Spring Moss, Spring Rain, White) Papertrey Ink; (Key Ingredients Kit - Winnie's Walls) Taylored Expressions Ink: (Memento - Tuxedo Black; Versamark) Tsukineko Embellishments: (Steel Dies - Cloud 1 & 2 Die Collection) Papertrey Ink; (Airplane Medium Punch) EKSuccess; (Embossing Powder - Ebony) Martha Stewart; (Double-ended Art Markers - Cool Greys) Prismacolor
I started punching out nine little planes and colored them in a monochromatic gray from 90% cool gray up to 10% cool gray. I knew that I wanted to play around with layering them and making it look like a plane was taking off into the sky - exactly against what background, I was still unsure.
Then I remembered that I had to incorporate fun colors and what better way of utilizing these fun, bold colors by breaking in some negative space in the form of clouds? Planes live in skies which have lots of clouds...
It still looked empty at this point and then I remembered I had a fun city scape in My Favorite Things "Goin' Places" stamp set. A little embossing action and a city skyline was quickly created - easy peasy.
That's when I realized I needed to add a sentiment - preferably masculine looking. The "Bon Voyage" sentiment was too cursive for my taste, so I pulled out my handy-dandy and trusty Waltzingmouse "Free Spirit - Sentiments" to make it work. I actually could not find a fitting sentiment for what I was looking for and was about to pull another set out, when a bunch of lightbulbs lit up in my head. You see, I was thinking "How sad, I'm not sure where the little jet plane is flying to..." when it occurred to me, this card is perfect for when someone leaves...and I have plenty of friends that keep leaving the area to venture into other jobs or they go back to their home countries.
If you made it this far - kudos to you reading my ramblings. Hope you like this little card. As you can tell, when I create cards, I often don't have the entire card designed out. I let myself be inspired by my stash. Also, sometimes that perfect sentiment is exactly not the one I had in mind and "making it work" often forces me to think outside the box.
So, what kinds of cards throws you out of your comfort zone?
One of my online crafting friends has had this dream to pursue her own store. And that special day of launching is today! This dream belongs to no other than the sweet, dear Lisa Hjulberg. So please head on over her store blog and leave her some grand-opening, celebratory greetings and a few cheers. If I were her, I'd be nervous as a wispy leaf wavering in the wind.
I saw the previews and I haven been super psyched about some of those kits! I can't wait to get my hands onto some of the Claire Brennan exclusive stamp designs. So, hop on over there :)
Scrap Our Stash'sMarch challenge is very near and dear to my heart: Spring Cleaning, which means dig long and deep into your stash to find things that need some dusting off and loving. Dig up dusty stamps and love them with some fresh ink. Pull out that pattern paper that's been attracting dust mites - I know we wait for that "perfect" project, but do we really know if we're making that perfect project upfront? Dust off those punches that have been sitting in a bin and give them some punching action.
I'm sure we have certain crafting vices, so this is a good time to 'fess up. Mine is pattern paper. I see some and fall heads over heel over it and often can't help myself from buying it. The key is to really do paper swaps with gals, so if you're interested, drop me an email and we can do a paper swap! :)
Anyways - off to the deets of the card. I needed a good guy card and knew that I was hogging my Archaic paper from Basic Grey for far too long. So I created a "quilt" of pattern paper and laid each panel together. Super easy.
Have you been watching CNN? The news coverage on NPR and CNN.com has me moved to tears. Everyday there is new development that is becoming more and more tragic. So for this week's Music Saves My Soul song selection I want to play something near and dear to my heart. I have never heard this Anna Netrebko version but she's one of my all-time favorite Sopranos in the world!
We are running a Bake Sale at work to help run funds and awareness. The money will be matched by our wonderful company. There are so many venues of supporting the relief effort and I am glad to see so many people stepping up and contributing to it. Every little dime helps, right? In the meantime, if you want to post a song up for our weekly Music Saves My Soul, hop on over to Marcea's blog and leave a song. Thank you for stopping by...
Another Mami Doodles challenge is starting today and I hope you like the theme. We are celebrating Spring amongst the team.
