Sweet and Simple

I made this sweet little card for this week's challenge at Do it With Digis.  I get to be a guest Digi Diva over there occasionally.  The theme this week is fairies/pixies so I used one of the Prairie Fairy images -  Tippy Toe Fairy.  She's one of my favorite fairy images from the Prairie Fairy.  Her skin and hair were colored with Copics and I took a bottle of Liquid Pearls and an aqua painter and painted her dress and wings with Liquid Pearls.  It looks so pretty IRL.  Special Birthday Wishes are going out to Kirsty Vittetoe and the gang over at the City Crafter Challenge Blog.  The blog is celebrating its first birthday this week.  Congratulations on a fabulous first year and wishing you many more!

A little about what I have going on with this card.  The lovely DP is from the Ever After pack by Cosmo Cricket and miracle of miracles, I even managed to let some of it show through!  How do you like the doily lace?  I found a few packs of it and snatched them up to sell in my new Etsy shop.  It comes in strips three inches wide and 40 inches long.  It will work lovely for card making and scrapbooking!  You'll definitely be seeing more of it on upcoming cards!  And I had to add another of my fluffy crinoline flowers (tutorial) to which I added a hand folded seam binding rose as a center - I love the pop of color the pink gave.  In fact, I liked the pink so much I added a small seam binding bow and found some tiny paper flowers of the same color in my stash that worked perfectly to add a bit of decoration to the doily.  

The heart is from an old SU set - Gentler Times.  I stamped it on black CS with versamark and embossed it in white.  To finish the card off, I added a few black Kaiser pearls and a metal filigree butterfly.  I love using metal in my art so I've added metal filigree findings to what I am selling on my Funkie's Junk blog.  This sweet butterfly started life as an antique bronze.  But I wanted it black to coordinate with my card so I applied Adirondack Alcohol ink in Pitch Black with a felt pad.  I think it's so cool to be able to use  the alcohol inks to change the color of metals.  

That about wraps it up.  I hope you will stop over to the Do it With Digis blog and check out what the design team has created.  Thanks ever so much for stopping by today!

Challenges Entered:
City Crafter Challenge - Happy Birthday City Crafter
Charisma Cardz - Pink, Black and Green

Friends Forever

Good morning!  Hope you are having a great week.  Today I have a card to share that I made as a guest designer for Do it With Digis.  This is one of my favorite images from the Prairie Fairy called A Helping Hand and sentiment is from Sentiments 4 You.  The challenge this time at Do it With Digis is a really lovely sketch challenge.  The papers are Pink Pirouette and Close to Cocoa from Stampin' Up! and the pink/brown digital paper is from Summertime Designs - Happy Mother's Day kit (I darkened the brown pattern with my PhotoShop) and the green digital paper is from Barely Mine Designs Vintage set.  The newsprint from which I die cut the butterflies is Classified Ads from Whimsey Stamps and has become a favorite go to stamp for me.  Too bad the sweet little butterflies don't show up well against that busy DP background.  

I hope you will stop over to Do it With Digis to check out the beautiful work of the design team and maybe participate by using this beautiful sketch.  Thanks for stopping by today!

Challenges Entered:
Oh La La - For Someone Special
Digital Tuesday - Use a Die Cut
Flourishes Timeless Tuesday - Use Three Patterned Papers

Love You Forever

It's time to play with the fairies at Fairy Fun Friday.  This fortnight our challenge to you is In The Fine Print.  We want to see some printing on your card that is not part of the sentiment.  I made this tag for several challenges besides the Fairy Fun Friday.  I used the Fairy Love image again from Prairie Fairy that I think is so darling.  And more of my enameled flowers, which I am working on a tutorial for - check back later in the weekend for that.  I also used UTEE on the heart and banner, but not with the melting pot - just Versamarked them and applied two coats of UTEE.  The designer paper is digital from Raspberry Road printed on white CS and cut with a Spellbinder die.  Kraft CS was used with Chocolate Chip ink, the text was clear embossed and then more Chocolate Chip ink was sponged around the edges.  I also used a Prima flourish and text stamp in the lower left corner, after stamping off twice because it wanted it to be faint.  The image was colored with Copics and the wings hit with a little Stickles.

That's it on the dets for this one.  Hop on over to Fairy Fun Friday and see what the rest of the team has made and maybe even swing by their personal blogs and leave them some love.

Thanks for stopping by today.  Love you all!


Challenges Entered:
CR84FN Color Challenge:  Light Pink, Bright Pink and Chocolate

The Kraft Journal - Love
The Shabby Tea Room - Sweet Hearts
Tag Tuesday - Tag on a Tag
Try it On Tuesday - Hearts and Flowers
Sentimental Sundays - Happy Valentine's Day
Stamptacular Sunday - Hearts Gone Wild
Flourishes Bring Back Beautiful - The Beauty of Love
Flutterby Wednesday - At Least 3 Hearts
Simon Says Stamp - Anything But a Card
Cute Card Thursday - Hearts and Flowers
The StampMan - Hearts

Fairy Love

Hello everyone,

I'm so happy you stopped by today to see what I have to show you for our Fairy Fun Fridays challenge.  This week our challenge to you is to make something For a Sweetheart.  I was so lucky to receive this awesome fairy image to use for my card, along with the vintage heart lock, key and sentiment.  I believe they will be on sale at The Prairie Fairy later today.  

