Friday, December 31, 2010

Bloggers Challenge 184

I almost missed Bloggers Challenge this week. I completely lost track of time. This weeks challenge is reuse/recycle.  Since I didn't realize that it was already Thursday, I had given no thought to what I was going to do. In fact, I was sitting at my table replacing calendar pages in my yearly wall calendar. I almost threw away the old pages (shame on me) when it hit me (twice) that it was challenge time and that I needed to recycle something. That's how the background of this card came about. I adhered the old pages collage style to a piece of cardstock and sprayed with glimmer mists.  I then distressed the edges and put Vintage Photo distress ink on the rough edges. I die cut the label from grungepaper using my Vagabond (tsk tsk, showing off) and painted with antique linen crackle paint. I highlighted the cracks with walnut stain. The numbers came from a grungeboard pack. I painted them with liquid pearls. The sentiment was printed on my label maker. I love it when everything comes together.

Finally...don't forget to mark your calendars and plan to join members of the Kitchen Sink Crew as they welcome you to the Grand Opening of the KSS Forum/Gallery this Friday, New Year’s Eve. The KSS Crew will be in the forums from Noon to Midnight EST, there will be plenty of fun Challenges, Games, Prizes, and Giveaways - Hope to see you there!!! Check HERE for location information. I'm very excited about this event. I've been asked to be a Guest Designer at Kitchen Sink Stamps for the month of January. Check back on my blog on Monday for my first posting.




 

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Kitchen Sink Stamps Crew Challenge 30-2


Artwork by Maria Colosimo
I have discovered the cure for the common cold. Well, maybe not the cure, but it sure made me feel better this evening. I went down to my studio and stamped. Tonight is the last hour to enter the Kitchen Sink Crew challenge. The challenge is to CASE one of the crew member's work. Today I chose to CASE a card that Maria did back on September 13th. I wanted to do something non-Christmas and I loved the look of this simple, but elegant card. The ivy stamp set is such a pretty one. My one concern on these CASE cards is that I am totally ribbon challenged. I have two drawers of ribbon, but I can never find what I need, so I had to improvise.
I have a stack of other cards I wanted to CASE, but I think that this will have to be it for this challenge.

Color recipe: (All inks used are Adirondack)
Ivy --  2 lettuce, 3 meadow, 4 bottle, 1 willow

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Kitchen Sink Stamps Crew Challenge 30


Artwork by Lisa Somerville
This month's Crew Challenge at Kitchen Sink Stamps is to CASE a card done by one of the KSS Crew members. I chose to CASE a card by Lisa Somerville. I remember when Lisa first posted this card. I thought it was really cute and thought about casing the idea back then. The main images are from Build a Garland and the sentiment is from Christmas Lights. I learned something very important today about doing a CASE. It's not as easy as you would think, especially when you choose a card done by one of the best.
My Color recipes: (All inks used are Adirondack)
Pine branch -- 1 Willow, 2 lettuce, 3 meadow 4 bottle
Gingerbread Man -- 1 hazelnut, 2 ginger, 3 espresso
Cranberries -- 1 watermelon, 2 cranberry, 3 raisin
Popcorn -- 1 sandal, 2 lemonade, 3 sunshine yellow, 4 caramel

Monday, December 27, 2010

Tag time Part 2


Tag 7

Tag 8

Tag 9

Tag 10

Tag 11

Tag 12






















It's Boxing Day and I'm excited to say that I have completed the 12 Tags of Christmas. (Oops, midnight just chimed so this post will actually publish on the 27th) No, I didn't quite keep up, but I thinks it's an accomplishment to have done them all. I've learned a lot and remembered even more of the things I've already learned. It's been a very busy, but happy season.
I have a few more things to do to finish off this year. Hopefully I can start early on my New Year's resolution. I want to get my studio into some semblance of order so that I can have play dates over for fun and stamping. Right now it is only somewhat usable for me, and then I have to use space very creatively. This week is a good week to start since many of the challenges are taking a holiday break.
Wish me luck!

Friday, December 24, 2010

Alice in Winter Wonderland

I missed the last two weeks Oh Alice challenges and I really missed them. This week I wanted to participate. I made it within minutes of the close of the challenge, but here I am. This week's challenge is winter wonderland. I chose to use the pine trees and sentiment from Artistic Outpost's Sleigh Ride.  Alice is from Oxford Impressions. The window is a die cut from Heartfelt Creations cut out using my new Vagabond. (oops, I had to get that in). The background colors are done using the pulled glimmers technique from TJ. The snow is highlighted using a Viva Pearl Pen. This was a fun card to put together. Alice is in a winter wonderland.

Bloggers Challenge 183

Merry Christmas everyone. This weeks Bloggers Challenge is Christmas. I made this card for a special friend of mine. It was created in the style of Tim Holtz using stamps from Tim, background paper from his paper stack covered with a distress ink smoosh. The whole card is covered with rock candy distress sticlkes so it really sparkles.  Hope everyone has a happy holiday!