My spring indicators are very unromantic: my nose starts running like a leaky faucet and my eyes get itchy and watery. But this time of the year gets me excited, because it means warmer weather. Warmer weather means I get to switch into T-shirts and skirts and other fun things like sandals and flip-flops! :)
But alas, we have been having lots of downpour here lately so I have not been able to indulge in any of the above Spring-related activities (aside from the sniffling nose and itching eyes). But rain is good - it feeds our little flowers-to-be. So to make myself feel better I have been chanting "April Showers, Bring May Flowers..." And this card is what ensued:
Elisa has done it again and created a dear little digi. I decided to paper piece her umbrella and boots. Some Glossy Accents for water is never a bad idea and here she is - trying to stay dry in all this rain!
Since the theme was rain and I had settled on polka-dotted pattern paper to paper piece the lil girl's umbrella and boots, I thought a "sky" with some gray spots would be the perfect complement her colors. After all of that was decided, the sentiment, ribbon and brad fell into place. Here a closer look on the sentiment...
Since playing along with the Wee Memories crew has been a while for me, I thought I'd throw this card into the ring. Their theme is "anything green, or anything Spring"
This pick-me up counts, right?
I hope you'll feel inspired to go craft a spring card. Mami Doodles have been releasing a few digis for this month and they are just adorable. In the mean time, Happy Friday, everyone! Any exciting plans for the weekend?
I have to blog posts for you today, so if you're looking for the PaperPlay challenge card, scroll on down!
It is my favorite time of the month: a blog waltz with Waltzingmouse Stamps. I get to peruse a bunch of amazing projects all featuring some kind of Waltzingmouse Stamp set and be filled with so much inspiration. And if anyone knows Claire (headmouse of the Waltzingmouse Stamps Gang), you'll know that she's Irish. So guess what the theme for our March 17 Blog Waltz is? You got it - anything Irish!
In honor of this Blog Waltz Claire created an freebie so that everyone had something Irish to work with. My creation is also inspired by this week's Waltzingmouse Sketch - an indulgence that I don't get to satisfy enough 'cause of my ridiculous back and forth travels. Ahh - life as a consultant!
This was a really fun card to make, since this is the first year that I have felt the urge to really go make a point of honoring St. Patrick's Day. My stamping love started with Waltzingmouse Stamps (an Irish company). Recently I have been accepted as a DT member to the PaperPlay challenge group by the lovely Sandie, who is also Irish and resides in Ireland. The lovely creator of Mami Doodle Elisa (for whom I also design now) took a chance on me and she is a Irish resident :)
As you see, my luck this year is really with the Irish.
Thank you, Claire, for providing this amazing, fun digi! Here is a big cheer for celebrating St. Patty's Day!To many more... :)
It's time for another fun round of PaperPlay Challenge and I'm super excited about this week's theme. It is near & dear to me, because it's one of the first stamping techniques I tried at a friend's house and immediately fell in love with this technique. Super easy, not messy, and a great effect - it's like magic! I speak of Embossing of course!
This week we're sponsored by the talented Melissa Jenkins of Meljens Designs. Winner gets to choose *four* digital images, and if you haven't had a chance to spy at her blog, they are super cute! Whimsy & fun for any occasion.
My card spotlights "Ride Em Cowgirl" which I was instantly drawn to by it's fun cheerful expression. This stamp immediately reminded me of Jessie from Toy Story 2. May Meljen's version is a distant cousin...
This would make a fun invite, right? If I invited you with this card to spend an afternoon stamping & crafting with me, would you come? I promise not to make you wear a cowgal hat :)
Anyways, I wanted to repeat the swirly pattern outside the Label area and added my own "stitched" swirls and gold flecks on. A little pattern paper with a gingham pattern for good measure, and final embossing with my favorite (and first acquired) embossing folder. The sentiment was sort of a last minute addition and I thought that it looked best running along the right edge.
I must say that Digis are starting to grow on me. After landing my gig with PaperPlay challenges I am getting more exposure to various company sponsors that do offer up digis. So far none of the digis have really given me any grief (aside from my printer setting - Ah, my lil HP printer, how my love yet hate thee!), and the resolution and lines width are perfect!