Here are some basic details on my card:

Images:  Key to My Heart and Vintage Lock and Key -  Prairie Fairy
Paper:  SU Always Avacado and Very Vanilla, Flourishes CS for the images

Ink:  Printer ink, Copics, Vintage Photo Distress Ink

Stamps:  Digital images from The Prairie Fairy, plus a text stamp that has a lot of love quotes that I won in a give-away and it has no name on it

Accessories:  Doily, Vintage Photo glimmer spray, Prima flowers and crystal flourish, lace from Jo-Ann's, crocheted lace from SU, bead caps ordered from eBay, Crystal Effects on the lock and key, Star Dust Stickles on fairies' wings

I absolutely LOVE this fairy image.  When you look at it uncolored, it looks kind of busy and hard to color, but it colored up beautifully and really didn't take long at all.  I want to use it again this Valentine's season so you haven't seen the last of this one!

Now hop on over to Fairy Fun Fridays to see what the rest of the team has to offer.  We have some new team members and I hope you will give them a warm welcome.  

Challenges Entered:

Order of the Opus Gluei - Key to My Heart

Paper Sundaes - De-stress with Distressing

City Crafter Challenge - Sew Fun!!

Flourishes Timeless Tuesday - Add Some Hardware

Tuesday Throwdown - Distressing

Fab 'n' Funky Challenges - Delight i n Your Digi

Little Red Wagon - Lace

Pixie Cottage - Sketch and/or Flowers

Charisma Cardz - Valentines/Love

A Cherry Blossom Birthday

Good morning!  I hope you are all well and surviving any recent snowstorms.  We're looking forward to a sunny weekend here in south Florida with temps in the mid 70's F and nights in the mid-50's - perfect winter weather!

This fortnight at Fairy Fun Friday, our challenge to you is to make a birthday card.  I used the Cherry Blossoms digital image from the Prairie Fairy to enhance my vintage card. It was colored with Copics.   I used the current sketch from the Shabby Tea Room to determine my layout.  The image, I believe, is from the Graphics Fairy.  The Happy Birthday label and the sentiment banner were both printed on my home printer.  They were sponged with Stormy Sky distress ink and dabbed with alcohol ink gold mixative (which I seem to be finding a lot of uses for lately).  The DP is digital and is from Raspberry Road.  The ribbon is (retired) from SU!, trim from Jo-Ann, used the Cuttlebug Script embossing folder and sponged almost everything with Antique Linen distress ink.

I think that's all the details, but feel free to leave me a question if you need further information or clarification.  As always, I appreciate your comments from the bottom of my heart.

Challenges Entered:

Flourishes - The Beauty of Vintage

The Shabby Tea Room - Sketch

The Stamp Man Challenge - Distressing

Wishing You a Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all of you who celebrate the sacred day and happy weekend to those of you who don't.  I'm here with our last post of 2010 for Our Creative Corner.  As we close out the year, I want to thank all of you for stopping by each week to see what I've been up to.  Your comments and support mean the world to me and your positive reinforcement letting me know that I actually can make worthwhile art projects have helped to keep me going throughout this past hyper-busy year.  I've had the privilege of serving on some fantastic design teams and have "met" some incredible women.  I know I don't get around to your blogs often enough, but you are all special to me - especially those of you who are regulars who I so enjoy hearing from.  So thank you from the bottom of my heart.  I hope the blogosphere has blessed you as much as it has me.  

Alright, so now on to this week's challenge at Our Creative Corner.  Our host, Sarah Gough, has challenged us to use felt, flocking, flocked paper or felt embellishments on our creations this week.  I am so into using textiles on my cards recently and loved this challenge immediately.  My felt is in the form of die (Cuttlebug/Spellbinders) cut snowflakes.  I used ivory felt and rubbed some Antique Linen Distress Stickles on them for a bit of bling.  And I seem to be very into kraft card stock recently.  I had forgotten how wonderful it is for that rustic country look.  How about this retro style image? I absolutely love it!  The Fairy Queen over at Prairie Fairy has just released it as a digital image and she's giving it away as a freebie on Christmas Day!  Hop over to her blog immediately and sign up to receive her posts and maybe you'll be in time to receive this awesome freebie.  

I'm not going to go into details as I think everything is pretty self-explanatory, but if you have questions just leave them in the comments and check back later for an update to the post.  Now I gotta get some sleep so Santa can come!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:
Fussy and Fancy Friday Challenge - Snow
If The Shoe Fits - Get Crafty
City Crafter Challenge Blog - Vintage Christmas

Shower of Stars

Good morning friends!  I hope your last work day of the week is off to a great start.  I'm sure it will be a busy weekend for everyone now that we are into the Christmas season.  This week at Fairy Fun Friday our challenge to you is "Use a Star".  That's a perfect theme for a Christmas card which I have made using one of the adorable Christmas Fairies from the Prairie Fairy (colored with Copics).  This one is called Holly Fairy and she comes with a poinsettia and sentiments.  My sentiment is from another Prairie Fairy Set called Candy Cane Fairy.  Check out all the wonderful seasonal digital images in the Prairie Fairy's store.  

