Thinking of You

This is for my friend Carmen, whose middle daughter (14 years old) was diagnosed with leukemia three days before Christmas.  Stressful to get that news anytime, but it seems all the more stressful this time of year.  Their family celebrated Christmas at the hospital in between treatments.  Luckily the prognosis is very good.

Laura Bassen is teaching an online class at Craftsy and one of her sample cards uses this background stamp in basically the same colors.  I just bought the same stamp while I was in Hawaii before Christmas, so I wanted to try it out.  I fussy cut the curves to enter it in CAS(E) this Sketch #104.

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

Papertrey December Blog Hop Challenge - 3

This is my third entry into the PTI December Blog Hop and my favorite of the three.  Same stamp and inks - one image stamped in Gold Delicata ink, a second embossed with silver and a third embossed in platinum. I made a mask so the the stripes are even thinner for this one and added some gold splatters. It's very CAS and very shiny in real life!

I'll enter this one into CAS(E) this Sketch #104 as well.

Thanks so much for Looking,
Karen

Papertrey December Blog Hop Challenge - 2

This is my second entry into the PTI December Blog Hop.  I used the same Random Stripe Set as my first card but masked it off to make it thinner.  I stamped in gold Delicata ink then stamped offset a second time with Versamark embossed with silver for both the stripes and the sentiment.  This gives the sentiment a kind of 3D look. I added a strip of gold shimmer paper under the stamped stripes to ground them.

I'm also entering this into CAS(E) this Sketch #104. 

Thanks so much for Looking,
Karen

Papertrey December Blog Hop Challenge

This is my first time doing the PTI blog hop.  This month we are to use both gold and silver on the same project.  This New Year's card is very basic -  Random Stripes stamed once with gold Delicata ink pad, stamped a second time embossed in silver then a third time embossed in platinum (which I think is a delicious combo of gold and silver).

Edited Dec 28 - The fab Kimberly Wiener sent me a link to a (new to me) challenge that this card is perfect for, so in it goes to Stampin' Celebration challenge. Thanks Kimberly!

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

Congratulations

Okay, so I had to get one more challenge in before I leave for Hawaii, although...my mind is mulling over more ideas so there may be another "one more", who knows.

A super quick and easy card (a queasy card...no, that doesn't sound right!) for CASology this week where the cue card is Silver.  I cut a 1/4"  off the side of the front panel of my card, then stamped and silver embossed the SSS sentiment and PTI's Random Stripes above and below the sentiment.  The hearts are a punch that I stacked three times with silver thread looped together and attached between the layers.  A gem on each heart and a strip of red on the edge of the back panel and it's all done! I will also throw it into Simon Wednesday Challenge as it has some bling on it.

Edited Dec 25: Happy my card received an Honorable Mention for CASology! 

Many years ago, a good friend of mine got married on New Year's Eve, the ceremony was at 11:30pm.  It was a black tie affair with only about 12 of us attending.  I think it was the most fun I've ever had on New Year's.  That New Year's eve wedding is the inspiration for this card.

Thanks so much for Looking and if this is my last post before Christmas then Merry Christmas to everyone!

Karen

Celebrate the Season

This is a card I made a while ago that I really love.  I smooshed watercolor paper into distress inks then partial die cut PTI's Freshly fallen snowflakes.  Then I masked off the die cut portion and embossed the matching stamp on the watercolor portion. I curled up the die cut portion slightly to give it some dimension then embossed a stripe across the top and the sentiment (PTI) in classic pewter EP.

 I'm lucky enough to be leaving for Hawaii on Friday, so this is likely my last chance at challenges before Christmas.  I may as well make it worthwhile!   I'm going to put it in for Curtain Call, Less is More, AAA Cards, Time Out CASEing Amy Wanford (three snowflakes), and SSS Wednesday Challenge.  

Edited Dec 25: I'm happy to have received an Honorable Mention for my card at Time Out!

 

                                                                                                                                  

Thanks so much for Looking!