Anyways, hope ya'll feeling a lil inspired and cheery to play along. How can you not, when looking at this darlin' lil cowgirl, right? See ya soon, Pardner!
Have you seen the latest and greatest Embellish Magazine Challenge? This posted just screams yummy from top to bottom. Two of my favorite things are on this poster: music & food, specifically these yummy macaroons.
This posted brought back a delicious memory of macarons that I had tasted about a year ago in San Francisco. Some of you might know the Ferry Building Market Place in San Francisco. Located inside is the most delightful little bakery and confectionary store called Miette. It is always rather difficult to choose which treat to go for, but in the end the Macarons are my go-to choice. Airy, light in texture, and full of bursting flavor is how i remember them.
Funny enough, I'll be in San Francisco soon enough to attend a wedding, so I might have to swing by and have another delightful bite! In the meantime, here is the aforementioned wedding's card that I have created, using the delicious inspiration mentioned above.
Stamps: (Musical Backgrounds, Victorian Alphabet) Waltzingmouse Stamps Paper: (Paper Basics Card Stock - Kraft, Dark Chocolate, Raspberry Fizz, Spring Moss, Plum Pudding) Papertrey Ink Ink: (Perfect Match Pigment Ink - Raspberry Fizz, Spring Moss, Plum Pudding) Papertrey Ink; (Versamark) Tsukineko Embellishments: (Perfect Pearls - Perfect Pearls, Super Fine Embossing Powder - Silver) Ranger; (Steel Dies - Signature Series: Butterfly ) Papertrey Ink
I stamped on the musical background onto the butterflies and decided to ink the edges of the butterflies with the matching inks. Each butterfly has a little gem in the middle to give it that little finish. Isn't it cute? I like how cheery they look.
To make the card a tad more special I decided to create a background of more musical notes onto the kraft and dusted with my Perfect Pearl. I love how it looks silvery on the the kraft - a little subtle shimmer to up the elegance on this spring wedding card!
To personalize this card, I decided to heat emboss the couple's name on here. A slow and tedious lining up process, but I'm pretty happy with the way it came out. I had all these nightmare of it turning out crooked and uneven since the brown card stock was horrible to line up.
Just crossing my fingers that the spring wedding pair will love it. If not, I'll go drown my misery in a Macaron ;) Do you have special memories of certain foods from your travels? If so, what are they?
This week ended with some devastating news hitting Japan. I have a cousin that lives there and I was worried stiff. I finally got hold of his brother to confirm that he has heard from him and he is alive and well. A few friends in Japan also posted up in Facebook that they were thankfully not hurt. I know that not everyone is fortunate enough to be able to breathe a sigh of relief and my heart & prayer goes out to them. This week I'd like to dedicate my Music Saves My Soul song selection to the everyone that is going through this disaster - be they near or far.
If you want to add a song to music blog hop, just hop on over to Marcea's blog and leave a song. In the meantime, if there are an prayer request, feel free to leave one in the comment or email me.
I decided to pull out my Roses in Bloom set and since I had felt staring at me, decided these would make perfect petals. The rest came together on its own...
I wanted to add a sentiment but didn't know where to place it. And after feeling a tad lazy and realizing I had no blank cards in my stash, I decided it was done.
In fact, I can always stamp the sentiment inside when I know what I need this card for, right? ;) Hope it tickles...
I am hanging out with my brother this weekend and we were eating with friends at "Honey Pig" - a fantastic restaurant for Korean BBQ. Price-tastic & great food. The pork belly is yummy-licious. So while we were enjoying these dishes, a song popped up and help set the fun upbeat mood. So here I am sharing this song for this week's Music Saves My Soul.
So I hope this song has you bobbin' the whole week through...I certainly will need it ;)
Happy Blog-o-birthday to You, Happy Blog-o-birthday to You,
Happy Blog-o-birthday to a Delightful Waste of Time Happy Blog-o-birthday to you!