I randomly stamped snowflakes using white craft ink on kraft card stock and paired it up with Cherry Cobbler.  A large snowflake "doily" was created by cutting five smaller snowflakes and adhering them to the back of a scaloped circle.  The stars were cut with a Sizzix die and embossed with Judi-Kins Egyptian Gold embossing powder.  I applied Antique Linen distress stickles to the felt star and the metal sentiment holder is from the Vanilla Hodgepodge Hardware from SU.  The distress stickles were also used on the fairy's wings.  

There you have it - a very simple card for this lovely challenge.  Can't wait to see what you will make using stars.  Stop by and visit us at Fairy Fun Friday.  Thanks for stopping and for your comments.  Have a great day!

Blessings & hugs,

Peace and Joy

What a long and exhausting week I have had - so much overtime and so little crafting time.  And way too long between posts!  So I am happy to be back today for Fairy Fun Friday with a card I made with one of the Prairie Fairy"s beautiful new digital Christmas images.  This one is called Christmas Doves and comes with a full set of sentiments too.  There are several other vintage type Christmas fairy sets available to so be sure to check out the Seasonal section of the store. 

Our challenge theme this wee is Buttons & Bows.  I decided  to go with a white-on-white theme for this card.  The edges of the bottom layer of white have been glittered with Star Dust Stickles and the next layer up embssed with the SU Petals A-Plenty embossing folder.  The die cuts that the doves are perched on and the sentiment is on are from the Spellbinders Shapeabilities Lattice set.  A label punch from SU was used to punch the vellum piece that  the sentiment is on and Stickles were lightly applied around the edge.  The buttons were embossed with silver EP and the Stickled flourish was cut with a BossKut die.  The fabric flower was made by cutting four shapes from crinoline with the Tim Holtz Tattered Florals die.  I wet it with plain water, scrunched it and dryed it with my heat tool, dabbed on a bit of glue here and there and sprinkled SU Dazzling Diamons glitter over it.  I've had that pretty clear plastic and silver button in my stash forever - knew someday I would find a use for it!  The flower sits atop a large bow made of white tulle - sorry you can't see it too well in the photo. 

Now that you 've seen my card, hop on over to the Fairy Fun Friday blog to see what the other design team members have to show.  I had a peek at some really beautiful samples that you are going to love!

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  Hope you have a marvelous day!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:
Crafty Cardmakers - Dry Embossing
Polycraft Monday Challenge - A Glittery Christmas
Digital Tuesday - Anything With Wings
Tuesday Taggers - Peace, Love and Joy
Tuesday Throwdown - Buttons and Bows
Crafts and Me Challenge - Glitter
CCEE Stampers - Buttons
MelJen's - Sparkle and Shine
PaperPlay Challenges - Let it Snow
If the Shoe Fits - Tickle Me with Tinsel
Paper Cutz - Lots of Bling
Top Tip Tuesday - Buttons Galore!

No Buttons or Bows - Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Guest Designer

Several weeks ago I received an email from Betty Wright asking if I would like to be this week's guest host at Flourishes Timeless Tuesday.  Would I....humm, let me see...only in my wildest dreams - LOL!!!  Of course, my fingers were shaking on the keyboard when I typed my acceptance!

And now it is time for Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge (FTTC90)!  It is the last Tuesday of the month when they have a guest challenge host.  This month's guest is YOURS TRULY!!!  I am challenging you to Anything Goes But Buttons and Bows.  There are so many wonderful embellishments to use for accents on our paper crafts, but all too often we fall back on our old favorites.  This week, let's stretch ourselves and see how creative we can be embellishing our cards.  We want to see what you can do without using buttons or bows.  Keep in mind that ribbon is still allowed along with lace and twine.  It's the bows and the buttons that are not.  We'd love to see what you create!

Flourishes has so many gorgeous stamps, but I am very partial to their fruit stamps.  I chose to work with the largest bunch of cherries from the Cherries and Peaches set.  In keeping with my autumn mindset, I kept the colors dark, rich earth tones.  And of course, I made it in my signature style - distressed vintage!  My main panel, layered over several pieces of K&Co. DP, is Flourishes Classic White cardstock, which I love for coloring with Copics.  The image was stamped in Memento ink and colored with  Copic markers. Then it was masked and a script stamp was overstamped in Old Paper DI.   I randomly embossed a mixture of UTEE/Heirloom Gold Perfect Pearls to give it just a hit of gold tone.  All of my main embellishments were cut with dies from Flourishes Classic Ivory cardstock, sponged with Antique Linen DI and then double embossed with clear UTEE.  I was going for sort of a country enamel look, which I think I achieved.  The flower was handmade and dyed with several colors of inks to try to match the cherries.  The jewely end caps were squashed into a Versamark pad and then gold embossed.   