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Stampotique Challenge

The challenge at Stampotique was to use die cuts or punches. Old Santa is stamped using an Artistic Outpost stamp from Snowy Woods, one of my all time favorite stamp sets. The focal image was diecut using a Spellbinders die. The holly leaves surrounding the image were punched using the Martha Stewart holly berry punch. The background paper is from Club Scrap.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 24 Rock Candy Distress Stickles

 This Compendium of Curiosities challenge was the Rock Candy Distress Stickles technique from p. 47 of Tim's book. I absolutely love Rock Candy Distress Stickles. I'm on my third bottle (and stickles go a long way). I decided that for my collage background I would use papers from the seasonal paper stack (and a little from Vintage Shabby) The background distress color is Victorian Velvet and the edges are trimmed with Aged Mahogany and Walnut Stain. I used a favorite Santa image from Tim's line. I hope Santa has an easy and safe trip.

Friday, December 17, 2010

Bloggers Challenge 182



This week the Bloggers Challenge was a sketch challenge. (Lisa, this was a cool sketch.) I kind of started backwards with this one. I had this background paper which I really wanted to use. Even though it has a distressed look, it also has sparkle. Besides I like deer. For my image I chose this wintery scene from Heartfelt Creations. I thought it was the kind of place you might find the deer wandering about. Since I'm still working on Christmas, I thought the jingle bell punches worked well, and of course, the sentiment is definitely Christmas. I can't wait to see how the other group members interpreted this scene.
I came very close to not being able to play today. My Internet was down for about 24 hours. Six of those hours I spent on the phone trying to get it back up and running. Fortunately, as you can see, it was successful...draining, but successful.

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

12 Tags of Christmas 2010 -- Tags 1 thru 5

Tag 1
Tag 2
Tag 3
Tag 4

Tag 5

For the last several years, Tim Holtz has shared with us his 12 Tags of Christmas. It's an exciting and challenging time. Last year I pretty much kept up. This year Tim has finished Tag 12, but I haven't. I'm really enjoying the tags, but I'm a bit time challenged. I've finished the first five tags so far. If you've been following the tags, you'll notice that I have tried to keep very close to the actual tag created by Tim. I try to treat this activity as if I were sitting in a class with Tim. I follow his examples and instructions fairly closely. I figure that if I learn or review the technique by following Tim, I can branch out on my own whenever I choose. I'm enjoying making the tags. By being so far behind, I can savor the activity so much longer.

Monday, December 13, 2010

Ornaments


I have to thank my friend Lisa for the inspiration for these ornaments. I had seen one she made and loved it. When I saw the porcelain ornaments at Michaels, I just knew I had to try my hand at decorating them. All of the stamp images are from Heartfelt Creations. I stamped the images on the ornaments with black Staz-on ink. I used my Creative Inspirations paints for the color. The shimmery paint is perfect for Christmas decorations. The finishing touch was to paint the sides with antique gold paint. They have the look of vintage porcelain ornaments. My daughter and grandson put up the tree last night. I'm off now to add these ornaments to the tree.

Friday, December 10, 2010

Bloggers Challenge 181 -- Birthday

Today's Bloggers Challenge comes right on time. Yesterday was my Dad's 90th birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DAD! We are having a big family celebration on Sunday. I thought this was a perfect sentiment for Dad since he may be 90 in years, but in body, mind and spirit he is considerably younger.
My card is simple. The background is Shimmersheetz embossed using the numbers folder. The numbers are highlighted with blue Stazon. The sentiment is computer generated and die cut with a Spellbinders label die.

Friday, December 3, 2010

Off With Their Heads




"Off With Their Heads" is the challenge at Oh Alice this week. It's a crazy and fun challenge where the challenge is to alter your stamps and mix it up a little by giving them a new head or body. It took me a little thinking for this one, but suddenly the lightbulb went on. I thought about the kids books where the pages are divided and when you flip the top or bottom part of the page different heads are matched with different bodies. The characters on this project are the white rabbit (top photo), the caterpillar, the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire cat, the Red Queen, and the frog messenger. Depending upon which page is flipped, you might get the Mad Hatter's head on the frog messenger's body or the Cheshire Cat's head on the caterpillar's body or the Red Queen's head on the White Rabbit's body. You get the picture. There are 36 possibilities, so I'll stop here.

Red and White Ornament Card



The challenge at Bloggers Challenge was ornaments. I guess this may be a bit of a stretch, but I used an ornament as the focal image on a card. It is a swing card and the ornament does hang on the card. It's fun to twist the ornament around several times and watch a person's expression as he/she opens the card and the ornament spins around. The color choice was based on the Play Date Cafe color challenge of red and white. I wish you could see the paper in person. The red ornament is made from very shiny metallic cardstock. The white is paper I received from Paper Temptress. It is absolutely luscious. The base card is some red shimmery cardstock I had in my stash.
This card also fits the Created By Hand challenge. The theme is Christmas countdown. To me the hanging of Christmas decorations definitely denotes the countdown to Christmas.


Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Try That Technique--Marker Watercolor

I made this atc using the Marker Watercoloring technique from the June/July Technique Junkies newsletter. This was the Try That Technique challenge for the week. I must admit that I have never actually created anything with this technique. I tried a couple of times, but didn't like what I did...perhaps I should have used watercolor paper then like the technique calls for. It does work. I used Old Santa from the Artistic Outpost Snowy Woods sheet. Along the side is a strip of tissue tape from Tim Holtz products. The sentiment is highlighted using a Tim Holtz fragment. I may be getting into the spirit of Christmas finally.