(yes you can sing these words to the birthday song by adding a bunch of extra notes in there to take care of the extra syllables ;) I decided not to record and show you how it can be done, since I love and care for all your ears. And I do not want to inadvertently scare my lil wee readership away ;)
But yes, today is Meredith from A Delightful Waste of Time's Blog-o-birthday! So head over there and leave her some love and great wishes! She's been doing something amazingly fun - highlighting an inspiration in her crafty life every day and issuing a challenge to go along with it. So go look at them and play along :) And if the stories and fun is not enough - maybe a free stamp set is incentive enough :P
The challenge on Meredith's blog is to create some fun gift wrapping. I decided to make a little tag using Vintage Label One. The colors were chosen to match the little dimensional sticker. It almost looks a tad retro, don't you think? I had deliberately left off a sentiment, since Princess Leah (no not the one from Star Wars, but the one from Papertrey Princesses!) had set the next challenge: Don't use a sentiment, use a frame! and this is my attempt :)
Anyways, I hope Meredith approves and if you're reading this: it's been so fun to watch you grow. Your journey resonates with me so well, since I came in as a newbie crafter, too, a little less than a year ago. You were one of the few people to jump on board with the WMS RAK Pack, and your enthusiasm is what makes you so sweet! I'm so happy for you that you're part of Cr84fn Color Challenge family and Mona sure knows how to pick her gals :)
Life never stands still, which is great. It allows for new exciting things to happen. Some are bittersweet changes, other are just sheer exciting. I wanted to dedicate this card to a few special gals that have been sharing some of their blessings with me and I'm truly excited for them!
Many know how much of a Waltzingmouse Stamp lover I am. In fact, the one reason I've become a paper crafting addict was the warm and loving community that I found at the Waltzingmouse House and the weekly Waltzingmouse Sketch Challenges. If you are part of this community, you know that a special lil mouse has been running small but instrumental behind-the-scenes things: keep the sketch challenges going, reminding us of the waltzes, announcing winners, keeping the DTers on task (i think that's what a DT Coordinator does?). So when I heard about Lisa's departure on Claire's blog I was really sad. But reality is, life is full of changes and new opportunities arise. And from reading all the other words on the other DT blogs, there is something exciting brewing. So I can't wait to see what Lisa, aka previously known as the Mousekeeper, has in store for us! So this card is made in honor of my fond memories of Lisa!
Coincidentally if you have been paying attention to the Waltzingmouse group on Facebook, it's a very special person's blog-a-birthday. None other than Meredith from A Delightful Waste of Time. Meredith is one of the gals I met in the Waltzingmouse Forum that has also jumped at the opportunity of being part of our small, wee lil RAK Pack. She's running a fun little Birthday Bash of events over at her blog. Hop on over and join in on the fun - the more the merrier, right? And prizes are to be had!
Stamps: (Just the Ticket) Papertrey Ink Paper: (Key Ingredient Kit - Penelope's Potpourri) Taylored Expressions; (Card Stock Scrap Pack - Pink) Recollections Ink: (Momento - Tuxedo Black, London Fog) Tsukineko; Embellishments: (Multi-colored Twinkles) Taylored Expressions; (Steel Die - Just the Ticket Border) Papertrey Ink; (Pen - Black) Sharpie
This card is for Day 1's Birthday theme.
Forgive the horrible handwriting, but it was in honor of Meredith's blog, and thought it made more sense to write in the blog's name rather then Meredith's name. Heehee :)
You know two weeks have flown by when another PaperPlay Challenge is ready to go out and it is my turn to put something together. We are a friendly bunch of crafters who love to see your work! This week you could be the lucky winner to do shopping spree at Simon Says. With $15 I could buy a bunch of fun embellies, or several bottles of mists, or add to my distressed ink collection, or acquire a new stamp set. The choices are endless! All it takes is throwing in a card into this week's challenge to play along! This week's theme is Shabby Chic / Vintage.
Here my inspiration (be kind and don't laugh too hard).
If anyone knows me, I cringe at Shabby and Vintage. I had this blank stare at my crafting table, similar to this experience. So what did I do? Grab my trusty Vintage Photo and had a party inking up my card stock. I'm in love with the card stock in my Taylored Expression kit, since it has a tad of texture. The inking was actually just another form of procrastination, cause after that was done, I was thinking "Now what?"