Inside Panel With Space To Write

The inside panel has also been finished off leaving a blank panel to write a special message.  I stamped the cherries again in Antique Linen and the script very lightly with Old Paper. 

I hope you will stop by the Flourishes blog as well as the other designers personal blogs.  I'm so excited to be working with this elite group of designers this week! 

Dee

Silke

Maki

Betty

Barbara

Cindy

Thanks for stopping by to share my little bit of excitement this morning.  Have a great day!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:

Sentimental Sundays - Distressing with a sentiment on the front

Charisma Cards - Vintage

Alphabet Challenge - Z is for Zig Zags

Frosted Designs - Let's See Your Die Cuts

Thankful for Fishing!

It's another Fairy Fun Friday and I'm here to share my design team card with you.  Our challenge to you this fortnight is "Tag or Ticket".  You can make a card with a tag or ticket or simply make a tag.  You don't have to use a Prairie Fairy digital image, but we love it when you do!  We just hope you will play along with us in this fun challenge.

I got a bit carried away with layers on my card - eight in all and that's just on the outside.  I finished off the inside with another five layers.  This is such a heavy and rich-feeling card.  I decided to to a little fancy work with a Spellbinders border die, cutting four borders and piecing them together and assembling them on a square of Close to Cocoa CS.  That was followed by a double layer of CS and DP popped up on a layer of craft foam.  Then on top of that another double layer consisting of CS and CP, both upper panels stitched together.  I used the SU photo corner punch, which I dragged out of the bottom of my equipment drawer, and subjected the corners to the same UTEE/Perfect Pearls random embossing that I have used on my last two Prairie Fairy cards.  I guess I'm getting into a rut with that, but I really like how it looks and think it makes an excellent masculine style embellishment.  The image is a Prairie Fairy digi, printed on Flourishes white CS and colored with Copics.  I was experimenting with creating a sunset sky with the dots and blobs I've been using, but really didn't like it until I sponged with with Creamy Caramel ink to give it some distressing.  That filled in all the light areas, blurred and mellowed the sky and now I am quite happy with it - LOL.

I took the time to finish off the inside of the card with coordinating DPs, styles and embellishments.  I stamped the SU stamp Give Thanks on the tag, but if I decided not to use it for Thanksgiving, I can change out the tag and make it a birthday or some other occasion card.

So that's my card for Fairy Fun Friday this time around.  I hope I have inspired you to play along with the design team and will look forward to seeing your entry into our challenge!  I hope you will take time to visit the blogs of the other designers too. 

Products Used:
Stamps:  Gone Fishin' by the Prairie Fairy, SU Holiday Best (for sentiment) and leaf flourish is Inkadinkado
Paper:  SU CS - Naturals White, Close to Cocoa and Always Artichoke, Flourishes White CS for main panel and digital DP from Little Scrap Garden, Kallee paper pack
Ink:  Versamark, Copics, Vintage Photo and Creamy Caramel for distressing, Walnut Stain DI for stamping
Accessories:  Spellbinders Lattice Borderabilites, Labels One Nestabilities, SU Photo Corner Punch, SU brad, jewelry spacers, gold half pearls from Michaels

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  I do so appreciate your comments.

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:
Stamptacular Sunday - Layer It Up
Oh La La Creations - Nothing Floral
Dutch Dare Card Challenge - Tagalicious
All That Scraps - Manly Cards

Beautiful Fall Colors

Oh, the colors of fall.  Can any other season truly compare?  Such a beautiful time of year and we are celebrating the season this week at Our Creative Corner. It's a new month and we have a new hostess, Diane Gilbert of My Little Stampin' Spot.  She has a beautiful fall color challenge for us.  Use the colors Old Olive, More Mustard, Cajun Craze and Early Expresso or the closest match you have.  For my card, I substituted Really Rust for Cajun Craze and Chocolate Chip for Early Expresso (note to self:  be sure to order the new SU colors!).  While I was noodling ideas for this week's card, I happened to stop by Isabella's Sketchbook and lo and behold, Isabella has some new fall digital images that are splendid!  That made me very happy because I seem to be bored with all my existing fall images.  You gotta love the instant gratification of purchaing digis too.  In all of about 2 minutes I was printing this delight and ready to color it up. 

The image was colored with Copics and UTEE with some Heirloom Gold Perfect Pearls mixed in was randomly embossed around the edge then Vintage Photo DI was sponged over it.  The border flourish and sentiment are from the Celebration of Thanks set by Verve.  The leaf is a Cuttlebug die that I had fun dying with Old Olive and Really Rust with a little Perfect Pearls/DI mixture spritzed on for glimmer.  I really love the way this one came out.  I think the image is gorgeous and I was so pleased with the way it colored up. 