Karen

Happy Christmas

Curtain Call Challenge has Winnie & Walter as a new sponsor!  I love W & W!  I used an image from their Scenery: Rectangled & Triangled to watercolor a little panel in the green and blue from the inspiration image.  You might think that Happy Christmas is an unusual phrase, but it's more common that Merry Christmas in the U.K. (that and the fact that I don't have the Big, the Bold & the Merry yet may be a factor in why I went with Happy).  The blue background paper isn't really that bright IRL, it amazes me how some colors look so different on camera. I'm also putting this in for SSS Wednesday Challenge where the challenge is Christmas/holidays.

                                  

I topped off the watercolors with glossy accents to get more of that clear part of "Clearly Christmas" and the sentiment is embossed with lovely shiny silver EP.  The Christmas stamp is PTI.

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

believe

I really like the challenges at CASology and The Card Concept (clean and layered) that end today,  so I made another card last night.  Luckily it also fits in nicely with the challenge that started today at Merry Monday!


                                       


I blended SSS Beanstalk Green across the center of my cardstock then spritzed with Heidi Swapp gold color shine.  It looks muddy in this picture but shimmers nicely IRL.  Then I made a bunch of banners using a PTI Sketched Shapes die.  I stamped the large circle image from the Sketched Shapes stamp set in 2 directions with Antique Linen DI over the kraft flags to get a burlap look then swiped the edges in Frayed Burlap DI.  The letters (Lawn Fawn Clarks ABC's) were stamped with Barn Door DI.  Those are layered onto the red flags using glue dots then mounted across the green (also using glue dots - it looks like it has a lot of dimension in the photo but it is actually quite flat).

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

joy & peace

CAS(E) this Sketch  is on sketch #100 and it's a great one!  I stayed pretty true to the sketch layering up both the big solid chevron and the big outline chevron from W&W. 

Supplies:

Stamps: W&W, PTI

Inks: SSS Maliblue, HA Tide Pool, PTI Hawaiian Shores.

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

Colorful Christmas Tree!

 

 
This weeks  MUSE challenge has a great graphic tree. 













CASology's cue card is Festive so it fits in with that too.

 

I love the shape of the tree so I copied it but I wanted to add color in a different way.  For that, I took inspiration from this weeks Make it Monday to stamp an Ombre background.  A submission by Lesley really caught my eye so I CASEd it but used it for my focal point and not the background.  I made the card just 3.5" wide since it's such a skinny tree.  I think it makes for a very non-traditional, but really cute tree!  I put some dots of glossy accents on it to mimic ornaments.

Supplies:
Die - SSS hourglass die
Stamps - PTI
Inks - PTI & Hero Arts
Other - Glossy Accents









I die cut a few of the trees out of the paper I inked up.  Here is another card I made with the rest.

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

Mixed Media Tag

 

Oh, this is so far out of my comfort zone!  I lean to the CAS side of card making so this is a bit of a stretch for me.  I've been following along with Stamping with Loll's  Twelve Tags of Christmas and loving all of them, dreaming that I could force myself to layer things, splatter things, cut things and add things.  This is my attempt.  I first made a very clean version of this about 13 years ago, and it's probably been done to death,  but I think it's so cute and it was something familiar to "add to". 

I was happy to find a gold pop tab in amongst my silver ones to use as Santa's belt buckle!

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

Ombre for an Hombre

Make It Monday is a fun one this week - Ombre backgrounds.   

If you get the colors right they look great and are fairly quick to make.  I used the Sketched Shapes stamps and die with Spring Moss, Simply Chartreuse, Limeade Ice and Harvest Gold inks.  

The bottom of the white panel is pretty mangled, my cutting blade was getting dull and starting to shred my paper.  While changing the blade I sliced my finger on the new one!  I was so distracted with the blood and the band-aid that I forgot to trim another sliver of the bottom.  Oh well, it's going to my brother for his birthday and he probably won't notice.

Thanks so much for Looking!
Karen

Festive Ho Ho Ho

 

 

I'm lucky enough to be heading to Hawaii in 4 weeks time.  We get home Dec 21st, so I pretty much have to get everything ready and done before we leave!  So, with that desperation in mind, I have a super quick CAS tag today that is bright and festive.  

Challenges:

CASology  where the Cue Card is Festive.

Addicted to CAS where the Code Word is Tag.

ETA - Happy to have an Honorable Mention for my tag on CASology! 

Supplies:

Stamps - PTI

Ink - distress

die - Paper Smooches

Thanks so much for Looking!

Karen