So then I pulled a tea cup stamp and a doily, and procrastinated a tad longer with coloring my cup and distressing the doily with a sweet pink color (apologies for the photo, but the pink is too subtle to pick up). The doily looked to bright and clean, so I used a paper towel and inked it up with my gold, squishy pigment ink pad and "shabbied" up the doily. Now what?
Well there is always that misting addiction to quench! So out came the Calico White - another form of procrastinating. But oh so fun to flick specks of white onto the card!
At this point I have ran out of procrastinating material and decided to rummage my stash. After what seems many hours (but really only ten minutes), I found this fun dainty thread ribbon in my Key Ingredient ribbon stash. I mounted this delicate piece of ribbon onto a bigger, wider green/brown ribbon and decided to hang my tea cup at a whimsical angle. To tie the colors in a little better, I inked up the dainty ribbon with some Sugar Spun distress ink to match the doily. Can you see that slight pink sheen in the picture above?
After all that hard work (LOL) was done, the card still seemed "naked." The dangling teacup actually looked kind of depressing - so lonely, so empty, so abandoned. That's when my eyes caught the "Let's Have Tea" sentiment. And before anyone could blink twice, the sentiment was stamped onto the card to transform the sad lil' tea cup into a happy, inviting one. And that is how this little card came into creation, and why this little crafter is breathing a huge sigh of relief.
If you're still reading, thanks for doing so! I hope this was helpful for other crafters that feel as daunted by shabby & vintage as I do. It's a roadmap of my thoughts to show you that a non-shabby, non-vintage chick can attempt a shabby-vintage attempt and come out "not too shabby" after all - or so the dear PaperPlay sisters tell me. Or maybe they are just too nice to dampen my "E is for effort" spirit...;)
Another fun installment is being hosted at the Embellish Magazine Blog! And some changes to the DT are occurring. This will be the last challenge where we get to be inspired by Maile Belle's work on Embellish. It's really bitter sweet, since I really enjoy seeing her work here every other week.
However, things can't remain the same, if we want to allow for growth. Right? This opportunity allows for new talent to be spotlighted and Ashley has a great eye for picking the right gals! Cristina K has joined the team and I remember seeing many of her creations at the Embellish challenges - either as a winning design or a "What's Hot" spotlight. So I feel so lucky to be able to stalk her work now on a bi-weekly basis.
So I would like to dedicate this card's creation to Maile Belle.
This week I whipped my rather dusty Inkadinkado stamps out, that I used for a Christmas project back in 2009. The colors came together pretty quickly for me, especially cause I had enough foresight to purchase Mister Huey in a beautiful blue hue (Lunchtray). No questions asked - it had to fit in there somehow! I also had a toothbrush box (saved from a trip to Bangalore in 2008 - one can never have enough toothbrushes for cleaning or crafting!) made out of corrugated material. I have always found the texture fascinating and wanted to do something with it. Here is the card in a nutshell:
I initially had this idea of using the corrugated cardboard as tree bark, and started inking it up with Vintage Photo. I liked the distressed look on the edged and went to emphasize the uneven edges with my finger nail. (Super cool technique I learned from watching the talented Ashley in one of her Wednesday Tutorials.) The sky was created by playing with Mister Huey and I went for an uneven coverage - heavier on the left, lighter on the right.
I found a fun scrap piece of Basic Grey paper and knew I wanted to create some fun clouds with the pattern paper. Since I wanted to give the clouds some dimensions I swabbed some edges with my Papertrey Chai cube. This also blended the blue in better for the entire card's design - which was becoming more and more vintage-y. My bird was "colored" using Ranger Perfect Pearls. It has a gorgeous Copper and Bronze finish that shimmers in real life. The photo capture doesn't do it justice.
After playing around with some placement I opted to stick two letters from my leftover alpha stickers - that were conveniently available in the awesome shade of brown! Perfect for this challenge.
I was pleasantly pleased with this card, since it fell outside of my comfort zone. And I loads of fun creating this one! Will you be playing along?