So have you already stopped by Our Creative Corner to see what they other designers have for your beautiful fall colors inspiration?  If not, hope you will take time to stroll through their cards and enjoy the crisp fall feeling they provide. 

Products Used:

Stamps:  Apples & Pumpkins by Isabella's Sketchbook, Celebration of Thanks by Verve

Paper:  Really Rust, More Mustard, Old Olive, Chocolate Chip, DP is Auturm Thyme Again Add On Pack (currently a freebie) (andI changed the color slightly in PSE to make it more of a mustard color)

Ink:  Walnut Stain and Vintage Photo distress inks, Versamark

Accessories:  Vintage Wallpaper Embossing Folder from SU, Spellbinders Tag Die and Mega Rectangles, Cuttlebug Leaf Die, Old Olive Ribbon rom SU, Tim Holts mini safety pin, hemp rope, Ultra Thick Embossing Enammel, Heirloom Gold Perfect Pearls, Vintage Photo reinker

Thanks so much for stopping by and for all your wonderfully encouraging comments.  Wishing you a wonderful fall weekend!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:
Sentimental Sundays - Let's See Some Dimension
Stamptacular Sunday - Seasons Change
Incy Wincy - I Wonder What it Could Be (anything goes)
Ditital Tuesday - Thank You/Give Thanks + a digi
Tuesday Taggers - Here Comes Autumn
For Fun Challenges -  Fall, No Halloween
Simon Says Stamp - It's Autumn
If the Shoe Fits - Orange
Stampin' for the Weekend - Autumn Inspiration
Flourishes Timeless Tuesday - Fall/Harvest theme using the colors of green, brown, orange/russet and cream
Speedy the Cat Friend's Challenge - Buttons & Bows

Harbor Gulls

Isn't this a wonderful image? It's a new digital image from The Prairie Fairy called Harbor Gulls. I was so pleased at how it looked when colored with Copics. I thought the image was striking enough that it didn't need a lot of embellshments so I kept it pretty plain. Our challenge theme this week at Fairy Fun Friday is Embossing. I used both heat and dry embossing on this piece. Heat embossed was the map stamp on the frame and with clear ultra thick embossing powder around the parimeter of the base layer. Everything else is pretty self-explanatory, but if you have any questions, just leave a comment and I will update this post with the response.

Products Used:
Paper: SU Natural and Not Quite Navy CS, Digital DP Coming Home pack from Little Scrap Garden (looks like it is no longer available - couldn't find a link)
Accessories: SU Word Window Punch, Top Note die and brass brads, Cuttlebug Tiny Bubbles and Distressed Stripes embossing folders

Thanks so much for stopping by today. Have a great day!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges entered:

City Crafter Challenge Blog - One for the Boys

Prairie Fairy Blog Hop & New Digi Release

WELCOME,
to the PRAIRIE FAIRY BLOG HOP and
DIGITAL RELEASE PARTY!

If you came here from Kelly's Kreative Korner then you are on the right track! If not, please head on over to the PRAIRIE FAIRY BLOG because you don't want to miss out on all the fun offers and prizes and the rules at the beginning of the hop!

What's up for grabs??? Well not only is the Prairie Fairy offering up some yummy candy at her blog, she is going to be giving out digital prize packs to some lucky winners worth $15 each! That's right you could win the newly released images! There are multiple prizes so make sure you start at the Fairy's blog so that you don't miss out on how and what you can win!

If you get lost along the way, here is the hop list:

Carla
Corry
Hege
Kelly
Lori
Margreet
Sue
Suzi
Terry
Tonya
Trisha
Viv
Deonna (guest designer Aug)
Debs R (guest designer this week)

The hop ends at FAIRY FUN FRIDAYS challenge blog where you will hear some new announcements and if you enter a card in the challenge you will get an extra entry into the draws and if you use a Prairie Fairy image on your creation you will get another entry! The challenge this week is to use PEARLS AND LACE on your card. Be sure to visit all the DT's blogs as there are prizes at stake if you do, and we all love comments! Here's what I am giving out for my blog candy. Just leave a comment and I will do a random drawing on Friday, September 10th. (Basic Grey 6x6" Euphoria paper pad, Hero Arts Pearls and Gems, Jolee's tiny flowers, 2 clear mini stamps and a set of Daisy D's embellishments.)

Card Details:

Stamps: The Lighthouse by the Prairie Fairy, shells are stamped from a Flourishes set

Paper: Night of Navy, next level up is SU Natural stamped with an old map stamp in Memento Tuxedo Black and spritzed with my new fav embellie a solution of water, one dropperful of Vintage Photo ink and a craft stick scoop of Heirloon Gold Perfect Pearls. Combine everything together in a Mini Mister and mist away. Next layer up (blue) is a digital paper printed at home and after that a piece of the map paper from the K&Co. Sea Glass pad that I printed other Prairie Fairy nautical images on in black Too bad you can't see them - LOL! Again I spritzed with the Vintage Photo mix.

Accessories: Copic markers, cheese cloth spritzed with the Vintage Photo mix, Crystal Effects, Martha Stewart Pearls, Top Note Die, SU Corner Punch

We are so glad you joined us and hope to see your entry at the challenge blog! From here, just hop on over to Suzi's blog.

Update: A reader asked about a tutorial for the clouds. I used Annika Ryan's tutorial for the clouds. Her colors were a little to turquoise for me so I toned it down a bit with more gray (C1) and blue/gray (BV20 and B60) and then blended in a bit of pink (not sure but I think it was RV000 and V000). Also, while Annika advised to go up and down with her strokes, I went over mine several times with choppy horizontal strokes. Basically, I just played around with it until I got it to look like I thought it should. I also have good luck using an almost dry blender pen (0), picking up color from another maker and then applying with the blender pen. If it gets too dry, I add a couple of drops of clear blender solution to the tip, but I don't fill up the entire marker.

Challenges Entered:

Raise the Bar - The Hut (any kind of dwelling)

Just Add Ink - Just Add Material (mine is cheese cloth)

Punch it Up at Fairy Fun Friday

Hello friends, thank you so much for stopping by today to check out my sample for Fairy Fun Friday. This week, we want you to show us how you can embellish your work using punches. There are so many wonderful punches to choose from these days and we're excited to see all the variety that will be entered into this challenge. For my card, I used a Marth Stewart punch, nothing to jazzy this week. I had planned on doing something a little more special, but honestly when I finished coloring this image, I really wanted to let it take the center stage. Isn't it gorgeous? It's brand new digital image from The Prairie Fairy. I don't think it is even in her store yet, but it will be very soon. I was a bit nervous to color it because I usually don't have good luck coloring watering cans. But this colored up beautifully and I was very pleased with the result. I love the overall color palette, especially the designer paper. I think it looks very Old World, maybe with a slight French flavor to it.

Products Used:
Stamps: Digital image from The Prarie Fairy, sentiment stamp from Tim Holtz, Stampers Annoymous, SU Floral background stamp
Paper: DP from Raspberry Road, SU CS in River Rock and Chocolate Chip, Flourishes White CS for the image
Ink: Copics, Old Paper, Creamy Caramel, Vintage Photo
Accessories: Spellbinders dies for the die cuts and the handmade flowers, large brad from Michael's, bead cap from eBay, Versamark, clear EP, spiral clip from SU HodgePodge Hardware, Tim Holtz Antique Linen Distress Stickles

I hope you will stop by Prairie Fun Friday to see what the other designers have created this week. And maybe you could stop by their blogs to see more of their wonderful work.

♥Margreet - Margreet's Scrapcards ♥Suzi - Sugar n Spice♥Viv - Crafting Haven♥ Hege-Annie - Hege-Annie's Paper {He}Art++ ♥Ann - Raindrop Echo Designs ♥Carla - Carla's Corner ♥Corry - Fancy Free 4Ever ♥Lori - Just Ducky ♥Kelly - Kelly's Kreative Korner♥Trisha - T-Bear's Touch ♥Sue - Arty's♥

Thanks so much for stopping by today! I sincerely appreciate your comments. Have a wonderful weekend!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:

Polycraft Monday Challenge - In Stitches

The Pink Elephant - Ribbons & Sparkles

Paper Romance Challenge - Metal Heads

Res-Q-Challenge - Time for Some Therapy (mine is vintage!)

Stamp Something - August Digi Day

It's a Beach Thing!

Hello and happy weekend to you! Any beach plans in your weekend agenda? That's the challenge theme this week at Our Creative Corner. Isn't this an idyllic scene? Even though I live in Miami, I am not a beachgoer. My kids are and I am glad that they do take advantage of our wonderful beaches in the area. I'm more of a pool person myself and do intend to log some pool hours this weekend if the weather cooperates.

Here's my take on the beach challenge. I really love the bright tropical colors in the DP I found to use (Lost at Sea by Designer Digitals). The stamp used is from the By the Sea set by JustRite Stampers and was colored with Copics. The sentiment was computer generated. All edges were sponged with Creamy Caramel and the stitching was done by hand again (since my sewing machine is in the repair shop!). The CS is Tempting Turquoise and Barely Banana from SU and the shells were cut with a Cuttlebug Die. Spellbinders Ovals and the Labels Four dies were also used.

I hope you will stop by Our Creative Corner and also the blogs of the rest of the team. Lots of yummy eye candy to see this week!

♥Wendy Jensen♥Dana Grothaus♥Diane Gilbert♥Jennifer Meyer

♥Julie LeBlanc♥Sarah Gough♥Lori Rider♥

Thanks so much for dropping by today. I wish you a wonderful weekend!

Challenges Entered:

Bizzy Bec's Creatalicious - Show Some 3-D

Paper Romance - Stitch it Up

Twisted Thursdays - Water, Waves, Wetness

If the Shoe Fits - Take a Vacay

Just Add Ink - Just Add...Embossing

Allsorts - Summer Days

Lexi's Creations - Stitching

Lots to Do - Stitches

Secret Crafter - Summer Holidays

Wee Memories - Summer Fun

It's a Boy Thing!

Yay, it's Friday! And that means another challenge from Prairie Fairy! That's right, hop on over to Fairy Fun Friday and check out the challenge and the DT inspiration. The challenge is "For the Boys". That's right, we always need more guy cards! I made mine pretty generic. It could be used for a birthday or some other occasion. I think it would be great just for inspiration for a young man. I was thinking of sending it to my son who had his 27th birthday last week. I was on vacation and never got a card made for him. This could be a belated birthday card. I think he would like it and I was thinking of him while I was creating this card.

Before I left for vacation, I was trying to alter a bathing suit I had purchased that didn't fit just right and I BROKE MY SEWING MACHINE. Can you imagine? The first time I have tried to sew on cloth in probably two years and the cloth was too thick. I heard a bad "thunk" and then the needle wouldn't go all the way down. I worked on it awhile last night to no avail so I ended up stitching this card by hand using some old, old crochet thread from my grandmother's sewing box. I actually like the way it turned out - very rustic looking but it is NOT something I want to do all the time. I dropped the machine off today at a local repair shop and am hoping to get it back in a week or so.

After using cork for the OCC challenge last week, I fell in love with it and here it is again! I think you may see it frequently until I get sick of it! It's really great for embellishing male-oriented cards. It adds some pizzaz without being girly. The image is called Pokin Puddles by the Prairie and the sentiment is from Raindrop Echo Designs. The image was colored with Copics and cut out with a Spellbinders label die. The cardstock and twill tape are from SU, the DP from Cosmo Cricket and the stars DP was someting from a local craft shop that I purchased about 10 years ago. The buttons are from Jo-Ann's and the brad from SU.

Here are the blog links for the Fairy Fun Friday design team. I hope you will pay them a visit this week and let them know how fabulous their work is! And be sure to stop by the blog and play along with us this week!

♥Margreet - Margreet's Scrapcards

♥Suzi - Sugar n Spice

♥Viv - Crafting Haven

♥ Hege-Annie - Hege-Annie's Paper {He}Art++

♥Ann - Raindrop Echo Designs

♥Carla - Carla's Corner

♥Corry - Fancy Free 4Ever

♥Lori - Just Ducky

♥Kelly - Kelly's Kreative Korner

♥Tonya - Stamp Happens

♥Trisha - T-Bear's Touch

♥Sue - Arty's♥

Thanks for stopping by. Hope you have a relaxing, sun filled weekend!

Challenges Entered:

Incy Wincy Designs - Distress It

My Time to Craft - Butterfly Bliss

Tuesday Throwdown - Stitching

Flutter By Wednesday - Use 3 layers and a fairy, angel or butterfy

Dare You to Digi Stamp - Stitching

Res-Q-Challenge - Don't be anemic, eat a hamburger (use red)

Stamp Something - Something Digital (both the image and sentiment are digital)

C.R.A.F.T. Challenge - Babies/Children

Posies 'n Punches

Hello and happy Wednesday! I'm so glad to be back among my blogging buddies! I was away for another long weekend in Key West. This was family weekend with all my DH's sisters and their DHs. Too many people and too fast-paced to be relaxing, but it was still great to spend time with the family. But now I am back -no more long weekends until the fall football season rolls around. I'm just starting to get back into the card-making groove and have a lot to catch up on.

I managed to get this card finished for this week's Isabella's Sketchbook challenge before I left so it was already "in the can". Our challenge this week is another easy one - use punches. I have been fascinated lately by Becca Feeken's amazing use of punches amd wanted to try more of her right angle punching. So I made this two-layer element according to her video tutorial and a Martha Stewart corner punch. I thought it was too plain so I wrapped it with vintage crinkled seam binding and added buttons. The image, Flower Song, is relatively new in Isabella's boutique. I decided to give it a vintage flavor with the retired Parisian Summer SU papers and Creamy Caramel sponging. It was colored with Copics and the sentiment was made up on my computer, which was then cut with a Spellbinders tag die. Let me know if you need any more information on anything here.

Now that you've had a peek at my DT card, I hope you will stop by the rest of the teams' blogs and pick up a little inspiration.

♥Annika♥Cec♥Diana♥Jackie♥Linda♥Lisa♥Peggy♥Peri♥Randi♥Sharon♥Sue♥Viv♥

Thanks so much for stopping by today and for any comments you care to leave.

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:
Mark's Finest Papers - Use Punches
Paper Sundaes - Lots of Layers
Papertake Weekly - In the Garden
Stampin' Bees - Polka Dots

Truly Scrumptious - How Does Your Garden Grow?

Your Next Stamp - Flower Power

For Fun - Use Your Fav Coloring Medium - no die cuts as main image

Cork-a-Doodle-Do

Good morning, friends! Isn't this a wonderful wake-up call? I sincerely love this rooster from Isabella's Sketchbook. But first let's talk about the really cool challenge this week over at Our Creative Corner. Our fab hostess (and blog owner), Jennifer Meyer, has a wonderful challenge for us - use cork on your card. What a blast I had using this new media! The cork I purchased was from Michael's and came in sheets for around $7 a pack. It is very thin and works perfectly with your die cut machines. I started with this wonderful Rise and Shine image from Isabella's Sketchbook and the found a perfect match in a sentiment from Raindrop Echo Designs. (Don't you just love it when everything just seems to fall into place?)

There's not a lot more I can tell you about this card, but here goes. The digital image was colored with Copics on Flourishes card stock. The hearts were cut with a Cuttlebug die and the cork wings were traced on the cork from a Tim Holtz Grundgeboard set (I had already used the wings so I traced from the negative impression) and cut out. I honestly don't remember where the winged heart brad and the feather charm were from. The DP is again from a fav digital DP seller Designer Digitals. I'm sure there are lots of other details so if I have missed anything that you are dying to know, please leave a comment and I will update this post with the answer.

This type of funky collage card art is one of my favorites so I had a great time playing around with it. Now I hope you will stop by Our Creative Corner and see that the other designers have made to inspire you to use cork. And maybe you could stop by their individual blogs too. Here's their links to make it easy!

♥Wendy Jensen♥Dana Grothaus♥Diane Gilbert♥Jennifer Meyer

♥Julie LeBlanc♥Sarah Gough♥Lori Rider♥

Thanks again for stopping by. Hope to see you over at Our Creative Corner!

Blessings & hugs,

Challenges Entered:

Charisma Cardz - Watch the Birdie

Dare You to Digi - The Great Outdoors

Digi Doodle Shop's Best - Texture

Fresh Brewed Designs - Summertime

My Crafting Partner in Crime - Summertime

Craft Your Passion - Stitching

Artful Inkables - Stitching

Pretty Peacock

Hello and welcome to another Saturday with Our Creative Corner. It's my last week to be hostess. I've had a blast this month coming up with the challenges and I hope you have enjoyed them too. This week, our sponsor is Isabella's Sketchbook, one of the design teams I represent. I'm sure you know that Isabella has over 250 beautiful digital images over at her store and she will be giving three imges to the random winner of this week's challenge.

Our challenge this week is to keep our cool and chill out using the cool colors of blue and green. I selected this Peacock digital image to work with this week. I thought the image was perfect for this color challenge of blue and green. In the neighborhood where I live, we have several flocks of peacocks roaming around, but we rarely see a male with his gorgeous tailfeathers spread. They mostly just drag them around. But when you do see the rare display, it is truly stunning it its beauty. I came home to find one large tailfeather in my driveway the other day and picked it up to use to match up the colors. I know this is a pretty simple card for me, but I thought the colors, DP design and the punch design all worked together so beautifully to support the peacock motiff. The DP is digital from Pretty Petticoat. I scanned the Brilliant Blue and Green Galore into my PSE and changed the colors on the DP to match exactly. And luckily I had the exact colors in Copic markers to color the iamge. So everything just sort of fell together for this card. The bow is a la (the incredibly talented and generous) Becka Feeken. You can check out her amazing tutorial here on making a Collar Bow.

That's pretty much all the details for this card. I hope you will pop on over to Our Creative Corner to see the other beautiful work by our design team.

♥Wendy Jensen♥Dana Grothaus♥Diane Gilbert♥Jennifer Meyer

♥Julie LeBlanc♥Sarah Gough♥Lori Rider♥

Thanks for spending your Saturday morning with me. Hope to see you again next week. Have a wonderful weekend!

Blessings & hugs,

Happy Travels

Hello and welcome to my Wednesday post for Isabella's Sketchbook. This week our challenge theme is Summer Fun. And what could be more fun in the summer than the annual summer vacation. So I am celebrating my week in Key West with this Happy Travels card.
I used the Suitcase Stack digital image from Isabella's Sketchbook. I just love the retro flair it has to it. I stamped the Creamy Caramel panel with the large palm tree from the SU Balmy Breezes set (retired) in Chocolate Chip and Versamark and then clear embossed it. The DP is a very light print with many travel icons on it, a digital paper from Designer Digitals called Journey Home. I created my little luggage tag with the SU tag punch, a buckle from the Hodge Podge Hardware set and a bit of narrow grosgrain black ribbon. The Bon Voyage sentiment is computer generated and the globe stamped on it is from Crafty Secrets. The ribbon and black brads are from SU and the bottom mat on the image panel is the picket fence border punch from Martha Stewart.

I hope you will stop by the challenge blog and maybe even enter this week. All you need to do is use an Isabella's image and follow the challenge theme. You have a great chance of winning 2 of her wonderful digital images plus the gorgeous "I Won" badge for your blog! And while you are at it, stop by the DT blogs and leave them some love.

♥Annika♥Cec♥Diana♥Jackie♥Jennifer♥Linda♥Lisa♥Peggy♥Peri♥Randi♥Sharon♥Sue♥Viv♥

As always, I am deeply appreciative of your stopping by and of any comments you care to leave. Hope you are having a wonderful week!

Blessings & hugs,